Alaska exposed as state with the highest rate of women killed by men in the nation, Harris releases campaign agenda for Black men, pushback against racism’s classification as health threat, and the resurfaced story of the soul group Superiors. DeRay interviews New York State Senator Zellnor Myrie about his ongoing Congressional efforts and NYC mayoral campaign.

 

News

Domestic Violence, Child Abuse and DUI Cases Are Being Dismissed en Masse in Anchorage

Harris releases agenda for Black men as she ramps up effort to court them

Racism was called a health threat. Then came the DEI backlash.

A Truth of Self: The Story of the Dynamic Superiors

 

Follow @PodSaveThePeople on Instagram.

 

TRANSCRIPT

 

[AD BREAK]

 

DeRay Mckesson: Hey, this is DeRay and Welcome to Pod Save the People. On this episode it’s me, Myles, De’Ara, and Kaya talking about the news that you don’t know with regard to race, justice and equity. We talk about the election. There’s a lot going on down to the wire. Then I sit down with New York State Senator Zellnor Myrie to talk about his congressional initiatives and then his upcoming race to be the next mayor of New York City. I learned a ton, here we go. [music break] Hey, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of Pod Save the People. It’s a lot going on, it’s a lot going on. This is DeRay at @deray on Twitter. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Hi, this is Kaya Henderson at @HendersonKaya on Twitter. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: This is Myles E. Johnson at @pharaohrapture on Instagram. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: And you can find me De’Ara Balenger on Instagram at @DeAraBalenger. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Y’all, it is pretty wild to think that it’s 20 something days till Election Day. This feels like the longest 100 days that I’ve experienced in a long time. And so I’m interested in getting a pulse check on what’s happening with with everybody in the election. What are you seeing? I will start by saying that I was in the Cuyahoga county jail, juvenile jail. That’s the jail in Cleveland on Friday talking to the kids, 13 to 19 who are incarcerated there. We had a phenomenal conversation. But some of the kids are old enough to vote and that came up at the end. So at the end of one of the groups, there were some older boys and they were like, oh I can vote. And they get the ballots mailed to them in the jail. There’s a whole process to it. And I’m like, who you voting for? And they’re like Kamala, and we start talking about the issues. And so, you know, everybody is talking about this, even people that sometimes people have forgotten about. And I’m reminded that people are smart enough to understand all of the policy issues as long as we have frank conversations with them. So I’m interested in what has resonated with you over the past week. Like, what did you see? Where’s your mind with the election, what’s up. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: I’ve seen things slow down as far as like maybe, certain groups of people’s excitement, which I think that is just what was going to happen. I think you can’t just keep such a high energy balloon. That was that first announcement like in the air. So now I feel everybody is feeling the pressure of being like, okay. And I feel like Democrats actually communicated really clearly that this is not a sure in. Like like. This is going to be a race until we win [laugh] until we win we’re not this is not this is not a sure win at all. So I feel like um in this last week, you kind of feel that um like, of course, I think that President Obama just like stepped on himself I feel like every single time he talks to Black men directly. He seems to just kind of step in it. And and I’m always, like deeply disappointed that it seems like Democrats don’t really understand the Black man experience specifically like working class and not exceptional like the not exceptional Black men experience. And it always comes off very paternalistic, it always comes off very um it just it just always comes off like somebody is wagging their fingers. And I think that I’m that was kind of the main my main focus over this past week is just how that misstep was and and I’m just hoping that Democrats and the left in general just figure out a better way to communicate to Black men than what they have been doing. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Myles, before we go on from you, can you tell people what Obama said? Like what was, what did he say that struck you as a little paternalistic? 

 

[clip of Barack Obama] And on the other side, you have someone who has consistently shown disregard not just for the communities but for you as a person. And you’re thinking about sitting out? And you’re coming up with all kinds of reasons and excuses. I [?] a problem with that. Because because part of it makes me think, now I’m speaking to men directly. Part of it makes me think that, well, you just aren’t feeling the idea of having a woman as president and you’re coming up with other alternatives and other reasons for them. And I think anybody you are talking to at a barbershop, anybody you are talking to in your house, your family and church who was coming with that kind of attitude. I think you have to ask them. Well, how can that be? Because the women in our lives have been getting our backs this entire time. They been raising us and working and having our backs and when we get [?] when the system is not working for us. They’re the ones who are out there marching and protesting. And so now you’re thinking about sitting out or even supporting somebody who has a history of denigrating you?

 

Myles E. Johnson: Yeah, essentially he was just saying that everybody basically the idea that the reason why Vice President Harris wasn’t getting as much support or attention from Black men was because of internalized sexism and misogyny and kind of made a very multi dimensional reason why Black men may not be as motivated for Vice President Harris into a very one dimensional thing through through those comments. Um. I’m also very interested in optics. So not only was he saying this and saying that we like you know saying Black men need to show up for her and stuff like that, which I just don’t it I that just sits wrong with me. Just personally, uh just I don’t think that any democratic like I don’t think any political candidate needs to say you deserve my vote. I think that it’s always should be this is what I’m doing, This is what I’m like like this is what I’m here for. So I just that didn’t look right. But anywho, I’m also a aesthetics and optics person. Just I can’t not be a queer brown skin big thing in the world and not be an aesthetics and optic person and this high yellow man, [laugh] this high yellow man talking to these all these like brown skinned, dark skinned men, telling them what they need to do. That felt just extremely uh like a misstep. So, yeah, the Internet was on fire because essentially um Obama kind of flattened Black men’s um political life and their support to a [?] or not support of vice president Harris to um misogyny. And that is not the whole story. And of course, that is if you talk about men and you’re talking about patriarchy. That is the story of men and and some men. But I think it’s a lot a lot more nuance when you think about where we are when it comes to the comedy economy and fracking and and, and and Palestine and Israel and these other topics that might not motivate people to go and support her. 

 

Kaya Henderson: I’m sort of trying to hold my comments about that particular thing to De’Ara’s um news. But does anybody, I was offline yesterday. Does anybody know about this third alleged a third assassination attempt? 

 

Myles E. Johnson: I saw that this morning. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: I didn’t hear this. No, I didn’t hear this.

 

Kaya Henderson: So [laugh] so apparently, um wherever he was, now I got to think about it, because I did read a little bit. But Mr. Trump was in his he was having this rally at Coachella, I think, and the security people were checking people out. And they found this man trying to enter the thing with fake press passes. And his vehicle was had a fake license plate and they pulled him over as part of a regular security screening and found multiple passports in different names and tons of loaded weapons. And the man said he wasn’t it wasn’t an assassination attempt. That he was he’s a far right um Trump supporter. And the police said that those weapons were probably for his own personal use, whatever that means. But the mayor of whatever town this is was like, no, no, this is an assassination attempt. And we thwarted it. And it felt a little too much like we in this little town are doing our jobs. And you need to recognize this as an assassination attempt. But like the Secret Service and everybody else was like, this is not an assassination attempt. So what to make of that. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Kaya, what’s interesting about that, did you see that coinciding with this that the Trump campaign has requested military aircraft and armored vehicles and a set of protections only reserved for sitting presidents? Because he is saying that he is–

 

Kaya Henderson: Under attack? 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Under threat of attacks by both people like this and Iranian actors. And there was a um you know, it’s interesting what I saw. So I saw the request and I was like, well, that is really interesting. Um. And that they are saying that they need, you know, and some of some of the stuff that they’re requesting is like for all airspace, wherever he is to be restricted, for there to be decoy cars and military aircraft and that like this whole slew of things in addition to the protection he already gets. Um. And there was a Secret Service agent on MSNBC who literally said or on the source who was like, there’s no other reason than to sort of stage a coup, that he is requesting all of this military protection. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Oh wow. Yikes.

 

DeRay Mckesson: Like in this moment that like that it is that he is like laying the groundwork to have a portion of the military report to him. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Oh my gosh. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: In the event that he loses. And I’m like that actually makes total sense to me. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Whoa. 

 

Kaya Henderson: A ton of sense, oh my gosh. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Whoa. Super villain. 

 

Kaya Henderson: That is dastardly. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: And if nothing else proves that there are so many other people complicit because that was a little too smart. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Yes. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: For Trump’s head. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Absolutely, Myles. I was thinking that same thing. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: So somebody told him that. [laughing]

 

Kaya Henderson: I was thinking the exact same thing. Wow. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: What? That is wild. You know, I’m a culture person. You know Cissy Houston, she passed away. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Yes, she did. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Cissy Houston passed away. Cissy Houston is the mother of Whitney Houston, an accomplished gospel singer and background vocalists um when it comes to a lot of I was watching so many interviews where they right before they would sing together and they have mirroring voices and how Whitney learned control and just a lot of tonality. And their voices are just so similar that it’s almost a little eerie. I wanted to um say that. And then also, Wanda Smith, I’m I was born and raised in Georgia, in the suburbs of Georgia. And, you know, Atlanta was where I [?] Atlanta didn’t raise me. But it sure did uh see my first my first drunken behind nights. And Wanda Smith is such an icon in Atlanta. She’s a radio personality and comedian and she’s just an amazing comedian. And she passed away over the weekend, too. So I just wanted to just say that, too. We love some people who are part of Black culture who are just were just invaluable. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: I will say, about Cissy Houston, because I thought deeply about this. She was 91 years old. I find that the people that live a long time in my family are the ones that make the most–

 

Myles E. Johnson: Oh no. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: –trouble throughout the years. [laughter]

 

Kaya Henderson: Oh my gosh. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: And up until her last NPR interview, because I also am a fan and consider myself a family member of the Houstons, she still said that she would be uncomfortable with Whitney Houston being gay. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: What I tell you, as a queer, as a walking, crawling, flying queer. I still cackle when I see Oprah talk through Cissy Houston and give her every which way she can form that question. So you wouldn’t like it.

 

De’Ara Balenger: Every [?]. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: You wouldn’t like it. You wouldn’t approve. Not with a hat. Not on a train. Not on a plane. She said, I do not like rainbow eggs and ham. I do not care how you serve it to me. Not my God, not my Jesus, not my Bible. And there’s actually something I know that is homophobic, and da da da da, but it’s the flatness of it. I’m like, oh if we still had the old school homophobes like that, we would we would be able to see it coming in our face. Pause. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Not the pause. The pause is really special. The pause is special. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Have we talked about the um the conspiracy theory around Cissy not being Whitney Houston’s real mother? 

 

De’Ara Balenger: I heard that too. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Honey, um I just learned about this. I just–

 

DeRay Mckesson: Look at Myle’s face. Myles said don’t you dare talk about Whitney and Cissy like this. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Um. Listen. Myles. I so I had no idea about this, and I usually do not you know trade in conspiracy theories. However, comma, um when whoever showed it to me. There’s this woman. Her name is Teresa Graves. She was an actress. And um it is alleged that she is Whitney Houston’s real mother, that Whitney’s father had an affair with this uh with Ms.. Graves. And when she was pregnant, they took the baby to Cissy and said, we going to raise this baby as our own. And um I you were just talking about the mirroring honey child. The videos of this lady, Teresa Graves. She looks like Whitney. She talks like Whitney, it is uncanny. And I it just gave me pause, frankly. Um. And maybe consider everything that, you know, I mean, Whitney Houston was packaged right? Like Clive Davis created America’s princess, Black you know princess, even though her real life was far different from the image that she portrayed, which I think we’ve all come to know over time. And so it just made me question what else might be packaged in the world butt Ms. Teresa Graves sure do look and sound like with like Whitney Houston. Just saying. [groan from Myles] It’s the groan for me. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Oh. What’s interesting about this story to me is for the era. It is a possibility. Right. Like so for you know, this is my mom wouldn’t mind me telling this story because it’s part of her testimony now. But for the first ten years of my mom’s life, she lived with her grandmother and grandfather. And that’s who she thought was her were her parents. And I always thought that was such a strange story. And then as I spoke to more Black people in their family. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Very common in the Black community. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: It’s actually a very common thing. And then, you know, men have been mening for a long time. And before–

 

Kaya Henderson: Yes. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: As the wi-fi has sped up, the second and third and fourth families have slowed down because we’re all more connected. But there was an era where you could have two good paying jobs and have about six families. So so these kind of dynamics, even though they sound sensational, they’re actually not as extraordinary as as as they could be. So it is possible. But listen, Whitney said that’s her momma, Cissy said that’s her momma. And what they don’t look like in the mug, they look identical in the throat. And so I need a I need tp hear Miss Graves um hit a note or two or three or four. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Nature and nurture act in conjunction with each other. So you know how people start to look like each other when they’ve been together for a long time? Yes. I mean, I’m just saying it is possible. That’s all, possible. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: I will say Myles, when we talk about a generation, that generation could keep a secret baby. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Honey. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Yeah. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Now, so, you know, it’s not a closed deal about who is Whitney’s mama because they would keep all types of secrets. You look up, you’re like, well why did nobody ever tell me that was actually so-and-so’s son or like this so and so, Daddy, or you know, they could keep a secret. You’re right. As the Internet got a little better, it’s been harder to do that. And 23 and me got people out here caught up. But before that, it was you know, it was you say they your child they your child. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Now we let it spill for likes and and and a little virality. Jason Lee come knocking and we just let all our business fail. But we used to have dignity as a people. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: We used to have dignity is hilarious. Hey, you’re listening to Pod Save the People. Stay tuned there’s more to come. 

 

[AD BREAK]

 

De’Ara Balenger: Hot off the press. Y’all. I’ve been working on this campaign for three weeks no a month. And I’m so tired. Tired, but excited. So at 5 a.m. this morning, the VP’s Black agenda for Black men dropped. And so essentially what this effort is, it’s part of a large push that is really going to focus deeply on Black men, Black men and their families, Black men in their communities. So the other thing and I haven’t even watched it myself yet, is this policy dropped with an interview that she did with Roland Martin that y’all can check out. But this the policy essentially has like five pillars. So it’s providing one million small business loans that are fully forgivable up to $20,000. She has a whole pillar around championing education, training and mentorship programs that specifically target and help Black men get good paying jobs in high demand industries. The third thing is supporting a regulatory framework around cryptocurrency and other digital assets um to make sure Black men are protected. The fourth thing is, and when I read this piece. I don’t know time now, but some days ago I started to cry because I thought about my dad. But this this piece I’m particularly excited about. But she’s launching a national health equity initiative that’s going to focus on Black men. So addressing things that Black men are historically and systemically impacted by, whether that’s sickle cell, hypertension, diabetes, mental health, prostate cancer. Um. And so even even as we started to think about like the amplified amplification around that particular piece. Um. And I got, you know, sort of sort of started to go down this rabbit hole of public health thinkers and doers within the Black community. I just see that particular point being this national Health Equity initiative being such an area of opportunity. And it’s actually I’ve never heard of this being done at a national level, federal level ever. So I’m excited to see how that unfolds. Um. And the last thing is legalizing recreational marijuana and creating more opportunities for Black men in particular to succeed in that industry. So those are sort of like the core pillars of it. It’s really an economic and sort of public health lens um as well as education to supporting Black men and their families. So that launched this morning and is out in the world. She’s also going to talk about it tomorrow in Detroit with Charlamagne. And then from there, we’re doing these sort of Black men, we’re calling them huddles, but they’re sort of community activations that are going to be happening in Detroit, Charlotte, Atlanta, and Philadelphia. So we are all out. I’ve never said Black man so much in my whole entire life. And my daddy and uncle and brothers went to Morehouse. So I’m excited and hopefully I get a little break so I can go back to my other job on the campaign, which is finding nice white celebrity ladies to do things so. [laughter]

 

DeRay Mckesson: Don’t get De’Ara fired. Y’all need to scratch that Lord Jesus, oh goodness. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Now Call her Daddy is not the most respectable thing that– [laugh]

 

DeRay Mckesson: Right. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: That you could be on. We’re in the casual season of of public politics [?]. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: Yeah I don’t. People know. They know me what I’m what I’m doing. That’s alright. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: So I will say shout out to this agenda. Um. I don’t have any critiques of it. I think it is a it’s good policy. I am interested in what this is not necessarily a critique as much as like what I had hoped to see is a little bit more around incarceration. And this is where I do think class matters. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Yes honey. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Because I I don’t know who is telling Kamala or the campaign, what policies matter to Black people. But this feels a little this feels like one class of people got covered. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Yes. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: And a class of people did not get covered. So it is not a critique if it is about one class. I think they did that class well. And then, you know, I’m interested to see what comes for the other class. Now, obviously, my work is incarceration, so I’m trying not to be a I don’t want to beat a dead horse on why I think incarceration should be a part of Kamala’s thing, especially if she’s trying to talk about Black men. And I have seen and received personally the critique that people are offended that when we talk about Black issues, that people sort of veer so much towards police violence and criminal justice stuff. My only response to people is that if you were born in 1981, Black men have a one in three chance of being incarcerated in this country. And if you are born in 2001, it is a one in five chance. Those are wild numbers. 90% of the people killed by the police who are Black in general are men. And the and that is true regardless of race. So when I think about this issue of incarceration and all the things at the carceral state, the impact of incarceration is so stunning, both on the experience, but also on lifetime earnings. So there is a thing there about closing the racial wealth gap. It is impossible to close the racial wealth gap without ending mass incarceration because for Black people who are incarcerated, your net worth essentially flattens. Not true of white people. It is true of Black people. And when you think that one in three black men born in 1981 are are estimated to be incarcerated. That’s wild. It’s something like almost 30% of Black men are are anticipated to be incarcerated in their lifetime, with the updated stats. It is around it’s less than 5% of white men. The disparity is it is truly wild, we don’t talk about the carceral state enough. So when people talk to me about like we’re overdoing it, I’m like, you know, again, this is why I think class is an issue [laugh] uh when we talk about these. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: I think that’s an interesting take De’Ray, and I want you to talk more about it because I’ve been thinking about this obviously so much lately, and I I just anecdotally sit in this weird place because. I am am obviously very privileged and grew up very privileged. But I also grew up with family members who were not. And at points in my life. Namely when my biological father had kidnapped me and we lived with nothing in California. Like I’ve I’ve I feel like I’ve been in and out of sort of different classes. And with that, for some of my cousins who have been in and out of jail and who now have small businesses because they can’t get jobs because of their records. I find that things like the cryptocurrency and the small business loans are and and I have a cousin who actually is went to Fort Valley to get his degree so that he can grow recreational cannabis. So I just anecdotally from my life and where I stand in my sort of in the the diversity of my Black family. Those things are getting at a class of folks that are really trying to be upwardly mobile. And I think those particular sets of policies can be very helpful. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: This is why I won’t go as far to say I think that what she put forward is bad. I don’t think that is not how I characterize it. I think those things are true and I think that it would be better for you or better for those people if they never got incarcerated in the first place. Right. Like that would actually be the–

 

De’Ara Balenger: Yeah. But–

 

DeRay Mckesson: I would–

 

De’Ara Balenger: But, but but it’s also like these people also, I can’t be supporting everybody financially. So I think the other thing is for me, it is good that things like this are happening now like I I completely agree. But I think my mind always goes to like, how is this going to change my every day? And at what point can I buy a house instead of borrowing money out to people? 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Yeah yeah, but I think it I don’t know if that’s a I so again, I’m not this would be a different conversation if I was like, what she put forward is bad. I’m saying that, you know, when I think about the boys in the jail that I was just talking to, they can’t even process cryptocurrency because they’re like–

 

Kaya Henderson: Yes. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: I’m just trying to, like. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Yes. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Get out. You know what I mean? 

 

Kaya Henderson: Yeah. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: They like, a housing loan feels crazy to them because they literally are like, I don’t know when I’ll see, you know, one of the things the jail asked me was DeRay, do you know anybody at Lyft? Because their their parents and families can’t drive to come see them at Christmas because there’s no public transportation. They don’t have cars. Like, they are, you know, like the things they’re trying to solve for are way they can’t even get to crypto, they can’t get to a housing loan. And I think that it’s more of those people than the people who have all of the things working in their favor when they get out and can’t even access. And I think about myself as pretty privileged and I don’t even know what crypto is. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Even the entrepreneurship piece is a jump, right? Without without the trai– entrepreneurship is hard as who knows what. Let me tell you about it firsthand. And even if you know formerly incarcerated people have the aspiration to be entrepreneurs, the training, the support that that needs to be in place for them to be successful feels like it is missing from the it feels like there’s a jump and we need to fill that gap. I mean, I looked at it in the same way and I was like, there’s a certain class of people. I felt like Myles was in my head, but I felt like my cousins were in my head too. Like, I think that this does not address working class Black men as much as it might how about that. And I literally was just sort of saying, where do working class Black men see themselves in this? What do we need to do to make sure that they actually do see themselves in this? Um. And I’m not saying that they see themselves in in Mr. Trump’s platform, except he keeps on saying that he’s that things are going to be better under him. And they have a reminder of those checks with his name on them. And so I think we have to start talking about the more base level things that people are struggling with in the economy if we are going to reach Black men. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: A, I think everybody is right to me. I mean, not that I’m the judge. [laugh] I’m like everything that everybody says is like like ringing really true to me. And even when I read, um I can’t I don’t know who actually said this quote, but it’s said been said so many times that [clearst throat] that it’s really the polls versus the couch like uh and I and I kind of have dabbled in in in trying to alert people that there is like this wave of red pilled Black men in conservatism. And I’ve and and if I have, I’m apologizing now, but I might have like overrepresented how many Black men are like voting for Trump, you know, and how many Black men are underneath Trump? Like, you know, Black men are still a very, like, loyal demographic to the Democratic Party and still ahead of white um, still ahead of white men and Latino men. So I never want to make it, sometimes just when you’re in media, it just could become so sensational. And I never wanted to be a part of sensationalizing something. But I did want to alert that there is a huge group of um people who feel underrepresented. I was talking to my therapist and I’ve and and and just as I’ve been talking to my therapist and one of the things that they presented to me, what she presented to me was uh your, do you feel forgotten? Like she she did something where she kind of put me in the class of the people that I’m usually trying to speak towards or critique. And she was like, well, you didn’t graduate college. Well, you’re working class you’re you’re from a single working mother. You’re you you had a suicide attempt. Um. Like, you have all these different things. And she really said, I think that you’re advocating for yourself mainly. I think maybe because you’re gay or queer that you think you’re not advocating for yourself, but you are and that like, you know, of course I was crying, but I was able to say, yeah, I understand it because I feel forgotten too. I feel like if it wasn’t for this performance of class and intelligence that I’m able to do and not just performance, I am I am intelligent and I do have nice things. But because of because of that performance, I’m able to be in relationship with Black people of different class. But I find myself constantly, constantly frustrated because it’s like talking to and I’m sure everybody’s had, every I’m sure everybody on this call has had the experience of talking to somebody who’s maybe a multimillionaire, maybe close to a billionaire, and they just feel disconnected. It’s like sometimes I’ll have that kind of experience with Black people who are just in the upper middle class. And I’m like, I, like people are suffering. You know, people are really not doing well. And even these um narratives around the economy and saying the economy’s doing well, corporations are doing well, I where I live right now and I see these Black men, I have Black men who come to me in um send me an Amazon package and then I order something from DoorDash and it’ll be the same Black man. And then I’ll call a Uber because I can’t drive, because queer people don’t drive. And I get a Uber and they’ll be [?] my Uber too. So now Black Black men and working class Black men are overrepresented in exploiting their time and labor through these corporations and and still not making enough money and still not getting ahead. And I feel and I feel that weight, too. And luckily, I’ve been able to [?] to work, and seduce my way into work that really helped me. But it’s hard. And if you don’t have that, and if you don’t have that class performance and if you don’t have the friends that I have and the network that I have, I don’t, I don’t I it would not it would not surprise me that you would choose the couch, you know, and I think that’s one of the reasons why the Obama thing really upset me and really bothered me because Obama is the exact representation of the upwardly mobile negro who went to Harvard, who somehow is disconnected from other class of negroes. That was long child, sorry. Y’all can send me y’all invoice. [laughing] 

 

De’Ara Balenger: Can I actually jump in with actual. I just want to read a couple of things from because I think we’re also making a lot of assumptions, not–

 

DeRay Mckesson: We read it! 

 

De’Ara Balenger: –actually knowing what the pa– I read some pillars. Let me read deeper into it. So there are a couple of things. One, because it’s also like. Realize that now when we’re talking about they, like we’re talking about me. And I think that’s the thing that we don’t do enough is like actually humanize the human beings that are doing particularly the Black folks that are working their asses off to make sure that things are more expansive and more and and go a little bit deeper and that are thoughtful and that this rollout is thoughtful. So it’s just. I think it’s just I would appreciate some grace. I’m just going to say that. And that’s like for the world. Um. [computer sound] But some of the things here are expanding access to bank accounts. Um. And she will go after banks that slap on hidden fees for basic services. Predatory lenders. Um. What else? Um. Breaking down unfair and unnecessary, unnecessary barriers to employment for Black men. Knowing that Black men are disproportionately shut out of the job market based on their criminal records and credit scores, she believes that employers should consider a jobs candidate a candidate’s qualifications first. She will work with Congress to require a business to limit the use of unnecessary, unnecessary criminal arrests, histories, convictions and credit scores in the employment decisions. Uh and that’s related to 37 states in 150 cities led by Republican and Democratic governors, actually believe the same thing. It’s just a matter of turning that on. Um. And then, Myles, you know, to your point, enabling Black men and other workers to profit when company executives profit. So right now, Black employment rates are at all time highs. But too few Black Americans own assets that build wealth over time. So has a plan, she has a plan to help Black men own more assets by reforming our current tax laws to reward employer participation. So that goes to the corporate sort of greed section of it all, trying to open that up. And then it just goes deeper into like these oh here’s another one um providing more pathways for black men to become teachers and school leaders. Only 1% of public school teachers are Black men. Vice President Harris will build a pipeline of Black male teachers, including including by investing in programs under the Department of Education, which Trump wants to eliminate. So there’s a whole there’s like four more paragraphs after the education piece. So it goes y’all it goes on and on and on and on and on and on. 

 

Kaya Henderson: So I think this is a really important point. Um. A couple, two things that that makes me think. One, thankful to have you on De’Ara, where you know, you can take us past the headlines. But I think it’s also instructive to the to the campaign to really press on. The press is covering the college educated stuff, even the teacher thing. You got to have a degree in order to be a teacher. And in fact, the message that we need to be pumping right now is what we’re doing for working class Black men. So to me, when people like us who are predisposed to be supportive don’t see working class, I think that’s a message to the campaign that says we got to lean harder on the things that she’s doing. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: Kaya, when you see we need more Black male teachers, who are those Black male teachers going to be for? We have to cover the swath of– 

 

Kaya Henderson: Yeah yeah. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: –Black people. 

 

Kaya Henderson: But I think I think you have to have a message that is is not for the swath of Black people, because you already have Black men whose–

 

De’Ara Balenger: I agree. I agree.

 

Kaya Henderson: –loans have been forgiven, whose whatever, whatever. We are talking right now about the difference between 72% of Black men turning out for Kamala, which is not so helpful, and 90 something percent. And that difference is in the working class folks. And it is great that I actually think it’s beautiful that our policies cover the swath. I’m just talking about messaging right now in these last 20 something days. The message has to be for the least, the last, the lost, the people who are choosing their couch over the people who are choosing her. And what you’re telling us is she has a message for those people. And I’m just saying, lean on this message. Amplify that message. That is the thing that is going to win. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Well, what I actually was going to say, the thing that I think creates the most distance for me is that this administration has done historic stuff. I mean, I’m blown away. I think about like just on criminal justice alone, there is no administration in American history who has held police departments accountable like this one. It’s incomparable. Obama was the standard before what they have done past the Obama administration. And something that I would yell, I mean, it is truly there is no comparison, I think, about what this administration did to um increase the amount of food stamps. They brought back, you know, the under the Clinton administration, we got rid of Pell Grants for people incarcerated. Who brought it back? Biden and and Kamala, you when you when you get incarcerated, you get kicked off Medicaid and you can’t even enroll till you get out of prison so people don’t enroll. Biden and Kamala made it so you can enroll while you are incarcerated and you’re about to get relief I mean. They have done some stuff.

 

Kaya Henderson: How come you how come you aren’t the press secretary DeRay because that’s what people need that’s what they need to be talking about. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: This is the stuff that I even do you remember all those stories about um when people went to go do um get their houses appraised and the people were being racist against Black people? HUD released guidance against that. You know, like they have done so much about race that actually I that’s where I’ve [?]. I’m like, y’all are doing it. You did it it’s [?]. And you know if we if Kamala is going to have to take the heat on Israel and Palestine at least yell from the rooftops about the stuff y’all did. You know, like that, I think is what I am a little confused by because I see these plans and I’m like, they have actually done stuff. The stuff that I’m an expert on, they have done stuff that people have been fighting administrations for 20 years to do, and they did it. They just did it. They did it. It is true. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Yeah, I think the other thing, too, and this is, you know, Vice President Harris in the Biden this is such a weird, unique election that she’s even like running and she’s only had three months. I think the other thing is hopefully and I don’t know why we just always get amnesia like it feels like, why are we talking about Trump again? Um didn’t we see that, you know, Hillary Clinton’s super predator comments really affected her campaign? I just wish that once this election’s done, there is for the next four years just consistent connectivity with this group of working class Black people, these working class Black men. So for the last month, we don’t have to do that because to me, my thing is, um De’Ara, you’re doing an amazing job, but you only got 30 seconds you know what I mean? [laughing]

 

De’Ara Balenger: Exactly. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: You know what I mean? 

 

De’Ara Balenger: Exactly.

 

Kaya Henderson: Wait, no, no, no wait, wait, wait, wait. But to to DeRay’s point. This is not new for the vice president. I was reading that she has been doing work around Black men consistently over the last you know year or–

 

Myles E. Johnson: Yeah. 

 

Kaya Henderson: –[?] little while.

 

De’Ara Balenger: 20 years. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Okay. But I’m just saying that, like, including including bringing Black men to conversations, being in community with Black men and taking policy cues from them. But we don’t talk about that, that, you know, all I hear from the Trumpsters are Kamala Harris hasn’t done anything while she was vice president. Actually, she has an impressive record of continued focus on these very issues. But we have to tie this new agenda to the fact that she has been doing this work. And this is not new, like this connection between all of the things that have been done and what is and now she’s doubling down in these last 20 days. That’s the narrative. Not that this is not she ain’t new to this, she’s true to this. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Yeah. I think all of that is a connectivity issue. Like if you’re doing something. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Yeah, yes. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: And the people who you’re doing it for don’t know, there is this we’re not doing it. [banter]. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Yes. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: You know, we’re not doing it. I don’t know if I if I’m in my household and I’m cleaning every day and somehow my kids or my partner don’t know who cleaning I’m like oh that [laugh], I’m not there’s information loss. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: And and hopefully this week, like, I’d love to get y’alls perspective next week just to see if you felt like any of this has moved has has felt differently or shifted because there’s a lot of Black thought and push into how things are getting out a little bit differently and more effectively. So hopefully that happens um and it starts to feel a little bit different this week. 

 

Kaya Henderson: I had to to that point, I will say things have been feeling different, like things this is a very different race than any one that I have ever observed. And so things are feeling very different um if that helps. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Is there something that I’m missing in the news that’s happened in this past week? Maybe I just misunderstood. I thought I heard you saying that something happened around a commentary about Israel and Palestine that she’s been getting push back from. So I thought she was getting pushback from the Black man in Israel and Palestine. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: I’m saying that, like Kamala is being held accountable for what the Biden administration is doing around–

 

Myles E. Johnson: Got it. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: –Israel and Palestine, and she is not the president. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Got it. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: And if that is going to be true, then she might as well take credit for all the things the administration has done as well. You know, I’m like,. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Right. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: And they have actually done historic things about race, now, I think and I’m not an insider on the campaign. I just know the people like shout out to our dear sis De’Ara, and so I think that they you know, I think that there seems to be a calculation that if they overplay if they overdo some of the race stuff, they might scare away the undecided voters or something like that. I don’t know. But I am what I’m saying, like as an expert on issues around policy and race, what this administration has done is legitimately historic. It is more than Obama could do because Obama did get a lot of pushback on race. So he did Obamacare. But, you know, as you know, he couldn’t he was sort of hamstrung after Obamacare. This administration’s done a lot. And it’s like if Kamala has to take the heat on Israel and Palestine and she is not the president. She did not appoint any of the secretaries of anything, then she might as well yell from the rooftops, even they just did a history. I mean, not just but they did a historic thing around maternal health care, like Black maternal health care. They did it, you know, like it is it is those sort of things that matter to families. That matters to a lot of people on the couch who don’t know. And Trump is out here lying. And so that’s annoying because Trump’s like, you know, do you want the Black person or the white person, like Trump, is being so insane. So that’s, you know, also not a helpful thing. But the Biden team, this administration has actually done a lot. That’s what I was saying. Does that make sense, Myles? 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Mm hmm. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: On to you Kaya.

 

Kaya Henderson: Well, my news actually is connected um to this work um in a very worrisome way. As many of us know, right after the murder of George Floyd, we saw what was considered to be the racial reckoning with all of these um prioritizations around supporting Black people, people of color um diversity, equity and inclusion programs, set asides, all kinds of things. Um. And one of the priority areas where we saw a significant amount of long overdue attention and resources was to the area around health disparities. And we saw money going to research to look at health disparities. We you know, we’ve covered on this podcast everything from the fact that, you know, Black women who have a um a Black obstetrician have less, less of a chance of dying and their and their children have less of a chance of dying um to issues around cardiovascular stuff, hypertension, high blood pressure, sickle cell, all of the things that beset us. Um. And there were tons of millions of dollars were awarded to investigate racism as a threat to public health. Um. And now they are asking the researchers to stop using the word racism. They’re asking researchers to um to pull back on their research. In fact, a growing a growing number of U.S. institutes that were created to investigate the connection between racism and health and the researchers who do that work are under attack and their funding is in peril. Just four years after the George Floyd murder. Um. At the American Academy of Dermatology, some members have proposed sunsetting all DEI programs. Um uh, researchers are being added to right wing watch lists for teaching about and researching the ways that racism affect health. Um. This anti-DEI movement, which we see not just in health care, but in education and corporate programs and housing and all of these things, has created a climate of fear. Um. And now this work around health disparities is at significant risk in the same way that there is a um a legal group that’s going after all of the racial preference programs. There is and a legal group called America First Legal. They have um professed that they will defend merit, defeat racism, and demolish DEI. And so they are pursuing the litigation strategy that we’ve seen work um well, frankly, for any kinds of racially prioritizing programs. They are threatening the funding of medical schools that have trainings that include explicit bias. They are fighting against what they call divisive trends in the medical community. They say things like racism doesn’t belong in science. When we have tons and tons of data um that show that actually there are very disparate impacts. In fact, the Cleveland Clinic was hit with a complaint um saying that two programs illegally discriminate on the basis of race, the minority stroke program and the minority men’s health center. Um. What huh? And so it feels they they also have they also have these watch lists where they, quote unquote, “expose scholars” who discriminate against conservative students and advance leftist propaganda in the classroom. Um. They they have what they call the woke wagon, which is the searchable database of political appointees in federal agencies. And these people, you know, are advocating for colorblind science when colorblind science has killed more Black people probably than anything else that I can think of and these institutions are being held hostage because their research is compromised. And you know when we see things like the vice president’s health initiatives targeted towards Black men, you can believe that’s going to be one of the first places that these folks go to try to attack her agenda. And I brought this to the podcast because it just is so insidious that, you know, this is not just about pushing DEI back. This is about killing people. Like people die when the health does not recognize the differences between us. We have data on data, on data, and the simple fact that, you know, these folks are trying to cut us off physically. They are trying to cut us off economically. They’re trying to cut us off educationally. We’re trying to make sure that we don’t have food and shelter and housing like this feels. This is like I mean attacking health care that is able to meet people’s needs for thriving and longevity and survival just feels um if people don’t understand what is at stake in this election. I don’t know how to make it any plainer than things like this, so I brought it to the podcast because I wanted to know what you all thought about that. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: And just to say we’ve never had colorblind science, we’ve only experienced white supremacist science. And I think to be able to see um that the social, political, racial identities that people are influencing, how people are living their life and gender and sexuality, the ways that people people’s identities are influencing their life is is it is having real results. The one thing that’s weird because, you know, I watch too much conservative stuff and it makes my head hurt. But I remember partly because I’m very young, but I remember where a lot of things around mind and stress and emotional health connected to your um connected to your physical health, were just seen as pseudo sciences and I’ll watch conservative things and of course liberal leftist things that will really um just say it like as a matter of fact, like now we know that stress and things that happen to your body and all these different things um influence your your physical, your physical well-being. So when I hear these plans, it’s almost to me and, you know, I use very hyperbolic language, but not really. It almost it feels like like a violent attempt. It feels like a genocidal attempt. It seems it’s one of those times where I feel like things are trying to be put into law or codified in order to kind of commit this like legal, like genocide, because you know that your emotional well-being and what and your social well-being affects your physical health. So somebody’s studying how race does that is just studying science. You we know we know this. So you trying to take it away to me feels like a request to disappear Black folks, you know, like in in all of these little pop up things don’t matter if it’s the public school system. Whatever it is, it always just feels like a way to legally kill Black people. 

 

Kaya Henderson: And it’s not just the effects of racism, which there’s tons of of evidence on that, but it’s also like the environmental factors that Black people experience because of policy decisions made about our communities. It is also the fact that there are not enough Black doctors who are able to um relate to and serve their people differently. You know, we’ve talked on this podcast about the lack of Black medical schools turning out, you know, doctors and nurses and stuff. And so like it is, it is the cumulative effect of this, Myles. I feel it I like I read this thing and I was like, yo, these people are trying to kill us for real. Like, I don’t know any other way to think about this. It was jarring to me.

 

Myles E. Johnson: That reminds me of the biochemical thing. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Yes. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Um. Auntie Kaya, [?] in Atlanta. And that just in just in Conyers, there was um a chemical fire, and it was and if you’re not familiar with Conyers in Georgia, it is a very Black neighborhood. Um. And it skews older. And this sounds folded into that like these chemical labs, these things that can be disastrous for health and have been disastrous for health are usually placed in Black neighborhoods. So this feels folded into that, too. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Yeah. The what I’ll say is um and this is really a message to the organizers because everything else just exhausts me, is that I every time I talk to non activists and organizers, I’m reminded how much work we have to do to help people just know what’s happening. That like people don’t you know, I’ll I’ll bring up the jail because I was just there is that you would think that people who have had very first hand experience with incarceration would know things about the carceral system. They don’t. Right? Like they there’s like this whole I think about my dad who has he has he grew up in a world that was way more racist than this one. And still, I’m tell I’m talking to him about examples of structural racism and he’s like, no way, DeRay, That’s crazy. Like, there’s like a we got to help people see this stuff. And I do think that it is so crazy that people believe that it’s like a little conspiracy that like, they it feels so far fetched to a lot of people that they can’t imagine that all of it is actually true. And that is actually our work to keep reminding people how tgis. So when I think about the whatever that little thing is you put your finger in to like measure your blood, I mean, you measure your oxygen. I couldn’t never remember what it’s called. But the fact that that thing doesn’t pick up brown skin matters, right? And that’s the example I used to people, being like it just doesn’t scan your skin. [laugh] Like so and your reading is wrong. Not because you have high blood pressure because it can’t see your finger. That’s crazy. But I do, my call to the organizers and activists is to, like continue to tell the message so that people understand it because the right is playing dirty, dirty games. I mean, they playing at a whole different level. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: I think that the only thing I would add is that I think this is why it is important to have someone in the White House who is truly a champion around these issues and can make them work with Congress to to get them made into law, and particularly somebody who’s a litigator and who has a history of going after sort of bad actors like this. I don’t know if you all have anyone in mind, but it would be great if we had someone like that. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: So my news is about Anchorage. And I you know, De’Ara was a former prosecutor. Some of the prosecutors are good people. I’m not even against prosecutors in general. Like, I get it. Um. But in Anchorage, who knew that there are so few prosecutors that they can’t prosecute anything? And in Anchorage, the reason I’m bringing it up, that was even surprising to me, that I’m sort of like in favor of hiring more prosecutors. Is that Anchorage has the highest rate of domestic violence in the country. And there are countless examples that ProPublica, um ProPublica went through. It’s a ProPublica article. Oh. I got it wrong. Not just the highest rate of domestic violence. It is uh Alaska is the highest rate of women killed by men. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: Killed by men. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: So not just violence, it is murder. And I say that because in Anchorage there are no prosecutors. So there are all these cases of like um domestic violence that have been reported. There’s not even a restraining order, DUI, like all this stuff. And there just is no accountability. And I think, you know, those of us that consider ourselves the far farther left, we can acknowledge there should be some accountability, though putting everybody in a jail cell probably is not the best way to do that. And I was just shocked by this. I had never I you know, the stories that I normally see is no public defenders. There’s no defense da da da. But the reason I bring it here is that I’m actually it is a it is a clarion call that we have to do something about the courts. There’s one push about the courts that we already know. Clarence Thomas was in debt. The right bailed him out. The Supreme Court justices have been crazy. You know they didn’t, the Trump White House stopped the investigation into one of the Supreme Court like so we know we hear about the Supreme Court a lot, but these local courts are both a mess over over saturated with cases. We are either prosecuting too many people, my staff and the public defender’s office. But in this case, who knew is no prosecutor. So it is a free for all. And the consequences around women being abused was so big that I was actually just shocked about it. So I wanted to bring it here. 

 

Kaya Henderson: This was fascinating to me um because it made me think a lot about teacher shortages because that’s my sort of part of the world. And, you know, when you don’t have teachers, then there’s nobody in front of a kids classroom. In this case, when you don’t have prosecutors and you can’t bring the case within 120 days, then the case gets thrown out and the defense lawyers have gotten hip to this. And so they are calling for you know, they’re calling for a trial within 120 days. And there’s no way that you can make that happen. And so these cases just get dismissed. And in thinking about how they are going about solving the problem, they’re taking a long term approach, which is we need to increase the salary of these folks so that we can attract more folks um to the thing. But they you need a short term strategy and a long term strategy. So the short term strategy is that they they could hire contract prosecutors, but it takes 30 to 60 days to train them. Right. Okay. That’s less than 120 days that it takes to to bring the case. Right. And they’re like, that’s too long to train the people. So we’re just going to increase the the salaries and hope to attract more people. Attract who? All of the amazing prosecutors sitting around on Prosecutor Island just waiting for you to find them? No, like, that’s not how this works. You got to go out and do something to solve your short term problem while at the same time you’re working on the long term problem. So that was one thing that struck me. The other thing that struck me is, could you imagine being a woman? I mean, this this article told story after story about women who were beaten, how one man called the police on himself and said, I just beat my wife. And they got there the lady was bloody and whatnot. He said, you all took a long time. She could have been dead by now. And that man is walking free because they couldn’t do it. How do I feel as a woman if I if I do the things that I’m supposed to do to stop domestic violence happening in my house? And there’s literally nobody to my my man walks back out? Like this seems like a humongous betrayal. And I don’t I don’t know anything about the domestic violence sort of advocacy space, but this seems like a place where we should all sort of turn our attention to, given the the piece about the murder of women. Right, that the domestic violence advocacy field should turn their attention to and figure out how we support these women, even if it is just building alternatives, short term alternatives for them to go to. Because in Anchorage, where are you going to go? Where are you going to go when your when the person who is abusing you is let out, is let out? Not even in jail because these are misdemeanors? It is scary. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: My idea for Anchorage is to work with the Department of Justice and get y’all some of those prosecutors. They don’t go to trial. They’re just sitting in their offices. [laugh] Pushing paper. Um. And those some of those prosecutors should could go to Anchorage and do details there. And we would do when I was at the State Department and we were doing, believe it or not, criminal legal system reform in other parts of the world. We would take, you know, federal prosecutors, attorneys, etc., to different places to help either reform criminal procedure codes or help um make laws either sort of more efficient, more stringent, particularly in Kenya, we helped to build um the laws around rape there. But all that to say there are– 

 

Kaya Henderson: There are deployable people. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: Exactly. That that that is a, you know, sort of a crew of people that could be helpful to you or prosecutors and one of the things we did, too, was partner with um with Beau Biden in Delaware when he was attorney general and got some of his attorneys to help us in places in Eastern Europe. So there are ways to do this. Anchorage, holler at me. I can help ya’ll figure it out. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: It does make me just wonder what’s going on there, you know? So like, even when it comes to prosecutors and and and prisons and abolition and and all that, it’s like very like a, obviously it’s it’s it’s a weird place, so by the time you get there in the conversation usually it’s a way flatter, binary conversation because the effects of the society have already taken place. So this person obviously needs some type of accountability and the accountability of the system that we have right now is a, you know, jail and prison. Right. Right? But like I’m interested in, I didn’t get to like. So excuse me if this is answered in the article, but I’m interested in the jobs that these men have because I know that uh he in a lot of states, domestic violence cases and police, they coincide. They they they they they they overlap. So I’m interested in the job that these men have. I’m interested in like the class the the how just I’m just interested in a lot of things that are making up that society in that culture that’s producing like this behavior. And I’m always going to be interested in that because it’s a it’s just those are just scary, scary, scary statistics. It’s just horrifying, you know, and not just domestic violence, but murder. And and it makes me wonder what is the culture there that’s producing those men and we and and not to say it’s just there. Because obviously America has a violence and a patriarchy and a and quite frankly, a murder and domestic violence problem, bu. Yeah. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: And I would say in cases like this, Myles, where it can be as simple as when you think of prosecutors and jails and prisons and all that, it is very linear Um. But it when it comes to domestic violence, it’s usually a lot of it. And not that it works perfectly because it doesn’t, but a lot of it more is about like diversionary programs and how to get folks the help that they need. And so I think that could be something that could be helpful ultimately. But I do think I think you’re right there, it’s something deeply, deeply. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: But, you know, I’m a little purple when it comes to once you start once you start hitting people and stabbing. I don’t I’m not as far left and deep blue as you would think. I’m like, [?] nigga, you might have to go to jail. I don’t know. I don’t know. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: But I think to your but I think that–

 

DeRay Mckesson: Myles. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: That is it is. I think it’s a question though of what’s happening there. And what if this is something that’s not happening? Because you think the way are, you know, American culture is set up in these here United States is that, you know, there’s always a system to incarcerate. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Right. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: So. 

 

De’Ara Balenger: Right. If that’s not set up, what else in terms of services and infrastructure is missing in a place where women are dying at these rates, it’s just and violently. It’s it’s wild. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Because these are um like uh excuse me if I sound crass, but these are like poverty crimes. Like like I like usually these type of crimes are happening by people who are living certain types of lives. That’s just often this way it ends up like what I what I’ve noticed and from what I’ve read that’s been the common case that uh the less money a household has, the more prone to drugs and violence like it is. So I just think that that’s just something to to lift the hood on too but. Once you start swinging and [?].

 

Kaya Henderson: In Anchorage, it seems to be equal opportunity because one of the people that they called out was the head of the juvenile incarceration system in Anchorage who elbowed his girlfriend in the nose and broke her nose and whatnot. And so and and he got he was dismissed as well. And there’s no consequence to him in his job or anything like that. So apparently–

 

But he’s in the police system, you said?

 

Kaya Henderson: He is. He yes, he is. Basically, the warden is the superintendent of the juvenile incarceration facility in Anchorage. So my guess is that he is more upper class or at least upper middle class and not poor. And, you know, he’s throwing [?], too. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Yeah. Well that well that tracks. They say that um I would never I think it might have literally been DeRay like who educated me on that and got me deep deeper into it around um police, uh policemen and people who are apart of–

 

Kaya Henderson: In law enforcement. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: In law enforcement. Thank you. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: There are two studies that have found that around 40% of police families experience domestic violence. So. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Yeah. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: The stereotype around low um low income is, doesn’t hold up when we think about certain groups. But Myles close us out. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: So you know, tens of you which is a lot for me. Tens of you have reached out about my interview last week um regarding [laughing] Herb um from The Stylistics and I’m so excited about it. And I woke up this morning and I was like, you know what? Now that I have everybodys, everybody excuse me everybody’s attention around great uh soul bands from the ’70s, because I that was just my last incarnation apparently. I wanted to queer it because that’s what I do. So I wanted to talk about the Dynamic Superiors. Um. Dynamic Superiors are really an interesting group that were peers of groups like Heatwave and Enchantment and The Stylistics. And what made them unique was Tony Washington. Tony Washington was the lead singer and he was a flamboyant, queer man, and he sung in a high falsetto. If you close your eyes, you would think you were listening to Sylvester. But those harmonies and the production of it is um Motown. But just as you know it uh that their first two albums came out in 1975, so that little pocket in 1975 into the ’80s, that’s when R&B started getting a little weird and strange and uh the sound started getting a little bit more interesting. So they live in that little beautiful pocket of kind of classic Motown soul, but still things that feel a little a little off the beaten path. And, you know, Tony, Washington was off the beaten path. If you soul train youtube him like I do, you will find Tony Washington in some outfits of all outfits, not something unlike you would see me in a little square on this podcast, uh flowy, bouncy, hair done, makeup on. And the reason I wanted to bring this on was not just because I um interviewed a founding member of The Stylistics last week, but also because I think sometimes when we think about queer Blackness, we think of it as a new thing publicly. And uh, you know, the queer agenda and the gay agenda is just and now it’s everywhere. And I like to show evidence that there’s always been Black queer people, specifically visible Black queer people meaning people who you can look at them and you can tell that they are a sissy. Um like moi, and you can be able to be able to see that very clearly. We’ve always existed and we’ve always been fighting for our spot on the main stage. So if you didn’t know who the Dynamic Superiors were I wanted to put that in your ear because you can press play on that album and when I tell you your hips will move, your shoulders will shimmy, your head will rock, You will try to harmonize with Tony Washington and you will quickly learn that you don’t have that falsetto. And it’s a great, great, great um it’s just a great album. It’s a great group. And I thought that what better way then um to follow up what happened last week with The Stylistics and them being at Carnegie Hall in da da da da da. Then put a spotlight on a soul group from that era that hardly gets the same recognition. Um. This is I think any time I get a chance, I get to talk I talk about Dynamic Superiors. Um. I wrote about them for AfroPunk. I’ve talked about them on a podcast when I’m asked about queer Black music. Uh. I talked about them when I was talking about Sylvester. Any time any time I get a chance to shine the light on them for any reason, I do it because, you know, it happens brick by brick. And every brick is not the brick on the door that everybody sees, but all the bricks of Black culture and music matter. Okay, maybe this caffeine’s kicking in. That was good. Um. So [laughter] I was like– [banter]

 

Kaya Henderson: If you should say so yourself. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: I was like, that that brick line that was I was like Tony talked through me. But that was not me. [laugh] Um. So, yes, so I wanted to give you all that. And do you have any great soul memory, soul soul memories that bring you that warm, fuzzy feeling? I know Auntie Kaya is in Vegas with the cigars and the and the white wine, so I know that she got [laugh] I know that she has to have some soul music that’s that’s feel good to play in the background. So um so, yeah. 

 

Kaya Henderson: This was a maroon five weekend, but that’s a different story. Um.

 

Myles E. Johnson: Well, well they stole. They [indistinct]–

 

Kaya Henderson: [?] Okay. All right, all right, all right, I’ll go with that. Um I this was really interesting to me. Thank you for bringing it. Never heard of of of this group. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: Dynamic Superiors. 

 

Kaya Henderson: Um never heard of Tony Washington. And they’re from Washington, D.C., which is where I live, and call home for the last 20 plus years. And usually in D.C., De’Ara, maybe you’ve heard of them? But like in D.C., I feel like there’s a very like big, like local music preservation thing. And so you hear about lots of people, and I’ve never heard about [?] these folks [?] De’Ara did you? Were you familiar with? 

 

De’Ara Balenger: Mmm mm. 

 

Kaya Henderson: With them? 

 

De’Ara Balenger: I wasn’t I wasn’t Kaya. But to your point, it looks like um in this summer, there was an exhibition exhibition that um basically was a Motown DC exhibition, and it was in Anacostia, and I can’t believe we missed it, but if we had gone, we would have found out about the Dynamic Superiors.

 

Kaya Henderson: One of the things that was interesting to me about this article is that like they tried they tried to like put them in the Motown machine, right? Like they gave them Ashford and Simpson and Holland from Holland-Dozier-Holland, and they did all of the things. And somehow or another the machine did the like the machine that they created for the mainstream did not work with this particular group. Why? Because everything don’t work for everybody. And you got to I mean, they were unique and you had to find a different way to bring them to the mainstream. The article that you put um Myles in to to accompany this was how was from AfroPunk and was about how Tony Washington was a man ahead of his time and how lonely it must feel to be doing all of the things that would later be heralded. But people can’t appreciate in the moment. And that like that transcends music for me, that’s about leadership. That’s about like all kinds of creative endeavors, that is and it made me stop and think that like, so much of this is not just about the art, but like it is about life. And and so, you know, poor Tony Washington, who was not appreciated during his time at the level that he you know um is now, but thank you for continuing the legacy, Myles, and helping us stay abreast of our champions and our geniuses. He was a Black genius before his time. 

 

Myles E. Johnson: That AfroPunk article was by me by the way. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Yeah I was learning. I will tell you, I texted my father being like, Dad do you know um, do you know the Dynamic Superiors? He said, [?] but he goes, No, you got me with that one. So uh.

 

Myles E. Johnson: Okay. [laughter]

 

DeRay Mckesson: So, you know, I’ve shared them with Calvin. Shout out to you, Daddy, and thank you for teaching me today. 

 

[AD BREAK]

 

DeRay Mckesson: Don’t go anywhere. More Pod Save the People is coming. 

 

[AD BREAK]

 

DeRay Mckesson: This week we welcome New York State Senator Zellnor Myrie on the pod to talk about his campaign to be the next mayor of New York City and his ongoing advocacy around issues like tenant protections, early voting, gun regulation. This is a long overdue conversation. I learned a lot. Here we go. The one and only. Mr. Zellnor Myrie, thank you for joining us today on Pod Save the People. 

 

Zellnor Myrie: Uh. It’s great to be here. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Let’s start with your work in public service. What made you first run for office? Did you, like, grow up as a kid, you were like, I want to be in office one day or did something happen that caused you to think that this was the most important way to be in the work? 

 

Zellnor Myrie: Yeah. So I certainly didn’t grow up with any public service ambition. Certainly not in politics. I’m the son of two immigrants that were factory workers. So my mom came here from Costa Rica, my dad from the same and they both worked in factories in Brooklyn when we used to have more factories there. My dad went on to become a public school teacher, taught special education in the Bronx. And my mom became a nurse, became a small business owner, and they sent me to public schools in central Brooklyn. I grew up on Flatbush. Went to elementary school in Crown Heights. Then I went to Brooklyn Tech for high school, went to Fordham University for undergrad. I was a big public transit person. I remember getting on the B43 down Empire Boulevard as a kid and thought I was a big grown up uh and only to later found out my mom was riding in a car behind the bus to make sure that I was good. But the community, the community raised me and I was a beneficiary of afterschool programs. I was in something called the Crown Heights Youth Collective. I was in the public libraries so my mom would ensure that I was staying after school. And so by the time I got to law school, I went to Cornell for law school. I did have a sense of indebtedness to the people who would come before me. And so in law school, I did a number of things in the public service vein. I worked at a law firm once I graduated, did a lot of pro bono work there. Um. But then in 2016, when Donald Trump was elected president, this coincided with Democrats in New York who were elected as Democrats, caucusing with Republicans and giving them the numerical majority in the state legislature. That had real consequences for people like my mom, who lived in a rent regulated apartment and where Albany controlled the rent regulation laws. We had Democrats that were given the Republicans this majority denying them the progressive legislation that they needed in order to be better in life. So I decided that I was going to step up at that point because my community, the same teachers that gave me the education that allowed me to go to law school, the same directors of programs that helped me in after school, they depended on Albany representation to do the right thing. So I stepped up. I ran in 2018. I beat an incumbent that everyone said, you can’t beat him. He actually happened to be a former staff member of the current mayor. He was a member of this rogue set of Democrats. We took him on against all the odds. We won. And that’s why I’ve been doing my public service for close to seven years now. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Woop woop. Now, what is what is it like being an assemblyman? Is it is it what you thought it would be when you got there? Was it crazier than you thought it would be? Was it easier to make change than you thought it’d be like? You know, I think most of our listeners, uh it is sort of a black box, like what happens in the statehouse to people? 

 

Zellnor Myrie: Yeah. So being in the state Senate is both what I thought it would be and also a lot of stuff that I did not anticipate. There are some personal things that you never anticipate when you get elected and certainly when you get elected at the age that I did, I was 31. You know, there’s some things that you surrender to to public service. You know, you go in going out to the bodega or taking the train because I still take the train every single day and I’m riding, you know people are coming up to me and saying, Senator, what’s going on with the potholes or what’s going on with these particular issues? So that I don’t think I fully anticipated. But one of the things that I’ve been excited about and that I came to see was that if you work hard enough and if you are focused on the job, you can actually make some pretty big changes. And so the very rent regulation laws that I was telling you about, where I for, if not for them, I would not be where I am today. We were able to pass some of the most sweeping housing legislation in this state’s history, and we did that in my first year. I chaired the elections committee in the state Senate and we passed early voting in New York in 2019. It was the very first bill that we debated. The very first bill passed with this new majority. And since then, I have been able to pass close to 100 changes to the election law, what we could do around gun safety, what we can do around reproductive health, about climate change. These are all things that the states have a lot of power to impact. And I’ve been proud of the work we’ve been able to do in that regard. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Now, we’re obviously going to talk about the New York City mayor’s race. But as a segue way there, you know, there is some, I think, confusion that people have around what is your power as a state senator, as somebody who gets to go to Albany in the state house, like what what can a state, one of the state guys do around the city and their role Like, you know, when people come up and complain about the subway to you right now as a state senator, are you just like, hey, I have an email? The people because I can’t do nothing about potholes or the NYPD like what does that look like? 

 

Zellnor Myrie: Yeah. So we have um uh a lot of jurisdiction on everyday things for individuals. So you mentioned the subway. For instance, you know, I take the subway every single day. The governor actually has a lot of appointees on the MTA board. And so the state legislature has a role in passing the capital budget. You ever waiting on a platform for a train that’s delayed ten minutes, 15 minutes. That’s probably because the signals are over a century old and it requires money for it to be upgraded. That’s a capital improvement that the state legislature can allocate money for and fight for and is, in fact, something that I did. One of the things I think people don’t fully appreciate is that in the face of national inaction on a particular issue, whether that’s voting rights or whether that’s gun safety, the state legislatures can actually step up and provide help in that gap. I’ve done that on two fronts. One on gun safety. You know, I grew up in central Brooklyn where gun violence was a reality for far too many of us. And for a long time, the gun industry enjoyed immunity from litigation. So if you are a victim or if you are a survivor and because of a lack of procedure on a gun manufacturers part, you get injured or tragically killed. You had no legal recourse for this. And this is unique in the corporate ecosystem. I drafted a first in the nation law that said if you don’t put the procedures in place, if you’re not taking care of your product and ensuring that those illegal guns aren’t flowing into our communities, you could be held accountable. It was the first bill like that in the nation. But then other states followed. Eight other states now have that law on the books. We’re talking 30 million Americans that have this protection. And that is an example of how the states can step up when there is inaction on the federal level. I passed the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Act of New York, which was the strongest voting rights state level legislation in the entire country to provide protection after the Supreme Court gutted The Federal Voting Rights Act in 2013. So there’s a lot that can be done on the state level. And it’s why I’ve been pushing really hard since I got there. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Okay. Now let’s talk about New York City, there’s  a lot going on. There’s a lot going on right now. Now, why do you want to be the next mayor of New York City? What about the mayor’s role is do you think you can make a different type of change? Why would you not run for state senator or a statewide role again since that is your most recent experience? Uh what help us understand.

 

Zellnor Myrie: The I would not be who I am today without this city. And in the same way that my both of my parents came to this city 50 years ago for opportunity to come to a city where they could raise their family, where they could be successful. That same opportunity is lost on a lot of New Yorkers today, including myself. You know, I just got married last November. My wife and I went to the same–

 

DeRay Mckesson: Woop woop woop woop. 

 

Zellnor Myrie: Yeah yeah, you know, you know you know, my wife and I went to the same elementary school and we were in Crown Heights together. We have served the community and the prospect of us owning a home in central Brooklyn feels very far away. It feels almost unreachable. You know, we want to expand our family. And the average cost of childcare in this city is $20,000 per child. It’s getting too expensive to stay here. Our streets don’t feel livable. You talk about true public safety, opportunity. All of that seems lost. And instead of having solutions from city hall, we have had chaos and dysfunction. And this needs leadership in a time where we need folks to step up and do everything within the city’s power to ensure that we’re keeping New Yorkers here and allowing for them to prosper. So that’s why we have put our names forward, because we need things like afterschool for all. I told you I would not be here if I didn’t have an afterschool program. My mom, like most New Yorkers, did not get off at 2:30 or 3 p.m.. And we have an opportunity from City Hall to ensure that every kid in our education system, which is the largest in the entire nation, has the opportunity to be in a safe place after school, a place where they can build up their own pedagogy, their own courage, their own cultural competency. We can do big things like that in City Hall. We can build more housing that is affordable. We can have a path to middle class home ownership. We can solve crime instead of just responding to crime. These are things that I believe are uniquely within the province of City Hall, and that’s why we’re stepping up at this time. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: As you know, I’m an organizer and activist and I do police and and prisons and jails. Let’s talk about some of the specific issues. Where are you with regard to Rikers? 

 

Zellnor Myrie: Yeah. So, look, we have used Rikers as a institution to solve society’s ills, and it has been failing this city. We have sent individuals there who need actual help, who need a path to mental health recovery, who need really economic opportunity. And instead of focusing on giving them those resources before they interact with the system, we have instead tried to shovel everybody into a failing institution. So I agree with what is already on the books. It is a law that we should be moving to close Rikers so that we can be handling New Yorkers in a way that is positive. You know I have proposed a number of bills that look to build coalition to solve some of the root causes. I represent Central Brooklyn. There’s a block there that I have gone to on a number of occasions after shootings have happened. And I remember talking to one of the guys after a particular shooting on that block who said Z, because that’s what they call me in my district. They said, Z, do you think we want to be out here on this block? I just want a job, bro. Just give me some opportunity. And I just got fired from the job that I had in a kitchen down the block because they found out I had a record. So I said, let me figure out what I can do legislatively to get to the root cause of this. And we passed something called the Clean Slate Act that says if you have paid your dues, if you have served your time, if you are out and staying out of trouble, that we’re going to automatically seal those convictions. So you can apply for housing, you can apply for a job, you can get the opportunities that you need. So I think it’s solutions like that that we should be investing in and not just looking at carceral solutions to society’s problems. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: And I’m I’m sure that you’ve seen the ProPublica exposes at this point. I mean, there’s a lot going on so, you know, whew NYPD, you know, it’s a hard day when the police commissioner is getting raided and the next police commissioner gets raided. But I’m assuming you saw the reports around the stunning lack of accountability in the NYPD. That the police commissioner was routinely just literally dismissing or ignoring founding complaints of police misconduct. And what is your take on the accountability for the police department? 

 

Zellnor Myrie: You know, I think that we have been presented a false narrative, certainly in our politics um in the city, uh and in some instances on a national level as well. And that is that accountability cannot coincide with justice. And I have a real problem with this because, as you know, in the communities that look like you and I, we have to deal with twin illnesses. We have to deal with high rates of crime and high rates of overpolicing. You know, I myself, when I went out to protest, was pepper sprayed and arrested. And I had to go through the CCRB process where that was dismissed. And so I feel this in a personal way, but I also represent people like my mom, who was robbed at gunpoint with me in the elevator when I was very young and so her world view is informed by feeling safer when there are more cops around. So I have tried as best as I could in my representation to say the community is safer when we know that there is accountability when cops step over the line. We know that there are many people who put on that uniform and who have every single intention just to keep the community safe. That’s why they took the job. But we know that there are instances where individuals do step over the line. And thus far, we have not had, I think, enough accountability within the system. So I think that we have to be and it starts from the top. We have to be serious about both things that safety and accountability actually work in tandem. And we have to be serious about giving the CCRB the resources to ensure that that’s upheld. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: And what about um, you know, the rent is too damn high. I think everybody in New York City would say that that is true, that even the one bedrooms are 3K, 3500 and you know, people are spending a huge portion of their paychecks every month on not even great places to live, just trying to figure out what to do. What can the mayor do about that? 

 

Zellnor Myrie: Well, I think there are a couple of things. You know, this is the number one affordability crisis that I hear about is that people can’t afford to stay here and live here. And, you know, I was talking about my own personal story about us trying to figure out how we can lay down some roots in the very communities that we’ve made attractive in the first place. It’s going to take a couple of things. You got to build more. Of course, we have a supply issue here in the city. And so we have to build more housing, but we also have to utilize some of the city tools that have not been utilized. We have a little known city entity called the New York Housing Development Corporation. HTC and HTC, I think has the power to help with building, but not just building towers, building smaller units um that are more family friendly, that are more targeted for affordability for the middle class. Um. They can help be in multiple neighborhoods um and not just stacked in one. HTC has the capital to do that uh to support some minority and women owned businesses who are in the construction industry who want to be a part of solving this crisis. So that’s one avenue I think that we could use. We also have to loosen some of the restrictions to help convert some of the buildings that are no longer being utilized as high as they are now. So we see in our commercial real estate industry, there are places in midtown that post-pandemic are just never going to return to what they were in the past. We have an ability to convert that to residential so that we can have our young professionals be in some of those spots and freeing up some of the family, the two, three bedrooms so that people can stay there and raise their families. So there are a number of tools that can be used from city hall, but it requires, frankly, a focus on the nuts and bolts of government and having this be prioritized, not announcing this in the third year of your administration, but tackling this day one and in the first 100 days. And that’s something that I’d be excited to do. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Boom. Um another issue, you know, people clown de Blasio for a host of things. And, you know, I think a lot of us would be like, whew, this was that wasn’t what we got now is real rough. But one of the signature programs, if you recall, of the last administration was pre-K for all. And, you know, this administration has, you know, really screwed up pre-K for a lot of people and and has not been honest about screwing it up, which is really hard. What is your commitment, if any, to pre-K for all? 

 

Zellnor Myrie: Yeah, we have to not just support this program, but we have to expand it. We have we call this universal pre-K, universal three K, but we had families this year who put in their applications who were told from a press conference by the mayor that if you wanted a seat, you would have a seat. And then they got letters a month later saying, actually, we don’t have a seat for you or we have a seat for you that is too far away to make sense for you to go to work, drop your kid off and be able to pick them up. And so I think there has to be two things happening at the same time, a dedication to the philosophy that child care should be affordable for everybody. That we should provide this opportunity for everyone. And also being serious about the administrative nuts and bolts of achieving that. We know exactly where the applications came from. We know what exactly what the demand is and where that demand is coming from. It is incumbent on the city to then accomplish the matching of where that demand should be meeting the supply. And so I am very much in favor of us doubling down on pre-K and three K ensuring that child care is affordable, but also providing some of the other institutions that allow for child care activity like our libraries, to be open seven days a week. I thought it was ridiculous that this administration put our libraries on the chopping block because they not they don’t not only serve as a place where you go to get reading material, or you know, listen to music. I spent almost every day after school in the Flatbush Library doing my homework and being in a safe environment. A lot of folks depend on this during the weekend for places for them to go with their families. And so it’s about upholding the institutions that the public taxpayers support that allow for families to flourish in the city. I would be very much in favor of us uplifting all of those institutions. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: The last big policy question is around schools. As you know, biggest school system in the country, still the mayor mayoral control, unlike some other. I think, you know, I was the chief in capitol of Baltimore, the mayor does not control the school system in Baltimore. Very much sort of a board that does it. There so I’m interested in your plans for the school system. As you know, there are some schools doing very well in the city and some I taught in East New York, you know, which feels like [?] that was 17 years ago, feels like a long time ago, [?]. And there are some schools doing really well, some schools not doing well. So I want to know what you plan to, how you think about that. And then there was there’s been a lot of conversation about the specialized high schools and what do we do? Do we keep them or do we get rid of them? Like, what does that look like? 

 

Zellnor Myrie: Yeah. So I’m a product of a specialized high school. I’ll start with the second question first. I went to Brooklyn Tech for high school. It was a life changing experience for me. And the only reason I got into Brooklyn Tech was I had a math teacher in the seventh grade who said, I’m going to scrap the curriculum. And for the first couple of weeks I am going to equip you to do well on this test. And that’s what he did with the entire class. And we had a really high percentage of that class get into specialized high schools. And what that demonstrated to me was that our kids and all kids in these communities have the ability to be successful on this test, have the ability to succeed in specialized high schools, but they need the opportunity to do so, and they need to be equipped with the tools to do so. So I uh and really would like to focus on how we are equipping our children to be successful. My dad was a public school teacher, as I mentioned, and I think it is important for us to be supporting our teachers as much as we can as well. You know, I remember my dad talking to me on many instances about how he was paying for supplies out of pocket. And I know you know what that’s like. And I think that our supports for our educators need to be different. I also, as I mentioned at the top of this, we have we experienced a once in a century pandemic where we told our kids that we were going to educate you from home and that you had to log on to the Internet. But we had children that were in homes with no broadband and no Internet service. We had people that were just struggling overall. And so there was a significant amount of learning loss that happened over that period. And we still, I don’t think, know fully what the implications of that learning loss are going to be for our kids down the line. So it’s why I’m proposing after school for all, not just to provide relief for working families, not just as a public safety tool to keep our kids off the streets, but as a way to reinforce, even from a pedagogical standpoint, some of the learning loss that we’ve experienced over the past couple of years. And so I’d be excited to get the opportunity to do that. As a kid, that was um a product of the public schools. I’m a District 17 kid. I think it’s really important that we invest so that your zip code is not determinant of the quality of education that you get. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Boom, when I left teaching actually, I left to go start an after school center in Baltimore. [?]. 

 

Zellnor Myrie: Oh. Come on now. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: So shout out to after school for all. Um I do have a question. You know, one of the things that I find in the organizing world, is that we are telling people to vote. You know, there is a group of people who are sort of like, why does it matter? They’re like, you know, we’ve gotten the guy in there is crazy. We thought he was going to be one of our people. That turned out to be a mess that, you know, I don’t know what the mayors have done for me that sort of becomes this refrain where people are like, well, why does it? What would you say to people whose hope has been challenged that, like, if we get one of the good guys, then it can get better, which people are feel like they thought before and got let down. 

 

Zellnor Myrie: You know, I don’t fault anyone for having feelings about engaging in a system that has not been as responsive to them as it should be. We know that there have been injustices, that there have been failures on the part of our government, on the part of our leaders not addressing the issues that people care about most deeply. But I always implore people who are reluctant to engage and I say, look. If you don’t engage, other people will and their agenda will get enacted and you won’t have any shot at putting your needs to the forefront. I can’t defend every elected official. I can’t defend every person that has been engaged in the political system. But I can say that there were people that died for us to get this right. I have fought, I chaired the elections committee, and I know that historically this right has been suppressed. People have tried to remove us from this process. Post 2013, when the Supreme Court got rid of pre-clearance in Section five of the Voting Rights Act. Immediately, there were states, there were laws that were promulgated to suppress that vote. They wouldn’t be trying to take it away from us if it didn’t mean something, if it wasn’t a means for us to enact policies, that would be helpful. So I have, you know, done as best as I could, whether it is as chair of the elections committee or talking in my barbershop and saying, look, if you don’t engage, someone else is going to do it. Someone else is going to speak for you. And it’s important, even if you go in and you’re not voting for who everybody else is voting for. It’s important that there be a record that you showed up because if you do not show up, they’re not going to show up for you. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Boom. Last question is what’s a piece of advice that you’ve gotten over the years that’s stuck with you? 

 

Zellnor Myrie: I’ve gotten a lot of advice uh over the over the years. Every opportunity that I get to talk about this, I’m going to do it. And perhaps this is off topic, but take care of your mental health. Take care of your mental health. We do a lot of strenuous work, whether you’re inside or outside of politics, inside, outside of government. If you’re just doing your nine to five every single day. There’s a lot of stress in life. And unless we deal with that directly, unless you get some help with that and that looks different from for everybody. For me, that’s therapy and that is consistent therapy for other folks it’s something else. There’s something else that’s therapeutic. If you do not take care of your mental health, none of this stuff matters. None of it matters. It’s not more important than your mind. It’s not more important than your peace. It’s not more important than your family, your friends, your loved ones. So take care of your mental health, however that looks like for you. I can’t emphasize that enough. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Where do people go to get involved in the campaign to stay in touch with what you’re doing, is it Facebook, is it Twitter, TikTok? I don’t know what how do people get involved? 

 

Zellnor Myrie: Yeah. So I would encourage anybody that likes what you’re hearing if you want to learn more about us. Zellnor.NYC, Z-e-l-l-n-o-r dot NYC that has all the information about who we are, what our record is, how you can be supportive of the campaign. I would love for as many people to come check that out. You know, we’re trying to get towards a big fundraising deadline, so please come check us out, see what we’re about, and feel free to reach out and ask any questions. 

 

DeRay Mckesson: Boom well Zellnor, thank you so much for coming today on Pod Save the People. We consider you a friend of the pod and can’t wait to have you back. 

 

Zellnor Myrie: Thank you for having me. Looking forward to being back. [music break]

 

DeRay Mckesson: Well, that’s it. Thanks so much for tuning in to Pod Save the People this week. Tell your friends to check it out and make sure you rate it wherever you get your podcasts. Whether it’s Apple podcasts or somewhere else. And we’ll see you next week. Pod Save the People is a production of Crooked Media, it’s produced by AJ Moultrié and mixed by Evan Sutton. Executive produced by me and special thanks to our weekly contributors Kaya Henderson, De’Ara Balenger and Myles E. Johnson. [music break]

 

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