And, This Is Where MAGA Got Their Playbook With Congressman Jim Clyburn

Summary

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This is Gavin Newsom – "And This Is Where MAGA Got Their Playbook"

With Congressman Jim Clyburn
iHeartPodcasts | February 19, 2026

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Episode Overview

Governor Gavin Newsom sits down with Congressman Jim Clyburn for a wide-ranging conversation on American democracy, civil rights history, Black political power, and the current threats to voting rights. Recorded the day of Reverend Jesse Jackson’s death, the episode weaves together personal stories, reflections on iconic civil rights figures, and a clear-eyed discussion about the resurgence of anti-democratic forces. Clyburn highlights the urgent need to focus not just on preserving democracy, but also on ensuring dignity and accessibility for all Americans.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Remembering Jesse Jackson and the Civil Rights Generation

[03:21-07:10]

• Clyburn shares personal memories of Jesse Jackson, tracing their rivalry back to high school football and acknowledging Jackson’s exceptional athleticism and activism.
• Clyburn reflects on the recent loss of both Jesse Jackson and his wife Emily, drawing poignant parallels between struggles with illness in both families.
• The origins of Clyburn’s own activism: Meeting his wife during a sit-in jail protest in 1960 (“I married her 18 months later – all because of a half hamburger.” [05:41], James Clyburn).

2. Early Political Exposure and the Shifting Parties

[00:57-02:59]; [09:04-16:52]

• Growing up in a Republican household, Clyburn observed the shifting loyalties of Black voters and recounts how the Civil Rights Acts of the 1960s altered party demographics.
• Clyburn traces his leadership tendencies back to his youth — running the NAACP youth council at age 12, under the stern but nurturing guidance of his preacher father.
• He describes a formative experience meeting John Lewis and Martin Luther King Jr. at SNCC’s inception in 1960 and details generational debates over strategies for change.

“King was preaching nonviolence, and all of us were practicing nonviolence. But King was also preaching disobeying unjust laws and paying the price for it. And we thought he wasn’t demonstrating enough leadership in that category.” [12:26], James Clyburn

• The “infamous phone call”: Clyburn recounts how JFK’s decision to call Coretta Scott King during MLK’s 1960 imprisonment turned the tide of the election ([13:40-13:57]).

3. The Evolution of Black Political Power and Party Realignment

[14:12-16:52; 36:33-40:44]

• The podcast revisits the dramatic shift in Black voter allegiance from the Republican to the Democratic Party in the 1960s and emphasizes critical moments such as the passage of Civil Rights legislation.
• Clyburn highlights the importance of both democracy and dignity: “It’s one thing to talk about democracy, it’s something else to talk about dignity.” [15:29]
• Clyburn discusses meeting and learning from icons including John Lewis and Martin Luther King Jr. — and how these relationships shaped his worldview and congressional career.

4. Lessons from History: Reconstruction, Backlash & The Modern Threat

[36:33-42:48]

• In response to Newsom’s questions, Clyburn draws direct parallels between current events and the end of post-Civil War Reconstruction – emphasizing the fragility of political progress.
• Clyburn’s recent book was inspired by the erasure of Black Congressional predecessors after Reconstruction, and the ongoing “second Reconstruction” — warning that rights once gained can be lost again.

“The only way you can have a second Reconstruction is for the first one to come to an end. … The book is about saying to people, be careful of this.” [37:41], James Clyburn

• He describes how a single political deal in 1877—“the biggest double-cross in African American history”—ushered in nearly a century of Jim Crow.

5. The Fight Over Voting Rights and the Return of Jim Crow Tactics

[42:03-47:09]

• Newsom and Clyburn discuss contemporary voter suppression laws (e.g., voter ID requirements), making clear how these echo Jim Crow-era disenfranchisement.
• Clyburn critiques the selective nature of acceptable IDs (e.g., hunting licenses but not student IDs) as thinly veiled suppression.

“Why is it when they started talking about what forms of ID would be accepted—a hunting license would be accepted but your picture on a student activity card would not be accepted. Somebody explain that to me.” [43:31], James Clyburn

• Newsom highlights the logistical burdens for poor and elderly voters under new registration laws.

6. Economic and Political Empowerment: The Clyburn Doctrine

[29:46-35:49]

• Clyburn shares his long-time mantra: “Making America’s greatness accessible and affordable for all,” which has guided his legislative priorities—from broadband expansion to targeted poverty alleviation.
• His “10-20-30” strategy directs a minimum of 10% of certain federal funds to counties with 20%+ poverty for at least 30 years, emphasizing the broad, non-racial scope of his anti-poverty work.
• He notes, “2/3 of the counties that fall into this [persistent poverty] category are represented by Republicans, and they ain’t Black.” [33:23], James Clyburn

7. The Danger of Censored History & Assaults on Truth

[47:54-54:36]

• The conversation turns to the coordinated effort to censor Black history (e.g., Florida’s removal of Rosa Parks’ race from textbooks).
• Clyburn tells an anecdote about Thomas Edison and Lewis Latimer, emphasizing the importance of teaching full, honest history for both white and Black students.
• Newsom laments the palpable anger and frustration of watching these retrograde policies repeat themselves.

"We don’t have any problem putting things in the textbooks that make white students proud, but there’s a problem putting in things that make Black students proud.” [52:56], James Clyburn

8. The State of Black Voters & the Soul of the Democratic Party

[54:36-57:41]

• Newsom raises the surprising fact that Trump received significant Black voter support. Clyburn insists this is a Democratic failure—especially when “algorithms get more weight than lived experiences.”
• Clyburn offers this advice: focus on dignity, respect, affordability, and accessibility for all Americans.
• He expresses hope that with leaders like Hakeem Jeffries, the party will restore sensitivity and sensibility.

“We’ve got a job to preserve democracy, but I think we got to take it a little step further… making America’s greatness accessible and affordable for all.” [00:01, 57:41], James Clyburn

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On meeting his wife during a protest:
  “Emily walked toward me with this hamburger in her hands. I really didn’t know her at the time. I reached for the hamburger, she broke it in half, gave me a half hamburger. She ate the other half. I was so grateful for the half hamburger. I married her 18 months later.” [05:41], James Clyburn

• Civil Rights legacy and painful continuities:
  “History… anything that's happened before can happen again.” [37:41], James Clyburn

• On voter suppression tools:
  “A hunting license would be accepted, your picture on a student activity card will not be accepted. … I am against your telling me that the ID that I'm more apt to have in my possession will be no good.” [43:31], James Clyburn

• On why Democrats lost Black voters:
  “When the algorithms get more weight than lived experiences, you’re going to have a problem.” [55:00], James Clyburn

• On restoring democracy and dignity:
  “It’s one thing to argue for democracy, it’s something else again to argue for dignity.” [48:59], James Clyburn

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Timestamps for Major Segments

• 00:00 – Opening statement on preserving democracy and dignity
• 03:21 – Personal history with Jesse Jackson; sit-ins and meeting his wife
• 09:04 – Clyburn’s upbringing, early NAACP leadership, and the “age of responsibility”
• 12:26 – MLK, SNCC, the “oldsters vs. youngsters,” and JFK’s pivotal 1960 phone call
• 16:52 – On John Lewis, lived nonviolence, and Congressional friendship
• 29:46 – Congressional run, “making America’s greatness accessible and affordable for all”
• 32:08 – Explanation and impact of the “10-20-30” poverty strategy
• 36:33 – Black Congressional history, Reconstruction, and January 6th as a symmetry-break
• 42:03 – The threat of a "second Jim Crow," voter ID laws, SAVE Act
• 47:07 – South Carolina’s role and disgrace of gerrymandering
• 52:56 – Removal of Black history from textbooks, importance of honest curriculum
• 54:36 – Declining Black support for Democrats, strategies for moving forward
• 57:41 – Closing thoughts: “dignity, affordability, accessibility”

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Closing Thoughts

In a conversation marked by warmth, candor, and urgency, Congressman Clyburn threads his personal story through America’s battles for civil rights and democracy. He warns that progress is fragile and must be constantly defended—not just procedurally, but in the daily dignity accorded to every American. By reflecting on Reconstruction’s abrupt end and today’s voter suppression, Newsom and Clyburn articulate a vision of a more equitable nation, while sounding the alarm on familiar threats returning in modern guise.

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Transcript

[James Clyburn]

I believe we got a job to preserve democracy, but I think we got to take it a little step further. Majority of people in this country are saying the country is on the wrong track. So we've got to show them that we will put this country back on track, making America's greatness accessible and affordable for all.

[Podcast Host]

So I just sat down with Congressman Jim Clyburn on the same day that we learned of Jesse Jackson's passing. We talk about Jesse Jackson, John Lewis talk about the history of the civil rights struggle, but also the of history, the history of Reconstruction, and whether or not we are entering into phase two of Jim Crow. This is Gavin Newsom. And this is Congressman Jim Clagger.

[James Clyburn]

This is an iHeart podcast, guaranteed human Congressman.

[Podcast Host]

It's a pleasure to have you here, particularly here in Sacramento in Ronald Reagan's old mansion. Earl Warren's old magic.

[James Clyburn]

Yeah, well, Earl Warner is one of my favorites, as you can imagine, having been Governor of California. And the interesting thing, when I first started studying politics, I remember studying a little bit about Earl Warren and happened to have had both the Democrat and Republican nominations. That made it kind of interesting. And growing up in a household, my parents were Republicans. Yeah. Or members of the party of Lincoln. Yeah. And of course, I wonder where the college thinking maybe I was, too. And I was having to be on that campus in the 1960 election between Richard Nixon and Robert F. Kennedy. It's the first time I really got to understand how politics can be so different, even within the household. I'll always believe my mother voted for Kennedy and I will always believe my father voted for Nixon. This is 1960. A lot of people don't realize it, but 28% of the African American vote in 1960 went to Richard Nixon. And the big transition did not take place until 1964, when the Civil Rights act of 64 and then the Voting Rights act of 65, those things drove Strom Thurmond and others out of the Democratic Party, and they took over the Republican Party that had been basically African Americans. And so when people tell me about my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, Abraham Lincoln this and Abraham Lincoln that. He did so much for African Americans. Yeah. As the 16th president. But just remember, Rutherford B. Hayes was also a Republican, and it was he who initiated the biggest double cross in African American history when he brought an end to Reconstruction.

[Podcast Host]

Well, I want to talk about all of that and maybe reconstruct a little bit more about your history. And I love that little bit of history and the glimpse into your mom and dad you know, all that history was made in South Carolina where you were born. And it's interesting today, a little bit of history has been marked by the loss of. Of Jesse Jackson.

[James Clyburn]

Sure.

[Podcast Host]

Greenville, South Carolina.

[James Clyburn]

Jesse and I go back to high school. He was at Sterling High School in Greenville.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[James Clyburn]

I graduated from Mather Academy in Camden and we played against each other in football. I was nowhere near the football player that Jesse was. Jesse was exceptional athlete. A lot of people don't realize that. Great quarterback.

[Podcast Host]

He was a three letter. He was football, baseball, basketball as well. Right. So he played all the sports.

[James Clyburn]

Well, they went over the Collins on the football scholarship. Went up to Illinois at first, and then from there he went to North Carolina. A and T. And I often say, and we used to talk about this a lot, that we were rivals in high school and we were rivals in college because nothing on the A and T in South Carolina State where I went, we weren't particularly fond of each other when it came to sports. His mother was one of my biggest supporters. She really helped launch my political career. And so Jesse suffered a long time with the Parkinson's and other ancillary things. And you look at this and talking with Jonathan, I know how that is because I went through the same thing with my late wife.

[Podcast Host]

You were married 58 years.

[James Clyburn]

58 years we were married. And for 30 of those years she battled diabetes.

[Podcast Host]

I love the story, too. You guys met in jail.

[James Clyburn]

In jail, yeah.

[Podcast Host]

True story, huh?

[James Clyburn]

True story. True story. What were you both doing in jail March 15, 1960? Emily? We had this big march. You know, the sit ins started on February 1, 1960, up in Greensboro, North Carolina. And on February 15, those of us at South Carolina State and Claflin University attempted a sit in. But they had removed all the stools out of the sh Kress then. So we went back to the campus and we started organizing and we organized this big march that took place March 15, 1960. And of course we got arrested. Well, they filled up all the jails and the jails could not. They had no room for people. They started herding all the students back to the campuses. Well, they got into the cafeteria to bring us food. And I'm sitting there in jail waiting to get bailed out. We had all been gathered in one spot to be bailed out, but they were kind of lax with everything else. And so those students who had gotten into the cafeteria brought some food to us at the jail. And Emily walked toward me with this hamburger in her hands. I really didn't know her at the Time I reached for the hamburger, she broke it in half, gave me a half hamburger. She ate the other half. I was so grateful for the half hamburger. I married her 18 months later. 18 months later.

[Podcast Host]

How old were you at the time? How old were both of you?

[James Clyburn]

We got married. I was 20.

[Podcast Host]

20?

[James Clyburn]

Yeah. And she was 21.

[Podcast Host]

Okay, well that's respectful.

[James Clyburn]

Oh yeah, yeah. She always said she was a cougar.

[Podcast Host]

So it's interesting just going back. I mean the march is another minor. I mean so much of Jesse Jackson life is sort of, you know,

[James Clyburn]

the

[Podcast Host]

marches, the advocacy, you know, despite the runs for elected office, so much of his life and legacy is defined by what he did out of office office. You chose a very different path. You chose to develop strategies from within. Was that intentional? Is that by design or was it just by happenstance?

[James Clyburn]

Well, you know, even back when I was doing sit ins and stuff, for some strange reason, there was a little group, they were called, there was seven of us, four from South Carolina State, three from next door at Clapham. We were the so called Orangeburg seven. We worthy leaders. And when we would meet, especially at Rallis, they always ask me to do the invocation. And whenever it came time to negotiate with authorities, I was always asked to lead those negotiations. Even the president of South Carolina State, when things got real bad and he refused to meet with the students, he agreed to meet with me. And they blessed that meeting. And so I sat down with the president. So it just got to be the point where people just said, you are a negotiator, you do this. And so that's what happened. And so I just developed that mantra. And so when it came to running for office, I didn't spend a whole lot of time yelling and raising cane out. I tried to find a way to create an atmosphere that allowed me to do a deal when one was possible. And so I do the same thing today. I give speeches, I try not to call names I think is insulting. I don't want to be insulted, so I try not to insult others. I do try to make my point, but I try to do it in such a way that you will accept the fact that you need to think about what you just said or just did.

[Podcast Host]

You. We were talking right before we went on air a little bit about your dad. And we were talking about your time running the NAACP as a 12 year old. And I asked youth council, Youth council. But I mean the idea that anybody's in a leadership position at 12 years old, I gotta, I have a 12 year old. She's remarkable, but it's, you know, that's. That's a remarkable thing and of itself. But to me, what marked this, this question is how your father, who was a preacher.

[James Clyburn]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

Had certain expectations of a 12 year old. That was a time of life. And you had to develop a state of mind.

[James Clyburn]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

Of accountability, responsibility.

[James Clyburn]

Absolutely. Well, my dad used to preach as often from the Old Testament as he did from the New. And I developed favorite scriptures because my dad had two rules in our house. Well, had more than two, but two of the rules had to do with our studies. First one was every morning at breakfast, we had to recite a Bible verse and you couldn't say the same one twice. And every evening before retiring to bed, we had to share with him and my mother a current event. And we didn't have television, but the newspaper was delivered to our house every afternoon and we had to read that newspaper in order to really share current events. So I grew up doing that. And my dad had this thing about the age of responsibility, and that was 12. And that came from the story of Jesus assuming responsibility at the age of 12. I mean, that's what it was grounded in. So you grew up with that. And so here we are in the early 50s and things were beginning to happen. Segregation being challenged and activities that led up to the 1954 Supreme Court decision. We were involved in those things. And the people who started that in Clareland County, South Carolina, 23 miles away. Reverend J. Edel Lane was a good friend of my dad. And so we just grew up in this stuff. And by the time I went away to college, I graduated high school at the age of 16, and I get to college and all of a sudden things begin to happen on college campuses. So here I was, 19 years old. John Luce and I met as 19 year old college students. We were both in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating committee, commonly called SNCC. I met him and Martin Luther King Jr. On the same day, March of 1960. We met in October. We started SNCC in May of 1960 on Shaw University's campus in North Carolina. But the second meeting, the organizing meeting, took place on the campus of Morehouse College. Those events just changed my life. In fact, that meeting with King was over a disagreement between the oldsters and the youngsters.

[Podcast Host]

Define that. Oldsters versus the youngsters.

[James Clyburn]

Yeah. Well, King was preaching nonviolence, and all of us were practicing nonviolence. But King was also preaching disobeying unjust laws and paying the price for it. And we thought that he wasn't demonstrating enough leadership in that particular category. In fact, if you go back and check, a lot of people. I've laughed at the number of people who've checked this out. The big event that turned the 1960 presidential election. And I bet you've not heard this about it, because people, I don't think, really focus on this. In October of 1960, when we had that meeting, it was after that meeting on Morehouse, God's campus, that King went to jail the following week in Georgia. And it was while he was in Georgia. Now, remember what's going on in 1960. You got a big presidential election going on between John F. Kennedy. Yes. And Richard Nixon. And this was October 15th, three weeks before the election. That jail visit prompt a phone call.

[Podcast Host]

The phone call. That's right, the phone call. The infamous phone call.

[James Clyburn]

The infamous phone call from John F.

[Podcast Host]

Kennedy to Mrs. King, against all kinds of advice. Do not do it, sir. Do not do it.

[James Clyburn]

Absolutely. That changed that election.

[Podcast Host]

Do you really feel that? There's a lot of speculation, but to hear from you, that's really interesting.

[James Clyburn]

Absolutely. Change that election. Yeah. I tell people all the time going into that election, if you look at the polling, Richard Nixon was getting the majority of the black vote. Even afterwards, 28% of that vote still went to Richard Nixon.

[Podcast Host]

But it sent a message that Kennedy was willing to take a risk, do the right thing.

[James Clyburn]

And I'll always believe that in spite of what was done back in 1948, Harry Truman, what he did in 1948, when they integrated the armed services, when Franklin Roosevelt had refused to do so, it was. Truman was the first president to address the national convention of the naacp, those movements. On this part, it was Truman who introduced the first resolution to create civil rights committees to look at this stuff that started in 1948, but it all culminated with Lyndon Johnson's election of 1964. That's when Thurmond took his second exit from the Democratic Party. And that's when all of the shift began to take place. When the Democratic Party made the decision that you and many others have decided to amplify, that we are going to be the party of democracy and dignity. And so these two Ds are very important to people. It's one thing to talk about democracy is something else to talk about dignity. And what was going on in the 60s as it relates to the civil rights. What was going on with the Brown v. Board of Education was a search for dignity.

[Podcast Host]

I want to come back to that because I think it's powerful and it's. And we. And we don't talk about that enough. Democracy, we talk. We should be talking as much and more about. But dignity not enough. But I want to go back just at the time, because I. And forgive me, I want to also dignify your visit a little bit by trying to understand just. I love the, you know, meeting John Lewis, meeting Martin Luther King. You're contemporary of all these folks.

[James Clyburn]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

Jesse Jackson, all these folks. I mean, there's. So were they, you know, for someone like me, sitting back, I mean, we think of these people and obviously in appropriately reverential terms, as we do you. But as a living testament to that. But at the time, who were you? I mean, was it defined by. I mean, it was just situational. Did you have a sense of who you were with and becoming. Was there an expectation? I mean, was John Lewis. John Lewis then Martin Luther King? Martin Luther King then.

[James Clyburn]

No, no. I mean, we knew King was special. Yeah. There's no question about that. And we treated him that way. A lot of us knew that John Lewis was special. John Lewis internalized King's teachings. A lot of us practiced it. I was one of those who practiced nonviolence. I never lived nonviolence as John did. Even when we were serving together in Congress, John said to me one day, he said, you know, I never dreamed that we would be here in this place. He was sitting near the back of the chamber one day, the House chamber, when he talked about that. And it's kind of interesting, for some reason, John never had a really fine place to sit on the floor. I did and still do. People know where to find me on the floor. John was always among people, most often on the outside of the aisle. But there's nothing unusual for him to sit down with somebody on the other side of the aisle. And so John and I had this friendship that a lot of people in Congress did not really know about. And it's kind of interesting. Same age where he was a few months older. And we both married librarians. Lillian was a librarian, and Lillian and Emily became fast friends. And John and I talk often. In fact, I spoke with him just a few hours before he passed away. The night. Oh, the late afternoon that he was going to leave, go home. He knew he wasn't coming back. He called me to the back of the chamber one day. We sat that day. He said to me, I said, never forget this. He said, you know, I'm afraid that what is taking place here today is reminiscent of what happened to us with Burn Baby Byrne. Is the defund the police is going to do to our party what Burn Baby Byrne did to our movement. And in so many words, she said to me, we should not let that happen. And a lot of people ask when I made a public statement that defund the police was not in the best interest of our party. And a lot of people ask me, why did I do that? John asked me to, and he understood

[Podcast Host]

that just intuitively on the basis of that experience.

[James Clyburn]

Yes. What was.

[Podcast Host]

And may I ask, I can't help. I mean, it's private and I appreciate if you dismiss it. You've talked to him right before he passed. What was that conversation like?

[James Clyburn]

Well, it was more me talking to him because a rumor gotten out that John had passed away, and I just couldn't believe it. So I called my chief of staff and I said to him, I said, yep, I've gotten several calls and John had passed away. I said, have you heard anything from Michael? He's cheap. He says, no, that can't be true. I said, call Michael and check on the former. So he did, and he called me back. He said, no, I just talked to Michael. John has not passed away. Said something about, okay. He said, well, Michael wants you to call him. So I called Michael and I told him what I'd heard. I said, please tell John that I'm thinking about him, praying for him. He said, well, he's awake. Why don't you tell him? And that's what it was. So he put the phone next to his ear in the ceiling, and I could barely hear him, but I. I just told him how much I loved him. Yeah. And that I was thinking about praying for him and that was it. So it was me really talking to him.

[Podcast Host]

I love it. When was the last time you talked to Jesse Jackson?

[James Clyburn]

You know, Jesse called me, but Jesse a couple weeks ago, and I talked to Jonathan a whole lot about it. And Jesse's body guy is the son of one of my classmates from college. John was my classmate. John's son is just his body guy right now. Now, he called me last week and I tried to call him back and I did not get him, but I talked with Jonathan, and Jonathan spent a lot of time in South Carolina, and so we kind of just chatted about his dad. But, you know, you don't get too deep in those things.

[Podcast Host]

No.

[James Clyburn]

Right. Because everybody knows what's going to happen and you don't know exactly what to say.

[Podcast Host]

Your dad was proud that you got into politics.

[James Clyburn]

I think so. I know my mother was my mother was extremely proud. My dad was more reticent about politics than my mother, but he was conflicted when we got into sit ins. My dad was not too sure about those sit ins.

[Podcast Host]

Worried about your safety? Worried that it was going too far? Worried.

[James Clyburn]

Well, he is more old school. I think my dad would probably never say it, but I do believe that he had accepted the separation of the racist where my mother never did. And so I was always there. He never opposed anything I was doing. So we're supportive of what we were doing. But in the conversations, my two brothers and I knew that he wasn't all that excited about what we were doing. My mother was. She was one of the biggest fundraisers for the naacp. It was the biggest in our hometown and she became the first NAACP Woman of the year back when they started real serious fundraising. She was the woman of the year more because of how much money she was raising. It had nothing to do with being anything else.

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[Podcast Host]

before you were in politics, you were someone else. You were not only the NWSAP yourself in junior capacity at 12 years old, but then you went on, you were a teacher. And I love, by the way, I'm going to get to your book. I love that it begins with two of your students writing the Forward, which is wonderful on so many levels. But then you were also, you know, an activist of sorts in terms of just youth organizations, economic empowerment and the like. But you got into politics by the way of the governor working in the governor's office. Tell us a little bit about that.

[James Clyburn]

Well, I ran for office in 1970, ran for the state legislature and was declared the winner at around 10 o' clock in the evening. At this big celebration around 3:30 the next morning, I got this visit from a TV reporter who said you better get down to the courthouse. I just left the courthouse and something's going wrong with this account. My wife and I went down there and sure enough they told me rather than being a 500 vote winner, I was a 500 vote loser. Somebody adding up the votes forgot to carry a one okay, so that was a verdict. And so when I got in my office that day, I got this phone call from a reporter. Never shall forget Barbara Williams, willing to become the editor of the Towson Posting Courier. So Barbara asked me what happened and for the life of me, I cannot put it on anything but my background, what I was taught. And something Emily said to me earlier that year, when she asked me what happened, I said, it looks like I didn't get enough votes. And she said, oh, Clyburn, you know what everybody is saying, what do you think really happened? I said, I should have gotten some more votes. I didn't get enough. So the next morning, this is Wednesday after the election, Thursday morning, newspapers come out. I didn't get enough votes. In quotes. John Lewis had just gotten elected governor on that. I mean, John West. Yeah, John west had just gotten elected governor that day.

[Podcast Host]

So same ballot. Interesting.

[James Clyburn]

Yeah, yeah. And he was on his way to Kiowa, which back then was a hunting preserve. Nothing like what the date. And he was going out there to R and R with friends and he stopped in Charleston and picked up a newspaper and he saw that and called my house and I was at home. He told my wife, gave her his phone number, said, asked me to call him. So I called him and he said, can you meet me in Columbia Monday morning? This was Thursday and as I think I can. And when I met with him, he said to me, we will not leave our wounded on the battlefield. Come on, I want you to consider. Come workin for me.

[Podcast Host]

That's too good.

[James Clyburn]

And so I said to him, I said, well, Governor, I don't think so. I said, you know, I'm a little too much of the activist to be in your office. And he looked at me and said these words. He said, you know, if I were black with your talent, I'd be much more of the activist than you are. And it kind of shamed me. So I accepted the job and the rest is history.

[Podcast Host]

You were how old then?

[James Clyburn]

I was 30 years old.

[Podcast Host]

30 years old. And you were there for how many years in the governor's office?

[James Clyburn]

Oh, I was there for three years and about 10 months.

[Podcast Host]

Three years. 10 months. What happened? Three years and 11 months.

[James Clyburn]

He named me to run the state agency and that state agency? The state Human Affairs Commission. I became the commissioner of that and I was there for almost 18 years. I retired from state government, from that job to run for Congress. And of course it was that year that we had this big shift in the South. It was the year that John Lewis got Elected. We didn't have anybody elected from Florida. There was one from Georgia, no blacks elected from North Carolina.

[Podcast Host]

And this is in 1992. The election.

[James Clyburn]

1992. It was in that election and we all met in fact. Bennett Thompson, Bobby Scott from Virginia, Sanford Bishop from Georgia. We were all in that class. And there were five of us running in South Carolina. And I was told that I had no chance to win, that there were two state senators running all four of the candidates. Other candidates were elected officials and one of them would certainly win. Well, when the counting was over this time I had 56% of the vote by my lonesome and the other four shared 40, 44%.

[Podcast Host]

Do you remember the campaign? Do you remember the why? What was the motivation? What was the issue? What was it when people said why are you running for Congress?

[James Clyburn]

You remember? Well, I have always said in more ways than one, but I've got it all boiled down to one bumper sticker. Was really a billboard making America's greatness accessible and affordable for all. That's been the theme from the beginning. From the beginning. And my late wife insisted that every time I ran she wanted to see billboards. I don't care how many TV ads you do. I don't care how many radio ads you do. I want. She wanted to see a physical billboard. That's exactly right.

[Podcast Host]

Because she wanted what you to distill the essence of the wine.

[James Clyburn]

I asked her. She didn't. For some reason I don't think she felt that the political campaign should be. She's a librarian, remember? So all this newfangled stuff. She wanted people driving down the highway that misses making America's greatness accessible and affordable for all.

[Podcast Host]

And that was on the billboard.

[James Clyburn]

Yes, it's still on my billboards.

[Podcast Host]

But it's. I mean if. Even if it was a different reason. I mean, I love that, I mean that she wanted to see it, but it also forced you. Forced me to distill.

[James Clyburn]

That's exactly right.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[James Clyburn]

And that's almost everything. Everything is focused on that. Everybody says, you know, I'm on the Appropriations Committee, they say, and I am the ranking member on transportation and hud. And my whole thing is what can I do in this account to make transportation more accessible and affordable, to make housing more accessible than thought about it. In fact, if you look back and look at the so called broadband bill that became this big thing was 65

[Podcast Host]

billion or so I recall.

[James Clyburn]

65 billion, yeah. Now when I passed the House it was 95 billion.

[Podcast Host]

Okay.

[James Clyburn]

The Senate cut it to 65 billion. But the name of that bill is making broadband accessible and affordable. So I love it. I put it on everything I can. You know, I've got this other thing that a lot of people are enamored with that I call 10, 20, 30.

[Podcast Host]

Yep.

[James Clyburn]

And that is they say that we classify counters in this country based on what we call persistent poverty counters. And about 500, anywhere between 460 and 500 counters. Every time the census come out, they classify these counters as persistent poverty counters. And so I've always maintained, and I've got it in 17 appropriations accounts, something I call 10, 20, 30, and that is a county is considered to be in persistent poverty when 20% or more of the population are stuck between the poverty level for 30 years. And so I said we ought to direct or target at least 10% of all the money in this account into those counties. So 10% of the money should go over 20% of the model population. They've been stuck for 30 years. So in the poverty level for 30 years. So that's what I do with all this stuff, trying to do things in such a way. And I'll tell you something else, people say, oh, is that you only focus on Black people. Well, 20% of the mother population. And I say the black population. And if you look at that, 2/3 of the counties that fall into this category are represented by Republicans, and they ain't black. In Kentucky, for instance, they're going to be white. Throughout the Appalachia, if you're in Alaska, there could be Native Americans. If you're in New Mexico, there could

[Podcast Host]

be Hispanic, you're in California.

[James Clyburn]

I mean.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, white and Hispanic.

[James Clyburn]

Absolutely. Yep, absolutely. So this is about targeting resources into communities of need. And I emphasize all of that. The fact that you picking up only a third of them happen to be African American. So what? That one third will not get attention if we didn't do it. There you go. So why do I care about 2/3 so long as we pick up the communities of need? So there's nothing about that that's racial. It's all about using the resources we have in this country so that everybody think about this. When the FCC used to classify broadband coverage, they did it by census tracts. And if one residence in a community had broadband, the entire census tract would be considered as covered. Now, the reason I was so insulted by that, my daughter was on the fcc, so she's the one that first schooled me to this because I didn't know about this. She thought it was a real insult. And her Thing was, Daddy, we down there living where all these plantations were. I mean, the big house gets connected. All the little houses around it ain't got no connection. But according to the fcc, that entire census tract is connected. So that's the kind of stuff. We've had these kinds of things going on in government for a long time. And so that's why we need to focus people's attention on what this means. So why would you ignore the census tract? It's covered. We're Uncle Payton know why it's covered? Because the big house got coverage.

[Podcast Host]

Well, that leads me focusing a little bit more on this book, which, by the way, I loved and is what a history lesson and what a reminder. But history, that lens, not only your personal biography, a little bit memoir in history. And you bring it to light, particularly in the epilogue about where we are today, and connects a little bit of that dot, but also through South Carolina and just reconstruction, little, you know, little bit earlier than some had maybe believed. But I want to just make a deeper point, and that is many people believe, and you write about this in your book, that you were the first black representative when you were elected in 92 and sworn in 1993. That was not the case. And in so many ways, it inspired you writing this book.

[James Clyburn]

That's what made me start the writing of the book. But when I got halfway through it, thought I was halfway. 2020 election came about the reaction to that election and the phone call down to Georgia, find me 11,780 votes. I saw what was going on. I saw that the attempt was being made to treat the 2020 election the way the 1876 election was treated. And it was that 1876 election and the aftermath that led to the end of the careers of these eight African Americans, as well as all other African Americans throughout the south. And led to the fact that. That there are 95 years between number eight and yours truly, number nine. And then what I emphasize in this book and what I wish people would get from this book is the importance of respecting history. Because you must know that anything that's happened before can happen again. How many times have we heard people refer to the student movement of the 1960s as being the second reconstruction? The only way you can have a second Reconstruction is for the first one to come to an end. And so the first Reconstruction come to an end. Why not the second Reconstruction come to an end? And that's what I think is underway. And so the book is about saying to people, be careful of this. And then remember, there was no big wave over the country that led to the ending of Reconstruction. Reconstruction came to an end by a vote of 8 to 7. One vote brought an end to Reconstruction. Jim Crow became the law of the land by an electoral college vote of 185 to 185. The difference was one vote. Samuel Tilton had 184. Ruther B. Hayes had 185. Why did that happen? Because when the voting was over And Tilden had 184, he needed 185. Rutherford Hayes had 165. And there were 20 disputed votes sitting in three states. Florida, Louisiana and South Carolina. And when the House of Representatives couldn't figure out what to do, they appointed a 15 member commission to study the issue, meet with the candidates and make a recommendation that 15 member commission voted 8 to 7 to give those 20 votes to Hayes. Why? Because Hayes told them, give me these votes, I'll bring an end to reconstruction. That's what you want in Florida, that's what you want in Louisiana. That's what you want in South Carolina. They gave him the twin votes. He brought an end to reconstruction. One month after he was sworn in, he removed all the troops from the south and allowed Jim Crow to become the law of the land. And that lasted for nearly 100 years.

[Podcast Host]

You write about, it's interesting, you write briefly about what you just said that you were in the process, I think, in the introduction where you talk about him two years into this book and all of a sudden you're reflecting on January 6th as well, and your own personal experience relation to that, not just what happened down with the Secretary of State in Georgia. You reflect as you were getting sworn in, or not just sworn in, but as you spent your time in the Capitol, that there was no reference to Rainey, the first African American. There's nothing you can find. So you started, you know, to apply even before you write the book. Years and years ago, you said a lot of respect.

[James Clyburn]

Absolutely.

[Podcast Host]

You started put there, especially when you became majority leader. You had a little bit more power in that respect. You said, let's, let's start to celebrate these folks.

[James Clyburn]

Yeah, yeah. I introduced a resolution to put a portrait of Rainey in the Capitol building. We were successful in doing that. And then on his 150th, on 150th anniversary of him having been sworn in, he was sworn into the House of Representatives on December 12, 1870. And so on the 150th year, we put up another resolution to have a room in The Capitol name in his honor. Nice. And so on the first floor, the capital, room 150 is the name for Joseph Rennick. So, you know, I spent a lot of time with trying to make history, I think rhymes on its own, but sometimes I try to strike up a tune to help it, help the rhythm a little bit. That's one of the things I've done.

[Podcast Host]

But you said something and I hope everybody picked up on it. I'm gonna amplify it a little bit more. This, you know, when reconstruction ended and you can argue the sort of traditional prism 1865, what to 1877. And then the establishment of these Jim Crow laws and you know, poll taxes and I mean the voter registration issues, not just ID issues. And we can get to that a little bit.

[James Clyburn]

Absolutely.

[Podcast Host]

Save act. And it goes to this point you made and the question I want to offer. You talked about the second reconstruction potentially coming to an end. And I mean, do you feel like we're in that moment today in vivid terms? I mean, you talk about the red shirts becoming the red hats. You talk about, you know, redeemer Democrats. You talk a lot about contours of today, rewriting history, censoring historical facts. You reference crt, dei, I'll add esg and you know, all the anti woke, which seems to me pretty much anti black. So one thing it has in common, so much of that rhetoric. I mean, do you. How. How concerned are you?

[James Clyburn]

Very much so.

[Podcast Host]

The moment we're in.

[James Clyburn]

Absolutely.

[Podcast Host]

Do you think it's hyperbolic? Do you think we're overstating or do you feel like this.

[James Clyburn]

No way.

[Podcast Host]

God bless.

[James Clyburn]

It's not hyperbolic to say it. We are in throes of turning the clock back. And you mentioned voter registration and voter id and we've seen the houses pass a law on void id. I want somebody to explain to me, why is it when these states to put the stuff in, why is it when they started talking about what forms of ID would be accepted?

[Podcast Host]

Yep.

[James Clyburn]

And a hunting license.

[Podcast Host]

Thank you.

[James Clyburn]

Would be accepted. Your picture on the hunting license will be accepted as id, but your picture on a student activity card will not be accepted. Correct. Somebody explain that to me. And so when you tell me about voter ID and I say to people all the time, they try to twist us around. I have never voted when I did not ID myself, because the moment I present my registration card, as I always do when I vote, that is my id. So now you're saying that's not good enough. It's been good enough for all These years, but not good enough now. And so when you come out with all of these forms of ID is where the problem is. And so I'm telling people all the time, don't tell me because I object to this law that they're trying to pass, that I'm against ID. I am not against IDing yourself to vote. I am against your telling me that the ID that I'm more apt to have in my possession will be no good. But the ID that someone else had, like a hunting license. And you compare the number of black people with hunting license as opposed to white people with hunting license. How many black people. But these things that white people possess, who travel, who use various IDs for travel. Okay, these things, we just have to just call them out. So, no, that's not what this is. Let's talk about what ID you would have that you don't have to pay for. Don't put a poll tax on this. Don't say to this senior citizen who's having a job making ends meet that we're going to charge you another $150 to get an ID to vote. That's a poll tax, it seems to me. So that's the kind of thing that we're talking about. And that happens over and over again. And there are other forms of ID that we've seen discussed and nobody wants to talk about it.

[Podcast Host]

And of course, we're not talking about the other aspects of the SAVE act that go well beyond id. And it goes to the. I mean, which is also part of Jim Crow, the history. And that is when it comes to registration, you got to find your birth certificate if you know where yours is. I have no clue where mine is. Or you have to. Passport. And two thirds African Americans don't even have passports.

[James Clyburn]

Passport. I was blocking on just that. But not only that. How many people go out, get married.

[Podcast Host]

Yes.

[James Clyburn]

And then square their married name with their birth certificate.

[Podcast Host]

And that would be thrown out under that law.

[James Clyburn]

Under that law, yeah.

[Podcast Host]

So that's what just passed. The House of Representatives now needs to get the 60 in the Senate. So I like what Schumer said, Dead on arrival.

[James Clyburn]

Absolutely.

[Podcast Host]

But what's not dead is we are. We have arrived at a moment in time when there's so much other vandalism that's going on that's so reminiscent of what happened after Reconstruction as it relates to Voting Rights Acts, civil Rights Acts, issues related to trying to turn back the clock on mid districting, mid decade redistricting, rigging the gerrymander which is again, you in your book as well.

[James Clyburn]

And I'll ask people to remember at the time, most of what this book is about. In South Carolina, over 60% of the population was African American.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, it's remarkable, isn't it?

[James Clyburn]

Absolutely.

[Podcast Host]

6, 0.

[James Clyburn]

And I don't mean just after. And the same thing when it came to registered voters. How is it then that you have seven congresspeople and only one. That's what it is now. But at the end of this period of time, there were seven African American, seven congresspeople in South Carolina, only one district. They call it the shoestring district because it was drawn in such a way that all the black people were in that one district and the other six were white. And that's what it is today.

[Podcast Host]

I was telling my staff after reading this book, a lot of the history I vaguely remember, but you were able to connect dots and tell your own personal history to this and really distill the essence of how South Carolina played such an outside role in all this. And I said I preferred not to read it. And they said, why? I said, my blood is boiling even hotter than it was six hours ago. To know ignorance allows me to get through the day, sleep at night. I mean, but, but I mean that, you know, I feel like, you know, my own complicity this moment, and we're not doing enough, that we're not calling this out. How in the hell is this happening at the kind of scale, I mean, when I, we talk about rewriting history and sensing historical facts, it's quite literally happening. Institutions across this country, institutions of higher learning. What's happening with DEI and the assault with the, the just rank racism. Yeah, that's coming from the fee, the social media feed of, of the president United States just recently, what he did to the Obamas, I disgrace, you know, I, I, but tell me why I shouldn't be more outraged.

[James Clyburn]

No, I think you've demonstrated time and time again that you are outraged. Not enough that you can't let it go. I know a lot of people say, remember, it's one thing to auger for democracy is something else again to augur for dignity. I think you have to look at what is happening today and saying, where is the dignity in this, Obama's depiction? Where's the dignity in that? That kind of thing can operate within democracy because you've got freedom of expression and all of that. And you can stretch this. And if you remember the president, even at the time he did it, he talked about that freedom, that being a First Amendment freedom And it may be, but where is the dignity? And so I think that it's one thing to have democracy, is something else to have dignity. And I think that the dignity and respect that we need to have within this democracy is something we need to talk about more. And so I say to my democratic friends, I believe we got a job to preserve democracy, but I think we got to take it a little step further. And that is to talk about the dignity and respect that must exist within this democracy that we hold near and dear. And I see what is happening time and time again today is the lowering of the dignity standards that used to be important to this country and needs to come back. You know, I've been saying this all over. I don't know if I said it to the students earlier today, but I was down in Atlanta on Sunday and met with a lot of college students. And I said to them, you know, when I was a student, I learned in my history classes that Thomas Edison was the greatest American inventor of all time in large measure because he invented the light bulb. However, what I did not get in my history books was the fact that Thomas Edison couldn't get that light bulb to work until he got Lewis Latimer's filament put in that light bulb. Lewis Latimer came up with the filament. The son of former slaves who discovered the filament. And it's when Thomas Edelston had enough maturity to step outside of his comfort zone and sit down with this black guy, Lewis Latimer, that's what made his light bulb work. And I can. Why is it an insult for a student, black or white, to learn that? So why is that not in our textbooks? So I think that what we have to do is call people out on this because I'm amazed at the number of people. And I walked through other things. I was talking to somebody and I forgot what came up. And I said, yeah, we were able to do that. They were talking about soldiers in Belfield because Charles Drew discovered the way to refrigerate blood and seal. Well, this person had never heard of Charles Drew, but they knew about blood transfusions. And so we don't have any problems putting things in the textbooks that make white students proud. But there's a problem. They're putting stuff in textbooks that would make black students proud.

[Podcast Host]

Congressman, you remember it was just a few years ago that there was a social studies book in Florida that they rewrote under the Anti Woke act and they removed Rosa Parks race.

[James Clyburn]

Absolutely.

[Podcast Host]

Because it was, quote, unquote Too insensitive.

[James Clyburn]

That's exactly right. That happened. Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

That's happened only because of the blowback and the outrage.

[James Clyburn]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

That major national publisher that was threatened by other states. Did they back off?

[James Clyburn]

It is kind of interesting. You bring up Florida. Frederica Wilson, Congresswoman from Florida. I was on a zoom or virtual meeting with her the other day, and she brought up the fact. The same thing you just brought up. And she mentioned there's only two states in the union that made study black history mandatory in our schools, and South Carolina is one of them. And I never really thought about it. And I remember how that happened. It was to settle a lawsuit. And I happened to be on the committee that was appointed by Dick Riley to come up with some ways that he could go to the courts and get the lawsuit settle. I was on that committee and happened to be one of the people that. That's one of the things we put in that settlement. They put black history in our schools. And she says there's one. Only two states that's got that. I got to check on that. I don't know if that's true or not, but that's what she said. This was just a week or so ago.

[Podcast Host]

Well, we don't have much more time, and I. I regret if we didn't just quickly jump into. Yeah, you mentioned the 28% black support that Nixon received. Donald Trump wasn't that far behind, right?

[James Clyburn]

No, he was not.

[Podcast Host]

What the hell happened? Is that on us? Yes, that's on us Democrats.

[James Clyburn]

Yes.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[James Clyburn]

Remember, there was one question that Trump asked in his first campaign, and he was talking to black folks when they did. What do you have to lose now? A lot of people had trouble answering that question. I have never had trouble answering that question. And I think that we've seen enough today to know exactly what you've had to lose. And so what we've got to do is. And that's why I keep harping on dignity and respect, because he got a big portion of the African American vote, mostly African American men, simply because of that little word of dignity, maybe those two words and respect. And when you run a campaign and no matter what people of color say, you tell me you know more about this, because your algorithms or whatever you're using, rather than the lived experiences, when the algorithms get more weight than lived experiences, you're going to have a problem. And I think that that's what has happened in all too many instances. It's getting much better. I think that we've now begun to see Especially after the last election in. I think we won't be making that mistake again.

[Podcast Host]

What advice going forward? I mean, we're going to be successful this November. What does a Hakeem Jeffries mean to you? I mean, it'd be historic.

[James Clyburn]

It would be historic because I think what it would mean is that sensitivity and sensibilities will be brought back into the process. Not so much because it is Hakeem Jeffries, but because it is a party that he represents that offers to this country affordability and accessibility and offers to this country dignity and respect, and will define for the country exactly what you've got to lose if you do not change the direction we're going in. Majority of people in this country are saying the country is on the wrong track. So we've got to show them that we will put this country back on track. The right track.

[Podcast Host]

Well, that's a great way to end. Dignity, affordability, accessibility.

[James Clyburn]

Absolutely.

[Podcast Host]

In the spirit of Isaiah, be repairers of the breach.

[James Clyburn]

Repairs of the breach.

[Podcast Host]

Congressman, it's great to have you here.

[James Clyburn]

Thank you so much for having me.

[Podcast Host]

This is an iHeart podcast.

[James Clyburn]

Guaranteed Human.