WATCH: Republican House Speaker Pushes to OVERTURN 14th Amendment

Added: 2026-05-11

[00:00:00]A lawmaker has said it out loud. A lawmaker wants the court to get rid of the 14th amendment. You know, the the amendment that made black people citizens and creates equal protection under the law. It's a pretty big deal.

[00:00:16]Put them up full mass. Um, we have a hell of a story about Alabama House Speaker Nathaniel Led better. Here it is.

[00:00:28]Well, it certainly gives us an opportunity to look at those congressional districts again. Gives us a chance at all of them if we get some reprieve from courts. And so, give us a we'll see how that goes. And certainly hope that the Supreme Court will overturn amendment 14 and gives us a shot to to revisit those. So, I think that's happened. You know, all we need now is the courts to overturn 14 and and we can look at a new election.

[00:00:57]I I didn't even know it was up for debate. Equal protection under the law sounds like a really good plan.

[00:01:07]Okay, put it up full mass. After the Alabama lawmaker had just passed a bill to strip black people in Alabama of a second congressional district, Alabama House Speaker Nathaniel Led Better said during a press conference, quote, "It gives us a chance to look at all of them. If we get some reprieve from the courts, so we'll see how that goes and certainly hope that the Supreme Court will overturn Amendment 14."

[00:01:38]end quote. Uh some say, well, he may have misspoke, but he said it again just seconds later. Quote, "All we need now is for the courts to overturn 14 and we can look at a new election.

[00:02:00]Um, so remember Alabama is a state that brought you a law that gave a woman who was sexually violated more prison time if she sought to abort the fetus than the person who sexually violated her.

[00:02:22]Okay, Alabama gave you that.

[00:02:25]Let's get into it. The second of the post civil war amendment. The 14th amendment is what made black people in America citizens along with everyone else born on American soil.

[00:02:43]to the chagrin of many in Lead Better's party today. Amendment 14, as Lead Better called it, was America's acknowledgment that black people were people, that we were all to be considered equal in the eyes of the law.

[00:03:02]And it leaves little wiggle room on this point. The 14th Amendment guarantees equal protection under the law.

[00:03:13]And the courts have read that protection to cover the right to vote.

[00:03:23]GOP state representative Chris Pringle, um, real name by the way, tried to smooth over what the speaker had said.

[00:03:35]Alabama has been found in violation not only of the Voting Rights Act, but also the 14th Amendment. They want the court to change its mind on both things or else the state is stuck with the maps it has. They don't want the court to overturn Amendment 14. They just don't want the court to enforce it.

[00:03:54]Um we are in Alabama.

[00:04:01]Let me start there. So he's saying we're not asking for the courts to overturn.

[00:04:10]Nothing that drastic.

[00:04:12]We just don't want them to enforce it, which would mean you can violate it without penalty is what that would mean.

[00:04:22]Theoretically, there's more. Meanwhile, Republicans uh like uh Tim Burchett and Scott Jennings are downplaying that racism was a factor in GOP remapping efforts. Here's what Burchett had to say.

[00:04:39]>> Congressman, uh what do you think about the new maps? Some people say it's not fair. How do you answer them?

[00:04:45]>> Well, elections have consequences. When the Democrats do it, it's called redistricting. When we do it, it's called germandering. It wasn't anything to do with race. And this has absolutely nothing to do with race. Um it's it's kind of ironic that they they're throwing the race card when they're represented by a white guy. Steve Cohen, my friend, very liberal, but he's my friend. We're in the state legislature together. Yet he he is a white man. And to say that we're taking black representation from from some folks is is very disingenuous.

[00:05:18]Um, sir, they need to put you back on the hybrid alien detail. Uh, because your, uh, commentary to defend your bias friends, I'm friendly with that word, uh, is even more ridiculous than some of the conspiracy theories. So now, Scott Jennings would also parrot the same exact point. Here we go with the messaging.

[00:05:40]>> Like, y'all are cheating. Okay, just accept it. That's your Let me Let me just finish. Let me finish. You're cheating. And because you politically are not favorable right now and so this is the only way you would actually win the house is by drawing maps. You literally are taking Memphis which is a city that with black voters and you split it in three stretching 3,000 miles.

[00:06:01]>> Who's the current Democratic congressman there? What what what is it? A black congressman >> just because black people are allowed to elect people that don't look like them.

[00:06:08]>> Exactly. And that is the point I wanted you to make because just because you're not going to have a black congressman, why is it that a Republican can't do just as well representing black voters as a Democrat? Why is electing?

[00:06:18]>> Why does your race determine your politics?

[00:06:20]>> It doesn't. It doesn't. It does. No, just be you're making my point.

[00:06:24]Actually, the assumption is black people. No, no, no. The assumption is black people will only elect black people. No, black people are smart enough to let me finish. Black people actually finish. Black people will elect uh people who will actually represent them, who have their best interest at heart. And what Republicans have done in Tennessee is dismantle the power for black people to have their voice. They did the same thing in the in Texas because they said they thought Latinos were going to swing for Republicans.

[00:06:52]There are black people that are represented. I'm I'm black and I got a Republican president right now. Black people don't elect black people based on race. They elect people that are aligned with their moral, their beliefs in justice. And just took that away from them in Tennessee and in other states.

[00:07:07]>> I All right. Uh Scott doing what he does.

[00:07:12]Major gaslighting. Okay. Uh now in Virginia, taking it to Virginia. So in Virginia, the Virginia Supreme Court on Friday blocked a new Democratic drawn congressional map from taking effect.

[00:07:25]This delivers a major boost for Republicans as they defend their narrow House majority in the midterm elections.

[00:07:33]This ruling coupled with GOP map drawing efforts in other states in the last year and the US Supreme Court's recent ruling overturning racial gerrymandering regulations in the Voting Rights Act means that Republicans will head into the midterms with a clear redistricting advantage. In Virginia, the state supreme court concluded that the legislature began its constitutional amendment process too late to be lawful.

[00:08:00]quote, "This violation irreparably undermines the integrity of the resulting referendum vote and renders it null and void," the court wrote in its order. Now, just a reminder, the Supreme Court uh somehow in their wisdom, the majority of the justices decided that it's actually okay to create um racist redistricting maps.

[00:08:31]As long as you didn't intend to do it on purpose, but you still got to a space or a conclusion where the maps unfairly or disproportionately adversely impact black people.

[00:08:47]Never has that been the standard when it comes to public policy. The standard is typically not intent. The standard for civil public policy is impact. impact to the individuals who are adversely affected. That's your standard. Why?

[00:09:07]Because it's a public policy. Intent be damned. We don't even need to prove intent. We can prove we can show disproportionate impact. And that's enough because these individuals are Americans. These individuals have a right to the ballot. These individuals have a right to representation. These individuals have just as much equal protection as anyone else.

[00:09:35]Black folk in particular. Put it up.

[00:09:38]Full mask. This is what Republicans are trying to do. Republicans could gain as many as 14 seats from redrawn maps across six states so far compared with six for Democrats from redrawn maps. But there could be significant variation based on the actual election results in those new districts, which are not necessarily easy wins for the party that drew them.

[00:10:02]What does this mean?

[00:10:04]This means that voting is important.

[00:10:09]If it wasn't, they would not go through such extreme measures in order to manipulate your ability to do so.

[00:10:17]This means that politicians don't want to be picked by the voters. They want to pick the voters because they're just politicians. They're not true leaders.

[00:10:25]They're not transformative leaders. This also means we have to vote like we have have not voted before. And hopefully enough conservatives, Republicans, MAGA, enough of them have seen the light hopefully for this not to work. All right, we're going to bring you updates as they