They Never Expected THIS Backlash!

Añadido: 2026-05-26

[00:00:00]We made it to another Friday. It's been a crazy week, but he here. We're here.

[00:00:04]We're still standing. We want to begin where we always begin, and that is with the Middle East and and what's happening there. Uh we saw the horrible images of uh those activists who were stopped by the IDF off the coast of Turkey, the global Simud flotillaa and we saw the national security minister Ben Gavir taunting activists kneeling with their hands tied behind their backs, their faces on the floor. You know, there about 422 activists uh from a number of different places. And we see an immediate outcry based upon Gir's uh taunting and declarations. He said, "Good job. Welcome to Israel. We are the landlords here." That's what he said.

[00:00:47]That's what he said. Uh kind of uniform condemnation from the likes of the US, France, Greece, the Netherlands, Canada, and Ireland on the treatment. Even Netanyahu had to say this did not represent Israel's values. So, let's keep an eye on that. Also, we need to look at what's happening in Lebanon. The IDF engaged in air strikes on Tuesday and killed at least 21 people. Three of those people were children. Uh, three women in their attacks on southern Lebanon. This is just, I think, 45 days since they extended. This happened just a week after Lebanon and Israel extended the ceasefire by 45 days. So the attack on Tuesday happened right you know about a week after Lebanon and and and Israel extended the ceasefire and you know we want to acknowledge that over 3,000 people have Lebanese Lebanese have been killed uh since uh this conflict uh and number of innocents of course uh have been caught up in this violence. So we're always in the position where we want the wars to end. We want the innocent, you know, the unjustified killing to end. And we want to uh in in any shape, form or fashion uh call attention to uh those actions that undermine the ceasefire which leads to uh undermining that ceasefire which leads to the killing of innocents. Uh shifting our attention from the Middle East just for a brief second to to Cuba.

[00:02:22]The United States has indicted 93y old Rahul Castro. This is a Nicholas Maduro move. Uh it's a pretext for war. They've indicted him for shooting down those planes from from South Florida, I think, in the '9s. And and this is absurd. And this is happening, of course, in the context of the blockade, which continues to punish innocent civilians. Think of that blockade as a kind of equivalent to bombing civilian infrastructure. Denying access to fuel has an impact on on the delivery of health care. It has an impact on food. It has an impact on on just generally the quality of life. And we're seeing innocents suffer. And we need to understand this, I think, in the context of the Trump administration's imperial imagination. And we need to understand that they're doing all of this evil in our name. They're doing all of this in our name. But hey, they indicted Rahul Castro as if snatching him, the pretext for snatching him will somehow undermine the pullet borrow or or the governing structure of Cuba. This is all uh nonsense to my mind.

[00:03:29]Now there's Iran, of course, going back to to the Iran war. The talks continue, but the straight of Himuse is still closed. The there's no off-ramp. The offramp seems unclear. Um, and there's still talks ongoing particularly around the enriched uranium and and the straight of Hermoose, but the world is still choking.

[00:03:53]Economy, the global economy is still reeling from Donald Trump's war of choice. Congress, of course, is beginning to show some backbone. Well, really, let's say a mod of backbone. At least Republicans are. Um the House leadership had had to uh pull refuse to bring a vote around war powers resolution to the floor because they knew they didn't have the votes to kill it. There are Republicans who are breaking ranks. The Senate has proceeded. They're Republicans breaking rank on this war of choice. Now, I want to be clear. Donald Trump keeps saying, as I've said before, he keeps talking about the nuclear capabilities of Iran.

[00:04:32]But we have to begin, we have to remember that this is a Netanyahu talking point. As I said last week, this is a Netanyahu talking point. And the reality is, even though Donald Trump says it's peanuts, the closure of the Straight of Hermuz is directly impacting his base is directly impacting the quality of life here in the United States. So, Congress is beginning to show some, at least Republicans in Congress are beginning to show some backbone, right? Not only are they responding to Donald Trump's war of choice in Iran, trying to bring home troops, trying to bring home uh uh military assets that's impacting the way in which the US is functioning across the globe. But they're also turning their attention, these Republicans now, to Donald Trump's grift.

[00:05:21]I've said before that Donald Trump's corruption makes the the Grant administration uh in the 19th century look like, you know, bumbling kids. This is unprecedented the level of corruption. I mean, we saw this past week all of the the settlement around the anti-weaponization fund. Donald Trump sued himself in order to, you know, sue the IRS, the government that he runs, right? He sued himself and he was going to be the plaintiff and the defendant.

[00:05:49]He resolved it. They they they came to a settlement between themselves between themselves I take it 1.776 billion 1776. Can you imagine all of these patriots? Isn't that sacrilege?

[00:06:03]A 1 point basically a $1.8 billion s slush fund to dole out to his foe.

[00:06:11]The comedian DL Hugley called it white reparations for those who attacked cops on January 6. Can you imagine?

[00:06:19]But this weaponization anti-weaponization fund is just the tip of the iceberg. It is so blatant in its grift and its corruption that Donald Trump is just going to create some money, a slush fund that he will dole out to his friends and to himself. But then there's the IRS deal.

[00:06:37]The IRS IRS deal which basically blocks the audit of his IRS uh uh f uh you know submissions and whatnot. The man is trying to protect himself and the greed and the grift and the corruption that we've seen just in two years barely.

[00:06:54]You combine that with the warehouses being bought by ICE from 10 times their value but from people who are close to Trump. The reflecting pool that was not there was no bid for it. Bitcoin.

[00:07:09]The man is robbing the public coffers right in front of us. And we have to ask why are people why have people allowed this right in the name of what? Shrinking government, deconstruction of the administrative state. It means the oligarchs, the billionaires can can rob the country blind as they destroy the foundation of American democracy. Is that what we're talking about? But just as Republicans are breaking with Donald Trump's war of choice of Iran, there are Republicans who are breaking with this 1.776 billion slush fund. We see it in the Senate, right? Even the senator, what's his name? I can't even remember his name. The senator from Wisconsin even broke.

[00:07:59]You lose him. You've lost the room.

[00:08:03]Well, but you know, they're breaking.

[00:08:04]But what does it mean? Cuz they're breaking in the moment when Trump's iron grip on the Republican party is clear.

[00:08:11]Thomas Massiey's gone. Bill Cassidy gone. Trump just endorsed Ken Paxton over John Cornin. Pissed John pissed Thun off. Leader Majority Leader Thun off. He spent $90 million down there.

[00:08:27]And then Trump just parachutes in right on his revenge tour and endorses Ken Paxton.

[00:08:36]I mean, and I think it's really important for us to begin to interrogate this. Now, pundits are talking about this is a sign of of the breaking of the coalition. And perhaps that's true, that Donald Trump will get his Trump MAGA folk through the primary and then when they get to the general election, independents will break or they won't turn out or the like. and Republican party will lose power. Okay, let's say that's pretty much common sense. But what we have to do is to begin to wrap our minds around this this solid Trump base. These are millions of folk people.

[00:09:10]These are millions of people who are who are loyal to Donald Trump. When you look at some of the uh responses around the Massie campaign and you see them talking about they didn't care about the Epstein files, huh? You don't that they're looking past the corruption? Really?

[00:09:32]One has to ask what's motivating this. I mean, it's not enough to just talk about it as a cult, but there's something deeply and profoundly anti-democratic at work here. And those forces have in so many ways taken over the Republican party. These folk, you can call it courage. The ones who are breaking now, you can call it courage. I don't know.

[00:09:51]It might be political exped expediency.

[00:09:53]But the Republican party has been fundamentally compromised. Its bones, its structure has fundamentally been compromised by the virus of maism.

[00:10:06]We have to understand that for what it is. So, even as you see Cassidy voting the way he's voting now that he's lost, even as you see Susan Collins and and Macowski and and and and and even Mitch McConnell's folk, cuz you know it's not Mitch McConnell, even Mitch McConnell's folk calling the slush fund utterly, you know, ridiculous, right?

[00:10:30]They're still beholden to the to to the ideological, if we want to call it that, to the ugly ideological commitments that animate the base.

[00:10:41]Donald's Trump's vice grip on the Republican party remains even as you have these folk, some of these folk breaking. House leadership won't even let a vote get to the floor around the wars res war resolution act, right? Won't even let it get to the floor because he knows he will lose.

[00:11:03]They will lose because some Republicans are breaking. But still, but still, you know, the punishment is clear. So, we have to find out. We will see. We will see what this means for whether or not folk will actually get back. Will they grow a full backbone, not just show a glimmer of it? We will see whether or not Trump's base will remain loyal, right? But what we have to do is to understand what their loyalty actually means for our democracy.

[00:11:35]What their loyalty actually means for our democracy moving forward. And what does that require of us? Now, all of this, of course, has taken place against the backdrop of the allout assault on American democracy, particularly with the court's decision, the Kalaya decision that led to the gutting of section two of the voting rights act. Last week, we saw all roads lead to the south. Massive protest organized in a matter of week a week or so in Montgomery, Alabama.

[00:12:06]I happened to be a part of those protests, the protest in Jackson, Mississippi on Wednesday. On a Wednesday, over 3,000 4,000 people showed up.

[00:12:19]Thousands of folk showed up on a rainy Wednesday in Jackson, Mississippi. There are over 82 counties. I think 82 counties in the state of Mississippi. 52 counties were represented. organizations from the Southern Poverty Law Center to the NAACP to Black Voters Matter. All across the board, you saw this amazing expression of civic energy, not kind of couched in a nostalgic longing for the civil rights movement, but really mobilized and organizing, right, to respond to the allout assault on voting rights in the state of Mississippi. The idea that they're going to redraw the maps in order to end what Governor Tate Reeves called Congressman Benny Thompson's reign of terror. Can you imagine?

[00:13:07]Now, mind you, Reeves is a Confederate history buff. He loves his Confederate heritage. He loves his lost cause talk.

[00:13:16]So when he invoked reign of terror to describe Benny Thompson, he's actually referring to right the period of quote unquote southern occupation by northern forces and the carpet baggers and the like, the reign of terror. He is in so many ways along with his colleagues, right? I believe thinking about miss a new Mississippi plan. Remember the Mississippi plan was implemented in the context of the 1870s, right? To toa engage in effect in an allout coup to remove Democrats, engaged in a coup, to remove the Republicans who were who were running the state to to disenfranchise black voters, not only by way of literacy laws and the like, but also by way of violence and intimidation and coercion. So much so that by 1890 it would be get enshrined in the Mississippi constitution. The Mississippi plan would be duplicated across the south because in so many ways Mississippi represents the beating heart of the country. It represents in so many ways the contradictions of America. A state that is at once so beautiful and so cruel at once. All at once.

[00:14:29]While I was there, I had a front row seat to see the energy. And this is not that wasn't nostalgia. What I saw on Wednesday, that was organizing. That was laying the foundation to mobilize. Tate Reed and those folk don't know what they have done.

[00:14:45]Black folk make up 40% of the state of Mississippi. Only have one representative in Congress. 40%.

[00:14:55]And so they weren't talking about, you know, we died for the vote. They were talking about math.

[00:15:01]If they redraw the maps, what do we need to do in terms of turnout, right? How many more? How what's the number of folk we need to turn out in each county? What are the number of folks that we need to register in order to respond to their redrawing of the maps? We're going to undermine their fundamental assumptions by shifting the very the very landscape of black voting behavior. H the math.

[00:15:28]It's not about whining and and and and begging. It's about power and understanding how one uses that power. I said last time, right, they think we turned out for Barack Obama, which changed the map.

[00:15:45]just wait till they see how we turn out for ourselves. And I saw that on the ground not as an emotion, right, but as a fundamental practical politics.

[00:15:57]It just made my heart full to see young people, folk veterans of the civil rights movement, folk who walked across the bridge, folk who organized in Holmes County, Alabama. There was this one woman in a church um uh uh meeting who said, "I'm from Holmes County, Alabama, one of the most violent counties in the state of Mississippi." And when they passed the Voting Rights Act and they passed the Civil Rights Act the year before, these people said they weren't paying attention to it. These people didn't give a damn about Brown v. Board of Education. And so they stopped marching, they stopped singing, they just started withholding their dollars.

[00:16:31]She said, "I only got $3, but they not getting it. I love my Mississippi because I'm a I'm a native son born on the water in one of the greatest little towns in the country, Moss Point, Mississippi. 82 counties in this state.

[00:16:46]I think about 52 plus counties showed up on Wednesday.

[00:16:52]Yes, we can describe the grift. Yes, we could talk about the MAGA base. Yes, we could talk about this allout assault on democracy. with the power of everyday ordinary folk.

[00:17:07]We can't rely for our salvation on politicians.

[00:17:12]Our salvation is in our hands. We are the leaders we've been looking for. And as Miss Ella Baker said, strong people don't need strong leaders. That's all we need to do is look in the mirror and understand our power. And Mississippi, 40% black state, is waking up.

[00:17:32]They don't know what they've done. My soul was full. I was reinvigorated, replenished by watching everyday ordinary people, claim democracy as their own, and assume responsibility and exhibit the courage to take on the powers that be. Oh, there are brighter days ahead. And as I was in um the Mason Hall in Jackson where the Mississippi NAACP headquarters resides, was looking at the bullet holes in the windows and looking at an image of of Mega Evers, >> thinking about the history in this building. We went into the auditorium to debrief and and I thought about the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party gathering to choose delegates right in that room.

[00:18:28]>> I thought about Miss Ella Baker >> offering the words that we who believe in freedom >> shall not rest.

[00:18:39]>> I'm going to remember that now. I'm going to listen to the little sweet honey in the rock. We who believe in freedom, >> we won't rest.

[00:18:48]>> We won't rest.

[00:18:51]>> Yeah. They don't know what they've they've awakened, but we do.