Abdul Wins, Establishment Whines | The Joy Reid Show LIVE!

Summary

The Joy Reid Show: "Abdul Wins, Establishment Whines" (August 6, 2026)

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Episode Overview

This live episode of The Joy Reid Show centers on the seismic upset victory of Dr. Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan's Democratic primary—an event Joy Reid and her guests describe as an "earthquake" in American politics and a pivotal moment for the future direction of the Democratic Party. The episode offers an in-depth analysis of the race, reactions from progressives and establishment voices, and the broader meaning of El-Sayed's win for movements fighting corporate PAC influence, especially AIPAC, and promoting a more robustly progressive platform. Additional segments explore intersections of race, economic justice, and historical context, notably drawing lessons from the civil rights movement. The show ends with an update on the Nolan Wells investigation and a report on the economic state of Black men and boys.

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Key Topics & Segments

1. Abdul El-Sayed’s Victory in Michigan: A Sea Change

Timestamps: 04:43–10:55

• Context: Joy Reid and her team covered the Michigan election results late into the night, focusing on the Democratic primary for U.S. Senate.
• Significance: El-Sayed, a Muslim Arab-American and progressive, overcame tens of millions in opposition spending (notably from AIPAC and corporate PACs), the state governor’s endorsement for his opponent, and deceptive ads suggesting Obama supported his rival.
• Joy’s Take:

  "Do not let anyone downplay the enormity of this victory... It literally is an earthquake that just took place not just in the state of Michigan, but inside of the Democratic Party.” [05:53]

• Details:
  • Michigan is not a typical blue state but a must-win swing state.
  • El-Sayed resisted exceptional institutional headwinds and became a new face for Democratic progressivism.

Quote – Abdul El-Sayed’s Speech

"People remember that a lot more than a thirty second ad played on a loop... It's an investment, sure, in a campaign, but it more is an investment in democracy." [06:35–08:44]

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2. Right-Wing Backlash and Establishment Democratic Discomfort

Timestamps: 09:28–14:10

• Conservative Reaction: Excerpts from Ted Cruz and J.D. Vance frame El-Sayed as a dangerous radical (“Islamist”, “communists hate America”), claims Joy debunks as projection and fearmongering.
• Democratic Establishment Angst:
  • James Carville, emblematic of the "Democratic leisure class," expresses disdain for Progressive influencers like Hasan Piker and left-populist candidates.
  • Joy and guests reflect on how the party’s leadership and donor class are threatened by the leftward surge—especially on issues like Israel, Medicare for All, and the Green New Deal.
• Bernie Sanders responds:

  “If [James Carville] doesn't want to be in my party—the party I belong to, that Piker belongs to, that Sayed belongs to—he can start his own party... I think we need a big tent.” [13:36–14:10]

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3. What Drove Progressive Victories Nationwide

Timestamps: 21:09–29:33

Guests:

• Maurice Mitchell (Working Families Party)
• Adam Green (Progressive Change Campaign Committee)

Key Points:

• The victory is part of a nationwide “wave” of progressive, independent, and insurgent candidates winning—not just in blue coastal states, but in purple areas and the Midwest.
• Voters are increasingly distrusting of corporate/PAC-backed candidates, especially those funded by AIPAC, crypto, and AI interests.
• Progressives are seen as authentic economic fighters.

Notable Quote – Maurice Mitchell:

“Every single time there's a victory, there's another spin... I think at this point we've seen independent insurgents who aren't taking corporate PAC money, who are rejecting AIPAC, who are calling a genocide a genocide and focusing on the interest of everyday working people, claiming the true reality... Those people are winning in all situations, in every single dynamic possible.” [23:08–25:18]

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4. Impact of Israel/Palestine Issues and AIPAC Money

Timestamps: 27:23–34:44

• Voters interviewed express outrage over candidates taking AIPAC money; willingness to cross traditional ideological lines to oppose "corporate" or “compromised” politicians—“I would vote for a communist first. I don’t want somebody that’s in somebody else’s pocket...”
• AIPAC’s influence is discussed as both a moral issue (support for Israel’s military actions in Gaza) and a symbol of foreign/corporate entanglement in U.S. politics.
• Adam Green and guests highlight how misleading, negative advertising funded by AIPAC can distort voter perceptions (e.g., “He attacked Michelle Obama!”).

Notable Quote – Adam Green:

“If we had lost because enough of those voters were deceived to vote against our own interests, we would look and be told we were fringe... we’re trying to bring an agenda that is popular with working people... And if Democrats knew what was good for them, they would listen to us and adopt a working people’s agenda.” [39:11–42:02]

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5. Progressivism, Race, and Historical Alliances

Timestamps: 44:46–66:36

• Addressing the false narrative that Black voters are inherently moderate or resistant to progressivism.
• Recap of the Chicago Marquette Park march—connecting Dr. King’s northern campaigns, fighting redlining and segregation, to modern struggles.
• Dr. Rami Nashashibi (IMAN, MacArthur Fellow) gives a historical, intersectional perspective on Black and Palestinian rights, the continuity of economic and racial justice movements, and the spiritual dimensions of belonging and human dignity.

Notable Quote – Dr. Rami Nashashibi:

“You can be for economic justice here, human rights in Gaza and the West Bank, and be standing alongside your Jewish, Muslim, Christian, Catholic brothers and sisters. This is about basic human dignity. It’s about a basic spiritual, transcendent truth.” [62:38–63:48]

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6. Update: The Nolan Wells Investigation

Timestamps: 70:34–100:17

• Joy and legal experts (Paul Butler, Frank Figliuzzi) scrutinize the confusing and still unresolved case of Nolan Wells, a young Black man who died under mysterious circumstances after a July 4th boating trip.
• Critique of amateur sleuthing (Officer Tatum), the United Cajun Navy’s independent investigative report, and law enforcement’s failures.
• Examination of crowd-sourced evidence, uninvestigated leads, and media narratives about the case.
• Broader reflections on racism, justice, and transparency in American policing.

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7. Economic State of Black Men and Boys

Timestamps: 103:02–117:59

• Guest: Dr. Wes Bellamy (John Mercer Langston Institute at Virginia State University)
• Findings from a newly released report:
  • Black men are the only group losing employment ground: nearly 650,000 jobs lost (2025–2026).
  • Black men make only 77¢ for every dollar a white man makes; household median savings: $2,200 (vs. $10,000 for whites).
  • Black men increasingly under-represented in college enrollments.
  • High rates of suicide, lower homeownership, and persistent barriers to economic advancement.
• Action Items: Call for targeted state commissions, pathways programs, reading interventions, and intentional language and mental health attention.

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Memorable Moments & Quotes

• Maurice Mitchell (on the depth of progressive wins):

  "They’ll try to gaslight us now. You didn’t think there was a path to victory... This race completely discredits any further argument that you can’t win everywhere fighting for the people.” [23:08–25:18]

• Joy Reid (on progressivism and Black voters):

  “It is a little strange to see Democrats being upset that you’re actually seeing the Democratic Party get done the things that they’ve always claimed that they were for... It is a weird world in which these are considered bad things instead of good things.” [18:15–19:14]

• Hasan Piker (with Abdul El-Sayed, discussing intra-party conflicts):

  "Our party... a whole bunch of, like, center-right people realize that they had no home in the party that they destroyed. And then they all came to our party and trying to tell us what our party ought to be..." [16:39–17:50]

• Dr. Wes Bellamy (on the need for intentional solutions):

  “We have to be intentional all the way around about how we care and support for our black men... targeted strategies and measurable outcomes.” [114:37–114:56]

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Notable Quotes by Timestamp

• Joy Reid:

  "Do not let anyone downplay... It literally is an earthquake that just took place not just in the state of Michigan, but inside of the Democratic Party.” [05:53]

• Abdul El-Sayed (victory speech):

  "You can spend as much money as you want on lies, but it doesn’t make them true... People remember that a lot more than a 30 second ad played on a loop." [06:26–08:44]

• Bernie Sanders:

  "If [Carville] doesn't want to be in my party... he can start his own party... Big tent." [13:36–14:10]

• Adam Green:

  “…if Democrats knew what was good for them, they would listen to us and adopt a working people’s agenda.” [42:02]

• Maurice Mitchell:

  "This race... completely discredits any further argument that you can't win everywhere fighting for the people." [25:09]

• Dr. Rami Nashashibi:

  "You can be for economic justice here, human rights in Gaza and the West Bank... This is about basic human dignity." [63:48]

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Structural Breakdown (with Timestamps)

| Segment | Topic/Section | Timestamps | |--------------------------------------------|---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|------------------| | Opening & Election Recap | Joy’s intro, post-election context, overview of Michigan’s primary and Abdul’s win | 04:43–06:26 | | Abdul El-Sayed’s Speech | Excerpt from El-Sayed’s speech | 06:26–08:44 | | Reaction from Right and Democrats | Conservative meltdown, media and Dem establishment pushback, Carville, Bernie, Hasan Piker | 09:28–18:10 | | Progressive Victories Analysis | Maurice Mitchell, Adam Green on broad progressive victories, anti-AIPAC turn | 21:09–29:33 | | Voter Voices & AIPAC Impact | Voter interviews: AIPAC influence, black and white voter perspectives | 27:23–34:44 | | Historical Perspective w/ Dr. Nashashibi | Progressivism, race, Dr. King, Chicago march, intersectionality, Palestinian solidarity | 44:46–66:36 | | Nolan Wells Case | Investigatory updates, legal guests, challenges in case, larger systemic implications | 70:34–100:17 | | Economic State of Black Men and Boys | Dr. Wes Bellamy on new report, data, causes, possible interventions | 103:02–117:59 | | Moment of Joy & Closing | Summary, team appreciation, community engagement, wrap-up | 119:00–126:50 |

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Tone & Style

• Candid, witty, unapologetically progressive with a conversational, sometimes irreverent style.
• Joy and her co-hosts blend serious political analysis with humor and personal asides, engaging both guest experts and audience.

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For Further Exploration

• Must-listen Clips:

  • Abdul El-Sayed’s speech [06:26–08:44]
  • Maurice Mitchell’s breakdown of the “coastal myth” and progressive map [23:08–25:18]
  • Dr. Rami Nashashibi on Chicago’s civil rights history and Black-Palestinian alliances [49:43–63:48]
  • Voters on the ground in Michigan express anti-AIPAC sentiment [28:02–29:33]

• Practical Resource:
  For those interested in solutions to Black male inequality, check the full John Mercer Langston Institute report at VSU.edu.

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Conclusion

This episode is essential listening for anyone interested in the current fault lines inside the Democratic Party—from generational and ideological tensions to the rising tide of progressive politics, with a focus on grassroots momentum, resistance to entrenched power, and the intertwined struggles for justice, both domestic and global. The show’s layered approach—combining electoral news, on-the-ground interviews, historical remembrance, and social policy—offers context, clarity, and action steps for a politically engaged audience.

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This summary is intended for those seeking a comprehensive but accessible overview and guidance for further deep dives into any of the themes or segments discussed on this landmark episode of The Joy Reid Show.

Transcript

[Joy Reid]

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[Jason Reed]

Put that.

[Paul Butler]

Okay.

[Joy Reid]

Well, good evening, everyone, and welcome to the Joy Reid Show. Well, it's evening here, but if it's daytime there, good morning, good afternoon, or whatever day of time of day it is. Thank you for tuning in. We appreciate you. Whether you're on YouTube, Substack, Facebook, our wonderful Twitchies on Twitch, as well as anyone listening on an audio podcast platform, whether you're at Spotify or Apple, whatever it is, we just appreciate you being here. We do like to help you guys to help us train our little algorithm. It's like a little beastie that you have to train. And so if you could please hit, like, subscribe, hit share, also hit the little, the little bell thing so that you can always know when we go live. Jason, I think you have a fun graphic you wanted to debut. Do you want to debut that?

[Jason Reed]

Should I debut? I think you should do it later.

[Joy Reid]

I think you should do it.

[Jason Reed]

Well, we got. We don't have enough people in the room. Let them all get hit on.

[Joy Reid]

Okay, all right, we'll do it later. Okay, we'll do it later. We've got that to happen. But before we go any further, I want to go ahead and acknowledge one of our amazing sponsors. The Joy Read show on tonight is brought to you by our friends at Remy. Now, of course, teeth grinding, you know, teeth clenching, it's a thing. It is a real thing and people deal with it. Um, I deal with it myself. And it, it really does cause like, jaw pain, discomfort, and can actually disrupt your sleep. And usually the answer is you run to the dentist, you sit, you wait in the office, you have to make an appointment. It's like a whole thing. But you really don't necessarily have to do that. You can actually take action to improve your teeth, improve your smile, improve your quality of life and your sleep with Remy. Remy is trusted not just by me, but by 350,000Americans. Remy Night cards are the only FDA cleared and clinically tested at home impression kit night guards on the market. 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Protect your teeth with Remy by using the code Joy to get 55% off your new night guards from now to the end of August with Remy Club. Subscribe and save. That is 55% off at shop rmi.com joy with the code Joy. Thank you Remy for sponsoring this episode. Okay, so last night and actually I have to say this morning because you may hear my voice right now, we were up till like 2am getting these election results. Here's the New York Times with the big picture of all the big election results in the state of Michigan, the state of Kansas, the state of Washington, Virginia, lots and lots of election results all across the country. But the key race I think that everyone cared the most about and that we stayed up till 2 o' clock in the morning because we were going to get those results. We were crunching numbers. I was doing my best Kornacki crunching the numbers literally district by district by district. And it was, it was a lot of fun actually, but it was exhausting and big up to everybody. That's not only tuned in, we had a big crowd that tuned in, but also Jack, Carterella, Waj, who was here of course with us, Dean Obadala, we even got a jolly good ginger moment which was amazing. Melot Kos popped on. Charles Arab popped on. Chris Rabbit, sorry, popped on. It was really great. We had a full complement of amazing guests that stayed up with us. And the TJRS family got to watch. Along with elimination, of course, and all of our friends to watch Abdul win and Abdul El's win. You can see it here on your screen. It was narrow, but a wins, a wins, a win. And a lot of people on the side, on the media side are Trying to kind of downplay the enormity of this victory. But I'm telling you, do not let anyone downplay the enormity of this victory because it literally is an earthquake that just took place not just in the state of Michigan, but inside of the Democratic Party. This win, narrow though it may be, is literally a sea change because this is not New York, this is not crunchy Colorado. This is not a state that's super duper duper blue. This is a swing state, maybe the ultimate swing state, a must win state state for the Democratic Party in presidential elections and a rust belt, Midwestern, hardscrabble, good old USA American State. And Dr. Abdul El Sayed one, he beat $60 million in AIPAC cash. He beat millions and millions. Well, not just AIPAC, $60 million, including about $30 million from AIPAC. The state utility pumped money into Haley Stevens, his opponent's campaign, and he faced about 60 to 70 million dollars total combined in PAC spending which was thrown at him. The governor of Michigan, Big Gretsch, supported his opponent. It was a fake ad that claimed that President, former President Obama supported his opponent. And so he was going against every head when you could imagine. And he still won. It is a huge historic moment. This Muslim American man, an Arab American, he is half Egyptian and he's going to be the likely or he's going up against Mike Rogers. He still has to win the general, but he's a Democratic nominee. Let's listen to a piece of his, his acceptance speech.

[Abdul El-Sayed]

We built this campaign brick by brick back in April. I remember talking to a room of five people in a discussion that most people will never clock. But it was an opportunity for us to share a honest conversation about pain and about purpose. And I've been able to have 500 more of those discussions over the past 15 months. I trained to be a doctor in the single most important moment that makes a clinical encounter is that moment that somebody shares their pain with you believing that you could do something about it. I don't practice medicine, as has been well documented by all of you,

[Frank Figliuzzi]

but

[Abdul El-Sayed]

I hope that I get to practice that part of things. And I've been able to practice it, but it requires people being willing to share their pain with you so that you can do something about it. That is a moment, a piece of vulnerability people give you because they believe that you can actually fix it. It's an investment, sure, in a campaign, but it more is an investment in democracy. And as we traveled our state, we were in living rooms in Lansing, VFW Halls in Escanaba, basements in Grand Rapids, churches in Detroit. I got to meet so many of you, Michigan, so many. And you shared both what caused pain, but also what brought purpose. And we forged a movement out of that to get money out of politics, put money back in pockets and pass Medicare for all to guarantee health care in this country. And for our troubles, the corporations, the special interests who would rather get to decide who our elected officials are than let us decide who our elected officials are, they spent an unprecedented amount of money to beat us. Attack ad after attack ad after attack ad after attack ad, wall to wall ads. But it turns out that the commercials are the part of the television show most people don't want to watch. It turns out that you can spend as much money as you want on lies, but it doesn't make them true. It turns out that when you're able to reach out and dignify somebody's pain, people remember that a lot more than a 30 second ad played on a loop that you are.

[Joy Reid]

And that was just part of about a 20 minute speech, very moving speech by this historical candidate and his historic candidate who is now in a really good position to beat the sort of dull, boring Republican opponent who so far has not agreed to debate him. He has asked to do five debates with Congressman Mike Rogers. And I hope they do them. We will definitely cover them if they do five debates, if they even do one debate. And so there it is. This is an historic moment in the United States and not everybody was happy about it, as you can guess. Let's cue up one. Rafael Ted Cruz where the energy is. They want to cancel Thanksgiving.

[Jason Reed]

They're crazy enough.

[Joy Reid]

Yes, they want to cancel Thanksgiving, they want to cancel Christmas. Look, these communists hate America, they hate capitalism. El Sayed is also an Islamist, as is Mandami.

[Jason Reed]

And look, you see the green red

[Joy Reid]

convergence where the communists and the Islamists, they want Sharia law, they hate Jews, they hate Christians, they hate capitalism, they hate America. All of this is coming together in a way that is really a toxic, toxic stew. Yeah, okay. None of that is true, of course. That is Ted Cruz own projection because he is the guy who said he would be for Israel taking territory from all five of the neighboring countries. They want to invade to, to make greater Israel. He said, yeah, they could take it all as far as he's concerned. He said his whole reason for, for being a United States Senator is to protect a foreign country, Israel, not the United States. And Abdul El Sayed gave a very moving speech in which he talked about his love and respect for Judaism and the Jewish people. He just, I don't know, he hates genocide. That has nothing to do with hating Jewish people. And he gave a really great speech saying that there's a difference between Jewish people and the genocide being committed by the state of Israel, which is a foreign country. But, you know, we'll let Ted Cruz crash out and let's go on to another person that had something to say in a very snide way, and that would be John Donald Hamill, AKA JD Vance with us. We don't want the next administration, whoever,

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

you know, God forbid you're gonna have

[Jason Reed]

President El said in three years.

[Joy Reid]

We don't want him to undo all

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

the incredible work that we've been doing when we've been taking out the fraudsters

[Jason Reed]

and saving the American people money.

[Joy Reid]

And so Winsome's reaction when I told her about that clip was her. She had a one word reaction to President El Sayed and it was slay, which is the young people's version of yeah, you know, don't threaten me with a good time. He was born in the United States, so he theoretically could be the President of the United States. What you gonna do about it? People vote for him. That's just kind of the way it is. So the crash out on Fox, I think has been very real. But it is not just the right that is crashing out over Abdul El Sayed and Zorhan Mamdani and Melat Kiros and all of the Democratic DSA, DSA candidates. These are, they're not all DSA, but you know, there is the DSA, newly elected mayor of Washington D.C. who is an African American DSA candidate. But you know, this wave on the left which is washing over the Democratic Party, the base of the party turning left not just on Israel funding and aipac, but on policy in general. Wanting Medicare for all, wanting the Green New Deal, wanting to save the planet, all of the things that used to be sort of standard Democratic stuff that is now anathema to a lot of even Democrats. James Carville, a Ragin Cajun who was a big part of the Bill Clinton victory back in 1996, when of course you remember that was third wave politics, when essentially it is what Jesse Jackson called the Democratic leadership class or the Democratic leisure class, I should say the Democratic leisure class, which was these sort of high post high living Democrats who wanted calm and to allow the rich donors to be comfortable and pretend and feel woke, but not actually do anything woke that group. He's very mad about this leftward turn. And he has said he. He doesn't even want to be in a party that would allow Hassan Piker to be around. This is the very popular streamer. He said he don't want to be in the same party with them. Well, Bernie Sanders had some thoughts on that. Let's hear what he said on cnn. Someone like James Carville says he doesn't want to be in the same political party as Hasan Piker. Which one are you going to take? Well, that's not much of a choice of. Mr. Carville doesn't want to be in my party, the party that I belong to, that Pica that Syed belongs to. He can start his own party. Look, what we are doing now is you could turn the tables around and

[Jason Reed]

say, do you really want to be

[Joy Reid]

in a party where your leadership is

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

taking huge amounts of money from aipac,

[Joy Reid]

which is supporting an extremist Netanyahu government that many of us believe have committed genocide?

[Jason Reed]

You want to be in a party

[Joy Reid]

with people who do that. You want to be in a party

[Jason Reed]

which has not stood up to the

[Joy Reid]

AI industry because they got a lot of money from AI or from crypto.

[Jason Reed]

So you could pick, you know, you could pick whatever you want to pick,

[Joy Reid]

but I think we need a big tent. And I think people like Pica should be welcome into that.

[Frank Figliuzzi]

Certainly.

[Joy Reid]

Just affirm it fair. Absolutely. And you know who else is willing to be in the same party as Hasan Piker? Haley Stevens. Haley Stevens, who endorsed the guy that Hasan Piker was at the victory party for, Hassan actually was on our show last night as well. Big up to Hasan Piker. And he was one of the people who was chatting with our friend Adam Cocherella. And here's the statement from Jack Cocherella. Sorry, my brain don't work. I'm sorry, Jack Cocherella. What was my brain saying? Why did my. Why did my brain say, Adam, Jason, what's wrong with me? Oh, because that's our next guest. Okay. My brain was moving on to the next guest. Yes. With Jack Cocherella, who was fantastic last night, by the way. He was our correspondent with the mostest. We love Jack. But here's Haley Stevens statement about the aforementioned Hasan Piker. She said, I want to congratulate Abdul El Sayed on winning the Democratic nomination for U.S. senate. He's a doctor, a community health official, a Rhodes scholar, which is true, like Bill Clinton, a dedicated Michigander I'm proud of to offer my support as he takes on Mike Rogers in the general election. So apparently, Haley Stevens, unlike The Ragin Cajun isn't. Has no problem being in the same party as Hassan Piker. So there you go. Last night was also another big night for all of the candidates who were supported by the Progressive left, the Democratic Campaign Committee, Congressional Campaign Committee, or I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. The. The Progressive Campaign Committee, PPCCC, PCCC. They also endorsed a guy called Donovan McKinney who we had on our show. He also won last night. You can see there. That race took a while to count. That went on late into the night as well. But he actually ended up emerging victorious. I believe all three of their candidates actually won. And that's also the Working Families Party's preferred candidate actually won in that race as well. And just so that you can hear a little bit of the scary Hasan Piker who so, so terrifies a lot of Democrats, you know, it's not just the Republicans crashing again. It's also the Democrats. Let's listen to him talking to Abdul El Sayed and what they had to say about the raging Cajun. I know. And it has only snowballed. It has only continued. There was a documentary that came out on CNN last night.

[Adam Green]

Now James Car.

[Jason Reed]

Carville's talking about leaving the party. We got John Fetterman, James Carville fantasizing about leaving the party.

[Joy Reid]

I'm like, you're sweetening the deal.

[Abdul El-Sayed]

That was really interesting. Like, our party, if you look at what happened with Trump, you had a whole bunch of, like, center right people realize that they had no home in the party that they destroyed. And then they all came to our party and trying to tell us what our party ought to be. Think about, like, James Carville. I'm like, bro, you architected the complete right wing, like, ascent to neoliberalism in 96.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Yeah.

[Abdul El-Sayed]

And no, no, I don't know. Like, my point is this, this state

[Jason Reed]

is a swing state because of the

[Joy Reid]

machinations of the Clinton.

[Jason Reed]

Of the, the Clinton era of politics. Nafta. Exactly.

[Joy Reid]

This is not a swing state and neither is Wisconsin. I'm so annoyed.

[Jason Reed]

Like, everyone's always like, these are dangerous states to be making these sorts of decisions on. And it's like, these are not. First of all, the decision is being

[Joy Reid]

made by the voters.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Okay, no, that's fine.

[Jason Reed]

The decisions are being made by the

[Joy Reid]

voters first and foremost.

[Jason Reed]

They're not being. That's why they're chirping. Because the, the party bosses are mad that they can't, like, control the will of the masses anymore. They can't like duke people into voting for their hand selected pick.

[Abdul El-Sayed]

It's also, I mean, it's just so part of it's like, why does anybody still listen to James Carpenter? He said one smart thing once which he seems to have forgotten, which is, it's the economy stupid.

[Jason Reed]

Oh, with that, yeah.

[Abdul El-Sayed]

I'm like, buddy, it's the economy stupid. Like you, you wonder why people are pissed off. You've got these, okay, so both parties take money from all the same people to do all the same errands when they get elected, and then no one can afford. And then we wonder why everyone's mad. So some of us step in and be like, hey, maybe if we didn't take money from the corporations, maybe we could actually show up for the people. Maybe we could actually solve some of these problems. And. And he's like, well, I can't accept that in my party.

[Joy Reid]

Well, I mean, there you go. I mean, the reality is it's the economy stupid is actually the smartest thing that the raging Cajun has actually said. And he's actually right about that. Because people, when the economy goes to shit and people can't afford anything, people start turning to candidates who will solve their problems and meet their needs and they stop being really interested, I think, in this sort of chatter of the Democratic leisure class. As Jesse Jackson, who was the 80s version of a Democratic socialist, he was for free Palestine, he was for free health care, universal health care, universal jobs programs. He was for all the things Bernie was for. But this was in the 80s and he was black. That's the only real difference. And he ran in those campaigns in 84 and 88. And remember in the primaries in 88, he also, he actually won Michigan with that platform. So this is a platform that is actually popular not just now, but in the past when it comes to people who care a lot about change and about actual change. And so it's just interesting that you have the Democratic Party, sort of the leisure class of the Democratic Party crashing out over this guy and acting as if he's doing something wrong by running on things that used to be kind of what Democrats used to say they wanted. And it's just a little weird. It is a little strange to see Democrats being upset that you're actually seeing the Democratic Party get done the things that they've always claimed that they were for. I think that it is a weird world in which these are considered bad things instead of good things. I don't know if you guys got a chance. Oh, I don't I don't think I got the. Jason, I don't think I got the thing of dang. I don't think I got it. The other clip that I wanted to get, I don't think I have it. But the reality is, is that you do have a Democratic Party that is really having some soul searching right now to try to figure out if they can stand the idea of having Democratic socialists in the mix along with their Democratic Party regulars. Let's get Maurice Mitchell in. Maurice Mitchell, of course, who is the head of the Working Families Party, who was on with us last night. He was one of the stalwarts who was on with us last night trying to wait and wait and wait and wait for the vote counting to continue. And in the end, it was a big win. Congratulations. I know that you were an endorser of both Donovan McKinney and Abdul El Sayed, and you'll have to forgive me, there was a third candidate as well. Yeah, so. So tell us what went into this victory. How big of a deal is it in your view this is.

[Jason Reed]

I mean, if you like. Let's just back up a little bit with Abdul Donovan and Will. There weren't many political observers that were saying any of them were issuance. In fact, if you listen to all of the pundits, if you listen to the consultants and others who are based in D.C. if you would listen to the leadership of the Democratic Party, you would have thought that it would be an impossibility for any of the. Any of these candidates to win. Like, full stop. Like full stop. But yet here we are, and we want a complete sweep of all three of them. Will winning in. In a red to blue flip. So winning in a purple district. Right. You know, Donovan, you know, he's a black son of Detroit. You can't walk a block in Detroit without bumping into a cousin or friend or somebody you organized with. Right. He had an uphill battle because Sri Thandahar had so much outside money and he himself is a millionaire and he's an incumbent. And a lot of people didn't see a path for Donovan. He went through. And then Abdul. Right. And he famously talks about how he thought his name would be the barrier to him running for office, especially in a place like Michigan. And many people thought that that would be true. And he won statewide in a quote unquote purple state against an opponent that had close to $70 million of outside money. He was outspent more than 10 to 1. I mean, it is truly incredible. Like, he won despite Having all of that money spent against him. And you know, there's, there's people who are now trying to spin saying like, well, it was closer than we thought. No, no, no, no. You didn't think he was going to win.

[Joy Reid]

Right?

[Jason Reed]

They'll try to gaslight us now. You didn't think there was a path to victory. Right. And this is a clear victory. I mean, I think this, this victory there is part of a longer wave because this started in the winter in the suburbs of New Jersey with Ana Lili Mejia and then it continued from there into places like California where all five of our insurgent candidates in California for federal office, for Congress. One, we had a sweep in California, in Pennsylvania, both reprab in one of the bluest districts in the, in the country. He went, he went through as well as Bob Brooks in again a purple district. Right. We know about the wins in Cal, in New York, people like Brad Lander and then of course, of course Malak Karos. And every single time there's a victory, there's another spin. Oh, it's New York. Right. That's just because Zoram Dani was able to elevate these, these, these insurgents. It's very specific to New York, New York and California. Oh, it's a coastal thing. It couldn't happen. It couldn't happen in the interior of the country. Well, Colorado, well, you know, Denver actually is a, is a major city. It's very blue. It couldn't happen in, in purple districts. It couldn't. Well, the state of Michigan and I think at this point we've seen independent insurgents who aren't taking corporate PAC money, who are rejecting aipac, who are calling a genocide a genocide and focusing on the interest of everyday working people, claiming the true reality then the richest country in the history of the world. We should be able to afford Medicare for all childcare, good jobs. We should be able to have some time with our family. We should be able to have affordable housing. We should be able to tax the rich to make that happen. Those people are winning in all situations, in every single dynamic possible. And this race I think completely discredits any further argument that you can't win everywhere fighting for the people.

[Joy Reid]

I think that is hard to dispute. Let me bring in somebody who also predicted victory here and was very instrumental, as were you. My friend Adam Green, he's the co founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee. I always get what the C's are and mix them up. I just know it's pcccc.

[Adam Green]

Doesn't even matter that's okay.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah, exactly. PC and you've been at this for a really long time, my friend. I feel like I've known you for like 173 years and you've been fighting to make these progressive politics mainstream and to prove that they are. Not to make them mainstream, but to prove that they're mainstream. You were all over TV being questioned and queried as to how it could be possible that Abdul El Sayed could possibly win. And you were on with us last night. Talk about what you think this victory means and also all three of the victories because obviously Donovan McKinney won his congressional race. And Maurice just told me the third candidate and I.

[Jason Reed]

Will Lawrence.

[Joy Reid]

Will Lawrence. Will Lawrence. I'm so sorry. Will Lawrence tell me what it means.

[Adam Green]

Well, first I could listen to Maurice Mitchell debunk right wing talking points forever. Thank you, Maurice. That was very methodical. Andrew, it was great joining you last night. It's nice to have a little calm here. I felt like it was very loud and I was yelling last night through the crowd. This is nice. Yeah. So as Maurice was hitting at. We're proving a theory of the case here that bold shake up the system, economic fighters can win anywhere. And it's really important that we do it this year as a prelude to the presidential election next year. Our experience was that there are very well meaning, scared, electability voters who just don't want to mess things up and sometimes are afraid to be inspired in the presidential race. And if we can show that bold economic populace can win in states like Michigan, Maine, Nebraska and then some of these House seats that Maurice was talking about, then voters can feel comfortable following the heart and their head at the same time. And hopefully we can have someone in the White House who will actually use power and transform the entire brand and face and identity and center of gravity of the Democratic Party going forward.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah, indeed. And you know, to your point of people who are generally not risk taking type voters needing to feel comfortable to go ahead and vote their heart rather than their head, which is something that was a Bernie issue when Hillary versus Hillary Clinton. People may have loved Bernie's ideas, but their head told them go with Hillary. Right. Let me play for you a mix of Miz now and CNN who went sent reporters out. Love that they still do that to talk to voters in Michigan about what was behind their choice of Abdul El Sayed over his opponent. Take a listen. This is a.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

The one issue that seemed to be

[Jason Reed]

the most salient, the most elicit the most passion from people certainly was her

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

stance on Israel and her support for taxpayer dollars continuing to be used to

[Jason Reed]

support the Israeli military.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

I want to play you portions of my conversations with voters here today and I'll start with that point specifically.

[Jason Reed]

This is what a voter had to say when she learned that Haley Stevens, relative to Abdul Sayyad, supports US support for Israel.

[Abdul El-Sayed]

Take a listen.

[Joy Reid]

I just wouldn't want a single of our family's tax paying dollars to go towards something like that. It's like giving money to violence.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

So would you support a Senate candidate,

[Jason Reed]

in this case Haley Stevens, who's more of a, but more of a moderate like you tend to like.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

But would that be enough?

[Jason Reed]

Definitely.

[Joy Reid]

That would definitely turn me off as a candidate 100%. I, I couldn't, I couldn't. I would vote for a communist first. I don't want somebody that's in somebody else pocket that they have to agree to what they want to. You know, too many people like that in politics.

[Adam Green]

Abdul.

[Joy Reid]

And why is that? Because he doesn't take money from apac.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

I'm not voting for anybody who takes money from apac.

[Joy Reid]

And why is that?

[Jason Reed]

Because the money should be spent here, not over there.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Overall change and people who had an independent view and thought process of what's right for the voters, not what's right for corporate PACs or what's right for any affiliations that support them.

[Joy Reid]

Maurice, what I loved about those clips and was so interesting is, you know, we noted last night, as we were on until late at night, myself and Wajahat Ali went the distance till 2am plus that the key to winning Michigan statewide is how you perform in Detroit. And for Haley Stevens, she needed to win big in Detroit. This is where those ads that pretended that she had an Obama, that she had the support of Barack Obama were really targeted to try to get black voters specifically to go with her as the Obama candidate. And there is this meme that black voters would never vote for progressives and that progressivism is a white thing. It's white progressives versus black people. And that some of that was out there sort of in the Ethernet in the ether last night we heard people sort of talking that way and saying, well, you know what? The black voters are going to shut it down. Abdul can't win because he can't get black voters. All right. I will note that Haley Stevens did in fact win all of Detroit and the Detroit suburbs, but barely. She won 5,245 in Oakland County. She won 5,244 in Macomb County. And the Big one, which is where she really needed to really crush Abdullah Sayed. It was only a six point victory, 5,145, which means he cut her margin significantly. And I wonder if you, since you've been on the ground have any sense of whether that was a late deciding voter that were like the people we saw there. There were some unks, these were not necessarily like 20 year olds. These are some people who look like they might have been Gen X, like me who were saying, nah, I don't like the APEC thing. I don't like that, you know, people are in there in somebody's pocket. And then there was the white older voter who you would never think would be an Abdul El Sayed voter because she said she normally likes a moderate. It felt like this APEC thing cut across demographics.

[Jason Reed]

Yeah, I mean I think there's two things that are happening so when voters now inside of Democratic primaries, and I would argue just in general when they hear that a candidate is endorsed and supported by APAC or by crypto or by AI that is I think now code for oh, this candidate is compromised. And so I'm going to see if there are other candidates in this race that are pledging not to take this money. Right. So aipac. In previous years the AIPAC endorsement didn't have this type of negative impact, but now it's APAC is so aware that their endorsement is actually problematic that sometimes they sneak endorse, they won't, they won't directly endorse. They'll find other ways to support candidates

[Joy Reid]

and, or they switch their name. They use like these other names like udp, United Democracy Project that are apec, but they don't call themselves apec.

[Jason Reed]

Absolutely. And what has been true for years is that when they spend, when they spend on television ads or when they spend on mail, they never talk about any of the issues that they profess. They don't talk about the Middle east or the United States relationship to Israel because Israel has discredited itself. Most people agree with Abdul Al said that we should not be giving unconditional aid to Israel in order to pursue a war of genocide against the Palestinian people. That's actually a mainstream position. So there's that piece. Are you on the take or not? Are you independent? Will you serve my needs or the needs of corporations and your wealthy sort of donors? Right. But the second piece is, I think it cuts to the core of just morals. Right. So that that woman who's like a, you know, probably like a mainstream Democratic Party voter, she's a human being. She has eyes, she has ears. She's witnessed now for years the depraved and the day to day sort of like horror of watching women, children, families indiscriminately bombed and killed and ethnically cleansed. It's hard to look away from that. And it's hard to deny what we're seeing. And it's hard for anybody to feel comfortable knowing that in some ways those bombs are being being dropped in our names. And so this has become a majoritarian issue. It's a kind of right versus wrong, core moral issue. And look, I don't know if we're ever going back. I think not just Benjamin Netanyahu. Benjamin Netanyahu, but the whole project of having like an ethno state that is engaged in apartheid of a population in that state and having the United States just kind of blindly support that state without calling into question its practices. I don't think we're ever going back to that. I think more and more Americans are saying no. Especially at a time when their gas prices are high, the cost of basic commodities are high, the cost of housing is high, the cost of health care is high. It's hard to explain why we're spending billions and billions of dollars in order to prop up a foreign government that is performing these horrors every single day instead of propping up our communities.

[Joy Reid]

Jason, I don't know if you could pull it in. I apologize, I missed not downloading it before. But I have a clip called Van Jones when you got it. Okay, I want to play this because I can't talk about crash out without talking about Van because he did justification Adam of APAC spending that I thought was interesting on cnn. And he was talking to the grandson of Holocaust survivors and lecturing him kind of about what he should be thinking.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

Take a listen, say a word about that. Because we've talked about this before and I speak as, you know, as the son of a Jewish refugee. So issues of anti Semitism are very personal to me. I think that what you see in Michigan is a interest group spending $30 million. She's got $64 million in television spending. And they're responsible for at least half of that. And one of the issues, as Kristin mentioned, that people are grappling with is the power of money in our politics. Politics, the influence that interest groups have. And I think it's a legitimate, it's a legitimate question. Should essentially an agent of any foreign government, whether it's Israel or any other, be able to spend or is it healthy for them to spend $30 million in a race like this to influence the outcome of that race, I think that's a legitimate issue.

[Jason Reed]

But, well, I mean, I, I, I get your point. I don't think that they're an agent before in power. I think they're American Jews, as you said.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

Their mission is to support the policies of the Israeli government.

[Jason Reed]

Well, I think their issue is to protect Israel. But you have to have.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

No, no, but Van. Read, Read what?

[Jason Reed]

I'm happy to be corrected by you, but I can make my own point, which is that why is AIPAC going after this guy? That would be the question. They're spending what you said, $30 million. That's a lot of money. Is it because he's a Muslim guy? Is it because he's a hateful guy? It turns out his position is for a full military embargo of the state of Israel. Now hold on a second. A full military embargo? Now listen, he says he wants condition aid that's reasonable, defensible. Most Democrats feel that way at this point. After Gaza, if he says no subsidies, that's defensible. He says we can't even sell weapons to Israel even if they're defensive. So if this guy, so why is AIPAC so mad? This guy is saying that the United States government can't even sell defensive weapons to Israel, which would make Israel completely defenseless. Now that would be a reason for a group of people who cares about Israelis to say this is not our guy.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

So Haley Stevens ran in, in 2022 after the district, her district was redistricted. She ran against Andy Levin. Yeah, Andy, and Andy Levin, his position was that aid to Israel should be conditional on not pursuing policies that would subvert a two state solution. There that was, that would be considered a mainstream position now by many people. They spent millions of dollars to defeat him. They spent millions of dollars this year to defeat Tom Malinowski who said I can't guarantee that I will support every funding position. So I take your point. But this is not just about this race. This is about the entire volley of races.

[Jason Reed]

All we're doing is we're stick around.

[Joy Reid]

Exactly. I mean, first of all, Adam, I mean to have David Axelrod, who was one of the people, people behind the campaign for President Obama, right, to become President, United States, to be like Jewish splained that in and of itself was kind of wild. But what do you make of that? Because I think that what Van Jones was doing there is part of why people are so frustrated with the Democratic Party. With the Democratic establishment, with Chuck Schumer, because they will not admit that this entity supports a foreign country. They just won't admit it's a foreign country. And they won't admit that it is really wild that this entity will even go after Jewish politicians if they don't 100% support every dime for every bomb.

[Adam Green]

Yeah, that's absolutely right. There are so many levels of outrage on this stuff. One of the things that really gets me going is just the dishonesty in people's agenda. You know, you mentioned before these fake groups in Illinois. AIPAC spent millions of dollars through a group called Elect Chicago Women and another one called Affordable Chicago Now. Right? Now, even if you took Van Jones point on its face, one could argue that, okay, they should be honest. Hey, we're here, we're here representing the interests of the state of Israel. Let us tell you why we think this person is wrong on the state of Israel. I don't think there is one ad in the history of AIPAC that has ever done anything close to that. Right. Because they know their agenda is not popular. Right? So let me just like add a level of irony and scrutiny that isn't out there enough, which is like, imagine if we had lost last night by one point and not won by one point. What would the rap be on progressives today? Maurice, we can go, we can go to for time this one because there's so many things that they would say, but they basically say, oh, this, even Democratic voters don't support these economic policies or these far left policies, right? And meanwhile, they would not acknowledge how much they are polluting the debate with fake arguments to get those votes. As soon as I got off a plane in Michigan, I had an African American Uber driver. We were talking, his name was Lee. And he was saying, I'm going to vote. My wife and I are going to really talk to each other a lot this weekend about, you know, the various candidates. And I think he asked me, what do you hear from, like, I'm helping a guy named Abdul. Like, oh, I'll say it. I'm like, yeah. And he's like, she's running against Hilly Stevens, right? I'm like, yeah. I'm like, what do you know about. What do you know about the race? And he's like, well, let's see, he attacked Michelle Obama, right? And because he had been seeing these ads, ads run by apac, not on their issue, but playing to the fears and emotions of voters like that. And then when I said, you know who those ads are run by not the candidate, but by AIPAC and by corporate interests. He's like, oh, that's not good. And I was like, let me ask you a question. Abdullah said his motto is, money out of politics, Money in your pocket, Medicare for all. He's like, that sounds pretty good, right? So if we had lost and that kind of voter. I'm confident after our conversation, Maurice, you'd be proud of me. I was organized, my friend. But, you know, if we had lost because enough of those voters were deceived to vote against our own interests, we would look and be told we were fringe. And. And that's why I just say there's multiple layers of outrage. Like, his point, on its face, is outrageous. Even if you take his point, they're dishonest with their ads. And then if we lose, they're dishonest about what it means. And meanwhile, we're trying to bring an agenda that is popular with working people who are, you know, red, purple, blue state, Democrat, independent, Republican, you know, little guy versus big guy. And if Democrats knew what was good for them, they would listen to us and adopt a working people's agenda.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah. Adam Green and Maurice Mitchell, congratulations on the big win. It's a really important point because they would completely set aside all logic regarding what people say they want in polls and say, see, no one wants Medicare for All. No one wants that. That's totally unpopular. If it had been a 0.1% loss. But the fact that there was this win, that was narrow. The new spin is, oh, he barely won. That means that literally he lost by winning because he didn't win by 15 points. You can't win because the mainstream media is bought into the establishment and the calm and peace of. Of no change. But you guys are not. And I appreciate both of you, Adam and Maurice, you guys are great. Thank you. But thank you very much. And come back because we got to talk about the general.

[Adam Green]

Thanks.

[Joy Reid]

Good to Appreciate very, very much. Join me. Now, I want to keep going with this because the reality is one of the kind of memes that we have, unfortunately, in the country. Oh, wait a minute. I just got some breaking news. Breaking news. Before I move on, I have to get this breaking news in bonita Parita on YouTube, who is one of our most favorite readers. She's always supporting the show, is a member always throwing some coins in the till, just being a really fabulous person. It is Bonita Pajarita's birthday today. This is important. This is breaking news. Breaking news. It is Bonita Pajarita's Birthday today. Everyone please join together in the chats. Whether you're on YouTube, Substack, thank you very much, Winsome, or on Twitch, wherever you are, please wish Bonita Pajarita a very, very happy. We're gonna say 30th birthday, 30 plus whatever, or maybe 20 plus whatever. She might be even younger than that.

[Jason Reed]

We don't know.

[Joy Reid]

But we wish you a wonderful happy, happy, happy birthday. We appreciate you. One of our absolute favorite readers is always here making the chats fun and fresh and fabulous. Just always kind to her fellow chatters and just a cool, cool, cool, cool person. So we appreciate you. We love our readers. And if it's your birthday, we're going to do it. Like remember when the. Who's the guy who used to do it when he used to talk about the Jam and Jelly on the Today show? I have the guy who was the. You know, I always forget names. The guy who was the. He did the weather. He was the weatherman. And it's a happy birthday from Smuckers. Smuckers Jelly. It's a big happy birthday, Smuckers.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

I remember you talking about.

[Joy Reid]

You know what I'm talking about. But happy birthday to Bonita.

[Jason Reed]

Was it with it Scott?

[Joy Reid]

Willard Scott. Is this in Willard Scott.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Is it with us something. I don't want to put the wrong name. Was it.

[Joy Reid]

Will it now you're doing like me.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

I don't remember.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah, Willis, like with Jack.

[Jason Reed]

Willard Scott. Yeah, that's it.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah. So Adam was coming on next. That's what happened. But we love Jack Carrella. Big up to. Big up to Jack. Yes. Willard Scott is the person who said happy birthday from Smuckers. If you turn 100, you would send your name in and he would read your birthday and say it was your birthday and talk about Smuckers. The Smuckers was the sponsor. You see how that works? So Smuckers was the sponsor. I see some champagne popping in the YouTube chat. The YouTube chat is all over the Bonita Paharita birthday. Bonita, you're a star. So thank you very much for being a reader and happy, happy, happy, happy birthday. All right, I want to keep this conversation going because this idea that black voters will not support a progressive agenda is one of the memes that the corporate Democrats, the corporate sort of establishment and the corporate media are trying to push Bush in order to keep a separation between these two groups. And they're doing it in part based on the fact that Bernie Sanders was not able to surpass Joe Biden during the primaries in 2016. And I think if you're being honest and analyze his race, he didn't really have a black strategy. His strategy was much more class based and didn't take race deeply into account. But this idea is bigger than that. It's the idea that progressivism is like a white thing. That's just not true based on history, whether, you know, the history of Dr. King or the history of Jesse Jackson, who was trained by Dr. King. And so I want to note that over the weekend, Jason and I were in the great city of Chicago where we participated in the Jubilee 60th anniversary of a march that Dr. King took part in toward Marquette Park. Let me take a look at that, Jason. You want to throw that up there? There it is. Thousands of people showed up despite the tsunami downpour. Really, you know, commemorate the 60th anniversary of this historic march. It really actually doesn't get a lot of attention in history because this march was not in the deep South. It wasn't there to go to the Deltas. He was. It was in the North. It was a state senator there. And because it was in the north, people thought, wait a minute, this is like discontinuous with what we believe is. Is happening in terms of civil rights. This was a northern city where there was deep, deep segregation. Some of the worst segregation that he had ever seen. And in fact, nothing that he had experienced in Selma, Alabama, or any part of the south really could compete with the vitriol and the rage and the hate that he found when he arrived in Chicago in January of 1966 and moved his family into a tenement on the west side of Chicago. And the goal of doing that, and this was two years before he died, was to take the civil rights movement and make it national and say that this is not some disease, racism that was confined to the American south, but it was a national problem, a national illness that had to be tackled everywhere. And that the idea of poverty in the city of Chicago was as egregious as the idea of poverty and want and segregation in the South. And so he did that, moved himself to Chicago with his family to firsthand experience what black folks were experiencing in Chicago. In a minute, you're going to hear Dr. King, which is. That was common. You're going to hear Dr. Bernice King, who actually spoke at this march. You can see her standing there in a cute pink outfit, and you're going to hear just a little bit of her speaking. She's going to speak in just about three seconds. I'm going to let her start. And then we're going to let you hear what she said. There it is. You can turn it up. When the cry for justice has become too loud to ignore, when the winds of history has shifted and called us to stand with courage that does not shrink. And join me now because we're going to talk about this and talk about just the real sort of epic violence of that day and what to do about it is Dr. Rami, I'm going to pronounce your name wrong. Nashasha, Bibi, Natasha. You have to pronounce it for me. I. I just know you as Rami.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

There you go. And that's good. Can you hear me?

[Joy Reid]

Yes, indeed. Let me give your bio. I'm gonna give a little bit of your bio. And this is an incredible community organizer who I met for the first time in Chicago, and he just blew my mind, giving me the history of this march. He is a MacArthur fellow, a sociologist trained at the University of Chicago, and, and the founding executive director of the Inner City Muslim action network, IMAN. Since its founding in 1997, IMAN has fostered health, wellness and healing on Chicago's south side and in Atlanta's West End by organizing for social change, cultivating the arts, and running a holistic health center. This is one of the coolest people that I've ever met. Rami. Dr. Rami, I didn't know you were a doctor when I met you, that you were a Ph. A PhD. But thank you so much for being here.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

Yes. Peace and blessings. Salaam alaikum. Joy. And it is Rami Neshashibi. And you were close. And it was equally a profound honor and privilege to see you show up. Weather the rain, weather the storms, and to be out there with us on Saturday, it meant a tremendous amount to those who got a chance to interact with you. And as you were saying at the top of the show, it was a historic moment that was 60 years ago today that King Chicago Freedom Movement selected Marquette park, specifically the neighborhood more broadly and, you know, to be able to confront the legacy of redlining, restricted covenants. But even more broadly, to speak to a point that you were talking about earlier about this false notion, this duality about progressivism being a kind of white liberal elite thing. No, back in the day, they were very clear then. King did not just start on August 5th. He was. He was mobilizing with Vice Lords, Blackstone Rangers, young black folks, talking about in the same year, economic injustice, disparities at home and human rights abroad. You know, and in some ways, we saw that win overnight in Michigan. It's really the same platform. Yeah, that's not a new platform. It's certainly not a white platform. It is really basically been at the core of movements that black folks in this country have been championing, from Marcus Garvey to W.E. dubois. And we're all, in fact, inheritors of that legacy. Anyone who's been organizing in the, you know, in the context of the US we are all beneficiaries of that. And I certainly am, as someone who has kind of been doing this for 30 years on the south side.

[Joy Reid]

Absolutely. Let me show a clip for you guys. If you aren't aware of it. I have not seen this clip before. We sourced it today. But it's just people just really don't talk really that much about King's Chicago campaign because it just breaks the sort of mold of what we think of as a civil rights movement, which is supposed to only be in Alabama. It's supposed to be in the south, but this was right in the city of Chicago. And watch this. These scenes are pretty wild. This is B2. Jason.

[Jason Reed]

Yes.

[Joy Reid]

I'm tired going to jail. I'm tired of all of the surging murmur of life's restless sea. So I'll tell anybody I'm willing to start marching. I don't march because I like it. I march because I must and because I'm a man and because I'm a child of God. Coming up, though, we got separated and we couldn't get through the Mobile. So what way did you come up? We had to go all the way

[Jason Reed]

around the park to come back in. Come up the back.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Oh, I've been hit so many times

[Joy Reid]

I'm immune to it. How do you feel about this reception, sir?

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Well, this is a terrible thing.

[Joy Reid]

I've been in many demonstrations all across the south, but I can say that I have never seen, even in Mississippi and Alabama, mobs as hostile and as hate filled as I've seen in Chicago. But the marsh will go on anyway.

[Jason Reed]

Oh, very definitely. We can't stop the march.

[Joy Reid]

We've gone on a few minutes. If you could repeat for our audience the history that you gave me and Jason about the history of that terrifying looking march.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

It was terrifying. And, you know, people like Andy Young, who was there that day, said, you know, one thing that they had never confronted in the South. And this is a year after Selma. Right. This is a year after Edmund Pettis. This is a year after some of the most horrific confrontations with white supremacy unbridled in the South. But what King. What they confronted in cities like Chicago, when they confronted Marquette park, what Andy Young would say in the south, it was often relegated to the mob, so to speak. Those with the hoods are the Bull Connors. It was in places like Marquette park where you saw 5,000 people, grandmothers, children, you saw women, you saw young men. And that was also a horrific, disorienting thing for them to have to encounter, right. That. That was unlike anything they had seen in the South. And so. And that was not just 1966. Remember, that is happening August 5, 1966. But a decade later, the same park was having American Nazi Party rallies in. The American Nazi Party headquartered itself on 71st and Rockwell. In fact, the Blues Brothers film was where Dan Aykroyd and Belushi, where they kind of had that iconic scene. They lampooned the young, the Nazi leader. And you could find those two. His name was Frank Collins, and yet he was very. He was a very buffoonish character, but he had thousands of people that he rallied. And that moment where they drive them off the bridge into the lagoon is supposed to be a kind of a homage to. To Marquette park. That moment in the 76. We even have images, joy of in 1986. We're talking about, you know, commemorating the 20th anniversary of literally, Klansmen in the park. So this is not ancient history. Right. My mother was probably one of the first Palestinian American families on the south side. She was a refugee from May 1948, literally born in May 1948. Palestinian families, along with Jewish American families coming from the show alongside black families fleeing the asylum, fleeing as alongside people like my grandfather. The horror of the south into the south side of Chicago in the neighborhoods like Inglewood. And all they were looking for was a place of dignified housing, a place that didn't have literal rats and tenement housing that was completely inhospitable to basic human life. Trying to find that quote, unquote, basic American dream, I. E. The dignity to live like human beings. There was a realtors that were whipping people into a frenzy, making mass kind of bank off the idea that the psychotic fear of proximity to blackness. Right. And associating that idea with losing not only all of the things that you have worked for in terms of the American dream, but even your entire way of life. That was the history behind then Marquette Park. Because by that point, of course, the Chicago freedom movement was confronting all the tenement housing issues. But they started to confront these red lines where. Right. These red lines that black families were not allowed to live beyond that. Bankers weren't giving, you know, loans to. That led to what Ta Nehisi and others talk about, billions of dollars of theft from the black community through contract sales. That doesn't just go away in the 70s and 80s, but is the modern kind of framework for the socioeconomic inequity that we see across urban centers in the north. And so King's presence in a place like Margaret park, if you were to play that interview on at one point, Joy, he's asked, do you Reg what's happened today, you Gretch, coming here? And King says very, you know, very with no hesitation, absolutely not. We had to bring the evil out into the face of day. And in many ways that's what we also were trying to confront Saturday. Joy, that, you know, King deployed a spiritual language alongside a progressive community economic language. And that is also within our repertoire. We are people like, I always call him the greatest civil rights rabbi you never heard of. Rabbi Robert Marx marched with King. He goes on to found an organization called the Jewish Council of Urban Affairs. They were out in large numbers on Saturday. You had Palestinian families that were out in large numbers. You had Muslims. People don't know that. On that again, August 5, 1966, you had a young Jeff Ford who was the leader of the Blackstone Rangers, who King was organizing and meeting with alongside Vice Lord members from the west side of Chicago who King had talk working in a capacity of nonviolence. They talk about wearing baseball gloves because they were catching so many bricks, right? And these were young 19 year old black men who were trying in a non violent fashion to march alongside this organizer because they were trying to give that a chance. And so we had some of those family members with us Saturday. We had Jesse Jackson's family with us Saturday. And alongside we have hundreds of people that came from across the country, from cities as far as Baltimore, Jackson, Mississippi. Because I believe in this moment more than any that spiritual message about us confronting red lines. Back in 66, those red lines were about who does or doesn't get a loan. Today, those red lines are about who is or who is not considered worthy of basic human dignity and our communities now, as evidenced in the election in Michigan, but I think across all this country, black, white, Muslim, Latino, you're beginning to see a demand that the basic fight for economic equity here and human rights here and abroad are not in any way shape or form incompatible, but very aligned and have been for a very long time.

[Joy Reid]

Wow, that is deep. And I mean, and the reality too is just the viciousness of the fight against black folks just walking in the park in a community. You described it when we met as guarding the citadel. Right? You have the elite who go to working class white people and say, you get nothing, but you need to guard this white neighborhood of yours with your very life and stop anybody black from moving near you. And that's your real fight. Your real fight is not for economic justice, even for yourself. And so you get people to work against what we would see as their interest, their economic interests, because they're just working their racial interest. And I find it sort of, kind of depressing and kind of fascinating how well that works and how well that has worked over the decades in this country.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

It's the ultimate Faustian barter. It's what, you know. You know, Jim Wallace, the great kind of, you know, organizer and spiritual leader in the white evangelical community, talks about the original sin of America. It. And we have to see it as such. White supremacy is not about any one particular ethnic community. It is about a disease, spiritual condition that thinks the false hierarchy of human value and that imposes it on every facet of our life. That works on a mentality that does pit us against one another, that again, says, yes, you're allowed in if you can guard the perimeter, and if you guard the perimeter effectively enough, we will allow you access, even if it means fighting and guarding the perimeter against your own blood brother or cousin. And that's not uncommon. You know, you'll find a Latino family that has brought in through one route that is now saying, we got here legally.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah, exactly.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

We got here. And not ignoring the entire history of who became legal when borders were drawn over hundreds of thousands of Mexican Americans in the Southwest. Right. Ignoring that history of the arbitrary notions of legality, illegality. And again, why now more than ever? I think it's a spiritual question because we're getting to a point where in this country and across the globe, we're really talking about the spiritual value of human dignity. And I think that's what that march was about. It was about human dignity. It was about who deserves to live in a sacred home, who lives deserved with tranquility. That one of the home, one of the signs that King had to confront, that became the inspiration for the first memorial that we built and unveiled for. For King and the Chicago freedom movement in the state of Illinois that's there in Marquette park right now. And I had the honor of taking Bernice King to that memorial. Believe it or not, it was her first time that she was retracing those steps. It was the first time she was walking into Marquette Park. But one of the signs that King confronted and that the photographer Bernard Kleiner captured was a man very angry with a very sign that said tired, go home. And a racist kind of caricature of black African feet. And so we use that sign when we were crafting the memorial to talk about what is home, who is home, right? And one of the. One of the words for home and on the memorial, home is written in eight different languages, starting with Potawatomi, right?

[Adam Green]

Who.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

The First Nation communities. And that's why they were also out there with us Saturday. One of the words in Arabic for home is meskan, which means a place of Sakina, a place of spiritual tranquility. And we all as human beings deserve that. And in many ways, the civil rights movement was also a human rights movement. And that's why King during those times was not only talk about economic injustice here, was not talking just about civil rights. He was talking about. And he was using words like internal colonialism, he was talking about domestic colonialism. He had a global and local analysis that that was not popular with many leaders. And that kind of. But that is not new. He was not the first one in black liberation movements or community movements to have that. And that is certainly, again, going back to what we saw in Michigan yesterday and what I think we will continue to see around the country are people are not buying into these false dichotomies anymore. You can be for economic justice here, human rights in Gaza and the west bank and be standing alongside your Jewish, Muslim, Christian, Catholic and brothers and sisters. This is about basic human dignity. It's about a basic spiritual, transcendent truth.

[Joy Reid]

I love it. I love the way that you explain things. It's so brilliant. But I'm going to let you go. But before I do, I do have to. You said something that is triggering. I must ask this because as a Palestinian man yourself, that whole right to home is something that is just abjectly denied to the Palestinian people. People were literally run out of their homes and told they don't deserve them, that God promised your home to someone else. And that is, I think people don't understand why African Americans, why black folks, and why South Africa, black South Africans and other black folks in the diaspora are so connected to the Palestinian people. It's because of that, right? It is this sense of, you don't deserve a home. And I think black people just connect to that. They connect to the anti apartheid struggle in Israel as well. Very Quickly, could you just talk about that alliance? Because I think people don't understand it. And if you could just sort of lay that out for us.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

Yeah, like you said, Joy, I think it's just very much aligned. You can't, whether you're Jewish, Muslim, Christian and you're connected to the black American experience and it's all reality. You talked about this psychotic fear of proximity to blackness. I mean, we know it's a psychosis that goes all the way back to the inception of this country. So no human being, no group of people have felt the kind of visceral sense of what it means to be dehumanized. The first race riots in Chicago started in 1919 because a black, young black man had the audacity of floating into white waters. Think about the insanity of that. And so when black folks show up, I don't care what religious faith they are on the west bank and they show up in Jerusalem and they experience viscerally what is so resonant both ancestrally here on the soil. It really doesn't take a lot of theory. This is not a bunch of ideological kind of, you know, alignment that's happening in a graduate workshop. This is just something that people feel very viscerally and, and you experience it, you know, and I, and I've gone and I've traveled with delegations from multi faith delegations and I think, you know, what people have to confront. And when, you know, Ta Nehisi talks about it, I think very beautifully in his book, it's just, you know, you know, apartheid when you feel it, you know, and, and no community understands the visceral pain and sting of that like a community that has experienced the brutal terror of that on this soil here. And certainly that Alignment is both in, based in history, politics, but also I think, a spiritual aspiration for what it means to truly belong to a promised land where we are all free and we are all experiencing basic human dignity. That's the struggle, I think, that black folks have led here and across the globe. And what makes Alignment with Palestinian human suffering just such a natural place to be.

[Joy Reid]

Dr. Rami Nashashibi, don't block my number because I'm going to be bugging you to come on this show a lot and do what you just did and lay out sort of the very beautiful prose, what the struggle means and what it means for our connected communities, our interconnected communities. Thank you so much for having me at the jubilee march that Dr. King very bravely endured along with so many other activists in Chicago to market park, thank you so much for having me. I appreciate you, brother. You're welcome.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

Thank you, Joy. Peace and blessings.

[Joy Reid]

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. That dude is that. That's a bad man. He is incredible. He's so smart and he explained things in a way that was so just beautifully said. But you're like, wow, this dude really understands humanity in a deep way. So. What a great guy.

[Jason Reed]

Welcome to go today. Exactly.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah, Today. And that's what he said. He said today's the anniversary. It's actually today.

[Paul Butler]

Yeah.

[Joy Reid]

Isn't that wild? Today is the actual anniversary of that march. And so God is. Was. Was in it. The alignment was perfect to have him on today. So thank you very much to Dr. Rami. And it's so wild because the people there, he's so, like, cool. In the community, they literally just introduced us to him as Rami. They didn't tell us he's doctor Even all the things. We're gonna give him his flowers. Welcome to hour two of the Joy Reid show. We appreciate you all so much. Whether you are, you know, beaming in to Watch us on YouTube or substack or wherever you are watching. I'm looking at the stack. I'm looking at the Facebook crowd. The Facebook folks be acting up. Y' all behave yourselves over there. The Twitchies. And also, of course, our LinkedIn fam. Everybody, we appreciate each and every one of you. Please be sure to hit like and subscribe. Particularly if you just loved hearing that interview with Dr. Rami, you're going to want to hit like and subscribe to get more of that great content. Also hit share and hit the little bell thing so you never miss a live. Let me let you know that this hour of the Joy Reach show is brought to you by some food our friends at Forkful. So eating well can be difficult when life gets busy finding time for meal planning or cooking a horrific challenge, especially for me. Super busy. Look, we worked at 2am last this morning. What are we doing? Most meal kits promise you convenience, but they require a whole lot of prep and a whole lot of cleanup. Meal services often. Don't often use things like industrial seed oils that actually can be harmful to your body. And don't even start with takeout and processed food. You're not supposed to be eating ultra processed food anyway because it sacrifices quality and healthy ingredients and taste just to get food in. And that's not good enough for you. What Forkful offers are meals that prioritize flavor and function and health. Zero seed oils, chef. Cooked fresh, never frozen. Ready to eat meals made with high quality premium proteins. Grass fed bison if you're a meat eater, wild caught salmon if you're at a pescatarian or if you're a veggie source. Delicious fresh vegetarian meals you can get gluten free dairen free dairy free you can get keto plant based GLP1 low carb meals. You basically go online and you pick which is your food preference and then they're going to make sure that you get that food conveniently right to your door. Eating well does not need to be complicated, y'. All, or full with fully prepared, deliciously healthy meals. No meal prep. Zero meal prep, no cooking, no cleanup. Jackie Reed knows that. I like that. Just clean favors and ready to eat in under three minutes. Delivered right to your door within 24 to 48 hours. This is game changing for me, for the the busy people and I think it will be for you too. Explore our meal plans with fresh ready to eat [e-mail] and use the code joy joy to get 50 off your first order. That's a pretty good deal. That's forkfulmeals.com joy use the promo code joy for 50% off. Thanks to Forkful for sponsoring this episode. So I, I want to talk. Oh, I think I'm skipping something. Hold on just one second. Block C. Yeah, let's talk about the Officer Tatum interview a little bit. Officer Tatum has jumped into the Nolan Wells case not really to try to solve the mystery, but really to try to defend the white French.

[Jason Reed]

Right.

[Joy Reid]

There's lots of clips around of him going around. I don't know if this one is AI of him saying that Nolan Wells had no black friends. I'm hoping that's AI because there's this video that would Google that would dispute that. But he seems really invested in the idea of defending these young men. And he went and did these interviews that in the end probably did them more harm than good. Because what Officer Tatum has done by so aggressively trying to defend Nolan Wells friends is he's just raised more questions. I don't know if you guys saw the Nancy Grace interview where she cornered him on the question of whether there was cell phone service on Horn Island. He originally made it sound like there's no way that Nolan Wells could have been taking video or anything like that. There was no cell service, but it turns out, oopsie, there was cell service because he had cell service when he was on Horn island doing his investigation. She also got him to, you know, sort of stick to this timeline that he's created, he has, you know, sort of walked these teenagers through a timeline that they're now stuck with because they've done it on his podcast. And it kind of doesn't make sense. If you are a former police officer, which he is, and you're using your skills as a former police officer to try to disprove that these young men did anything wrong. But your interviews with them are so softball and so clearly, you know, meant to lead the witness toward a conclusion that's helpful to them, that you actually, actually hurt them. This is a problem. Let me play for you one clip of this Officer Tatum interview that rather than shutting down questions, is just raising more questions. So this is Officer Tatum. We call him Officer Unfriendly to black people. You know, how Officer friendly back in the day. He's an unfriendly, yet he's an unfriendly. Guess he don't like black people. He thinks black people are terrible. He thinks we're better off under slavery. He said that in a Piers Morgan interview. He thinks the civil rights movement was the biggest harm to black people. He's a grifter. Absolutely. We just one of the commenters saying he's a grifter who basically has created an entire genre of content designed to make racist white people feel good about being racist by saying, no, don't worry, boss, Oz agrees with you. That's kind of his job to say, oh, no balls. I agree. Them black people are terrible. He's basically Clarence Thomas with a podcast. But anyway, let me play this clip, because I think this clip is actually not helpful to the Nolan Wells friends. You tell me what you think.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

This is C1 multiple people involved, people that may have seen Nolan last, but it's not being truthful and coming forward as to what they saw, who was with him last. And we have various people that have come up, come out or come to us with the information, and one was sent in a dm, honing in on one particular person that may have been in an altercation with Nolan that alluded to the fact that. And I. And I messaged this person because I want to talk directly to the person that I saw the DM from. And we haven't talked to this person yet, but the person said in the DM to another kid that is associated, not any of the kids that I interview to talk to, but that could be in. Associated to some degree that knew Nolan, that this person wrote a message saying, me and my husband saw you arguing with Nolan. And to the Effect of you're going to spend the rest of your life in prison.

[Jason Reed]

What?

[Joy Reid]

So officer unfriendly to black people, you're saying that you got a DM from someone who alleges that they saw that they interacted with someone who had a fight, allegedly with Nolan Wells potentially, and that then said, my husband and myself, it's obviously a woman or a man maybe. It could be a man with a husband. We don't know, saw you and you're going to spend the rest of your life in jail. Have you shared that information with the FBI? Have you shared the identity of that person with the Jackson County Sheriff's Department? Have you shared any of this with authorities? Or are you just talking about this and yapping on your podcast about it? Because it sounds to me like you got evidence, bro, of somebody that may have confronted Nolan Wells sometime between the time that your friend Warren Hudson says he last saw him, which is at 3pm and the time the days later when he was found face down in the water, dead. And you're saying that now you may have evidence that there was somebody who got in a fight with him house way. You need to make that make sense. Meanwhile, another development in this case is that the United Cajun Navy, which is the, the group that of volunteers who go out and they help people who are having distress at sea. They've now issued their own report, a 22 page working analytical report, which is interesting because when this, when the disappearance first happened, when Nolan Wells first disappeared, the United Cajun Navy called for volunteers. I went on their Facebook page and looked at the video where a gentleman from the United Cajun Navy called out to say, hey, if you've got a boat, we've got a missing young man. He described him, described what he was wearing and said, get your boats out there and try to find this young man. Well, the United Cajun Navy has now created a report of their own, a 22 page working analytical report which references data from the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources photos and social media comments. And then they list most of the information as needing additional verification. What you're seeing on your screen right now is a working timeline that they created of the investigation and it is a compilation of information that the United Cajun Navy themselves suggest that law enforcement or private investigators should go back and verify. In other words, they're doing more actual work than the Cash. Patel, FBI apparently, this report, what you see on your screen, this is only three pages of it. That's the, the whole, the sort of front page of it and these are some of the pages inside. It provides a list of evidence that they suggest requesting, like phone records, GPS coordinates and separate witness interviews. The fact that they've suggested requesting specific evidence is not an indication that it had or had not already been done or verified or asked for. They're just saying this is something that should happen. Brian Trasher, the Vice president of the United Cajun Navy told TMZ that they provided the report to Wells family, attorneys and law enforcement and they've all confirmed that they've received it. The United Cajun Navy highlighted the boats that were at horn island on July 4th. They have still images which show placements throughout that afternoon. The report did not authenticate whether the timestamp provided are from when all the included videos or images are captured. They identify six boats. Boat number one, Boat X, boat number two, which is Frontier Bay. Boat number three, Palm beach and Triton. Triton is the boat that you seek making the distress call. All were near each other at Horn island throughout the day. Only the Palm beach and the Triton, both of which by the way were referenced by Warren Hudson in his interview with Officer Unfriendly to Black People. They're clearly identified as being related to Nolan Wells group. He rode out on the island on the Triton. That confirms what Warren Hudson said, which witnesses said left around 4:30pm because of a faulty bilge pump. The boat was reportedly partially towed back to the mainland by a friend, which we believe is the friend Bart, who was a 21 year old football player. None of the information supplied addressed when the Triton started taking on water. While the report suggested others should collect that data, the United Cajun Navy was not able to do that themselves. They noted that there's no roster for any of the boats in question to know who was actually on them. Boat X had moved away from the cluster before 4:50pm When a fight video was recorded. When or why it left was not determined. It's unclear. I'm reading from the Clarion ledger right now what relation, if any, it has to the case. The clearing ledgers report on this report. The report also shows two images of GPS coordinates off the coast of Horn island based on something called MDMR information. It does not claim to have confirmed when the boat was there or after it happened. So it's, it's basically tracking the movement of the Triton. According to the United Cajun Navy, there are five questions that need to be answered regarding the death of Nolan Wells. And these are the five questions they say need to be answered. And they say until these five points are resolved, any narrative that claims certainty about Nolan's movements during the gap exceeds what the supplied evidence can support. That's in this report, which I have, I'm looking at right here. Okay, Here are the five questions they say should be asked. Question number one, when was Wells last seen alive? Question number two, what happened between 3:23pm and 4:27pm on July 4th at Horn Island? Question number three, who was on boat X? When did it leave and why? Question number four, can the 4:31pm Triton departure time be confirmed with electronic data? And question number five, who was on every boat and how do their statements match the photos? These seem like sound good questions to me because what it appears that they are saying is that we need to understand the movements of the actual boats so that we can understand, number one, who took the video of the boat? That officer unfriendly to black people showed on his platform saying, hey, here's the boat. You can see it. Who took that picture? Who was on the Triton when they called in for the distress call and said they thought there were seven people on? And obviously the obvious question, was Nolan on that Triton after 3pm When Warren says it was the last time he saw him. But Katie, who is the young lady he was supposed to be staying on the island to see, says no, she thought he got on the boat. One other thing that is out now is the Jackson County Sheriff's Department has released their two page report, which is C3. There it is. There's not a lot in here and a lot of it is blacked out. So those are the new things that have happened that we wanted to talk with about, with our favorite, some of our, two of our favorite guests, Paul Butler and Frank Figluzzi. Paul Butler, of course, is our wonderful legal analyst, a Georgetown law guy and author, and also our friend Frank Figloozzi, who is the host of the Frank Figloozzi show on Substack and former FBI boss. I feel like you should have been the Director of the FBI. I think we would have had a stronger FBI had you been Director. But you were, you were Associate Director, right?

[Paul Butler]

Assistant Director, Yeah, Assistant Director. Feel free to promote me.

[Joy Reid]

I'm going to promote you. I'm going to promote you, Frank. I want to go through these five questions with you. To start with you, and then with our, our favorite former prosecutor. And I don't know if you were able to hear them backstage as I was reading through the questions that the United Cajun Navy has Said should be asked, and they really boil down to who was on the boats, where did the boats go? Can you get GPS coordinates to verify where the boats went and who was on. They really specified boat X, which was near the Triton at some point before it took on water. What do you make of that?

[Paul Butler]

So, first, look, generally, it pains me to admit that we are now in a mode where we're taking third party smart. By the way, credible questions and investigative leads are being laid out by third parties, and, comma, like the Cajun Navy and, comma, we have no idea whether law enforcement has pursued these otherwise logical leads.

[Frank Figliuzzi]

Now.

[Paul Butler]

All right, so that's my general opinion. And, yes, why do I say it pains me? Because I had 25 years in federal law enforcement. You know, I. Well, I appreciated the cooperation of the public, and it was necessary.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah, it's not.

[Paul Butler]

It's not the greatest thing in the world when your leads are being dictated to you because you still haven't figured things out that. That's not good. All right, let me get.

[Joy Reid]

You say you didn't want to crowdsource law enforcement back then, and you don't think it's good now.

[Paul Butler]

Well, no, no, I. No, I don't want to say that. I think I do believe now I'm the full believer in crowdsourcing crime solving. It works. It's worked in identifying the January six insurrectionists in a large way. You know, indictment after indictment of those now pardoned January six insurrectionist says. Leads off with a prosecutor saying, you know, based on information obtained by, you know, various crowdsourcing entities. But that's fantastic. My point, Joy, is that we shouldn't. We should in a case like this. This isn't 1000 people rushing the Capitol. This. This is a small case that should be over by now. That's just my investigative opinion. All right, now. Now, moving on to a micro look at this thing. The key. The key here is indeed a couple of things on this list of five. The boat X, the mystery boat X, who's on it? Why did they leave? What's the fight about? And as you said, who indeed took the video? And then the whereabouts of Nolan, we don't even seem to know. At least we don't at this point. Was Nolan even on that boat? And we've got the young lady saying, I don't think so, or, I thought so. Then we have his friend saying, no, it's a mess, and I just want to throw in if we don't get to it. I was appalled today to see that Nolan's mom is under investigation by the Nurse Licensing Board of Mississippi because someone filed some complaint. She's never had a complaint, allegedly, in her career, but here it comes.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah. She's also not subject to the FBI's various investigations about threats to the friends and their families and to the judge, who is the stepmom of Warren. But to my knowledge, I don't know that the FBI is investigating any threats toward her. Not that we know if she's received them. But you're absolutely right. There's been a campaign, an online campaign to destroy Christine Wansley, to destroy her reputation. And this is the double tragedy. This woman lost her child. And for the apparent crime of just wanting to know what happened to her son, which, to your point, Frank, if it was just a drowning, why are we still talking about it all of this time later? Why are there blacked out parts of a basic police report about a supposedly simple drowning? Why is the United Cajun Navy suggesting questions to ask? This should have been open and shut. Why are they holding on to the autopsy if it's a simple drowning? It's open and shut. Tell the mom what happened. She doesn't want to be doing this. And, yeah, then now she's having to face harassment. It's. It's actually. It's. It's. It's a. It's a horrible sin. But I want to go to you on this, Paul, and talk about the Officer Tatum piece of it, because I think it's clear he wanted to help. He told one of the young men, Trayston, that he thinks he's incredibly brave and he's got his back. He's got you guys his back. It's clear that was the purpose of the interviews. The interviews were very leading. They weren't very objective. They weren't very journalistic. But I don't think the interviews helped them. I feel like the interviews just raised more questions. This new interview in which he claims to have gotten a DM from someone who says they witnessed a fight with Nolan Wells and that they then reached out to the person in the fight to say, you're going to spend the rest of your life in prison, and my husband and I saw you. Well, wait a minute. Shouldn't he call the police?

[Frank Figliuzzi]

He absolutely should call the police. He should call the Jackson County Sheriff. He should call the FBI. He should call any other investigative bodies, and he should also call Ben Crump, because Ben Crump is conducting an independent investigation that in some ways has more credibility. The reason that this case has to be Crowdsourced is immediately after Nolan disappeared. The Jackson county sheriff said he didn't suspect any foul play. Now, Joy, imagine if there were a young white man on an island with 200 African American young people and that young white man disappeared. All 200 of those young black people would have been questioned and hauled in front of a grand jury fast, quick and in a hurry. And here we are more than a month later after Nolan disappeared, and we don't know squat.

[Joy Reid]

It is really just insane. Right? I mean, it boggles the mind. And I want to go back to this timeline. So helpfully, the United Cajun Navy, which again, bears be doing more work than Cash Patel in them, put out a timeline. And I want to go to. I want both of you guys to discuss. I'm going to go to you first on this, Frank, and I think it's. I don't think you would disagree, right. That this is. It's strange even that there would be this immediate dismissal, that there's no crime involved and then suddenly there's a grand jury. Right? So, I mean, the Jackson county sheriff hasn't helped either. They're like, give us patience. But patience for what? You said there was no crime. It was just a drowning. Patience for what?

[Paul Butler]

It's almost always regrettable and certainly ill advised to ever for a law enforcement leader to ever come out immediately and say, I don't see any signs of foul play. You will eat those words about half the time. Now, with regard to the grand jury, I think it's important to note that in Mississippi that any death of unknown origin is going to end up at the grand jury. It does not. We should be careful not to infer that that means that there's a criminal inquiry and someone's going to get indicted. Far from the truth, this. And you know, it's almost sad, though, because it means this is pro forma and they've got to do this and get it out of the way. That's what concerns.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah. By the way, in Jackson, there has been another black person. There's a black woman found hanged behind a house. And we're going to dig into that story. More coming up and we'll see if the. If that ends up in a grand juror, if there's that dismissal as another suicide. Let's talk about this timeline. In light of last time you guys were here, I did play for you this seato distress call that lots of people are cleaning up the audio for. So there's a gentleman named Elliot, Connie who received yet another version of this distress Call from somebody who separated the audio. Essentially, what he was saying, that this person explained to him who's an audio engineer, and he verified their identity, was that the distress call. When you're on hold, the hold music is only on one channel of the two channels. It's not in stereo. It's in mono in one ear, so that the call itself was in the other channel. They're two separate channels. So what this audio engineer did is they separated. With the channel separated, they could just mute the whole music and really hear the distress call. Now, I. The person sent it to Elliot, Connie, with the words on it again, which I do think is leading, you know, if you see the words. So I took the words out. I put on some generic video that's been circulating on social media. And I would love for the two of you to listen to this and tell me if you hear anything different this time. This is C4, of course.

[Paul Butler]

How far is the water coming up, sir?

[Joy Reid]

Can you give me a description?

[Paul Butler]

Ankles.

[Frank Figliuzzi]

Hello?

[Paul Butler]

Hey.

[Adam Green]

Yes.

[Joy Reid]

How far is the water coming up, sir?

[Adam Green]

It's coming up.

[Joy Reid]

We're just thinking. I don't know, like, we're just. We're going down. Frank Elliott says he distinctly hears labored breathing or coughing, choking sort of breathing. And multiple people who've listened to the audio say they hear. Is he dead? Do you hear that?

[Paul Butler]

I did not hear. I heard labor breathing, and I took that to be perhaps just that they're in a panic if the boat is truly sinking. And we've already talked in prior episodes about alcohol consumption. So, yes, I do hear labored breathing. I. I personally don't hear. Is he dead? I don't. I do. And again, we talked about this before. You know, is the water up to your ankles or, you know, I don't know.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

You don't know?

[Paul Butler]

Is that. Are you taking on water or are you not? I don't know.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah, that is very strange. And also the calm. If you're really sinking in 30ft of water, I would be a little less calm because you can see in the video that Officer Tatum released, they don't have life jackets on. What about you, Paul? Do you hear any of the things that people hear? Is he dead? He's dead. And the labor breathing.

[Frank Figliuzzi]

I didn't hear, Is he dead? I did hear heavy breathing. I heard panic and distress that the boat might be sinking. But, you know, a lot of this is beyond speculation. There's forensics that hopefully the Jackson County Sheriff and the FBI are using to exactly determine. Determine what's said on this tape and with regard to the evidence, and we can use that word to describe the information that the podcaster police officer got. The good news is that we don't have to wait for him to bring that evidence to the police. The grand jury can subpoena that evidence from him. They can trace whoever is sent that message and find out if it's valid that that person saw an altercation and that that person has information about what happened to young Nolan.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah, and I'm sure they're going to also, you know, subpoena. Jason, if you can look at C7 here, Officer Tatum obtained this video that he says is that day. This is the boat. You can see the size of the boat. And the goal of this for Officer Tatum is to prove that Nolan Wells was not on the boat. But the problem for me is that, number one, it shows the boat very much alone. You don't see other boats around them. Which begs the question for me, who's taking the video? And I wonder if that video, Frank, might be boat X. That's the question that are raised for me. When I see that all I want to know is who's taking the video and has anybody talked to them?

[Paul Butler]

Yeah, indeed. And again, I know this sounds like I'm beating the same drum last time we spoke, but I am, I am at a loss as to why the FBI is not taking, if not the lead, a co. Lead on this. Because, you know, we remind your viewers this did happen on federal property, part of the National Park Service. And the FBI seems really keen on investigating threats to the, to the white families and even arresting on federal charges. Joy. For interstate threats. But seems unwilling to spend investigative resources other than. And I don't want to minimize this other than the digital forensic examinations with their. Which they're very good at. But I, but I don't understand the lack of dedication of investigative, you know, boots on the ground investigative resources where these interviews could get knocked out. I mean, you just, you tell your field office there in Jackson, hey, we're all doing these interviews today. There's 100 of them. We're knocking them out and it gets done.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah, you would think a month later. Let me go through some of this working timeline that the United Cajun Navy put out because there's some other stuff that is very actually strange. Right. So you have at 3:23pm A vertical screen recording displays a phone clock while showing the crowded anchorage and nearby boats. So basically they're all around lots of boats. At 3:23, the last independently corroborated sighting of Nolan is around 323. And we could put that picture up C6 if you could. Jason. This one, we don't know the timeline on this, but this is the last picture that we have or one of the few pictures that we have. TMZ obtained it that shows what appears to be Nolan Wells on the boat. Theoretically, that is around sometime in that 3:23 time period. You then have at 4:27pm you have a recording showing a boats and people on the anchorage, but not necessarily with Nolan in them. 431, the boat on which Nolan arrived at Horn island departs at 1631, per the user supplied timeline. The supplied package does not include the underlying gps, so no gps, but this is when it supposedly leaves. Then you have someone named Matthew Lamp who states at 5pm that a passenger was pretty certain a person was part of a group that was almost fighting around 5pm he says that the Bertram with blue top left shortly afterwards and fast. Not believed to be a factor at this time, but that someone got in a fight around five. Then another person named Melissa Thomas disputes the identification and says a different young man was with her group and says they spoke with the boys. One of them had an entire vodka bottle. Then you have at 6:00pm MDMR, I guess, which is the marine agency, has correspondence with the origin vessel, which is the vessel that apparently was having some sort of distress. And I guess it continues to move. But then at 7:30pm another witness named Caitlin Brochard says that they were parked next to that same boat and that Nolan was nowhere in sight. But it seems that from this timeline, which is a little bit difficult to understand, that the boat that Nolan was on when he came to Horn island, but then went back without him, moved somewhere else and parked. So it didn't go all immediately back to its origin. Does that make sense that somehow the boat was still operative?

[Paul Butler]

It sounds like that. It sounds like that. And we don't know at what point exactly they discovered if it happened, that it was sinking. Right? Oh, we've got a problem. And yeah, there's a. There's a gap of knowledge there.

[Joy Reid]

And Paul, I mean, the challenge is, is that it's kind of amazing to me the United Cajun Navy has names of people who are witnessing the boat moving around, but that they're disputing whether or not they cited Nolan as part of an argument, whether or not it was a different person that was part of an argument. You've got Trayston saying he's the one who was Part of the argument, there's so many conflicting stories, but also the conflicts as to whether the boat was really disabled, whether the boat then moves to another place and parks, which seems weird. If it was a sinking boat, you'd think it would just go back where it came from. I feel like there's so many questions here that lead me to think that maybe the boat wasn't sinking, that maybe the boat wasn't so completely disabled that it didn't continue to do more things. Am I wrong for thinking that?

[Frank Figliuzzi]

You're not wrong at all. If a boat is sinking, then, and people are on the boat and people are around the boat, then everyone should know that. And so, once again, people should be questioned. The weird thing is that we have this photo of Nolan at 3:30 and then a bunch of other activity, but apparently no one knows what was going on with Nolan, even though people were on the island as late as two hours after. Joy, you and I have been in situations where we're the only one. Right. We're the only African American or black person in a group. And lots of times in those situations, I feel like people are kind of noticing me. They understand, like, where I am, what I'm doing. Not. It's not a hostile thing. It's just, again, you're the only one. So in some ways you stand out in the same way that in that photo you just showed, Nolan stood out even though you couldn't even see his face. So again, it's just weird that even though there are people around for a couple of hours after this last photo of Nolan, no one seems to know where he was, what he was doing, or what happened to him.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah, I think between that and the first call on a sinking boat being to grandpa, not to the Coast Guard. Also weird. Like, it's just. There's a lot to it. And again, I think we'll. Frank, you've made the point numerous times that if this was just a drowning, we shouldn't even be talking about this anymore. This should have been wrapped up and aggressively investigated and concluded so that the mom and the dad could sleep at night. Thank you both for being here. We appreciate you. FrankFuruzzi please follow the Frank Fugluzzi Show. We appreciate you very much and also our friend Paul Butler. Thank you guys and we will have you back.

[Paul Butler]

Thanks, Joy.

[Joy Reid]

Thank you very much. It's weird. It's all weird. It makes no sense. I wish it made sense, but it doesn't. And I think those who are following the case are doing it simply because they just want. They just want any answers whatsoever. I will note that, as Frank just mentioned, a third person has been charged now for threatening witnesses. This is TMZ once again reporting that the federal crackdown over alleged threats to the Nolan Wells investigation. As Frank Fogluzzi said, a person named Edward James Porter from Berwin, Illinois, has been accused of using phone calls and text messages to threaten two witnesses involved in the ongoing investigation into Nolan's death. Prosecutors alleged that Porter repeatedly called one witness on Friday, threatening to come kill the witnesses and their family. The complaint says that he also, he had the witness's home address before allegedly texting the address directly to them. So that's no bueno. People should not be threatening anyone in this case. But I also think that people should not be necessarily giving interviews about the case to anyone other than law enforcement at this point. It is a strange case, and we will just keep up with it. And horrors for the Nolan Wells family having to still deal with this. Okay, so we talk a lot about the economic state of black women in this country and the mass of layoffs and firings that have left more than 400,000 at this point, black women without jobs, including really being run out of the federal government aggressively by the current administration. But we don't talk often enough about the equivalent challenges facing black men in this country. Well, no more. The John Mercer Langston Institute for African American Political Leadership has combined with the Virginia alliance for Black Men and Boys to put out a report on the economic state of black men and boys to sort of dig into what's going on with this group of Americans who are also like black women, facing tremendous challenges in the current environment. And joining me now to discuss this is our friend, Dr. Wes Bellamy. He was, I want to say, you were the youngest legislator in Virginia's history when you, when you were the person who was very much directly involved in the Charlottesville nightmares that were taking place back during Donald Trump's first term. But you are also now a professor, a public intellectual, and somebody who is on top of this report. Thank you for being here, Dr. Bellamy.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Well, you know, anything for you, my sister. I appreciate you for having us on a very timely conversation, a very serious topic.

[Joy Reid]

Let's talk about this report. And thank you very much. And I'm glad that you all did this report. What are some of the top lines for this report? And I should also note. Let me give you your full flowers. You're a professor and executive director of the John Mercer Langston Institute for African American Leadership, which produced this report at Virginia State University. Give us the top lines.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Yeah, man. Well, one, you know, I want to make everybody be fully aware that this report is sombering. We're not going to sugarcoat and pretend as if that it is not something in which it's very disappointing to hear in a wide variety of different ways. But I do want everybody to know that not all is lost. So when we talk about top lines, there's a couple things that really stood out initially. Black men are really the only group losing ground in unemployment. So in quarter one of 2025 to quarter one of 2026, Black men lost nearly 650,000 jobs. The population, the employment to population ratio, it fell from 60.5% to 58.8%. Again, that's between quarter one, 2025 and 2028, almost a 1.7 point drop. And that's roughly that. Not roughly. That is the highest percentage of any of the four major subgroups. Again, I touched on the fact that black unemployment is a really, really down black male unemployment. And when we look at the month of April of 2026, that number was 7.4%. In June, it was 6.6% for Black men, again, the highest of the four major racial groups. When you look at black males in college, know there's a lot of discussion about black males and where we're going to school, what we're doing. Black males only ran represent 26% of the enrollment share at HBCUs and roughly 28% of the enrollment share at PWI. Numbers that are very troubling when it comes to job creation and pay. Black males only make 77 cents for every dollar that white men make. And then there's no cushion, just quite frankly. The median Black household holds $2,200 in transaction accounts. And for white households, it's $10,000. Home homeownership is 43% in comparison to 73% for white households. And then lastly, I'll just say when you look at the literacy rate, African Americans and males are included in that. Men are included in that. We're reading at a 17% proficiency rate in the fourth grade. So we have our work to do in every shape, form or fashion, but we can do it. And we've seen items of success throughout this report. Excuse me, Alabama A&M. Morgan State University, the city of Baltimore, all are included in the report for things in which they're doing tremendously well. At a call with the president of Benedict College this morning, President Rouse on the artist and talking about some of the Work in which they're doing. So there are lights. But again, we have a great deal of work to do.

[Joy Reid]

Are these statistics new for black men? Because we know obviously that enslavement was designed to keep a percentage of the population forever incarcerated in free labor. And then Jim Crow was designed to keep a, you know, 13% of the population forever poor and uneducated. And it was, you know, very deliberate and also out of the voting booth. And so there's always been a disparity. That's not new. But is the disparity, has it gotten worse, let's say, over the last 20 years?

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Yes. So the numbers have exasperated. When you look at HBCU enrollment in 1976, it was nearly 2038 black men, representing nearly 38% of the enrollment share. And today that number is down to 26% in 2026. So I mean, we've seen the decrease over time. Even from an economic standpoint, while it may seem as if black men are making more money, when you compare that to the, the, the amount of, again, 77 cent for every $1 that white men are making is nowhere near where it needs to be. So to your point, point, these systems are working exactly as they should, but now we have the concrete data to point to. Okay, this is what one plus one is saying. And I firmly believe that, you know, this isn't the, the first report of its nature talking about black men, but I think it's one of the more comprehensive ones as of late so that it can stop us from simply using innuendo and guessing and saying, hey, this is what we think. Well, we have, you know, we did extensive research. We, we took about a year to complete this study. And the facts are the facts. We've triangulated the data, we've disaggregated in a wide variety of different ways. We've pulled from several different major statistical publications to ensure that this number is right. We fact checked it seven different times and unfortunately, the numbers are the numbers. But again, I'm inspired by the fact that now we know and now we can create plans to move forward.

[Joy Reid]

Does the report get into causation? Like what are some of the causes for these disparities?

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Well, yes, it does. And I mean, unfortunately, in that regard, there are things that aren't quite surprising. So when we look at the trajectory of black men in their wealth creation, there's two things that really stood out to me. One, black men, even if they come from affluent or high wealth households, they were not prevented from being exposed to the, the barriers of systemic racism. So what does that mean? A black man can go to college, go to a four year university, get a degree, enter into a field in which they're making money. And we see time and time again that that man, that black man will not be paid at the same rate as their white counterpart. Furthermore, there are different barriers that will prevent them or prevent him from advancing in his career at the same rate as his colleague. Much of that is due to the, the fact that again, these systems have created jobs and entities in which mostly white men, or white people for that matter, white women for that matter, are in positions to be able to do the hiring and again, decide who advances. And because of that, black men specifically, and obviously we know this is the case with black women, but for the sake of this argument, we're talking about black men. Black men are not chosen to move up the ladder at the same rate. That leads us to another conversation in which was. In which we've seen several people discuss. Well, brothers need to go to trade school. Well, here's the thing. When you go to trade school, there's a list of barriers with that as well. One, there are not enough apprenticeship programs that are free or cost efficient for brothers to tap into. We're encouraging municipalities to create these programs. When I was the vice mayor of Charlottesville, we created something called the Pipeline Pathways to Pipelines trade program, and it's still in existence today. But we don't see enough of those programs across the country. So here's what happens. A brother, let's just say Little Wesley, at 21 years old, I may have a felony. I may have made some mistakes at 17. 18 was tried as an adult. 17 was tried as an adult. I have a felony on my jacket now. And I say, hey, I'm gonna go become a carpenter, I'm gonna go become a plumber. Because that's what people say, hey man, go be an electrician. You can work for yourself, brother. Well, one, to enter the trade school, there is a cost. And when you're in the trade school school, you have to be able to sustain yourself. Let's just say little Wesley has a child. That child needs money, that child needs clothing, that child needs Pampers. So how are you sustaining yourself when you're in the trade school? Once you finish the trade school, by the grace of God, if you make it through, there's a cost associated with develop, excuse me, with earning and obtaining your tools. So how do you get those tools without a cushion to be able to get the start going Once you get your, your tools and let's just say you do get the opportunity, opportunity to go to a job, we face significant barriers in terms of moving up the ladder to potentially become a foreman or a leader on the job, if you will, or within the company. Then you couple that with say, hey, okay, I'm going to go do my own thing. After maybe 8, 9, 10 years of experience, I'm going to go do my own thing. What we've seen, there's a lack of intentionality with local municipalities and even some state municipalities with developing specific contracting practices for, for African Americans and minorities. So all of those things play a role in terms of why our wealth is behind and still what we saw from the data. Not, not innuendo, not innuendo, excuse me. The, the fastest rate for black men to still be able to achieve economically is with the credentialing of a four year degree. Our data is very clear in showing the earnings of a person with a four year, a black man with a four year degree, great degree opposed to one who does not, and even those who receive trades. So again, this, this problem is convoluted in a wide variety of different ways, but it doesn't mean that we can't find success stories and, or build upon what we know is broken.

[Joy Reid]

So does this report like sort of started, start to dig into some of those solutions? Like, you know what, what are the suggestions that are made in the report as to what can be done to close this gap?

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Yes, ma'. Am. So we have six priority items within the report. One that's not in there that I'm going to say to you, and I'm encouraging all of your listeners to say is one, we got to stop calling our little brothers Y N's. Okay? That's, that's first and foremost. The, the wording and the way in which we communicate and talk about each other plays a great role, plays a major role in the, the emotional feelings of brothers because black men are also one of the leading subgroups for committing suicide right now. So again, we, we. The, the intentionality of our language plays a major role in how they're impacting. Excuse me, how they're advancing. So I'll give you briefly some of the priority levels. First and foremost, we're calling on every state to create and adopt a commission for black men and boys. We need targeted strategies specifically for our brothers because we can see across the country black men are in a state of emergency. So that's one of the things in which we're asking for Everyone to do. Secondly, on a municipal level, we're asking for all of our municipalities to create some form of pipe, excuse me, pathways program for black men specifically. And we know that not every, every municipality has access to the kind of industry that will be able to, to allow for black men to earn a living wage or, or even earn the economic gain that we know they need. But we're asking, can they be created, can they partner with other municipalities, can they be creative in terms of how they partner with different industries to be able to provide support for these young men? Thirdly, from an educational level, we're saying specifically, get on, get them, get these boys on the ramp early. So we need reading interventionists in our low performing schools. We need reading interventionists in our high performing schools. Where you go to school as a black man does not solely determine how you're going to advance and where you're going to be economically once you graduate. So again, kindergarten, first grade, second grade, third grade. All of these schools and these brothers specifically need reading interventionists. Now some folks will say, well, hey, if they're in an underperforming school, such as, designated as a Title 1 school, they're already getting funds from the federal government to do these kind of things. But those, those met, those strategies are not always targeted for black men. Men. And in fourth, fifth, sixth, we're really harping on the fact that if you hear nothing else, if you learn nothing else from this report, we have to be intentional all the way around about how we care and support for our black men. When you look at again, the state of economics in terms of our weekly earnings, which as you see on the screen, only $1,039, only 26% of us going, going to HBCUs, only 28% of us going to PWIs, one of the highest suicide rates of any of the major subgroups. You need targeted measures. Excuse me, targeted strategies and measurable outcomes for how we're going to deal with our brothers. And I believe we can do that.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah. And before I let you go, I mean, I can't imagine that your phone is ringing off the hook from mainstream media to come on and talk about this report. I mean, I do think that, you know, people see, you know, there's a LeBron James, they're like, the black men are doing great. You know, there's famous black men, there's rich black men, there's celebrity black men. They're like, they're fine. And I think there's a dismissal of the whole, you know, and the Whole anti DEI wave, which is it black women as well, that people are just dismissing everything that's going on. But is that something that you've confronted in terms of trying to get this report out there and publicize it?

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Yeah, I mean, we think we thank God for sisters like you who allowed us to use your platform to be able to highlight this report. Unfortunately, we have not seen mainstream media come in droves to pick up the report. We've seen black media show that they care. And we got us. I'm happy to say that we did some data analytics actually earlier today. So the report is around 750,000 views up until this point. So we feel, feel happy about that. Yeah, that's good. That's. That's great. However, yeah, I, I be candid. I've been disappointed that we haven't heard from many of the mainstream media outlets to talk about this soon. And this kind of ties into what we heard several brothers say when we were having our conversations. We've engaged nearly 10,000 black men in a wide variety of different areas over the last year. So while we're working on this report. And brothers will say, man, I ain't a sister. So they don't care or people don't care about how we feel. People don't care about what we're going through. And unfortunately, you know, in the aftermath of this report, by and large, that that has been the case from mainstream media. But I will say again, sisters like yourself, Angela, Ron, my sister, Tesla Figueroa, like, you know, our folks have ensured that this has been amplified and looked up. And we're thankful for you. And again, man, we got us. We don't, we don't. We can't worry and harping on what somebody else isn't doing. We got the data. Now we know what we have to do. We know what's in front of us. And, and we're going to get to work.

[Joy Reid]

My friend, Dr. West Belby, I'll have to have you come back because I really think we should dig deeper into these questions of mental health. And we have a new friend, Dr. Elliot, Connie, who is really brilliant and I would love to put the two of you together and talk about black men and mental health. I think it would be a really fantastic conversation. But I have my copy of the report. How do others get theirs?

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

So you can literally go to our website, www.vsu.edu. the report is on the homepage. You could just type in the political science department issue on Google. You will see the report. It has a Big landing page and the graphics and the social. Excuse me, the social graphics as well as the full report. And I'm encouraging everyone to read it. It's a relatively easy, easy read. And I'm being respectful to everyone's aptitude and their ability to be able to digest this kind of information. I encourage you to brace yourself because the report has some findings that, again, many of us knew, but it's kind of tough on reading it. But it's there for you, y', all, and I encourage you to read it. It's only 12 pages. Check it out, share it, and then let's get to work. You make a plan, and let's get to work.

[Joy Reid]

Oh, our readers are nerds. They're. They're very proud nerds. They like to read book. They like to read. That's why they're called readers, man.

[Jason Reed]

See what you did?

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Okay, okay, okay, okay.

[Joy Reid]

I appreciate you. Thank you. We call him. I call him Dr. West, but you guys go to call him Dr. West Bellamy because. Thank you, my friend. I appreciate you.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

We appreciate you. Thank you, sis.

[Joy Reid]

Thank you so much. All right, so we're gonna put the link in the description of the show so you guys can read the support. Scaring is caring, as we say, but, you know, you have to read the bad news to know what you can do about it and change things and turn them around. So Dr. West Bellamy is one of the great ones, I'm telling you. Go back and read his book that talks about what he had to deal with when the Charlottesville riots happened because he was a young state legislator at the time. That was the only black legislator, I think, in. In his cohort, in dealing with that madness. So anyway, he's a brilliant guy. So thank you to Dr. Bellamy. We will definitely. Yes, the readers are here. We are blurds, nerds and all the nerd things. Let's do our moment of joy before we get out of here. And this one is actually great. Winsome found this one. This one is a great and wonderful and joyful story about doing nice things for other people who do not have the haves, doing for the have nots. And it's a beautiful story. It is our moment of joy. And it is from Ray and Knight on Instagram.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Crazy party for the homeless community. I had a free spa with facials. I had a barbershop.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

Free.

[Joy Reid]

Free haircuts. Endless free clothes.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

New clothes, too.

[Joy Reid]

Like we pop tags.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

We had shoes, everything.

[Joy Reid]

Waterless toothbrushes, hygiene products for women.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Endless free food.

[Joy Reid]

Sushi Alfredo fruits, veggies, Pizza.

[Adam Green]

Everything.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Had a live dj. The dance floor got crazy. This is my favorite part. Everybody pulled up and showed their moves. So you can't go to a party without dancing. That's law.

[Joy Reid]

We even opened the mic up and

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

had a karaoke session. This was so much fun.

[Joy Reid]

We even had goodies for the homeless

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

animals around the block.

[Jason Reed]

I love it.

[Joy Reid]

Even took care of the homeless animals around the block. That is a really great thing. Ray and Knight on Instagram doing nice things for other people. Yes.

[Jason Reed]

Before we go. Right. Sean win and Juan J2 actually told

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

me that last Friday.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah.

[Jason Reed]

While we in Chicago.

[Paul Butler]

Yeah.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

That while we was having technical difficulties.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah.

[Jason Reed]

They can hear me cussing.

[Joy Reid]

Oh, yeah.

[Paul Butler]

So.

[Joy Reid]

Well, I was next to you, so I heard it too.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Well, you were right there.

[Jason Reed]

So Sean came up with this brilliant idea. So when I start cussing.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah, right.

[Jason Reed]

Or if we have technical difficulties, she came up with these four graphics.

[Joy Reid]

So you'll see them. Yeah.

[Jason Reed]

So, yeah. So I'm gonna share with our audience before we go.

[Joy Reid]

Okay. Please.

[Jason Reed]

So if you see this first one

[Joy Reid]

right here, we got gremlins.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

We got gremlins. And I'm trying to get them out

[Jason Reed]

of here because we gotta get back to you guys now. Here goes another one. If the Internet goes down, we gotta reboot it.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

You know what I mean?

[Jason Reed]

We're gonna put a graphic of that. Guys, just wait.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

We're coming.

[Jason Reed]

Trust me.

[Joy Reid]

Okay.

[Adam Green]

Okay.

[Jason Reed]

The third one is like, you know,

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

if y' all don't move fast enough, I'm just gonna.

[Jason Reed]

Just listen.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

We got to be able to do now when we're locally in different locations

[Jason Reed]

that I don't have complete control over my environment.

[Joy Reid]

Yeah.

[Jason Reed]

This is what they will see. And this is what happened on Friday of last week.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

You know, me and the technologist got into an argument and y' all heard that. So in the future, you'll just see this and not hear me rant. So.

[Joy Reid]

Yes. You just put that up. And in lieu of rent, in lieu of cussing, you'll see the graphics. Jason. Oh, that's what they call him, the Conductor. Because, you know, Jason likes the show to start on time. He's the conductor. That's why his special drink is called the Conductor. Whereas mine is called Security. His is called the Conductor, which is his bourbon sour with Woodford Reserve. That's his special drink. But he. He's an on time person. He's just an on time guy. And he likes things to start on time and he likes the tech to work. When it doesn't work, instead of cussing at the tech. You just throw the graphics up and then everybody knows what's happening. You don't have to cuss.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Well, I'm gonna cuss anyway, but you just turn the audio off.

[Joy Reid]

Turn the audio off. Behind the scenes. Yes, absolutely. And cussing is fine also. I agree with that. I'm a custom Christian. I done told y' all already. I'm a custom Christian. You gotta custom gremlins because they'd be coming for you. And sometimes we think it might be Palantir. We don't know. Could be Starlink.

[Jason Reed]

There you go.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

So guys, if you hear this, just

[Jason Reed]

know I'm just in my feelings and that's about it.

[Joy Reid]

We appreciate you. Jason Reed, because he makes the tech work and he makes the show go on. We love all of our team. Wanji is back there also in behind there in the fighting the Gremlins. Sean, Wanji. Nila's back there, but I think Nil is just partying. I think she's just hanging out. She's just chilling back there. But she loves to chill with us. And these are our on air team. And of course, Winsome, who moderates the chat. Sometimes we can get Miles to moderate the chat too. You might see him in some of the chat rooms as well. So we. We're all behind the scenes. Well, I'm in front of the scenes, but everybody else that's behind the scenes is making it work. Because of course, to Adrian and Ron and our whole team, we love our team. The Joy Reed show team loves you guys very much. We appreciate each and every one of you. They said cussing is a sign of. What is it? Cussing is a sign of intel of high intelligence. I agree with that. Thank you very much. Cussing is a sign of high intelligence. If you can cuss properly, that means you're smart because you could think of some salty words to say.

[Jason Reed]

I don't think I was cussing intelligently.

[Joy Reid]

You were discussing, period. Yeah, Just dropping F bombs like blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Because you ask them to do one thing and one thing is not done.

[Joy Reid]

So anyway, I get it. I understand it. Well, we appreciate. Somebody said. I knew it. That's Nubian Queen 6391. Appreciate each and every one of you. We're going to make sure we put a link to this economic state of black men and boys report. If you get a chance, please read it so that you can help a friend or help a friend of a friend or anyone that you love. Loved one or family member, neighbor Whoever it is, we are on our way to 500,000 subscribers. We asked and you guys answered. We are less than 10,000 subscribers away on YouTube to 500,000 substack. We got to work on you guys. We were trying to get you sub stackies to 250, but y' all are not growing like we would like you to. So guys, put in the work. You can subscribe for free. If you want to do both. You can get the little newsletter and get the little text musings as well as the video. So please feel free to like and subscribe. And we appreciate everywhere that you guys are tuning in, whether it is Facebook or LinkedIn everywhere. The other day we were actually briefly streaming on Twitter X Twitter because Waj was streaming on Twitter. So we were briefly. We made an appearance streaming on X Twitter. But go ahead. And you guys, we're gonna do a little poll. We want to ask you guys, what do you guys think we should do when we get to 500,000? Yes, I am tired. And you can tell, right? Teresa Martinez can tell that I'm tired. Y' all can see that I'm run down. We were up till two in the morning just on air. And then I had to do my whole routine to get the makeup off and do all the things. I probably went to bed at three.

[Jason Reed]

I was in. I was up when you was up.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

So we both went to bed around

[Jason Reed]

3:30, had to get up at 7.

[Joy Reid]

We went to bed like 3:30, had to get up at 7. Because I was interviewed today, this really great interview that I did today. But I had to be in, in the seat for that at 11 o'. Clock. And we also had meetings before that. So yeah, we got like four hours of sleep. So you can see I. You can tell I'm tired.

[Frank Figliuzzi]

But.

[Jason Reed]

Yes, but never too tired all over again tomorrow.

[Joy Reid]

Never too tired for you guys. We appreciate you guys. Tomorrow I have to announce that we are not gonna do a premium Substack Live. I apologize to my Premium Substack Live folks. I will put up a post in lieu of. But we are not going to do a Premium Live on Substack tomorrow. Apologies, but we have to pre record an interview and the only person of the availability for the interviewee was at a certain time. So we, we couldn't. We can't do both. So we have to do that. So I will be back to the premium lives the following week. So not this week. And we have some announcements about our afterparty. We're going to be upping the in The. The frequency of that. We got a lot of more good stuff for our members, so lots of good things coming. But let us know. You can throw it in comments either now while you're live or even later. What you guys would like us to do to celebrate our 500, 000, which is our vault to get to a million subscribers on YouTube. What should we do when we get to 500,000? Let me know what you guys think we should do. It says when you hit 500, 000, we should do an F. An HBCU live pod. Oh, I like that. Whole armor says a live podcast and an HBCU for the 500, 000. That's a dope idea, you guys. Keep them coming. Let us. And thank you all, by the way. Who. Who hung out with us late light and we into the early morning for that historic moment because we wanted to watch it live. We weren't gonna miss it if. If Abdul was gonna win, we were gonna be there, and we were there. Thank you all for watching. We will see you on the next the Joy Reid show. Have a good night. Be good.

[Paul Butler]

Be.

[Joy Reid]

Be nice to somebody and be joyful.

[Adam Green]

Love y'.

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

All.

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

Bye. Getting back to the basics Grassroot level

[Joy Reid]

let me dig a little deeper with the shovel plenty can't tell on the force from the trees that I'm hard to detect like a black hole in a jar Injustice anywhere it's a threat

[Dr. Rami Nashashibi]

to justice everywhere Let me make this

[Jason Reed]

clear I got a bone to pick and I'll never fear the threat of

[Joy Reid]

poverty they don't want to talk about

[Dr. Wes Bellamy]

it they rap the party so I'm a real talk about it for show.