Did you watch the conventions? Did you read the policy booklets? Well, we did and want to share with you our insights with Kenny Burns. Hosted by Alphonso David and Ebony McMorris.
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00:00Good evening, everyone.
00:01Thank you so much for joining us tonight.
00:04My name is Alphonso David.
00:06I am the president and the CEO
00:08of the Global Black Economic Forum,
00:11and I'm also a civil rights lawyer.
00:13Hello, everyone.
00:14I am Ebony McMorris,
00:15a White House correspondent
00:17for American Urban Radio Networks.
00:19We are so pleased to be here tonight.
00:22I'm happy to be able to co-host this amazing town hall,
00:26Paint the Poles Black.
00:29So folks, a few weeks ago,
00:31we launched Paint the Poles Black,
00:33which is a voter awareness, registration,
00:36and mobilization initiative.
00:38It's supported by the Sundial Group of Companies,
00:41which includes Essence,
00:42the Global Black Economic Forum,
00:44Girls United, Afropunk, Refinery29,
00:48BeautyCon, and the New Voices Foundation.
00:52And again, the focus here is to educate,
00:54mobilize, and register voters to take action
00:57this November and into the future.
01:00We hosted our first town hall in the beginning of August
01:03with Congresswomen Jasmine Crockett and Chantel Brown,
01:07Bakari Sellers, Van Lathan, Lene Vanee,
01:11and kicking us off last time was the one and only Dee Nice.
01:15And tonight we're hosting our second town hall
01:18where we will be dissecting some of the key policy issues
01:21and discussing how they affect you, the voter.
01:25We had a good time the first go around
01:27and we're gonna do it again.
01:28I'm so excited about today.
01:30Look, there are many issues that I am sure
01:33you have all heard about from immigration to housing,
01:36from economy to education, from democracy to public safety.
01:41We can't address all of them.
01:42However, tonight we are going to tackle
01:45three of the most important issues,
01:47the economy, healthcare, and public safety.
01:50Now, this campaign is tailored to provide information,
01:56address misinformation, and register voters
01:59for one of the most important consequential elections
02:04of our lifetime.
02:05We will be joined by a few special guests
02:08and we'll be answering your questions.
02:11We wanna hear from you.
02:12So we got a few housekeeping rules.
02:14First, this is a nonpartisan call
02:17focused on voter registration and mobilization.
02:21Further, it's not a fundraising call.
02:23There are other events focused on that.
02:26We'll be answering your questions.
02:29So please put your questions in the chat
02:32and we'll try to answer as many as we can
02:35by the end, before the end of the town hall.
02:38Also, please see the link for voter registration.
02:42One of our main goals here is to make sure
02:44that we are all registered to vote.
02:47If you have not registered to vote, please do.
02:49You can go to hashtag paint the polls black.
02:52You can go to our website to get that information
02:55and register to vote.
02:56And then finally sit back and relax
02:59and enjoy this town hall.
03:00And it is my pleasure to welcome our very first guests
03:04for this town hall, Mr. Kenny Burns,
03:07who is a multimedia entertainer and investor and a producer.
03:12Kenny, thank you so much for joining us.
03:15It is my pleasure to be with you, Alfonso and Ebony.
03:18How are you guys doing?
03:20We're doing good.
03:21I'm doing good.
03:22I'm trying to figure out what is on your mind.
03:24Look, I'm just getting to it.
03:27I'm gonna talk about the debate.
03:29What are your thoughts on what we saw during the debate?
03:34During the debate, I saw a good old fashioned
03:37grandma butt whooping.
03:39It was get in the closet and stay there.
03:44I didn't really appreciate the after effects of the debate.
03:50The debate was exactly what I thought it would be.
03:52You have a highly educated person
03:54talking to a non-educated person.
03:57You have a lawyer by heart and trade talking to a criminal.
04:01And in that exchange, you saw all the uncomfortableness
04:06as if he was on the stand.
04:07I mean, as soon as she went to the size of his audience,
04:14the size of his audience, it just went all the way left.
04:17He was unhinged.
04:18And I honestly was so happy to see that.
04:23The problem is, is post the debate,
04:26you literally see the audacity of news outlets
04:30as well as the talking head saying that he won the debate.
04:35And now there's this farce of a,
04:38oh, I didn't curse.
04:38Did you like that?
04:39I said farce.
04:40It is a farce of a statement saying that,
04:43you know, heavyweight fighters don't fight again
04:46when they win the title.
04:47I mean, who is believing this?
04:49And the problem is,
04:51is that no matter whether you're Republican or Democrat,
04:53every cycle, the margin of victory seems to be this big.
04:58So it's just a wild moment.
05:00And it's actually heartbreaking
05:01when you think about our democracy
05:05longer being what we've grown up to know it to be.
05:08Kenny, I wanna ask you a question
05:10that I think many people,
05:11and specifically Black people,
05:13have been just sort of shocked about.
05:16And that's the dogs and the cats.
05:18Oh man.
05:20Let's talk about that.
05:21Yeah, that was dog whistle for, you know,
05:25you know, not just cannibals, obviously, but animals.
05:28And I think that, you know,
05:29when you think about the way they look at us,
05:32I have this conversation all the time on my podcast,
05:35The Kenny Burns Show,
05:36that, you know, it's not even a thing
05:38of the backdoor conversations anymore.
05:41It's not what they think about you behind your back.
05:43They're telling you.
05:44Just the other day,
05:45he had a Klansman at a, you know,
05:49stop sign where people were holding up Trump signs.
05:52And it's like, you feel that comfortable, you know,
05:55being outside in a Ku Klux Klan outfit in 2024.
05:59He's evoking an emotion across America
06:02that's very disturbing.
06:04And the sad part is,
06:06is that as much as it is about race,
06:09it's class that is taking over the directive
06:13of all of these dog whistles being blown,
06:16all of these narratives being pushed into the algorithms,
06:19and quite frankly, you know,
06:21messing with our children's minds.
06:23They don't know what to believe.
06:24They're seeing all types of memes.
06:26I mean, to think that a Jamaican is not black
06:29is the most outrageous thing I've ever heard in my life.
06:32But then to double down on things
06:34and for kids to actually, you know,
06:37repeat these things is really disturbing.
06:41Go ahead, Eminy.
06:43Kenny, you mentioned the Klansman.
06:45I couldn't figure out why there was a black man
06:47standing beside the man with the Klan,
06:50but I digress, right.
06:53What do you believe when we talk about this, right?
06:55What are some of the key issues then
06:57at stake at this election?
06:59And how should voters begin to prioritize them
07:02when they cast their ballots?
07:04Yeah, you know, that's a loaded question.
07:06On many levels and many answers to it.
07:10Well, first of all, our democracy is on the table.
07:14You know, laws, you know,
07:17I truly believe that he meant what he said
07:20when he said, if you vote this one time,
07:22my good Christians, you won't have to vote again.
07:24I think we should hear him loud and clear.
07:27He was in that debate,
07:28completely lying about his participation
07:31when I watched the TV and heard him say,
07:34go down there and fight like hell.
07:36Because if you don't fight like hell,
07:37we gonna lose everything we know to be true
07:41I mean, he didn't say the white part,
07:42but that's what he meant.
07:43And I think that at the end of the day,
07:45it's like, what type of like country would we have
07:51with this type of ideology, you know, in office?
07:54And when I go to the gym the next day,
07:57you know, white, black, indifferent,
07:59they're all unbelievably disturbed
08:02by the cat and the dog comments.
08:04It's like, would you really say that in a debate?
08:06Cause one of my white friends was telling his brother,
08:09who's a staunch Trump supporter.
08:11And this is how slim the margins are
08:14in households and families.
08:15You got one that's totally embarrassed.
08:18You got another one who's standing by
08:19and he's just dismissing it.
08:20He said, he called him and said,
08:21yeah, I'm putting some cats and dogs on the grill.
08:24Are you coming over tonight?
08:24Cause he knows he's a Trump.
08:26He's like, I didn't even watch it.
08:27Trump's gonna beat her, dah, dah, dah.
08:29But that's the mentality.
08:30The mentality is like, I don't care what he says.
08:33I don't care what he does.
08:35But that lets you know, ladies and gentlemen,
08:37that there is a racial divide,
08:40that there is a class divide.
08:42And we have to be aware of it.
08:43And the thing that I think we could do
08:45outside of going to the ballot box
08:48and winning this election,
08:49because if we all go to the ballot box,
08:51there's no way that there will be a small margin
08:54of victory, is to call people out.
08:56There's a respective way to make people feel so uncomfortable
08:59that they're embarrassed to do it.
09:00I know for a fact, Donald Trump going to the spin room
09:04immediately after that debate,
09:06he was grasping for straws.
09:09His underwear were on fire.
09:11And then you have somebody like J.D. Vance.
09:13J.D. Vance is literally, I wanna say a lot of things,
09:18this is not my platform, but he is literally,
09:21he's about the crowd size too.
09:23He's about the attention.
09:24He's about all the things he doesn't get in real life.
09:28And ladies and gentlemen, you have to pay attention
09:30to the people that build their worlds
09:31around their inconsistencies.
09:34Facebook, when you look at Elon Musk
09:36and what he's doing with X,
09:37these are things that these insecure men have always done.
09:43But guess what we have to do?
09:45Vote, that's how we beat them.
09:48As we talk about voting, one of the issues
09:50that we're hearing a lot about in this election,
09:53and we've heard about it for years, right?
09:56Every election cycle, black men, where are black men?
10:00Where are they gonna vote?
10:01Are they gonna vote?
10:03Talk to us a little bit about your perspective
10:06on how can black men play a pivotal role in this election?
10:11And from your perspective, what specific issues
10:14are you hearing from black men that we should be focused on
10:18to ensure that our voices are heard?
10:21I'm glad you brought that up, Alphonso,
10:23because when I got back from the premiere of Fight Night,
10:27the Million Dollar Heist, now Peacock,
10:28the number one show that I'm executive producing,
10:30we had a premiere last week in New York,
10:33and I came back on Friday to do a fight for our democracy.
10:37That's right, right?
10:38It was a fight for our democracy.
10:40Kasim Reed, Ari and Simone, I'm sorry,
10:45co-founder of the Fearless Fund,
10:46who just got their case dismissed,
10:48so big shout to them and all the amazing work they're doing
10:51for women-led founders, and Dottavio, Dottavio from Revolt.
10:57And we did a panel, and everybody was talking
11:00about what needs to happen and what needs to be done.
11:02And I was like, well, I think black men are as key
11:07to this election as white women.
11:09And I say that because I had posted from the DMC,
11:13her nieces had said how to correctly pronounce her name.
11:16And so I have fun on my platform, and I said,
11:19hey, comma, la, if the babies can say it, you can say it.
11:23Let's say it together, comma, la.
11:26And it was going through this whole thing.
11:27And the Russian bots attacked my Instagram feed
11:33like I had never saw it.
11:34But then I started seeing NBA basketball player.
11:37I'm like, wait, he said something twice.
11:39And the one NBA player said,
11:40well, why should we say her name correctly?
11:44And she hasn't done anything for us.
11:45I said, well, do you love your mom?
11:47I said, it's a respect thing that you're taught, right?
11:50But then a lot of black women just don't like women
11:53for whatever reason.
11:54I don't know if it's because
11:56they have always saved us from ourselves
11:59or always have pushed us to the point of execution
12:03when we couldn't get to the finish line.
12:05I don't know what you don't love about black women.
12:08I know they saved me.
12:09So I just, I get so confused about the hate speech.
12:13And then I get confused with the lack of consistency
12:17for us showing up for our black women.
12:19I mean, when you have, again, rhetoric coming
12:22from all over the place,
12:23but mind you, we know, I'm sorry,
12:25a lot of people don't know,
12:26but intelligent people know that a lot of the stuff
12:27you just can't think is real, right?
12:30But then the people that are ignorant,
12:32that have no clue, don't read, don't want the information,
12:35they are stuck with those memes.
12:38And so I just want to encourage my black men,
12:39one, to have men our age, Alphonso,
12:43to talk to younger black men and say, look,
12:45you know, the one thing 19 Keys,
12:47a friend of mine has said, he had said,
12:50you know, Kenny, you show up for us.
12:52You talk to us, even though you give us that OG
12:55and tell us how we need to be moving and mobilizing,
12:58you still let us talk to you.
13:01And I feel like disconnect between black men and Kamala
13:05talking to all of my mentees is that
13:07they don't feel she talks to them.
13:09I said, well, you know what?
13:11I can't believe that because I follow the news.
13:14I read newspapers.
13:16I see the foreign, you know,
13:18dignitary stuff that she does on our behalf as a country.
13:21I know her being an alumni from Howard University.
13:24I'm not in her age bracket,
13:25but my wife graduated from Howard University.
13:28H-U, you know, but I think it's the whole thing of like,
13:32if you knew something about someone,
13:34if you saw the journey from attorney to attorney general,
13:37to senator, to, you know, vice president,
13:39you could respect the resume just as a human.
13:43Let's talk human, right?
13:44If you go through the resume of the, you know,
13:46the competitor on the other side,
13:49it's a whole farce of racism, classism, you know,
13:54bankruptcies and all types of things
13:56you would never want to be involved with as a human.
13:58But then you look at the other side and have,
14:00you have this much service for the majority of your life
14:03and you can't give the benefit
14:04to someone of saying their name correctly.
14:06So I think we have a lot of work to do with understanding
14:08what this really is, how we should approach it,
14:12and more importantly, how, you know,
14:14we can feel good about showing up for this woman
14:16that deserves to be president of the United States.
14:19I love like everything that you said,
14:22especially the respect part.
14:24I do want to remind people, look, if you've got questions,
14:26go ahead and put them in the chat.
14:28Kenny, I want to ask you this,
14:31because when we're talking about like,
14:32there was a lot of folk, DNC, it was a lot of love,
14:35you know, we got conferences going on,
14:37CBC going on right now,
14:39but for those who aren't attending that,
14:41for the everyday person that's on the street,
14:42that's trying to work, that's got two and three jobs,
14:44do you think sometimes that,
14:46I can rattle off what the vice president has done,
14:49but do you think sometimes the language needs to shift?
14:51So we hear terms like democracy
14:53or disenfranchised all the time,
14:55but those aren't necessarily,
14:57you're not sitting at a table with your family saying,
14:59oh, democracy is it?
15:01No, you're like, we hungry?
15:03What are we going to do?
15:04What's going to happen with this business?
15:06Do you think that that needs to sometimes,
15:09how we talk change that language?
15:11And would that help in even attracting younger generations
15:14or black men also?
15:16Yeah, I think, you know, hearing people,
15:19you know, engages them, you know,
15:21willing to listen to the things that they truly feel.
15:24As a parent, my sons have said things to me
15:26that I could not possibly fathom them actually feeling,
15:30because we did not grow up like daddy grew up
15:33or mommy grew up.
15:34We have love in the house.
15:35We have two visible parents that are working hard
15:37to make sure your dreams come true.
15:39Like how could you possibly feel this way?
15:42But they do, and you can't ignore that.
15:43And I think that we have to listen, you know,
15:45but also in the same conversation of being a parent,
15:49we can never, ever, I'm sorry,
15:52they would never, ever understand the work
15:54that's being done if they don't travel
15:55outside their neighborhoods.
15:56I travel every week.
15:57I see infrastructure being done all over the country.
16:00Every city I go to,
16:01that's the Biden-Harris administration at work.
16:04I do know the, you know, the things that are happening,
16:06but see a lot of people don't,
16:08and it wouldn't be much like parenting.
16:10Again, you wouldn't get your flowers as a parent
16:13until they're grown and they're going through it themselves.
16:15But that's the disconnect, you know, with the generations.
16:18It's like, okay, people know that suburban, you know,
16:22Atlanta's going to vote black.
16:24Atlanta and the surrounding areas from Sandy Spring
16:27to, you know, College Park, all the surrounding,
16:29that's going to be blackity, black, black, black.
16:31But they depend on the rest of Georgia,
16:33which is toothless, meth, white, bonuses on Friday.
16:38Bonuses on Friday, if you go vote.
16:41I'm just telling y'all the truth.
16:42But see, the problem with us is we can't depend
16:44on the youngins to just go vote
16:46because they have too many questions
16:47without thinking about the things that they can't see.
16:50We have to believe, it's like believing in Jesus Christ,
16:53that things unseen, I'm not saying believe in politicians
16:55like Jesus, I'm not saying that,
16:57but you believe in things that you admire
17:00or desire without sight.
17:02You believe in things that you,
17:04these goals you want to accomplish in your life
17:06without actually touching them.
17:08So why can't you give someone the benefit of the doubt?
17:11But see, the problem is we don't want to do the work
17:12the rest of the three years before the next election.
17:14We just want to go crazy, hear all these things,
17:17go vote and think it's just going to magically,
17:19you know, disappear.
17:20But we have local and state elections
17:22to adhere to as well.
17:24Okay, final question.
17:27As we're thinking about this election cycle,
17:30we are facing, as you have alluded to and mentioned,
17:33some misinformation, disinformation,
17:36some apathy from young people.
17:39What are you finding to be the most effective tool?
17:42Say folks are watching tonight,
17:45they're facing challenges with having conversations
17:48with their kids or their parents or their friends.
17:51What are you finding are the most effective tools
17:54that are working in your communications,
17:56in your discourse with other folks?
17:59I'm finding that the truth along with proof
18:02is not enough to just be the truth anymore.
18:05The fake news, you know, industry that he's created,
18:08the, you know, him clearly denying a loss in a debate
18:12where we all watch the debate.
18:14So you have to have the truth
18:15and then you have to have proof
18:16and you have to double down on that.
18:18You cannot deliver either without the other.
18:21So I would suggest us all continue to put messaging
18:24out in the world that is factual,
18:26double down on those facts,
18:27have conversations like these,
18:28that essence are providing for, you know,
18:31people in the community that are doing this work every day.
18:33There are, you know, honorable people
18:35with honorable messaging, with honorable intentions,
18:38but you look into these rappers and all these people that,
18:41you know, are being paid to play, like, come on,
18:43like there are actual activists that mean it
18:46and want to, you know, authentically show up for you
18:48and have intention, you know what I'm saying,
18:51in representation for you.
18:53So, you know, I just, I think, you know, truth and proof.
18:56If you could show it with both, it's lights out Joe Jackson.
18:59Kenny Burns, thank you so much for joining us.
19:02Thank you for your advocacy.
19:04Thank you for your investments.
19:06Thank you for the producing work that you do.
19:09And thank you for taking the time to talk to us today
19:12and to actually do this work
19:14that is so critical for this election.
19:16Yes.
19:17Ebony, Alfonso, thank you for having me.
19:19And I'm gonna leave you with a little fun.
19:21You guys be good.
19:22I'll be out of here.