Latest / Pod Save America / “Justice for George Floyd.”

Transcript

“Justice for George Floyd.” · Pod Save America

• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America, I'm Jon Favreau.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: I'm Jon Lovett. I'm Tommy Vitor.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: On today's pod, we have Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: and our friend DeRay McKesson to talk about the nationwide
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: protests against police brutality and what can be done to
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: actually change the system. We'll also talk about how Donald
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: Trump and Joe Biden are responding to the crisis. Quick
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: note before we begin, please go adopt a swing state
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: if you haven't already. It's one of the best and
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: most effective ways to make a difference in the 2020 election,
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: even if we're stuck at home. Go to votesaveamerica.com slash adopt,
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: pick a state, And the first call to action you'll
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: get is an ask to sign up for a digital
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: organizing training session on Thursday, hosted by our partners at
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: Organizing Together 2020, featuring Tommy Vitor himself. So check that out.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: All right, let's get to the news. We are now
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: a week into a series of massive nationwide protests against
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: police brutality and systemic racism. That began when George Floyd
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: was killed after Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin kneeled on
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: his neck for eight minutes while three other officers stood
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: by and did nothing, even as Floyd repeatedly said he
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: couldn't breathe and cried out for help. On Friday, Chauvin
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: was charged with third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter. The three
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: other officers have yet to be charged. Minnesota Attorney General
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: Keith Ellison is now in charge of the case. Over
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: the weekend, protests spread to over 140 cities. And while
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: all of them started peacefully, many have not ended that way.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: As the New York Times reports, quote, And while the
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: overwhelming majority of protesters have been peaceful, There have also
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: been a small number of anarchists, right-wing extremists, and other
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: individuals who've looted stores, destroyed property, set fires, and provoked violence,
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: leading to the mobilization of the National Guard in 24
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: states and more than two dozen curfews, something on a
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: scale we haven't seen since Dr. Martin Luther King was
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: assassinated in 1968. Guys, I want to stop there and
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: get your reactions to the protests, to the police, and
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: to the chaos, both what you've seen and read from
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: around the country and what we have seen right here
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: in Los Angeles over the weekend. Let's start with the
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: peaceful protests themselves. Lovett, what's your reaction?
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: My general reaction to all of it is there's nothing
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: about the violent parts of this, the chaotic parts of this,
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: the destructive parts of this that detracts from the moral probity,
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: the righteousness of the overall cause. And simply because fires
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: look better on television, they are given equal billing. But
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: it's worth remembering that, you know, yes, in some sense,
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: these are protests that descended into something else. But in
• 3:16
  Speaker 3: a larger and I think more important sense, there was
• 3:19
  Speaker 3: a massive protest across the country. And then this other
• 3:22
  Speaker 3: part of it that's being tied to it, because that's
• 3:25
  Speaker 3: how everything is covered in our politics. Everything is sort of,
• 3:29
  Speaker 3: everything is seen through a political lens. And, you know,
• 3:31
  Speaker 3: you see on both, you see efforts to try to
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: tar the protests themselves because of what happened after.
• 3:36
  Speaker 4: That's all.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: Tommy, what's your reaction?
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: So look, you know, I'm excited to hear your interview
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: with the mayor. I'm excited to talk to DeRay because
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: I feel like I need to do more work on
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: figuring out like what activism is the best here, like
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: what legislation we should push for, what changes. I don't
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: feel like I have a lot of answers yet. But,
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: you know, this was an intense, emotional weekend. So like,
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: I just wanted to talk about two things that were
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: stuck in my head. And the first is a very
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: dumb story from when I was in high school. I
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: was driving with a buddy of mine, like after football practice,
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: we were going to somebody else's house and I was
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: speeding and I saw a cop going the other way.
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: And I don't know what got into my head, but
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: his sirens went on like he was going to pull
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: me over. And I thought I could like get away maybe.
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: And my car was made in 1987 and I absolutely
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: could not get away. And I was pulled over immediately.
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: And then three more cop cars pulled up. And the
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: story ends with me getting a bunch of extra violations
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: on my speeding ticket, but like not arrested and not handcuffed,
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: not roughed up. And what I did not realize then
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: that is very clear to me now is that if
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: I'm not like a white blonde kid from Dedham, Massachusetts,
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: if I'm black and I'm from Dorchester, I'm probably thrown
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: in jail and maybe kicked out of school. And like
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: my life as I know it today is unrecognizable, right?
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: So that was like one thing I just kept thinking about.
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: Another thing was how I felt on Saturday night. I
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: could see on TV video of people like destroying shops
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: and lighting fires and like literally sort of marching towards
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: where I lived. And then on my own street, like
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: outside my house, I could see people, some of the
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: same people loading stuff into a U-Haul that they had
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: parked on my street that they had stolen. And the
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: next morning, like love it, I'm sure we walked by
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: the same shops. Some of them clearly labeled like black
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: owned and a lot of them were destroyed or burned
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: or graffitied. And like you just saw these people trying
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: to pick up the pieces. And so that awareness of
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: this time in my life and that privilege and then
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: that fear I felt can feel like competing emotions, but
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: I felt them both. And then I also felt a
• 5:42
  Speaker 2: lot of anger because the video of George Floyd's murder
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: is one of the worst things I've ever seen. So
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: is the video of Ahmaud Arbery being shot, but the
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: police are supposed to protect citizens and people being abused
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: by the cops literally pay their salaries and have for years.
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: So that is why you know, people were marching and protesting.
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: And like you were saying, love it. Like, I really
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: hope the focus stays on that core issue and the
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: need to end police brutality. But what was like gutting
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: and enraging was watching the reaction by a lot of
• 6:13
  Speaker 2: those same police prove the protesters point, right? I mean,
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: like you saw police cars drive into crowds. You saw
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: journalists blinded by rubber bullets. A black CNN reporter was
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: arrested live on air. the two college kids in Atlanta
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: were terrorized. They had their windows smashed, their pepper sprayed,
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: they were tased. This brutality is happening in real time.
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: And when you hear the cries from people who feel
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: like they are treated as a threat when they are
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: marching or bird watching or voting, how can you not
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: hear that? So as scary as the violence was and
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: as scary as You know, it felt for me Saturday
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: night seeing some little fucking Antifa wannabe white kid on
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: my street with like stolen boxes and shit. You know,
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: I am more angry today about like the state sanctioned
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: brutality and escalation that we all saw and self-aware enough
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: to know that if there hadn't been protests and there
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: hadn't been all these actions, it wouldn't be on the
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: news and we probably wouldn't be talking about it today. So,
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: you know, I'm just trying to figure out like what
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: the next step is, how we stay focused. how we
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: don't let Trump do what he tried to do to
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: Colin Kaepernick, which was to make this about some made
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: up issue about supporting the troops versus police brutality. Um,
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: and then just like focus our frustration and enact, you know,
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: actions on the right things.
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I was, I was trying to think to myself why, why,
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: why George Floyd's killing was the one that sparked these
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: massive demonstrations when, um, you know, we've seen police killings
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: for years now. You know, and I was doing some
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: reading and 99% of police killings from 2014 to 2019
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: did not result in officers even being charged with, let
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: alone convicted of a crime, not even being charged, 99%
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: of police killings. And, you know, 2014 was Ferguson. And
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: I do think you have a country right now that
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: has been in so much pain. We are in the
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: middle of a pandemic, a pandemic that has disproportionately affected
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: people of color, that is disproportionately killing people of color.
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: We have a healthcare system, um, that, you know, is
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: sort of racked by disparities, uh, even before the pandemic hit.
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: We have the economic fallout from the pandemic that again
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: has fallen even more acutely on people of color, black
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: owned businesses, um, black members of our community, people of color.
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: And we have seen how many of these police killings,
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: how many of these videos now, now that we're in
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: an age of viral videos and there are protests and
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: there are, you know, there are reforms and there is
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: voting and yet it keeps happening and we don't see
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: change and it, you know, when you put all these
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: things together and when you've had all these people, when
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: you've had everyone home for months now and people sick
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: and people out of work, and then they see that video,
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: which I agree is like one of the hardest things
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: I've ever had to watch, you of course understand it.
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: You of course understand it. You wonder why it hasn't
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: happened even sooner. And I do think, Tommy, like you said,
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: like the police response to this over the weekend is,
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: has maybe proved the point of the protest better than
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: anything else that we saw. In that way, I think
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: the protests have already succeeded in showing, because look, we
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: know that, and Lovett, you were saying this, we know
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: that television, and especially local news, which I don't watch
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: a lot of local news, and I watched it this weekend,
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: and local news loves to find a fire, they love
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: to find the looting, and it was all there, the
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: fire and the looting, but I also think what broke
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: through In the media and on the news this weekend,
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: were these examples of police using aggressive force to respond
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: to these? In Louisville, a man was killed when police
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: officers and National Guard soldiers say they've returned fire after
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: someone in a large group fired at them. Tommy, I
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: think you named some of these, but, you know, in
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: New York City, a police car drove into a crowd.
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: Police officers threw a woman to the ground so forcefully
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: she had a seizure. A child was sprayed with mace
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: in Seattle. You mentioned what happened to Atlanta to those
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: two college students who were tased. And then especially, you know,
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: I think to wake up the press and other people, unfortunately,
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: has to come to this. How many journalists were hit
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: with rubber bullets, sprayed with mace, arrested even after identifying
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: themselves as members of the press?
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: And targeted, specifically targeted.
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: Specifically targeted.
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: Shot at with rubber bullets.
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: And, you know, what went through my mind watching all
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: this was like the police know that. phone cameras are
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: everywhere these days. They know that there are body cameras, right?
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: Some of them are wearing body cameras and they're doing
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: this anyway. Like, what does that say to you guys?
• 11:31
  Speaker 3: You know, I've seen all that footage, the cop turning
• 11:34
  Speaker 3: the rubber bullets on to the journalist, journalist being arrested,
• 11:37
  Speaker 3: all of this. And what you actually, to me, what
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: I see is this militarized police presence. You know, these
• 11:44
  Speaker 3: guys are in, you know, in helmets and riot gear.
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: Their faces are covered And I do think that that contributes. And,
• 11:52
  Speaker 3: you know, rubber bullets are dangerous. And they are, you know,
• 11:59
  Speaker 3: we have these two things happening. You know, the move
• 12:03
  Speaker 3: towards these non-lethal technologies, rubber bullets and other forms of technology,
• 12:09
  Speaker 3: on top of the militarization of the police, which has
• 12:12
  Speaker 3: seen police kind of build out these armored vehicles, these incredibly...
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: sort of these militaristic rigs that they kind of go
• 12:24
  Speaker 3: around the cities with. And all of it, I think,
• 12:27
  Speaker 3: contributes not only to the dehumanization of the citizens they're
• 12:32
  Speaker 3: sworn to protect, but also to their own dehumanization. They
• 12:35
  Speaker 3: are part of this organization. They are part of the machine.
• 12:39
  Speaker 3: There's an impunity that comes with standing in a phalanx
• 12:43
  Speaker 3: of people with a military vehicle behind you, your face
• 12:46
  Speaker 3: completely covered. in a line of people. So, you know,
• 12:51
  Speaker 3: beyond just the need to make sure police officers individually
• 12:54
  Speaker 3: are held accountable, there's the need to demilitarize the police.
• 12:58
  Speaker 3: There's a need to look at not just the use
• 13:00
  Speaker 3: of deadly force, but the use of these intermediate weapons,
• 13:06
  Speaker 3: whether it's rubber bullets, pepper spray, mace, tear gas.
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: There's a.
• 13:12
  Speaker 3: Need to look at what's going to happen in the
• 13:13
  Speaker 3: next few months as budgets across the country are slashed dramatically.
• 13:19
  Speaker 3: Los Angeles is about to go through an incredible period
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: of budget cuts because of the pandemic and the economic crisis.
• 13:26
  Speaker 3: So are cities across the country. And the question is, well,
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: where is the limited amount of money going to go?
• 13:30
  Speaker 3: Is it going to continue to go to reinforce this
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: militarized police force, this militarized version of law enforcement that
• 13:39
  Speaker 3: we've seen take hold across the country? Or is it
• 13:41
  Speaker 3: going to go to schools? Is it going to go
• 13:43
  Speaker 3: to people in need? Is it going to go to
• 13:44
  Speaker 3: social services? So To me, that is the next place
• 13:47
  Speaker 3: this conversation goes. And, you know, one aspect of this is,
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: you know, Republicans have been gleefully pointing out all weekend
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: that these are Democratic-controlled states and Democratic-controlled cities and Democratic-controlled
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: city councils and Democratic mayors. And looking at the ways
• 14:02
  Speaker 3: in which the police have not been reflecting the Democratic
• 14:05
  Speaker 3: values of the cities that they govern, that they actually
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: don't reflect the will of the people in those cities
• 14:10
  Speaker 3: because of the power of police unions, because of inertia,
• 14:13
  Speaker 3: because of political fear. on the part of politicians, is all,
• 14:16
  Speaker 3: I think, the next part of the conversation.
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: I will say also, sort of looking around the country
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: at some of the different reports, it doesn't have to
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: be this way, right, when there are protests. The police
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: don't have to be responding with this kind of aggressive
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: force because, you know, they'll say, oh, well, there's protests
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: and there's violence and, you know, you don't know how
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: to handle it and so it's tough to control a
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: crowd and there's different things you have to balance. But
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: in places where there has been reform of police departments
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: where there are more diverse police departments, where there is
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: a history of better relations between the police and the community.
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: You saw peaceful protests that didn't necessarily devolve into some
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: of this aggression. You saw this in Newark. There were
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: officers taking a knee in certain places. There were officers
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: holding a sign that said, end police brutality. I think
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: one of the best examples over the weekend and And
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: Mayor Bottoms pointed this out during her press conference in Atlanta.
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: Atlanta Police Chief Erica Shields actually went outside and just
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: talked to the protesters in the crowd for a while,
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: actually saying at one point, we agree with you, it's
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: fucked up and nothing changes. And that is not to say, oh, well,
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: it's not all cops. There are some good cops, too.
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: It's to say that It's possible to get police officers
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: to change. And it's not individual change. It's systemic change
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: and it's reform. But these protests that you're seeing over
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: the weekend, that we've seen over the weekend, that we're
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: seeing right now, can have a difference. They can bring
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: about reform. You can have a police department with enough reform,
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: with enough pressure, with enough protests, with enough change that
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: will actually protect and serve people and not act like
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: basically what we're seeing the majority of police departments in
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: this country acting like right now. It's possible. And I
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: just think, you know, I mean, that was it. And look, and,
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: you know, I already spoke with the mayor, but she
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: said something that was striking to me, which, you know,
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: we talked about the two officers that got fired in Atlanta.
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: And she said, I have to be honest, before this weekend,
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: if that had happened, I might not have been involved
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: and they might not have been fired. I might not
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: have checked those body cameras six or seven times because
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: I saw everything, you know, because of these protests is
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: why we acted. And I'm just like, I'm glad I did.
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: And they were fired. But these do have the effect
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: of bringing about change or they can at least.
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: I do think it is telling that these sort of
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: moments of humanity and conversation among police and protesters were
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: seen by people and lifted up because they felt unusual.
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: And then when you think about the George Floyd murder,
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: that's not even the first time that we've seen such
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: a video come out of Minnesota. Philando Castile was murdered
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: by a Minnesota cop. It wasn't the first video showing
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: someone being choked to death. That was Eric Garner. And
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: I think like the regularity of this kind of just
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: like horrifying like snuff film that just gets thrown to
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: social media all the time. Is part of the cumulative
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: effect that led to these protests over the weekend. I mean,
• 17:31
  Speaker 2: it's it's particularly searing and scarring for people in Los
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: Angeles who were here in 1992 who have just vivid
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: memories of the way that the city was torn apart.
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: And so, you know, it's yeah, it was it was
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: a hard weekend.
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: Last thing I want to talk about before we get
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: to Trump and Biden is how every day of these
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: protests has devolved into chaos. Buildings and cop cars have
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: been set on fire. Stores have been looted and destroyed,
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: especially a lot of black and Latino and immigrant owned
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: small businesses. We especially saw that here in Los Angeles
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: and downtown LA. What do we know and not know
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: about who's responsible for the chaos side of this? Because
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: I think this has been very difficult to untangle over
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: the weekend.
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: I mean, listen, I, I'm really like hesitant to say
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: a lot about this because I just genuinely think we
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: don't know. There was a ton of inaccurate data right
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: out of Minnesota. Like, oh, every arrest has been from
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: out of state. It turns out that was total bullshit.
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: The vast majority of arrests were in state. I think
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: it's foolish to say, oh, this is outside agitator because
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: I think in some ways that can undercut the real
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: anger and frustration of people who are on the streets
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: and maybe weren't part of the violence but can understand it,
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: you know? And so like, look, I understand people saying,
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: please don't burn down. Please don't destroy things in part
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: of our own community. I do think that focusing on
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: that part of it versus the underlying systemic problem is
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: not the right focus. I want to be focused on
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: the issue of police brutality.
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: So I think it is incredibly hard to figure out
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: sort of who's responsible and who's not. We don't have
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: enough reporting yet. I think it is incredibly annoying for
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: protesters to continue to be asked about the violence when
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: the focus should be on the protests. I think the
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: reason that we're talking about it is in a political context,
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: because this is how Donald Trump and the right are
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: already coming at this. And so we should talk about
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: how Trump's responding. He has basically reacted to the crisis
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: exactly as how you'd expect him to, hiding in the
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: White House and tweeting crazy shit. On Thursday, the president
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: effectively called for violence against the protesters in Minneapolis, tweeting, quote,
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: these thugs are dishonoring the memory of George Floyd, and
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: I won't let that happen. Just spoke to Governor Tim
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: Walz and told him the military is with him all
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: the way. Any difficulty and we will assume control. But
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: when the looting starts... the shooting starts. Thank you, exclamation point.
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: Thank you is a real nice touch at the end
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: of that. Trump tried to walk back the comments a
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: little on Thursday, following up with the tweet explaining that
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: his comment, quote, was spoken as a fact, not as
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: a statement. Doesn't mean anything. Aside from a few other
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: crazy tweets, the president has said nothing over the weekend
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: because according to the Washington Post, quote, Trump and some
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: of his advisors calculated that he should not speak to
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: the nation because he had nothing to say no tangible
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: policy or action to announce, nor did he feel an
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: urgent motivation to try to bring people together, so he
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: let his tweets speak for themselves. Tommy, why do you
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: think he tried to walk back the when the looting starts,
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: shooting starts tweet, which was horrendous, but usually he doesn't
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: walk back his horrendous tweets?
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, look, it sounds like from some of
• 21:02
  Speaker 2: the reporting that he actually genuinely scared even some of
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: his closest supporters. with that kind of language. It was
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: so alarmist. It was so clearly throwing gasoline on the
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: fire that people like Lindsey Graham were on the Sunday
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: shows criticizing him for the first time in years. But
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: I just think the problem is Trump is in favor
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: of police brutality because he did a call today with
• 21:29
  Speaker 2: a bunch of governors where he told them, you have
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: to dominate. They're going to run over you. You're going
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: to look like a bunch of jerks. You have to dominate.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: Those are quotes.
• 21:36
  Speaker 5: Right?
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: And then he tried to get them to focus on
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: fucking flag burning. So he's trying to make this about
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: anything but police brutality because he supports police brutality. Remember
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: a couple of years ago when he gave a speech
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: to a bunch of police and he literally joked with them,
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: he told them it was okay to rough up suspects.
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: He said, stop putting your hands on the top of
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: their heads when you push them in the squad car.
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: It's okay to rough them up a little bit, right?
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: Like he's in favor of all of this. So that
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: has been his primary and only message the rest of
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: the time. Like I, like we can talk about the
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: politics of it, but it is remarkable when you think
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: back to Ferguson and what Obama did in those moments
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: and how it was coverage and how much was asked
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: of Obama, how much was expected of Obama and of
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: other Democrats versus how little is expected of Donald Trump.
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: He just, he hid behind his gates in his house
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: in and shit posted and sent tweets and couldn't even
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: bring himself to address the nation.
• 22:36
  Speaker 4: So.
• 22:36
  Speaker 6: Love it.
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: What did you think? I mean, even what in Tommy's
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: saying right now, there is this sort of dichotomy and
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: how Trump's acting, right? Like on one hand, he is
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: the fucking, you know, George Wallace, bull Connor come to life, uh, in,
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: in 2020 talking about shooting and looting and stuff like that.
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: But it's all these tweets that, from inside the White
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: House where he's cloistered. He's not speaking to anyone. He's
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: not going out. He's not talking to anyone. And he
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: seems like... I think he seems smaller almost than he's
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: ever been, that at this moment of great crisis and
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: unrest in the country, the president is reduced to just
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: tweeting out sort of racist shit and attacking the protesters
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: and all that kind of stuff. It's interesting.
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, it's an optical illusion. He's the same size.
• 23:25
  Speaker 7: But the.
• 23:28
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 23:28
  Speaker 3: I mean, look, you know, there's all these impositions. You know,
• 23:32
  Speaker 3: where is the president? Where is, you know, he should
• 23:33
  Speaker 3: be speaking. I can't believe he's cloistered inside the White House,
• 23:35
  Speaker 3: not saying anything, just tweeting. And, you know, obviously that's true. Really,
• 23:39
  Speaker 3: I think what people are saying is, I wish we
• 23:41
  Speaker 3: had a president who was worthy of this moment and
• 23:43
  Speaker 3: from whom we would want to hear. I don't need
• 23:45
  Speaker 3: to hear Donald Trump address the country. And I don't
• 23:47
  Speaker 3: think anybody who's lamenting the fact that he's not speaking
• 23:50
  Speaker 3: would like that either. You know, he doesn't have the
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: tool set, right?
• 23:53
  Speaker 7: What he has.
• 23:55
  Speaker 3: What are the tools at his disposal? He can't lead.
• 23:56
  Speaker 3: He can't manage. He can't reassure. He can't assuage. He
• 24:00
  Speaker 3: can't empathize.
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: Those are not.
• 24:01
  Speaker 7: He can't inspire.
• 24:02
  Speaker 3: He doesn't have that in his arsenal. So he can distract.
• 24:05
  Speaker 3: He can tweet. He can incite. He can blame. That's
• 24:08
  Speaker 3: what he's doing now with the governors. And of course,
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: I saw instantly coverage. I happened to have had CNN
• 24:16
  Speaker 3: as the news of the call was coming in. And
• 24:18
  Speaker 3: the call was covered straight, right? Something along the lines of,
• 24:22
  Speaker 3: You know, Donald Trump took a heavy hand with governors
• 24:24
  Speaker 3: urging law and order, calling on them to be tough.
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: And even in that language, it's a concession to Trump.
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: They don't work for him.
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: Governors don't work for Donald Trump. He's just looking for
• 24:34
  Speaker 3: somebody to blame and looking for someone to yell at
• 24:36
  Speaker 3: because he's scared and alone in his house.
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: Just like the pandemic.
• 24:40
  Speaker 3: Just like the pandemic. Just like the pandemic.
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: The same thing he did then.
• 24:43
  Speaker 3: And, you know, in the absence of a human being
• 24:46
  Speaker 3: in that job with any capacity to to meet this moment,
• 24:50
  Speaker 3: whether about the economic depression he caused or the pandemic
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: he failed to contain or the protests in our cities,
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: which he has, you know, in terms of policy only
• 25:00
  Speaker 3: sought to make worse. There's nothing he can say. There's
• 25:03
  Speaker 3: nothing he can do.
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: Well, I mean, so we have no idea. We should
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: start by saying how the politics of this will unfold,
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: of course. But you can tell that, you know, the
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: Trump team has... sort of a narrative in mind here.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: And we've seen it sort of unfold over the last
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: couple of days. They are very big on this is
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: all outside agitators, Antifa. You know, Trump tried to declare
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: Antifa a terrorist organization, which is a problem because Antifa
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: isn't an organization. And and you can't really do that.
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: But what they're trying to say, you know, he's trying
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: to have it both ways because, of course, he's trying
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: to he thinks his path to victory is either winning
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: a higher percentage of the black vote. Good luck. Or
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: at least trying to make sure that some segment of
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: black voters stay home and don't vote for Joe Biden.
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: And so what he wants to say is the protesters
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: are fine. You know, you know, honor George Floyd's memory.
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: But these are all radical left Antifa people destroying our
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: cities and everything is out of control. And these governors
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: are letting it happen and you have to be tough.
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: And they are betting that, you know, the longer that
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: we see images on our television screens of fires and looting,
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: that more people around the country will say, yeah, I
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: don't like that. And maybe Donald Trump's right about this.
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: What do we think? Tommy, what do you think about
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: sort of like the political strategy that Trump is betting
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: on here?
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, you can tell that they're divided even
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: inside the White House. And like, look, on a personal level,
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: like I am very worried about him tweeting or going
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: out and giving a speech and pouring gas on the fire.
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: But it's also like no consolation that we have no
• 26:56
  Speaker 2: president and no one is in charge and no one
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: is doing anything. And so you're also seeing Republicans, including
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: White House aides, say they're worried about Trump's tone. And
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: of course, they're doing it on backgrounds, the New York Times,
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: like they usually do because they're cowards. But then you
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: also see one White House aide telling the New York
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: Times that they think that images of destruction could be
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: helpful to Trump because he's going to focus on a
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: law and order message. And so I've read a lot
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: recently about Nixon in the 60s and the backlash to
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: the civil rights movement and the Watts riots and how
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: Nixon twisted those events and channeled that racism for political
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: advantage and pulled all these white voters since the Republican Party.
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: I think trying to draw, like predict the future from
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: that history is very difficult for a million reasons. But
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: one key difference here is that Trump is currently in charge, right?
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: Like he is leading us in this time of absolute chaos,
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: which comes on top of a pandemic response that is
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: literally the worst in the world. And like we were
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: saying earlier, he does not look in charge. He looks small.
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: He looks scared. And he looks vicious and nasty. And
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: all the things people hate about him, even Trump supporters,
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: are playing out publicly through these tweets. And so, yes,
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: am I worried about Donald Trump cynically using racism for
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: political advantage?
• 28:21
  Speaker 7: Absolutely.
• 28:23
  Speaker 2: I'm worried about everything. But it didn't work in 2018, right?
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: The caravan threats didn't, you know, do what he wanted
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: them to do. And I do think people are exhausted
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: by his divisiveness. And I hope, I hope and pray
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: that they will look for something else in this moment.
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: Lovett, what do you think?
• 28:41
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I feel like there's two things. There's
• 28:42
  Speaker 3: the politics and there's the actual policy. I think, you know,
• 28:46
  Speaker 3: Trump sees clearly, even in just walking back his looting,
• 28:50
  Speaker 3: shooting rhyme, there's evidence, right, even to Trump that what
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: he's doing is a bit more nuanced. It's a little
• 28:58
  Speaker 3: bit more complicated than he'd like it to be. What
• 28:59
  Speaker 3: he'd like to do is just fucking go after the protesters,
• 29:03
  Speaker 3: attack the protesters, declare war on the protesters. He knows that.
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: There's some- In his heart, that's where his heart is.
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: That's what he wants, right? That's what's in his heart,
• 29:09
  Speaker 3: but he knows he can't do it. So he thinks
• 29:11
  Speaker 3: that Antifa is somebody that's- That's a second term move.
• 29:13
  Speaker 3: Antifa doesn't have enough friends.
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: Right, right.
• 29:16
  Speaker 3: So he knows, right, exactly.
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: That is exactly what he would be doing in a
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: second term right now.
• 29:19
  Speaker 3: Right, but he knows that Antifa is less, has fewer
• 29:23
  Speaker 3: friends and has fewer supporters and is more controversial and
• 29:27
  Speaker 3: is less, you know, less righteous. And so, you know,
• 29:31
  Speaker 3: to me, it's about focusing on Antifa because he thinks
• 29:33
  Speaker 3: politically that's more advantageous. But I also think there's danger
• 29:36
  Speaker 3: in that too, because, you know, the end result of
• 29:40
  Speaker 3: Donald Trump saying we're going to crack down on Antifa,
• 29:42
  Speaker 3: you know, is that it will end up being a
• 29:44
  Speaker 3: crackdown on the black community, on the protesters, on people
• 29:47
  Speaker 3: who have nothing to do with Antifa, right? And he
• 29:49
  Speaker 3: doesn't care about that. That's a good goal for him.
• 29:51
  Speaker 3: So just worth remembering that, you know, Tommy made this
• 29:53
  Speaker 3: point earlier. We've talked about this, right? There's this effort
• 29:56
  Speaker 3: to kind of sort the blame for the violent aspects
• 29:59
  Speaker 3: of what followed the protests. And it's worth remembering that
• 30:01
  Speaker 3: no matter what the explanation is, when we're focused on
• 30:03
  Speaker 3: the violent aspects and not the process itself, it is
• 30:06
  Speaker 3: an opportunity for the people that want to use that
• 30:09
  Speaker 3: violence as a means to paint with a broad brush
• 30:12
  Speaker 3: the entire movement. And that will be true whether you're
• 30:14
  Speaker 3: blaming Antifa, blaming opportunists who just joined in the protest
• 30:18
  Speaker 3: to loot, blaming the protest itself. It ultimately is about
• 30:21
  Speaker 3: making sure that the focus is on chaos and violence
• 30:23
  Speaker 3: and not systemic reform. because that's what Trump wants to
• 30:27
  Speaker 3: talk about.
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: Well, and again, back to the 1968, the Nixon comparisons,
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: this was tried before, right? This is the same playbook
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: that has been run before in the 60s, right down
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: to the outside agitators. And they were communists, not Antifa
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: at the time. And Nixon was screaming law and order.
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: And they wanted to use the scenes of chaos to
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: their political advantage. And It is one of the reasons
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: that Martin Luther King and the civil rights movement preached
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: nonviolence and made it sort of the central message of
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: the movement, peace and nonviolence and justice, because they knew
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: that they were going to that that that was going
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: to be Nixon's strategy, that that was going to be
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: the strategy of sort of racists all across America. And
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: it required tremendous discipline. to have that message and tremendous
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: discipline to not exert, you know, to make sure that
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: you are nonviolent. And so it is, you're right, like
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: they are going to try as hard as they can
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: to make it about everything than what this is really about,
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: which is police brutality and systemic racism and how to
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: change it. And I do think from our side, whether
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: it's Democrats or activists in the street, focusing on that
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: message and getting it through over and over again and
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: not letting yourself get distracted is probably the most important thing.
• 31:53
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: Just two quick things. I mean, to your point, like
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: the really, the really awful reality of the, of history
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: in this country is as, uh, unbelievable and admirable, uh,
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: and brave it was for those people to preach nonviolence,
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: the violence inflicted upon people like Martin Luther King and
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: and other freedom riders and activists was what woke up
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: the nation and shocked the conscience of a lot of
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: people who ultimately came around to supporting civil rights legislation.
• 32:22
  Speaker 2: So in that way, violence has a very central part
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: of that history. But John, I just want to point
• 32:30
  Speaker 2: out one thing you said earlier. You correctly noted that
• 32:32
  Speaker 2: Antifa isn't an organization. And Trump tweeting that he's going
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: to label them a terrorist group, just so people know,
• 32:39
  Speaker 2: the State Department designates organizations, foreign terrorist groups, and then
• 32:46
  Speaker 2: they use a bunch of tools to like choke off
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: money to them, right? It's like all these material support
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: statutes they use to prevent you from sending cash to Hamas.
• 32:55
  Speaker 2: Like him trying to apply that set of tools to Antifa,
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: which is not an organization, which is seemingly maybe like
• 33:03
  Speaker 2: a bunch of people in the US is just so
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: unbelievably idiotic. And I think speaks to how much he
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: is flailing and has no policy proposal but has actually
• 33:11
  Speaker 2: walked back a bunch of really important things Obama did
• 33:14
  Speaker 2: to try to address some of these policing disparities since
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: he took office.
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about Joe Biden's response. On Friday, he spoke
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: to George Floyd's family. On Saturday, he released a statement
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: supporting the protests. On Sunday, he left his house for
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: the second time since the pandemic began to visit the
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: site of the protests in Wilmington, Delaware, and spoke with
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: some of the protesters. And today, Monday, he met with
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: community leaders at a black church in Wilmington. He also
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: had this to say in a video from over the weekend.
• 33:42
  Speaker 6: It's time for us to take a hard look at
• 33:44
  Speaker 6: the uncomfortable truths. It's time for us to face that
• 33:49
  Speaker 6: deep open wound we have in this nation. We need
• 33:53
  Speaker 6: justice for George Floyd. We need real police reform that
• 33:58
  Speaker 6: hold cops to a higher standard that so many of
• 34:01
  Speaker 6: them actually meet. That holds bad cops accountable. that repairs
• 34:06
  Speaker 6: relationship between law enforcement and the community they're.
• 34:10
  Speaker 7: Sworn to protect.
• 34:11
  Speaker 6: We need to stand up as a nation with the
• 34:14
  Speaker 6: black community, with all minority communities, and come together as
• 34:18
  Speaker 6: one America.
• 34:19
  Speaker 7: That's the challenge we face.
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: Lovett, what did you think of Biden's comments and appearances
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: since the protests have began?
• 34:26
  Speaker 3: I think the truth is Biden being out there and
• 34:29
  Speaker 3: saying things that are empathetic, that shows that he's listening,
• 34:33
  Speaker 3: that he's paying attention, that he's learning, that he's seeking
• 34:37
  Speaker 3: to put forward a set of policies that actually speak
• 34:39
  Speaker 3: to the scale of the crisis, or at least is
• 34:42
  Speaker 3: open to doing so, and is going to listen and
• 34:45
  Speaker 3: be a president whose door is open, does a lot
• 34:48
  Speaker 3: of what he has to do to show a contrast
• 34:50
  Speaker 3: to Donald Trump and his absence, or worse than absence,
• 34:53
  Speaker 3: his contribution to the chaos and to the kind of
• 34:57
  Speaker 3: the fever pitch of this moment.
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Tommy, Astead Herndon had a great piece in the
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: New York Times over the weekend where he spoke to
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: a who argued that Biden's original campaign pitch of a
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: return to normalcy isn't right for this moment. I think
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: that's fairly obvious to everyone now. Reverend Jesse Jackson said,
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: our needs aren't moderate. The absence of Trump isn't enough.
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: And Stacey Abrams said this about voting in particular, quote,
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: you cannot motivate someone to a behavior that they don't
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: believe will actually bring change. How do you think Biden
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: goes about answering this sort of larger challenge?
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: I literally cut and copied and pasted that Stacey Abrams
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: quote to talk about today. The next part of her
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: sentence is, we have to start by saying what you
• 35:36
  Speaker 2: feel and what you fear is real. And I thought
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: that was a really succinct and powerful way to put it,
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: which is, you know, you can't just tell activists who
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: are so frustrated and fed up, well, hey, your job
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: is to organize and vote in November if they feel
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: like that's a return to a system that wasn't serving
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: them to begin with. So I do think Biden is
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: starting to internalize that, speak to that frustration and that
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: fear and that hurt. And like, you know, in, in
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: a way that is familiar now, like that is actually
• 36:08
  Speaker 2: his strength is being able to empathize and reach people,
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: even if he can be completely clunky, uh, with his words.
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: Sometimes I think like the humanity is in him and
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: it's decent and it has served as a stark contrast.
• 36:21
  Speaker 2: I'm glad to see that. Um, he went out to
• 36:25
  Speaker 2: the site of a protest yesterday. It sounds like this week,
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: he's really starting to get out of the house and
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: sort of like coronavirus bubble, which was very understandably keeping
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: him constrained. But, you know, I think they've done well
• 36:39
  Speaker 2: so far.
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I do too. I have to say, like, you know,
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: the media latches onto narratives and then they get lazy
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: and they keep the narrative even when it feels very old.
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: And there was a bunch of stories like is where's
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: Joe Biden in all of this? Is Joe Biden still
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: in the basement? And like Joe Biden's been out more
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: than Trump has.
• 37:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: He's been talking about it more than Trump has. He's
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: given more statements than Trump has. And now he's out
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: of his house. He was both, you know, at that, uh,
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: meeting with, um, protesters and meeting with, um, uh, with
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: leaders in a black church today. And so I think,
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: you know, step one, he, uh, you know, he can,
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: he can check that box. He is showing empathy. He
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: is out there. I think, um, sort of the next
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: step is going to be, will he sort of detail,
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: and I know he already has, you know, he has
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: sort of an agenda and he has criminal justice reform policies,
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: but part of these unity task forces that he's put
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: together with Bernie's campaign folks is about sort of figuring
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: out what new policies they can come out with on
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: a number of topics in criminal justice reform and police
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: reform are one of those topics. And so I think
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: that's going to be the next step. Let's see sort
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: of what he comes out with, possibly even this week
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: when it comes to police reform and do those reforms
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: sort of meet the moment. But I do think on
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: just being the president we need right now, being a
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: leader who can heal and empathize and attempt to try
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: to bring the country together while also recognizing sort of
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: the deep and systemic injustice and racism that exists. I
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: think he's done a really great job of that.
• 38:18
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 38:19
  Speaker 2: And he has a detailed policy plan on his website
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: that people should check out if they want to get
• 38:24
  Speaker 2: into more specifics. It's for the African-American community in this country.
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: It's interesting. I mean, like there's an older school approach
• 38:30
  Speaker 2: to politics where someone like Joe Biden might form a
• 38:33
  Speaker 2: plan like that. And it's like a bunch of tax
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: credits and other things that sort of lift all boats,
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: but would disproportionately help the African-American community because, you know,
• 38:43
  Speaker 2: for a variety of reasons. I think that it's good
• 38:45
  Speaker 2: that he made a plan that is a little more
• 38:47
  Speaker 2: specifically tailored to To that pain, like into the needs
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: of people in the black community and things that he's hearing.
• 38:53
  Speaker 2: So I don't know. I did think that that was
• 38:56
  Speaker 2: really worth reading and digging into.
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: To talk more about what real change in structural reform
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: would actually look like. We're joined by the host of
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: Pod Save the People, DeRay McKesson, who's also a co-founder
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: of Campaign Zero, a platform of research based policy solutions
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: dedicated to ending police brutality in America. DeRay, how you doing?
• 39:15
  Speaker 7: I'm good.
• 39:15
  Speaker 8: It's a lot going on. And I think people are
• 39:18
  Speaker 8: hungry for change. And the thing that's unlike 2014 is
• 39:21
  Speaker 8: that we actually just know so much more than we
• 39:23
  Speaker 8: knew before about the way the system protects police. And
• 39:26
  Speaker 8: I'm excited to figure out how we stop it.
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: Well, that's going to be my first question. In terms
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: of police brutality and police reform, what has changed and
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: what hasn't between Ferguson and Minneapolis?
• 39:40
  Speaker 8: So the thing is, is that like what people don't
• 39:42
  Speaker 8: realize that the police have actually killed more people since
• 39:44
  Speaker 8: the protests, not less, right? So because it was just
• 39:47
  Speaker 8: in the news list, people were like, oh, it got better.
• 39:48
  Speaker 8: It actually never got better. The police killed at a
• 39:51
  Speaker 8: pretty consistent rate. The only sort of top one is
• 39:54
  Speaker 8: that in cities, the police actually killed less people. So
• 39:57
  Speaker 8: in the 30 largest cities, 100 largest cities, statistically significant decrease,
• 40:01
  Speaker 8: but it's offset by an increase in rural communities and
• 40:04
  Speaker 8: suburban communities that is so great that it completely wipes
• 40:07
  Speaker 8: out the gains we get in cities.
• 40:09
  Speaker 7: So that's sort of one.
• 40:10
  Speaker 8: In March and April of 2020, the police actually killed
• 40:12
  Speaker 8: at the same rate and number as in March and
• 40:15
  Speaker 8: April of 2019. So COVID, quarantine, lockdown, no impact on
• 40:19
  Speaker 8: the numbers. And 2019 was actually the first year ever
• 40:22
  Speaker 8: where Black people were more afraid of being killed by
• 40:24
  Speaker 8: an officer than being killed by community violence. So this
• 40:28
  Speaker 8: is not a niche issue.
• 40:29
  Speaker 7: It's a huge deal.
• 40:30
  Speaker 8: A third of all the people killed by a stranger
• 40:32
  Speaker 8: is actually killed by a police officer. When we think
• 40:34
  Speaker 8: about the solutions, it's two big buckets. The first bucket
• 40:37
  Speaker 8: is reduce the power of the police. We can manage
• 40:40
  Speaker 8: how much power they have, how they use force.
• 40:43
  Speaker 7: That's one bucket.
• 40:44
  Speaker 8: And the second bucket is shrink the role of the police.
• 40:47
  Speaker 8: And then the reduce the power, it's like use the
• 40:48
  Speaker 8: force policies.
• 40:49
  Speaker 7: And police union contracts.
• 40:50
  Speaker 8: And then the shrink the role, it's realizing that of
• 40:55
  Speaker 8: all the arrests that happen in the country, only 5%
• 40:56
  Speaker 8: of the arrests are for violent crime.
• 40:58
  Speaker 7: 5%, it's really low.
• 41:00
  Speaker 8: But we staff police departments as if it's like 90%.
• 41:04
  Speaker 8: So we need to offload all the resources they get
• 41:06
  Speaker 8: for the stuff that has nothing to do with emergency
• 41:09
  Speaker 8: intervention that might require force. So like, do we need
• 41:13
  Speaker 8: somebody with a gun to show up for a missing kid?
• 41:15
  Speaker 6: I don't know.
• 41:16
  Speaker 8: Do we need somebody with a gun to show up
• 41:17
  Speaker 8: for somebody who has like crashed on the side of
• 41:22
  Speaker 8: the highway?
• 41:23
  Speaker 7: Probably not.
• 41:24
  Speaker 8: Like missing cats, like we don't, you know, that is
• 41:26
  Speaker 8: the majority of 911 calls. We actually don't need anything
• 41:28
  Speaker 8: like the police for those incidents. And we should actually
• 41:31
  Speaker 8: shift the resources to other places.
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: So, Dre, look, we focus on Trump a lot and
• 41:39
  Speaker 2: obviously DOJ is a mess. But can you talk to
• 41:41
  Speaker 2: people about decisions that are getting made at a local
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: level and the people making those decisions and how listeners
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: can focus on activism at that level that can vote
• 41:52
  Speaker 2: out the bad people and get better folks in place?
• 41:56
  Speaker 8: Yeah, so almost all the things that matter with the
• 41:58
  Speaker 8: police are at the local level. 18,000 police departments, local.
• 42:01
  Speaker 8: The DOJ funds most police departments, but we've always been
• 42:04
  Speaker 8: fighting to get them to condition funding by how well
• 42:07
  Speaker 8: the police do things like accountability and stuff, and they've
• 42:09
  Speaker 8: never done that.
• 42:10
  Speaker 7: So local level.
• 42:11
  Speaker 8: Now, let me tell you the five things that don't work,
• 42:13
  Speaker 8: and then I'll talk about the two things that do work.
• 42:15
  Speaker 8: So when we think about what a solution is, a
• 42:17
  Speaker 8: solution has to do two things. It has to both
• 42:18
  Speaker 8: change police behavior and change the outcomes. So say, for example,
• 42:22
  Speaker 8: there are some solutions that might change behavior. So say,
• 42:24
  Speaker 8: for example, we can show that the police are nicer
• 42:27
  Speaker 8: to people, so less complaints happen. But if they kill
• 42:30
  Speaker 8: the same number of people, that change in behavior had
• 42:34
  Speaker 8: no impact on the change in outcomes. So we're looking
• 42:36
  Speaker 8: for things that do both. So one of the most
• 42:38
  Speaker 8: commonly cited things is body cameras. The body camera data
• 42:41
  Speaker 8: is mixed at best. In some studies, it is a
• 42:44
  Speaker 8: positive relationship to behavior change, but it's so negligible that
• 42:47
  Speaker 8: we don't consider that a scalable solution.
• 42:50
  Speaker 7: Training.
• 42:50
  Speaker 8: There are two big trainings that police go through. One
• 42:52
  Speaker 8: is implicit bias and the other is mental health training.
• 42:55
  Speaker 8: Both of these trainings change police attitudes. They don't change
• 42:58
  Speaker 8: police behavior. The fourth is interesting. It's around the number
• 43:02
  Speaker 8: of Black officers. So the number of Black officers actually
• 43:05
  Speaker 8: does matter, but it doesn't matter until you reach the
• 43:08
  Speaker 8: tipping point of over 35% Black. There are only 12
• 43:13
  Speaker 8: police departments in the country that have even 30% Black officers.
• 43:17
  Speaker 8: So while this might be an interesting solution, it's not scalable.
• 43:20
  Speaker 8: And the fifth is community policing. People talk a lot
• 43:22
  Speaker 8: about community policing. Now, we think community policing is sort
• 43:25
  Speaker 8: of racist at the core, that it's only Black people
• 43:28
  Speaker 8: and poor people that you're like, you know, I need
• 43:30
  Speaker 8: you to go play football with my son to treat
• 43:32
  Speaker 8: him like a whole person. Or like, it's only poor
• 43:34
  Speaker 8: people and Black people that it's like, go take my
• 43:36
  Speaker 8: daughter out for ice cream so you like don't kill her.
• 43:38
  Speaker 8: It's like, that's sort of racist. But the data also
• 43:42
  Speaker 8: shows that community policing only changes attitude. It doesn't change outcomes.
• 43:47
  Speaker 8: The single biggest impact is actually use of force policies.
• 43:50
  Speaker 8: And we track eight policies when they all are present.
• 43:53
  Speaker 8: So if you go from a police department that had
• 43:55
  Speaker 8: none of these policies to all of them, there's a
• 43:59
  Speaker 8: 72% reduction in police violence.
• 44:01
  Speaker 7: Huge.
• 44:02
  Speaker 8: The policies, what's cool about them is that they're simple.
• 44:05
  Speaker 8: Banning chokeholds and strangleholds. Making sure that people have to
• 44:09
  Speaker 8: give a warning before they shoot. Having a duty to intervene.
• 44:12
  Speaker 8: So if you see another officer engaged in misconduct, you
• 44:14
  Speaker 8: actually have to do something about it. Requiring de-escalation, right?
• 44:18
  Speaker 8: Like these are like, No brainers. Is there a continuum
• 44:21
  Speaker 8: for how you use force in the police department? Like
• 44:25
  Speaker 8: these are just simple solutions. The thing, though, is that
• 44:28
  Speaker 8: it's been really hard to get them enacted. So chokeholds
• 44:31
  Speaker 8: is a good example. Only 28 of the 100 largest
• 44:34
  Speaker 8: police departments ban chokeholds.
• 44:37
  Speaker 7: That's crazy. Yeah, that's like a wild thing. Right.
• 44:40
  Speaker 8: So we are going to in the next couple of days,
• 44:42
  Speaker 8: we're going to be pushing. and arming citizens with the
• 44:45
  Speaker 8: knowledge so they can lobby their mayors and their city
• 44:47
  Speaker 8: council people to immediately enact all eight of these because
• 44:51
  Speaker 8: they are the single biggest lever.
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: And where should people look out for that, DeRay?
• 44:56
  Speaker 8: So they should just go to useofforceproject.org today to just
• 45:00
  Speaker 8: learn about the use of force rules in their cities
• 45:03
  Speaker 8: and towns. We have an analysis up that's right now
• 45:05
  Speaker 8: the 100 largest cities. But when we roll out this
• 45:08
  Speaker 8: new project that's coming, hopefully in the next couple of days,
• 45:10
  Speaker 8: it'll be a little bit expanded. So it'll be more
• 45:12
  Speaker 8: than just those policies. It took us a long time
• 45:14
  Speaker 8: to find the policies because most policies aren't public. So
• 45:17
  Speaker 8: we spent the last five years collecting them and gathering them.
• 45:20
  Speaker 8: And they are at useofforceproject.org.
• 45:23
  Speaker 3: Can I ask you about, you know, In listening to
• 45:25
  Speaker 3: what you're saying here, you point to these efforts to
• 45:28
  Speaker 3: change police culture, mental health training, implicit bias training, community policing.
• 45:34
  Speaker 3: You say those don't work. You have to just focus
• 45:37
  Speaker 3: on the policies, the use of force policy, the duty
• 45:41
  Speaker 3: to intervene. Basically, one set of ideas is around making
• 45:45
  Speaker 3: sure police see the people that they are serving as
• 45:48
  Speaker 3: fellow human beings, as a community of which they are
• 45:50
  Speaker 3: a part. The other is about making sure that even
• 45:53
  Speaker 3: if they don't, even if there is an impulse to
• 45:56
  Speaker 3: use force aggressively, too aggressively, that there are these other
• 45:59
  Speaker 3: controls to protect people from the police. Is that your
• 46:03
  Speaker 3: look at this now, that basically these efforts to change
• 46:05
  Speaker 3: police culture have largely failed, and so the effort has
• 46:07
  Speaker 3: to be entirely focused on kind of enforcement and making
• 46:11
  Speaker 3: sure that there is accountability? Or do you still see
• 46:13
  Speaker 3: some value in the larger effort to change the cultures
• 46:18
  Speaker 3: of these police departments and of the mentality of police
• 46:20
  Speaker 3: officers themselves?
• 46:22
  Speaker 7: Yeah, I think that's a good push.
• 46:23
  Speaker 8: I don't know how you change the culture of anything.
• 46:26
  Speaker 8: And so the police, the workplace, the school, if the
• 46:30
  Speaker 8: people in that place know that the worst consequence for
• 46:33
  Speaker 8: whatever they do will be nothing, right? So you can
• 46:38
  Speaker 8: go to as many trainings as you want to, but
• 46:40
  Speaker 8: if you know that you could do anything and nothing
• 46:44
  Speaker 8: will happen to you, so 1% of officers get convicted, Almost,
• 46:50
  Speaker 8: you know, in some places, up to 70% of officers
• 46:52
  Speaker 8: who get fired get rehired. So they know that, like,
• 46:55
  Speaker 8: no matter what, you can send them to a million trainings.
• 46:58
  Speaker 8: Could you imagine if the worst thing you did, you
• 46:59
  Speaker 8: got sent to another training? It's like, yeah, that's not
• 47:02
  Speaker 8: a deterrent, right? So even in Minneapolis, you think Minneapolis
• 47:04
  Speaker 8: is actually a microcosm for all of these things. In Minneapolis,
• 47:07
  Speaker 8: half the police that get fired get rehired. In Minneapolis,
• 47:11
  Speaker 8: Black people are 13 times more likely to be killed
• 47:13
  Speaker 8: by a police officer than white people. And in Minneapolis,
• 47:16
  Speaker 8: a police union contract has a clause that says that
• 47:18
  Speaker 8: no community oversight structure can ever have the power to
• 47:21
  Speaker 8: discipline a police officer.
• 47:23
  Speaker 7: That's wild, right? Like imagine being in that culture.
• 47:28
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: Drake, can you talk about the police unions for one second?
• 47:31
  Speaker 2: Just because I saw Sam tweeting that in some areas,
• 47:35
  Speaker 2: maybe in Minnesota, when an officer is accused of misconduct,
• 47:41
  Speaker 2: like what happened after George Floyd's murder, They actually couldn't
• 47:44
  Speaker 2: fire them until some sort of mandated waiting period. So
• 47:47
  Speaker 2: it just sounds like police unions are negotiating contracts that
• 47:52
  Speaker 2: prevent accountability in almost any event. Can you talk a
• 47:56
  Speaker 2: little bit about that and how that could be reformed?
• 47:59
  Speaker 8: Yeah, so we think about police unions not as labor unions,
• 48:03
  Speaker 8: but like the NRA.
• 48:04
  Speaker 7: That's the best way to think about a police union.
• 48:05
  Speaker 8: They're like a lobbyist organization with special interests that are
• 48:09
  Speaker 8: not the interests of the public. Sometimes people who come
• 48:12
  Speaker 8: from labor backgrounds, like I used to be a union
• 48:13
  Speaker 8: leader in education, they're like, oh, you can't sort of
• 48:16
  Speaker 8: attack this union. You're like, this is not, they do
• 48:18
  Speaker 8: not care about wages and health insurance. They are focused
• 48:21
  Speaker 8: on protecting the police. So in cities across the country,
• 48:24
  Speaker 8: the unions have these clauses, like Sam was saying in Minneapolis.
• 48:27
  Speaker 8: In Minneapolis, after the police kill somebody, they have to
• 48:30
  Speaker 8: be mandatorily put on paid leave for three days. But
• 48:33
  Speaker 8: in the contract, it doesn't allow you to terminate them
• 48:36
  Speaker 8: in those three days, which is sort of wild. But
• 48:38
  Speaker 8: all across the country, these rules exist. So California has
• 48:40
  Speaker 8: a law that says that any investigation of an officer
• 48:42
  Speaker 8: that lasts more than a year can never result in discipline,
• 48:44
  Speaker 8: regardless of the outcome. And what's wild about that is
• 48:46
  Speaker 8: the police manage how long the investigation is. So you're like, well,
• 48:50
  Speaker 8: that doesn't seem like a fair system. What is also interesting,
• 48:53
  Speaker 8: and this is what we didn't know in 2014, is
• 48:55
  Speaker 8: that there are now three independent studies that have no
• 48:59
  Speaker 8: relationship to each other that have shown that the only
• 49:02
  Speaker 8: effect of police unions, when we look at what changed
• 49:04
  Speaker 8: before officers could unionize and after, is that they kill
• 49:08
  Speaker 8: more people.
• 49:09
  Speaker 7: That is literally the effect.
• 49:12
  Speaker 8: And it's because the police unions, their sole purpose is
• 49:16
  Speaker 8: to protect officers from accountabilities.
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: Drea, you were telling me the other day, there's a,
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: is there a, there's a bill in the House of
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: Representatives right now that would deal with some of these
• 49:28
  Speaker 1: union contracts?
• 49:29
  Speaker 7: In a bad way, yeah. So there's a bill, H.R.
• 49:32
  Speaker 4: 1154.
• 49:33
  Speaker 7: It's sneaky because it's called public safety.
• 49:35
  Speaker 8: So it technically includes firefighters, EMS, like It looks like
• 49:38
  Speaker 8: it's a bill geared towards opening up labor for people.
• 49:41
  Speaker 7: But what it would do.
• 49:42
  Speaker 8: In a disproportionate way is allow any police department in
• 49:45
  Speaker 8: the country that currently cannot unionize, it would allow them
• 49:48
  Speaker 8: to unionize. It would be the single worst thing to
• 49:50
  Speaker 8: happen in policing in the past six years. It is
• 49:53
  Speaker 8: a policy choice that a lot of people on the
• 49:55
  Speaker 8: left are actually supporting, which is wild, but it is bad.
• 49:58
  Speaker 7: So we are trying to get to as many congresspeople
• 50:00
  Speaker 7: as possible.
• 50:00
  Speaker 4: It's HR 1154.
• 50:01
  Speaker 7: It is a bad bill.
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: DeRay, thanks for coming on. I know you've got a
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: lot going on, but we appreciate you educating us today.
• 50:13
  Speaker 4: Cool.
• 50:13
  Speaker 7: Good to be here. And I can't wait to see
• 50:15
  Speaker 7: you guys continue to be in the fight.
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: Thanks, DeRay.
• 50:17
  Speaker 7: Thanks, DeRay.
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: All right, everyone. Ahead of this year's elections, what people
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: have asked us more than anything else is what they
• 50:30
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• 50:33
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  Speaker 1: Just want to throw that in there.
• 51:37
  Speaker 3: Gut health.
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: It helps you sign up for life insurance and you
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: can mail things from the safety of your home.
• 51:45
  Speaker 2: Just adopt-a-state, it will solve all your problems.
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: And it'll get you a job. On the pod today,
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: the mayor of Atlanta, Keisha Lance Bottoms. Mayor, welcome to
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: Pod Save America.
• 51:56
  Speaker 4: Thank you so much for having me.
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: So you and Killer Mike delivered two of the most
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: viral and I thought powerful impromptu speeches over the weekend
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: about these protests. And they both happened to be at
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: a press conference that you organized. Can you give us
• 52:12
  Speaker 1: the backstory of how that came together, how you decided
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: who to invite and sort of what was going through
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: your mind before you spoke?
• 52:21
  Speaker 5: So I'll tell you, Friday was a whirlwind. I spent
• 52:26
  Speaker 5: most of the day on Friday participating in congressional testimony
• 52:32
  Speaker 5: with some other mayors on COVID-19. And I had on
• 52:38
  Speaker 5: the evening news and it just started not to look good.
• 52:45
  Speaker 5: So I eventually made my way down to police headquarters
• 52:49
  Speaker 5: and I wish that I could even remember the sequence
• 52:54
  Speaker 5: of events, but I immediately knew to reach out to
• 52:58
  Speaker 5: Killa Mike and to TI because I know I have
• 53:02
  Speaker 5: four kids and I know my voice is not always
• 53:07
  Speaker 5: heard or listened to and that I had to get
• 53:10
  Speaker 5: somebody who could say the things that needed to be
• 53:13
  Speaker 5: said that I knew probably wouldn't be received if I
• 53:16
  Speaker 5: said it. And we went into the press conference and
• 53:21
  Speaker 5: I didn't, I honestly couldn't remember what I said after
• 53:27
  Speaker 5: I said it. I had to, after I came home
• 53:29
  Speaker 5: that night, I watched it on television and, you know,
• 53:35
  Speaker 5: I'm a woman of faith. I think those words were
• 53:39
  Speaker 5: divinely given to me in that moment.
• 53:42
  Speaker 4: And Killer Mike, I mean, I could sit at his
• 53:46
  Speaker 4: feet All day long. I know.
• 53:50
  Speaker 5: He talks that way sitting in a barbershop. But I think,
• 53:55
  Speaker 5: you know, the thing that the common thread with myself
• 53:58
  Speaker 5: and Kayla, Mike, and with Tip, we bleed Atlanta.
• 54:02
  Speaker 4: We love this city. And we hurt with this city.
• 54:07
  Speaker 5: And the pain and the frustration is felt by so
• 54:14
  Speaker 5: many people across America. And I think you just... You
• 54:18
  Speaker 5: got it from us in real time on Friday.
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: Your job seems incredibly difficult right now. Ahmaud Arbery was
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: murdered in Georgia. You called that a lynching. You said
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: George Floyd's murder made you hurt like a mother would.
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: You obviously feel the anger and the pain that protesters feel.
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: On the other hand, your role as mayor is to
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: keep your people safe, keep your city from being destroyed.
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: How do you balance that?
• 54:48
  Speaker 4: It's hard.
• 54:51
  Speaker 5: And the reality is if I weren't mayor, I would
• 54:56
  Speaker 5: probably not even consume as much because it hurts so much.
• 55:02
  Speaker 5: And it just hurts me so much as a mother.
• 55:05
  Speaker 5: And with Ahmaud Arbery, like I get, it's this physical
• 55:09
  Speaker 5: feeling I get in my stomach and it makes me nauseous.
• 55:15
  Speaker 5: And With George Floyd, I knew I had to watch
• 55:21
  Speaker 5: it because I'd be asked about it, but watching it
• 55:25
  Speaker 5: so that I can speak about it as mayor and
• 55:30
  Speaker 5: feeling it as I do as a mother are two
• 55:32
  Speaker 5: very different things.
• 55:37
  Speaker 4: It's interesting.
• 55:38
  Speaker 5: I often try and look at things from the lens
• 55:40
  Speaker 5: of my kids and how things will impact them and
• 55:45
  Speaker 5: affect them. but I've had the most interesting conversations with
• 55:49
  Speaker 5: my mother over the past few days. And my mother
• 55:53
  Speaker 5: had said to me last week that this doesn't feel
• 55:57
  Speaker 5: like 1965 in America. It feels like something before 1965.
• 56:00
  Speaker 5: And that struck me because my mother grew up in
• 56:07
  Speaker 5: the segregated South in Atlanta. And then I spoke to
• 56:12
  Speaker 5: her yesterday. I can count on one hand the number
• 56:14
  Speaker 5: of times I've ever heard her see my mother cry
• 56:17
  Speaker 5: outside of the death of a family member of loved ones.
• 56:21
  Speaker 5: My mother sobbed yesterday. And she sobbed talking about George
• 56:26
  Speaker 5: Floyd and imagining that being my brother or being one
• 56:33
  Speaker 5: of her grandsons and I share that to say there's
• 56:37
  Speaker 5: this anger and this frustration and this sadness that we
• 56:40
  Speaker 5: see in this very visible way with young people in
• 56:43
  Speaker 5: our streets. But so many people are feeling it across America.
• 56:49
  Speaker 5: And when I look at police officers taking a knee
• 56:51
  Speaker 5: with protesters, I know that people are being heard. I just,
• 56:57
  Speaker 5: my fear on Friday and my fear remains that the
• 57:02
  Speaker 5: voices will be drowned out by the destruction.
• 57:06
  Speaker 4: And, you know, we've got so much work to do.
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: You said on Friday night that a protest has purpose.
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: What specific goals do you think should be the purpose
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: of these protests?
• 57:21
  Speaker 5: Well, I think the first purpose has to be to
• 57:24
  Speaker 5: draw attention. But I also think that on the other side,
• 57:28
  Speaker 5: it's got to be a tangible point of satisfaction. The
• 57:31
  Speaker 5: reality is there will be another Black man who dies
• 57:35
  Speaker 5: in America at the hand of police officers. I wish
• 57:38
  Speaker 5: that it weren't so, and I pray that it's not so,
• 57:42
  Speaker 5: but it will likely happen. And we've got to know
• 57:47
  Speaker 5: where we're trying to go with this. So, you know,
• 57:51
  Speaker 5: under the Obama administration, the same way the pandemic handbook
• 57:55
  Speaker 5: was left, there were reforms that were left on policing
• 57:58
  Speaker 5: and America and the launch of My Brother's Keeper and
• 58:02
  Speaker 5: all these great initiatives that had tangible outcomes. And when
• 58:07
  Speaker 5: I spoke on Friday and I talked about the West
• 58:09
  Speaker 5: Side of Atlanta, what's happening on the West Side of
• 58:12
  Speaker 5: Atlanta is we've got job training programs. We've got substance
• 58:17
  Speaker 5: abuse programs. We've got wraparound services. We've got police officers who,
• 58:23
  Speaker 5: when they are recruited into our police department, have to
• 58:25
  Speaker 5: volunteer at our At Promise Youth Center on the west.
• 58:30
  Speaker 4: Side of Atlanta.
• 58:31
  Speaker 5: Those are the things that have to happen across America.
• 58:36
  Speaker 5: And we've got to have some tangible metrics on what
• 58:39
  Speaker 5: does it mean? Are we trying to reduce incarceration like
• 58:42
  Speaker 5: we're doing in Atlanta by turning our jail into an
• 58:45
  Speaker 5: equity center? Are we trying to measure how many more
• 58:48
  Speaker 5: people get jobs and become financially literate, et cetera? I mean,
• 58:54
  Speaker 5: there's so many metrics that we've got to be able
• 58:57
  Speaker 5: to articulate. And I think the uprising and the protest
• 59:01
  Speaker 5: is one part of it. But we've got to know
• 59:03
  Speaker 5: what is it we're trying to get to on the
• 59:05
  Speaker 5: other side of it.
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: You fired two officers this weekend for excessive use of
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: force against young people who were out past curfew. Do
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: you have thoughts on how to reform policing in a
• 59:18
  Speaker 1: way to prevent that excessive force in the first place?
• 59:23
  Speaker 5: Yeah, there is a culture change. And I can tell you,
• 59:25
  Speaker 5: had that happened last week, I wouldn't have watched the video.
• 59:29
  Speaker 5: Likely I would have seen the video that was on television,
• 59:33
  Speaker 5: but I would not have spent four to five hours
• 59:35
  Speaker 5: in my afternoon yesterday watching seven different body cams, five,
• 59:41
  Speaker 5: seven times each. And because even for as conscientious as
• 59:48
  Speaker 5: I am, there are things that, you know, you, you go, well,
• 59:55
  Speaker 5: That was horrible. Let's investigate and let's go through all
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 5: these hoops. But with where we are in America, we
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 5: don't have time to wait. So my police officers just
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 5: got a very real lesson on what our expectations and
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 5: our level of tolerance will be in the city going forward.
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 5: The force was excessive. They got to be fired, period.
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 5: And I think that those are the type changes and
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 5: expectations that we've got to be as leaders to give
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 5: to our police officers, but also that level of expectation
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 5: to our communities, because nobody has patience with waiting.
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: So at one point in your speech on Friday night,
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: you said, if you want change in America, go and
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: register to vote. New York Times interviewed a young woman
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 1: who was protesting in South Carolina over the weekend, and
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 1: she said the following about voting. I just don't think
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: that's how change happens. They've been telling us to do
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: that for so long and we've done it and look
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: at everything that's still going on. What do you say
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: to that young woman and young people like that who
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: just feel so frustrated that they don't see the difference
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: that their participation in democracy can actually make?
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 5: The words of Audre Lorde have been on my mind
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 5: all day. Revolution is not a one-time event. And my
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 5: fear with where we are with Donald Trump as president,
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 5: even when I look at my kids, I look at
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 5: my twins are nine.
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 4: They're my youngest.
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 5: They don't remember President Obama being president. They know about him,
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 5: but they don't remember what that feels like in And
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 5: this concept that things were happening and moving and working
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 5: on our behalf.
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 4: And I think day by day, that's what we're losing.
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 5: And I think that what we're seeing with our, especially
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 5: our young protesters across the country, they don't have the
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 5: patience for these things that need that for the change.
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 5: So I think you've got to give them quick deliverables
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 5: like we've done in Atlanta. First three months in office,
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 5: I eliminated cash bill bonds. In our city, we're working
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 5: to turn our jail into a center of equity. We
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 5: closed our doors to ICE. COVID-19 hit. We started delivering
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 5: meals to our seniors and our kids who aren't getting
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 5: their meals. So I think that gives you instant credibility,
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 5: but it also gives you grace to plan long-term for
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 5: this work that we know it doesn't happen overnight. It's
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 5: a series of actions and policy decisions that end up
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 5: changing America. But I think you've got to have a
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 5: combination of both. And I think you got to be
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 5: able to establish credibility with young people across America because
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 5: they're hopeless right now. And I was thinking about my
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 5: grandparents who came to Atlanta. My grandmother's grandparents were slaves
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 5: in Crawfordsville, Georgia. And I've heard that my grandmother's grandfather
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 5: served in Congress during Reconstruction. I don't know if it's
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 5: true or not. This is a freed slave. I've seen
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 5: his worth listed on a registry. There was something that
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 5: gave him hope that even when he was enslaved in
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 5: the cotton fields of East Georgia, there was something that
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 5: gave him hope that something could be better if not
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 5: for him than for his children's children. And I think
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 5: that's where we are in America. We've got to be
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 5: able to give our kids and our communities hope. Because
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 5: even with my 18-year-old, with all the trappings that come
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 5: along with being the mayor's son, sent me the video
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 5: of the kids, the college kids being pulled out of
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 5: the car over the weekend. And he said, This is
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 5: why we're burning down our cities. This is what we're
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 5: mad about.
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: And what did you tell him when he said that?
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 4: I said, I understand.
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 5: The one thing that I've learned as a parent, and
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 5: I'm learning more and more every day, sometimes it's just
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 5: an opportunity for me to acknowledge that he's hurting.
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 4: Sometimes I just have to say, I understand.
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: And I do.
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 5: And when I see that anger and frustration in my son,
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 5: because the reality is when he walks out the door,
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 5: it doesn't matter that he's my son.
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 4: He's still, I.
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 5: Call him my man child in America. And he has
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 5: as big of a target on him as anybody else's child.
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 1: You wisely said over the weekend that Donald Trump should
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 1: just stop talking because he makes things worse.
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 7: I agree.
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: Last question. What would you want to hear from a
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: real president right now? What do you think the country
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 1: needs to hear to heal and to sort of get
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 1: through this moment?
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 5: What I want to hear is that we have a
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 5: president who believes that we're better than this. And I
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 5: want to hear from our president a genuine care and
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 5: concern and commitment to make change in our communities. I
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 5: want to hear an acknowledgement that we're hurting and that
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 5: this hurt didn't start yesterday. It didn't start a week
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 5: or so ago with the killing of George Floyd. This
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 5: is 400 years of hurt and pain and the need
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 5: for reconciliation and reformation in this country. That's what I
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 5: want to hear from our president. I want to hear
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 5: our president say, I may not have all of the answers,
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 5: and it may not all work out for us today,
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 5: but I believe there's a better tomorrow. And I'm going
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 5: to do everything I can as president to make sure
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 5: that that better tomorrow is what all of our children deserve.
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 4: You know, I'm a sucker for a good quote.
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 5: One of my favorite lines is from a poem from
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 5: Maya Angelou, and she says, I am the hope of
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 5: the slave. And I think there has to be a
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 5: president who says to communities of color, especially in this country,
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 5: you come from a legacy of hurt and pain, but
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 5: there was hope that your forefathers had for you. And
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 5: as president, I had that same hope for you. And
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 5: I'm going to make sure that America stands up to
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 5: its commitment that we are better than where we are today.
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 1: Well, I hope we hear words like that soon myself.
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 1: Thank you, Mayor, so much for your powerful words. Thank
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 1: you for your leadership. And hopefully you can come back
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 1: to Pod Save America under different circumstances in the future
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 1: and we can gossip about politics.
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 4: Anytime. Thank you so much for having me.
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 1: Thanks to Mayor Bottoms and thanks to DeRay for joining
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: us today. And we will talk to you guys later
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 1: this week. Pod Save America is a product of Crooked Media.
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 1: The executive producer is Michael Martinez. Our assistant producer is
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: Jordan Waller. It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: Seglin is our sound engineer. Thanks to Tanya Somanator, Katie Long,
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 1: Roman Papadimitriou, Caroline Reston, and Elisa Gutierrez for production support.
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: And to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Nar Melkonian, Yale Freed,
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 1: and Milo Kim, who film and upload these episodes as
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: videos every week.