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Some follow the noise. Bloomberg follows the money. Whether it's the funds fueling AI or crypto's trillion dollar swings, there's a money side to every story. Get the money side of the story. Subscribe now@bloomberg.com. Well, okay. Happy Monday everyone. Welcome to the Joy Read show live from New York City. Hope you guys are good. Hello readers. We can see you all loading up inside of the YouTube chat. Big up to everybody that's also watching on Subset. Let me go ahead and look at the substack chat and say hello to each of you as well. Let me greet our 500 strong twitch army which is now 538 adorable twitchies. You could not be cuter and we appreciate each and every one of you. Big up to everybody that's listening. Also on Substack, those who are listening on. Where did I mention everybody? Oh, I forgot the LinkedIn people. Thank you, LinkedInies. LinkedIn folks as well as those who are on Facebook. Again, don't be getting your news from Facebook except our show. Other than that, be very careful with Facebook. It is really not a place to get your news. I want to let you guys know. Thank you to everybody who voted in our Vontel contest. Jason, we can get a round of applause for that. We actually have a winner. People are the winner. The winner is. Roll drum roll please. 7th Avenue Merlot. 7th Avenue Merlot. I didn't get the applause that I, that I. But Jason is okay. He's not, he's not giving us an applause, but 7th Avenue Merlot. Can we get applause? No, no applause. Oh, okay. Well, I'll talk, I'll applaud myself. I'll do the applause myself. Applause for 7th Avenue Merlot, which won by a whisker. Amina and 7th Avenue Merlot were tied for like a minute. Like they were tied and that the tie was not being broken. So finally 7th Avenue Merlot just shot ahead. I'm guessing the delta is probably added like put their thumb on the scale because it's red. We don't know, but we love it. 7th Avenue Low. Beautiful glasses. They don't necessarily have to be sunglasses. And so those are the glasses that you guys chose to be the basis of our new readers frames that are going to be designed with our friends at Vontel. So thank you everybody who voted once again. And also if you do want any of those three amazing glasses frames for yourself, for your mom, it's Mother's Day coming up this Sunday. You can just go to shopredbag.com shopredbag.com. thank you to shopredbag.com for partnering with us and Vontel. Thank you to the lovely sisters at Vontel. It's an incredible small business and you know, we're all about small business. Both shopredbag.com and Vontel are small businesses that we love. So thank you all for partnering with us on that. And I cannot wait to see what we actually design for these frames. We now have like a basis of which to begin to work on that. Now here's another big announcement. This one is actually quite big. If you are in or near New York City.
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City.
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If you're going to be in or near New York City in June, we have a very, very, very special event coming up. A live in person edition of the Joy Reed show featuring comedian Godfrey. The hilarious Godfrey will be our special guest for a live IRL version of the Joy Reed Show. It is exciting. If you guys want to go, we're gonna send you right to live.com thejoy readshow.com live. The joy read show.com to be careful because there are a lot of scam websites out there. I had a thing happen to me last week where a like fake email was going out saying I was inviting people to a party. That's not true. I did not have a party. And it was a phishing email. So you have to be really careful. You have to really look at who's emailing you because it'll look like it's coming from someone you know, but it's not. It's actually a phishing scam and that's what that one was. But this one is real. So here's what we want you to do. If you want to go to the live the Joy Reach show episode in New York City at City Winery, which is going to be on Thursday, June 11 at 7:30pm there's also there's going to be a meet and greet earlier if you want that. That's like a plus up if you want to do a meet and greet. But that is taking place. And the best way to do it is either scan the QR code that we're going to put up on the screen here, scan that QR code or go to live.thejoyreadshow.com or you can just go to City Wineries website. If you go to City Wineries website, which is how people are already buying tickets. Like we just put this up. We've already sold a lot of tickets but there are still tickets left. If you want to go, get in, get in while you Fit in, get in while you still can, because those tickets are going fast and they literally just started being sold. We haven't even had a chance to promote it yet, and people are already buying the tickets. So scan the QR code and you can get in, or you fit in and come and see us. We'll talk about again at the end of the show. We would love to see you guys, meet some of our amazing readers, meet some of our Team TJRS fans. It's going to be really fun. It's going to be hilarious. We've got some other special guests. It's going to be really fun, fun, fun. We're gonna do it live. We'll do it live. That's what we're doing on June 11th. So I wanted to let you guys know that as well. Now, I also want to note that of course it is May 4, which of course is Star Wars Day. So the correct greeting for the nerds out there is May the Fourth be with you. So may the fourth be with you. And just to give you all who are not like, super nerds, the background on it. Now in Star Wars Episode 3, the Return of the Sith, which of course is a prequel to Star Wars. Remember, they did them out of order. They did Star wars, then they did the prequels to give you the backstory behind the sort of fight. You had the Empire Fights Back, which is like the next one. And then you had the article, the third one is a prequel that kind of gives you the background to what was happening in Star wars. And it was called Return of the Sith. Now, in Return of the Sith, Supreme Chancellor Palpatine consolidates his Empire, taking advantage of a war which is called the Clone War. So he takes advantage of the Clone wars by issuing what he called the Declaration of a New Order. And he did that during an address to an extraordinary session of the Galactic Senate. So let's play that. A four. The attempt on my life has left me scarred and deformed, but I have joy. My resolve has never been stronger. Ooh, attempted by life. Why does it feel like kind of familiar just narratively? Never mind. Maybe not. So according to Wikipedia, which, of course, yes, is a thing. Wikipedia. In his New Order declaration, okay, Palpatine names himself Emperor of the Galaxy. He legalized the extermination of the Jedi Order and outlined his vision for for transforming the now abolished Galactic Republic into his new Galactic Empire. And the anniversary of this declaration of a New Order would be celebrated as Empire Day. Play the next clip API to ensure the security and continuing stability. The Republic will be reorganized into the first Galactic Empire for a safe and secure society.
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So this is how liberty dies, with thunderous applause.
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Now, of course, that is the mother of Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia, who is the wife of Anakin Skywalker, who later becomes Darth Vader. Right, so that's the sort of origin story. Now, you know the. Yes. And all the blurreds out there are saying blurred what? And everybody else is saying nerds, but that's it. Right, so that's what's happening in the fictional world of Star wars, where you have an autocrat taking over not just the galaxy, but the entire. Taking over the entire galaxy, turning it into his own private empire, getting rid of the one group of people who could actually stand in his way, which would be the Jedi, and attempting to consolidate absolute power. So the blurts are like, yay, blurts. So that brings us back to our declining empire when we are also finding out how liberty dies. And our declining empire is defined just like the fictional Empire in Star wars, by endless, never ending war, by economic pain and increasing poverty at home for everyone except the super rich. Plus an attempt by the Sith in power here to eliminate any chance for us, like the Jedi, to defeat him, to vote out the people who are doing these things to us. Now, legal eagle and constitutional expert Melissa Murray is going to join us later in the show to talk about the evisceration of the Voting Rights act, which is the thing that, that could allow us, like the Jedi, to overcome the Empire. But they're like, nope, we're going to make it so that basically, if you're black or brown, you have no representation. You cannot take us out of power. And the shredding of the Constitution is the way that our Palpatine and his fellow Sith Lords, et cetera, are trying to do damage to us and keep and create an empire of their own.
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Right?
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So the bottom line is this gross inequality that is part of our declining American empire is actually a thing. So we know the war in Iran is not going well. Oil and gas and food prices and fertilizer prices are through the roof. There's no end in sight to the war. We don't see any end. Donald Trump's to give him time. It could be an endless war like Afghanistan or Iraq for all we know. We have no idea. Also, rest in peace Spirit Airlines, which has gone out of business, the low cost airline could no longer stay in business. There are these creepy pictures of all the downed planes that are just Sitting there in the parking lot. It's done. Also, rest in peace to the 15,000 jobs, many of which were people of color who are now unemployed. Meanwhile, when it comes to the inequality, our troops who are being forced to fight this war in Iran, are basically eating slop. We've got this picture, Jason, if you could put it up, of the nasty food that's being served to our troops. This is the kind of slop that they're eating while they're being asked to fight a war in Iran. And while they're eating that and regular people can't afford groceries, Donald Trump and the oligarchs are living quite large. So Trump had his fancy dinner last week with King Charles and Camilla at which all six right wing members of the Supreme Court attended on the same day that they gutted the Voting Rights Act. None of the liberals attended. We're going to talk about that a little bit later. But it was sort of a perfect juxtaposition. Everyone's sitting around a fancy dinner at the White House with an actual king and a fake king, all laughing it up while they were gutting our ability to vote out the people who are harming us. And as we speak, right now, even as we speak, speaking of inequality and wealth, all the celebs, not all of them, but a bunch of celebrities, are lining up at the Metropolitan Museum of Art for the Met Gala, which is being hosted this year by model Ashley Graham, actor Lala Anthony and model Cara Develany. And I think I'm pronouncing that wrong. Delveen or Delveen. I think it's Delevingne and influencer Emma Chamberlain, who is on the red carpet. And this year's theme is costume art, and fashion is art. That's happening literally right now. Now, if you go over last year, Jason, you can put it up a seven. Remember last year? Remember where we were? Remember last year when we were all so interested and excited about the Met Gala and the theme was about the black dandy, and you had all of these incredible costumes and all of these incredible looks and Whoopi Goldberg and her top hat and the whole thing. And the whole theme really was celebrating black culture. Just at the time that a white supremacist regime was taking place, it was sort of like an in your face. Although it had been pre planned, of course, in theory, Kamala Harris could have been the president, could have been celebrating this very black moment in American history. But instead it was happening at the time when Donald Trump was taking over. And so it was seen as sort of this incredible artistic statement that in the midst of the entrance of an anti black administration, there was still black joy and black fashion, black style and hope. And that's what it felt like last year when we were watching the Met Gala. It felt like it was, it was a response, it was a pushback to all the bad things that we were seeing happening. And the art was saying no art was saying that there's still hope, there's still beauty and there's still non white possibility in America. And that's what kind of that Met Gala felt like last year. Well, not this year. This year Palpatine is not being opposed. It definitely feels like writ large American culture, the sort of American cultural galaxy is bending the knee. It feels like at a time when we are facing the nadir of voting rights for African Americans and Latinos, but it's really black folks that are being targeted. Let's just be clear. This is about eviscerating black power and with it any chance that the south could ever produce another black member of Congress or produce any opposition to the empire. That's happening at the same time that a lot of black cultural icons and people who we thought of as woke cultural icons are literally at the Met Gala celebrating very expensive fashion. So, you know, this year they're the megastar co chairs, Beyonce, Nicole Kidman, Venus Williams, who serve alongside Vogue global editor, Vogue global editorial director, I should say, and Cloud Bob Colonial enthusiast Anna Wintour will share space not just with other big names on the host committee. YSL creative director Anthony Vaccarello, YSL campaign star Zoe Kravitz, host committee members Angela Bassett, Sabrina Carpenter, Doja Cat, Misty Copeland, Sarah Sam Smith, Teyana Taylor, Asia Wilson, you name it. They're just tons of very popular celebrities in attendance. But they're not just sharing space with one another. They're also sharing space with Amazon oligarch, Washington Post destroyer and Trump MAGA fanboy Jeff Bezos and his wife Lauren Sanchez Bezos, who happen to be the honorary chairs. And it's not just like that pair of MAGA oligarchs who are invading the annual house of iconic fashion and culture. Let me read you this from the Observer. Quote, a growing relationship between the Met Gala and tech executives is a new phenomenon in terms of the broader history of the gala, which was really about fashion. Deirdre Clemente, a fashion historian at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, told Observer. Founded in 1948 by publicist Eleanor Lambert, the Met Gala began as a fundraiser for the Metropolitan Museum of Art's. Costume Institute, attended primarily by New York City socialites, it was a far cry from today's global spectacle. The shift toward celebrity accelerated in the 1970s under former Vogue editor in chief Diana Vreeland, and by the time Wintour took over as chair in 1995, the event was well on its way to becoming a cultural juggernaut. Wintour recently stepped down as editor in chief of Vogue US but remains its global editorial director. As the Met Gala's profile has written, so has the price of entry. Tickets, available only to guests approved by Wintour herself, cost $100,000, while tables start at $350,000. As tech companies have amassed enormous wealth, they've increasingly stepped in to foot the bill in exchange for cultural cachet. This year's table buyers reportedly include Amazon, OpenAI, Meta and Snap. I'm calling it the Tech Gala because so much tech has gotten involved over the last decade, Amy O', Dell, the author of the 2022 renter biography Anna, told Observer. Over the years, the price of admission has become so high that it's just like who else can afford it? From the New York Times now Opposition to the Bezos started almost immediately after they were announced as financial sponsors in February and comes amid a surging anti rich sentiment nationwide and in New York City, the event's liberal home. The outrage seemingly gained momentum after the city's newly elected mayor, Zorhan Mamdani, a Democratic socialist, declared in mid April that he would skip the gala, breaking with many of his predecessors saying that his focus is on affordability. And in the weeks leading up to the event on Monday, an avid anti Bezos campaign has erupted on New York's streets, in subways and online, where social media users have described the event as the Amazon Prime Gala, or Bezos Ball. Reports of skittish stars and upset fashionistas have peppered tabloid pages, including rumors of some past guests steering Clear. A guerrilla activist group called Everyone Hates Elon, a reference to another controversial billionaire, Elon Musk, has been calling for a boycott of the event with a steady drumbeat of eye catching campaigns around the city, including plastering posters on subway cars and bus stops on Friday in a nod to complaints by Amazon workers of having to skip bathroom breaks and urinate in bottles. Instead, the group placed close to 300 bottles of fake urine inside the Metropolitan Museum of Art. So Mayor Mohamdani and his wife are not attending. Neither is fashion icon Zendaya, who usually provides probably the fashion moment every year. Last year, actually, Diana Ross was probably the big fashion woman, but she's always a huge icon. Although her spokesman did not specify as to why she's not going. She just won't be there. Neither will Meryl Streep, who is the star of Devil Wears Prada. But she also doesn't normally attend, so you really can't read much into that. But with so many, you know, cultural icons attending, it definitely does feel like cultural leaders are normalizing. Jeff Bezos and Sam Altman and Meta and all the rest. Right. It feels like the tech oligarchy is being normalized inside the Hollywood world. And, you know, that's a thing. It's a thing that's happening. And maybe that's not intentionally what people are doing, but it's what it definitely feels like that, that the idea of these maga tech oligarchs is not offensive to other people who are rich and who are famous. It doesn't necessarily bother them. And I think the truth is, is that rich and famous people, they're going to rich and famous people is what they're going to do. They're going to. They're going to do high fashion events. They're going to go to events where they sit with other rich people and sit at their tables and kiki with them and go to their $50,000 or $50 million weddings. How much was Jeff Bezos? What, $50 million? They were like, we're going to that, you know, lots of stars you love are going to do it. And I think we presume that these people are woke because we become so used to them, you know, lending their music to Beyonce or campaigning for her. I mean, for Beyonce to Kamala Harris and promoting her and being on her campaign trail and, you know, seeming to be woke. And we also got used to, I think over the decades, celebrities doing things like funding, you know, Dr. King's movement, which Harry Belafonte and other celebrities did, or appearing at the march on Washington and sort of this overt, you know, wokeness or writing songs like Mississippi Goddamn right. Like that is a thing that we got used to. And so art has always been seen as liberal and woke. And I think for really good reason, because in many ways it was, you know, the sort of the revolution included a soundtrack that was folk musicians and blues musicians and rock musicians and black and white musicians who were just considered liberals. When you go back to the jazz era, these were the people who were just in their own bodies fighting against segregation. There were people back in that era who would refuse to perform in front of segregated audiences and made huge waves because of it. So even the right has been very clear that art and artists are liberal and that art itself is a liberal thing. And it's one of the reasons they so crave to be a part of it. It's one of the reasons they so desire to have a piece of it or to own it. It's why the right got so thrilled when they had Kanye. Because they're like, see, now we have the culture. We're not stuck with just Kid Rock and other whack ass musicians like him. Like, we've got cool musicians. They don't want to be with each other. They want to be with us. They want to be with cultural cool, and they want to own cultural cool. They want the culture, and they normally can't have the culture, and they're mad about it. They hate the fact that they can't own it and have a piece of it, and they want it. And, and the problem is now that we're not in the 60s, you know, we're not in that. We're not in an era where that sort of culture, Even Michael Jackson would make statements. You know, people were like, well, he's turning white, but he was black. You know, I mean, his statements were like, I am for my P. I am for black people. It's a thing I'm for. Right. But the, the reality is things have changed so much. Yeah. People putting, talking in the chat about Ted Nugent. Right? Ted Nugent is, is an insane person who allegedly was, you know, being. And after like teenage girls who were like preteens and stuff, so ill. But these people are angry that they can't be in the culture. Donald Trump is mad about it. If Donald Trump could hang up with George Clooney, he'd do it in 10 seconds. That's what he really wants. He wants to be around cultural cool, and he wants to be considered part of cool culture like he used to be in the 90s, and he wants that back. And so being feeling locked out of the culture is part of why they'll create, like, alternatives, like their own fake versions of Hollywood. Breitbart.com was actually founded by a wannabe filmmaker, Andrew Breitbart, who was angry that conservatives, in his view, couldn't get access to Hollywood and were shunned in Hollywood. And so he created a website whose goal was to create a parallel version of cultural cool, a parallel Hollywood. And they're still doing that. You know, Ben Shapiro's outfit is they make movies because they want to have a parallel version of cultural cool. And so there is an anger on the right that they don't have access to that and they want it. And now what's happened is because now we're in an era where celebrities are actually billionaires, where they too are billionaires or where they can aspire to be billionaires, they just have to catch. Have one great brand catch on. And they're billionaires too. And so now their circle of friends includes other billionaires like Jeff Bezos, and there's not really a real cultural prohibition amongst them to hang out with them or going to their weddings or hanging out with them or being at the Jeff at the Met Gala with them. And so if Jeff Bezos is now associated with the Met Gala, then the Met Gala is associated with maga. They're all together now, and that's what it is. And there's just been a normalization of that merger. And, you know, not to obsess about it, but I am sad about it, because it definitely feels like there are not. We just expect when the Oscars happen, that everyone who gets up is going to make some statement on behalf of immigrants or make some statement on behalf of the oppressed. But we maybe are expecting too much. It may be that we have to look towards something other than celebrity culture to fight for our rights or fight for us. And maybe these people are super woke, or maybe they just don't pay attention to politics. Maybe they actually just don't pay attention to it at all. And they're not paying attention. They just want to dress up. And it's just a fashion thing. And if, like, the great, you know, if their favorite fashion houses invite them, they're just gonna go. But yes, as Joshua Underwood said in the chat on YouTube, Maga kills everything. Definitely the taint of MAGA makes the Met Gala less fun for me. Everything MAGA touches dies. Everything MAGA touches is less cool, it's less fun, it's less interesting. And I will just in my mind, for me, last year's Met Gala was peak Met Gala, and everything after it is just whack. It's too magatated. It's too MAGA associated. If Jeff Bezos is in it, I don't want it. I'm just being honest. That's just me. If MAGA is in it, I don't want it. Jeff Bezos is running it. Do we really want it? People saying MAGA is almost dead. Yeah, MAGA is definitely withering on the vine. And it'll be interesting to see, as Latasha Brown says is when they come black because in the end, cultural cool really was created in many ways, is still curated, particularly by black women. And if black women don't consider something to be cool, it's hard to hold up the cultural cool without us. And they've tried to exclude us and siphon us out of every space. Make it harder for black writers to get on writing teams in Hollywood, make it harder for black creators to get their projects made, make more white and fewer black characters in programs and in movies. They're trying to rinse us out, but they still want our culture. It's the way Brooklyn ran. All the black people out, gentrified the town, but they still have a giant poster of a giant painting of Biggie so that they can have, like, the slight flavor of black without black humans, without black living people. Because at the end, they still want cultural cool, and they still know that comes through black people. And they still want it. They still want it. They took rock and roll for a reason, because they wanted to be associated with that cultural cool. And they. And rather than invent it, they just took the one. The black people made the same thing with country music, did the same thing with jazz. If you go on Apple and say, download, give me the. The Apple Jazz catalog, they just give you a lot of white creators and almost nobody black. They're like, we'll just take that, you know, and all of a sudden, in vogue, an Afro is a cloud, Bob. Like magic. Everything gets appropriated and then reduced in genuine cultural cool. It's. I'm sad about. Because I think the Met Gala is a. It's a worthy cause to raise money to restore costumes and art. Art is very worthy as a part of our cultural conversation. But if. Now what we're saying is that MAGA is allowed in our spaces that we consider to be part of the culture. I don't know. Yeah, I am serious about that. Is this loudly Napoleon? Yes. I tried to download the jazz collection on Apple music and it gave me maybe Ella Fitzgerald and a lot of white artists. So make art, not war. Yeah. And we. And then look, somebody says, rights. Cornrows are scalp braids, right? All of a sudden. Because they want the culture. They want the culture. They just want the culture to be under their control. That's what the right is. The right is an appropriator. The right is not a creator. Conservatism isn't creativity. It's appropriation and colonization, and it's aggressive colonization. It is what it is. So there you go. And yes. No, Zendaya is Not going to the Met Gala. Somebody says, stop glamorizing the wealthy while Bill find the poor. That is very true. I think that the mayor of New York City might have it right, that maybe we've all been to Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous, and maybe it is time to really think about what's really important in our culture. And what's really important might just, just might not be a fabulous costume gala. It might be making sure that ordinary people can afford their rent and food and not go to endless war and that our troops don't have to eat slop and have Israel order them to go and die in Iran because Bibi Netanyahu needs to stay president for life. Maybe that. And we love fashion, but a lot of people can't even afford fashion right now. No one can afford anything. There's no spirit airlines. There are a lot of people who can't go. They can't even go on a decent vacation that they've slaved away for because they can't afford an airline ticket because whatever airlines are still flying. There's no more spirit. And it sounds like JetBlue might be next because everything is so unaffordable. And we're in Gotham. We're here in New York City right now. And New York is, you know, New York is Gotham City. And it does feel like, increasingly it is the galaxy and it is a city of villainy. And that's why we have a mayor that is trying to reverse that. And that might be the cultural move we want. That might be cultural cool is caring about the people who can't have and don't have and not about this. So that's my rant of the day. I just had to get that out of my system. Welcome to new member Sandra Sharif. Thank you very much, and welcome to Team tjri. So let's move on. Before I do that, though, I do want to let you know that, you know, doing independent media is. It is an exciting thing. It is a challenging thing. It is a thing. It's a. It's a lot. But we really do count on those who are willing to help us keep these things on the air. And sponsors are a big part of that. And what I love about it is that we have a direct relationship with them. It's not just that, you know, they're like, here's some money. You know, talk about our thing. They're actually like, no, try our thing. Tell us if our thing is good and if you love our thing, then talk about our thing. And 120 life is one of those amazing sponsors and we really appreciate it because one of the things that's important is health. Health is wealth. As my friend Hank used to say, health is wealth. And one of the things that really is a huge detriment to your health is high blood pressure. And it is one of those things that's not just unpleasant, it's actually dangerous. It is the chief indicator of mortality. If your blood pressure is high, half of all Americans have it. And with the stresses that we're going in, it just doesn't get any better. And so trying to find ways to improve your blood pressure to bring it down in a natural way that doesn't require a lot of pills and things is probably a good thing. And so 120 life is one of those really great things. It is a once a day functional drink. It's made with ingredients that do help support healthy blood pressure. It tastes great. It's not like filling. It doesn't make you feel full and bloated. It's got super fruit juices. It fits into your lifestyle. There's a powdered version with just one gram of sugar. If you're also watching your sugar and just asking you to just give it a try, try for seven to 14 days or try for 14 days. Just, you know, measure before and after. You should have a blood pressure measure, especially if you're over 40 and even some of you millennials are over 40 now. I'm saying everybody, especially if you're Gen X or older, please measure blood pressure anyway. But try it after 14 days. If your blood pressure does not go down, they'll actually give you a full refund. Over a thousand health professionals have supported or endorsed its use. It's increasingly becoming a go to natural tool in clinical settings, not just in wellness circles. If you want to try it, you can go to 120life.com that's120life.com just use the code joy j o y or read R E I D for 20% off. You can try it risk free for two weeks. If your blood pressure again does not come down, they just give you full refund. So go to 120life.com use the code joy or read for 20% off. Don't wait till next month. You know your blood pressure is not something you can wait. You have nothing to lose except your higher blood pressure numbers. Go to 120life.com and use the code Joy or Reed. That's our code for 20% off. Joy or Reed. Use that today. These statements have not been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat or cure or prevent any disease. Okay, so moving on. So last week, I've gotten my Met Gala rant out of my system, so thank you for bearing with me for that. Now, last week, this exchange between Jessica Waters, who is the senior Scholar in residence at American University, and a representative named Brandon Gill of Texas. He's a Dartmouth graduate, of course, and he's a former editor of the Dartmouth Review, which is the sort of right wing rag that a lot of Dartmouth. That a lot of sort of right wing stars have come from. He also happens to be the youngest member of the Republican caucus. So basically, he's his caucus's aoc, if you can believe that. This exchange went viral. And here it is. This is B1. That abortion should be safe, legal, and rare.
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B
I believe the abortion decision should be left to a patient and their doctor and their family and their God.
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A
Do you believe it should be safe, legal, and rare?
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B
I believe it should be safe, legal and rare, yes.
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A
Okay. Why should it be rare?
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Because if we are engaging in public health activities appropriately, we are able to provide. Prevent pregnancies when people want to prevent pregnancies.
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So I think.
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What's wrong? What's wrong with an abortion?
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May I finish my sentence?
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Sure.
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You know, I think if we're actually talking about reproductive health and caring about maternal health, we should be talking about, do people have adequate access to preventative care?
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Right.
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B
Do they have adequate access to contraception?
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A
Okay, I think that that's a no, then. You're an advocate for abortion, for abortion policy. What's your favorite type of abortion?
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B
I am an advocate for patients having access to the full realm of reproductive healthcare.
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A
Do you have a preferred method of abortion that, that you. That you like?
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B
I do not.
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A
Let me read through a couple different methods, and I want to get your take on. On how much you like these. The first type is called a suction abortion. This is when the cervix is dilated and a strong suction 29 times the power of a household vacuum cleaner, tears the baby's body apart and sucks it through the hose into a container. Do you prefer that method?
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B
I stand by my former testimony.
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A
That sounds kind of gross, doesn't it? Sounds pretty gruesome. Do you agree? It does to me.
- [35:33]
B
I stand by how I answered your question fully and accurately.
- [35:37]
A
He seems nice, not an asshole at all. So today, since he doesn't, he wants to quiz people about what kind of abortion they like, which is a stupid question, but we'll just leave it there today. The Supreme Court today restored broad access to the abortion pill myth of pristome, blocking a lower court ruling that had threatened to upend one of the main ways that abortions are actually provided across the nation. The order signed by Justice Samuel Alito, shockingly enough, temporarily allows women seeking abortions to obtain the pill at pharmacies or through the mail without an in person visit to a doctor. These practices have permitted for several years using a federal appeals court, until a federal appeals court imposed new restrictions just last week. And so this order actually restores access to that medication. Joining us now is the aforementioned Jessica Waters. She is the senior scholar in residence at American University. Hello and welcome, Ms. Waters.
- [36:44]
B
Hey, thanks so much for having me.
- [36:47]
A
So that exchange, I had a longer version of it, but I cut it down because there's only so much of Representative Gill that I can take.
- [36:54]
B
Same same.
- [36:56]
A
So the, the exchange went on. Did you, do you ever feel that you were able, ever able to make your point or what did you think he wanted from you? What do you think his purpose was?
- [37:07]
B
I mean, it was very clear to me in the moment, and it has been clear since that he wanted his TikTok moment. Right. He wasn't there to have a policy debate. He wasn't there to have an actual debate about the ethics of abortion or the safety of abortion. And he certainly didn't want to talk about the topic of the hearing, which was the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances act, which is our federal law that says you can't murder abortion providers.
- [37:31]
C
Right.
- [37:31]
B
He didn't want to talk about that. He wanted this tick tock moment and
- [37:36]
A
the Face act that you gave the full name of it. What's ironic about the Face act is that is the law that they use to arrest Don Lemon in Georgia. Ford. Right. One of the things that Republicans are doing is they're taking a law that was meant to, to prevent things like the murder of Dr. Teller, who was infamously murdered by people who had the same ideology as Representative Gill of right wing people who are absolute opponents of abortion. And there had been violence against clinics for years. There had just been incredible increasing violence up until that murder. So the Face act was passed, as you said, to protect abortion clinics, most of which now don't exist in the South. What do you make of the fact that now, according to Republicans, the person purpose of that law is to prevent people from protesting at churches?
- [38:23]
B
I mean, it's just a claim without any basis, right? I mean, when we talk about the FACE act, you know, it does protect places of religious worship and it does protect reproductive health clinics, whether that's a pro choice clinic or an anti choice clinic.
- [38:38]
C
Right?
- [38:38]
B
And the Biden administration has prosecuted both. Right. What we're really talking about here, and I experienced this firsthand after the hearing. You know, I, I went and I testified at this hearing and I'm a lawyer and I'm a legal scholar and I was there to talk about the constitutionality of face and I gave testimony voluntarily for two hours about the violence against abortion providers and patients. Rep. Gill came in for five minutes. He didn't hear my testimony. He got his tick tock moment and he left. And I knew in the moment what he was doing, because I want to be really clear, that was a dog whistle, right? What he was doing was going out to the people, the very people that are against FACE and support violence. And they turned on me. You know, I testified on Tuesday. By Wednesday morning, I had. There were over a million social media posts saying the most horrific things you can possibly imagine about me. You know, the emails I got in my inbox were steeped in misogyny and steeped in hate and they were threatening. I don't know how, how, how what kind of language I'm allowed to use on your show, but, you know, whatever
- [39:49]
A
language you want, my friend.
- [39:51]
B
You know, these, these emails, these were not emails saying, I disagree with you. Can we talk about this? They were, they said, you are a, you were an ugly whore, you are a bitch, you are a cunt. You know, they said, you know, can she still be aborted? I think she can. Does anyone know where she works? Does anyone know where she lives? You know, they said, this is what firing squads are for. They said, is she infertile? Does she hate children? She's going to hell. And this is millions, right? And, and I will say that most of these were men, if I can go. I didn't ask them their pronouns, but if I'm going by, you know, the assumptions we can make, you know, the misogyny. And that is the point, right? To create this fear and to try to silence people. And like, obviously it didn't work. But it's, it's ironic that I was there to testify about safety and harassment and violence and it was then sicked on me.
- [40:49]
A
And that is the point, right? I mean, that is the irony because the way that these anti abortion zealots in, back in the day used to target clinics and to try to sort of induce hatred of these clinic operators would be to bring pictures that were horrifying, that would horrify people or in their ways to give descriptions of the abortion procedure, the worst possible descriptions. And currently they'll do it by lying and claiming that people are aborting in the ninth month of pregnancy, that people are just deciding I don't wanna be pregnant anymore and just going to an abortion clinic and getting abortion. Which is insane. Right. And so the lies and the distortions and what he was reading was an attempt, as you said, to create violence against you. And you were literally there, or to at least create the atmosphere that could create violence against you. And you were literally there testifying about it. It is incredibly ironic.
- [41:42]
B
It is. And sad. Right. You know, I wish that a private citizen, a lawyer, a professor, a woman could go to Capitol Hill and have a policy conversation about this, but apparently that is not possible with certain members of Congress.
- [42:01]
A
So let's talk about this mifepristone ruling. I was surprised Samuel Alito signed it. I think it just came to his, you know, there were nine sections and it just came to him. He's somebody who is a doctrinaire just as much as Representative Gill, anti abortion zealot, and wrote the jobs ruling accordingly. What does it mean pragmatically that at least temporarily women can get access to, to mifepristone?
- [42:25]
B
Yeah. And I think that's a really important point. Right. I talked about this campaign to create chaos and fear and that's what these like sort of back and forth court decisions are doing.
- [42:36]
C
Right.
- [42:36]
B
You know, since Dobbs, we have states changing abortion laws left and right.
- [42:41]
A
Right.
- [42:41]
B
We have 13 states with bans. We have six more that have bans that, you know, anytime beyond the very earliest points of pregnancy. And it creates so much confusion for both patients and then providers of reproductive healthc. And that's what this, this, these decisions do. But I think, you know, anyone listening should be very clear that given where we are right now, legally you can have abortion medication mailed to you in any state right now.
- [43:09]
A
Right.
- [43:09]
B
And I want like women hearing that.
- [43:11]
A
Women, even Texas, even Mississippi and Texas,
- [43:14]
B
I mean, they're trying not to for sure. Right. Like there are every, you know, there are these states with abortion bans and states like Texas and states like Louisiana are trying to go after any doctor who ships mifepristone into their state.
- [43:27]
C
Right.
- [43:27]
B
That is certainly happening and it's not without legal risk. Right. But you know, we, we should be clear to, you know, people who are thinking, like, what do I do Now. Right. You can still get the care and help that you are seeking.
- [43:40]
A
And you know, the challenge is, to your point, there are some states where lawmakers, I think South Carolina is one of them, are seeking to apply the death penalty to women and doctors. And the result of that has been not a decrease in abortion, because
- [43:58]
B
the
- [43:59]
A
reality is the vast majority of abortions are done medically. They're done through chemicals, they're done through mifepristone, they're not done through suction abortion. And the things that this guy was describing, this is the way most women get abortions. But in the states where strict abortion laws have been passed, doctors are leaving. There are fewer and fewer medical school graduates who are choosing to practice in Georgia because of the six week ban in Florida. In Texas, there's been basically a mass exodus of doctors. And so what does that mean if you're in a state where you can get mifepristone but you can't find a doctor? Yeah.
- [44:36]
B
And let's be clear when we say that doctors are leaving these states, these are doctors who were providing the full realm of reproductive health care. Right. They were providing prenatal care, they were providing STI testing.
- [44:48]
A
Right.
- [44:48]
B
They were providing birth control, they were providing things like ivf. They weren't just providing abortion care. So we're creating these maternal health deserts around the country and we're seeing the ramifications of that. Maternal mortality rates have skyrocketed in the states with abortion bans for precisely this reason. Right. So this isn't just about whether people can access abortion care. They can't access reproductive health care generally.
- [45:16]
A
And also, what do you know, you're a legal scholar. So how much fear are doctors in that they will go to prison? If it's unclear in state law, is it just safer? Is it at this point, doctors. It's just safer to just not. Because I've heard of stories of doctors not being willing to touch a woman if they think she's pregnant. And meaning not just because for abort, not just for pregnancy care. If they just think a woman is pregnant, they don't want to touch them. They don't want anywhere near. Because if for some reason that pregnancy ends abruptly for some other reason, they don't want their fingers on it, they're afraid they're going to go to prison.
- [45:51]
B
Yeah. I think this is changing the practice of medicine. Right. When we are seeing, for example, like the lawsuit we're seeing out of Louisiana and the fifth Circuit, you know, this, this is a lawsuit to take a drug off the market that was, you know, approved by the FDA 25 years ago by the agency with actual expertise to do it. So we're interfering there. Right? And then we also see Republicans trying to interfere and cause this intimidation for doctors. And I, I, it's important, I think, that we connect what happened at the FACE hearing with what's happening with mifepristone and abortion providers generally, right?
- [46:26]
A
It's.
- [46:26]
B
We are going to create fear so you will not provide this care. We're creating fear of civil liability. We're creating fear of criminal liability. And even if what you're doing is, for example, miscarriage management, and now with this attack on face and President Trump saying he won't, you know, he won't enforce face against violence at abortion clinics, you know, what that's saying is this is open season, right? It is open season through the law. It's open season through violence on people who are providing reproductive health care and the patients who are seeking it. The message is we won't protect you. Right. You have exposure everywhere.
- [47:07]
A
And that's, you know, I often compare Project 2025 to the Handmaid's Tale, right? If they had, if the Handmaid's Tale included a story of the document they produced before actually executing the takeover of the American government and turning it into Gilead, you know, it would be Project 2025, right? Because the goal, at least if you read what they say and believe what they say, is that they are, are panicked by two things. Women not making their primary focus childbirth and child rearing and being in the workplace instead, which they do not like, and they mean mainly white women, because they really don't care about. Black women are supposed to be working in maids, right? Black people are supposed to be working as, as maids in their view. But white women, they're like, get home and make churn. Churn butter. But the second thing that they panic about is the birth rate being very low. And the birth rate in the US is, it is low, it's declining, and it's getting to European levels. This is not helping. Right? There's no, Is there any evidence that banning abortion increases the birth rate?
- [48:12]
B
No. We're just not, like, operating in reality.
- [48:19]
A
Right.
- [48:19]
B
You know, if you look at also the latest Heritage foundation report, you know, so they were the architects behind Project 2025, and then they have a new one out about the Esther Project.
- [48:31]
A
Yes.
- [48:31]
B
And, you know, I mean, if, if you read that thing closely, I mean, there's a whole section on, like, we need to stop women from going to college. Because when do they marry later and they have fewer babies? And you read it, and I. I actually wrote an article when the Texas laws started coming out called this is Gilead.
- [48:51]
A
Right.
- [48:51]
B
For the exact thing you're talking about, we're seeing the playbook here.
- [48:56]
C
Right.
- [48:57]
B
Like, this is the playbook every single time. Yeah. We all got to go back, and, I mean, we're living the beginnings of the Handmaid's Tale, as you point out. But we got to go back and read it, learn the lessons.
- [49:08]
A
We do. I mean, we were just reporting last week that all of the women who were on the USDA board that just manages sort of agriculture, they were all kicked off because they're like, they can't be any women on the board. They have to all be men. Like, women can't even sit on agricultural boards now. It's like, women have to leave the military. Women, they're just like, go home and have children. But what's actually happening is that women, particularly millennial and younger women, are increasingly getting sterilized, particularly if they live in red states that can. That, you know, mandate abortion bans. They're just choosing to never have children. That's all that's happening.
- [49:45]
B
Mm. No. I teach at a university, and a lot of my students are talking about that.
- [49:50]
A
Yeah. So what is the answer to that? Because we're. We're in this moment where we're kind of losing rights that, you know, our mothers had, and we're losing them very quickly, and women are losing them first. From a legal standpoint, what do we do? Fix it. Fix it now.
- [50:10]
B
I mean, look, you know, one. Like, I get asked this question a lot, and my first answer is always vote.
- [50:16]
A
Right.
- [50:16]
B
Like, vote and talk to the men in your lives about voting, too. Right. You know, I think one of the. The real tragedies of that hearing I was at is, you know, that representative didn't want to hear about women. Right. He didn't want to hear about their lives. He didn't want to hear about doctors who were going to work in bullet. Bulletproof vests.
- [50:41]
A
Right.
- [50:41]
B
He didn't want to hear that. And I. I think it is so important that we keep at it. Right. Like, this hate I got directed toward me was designed to silence me. Like, that is the point of misogyny. Like, they want me scared. They want me quiet. And, you know, my response to that was like, hell, no. Right. Like, and we have to keep doing that. And I also think it's important that we don't necessarily play the game that they are trying to play. You know, I've had people say to me, like, why didn't you push back more on Rep. Gill at that hearing?
- [51:11]
A
And.
- [51:11]
B
And I'm like, because I was there for the Congressional record, right. I was there to get facts and statistics into the congressional record, and I was not there to have a sidebar TikTok conversation with some representative I've never heard of. Like, that.
- [51:24]
A
That.
- [51:24]
B
That's not why I'm there. And, like, that is not worth my intellectual capacity. Right. So we need to stay focused and we need to keep our eye on the ball.
- [51:34]
C
Right.
- [51:34]
B
So it's voting, it's these new litigation strategies. It's supporting the litigators who are there every single day.
- [51:41]
A
And.
- [51:41]
B
And I think it's going on the offensive.
- [51:43]
C
Right.
- [51:43]
B
And I think it's calling things out for what they are.
- [51:47]
A
Excellent answer. And then. Absolutely. The right answer. My closing question to you, Professor Jessica Lee Waters. Did any Republicans a stay for the full hearing and listen to your answers or ask you any interesting questions that were more conversational, loud the truth to come out.
- [52:09]
B
You know, this was the second time I've testified in front of this committee. About face. And, you know, I would say that the first time I testified, I felt like I was treated fairly. Right. Like, and, you know, this is not my first rodeo. I've been doing this work for a long time, and it was the reason I went back. You know, there were, in fairness, a handful of Republicans who did stay the entire time. And, you know, there were some who engaged in monologues, but it was really only this one representative who I felt like was really just there to get, you know, attention. Well, I mean, political sideshow. Right. You know, and again, I think he knew what he was doing, and I think he knew what he was unleashing.
- [52:55]
A
Yeah, he wants to be the rights aoc and everyone is auditioning to be the next big thing. And that's what he was trying to do. But instead, I think he made you the next big thing. Professor Jessica Waters, I really genuinely, I thought your answers were. You were measured, you were smart, you stuck to what you were there to talk about. It was very impressive. And so we thank you for standing up for women. And you, you gave exactly the answer that I would have given, which is, we got to vote, vote and vote, vote and vote, because these people have to be stopped. Thank you so much.
- [53:25]
B
Thank you.
- [53:26]
A
Thank you. Jessaly Waters. She's good. If you guys get a chance to go online and watch more of that hearing, it was infuriating I can only take but so much. He was a real ass, if I'm being honest. Representative Gill, he was an ass. But her team reached out and we were like, yeah, she should come on and talk about what happened in the hearing. And that hate that she got is exactly what you get when you try to stand up for women. And it's interesting the way the very people who claim that they are pro life and care about babies and just want women to, you know, not have to compete with trans women and all that, they're the most violently misogynistic. The first thing they'll say is, you should die. And they claim to be pro life, but the first thing they say is, you should die. And so we know exactly who they are. They don't care about women. They certainly don't care about children. And they are of the group that is the most dangerous to women and children, they're the most dangerous because they are Epstein adjacent, because they are supportive of a president that was besties with a sex bender. And they don't care about the Epstein victims. They don't care about women who are dying from just having a child. It's more dangerous to be a black woman having a baby in the United States than it is to be a black woman having a baby almost anywhere in the supposed West. There's no western country where it's more dangerous for a black woman to have a child, which is insane, than the United States. You're just not safe here having children. And if you're a woman, period, in multiple states, more than 20 states, you can be criminalized and essentially incarcerated by the state and forced to have a child, even if having that child would kill you. Because they think they can increase the birth rate. And I don't mean the birth rate of people who look like me. They think they can increase the birth rate of people who look like Dr. Water, Professor Waters. That's not happening. The white women are free. They is free. They got. They left the house. They not turning that butter. They're marrying later or not marrying at all. They're not having kids, and it's not happening. And as much as the Elons of the world want to try to order them to have children, all that's happening is that they're. That the abortion rates have actually gone up. There's actually more abortions that have taken place year after year post Dobbs than before. So it did not have its intended effect. It had the opposite effect. Women are right. Women are not going back. They're not Going back. It's just not happening. The thing 1710s that we're not going back. I want to thank some of the folks who have thrown a little bit in the till. Megan Underwood, thank you very much. $99.99. We so appreciate that. Saying Monday with the TJRS crew. Wanna big up Gladiola D7T, $49 super sticker. You love a good super sticker. Bigging up everybody that's on all of the things. Let me pop over to the Twitch people and say hi to you guys and see what you guys are talking about over here. We just appreciate everybody that's tuning into the show, wherever you're tuning in. But the bottom line is I think what Jessica said is absolutely the right answer, despite the fact that we are. They're trying to run us out of the voting booth and say that we can't vote and making it harder and harder and harder for us to vote. That's exactly what we have to do. And these are the reasons that we actually have to fight against this attempt to destroy the Voting Rights act. Because what they're trying to do is close off all of the ways that we can defeat the Empire. It's Star Wars Day, everyone. And we are the Jedis, and they are the Empire. They are Palpatine, and they are trying to destroy us, and we have to be Luke and Leia. But they're trying to close off all of the ways. They're trying to deaden our lightsabers, as it were. They're trying to take away our Yoda and make it so that we're silent and that we can't vote. And one of the ways they're doing that is absolutely by choking off the Voting Rights Act. We're going to go into more about that in the next hour because this is. None of it is accidental. They genuinely think that if they can choke off the Voting Rights act and effectively cut off the American south and make it so that African Americans have zero representation in multiple states, they're talking about zeroing out black representation in multiple states. Alabama, Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana. They would push the number of black representatives to zero. And they're doing that because of racial polarized voting. They know that 90% of blacks in the south are Democrats and 90% of whites in the south are Republicans. And they want to ensure that no black people are in the House of Representatives representing any of the black people in their states. And if they do that, and they can cut off black voting all across the south, that's 52% of African Americans live in the South. And if they can zero out their representation or whittle it down to one, two, or three people, it will make it very hard to take over the House and Senate. It'll make it very hard to have a Democratic controlled house and Senate, meaning it will be very hard to regulate their corruption and to stop them. And the history of black voters is that black voters tend to vote for the most progressive candidate who can win. And so black voters, because black voters may be socially conservative in some ways, but black voters are the most liberal voters. Black voters tend to vote for increasing taxes on the wealthy, tend to vote for broadening access to education and healthcare, because black voters are survival voters and have always voted for progressive policies because the country's always been such rat bastards to black people that black people are like, let me try to vote for things that will help save my life and save my children. And then when we do that, it tends to help white poor people and brown people and aapi people, gay people and women. It tends to help them because the policies that black people tend to vote for tend to help everyone who isn't rich. And so that's why shutting off black vote, you know, black voting and access has always been the game. It's the whole reason that we had the Klan. The purpose of the Klan initially was to stop black people from voting black men. It's always been the reason anti blackness is. It's intentional. And it's not just about racism. It's also about power. It's about making sure that black people can't do what black people do, which is vote for the most progressive candidates and policies. They don't like black people. They definitely like our culture and they want to take it. They don't necessarily like black people, but they really hate how we vote. All right, let's welcome everybody to hour two of the Joy Reid show. Please do be sure to hit that like and subscribe button, because the other piece of doing this is that there is this algorithm, particularly on YouTube, that is very. It really. It really determines what you're able to do and how you're able to grow. And these channels really depend on being able to beat the algorithm at its own game. And in order to do that, hitting like and subscribe, but also commenting, the more that you comment and participate, whether it is on Twitch, which I'm looking at Twitch right now, Jenny Oblivion says, I'm a white woman and my favorite reps are black women. We have to stop these old white men. Oh, we love that Raven, that is Jenny Oblivion. We have Raven Wolf says Rebels we are. I love that. May the fourth be with you. Jenny Oblivion on Twitch. The Twitchies are chill. Like the Twitchies are chill. I love that. Those are great comments. Quick question. Yes. Do you think I'm just trying to be strategic here, guys, just to hear me out a second here, how about in the south, since they're trying to take away all black representation. How about during the primaries, a lot of black people in the south should just register Republican and reverse vote them out and vote in anybody else who they want. Like use their power since they take each as you can be a Democrat, Democrats have no power. How about drew the primary, vote out whatever Republican you dislike because now you're a Republican and then take it from there. Just a thought. So Jason and I were talking about this over the weekend and here's what's so interesting. I think what we have to do is whatever it takes. J.C. no, come back on. Don't go in. I think whatever it takes, we have to. And it has to be situational, depending on where you are. Right. So I'll give you an example. I remember we had Yolanda Jones on and we took out the maps in Texas. So There is District 9 and District 18 in Texas where they're scooping out. I hope I'm not getting them reversed, but they're scooping out, I think District 9, dumping it into District 18 and then turning District 9 into an overwhelmingly Republican district. So now that district that used to be, you know, full of liberals is now full of Republicans. If you're in that district. Because what happens is, and let me just explain to you how to do it, I'm going to, we're going to do this again. So I'm probably, I'm previewing it, what I'm going to say tomorrow and read this, read that. But if you think people are like, well, how can that be? The same humans are still there. Now here's how they're doing it. If you have, remember peanuts. And so remember when, when poor Franklin is at the table, we're gonna do this tomorrow. But if, if you have Franklin at the table with all of the other peanuts and everybody had a slice of pie, the, the way that you stack and pack is that you take Franklin's slice of pie and you cut it up into four pieces and give it to all the other peanuts and Franklin ends up with no pieces. Everybody had a slice, but then they take Franklin's and they carve it up and they give everybody Else Franklin's shares of the pot. That's what they're doing. They're stacking and packing. They take the black district that they've actually created. I know, poor Franklin, they just treated him so bad. They're taking these districts that they created to force a black representative in by packing all the black people into one district, which also, by the way, isn't always that wise, you know, to just pack them all in one. So when you put all the blacks in one district, like in Mississippi, all the black people are in Bennie Thompson's district. So all the white districts all around it are bleached. So you black in one district and bleach the ones around it. And now what they're doing is having made that, that deal in some cases with Democrats, not necessarily Bendy Thompson, but some Democrats went along with those deals. I know in Florida they did, where they're like, give us these three seats that are going to be very, very, very, very, very black. Then all the seats around that are very, very, very, very white. Now what they're doing is they're saying, gotcha. The trick's on you. We're going to take your Franklin districts, cut up the pie, and give it out to all of these other districts. And then every district has just a tiny slice of blacks. And every other district has no black. And on the other district, there's no black district anymore. They just cut it up and hand it out to all the other districts. So they bleed. They do it. They call it bleaching. It's stacking and cracking or cracking and stacking. Whatever they call it, that's what they're doing. And so they're going to mess up all these districts. And so what Jason is saying is, okay, so now you're in, you're in District 9. You are the remaining blacks in District 9 that used to be like 70% black and now it's like 30% black. But they know that all the blacks are Democrats. They know that whatever blacks are left are all Democrats. So now they can just do policy that's anti Democrat, knowing all the Democrats are black because in the south, most Democrats are black and most white people are Republicans. It's like 90% of white people in the South. It's like 60% nationwide. But in the south, it's like a hard like 80 something percent of white Americans in the south because they used to be the Dixiecrats and they just switched parties. And so what Jason is saying is, okay, so let's say you're in that district and now you're one of the 30%. You're now the 30% black. Maybe all y' all should just register as Republicans and fuck their whole head up. Because then they're gonna be like, are they Byron Donald's Republicans or are they fake? Are they real? Are they not? Because then if they try to gerrymander that district again, now they have no choice but to gerrymander by race. Because now everybody's a Republican tonight. If everybody's a Republican, what do we do? How do we figure out how to get these blacks not to have any power? They won't be able to figure it out. They're going to have to literally get all the blacks. They're going to have to do it by race. And that's what I saw another post, and that's Jason's pitch. He's like, if you're in a district where they're bleaching you into putting you in a bleach district that is still like 20% of you, then you should all just register as Republican, go in their primary and fuck up their primaries. Go in their primary and vote out who, you know, vote against whoever the incumbent is, get them out. And I'm going to get into this because I think this is important stuff to discuss. There's another person I was watching that had another. Had another theory on what to do. Before I do that, let me. Let me actually just thank one of our other sponsors because it is important that we get of our sponsors the love that they deserve. I'm going to get into it a little bit after that, but I want to note that this section of the Joy Reach show. This hour of the Joy Reach show is brought to you by friends at Fast Growing Trees. This is actually one of my favorites. So Fast Growing Trees, if you don't know, is one of America's largest and most trusted online nurseries with thousands of trees and plants and more than 2 million happy customers. They have all the plants that your yard or home needs, including fruit trees, privacy trees, flowering trees, shrubs, houseplants, all grown with care and guaranteed to arrive healthy and beautiful. It is like your own local nursery, but anywhere that you live with more plants than you would find anywhere else. Now, whatever you're looking for, Fast Growing Trees helps you find options that actually work for your climate, space and lifestyle. You actually put your zip code in when you go on their website and they tell you what kind of plants and trees will actually grow best where you live. They make it easy to get your dream yard by like customizing it to actually where you live. So you're not ordering stuff that won't survive in the climate where you are. They have an alive and thrive guarantee that promises that your plants will arrive happy and healthy. No green thumb required, just quality plants you can count on. Plus you get ongoing support, support from trusted plant experts who will help you plan your landscape, choose the right plants and learn to care for them every step of the way. Now, Jason and I, we did order these gorgeous cherry blossom trees for our yard, which are fabulous. We ordered them in the five foot. You can order them from two feet, baby tiny size, all the way up to five or six feet so that you can already get them tall so you don't have to wait 10 years for them to grow. So that's what we went for because they're pretty and that they work in the climate. And the first thing we did is put in a zip code, let people so that we are not ordering something that is appropriate for the yard. And it is a fabulous way to do it. And we're looking to get more and add to our fabulous. You know, you got to build the wall. We're going to have more stuff. You got to build the wall. The experts at Fast Growing trees have curated thousands of plans for every climate, every climate zone so customers find options that truly work for you. Now, right now, they have great deals on spring planting essentials. They have up to half off on selected plan plants. And listener to the Joy Reid show can get 20 off their first purchase. If you use the code Joy at checkout, that's an additional 20 off. Better plants and better growing. @fastgrowingtrees.com using the code JOY at checkout fast growingtrees.com and use the code Joy. Now, it's the first perfect time to plant. It is spring. So let's grow together. Use Joy to save. Today offers valid for a limited time. So get in on it. Terms and conditions may apply. Okay, so we're going to get into this issue of the Supreme Court, I mean, issue of the Voting Rights act and the supreme court. So on April 28th, if you guys remember, on April 28th, a day before the daughter's birthday. So I'm very upset about it. Six Republican nominees to the Supreme Court went to the White House for a posh state dinner for King Charles and Kamua. Now, they did that on the same day that Samuel Alito's order gutting the Voting Rights act dropped, right? And notably only the six of them, the six conservatives who had been appointed by Republicans and None of the liberal members were invited to the lavish party. And I confirmed that with sources close to the situation, that only the conservative members were invited. And despite John Roberts always saying they never wanted to appear partisan, they all put on their fancy suits and went with their wives, many of whom have made money in their law firms after their spouses became Supreme Court Justices, including Amy Coney Barrett's husband, John Chief Justice Roberts wife. These families have all benefited from their member of their family, their spouse becoming a Supreme Court Justice. So it's all very corrupty, very corrupting. And so they're all there alongside all the tech oligarchs, Jeff Bezos, the Apple CEO, the outgoing Apple CEO. They're all there kikiing with each other, all the billionaires, all the people. And the timing again was interesting. It is interesting that they did it on the exact same day that they dropped the ruling in Louisiana versus Calais, gutting the Voting Rights Act. And it does hint to the absolute corruption of this court. Now, I did write about it, if you care to read it. I shorthand the article. John Crow. I went back and forth on whether to call it Don Crow or John Crow because you kind of want to call this the Don Crow era. But this era preceded Donald Trump. Chief Justice John Roberts has spent basically his entire career attempting to gut the Voting Rights Act. As you'll recall, I've said it on the show before. He came into the justice department as a 26 year old lawyer during the Reagan administration in 1981 and almost immediately by 1982 was literally writing the Reagan era policy on how to gut the Voting Rights Act. Sixteen years after the Voting Rights act passed, the voting rights people forget the timing. I always love to do the timing. Voting Rights act passes in six, is signed into law by LBJ in 65. By 1981, John Roberts was trying to kill it. He thought it had run its course after 16 years. It took 116 years to have that legislation that actually actualized the 15th amendment right to vote. It's not really a right to vote in the Constitution, but you know, it actualized the 15th amendment. Took 116 years. But he's like, after 16 years, we don't need that shit no more. So this has been his life's work. And what he does is he likes to assign Samuel Alito to write the hot stuff. It's his ideology. But he lets Alito write it because Alito is the asshole on the team. And so he'll write the Dobbs ruling, which was his life's work was to get rid of Roe v. Wade. So he let him have that one. But John Roberts, let's just be clear, he is the captain of that ship. And getting rid of the Voting Rights act is literally his life's dream. So when this happened, gutting the Voting Rights act, while they were sipping tea with the King of England, the right celebrated because they were like, great, now we don't have to worry about losing the House and Senate in November. We no longer have to worry about the midterms because now all of these states, which immediately. Tennessee is now in a special session where they're going to try to get rid of the one member of Congress who's a Democrat, who's right now, Steve Cohen. But this is where. And we had him on the show, Justin Pearson. Justin J. Pearson is running in a primary for that seat, but there would be no seat. So he'd be running for a seat that doesn't exist anymore. They're trying to get rid of that one Democratic seat in Tennessee. The Louisiana governor, the demonic Louisiana governor has said, oh, we're going in special session, too, even though they're already voting in Louisiana in their congressional primary. He's like, no, no, you can stop voting now. We're going to go ahead and get rid of that, that one seat there as well. Alabama's governor, who's the outgoing governor, is like, let's go ahead into special session and get rid of the two black seats there. And it goes on and on and on and on and on. They're not going in Mississippi yet, but they'll get to it. Florida's like, let's get rid of four seats, Democratic seats. They're not all going for just the black seats, but the way that the new maps that they're proposing are drawn, effectively, it would almost eliminate like a third of the Congressional Black Caucus in one go. And there's a record number of the CBC right now. It's obvious that the goal here is to get rid of the black members. And of course, cue Megan Kelly. Megan Kelly. The, the Barbie you left outside and got dry and, and angry, belched out some, some. She attacked Sunny Holston because, oh, my God, Sunny Holston's son went to Harvard. How dare he? And saying, well, she's rich. She shouldn't be upset. She's got no problems. She's never been discriminated against. And then she did this thing where she's like, what would, how would, how would people feel if I got on the Supreme Court? As if you ever would, Megan well, maybe actually in this climate, maybe Trump would put her on there. Maybe that's what she's auditioning for. I'm always wondering what her game is. Maybe that's her game. And she said, what if I went on because there was an article that talked about Clarence Thomas turning on his people, turning on black people, turning on his own people. And she's like, well, what if I went on and got on the Supreme Court and said, all I do is stand up for the whites, ma'.
- [74:23]
B
Am.
- [74:24]
A
Captain Blackface, all you do is stand up for the whites. What are you talking about? You say all you, you do everything but say your goal is to stand up for the white. So I'm not sure what you mean by that, Captain Blackface. Don't tell what you're talking about. Also, George Will wrote a piece for the Washington Post basically arguing that the Voting Rights act was so successful and since racism is over, it's no longer needed because the Voting Rights act already did its job. So who needs it anymore because there's no racism anymore. And look at all behold all the blacks in the cbc. And what conservatives are arguing that you don't need the Voting Rights act anymore. And John Roberts, as I start reading it, says effectively that because racism is over, congratulations, America. White conservatives can just as well represent black and brown people. Why not black people? That white people will vote for black people. Behold the four black Republicans who are all leaving. By the way, there are only four black Republicans in the United States House of Representatives. There's one in the Senate, Tim Scott, there's four in the House. All of them are leaving to run for other offices. So there'll be zero black Republicans in the House. They're all leaving office. And note to Will's point, none of them represent majority black districts. They all represent overwhelmingly white districts. All four of the Republicans that are now out of here leaving office to run for other offices. Byron Donald's trying to run for Governor of Florida. But here's the problem with this argument. There are almost no white Republicans who represent majority black districts other than Cohen in Tennessee. And there are. There is no evidence that there is a single white Republican who represents Even a plurality, 20% or more of their district being black or brown, who have increased the prosperity and opportunity for their constituents. I'll say that again, there is zero evidence that there is a single conservative white Republican that you can point to who has grown the prosperity of the people of color they represent. I just don't see evidence of it. And because there are almost no Republicans that represent districts that even have 20% or more black or brown people in them. We did a search for today. There are very few, one of the few that you can point to that is a white Republican, particularly in the south. Right. Because 52% of something of black people live in the South. Let's just limit it to black people and Republicans. The one that we found who, who has 20% of their district is black and they represent them is Speaker Mike Johnson in the great state of Louisiana. 20% of his district is black and his district has a poverty rate of 18%. It's one of the poorest districts in the country. So if you just go by the, the math, the economic math, Mike Johnson is the one sort of representative of what it looks like when a conservative southern white Republican is representing black people. This district is poor. What has he done for these people? I can't. What has he done for them and what are they going to do for them? Republicans are anti dei. They don't want to have diversity. They want to decrease DEI funding. They want decreased funding for black businesses. They want to gut the small business entities that help African American businesses thrive. They want to sue small black organizations that try to stand up small black women's businesses. They want to get rid of affirmative action, meaning they are hell bent on reducing the percentage and number of black people in elite schools. How can you argue that these kinds of people, the Megyn Kelly types, would be perfectly fine representatives for voters of color? In what way would they be good for them? Because they'll shut them out of all economic opportunity, cut off their access to education, cut off their access to small business funding. Explain to me how that works. And I will note one more thing. When it comes to racially polarized voting, there is a historical trend that you have to take into account in all of this, which is that racially polarized voting has generally, when it comes to white Americans, just in general, not, not everybody, we're not saying it, but in general, this is. The trend is that white Americans tend to consolidate in the most conservative party and really the most conservative party. When you say conservatism in America, it's meant conservatism when it comes to race, meaning the party that is the more white interests party. That's just the way it's been. Because I mean, if you've got the privilege that's built into society, particularly in a slave holding society or slaveholding is based on race and then Jim Crow is what follows that you're going to concentrate in the party that's looking out for your interests. And black voters have tried to be in the party that they think is looking out for their interests to the extent they can. And for black people, there has been more of a tension in that. I want to put this up. This is C6 Jason, if you could. So to the point that Jason was making earlier about what should black folks do in terms of what party they should register as versus how they vote. If you look at the history of black voters after the Civil War and black men were given theoretically the franchise, the vast majority of black people were registered Republicans. But that doesn't mean that they voted for Republicans. If you go through and you look at the three times that Franklin Delano Roosevelt overwhelmingly won the black vote, he got 70% or more of the black vote every time he ran. Only 40% of black people were actually Republicans, were actually Democrats. Only like 40% or so of black people actually considered themselves Democrats. The vast majority of black people were still Republicans and there was not a Democratic majority among African Americans until Harry Truman. Until Harry Truman, the voter registration of black people did not match their voting behavior. Black people were registered Republicans mostly, but they were still voting for whoever they felt was going to better their communities. So they were staying. They were still calling themselves Republicans, but voting for FDR three times. None of the three times did black voter registration as Democrats exceed black voter registration as Republicans. They stayed Republicans, but they voted Democrat to the point Jay Z was making. You could theoretically register however you want because black people will register one way and vote the other way. It's more consistent for white voters have consistently registered and voted for the party that is more conservative. It's not always that way. And the last thing I will add here. So there's a possibility that you really could trick the system if you really wanted to, or vote register third party or register somebody. They just don't know what you are and they have no idea what you are. But you're still going to vote for the people. You're still going to, you know, vote the way that's going to be for your interest is what I'm trying to say. Now the last thing I will say here is they're also missing is that the reason we even had to have a Voting Rights act is that while conservatives who used to call themselves Democrats, the reason that we needed a Voting Rights act is that Even after the 15th amendment was passed in the Constitution, conservatives who used to call themselves Democrats refused to let black men and women vote. Let me very quickly read from this here, this is an annotated copy of the Constitution. Here it says the last of the three reconstruction amendments, the 15th amendment, was ratified in 1870 to prohibit the denial or abridgment of the right to vote on the basis of race, cover or previous condition of servitude. It's widely credited with giving black men in the United States the right to vote. But what Melissa Murray does in this is she goes on to talk about the fact that during the drafting of this amendment, legislators debated the scope and substance of the proposed amendment. Some argued for a broad ban prohibition on all barriers to voting, including literacy tests and property ownership requirements. In the end, a more modest proposal to prescribe racial qualification and voting prevailed. Congress enacted the proposed amendment, which was then dispatched to the states for ratification. The 15th Amendment was ratified on February 3, 1870, meaning it left open the idea of tricks to try to stop black people from voting. And Melissa Murray, who is the Frederick and Grace Stokes professor of Law at New York University School of Law and the co author of the number one New York Times bestseller, the Trump Indictments, the Historic Charging Documents with Commentary, the co host of the Strict Scrutiny podcast and a regular commentator on news, now, joins us now. Her new book, which I have in my hot little hands, the US Constitution, a comprehensive and annotated guide to the modern reader, an accessible and modern guide to how to read and understand the U.S. constitution, joins me now. Hey, Melissa, how are you?
- [83:37]
C
Hi, Joy. Thanks so much for having me tonight.
- [83:40]
A
It is so great to see you. I miss you. How is life? I mean. Well, actually, life is really awful for anyone who knows anything about the Constitution because it's being shredded.
- [83:50]
C
Life is lifing. Although I still get to see you even if you don't get to see see me. And it's great to see you and great to see you in your new home here.
- [83:59]
A
Thank you. I appreciate that. So let's go through this, because when I crack this open today, what I love about this book is that it's a good thing to just have on your desk as these terrible things are going through, because I went right to the 15th amendment, says I went right to it and started reading through it. You give some of the history leading into the amendments, you give some of the history of why they are as they are, and then you kind of break it down and what these amendments mean. Why did you decide to write this book?
- [84:27]
C
Well, Joy, it's a great story. Back in the day, I used to be in these Twitter streets on the regular Twitter, used to Be fun. And I used to be there a lot. And one day I was on Twitter and Luther Campbell, who you may know, Uncle Luke, right. Of 2 Live Crew, was out in these Twitter streets and. And he was going off on Joe Biden, like all these things that President Joe Biden needs to do. He needs to do this about the gas prices and this and this and this. And I was just reading this litany of things that Joe Biden needed to do. And it occurred to me that more than half of them, Joe Biden was not permitted to do under the Constitution. So it occurred to me that maybe Uncle Luke hasn't read the Constitution. And then I was thinking about it some more, and it occurred to me that maybe a lot of people haven't read the Constitution. You know, we live in a world now where post George W. Bush and no Child Left behind, we don't really have civics education in schools. There's nothing equivalent to Schoolhouse Rock that we had when we were coming up that tells people how government works. And I bet there's a whole generation of people coming of age right now as political beings who don't have any idea or have very little idea about how this document that scaffolds our government and indirectly our lives actually works and what it was intended to do.
- [85:55]
A
Yeah. The fun thing about it is now that Uncle Luke is running for Congress, it's going to be interesting if he wins to see as he, you know, and he'll. He'll be like us. It'll be like a person, you know, going into Congress and then finding out both the possibilities and the limits. You know, I think we've watched Marjorie Taylor Greene kind of make that transition trajectory. Right. They come in thinking, I can do this. And then they find out, oh, I can't do that. I can do that. And you find out the hard way, kind of the limits. Are you, like me, struck increasingly by the many, many, many flaws in the construction of the Constitution? I feel like in some ways it was built in a way that it can't possibly really work now.
- [86:39]
C
So, I mean, you know, this is a document that, let's be honest, is a trauma informed document. Like when they sat down to write
- [86:47]
A
this, they were going through it.
- [86:49]
C
And I mean that, you know, they had the whole colonial period where the British Crown and the British Parliament was staying on their necks taxing them. They, like, their representation was limited. That was trauma for them. And, you know, they responded to it in the Constitution. The other trauma was when they actually broke away from England and were Trying to basically have a war against a global superpower, the biggest global superpower of its age. And they were a country that was basically held together by Scotch tape and friendship bracelets. So, I mean, like, they're dealing with these twin traumas, and they have to reconcile them. How do we have a central government that can do things that we need to do as a nation, but not be so powerful that it becomes tyrannical? So that's the central conceit of the original Constitution. How to structure a government so that it works, but that it doesn't work so well and so effectively that it actually becomes despotic. And the way they decide to do this in the original Constitution is to divide power horizontally between the three branches of the federal government. So article one talks about what Congress can do, and they're very concerned about a federal legislature. Article two is about the president, and then Article three is about the judiciary, which is literally an afterthought. And then they divide power vertically between the federal government and the states. And this idea of states having sovereignty to do certain things that the federal government cannot do, that. That's the whole plan. Almost immediately, there are dissenting voices who say, like, that can't be enough to protect individual rights. Like, you barely even talk about individual rights here. It's just not enough to divide government power. And that's where we get the impetus for the first 10amendments, which are passed as a bill of Rights almost immediately as the Constitution is being ratified. And those are protections against the federal government for individual rights. And that's still not enough, because deeply woven into the fabric of the original document are a million different compromises for keeping slavery in the United States. If you read this document, they never say slavery explicitly, like they're too genteel for that. But if you read anytime the number 1808 comes up, that's a clue. They're talking about slavery like that. Because this is being written in 1788. They have this idea that they will compromise with the south on slavery for 20 years. They'll allow the south to continue the transatlantic slave trade until 1808. And this is in the Constitution. And then, wait, Congress can be authorized to pass a law prohibiting the importation of slaves. And they think that's going to be enough to end slavery. We'll give the South a little time. It's almost like sending that south to a halfway house. Like, you know, you'll. You'll get rehabilitated, and then you'll be able to be independent. But the south in 18 oh, 8 is like, okay, you're doing away with the transatlantic slave trade. We're not giving this up. And to a self reproducing slave population. And it is that tension that then feeds these sectional anxieties. And ultimately, a few years later, in 1860, precipitates the Civil War. And after the Civil War, we get another founding moment where the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments are ratified that fundamentally change the Constitution and restructure the relationship between the federal government and the states. And between the federal government, the states and the people.
- [90:23]
A
Yeah. And the thing is, so they get mad at Nicole Hannah Jones, but what you're describing are a group of people who are obsessed with trying to figure out how to both claim that they're producing a country and a document that's focused on individual liberty, but also trying to do that while owning people and the self reproducing enslavement, meaning breeding. So they want to do slave breeding, mostly through raping their own enslaved women or through forcing enslaved people to breed with each other, treating them literally as cattle. They create chattel slavery. They reverse paterfamilias. They're saying, you take the condition of your mother, and then like a couple years before the Civil War, Dred Scott happens and the Taney Supreme Court says, basically, black people are never going to ever be citizens. They can't be citizens. They do two fugitive slave acts. There's so much in the Constitution that's about how do we keep these slaves, y', all, and how do we also keep the south from leaving with its slaves and creating a different empire? And so when I look at this situation now, when that same region, having switched from being dominated by the right wing Democratic Party, now dominated by the right wing Republican Party, they're still trying to figure out how to not let black people have power. And it seems that obsession among conservatives, whatever brand name they call themselves, whether they call themselves Democrats or call themselves Republicans, they're still obsessed with not letting black people, people have power. And that, you know, the, the, you know, the strays, you know, women catch the strays and gay people catch the strays, and, you know, Latinos catch us. But at the end of the day, they're like, we can't let black people, particularly in the south, have any power. We just have to stop that. And so talk to me about the, the Supreme Court. You did clerk for Sonia Sotomayor, who did warn that they also lied about not wanting to have a king. Because 250 years later, John Robertson, behold the King of America. Donald Trump. Right. And now what they're effectively saying is f state's rights, too. A state can't even decide its own gerrymander if they let black people have an additional seat, it's illegal. No blacks can have a seat. If they say no blacks can have a seat now, that's fine. That's fair.
- [92:42]
C
So the court's decision last week in Louisiana versus Kelly is utterly devastating. And anyone trying to sugarcoat it is lying to you. It belies the original intent of the 15th Amendment, as you say, when the Reconstruction Amendments were promulgated and ratified, they recognized that the south was coming back to the Union begrudgingly and under duress. And so, you know, they have the 13th amendment, which abolishes slavery. They have to be very clear that, you know, we are going to make this apply to not just states, but also private actors. The 13th Amendment is one provision of the Constitution that applies to private actors. They don't want people enslaving other people going forward. So that's there.
- [93:30]
A
Unless they're in prison.
- [93:31]
C
Unless they're in prison. They also talk about the badges. Later, the court talks about the badges and incidents of slavery. So, you know, you can't recreate slavery under a different guise. Then they turn to the 14th Amendment, which again, as you say, is meant to repudiate the Dred Scott decision, or at least Section one, the citizenship clause. And we literally are debating that right now what the meaning of the citizenship clause is. And they talk all about the rights that individuals have against the states because they finally realize that the states, as much as the federal government, can be an oppressive force for certain groups and, you know, which groups they are talking about, then they realize there's a. There's a Provision in the 14th Amendment, Section 2 of the 14th Amendment, which talks about penalties for the south in their representation in Congress if they don't allow blacks to participate in the political community. And Congress never actually passes legislation to, you know, actually punish the south when they refuse to let black people. People vote. That's the impetus for the 15th amendment. They see the south basically trying to recreate a racial hierarchy even after emancipation. And they're like, the only way this will be stopped is if black people have a voice, if they can vote. And so they enfranchise African American men in the 15th amendment. And, you know, there is a modest proposal and a much more expansive proposal. They choose the modest proposal. It's probably a problem, but that's the point of it. And when you have a Supreme court in Louisiana versus Calais. Looking at the 15th amendment and the 14th amendment and saying this is entirely colorblind. Race is not supposed to factor into it. It's like, what are you on? Of course race is part of the equation. They understood it because they were trying to counteract the creation of a racial hierarchy. You can't counteract the creation of a racial high hierarchy against a certain group of people without considering all of the ways that you might have to rejigger the racial balance in order to remedy the wrongs done to them. And so here we have Louisiana after the census, drawing a congressional map. This is a state with one third of its electorate that is black, and it drew one opportunity Districts where black voters could elect the candidate of the their choice. The map was challenged as an impermissible racial gerrymander. A lower federal court said it was an impermissible gerrymander and it directed the Louisiana government to draft a new map. And they did. And they drew a new map that created two opportunity districts where black voters could elect the candidates of their choice. Then a group of non African American
- [96:09]
A
voters read that as you will, right?
- [96:14]
C
And it's basically a reverse discrimination claim. By thinking about race, by drawing a remedial map that would remedy the racial discrimination created by the original map, the state has now itself participated in another form of race discrimination. And the court basically bought it and said, yes, indeed, that makes sense. But here's what's really craven about this decision. Joy. When he wrote this, Justice Alito, who is no friend of the VRA and has never been, he says that he's not actually destroying Section two, he's preserving the central limits of Section two. You laugh, but here's why. So one reason I think he's casting this as preserving the. Preserving Section two rather than eviscerating it, is because it's important for the court. After literally blowing, blowing through precedence in almost every year that the supermajority has been in place, this court does not need to catch strays from basically eviscerating the Voting Rights Act. So they don't want any flack about that. So they're just preserving the central tenets. But there's also a really practical reason that Section 2 lives if inform, if not in function. And that is because when blue states like California begin their redistricting process, and maybe they opportunity districts to counteract the losses that are seen in these red states, then non African American voters can rely on Section two to challenge those new redistrict maps in blue states. Impermissible race discrimination and the only way that black voters will be able to use Section 2 to prevail is if they can show that a state has engaged in intentional racial discrimination against them. And that's going to be very hard to do in the south where race and political affiliation run together. Which is to say that black voters in the south are usually Democrats. So if black voters are saying, hey, this is a racial gerrymander, all Louisiana has to do to counteract that claim is say, it's actually not a racial gerrymander. We did this to consolidate Republican advantage. And the court will be like, yeah, that's right. That seems right.
- [98:22]
A
And the only way that they'll accept accept a section 2 claim is if white voters say, hey, this is a racial gerrymander against us. They've literally weaponized the 15th Amendment against black people. The thing that's so wild about the way that they do this is that the 15th amendment did actually nothing to allow black men to vote because it took another 116 years to get enabling legislation.
- [98:51]
C
Exactly.
- [98:51]
A
It's literally the enabling legislation to the 15th Amendment.
- [98:55]
C
The 15th Amendment, as I explained, has an enforcement clause. And it's basically nothing unless Congress takes up the Constitution on the ability to enforce the tenets of the 15th Amendment through legislation. And in 1965, literally almost 100 years after the 15th Amendment was ratified, Congress takes up this invitation that's been lying dormant and passes the Voting Rights act of 1965. Subsequent Congresses reauthorize it with huge bipartisan support. And this court since 2013 has done nothing but chip away at the VRA. 2013, Shelby county versus Holder destroyed the pre clearance regime. The pre clearance formula was a requirement that states with a history of suppressive voter laws, which is basically most of the states in the former Confederacy and sub some states in the north, if they wanted to change a polling place, a ballot box, they had to first go to the Department of Justice or three judge court, explain themselves and get pre clearance. And because that was required, there were a ton of voter laws that never even went into effect because they could not get pre cleared. The court, Shelby county versus Holder destroyed the pre clearance formula. And in his majority opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts assured this whole country that it was of no moment that the pre clearance regime was going away because Section 2 still existed. Now, he didn't note that Section 2 allows litigation against laws that are suppressive. And the problem with litigation is that it's expensive. It takes a lot of work for individuals to mount a litigation. It takes resources. It's really different from pre clearance, where you just go to the Department of Justice. Litigation is a lot. And even having the burden of litigation was too much for this court. And they have. In 2021, Burnovich versus DNC chipped away at the. At section two of the voting Rights act by making it harder to prove discriminatory effect in order to prove a voting rights claim under Section two. And now they've done this effectively authorizing the states to redistrict in ways that dilute the political power of black people and other minorities.
- [101:05]
A
And quite deliberately, Melissa Murray, this is going to be my companion. It's not even heavy, so I can put in it. And I got the soft one, so I can put it in my bag. Because I think what we need to do is we all need to become very conversant with the Constitution. Like, this is a moment when it is time for us to know what's in this thing. Know what's in this bad boy, y'. All. And so you can flip. And I'm telling you, this is what I did. I just went right to the 15th amendment. You see, I got it little. I got it folded over. And this is what you get when they try to come at you with some constitutional arguments. Be like, melissa got. Got me covered. We're gonna get this, but we're gonna put it in the store, we're gonna put it in the shop. I want you all to get a copy of this. You're gonna need this. Put it in your bag. It's soft, so you can put it in your bag for the articles. It's like Playboy. Get it for the article. This is what I'm saying, right? And it's. And look. And it's got a pretty cover. It's soft. It goes with. With every outfit. Melissa Murray, I appreciate you. Thank you for writing this. I appreciate it, because I do love to have a pocket constitution. I don't have big enough pockets for this, but this is gonna be my bag constitution. It's gonna be my. This is gonna be my hot constitution right here.
- [102:10]
C
Bag. And this swag.
- [102:12]
A
This is it. Hot sauce and the Constitution annotated by Melissa freaking Murray. How about that? Thank you, sister. Take care.
- [102:19]
C
Thank you, Joy.
- [102:20]
A
Thank you. Thank you. It's in the shop, you guys. I'm telling y', all, you need this. And I'm telling you. Soft. It goes with everything. It's neutral, Goes with all colors, and it's got a little red on it. Got a little color on it. Get it. All right, you guys. Because they're trying to play with us, but we need to know the Constitution better than they do. Let me know. Speaking of the Constitution, the JoyBridge show is also brought to you by our friends at the Freedom From Religion Foundation. I want to connect the dots for you. America started as a rebellion against the kings. Aha. Who claim to find authority. And instead of replacing that with religion, the founders created a secular constitution. No religious test, no state religion, and a government accountable supposedly to the people. That is the baseline. Even though we're challenged on trying to get that to happen now, what we're also seeing now is a coordinated effort to shift that from policy decisions to public messaging, including events like America praise on May 17. When government and religion start to mix in very ugly, invisible ways. And that has real consequences for people's actual rights. The Freedom From Religion foundation is working to protect the First Amendment because it protects you. As we approach America's 250th anniversary, this is about what kind of country we are shaping. Go to FFRF US Joy or text JOY J O Y to 511511 to join or learn more. Go to FFRF US JOY or just text JOY to 511511 now to support their work. Because freedom of religion requires freedom from government imposed religion. You shouldn't have to believe in the government's preferred religious doctrine in order to exercise your citizenship. So text JOY to 511511 today. Text FEES may apply if you decide to do the text route. I so appreciate. Melissa, y'. All. I'm telling you right now that this is going to be the most. This is gonna be my favorite thing to walk around with. It's so useful. Okay, so before we go tonight, the latest on the strange case of Cole Thomas Allen. Remember him? The judge apologized to the suspect in the alleged assassination attempt of our very own palate, our very own Palpatine. This is according to the ABC affiliate in D.C. u.S. Magistrate Judge Zia Faraki held a hearing this afternoon to discuss the treatment of suspect Cole Thomas Allen after stating in a court order that he had grave concerns about Allen's treatment, which he described as seemingly unprompted solitary confinement over several days. The judge apologized at the beginning and the end of the hearing in response to Allen being held in the safe cell, which he said was tantamount to solitary confinement. The judge added that pretrial detention is not meant to be punitive. It's weird. So they got him in, like, basically solitary. Now, over the weekend, the FBI dropped video of the alleged assassination attempt. And by the way, it is. It is weird. Weird. Showing what looks like a complete lack of reaction by more than half a dozen Secret Service agents and security personnel who look like they may have been hotel security inside the Hilton Hotel on the night of the White House Correspondent's Dinner. And Jason, if you throw up D1, I'm just going to show it to you. So you can see here in this footage of what's happening that this person, who is alleged to be called Thomas Allen, spends a lot of time kind of casing the joint. This is supposedly the day. This is on the 24th. This is before the White House Correspondents association situation where he's just kind of tooling around the hotel. He's just walking around and he's checking out. At one point he checks out the gym and there's just like nothing going on. Like. Right. He's just kind of a move. Here's the part where you see him walking in. He walks into the gym. You know, he's obviously got his little coat because he's staying in the hotel. Keep in mind that he is staying in the hotel. He supposedly takes a train. He's from California, goes to Connecticut, then checks into the hotel like the day before or before the dinner. And he's staying there. So he's a guest. So he's got a card key, goes in the gym. At one point, he chats up the lady in the gym. They don't really explain why they're giving him giving us this information, but he's obviously walking around and seeing what's happening in the hotel. I don't know if we can push forward just a little bit, Jason. I don't know if it's possible to even go forward a little bit. In the video, he has a little conversation with the lady that's in the gym. And so that's that day. Then the next thing that you see is him come back to the gym and you can see the date is sort of in the upper right hand corner. You'll then see him come back again and check out the same area again. Now this is the area where he's going to eventually come back to on the day of the actual event. So here he is coming back to the gym again. There's actually no one in the gym this time. And he's there and it's just. It's all just kind of very strange. Then we get to October 25th, approximately 8:23pm he comes back to the gym again. So he gets to the hotel on the 24th, I guess that's the day he checks in and then he comes back again. I don't know if Jason cannot fast forward, he probably can't fast forward. I don't know if it allows you to do that. But. But this is the. The day that's of the actual event. So now you can see him in a trench coat. And here is now the part where he's in that same hallway, but here's where all the Secret Service guys are. You can see it there, what you're going to see in this video. That is odd and that it makes kind of no sense. You can see 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 or 9. Different combination of security guards and Secret Service people. Look in the upper left hand corner, you can see the guy who's supposed to be cold, Thomas Allen with a circle around him walk into a back room there. He's followed by the. The guy with the dog that follows him. The dog tries to follow him into the room. Minutes later, after going in the room and the dog trying to go in, the dog actually goes twice to try to follow him into the room. You can see the Secret Service agents are taking down the magnetometers. Now, if you were to look through there, you see, then he just suddenly runs through. He busts out of the room and runs through. And no one reacts to him at first. Jason, if you can go to the next video, you can see then what happens? Then they all start following him. Now you can just see how many people. This is one floor up from the ballroom. If you. If you know that Hilton Hotel, that's one floor up from the ballroom. If you go down, if you go through those doors in the back and go downstairs, that's where the actual ballroom is. That's where you act. So you can see him run through. Only one guy reacts to him. Everyone else is just completely ignoring him. He then starts firing shots. Winnie and I went through and we counted at least four or five shots. You can see the little smoke. And he's the only one who fires at all. At first. It seems that he hits the guy in the back that's by the door, who then kind of crawls away. And so it appears that the one guy who actually took action, everyone else seems inert. They just don't seem to react to him at all. I think we have the next one. Jason, if you have that next clip, we have a little delay because we're in two different locations. So I'm about delay. So I mean, I'm up time, but you're kind of behind, so I'm a little behind. Okay, no problem. Just to let you know. Okay, no problem at all. So let's do, let's throw up D3, if you could maybe throw up D3, which is the still of what happens when he, when he, when he actually. Yeah, so that, so this is an image of. Do you see how no one is reacting to this? Only one person really reacts. Then you can see the three people who have the blue on, who I guess are security guards. They don't react either. No one reacts to him as he's literally running through the mag, which must not have been turned on because no one reacts to it and no one reacts to him. It's just, it's just, it's, it's interesting. And then let's. Jason, can you put up D2 D2, which shows when he goes into the room and the dog tries to follow him in and there's still no reaction. Look at this. There's the guy with the dog. He goes in the room and the guy is looking at him. Is the guy not looking at him? He goes in there in a trench coat. He then obviously leaves the trench coat out and runs out of the room. And the guy with the dog is like, didn't I just see you? I don't understand it. It's just weird. So that's the video that they released. It shows what definitely seems to be a lack of reaction. I did reach out to someone, some really smart police folks that are there in law enforcement, some law enforcement sources who explained to me that probably what happened was that those security officers in Secret Service, because they had already wanded people who came into the hotel and who were part of the party, they assumed that anyone who was inside the security perimeter was probably fine. So when they saw the guy in the trench coat and the tie walk into that room, they just assumed he was supposed to be. Be there and that he had already been screened and that that might be why that happened. There was also a release of this picture. This is D4 Jason of, of the, of the alleged shoot of Cole Thomas Allen taking like a selfie in the room. All just very strange. And, and, and we know that he was a part time teacher game developer from Torrance, California. But for the Financial Times and also for his LinkedIn, Allen, who graduated with a bachelor's degree from Caltech in 2017 and had a master's degree in computer science from California State University, who got that last year, wrote on his LinkedIn that he's a Mechanical engineer and computer scientist by degree, independent game developer by experience, teacher by birth. He was also involved in game development projects according to his LinkedIn which I did check as well, including a top down shooter RPG role playing game. He said he was that was under active development that you could find on link line. He released another game called Boredom and tagged it as an atomic fighter game seven years ago. But his experience also included teaching, being a teaching assistant at Caltech in 2016, but also a summer graduate intern at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena in 2014. He said that on his LinkedIn that at his time at NASA he added modeling capability for planets around several previously excluded stars and updated the most recent version of the model with new chemical reaction data. I don't know what that any of that means, but that's what he supposedly did. And the bad part about him being an intern at the NASA Jet Propulsion Lab kind of is piquing folks interest online because you now have a bunch of missing scientists who are either connected to the NASA Jet proposal Laboratory or who are connected to research on nuclear technology or other sort of next gen technologies like a I think it's now 13 that are missing and it is mostly the right who's covering it. So Jason, if you could play Defox. This is Fox 10American scientists who have either gone missing or died since mid 2024. They all reportedly had access to classified nuclear or aerospace material. Is anybody investigating this to see if these things are connected? I've seen the report, Peter.
- [113:51]
C
I haven't spoken to our relevant agencies about it. I will certainly do that and we'll get you an answer if true, of course that's definitely something I think this government and administration would deem worth looking into.
- [114:02]
B
So let me what really strikes me
- [114:04]
C
too when you mentioned kind of the similar behavior of some of these individuals that have gone missing, leaving things at home, people that that are mothers, fathers, they have family. We've even heard some that have said hey, raising an alarm bell if something happens to me, just know I didn't commit suicide. I mean that is stunning to me. So I know that we're hearing that the FBI is looking into it. I have full faith that the FBI is looking into it. But anytime you have a series of events like this, the American public is obviously very invested into this because it's concerning and it's a pattern. So I think the more clarity they can give, the better. I'm also taken back to when we had the drones over New Jersey, right? And it was like why can't we get answers on this? We're seeing them. Why can't we get answers? Turns out there was a simple explanation, but they withheld it for so long that people started to panic. More information is always better. I know investigations need to play out, but this story, now that the list is growing, is not going to go away. Congressman, I want to get your take on another real hot story story right now. The number of missing or dead scientists with ties to nuclear and space research continues to climb now hitting 13. We're also learning that the 2024 death of former Air Force intelligence officer and would be UFO whistleblower Matthew Sullivan could be tied to this growing mystery. Congressman, what can you tell us about Matthew Sullivan?
- [115:30]
A
Yeah, I first learned of Matthew Sullivan from David Grush. Whenever he was he began working with our committee, he had asked me to reach out or to write a letter to the FBI requesting an investigation into his suspicious death. And so we've been working on that. Whenever I spoke with the FBI in the last few months, I asked them directly, is there any investigation that you've begun in that they seem to indicate that they would not tell me at this time. And so but they would not confirm nor deny that there would that there was an ongoing investigation. But since then, you've had the missing General William Neil McCasland who went missing and all of these other scientists that have been somewhat associated. And that's caused a lot of attention to this topic. And now I'm thankful that now we are having that discussion about Matthew Sullivan because it's something that my office was trying to get some answers from the FBI almost a year ago. So full faith in the FBI. The FBI can't even find Savannah Guthrie's mom. And by the way, the FBI falls under the Department of Justice. That is in the hands of Donald Trump's former criminal lawyer, who's just basically doing stuff for Donald Trump and not releasing the Epstein files. The FBI and then the Secret Service, of course, falls under the Department of Homeland Security, which up until very recently was under the control of Kristi Noem. So it's not like these agencies are like super capable. So I'm not sure that having faith in what Cash Patel is going to solve this, find Savannah Guthrie's mom first. And by the way, just to go through some of these signs real quick, you had a guy to go. There were four who were missing in the Pasadena area in California. You had a guy named Frank miawald who was 61 years old. He's a lab researcher at NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab who died. He's not missing, he's dead. He died in June July 24th July 4th, 2024. His cause of death was not publicly disclosed as a guy named Michael Hicks, 59 year old, specialized in comets and asteroids, worked at NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab until 2022. He died July 30, 2023. Cause of death not publicly disclosed. Now his daughter says the father had struggled with known medical issues and she doesn't think his death was related to the other missing or dead scientists. You had a woman whose Name Monica Reza, 60 years old, a celebrated material scientist and director of the NASA Jet Propulsion Lab's Materials Processing group during the 90s. She had co invented a nickel based super alloy that was used in rocket engines. She is the final missing scientist from the NASA Jet Propulsion Lab. She went on a hike in the Angeles National Forest and never returned. In a letter to the FBI, the House Oversight Committee cited a report about linking her work to another scientist who disappeared in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Retired Air Force General William McCasland. You then have a guy named Carl Grillmare, 67 years old, renowned astrophysicist and astronomer at Caltech's Infrared Processing and Analytics Center. One of his notable discoveries includes discovering water on a distant planet. He was shot and killed on his doorstep in the small rural town of Llano, California, killed by a 29 year old named Freddie Snyder, who is not believed to have known that grill known grill mayor at all. And then you have four in New Mexico. Retired Air Force General William Neil McCaslin, 68, who lived in the Albuquerque foothills, who went up for a hike on February 27th of this year, carrying with him a.38 caliber revolver in a leather holster, his hiking boots and his wallet and never returned. His phone and glasses were left behind at his house. Then you have 53 year old Melissa Cassius. She's one of two missing scientists from Los Angeles from Los Alamos National Laboratory. She disappeared June 26, 2025 from her hometown in Ranchos Deos, which is approximately 65 miles from Santa Fe. She had dropped her husband off at the lab that morning where they both worked before returning home to work remotely after forgetting her employee badge. When her daughter returned home the same day, her mother's car phone and purse were home. But her mother was gone. Anthony Chavez, 79 years old, the second missing scientist who worked for the Los Angeles National Laboratory. He retired in 2017. He'd worked as a foreman supervising construction at the site. He's been missing since early May of Last year. According to detectives, no indications of foul play in connection with the disappearance appearance, but also no signs that he was planning to leave. His car was locked and parked in his driveway. His wallet, car keys and personal items were in his home. So it appears that he left home with the intention of not being gone for more than a few minutes. Carl Buckland described Chavez as his best friend wrote on Facebook last year, his disappearance is extremely unusual. You have Stephen Garcia, 48 years old, government contractor at Kansas City National Security Campus in Albuquerque. His work involved the production of non nuclear components for nuclear weapons. The site makes, quote, an array of national security products for the Department of Energy. He disappeared last this last August. Then you have, like General McCaslin, he left home with a handgun but without his keys or his phone. No known developments in the case. Then you got one in Alabama named Amy Eskridge, 34 years old, a celebrated MIT nuclear scientist and quote, genius anti gravity researcher. She died in June 2022, what was ruled a suicide from a self inflicted gunshot wound. But according to her friend Frank Milburn, Eskridge told him in a text message, quote, if you see any report that I killed myself, I most definitely did not. If you see any report that I overdosed myself, I most definitely did not. If you see any report that I killed anyone else, I most definitely did not. And Then the last two are in Massachusetts. Nuno F.G. lorero, 47 years old, a physicist, fusion scientist and MIT professor, fatally shot at his apartment in Brookline, Massachusetts. His killer was identified as Claudio Manuel Neves Valente, who was also found responsible for the Brown University Mass shooting. Remember that? Which took place two days prior. Both men attended the same university program in Portugal between 1995 and 2000. Valente was found dead in a New Hampshire storage facility on December 19, 2025. No motive was ever established. And Jason Thomas, 45 year old biologist for pharmaceutical company Novartis. Thomas had been missing for three months before he was found in Lake Quannapowit by local police. His wife says he'd been struggling to cope with the recent death of both of his parents. Both his parents died. Thomas was not mentioned by name in the lawmaker's letter to the FBI. When Republicans wrote to the FBI, but they did cite a, quote, pharmaceutical researcher. I will note that China is also apparently dealing with the disappearance of death or death of nine of its scientists, though we don't have really a lot of information about that. So what on earth is happening? I have no idea, but I just wanted you all to know that we are on this story. We're going to keep looking into it and just it is super weird that Cole Thomas Allen is also related to the NASA piece, but we don't know if it's related at all. No idea if it's related. It's just all super weird. All right, let's get to our moment of joy. Our moment of Joy comes from biscuitsandbath NYC on TikTok and it is hilarious. And we call it Dog says no. The dog said, I told you I didn't want to blow dry. I told you I just wanted a press and curl. The dog said, I just wanted to press and curl and you trying to give me a blow dry. And I said I didn't want you to blow my hair straight. I like my curls. I like my curls. Stop trying to blow my hair dry when I no. The dog said no. And the service, they just kept on blowing it. I said, don't want it. No, ma'. Am. The dog said, no, ma', am. Don't blow my hair out. Thank you all for watching. I want to remind you all one more time that if you want to go to our live show and you're in the New York area, it is going to be so much fun. June 11, 7:30pm City Winery, New York City. We're also going to do a meet and greet beforehand. That's like a plus up if you want to do a meet and greet and take selfies and such. But it is going to be actually a lot of fun. Use this QR code or go to live.the joy readshow.com do not fall for any of these okie dokes because you do have scammers. We already caught one of them that put up and they they're like the tickets are 300 something dollars and then you'll buy like a 300 ticket and all of a sudden you show up to City Winery and you don't have a ticket. Do not fall for that. Come right to us. Go to live.thejewelryshow.com or just go straight to the City Winery website. A lot of people have already done that y'. All and I promise you the tick get your tickets soon. Don't wait if you really want to go because those tickets are like going fast and we this is the first time we're announcing it but they announced it on their website and them tickets is going. So if you guys want to see, please tell God for he's a national treasure. I will do that. I will let him know Jenny, Jen, Pollock, I will let him know that you said he's a national treasure. And he is. He is a national treasure. And we're gonna have so much fun. We're gonna laugh, Kiki, talk about the news, talk about all the things, and we're gonna have some special guests and other special stuff. So I really hope that you guys will join us. And thanks again to all of you who voted on the glasses. And you can go to shopredbag.com if you're interested in getting those glasses for your mom for Mother's Day or for yourself. And we're going to keep you posted on these brand new readers that we're going to be doing in conjunction with the folks who made all this possible. So we're very excited about it. Thank you guys for tuning in. And we'll see you guys on the next the Joy Read Show. May the forest be with you. Getting back to the basics, grassroots level, let me dig a little deeper with the shovel Plenty can't tell the forest from the trees that I'm hard to detect Like a black hole in a dark injustice anywhere It's a threat to justice everywhere Let me make this clear I got a bone to pick and I'll never fear the threat of poverty they don't want to talk about it they rap the party so I'm a real talk about it for sure.