0:00

Hey,

0:04

this is DeRay and we're going to pause here with the

0:06

people in this episode. It's me, D.R., Kya, and Miles talking

0:08

about all the news that you don't know

0:10

with regard to race and justice. News that went

0:13

underreported in the past week, but that you

0:15

should have been talking about. And then I

0:17

sit down with Pulitzer Prize winning author Matt

0:19

Desmond to talk about his new book, Poverty

0:21

by America. It was an important conversation. I

0:23

learned a lot and you

0:25

might know from his other book, Evicted,

0:27

which he came in the pockets to

0:29

talk about in this book, poverty is

0:31

as amazing. Let's go. Family,

0:35

welcome to another episode of Pod Save

0:38

the People. I am D.R. Ballinger. You

0:40

can find me on Instagram at D.R.

0:42

Ballinger. I'm Kya Henderson at

0:45

HendersonKya on Twitter. This

0:47

is DeRay at D.R.A.Y on Twitter. So

0:50

we want to kick off today talking

0:52

with our new favorite film.

0:55

There's a consensus here. We all love

0:58

it. American fiction. Nothing

1:00

negative to say. Nothing. And I don't want

1:02

to hear anything negative from you people on

1:04

the internet either, because I'm not standing for

1:06

it. American fiction written

1:08

and directed by Corey Jefferson. It's

1:10

his first time directing. This film

1:13

is absolutely incredible. Jeffrey Wright is

1:15

the lead. I've loved Jeffrey Wright

1:18

for decades. He's also

1:20

a DC guy. Not only that,

1:23

he grew up in my neighborhood in Hillcrest. Oh, I

1:25

didn't know that. Sure did. Right down

1:27

the street from me. And like me,

1:30

mama sent him across town or really

1:32

uptown to go to high

1:34

school. So that's where we lost our Southeast

1:36

crib because then we went to private school.

1:38

But anyway, so lots in common with Jeffrey

1:41

Wright. He's incredibly talented, really shines.

1:43

DeRay just told us that he's nominated

1:45

for Best Actor for Golden Globe. DeRay.

1:50

And the film is

1:52

hilarious, but also

1:54

so profound and so beautiful.

1:56

But the plot is basically Jeffrey

1:58

Wright, who is... is a

2:01

writer who happens to be Black who

2:03

really writes about mythology. Another thing, can't

2:06

get published until he writes

2:08

something that is very sensationalized,

2:10

kind of Black exploitation, and

2:12

then does very well. And

2:15

so the movie talks about that,

2:17

but also has some really beautiful

2:19

layers around family and Black

2:21

identity and the intricacies

2:23

of it. So yeah, we

2:26

loved it. We saw it. Ray

2:28

and Campaign Zero hosted a screening

2:30

in DC that was really Kaya's

2:32

screening. So thank you, Kaya. If

2:38

you need somebody to help you get people out to

2:40

a movie, I can do that. I can do that.

2:42

It was pretty spectacular. I knew what

2:45

the movie was about, but I really

2:47

was expecting, I was a little worried

2:49

that it might be

2:51

a little minstrelsy involved

2:53

to pull a word

2:55

from Miles. And it

2:57

was so thoughtful and so well done

2:59

and so critical. And I

3:02

just, I really, it forced you

3:04

to have conversations. Like the one thing

3:06

that I'll say next time we do a screening

3:08

is we need to do it on a school

3:10

night and we need to have some time for

3:12

conversation afterwards because it just brought up so many

3:14

questions for me. And I'm trying not to say

3:16

anything because I want people to go see the

3:18

movie. I saw it at the

3:21

first screen in New York City. I

3:23

got his friends together to see it. And

3:26

I walked out like, oh, we got to show people this.

3:28

I was like, you know, I don't know if the trailer

3:30

is an accurate representation of what the film is about, but

3:33

the film is amazing. And let me, anybody who's

3:35

ever been in the theater with black people, the

3:37

black people are the other actor in the film

3:39

because it is just that

3:41

good. And it comes out in

3:43

December 15th. It was nominated as

3:45

Best Picture for The Golden Globe and Jeffrey

3:47

Wright got nominated. It's a

3:50

raise in it. Trace Ellis Ross is in

3:52

it. Eric Alexander is in it. They are

3:54

all Sterling K. Brown's in it. They're all

3:56

legitimate stars in it. They're not background characters,

3:59

which is sometimes. what they're relegated to be. And

4:02

it's just a good movie. So boom. See,

4:05

that was so nice, that conversation. Now we got

4:07

to get into what's happening in the world. All

4:10

humbug. So the

4:12

day of the college president's testifying was

4:14

actually the day of the screening, because

4:17

I remember leaving the

4:19

theater to go to the restroom.

4:21

And I was in the

4:23

restroom with women who were so

4:26

upset around the

4:28

testimony. And funny

4:31

enough, they were saying back and

4:33

forth to each other how stressed they were and

4:35

how this has been, you know, they're just so

4:37

undone by this thing. And this woman was like, I'm just

4:39

going to take a night off from this. I'm going to

4:42

take a night off. I can't take it anymore. I'm going to

4:44

take a night off. And I said to her,

4:46

you should, because some of

4:48

us can't take a night off. So

4:50

you should take a night off. And

4:53

then I went back into the

4:55

theater and continued watching my black

4:57

movies. But I feel like I've

4:59

been thinking

5:02

about that

5:05

moment because I feel like it's such a microcosm around

5:07

like kind of what's happening in the world. And

5:10

like, there are some real things

5:12

that are life and death things

5:14

that are just unimaginable and incomprehensible

5:16

that are happening right now at

5:18

this moment. And I

5:20

just get so incensed when

5:23

people make it so personal

5:25

about their privileged selves and

5:28

like how hard it

5:30

is for them in their privileged world to

5:32

understand what's going on. And they're just so

5:34

enraged around it. Get out

5:36

of town. Go have a seat. So

5:39

anyway, part of what I'm talking about this is

5:41

I think this is part of sort

5:43

of the dynamic around what's happening

5:45

around these college presidents. So the

5:47

president of Penn has already stepped

5:49

down. And now the

5:52

president of Harvard, you know,

5:54

there is some conversation around whether or not she's

5:56

going to resign. I think one

5:59

of the things that I was so lost

6:01

on with that testimony. It just was how

6:03

unprepared I felt they

6:05

were. And as someone who

6:07

has prepped, I

6:09

don't know, Hillary Clinton for, you know,

6:12

16 hours of congressional testimony, the

6:14

level of preparation that goes

6:17

into that so that you're

6:19

not, and I don't want to say caught

6:22

off guard, but I want to say caught in sort

6:24

of a trap, if you will,

6:26

because I feel like so much of the questioning

6:28

was trying to lead these folks into a place

6:30

not of resolution or a place of having

6:33

positive outcomes, but was really an

6:36

interestingly enough by the right to trap

6:39

them to

6:41

trap them into into just sort of circumstances

6:43

that there was no way to get out

6:45

of, you know, and maybe

6:47

that's not true. That's nowhere to get out of, but

6:49

I just feel like when they could have answered those

6:51

questions in quite a different way. I don't know where

6:54

the instruction was to answer in that way. Like, also

6:56

just answer how you feel what's going on, but

6:59

interested to hear how what you all thought around

7:01

it, because this is something that is like happening

7:03

right, right, right now. First

7:06

of all, on the testimony itself,

7:08

like stop parsing words. Just say the

7:10

thing, right? Like, just say the thing.

7:12

Say, maybe you were supposed

7:14

to say there are some instances where this happens

7:16

and there's some instances, but like

7:18

the word play and like congressional

7:21

hearing is not a place where

7:23

like nuance thrives, right? And so

7:25

you just got to be very

7:27

clear, you know, as somebody who has sat through

7:30

not congressional hearings, but a ton of

7:32

city council hearings being grilled, like grilled,

7:35

one of the things that I realized early on

7:37

was it's actually not about responding to the questions.

7:40

It is about telling your story. It

7:42

is about narrating what your point of

7:44

view is, the way it best works

7:46

for you. And they clearly didn't get

7:48

that advice. And so I feel like

7:51

the testimony, it was stupid. Whoever prepared

7:53

them should be fired and should, you

7:55

know, refund their money and whatnot. And

7:58

it was also sort of, of

8:00

weird that Congress calls these

8:02

presidents in. And

8:06

to what end? I'm not really sure

8:08

what the point of a congressional hearing

8:11

was for these college presidents.

8:13

And then I also

8:15

feel like it is not a coincidence

8:17

that these are three women presidents, and

8:20

they went at them like this. And

8:22

I just think about how many times

8:24

we've seen people botch

8:27

congressional hearings, just say all

8:29

the wrong things, and mess

8:31

up, and not

8:33

have the same reaction and response

8:35

that these presidents are getting. And

8:38

so it is the

8:40

big donors threatening to withhold money

8:43

from these institutions if these women are

8:45

not fired. It is, I don't know,

8:47

all the public pressure. It seems like

8:50

a lot of energy, maybe

8:53

this is way more consequential than I know,

8:56

but you fire the president, and then

8:58

what happens? You get another president. And

9:00

I guess the thing is, this is

9:03

about safety for young

9:05

people and faculty on campus who

9:07

feel unsafe. So I

9:11

am committed to figuring that out. Maybe

9:14

I am unequivocal. Maybe I am

9:16

not nuanced. Maybe

9:18

I'm going to stop testifying about this. How about that?

9:22

How about that? You know, one of the things that's

9:24

really interesting, let me just read what the line of

9:26

questioning was that Claudine, we're talking about the president of

9:28

Harvard, now Claudine Gay, the Congresswoman

9:30

who, to be clear, cares nothing

9:32

about free speech at all and is just on

9:35

a witch hunt, Stefaniq. She said,

9:37

at Harvard, this calling for the genocide

9:39

of Jews violate Harvard's rules of bullying

9:41

and harassment. And Gay responded, it can

9:43

be depending on the context. And

9:46

she was pressed again to give a yes or no. And

9:50

she replied, anti-Semitic speech, when it

9:52

crosses into conduct that amounts to

9:54

bullying, harassment, intimidation, that is actionable

9:56

conduct, and we do take action.

10:00

Stefaniak pushed back and said, so the answer

10:02

is yes, the calling for the genocide of

10:04

Jews violates Harvard's code of conduct, correct? She

10:06

said, again, it depends on the context.

10:09

And Stefaniak replied, it does not depend

10:12

on the context. The answer is yes, and this is

10:14

why you should resign. These are

10:16

unacceptable answers across the board. Now,

10:20

I have been following, his

10:22

name is Jeremy Ben Ami. He

10:24

is the president of J Street, which

10:27

is a prominent Jewish organization.

10:30

And he, you know, we don't

10:33

agree on everything, but he is

10:35

so good at being like, remember

10:37

that anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism. And

10:40

disagreeing with the state of Israel, criticizing

10:43

that Yahoo, saying that

10:46

we shouldn't destroy Palestine, none

10:49

of those things are anti-Semitic, just

10:51

by virtue of the fact that somebody says them, that

10:54

equating that with any realm of

10:57

anti-Semitism is just false choices. And

11:01

one of the really wild things about Stefaniak's

11:03

line of questioning is that it's a wild

11:05

hypothetical. She can't point to an instance at

11:07

any of these colleges that

11:10

was students or groups calling for

11:12

the genocide of Jews. She

11:14

is equating not

11:17

saying that, you know, Palestine should

11:19

not exist, and da-da-da. She's saying

11:21

that's anti-Semitism. You're like, no, that's

11:23

not, that's not it. So,

11:26

you know, I also don't think that people

11:28

are prepared for the slippery slope. I remember,

11:30

I was obviously not, you know, an adult

11:32

then, but when the ACLU was protecting the

11:34

right for the neo-Nazis on

11:36

American campuses as a

11:39

measure of free speech. And

11:41

if the bar becomes when people say things

11:44

that are racist or even

11:46

more intensely experienced as racist,

11:49

that you got to go, then baby, it's

11:51

not gonna be a white person in an

11:53

American college, because if everybody who I have

11:55

ever been on a college campus with, who

11:58

did something that made me feel like, unsafe

12:00

and made me feel like they threatened

12:02

the Black people and they got expelled,

12:04

it won't be no faculty. It will

12:06

be a different day in America. So

12:10

we'll see how this plays out,

12:12

but it has been really important

12:14

for me to follow Jewish scholars

12:17

and thinkers who have been very

12:19

clear that criticizing Israel's actions is

12:21

not criticizing Judaism and

12:24

being really clear that what

12:27

has happened in Palestine is

12:30

just a human rights violation, point

12:32

blank period. It really

12:34

feels, I mean, and I think

12:36

we've all sort of talked about

12:39

this, but it feels dangerous to

12:41

say anything at this point. And

12:43

I feel like I haven't experienced

12:45

anything like this, but I feel like,

12:47

you know, maybe McCarthyism in the 50s

12:50

where people were literally like scared

12:53

to talk to their family members

12:55

and friends because we were, you

12:57

know, routing out communism.

12:59

The stifling of dialogues

13:01

is the dangerous part

13:04

to me. It feels like we

13:06

can't talk across difference. We

13:08

can't be okay

13:10

with having different perspectives. And

13:13

you know, that's what colleges and

13:15

universities are for. That's where you

13:17

figure out what you really believe

13:20

by engaging with people across lines

13:22

of difference. And this feels,

13:24

you know, when you fire these three presidents,

13:27

then it feels like

13:29

you are endorsing a crackdown

13:31

on speech. And I've never been like

13:33

a big free speech advocate, but this

13:35

feels very different for some

13:37

reason. And I think part of

13:40

that is, it's like, Kai, we're actually, no one's

13:42

disagreeing. It's

13:44

like not an anti-Semitic positioning

13:46

versus I think part of

13:49

it is from what I'm seeing and

13:51

how this is playing out. It's about

13:53

power. You

13:56

said something we didn't like, and

13:58

we are not going to feel better until you're out of there. So

14:01

to DeRay's point, like where is that as

14:04

a paradigm? Like where is that going to

14:07

leave us? It's just a

14:10

very interesting phenomenon that is happening.

14:13

And the other thing with particularly

14:15

Dr. Gay, who's the president of Harvard, now

14:18

so much conversation around her

14:21

competency and she was

14:23

hired as a diversity hire. So

14:25

that conversation's okay. You

14:28

know what I mean? It's just, it's very interesting.

14:30

What we are saying is okay to say and

14:33

okay to do and okay to act and not.

14:35

And let me just say to that point, it

14:38

is really interesting because people have definitely been

14:40

in my, mostly Instagram, Twitter, I haven't seen

14:42

stuff, but in Instagram upset

14:44

with me that I have not

14:46

said something or disagree with my

14:48

stance or whatever. And just

14:51

this morning, I woke up to a white

14:53

Jewish woman in my DMs who

14:55

are commenting with, why did I ever think you

14:57

were smarter than this? Like you,

15:00

I thought you were smarter than this

15:02

take or like smarter than saying

15:05

that criticizing because

15:07

you're up for what's happening in Palestine. I thought you

15:09

were smart. And it's like, if you think that the

15:11

strategy is like calling me dumb, that doesn't work. And

15:14

the other things that I've gotten a lot of

15:16

was like we used to with you during BLM.

15:18

It's like, well, you know, the same, yeah,

15:21

I don't know, did you stand for the issue? Because

15:23

killing innocent people was a bad thing

15:25

then. Killing innocent people is a bad thing now. That's

15:28

what you should have been standing for. And you should stand

15:30

for that context every time it comes up. So

15:32

like seeing people try to guilt me

15:34

into it as an activist or like

15:36

into silence is one of those things

15:39

that, or people who are

15:41

like, if only black people understood, you're

15:43

like, understand what, baby, we get it.

15:45

This is why people, this is why

15:47

we don't allow, because we see how

15:49

easy it is for people to turn

15:52

a blind eye. We see how the

15:54

stories come and go and

15:56

dead babies and hospital rooms and people act

15:58

like it's a nightmare. other day. We live

16:01

that. We get it. So that's why I

16:03

know a lot of Black people who've never

16:05

even thought about a Palestine who are like,

16:07

oh, this can't be right because we have

16:10

lived very similar logic that says somebody

16:12

did something, you deserve this, we know better. And

16:14

you're like, no, that's not it. Hey,

16:18

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16:51

I wanted to bring this because I

16:53

actually find it quite controversial. Given

16:56

our political climate, this

16:59

is something Joe

17:01

Biden has done well during

17:03

the administration. I

17:05

will hold for everyone being like, oh my

17:08

God, I can't believe we're talking

17:10

about Joe Biden. Y'all,

17:14

we got to be able to hold space for

17:17

all these things at the same time. So

17:19

start practicing right now. So

17:22

this is Pew Research Center,

17:25

and they've done a lot of work around

17:27

looking at judicial appointments. And

17:29

you all know I'm obsessed with

17:31

judicial appointments because our

17:33

judiciary is so, so,

17:35

so important. I

17:38

don't know, Roe versus Wade, just a couple things.

17:41

So nearly two

17:43

thirds of federal judges

17:46

that Joe Biden has appointed are

17:48

women. And the

17:52

same share are members of

17:54

a racial or ethnic minority group. To

17:57

put Biden's judicial appointments into

17:59

historical context, He

18:01

examined how his appointed judges to date compared

18:03

with those of other presidents at the same

18:05

point in their 10 years, going back all

18:07

the way to Dwight D. Eisenhower in the

18:11

1950s. Essentially, he has appointed 145 judges

18:14

to the three main tiers of the

18:16

judicial system, the district courts, the

18:19

appeals courts of the US Supreme Court. Women

18:21

have accounted for just over 66% of those judges, 95 out

18:23

of 145. 95

18:29

out of 145. The

18:33

95 women judges Biden has appointed

18:35

as of November 5th far exceed

18:37

both the number and share of

18:40

any other president that

18:42

any other president has appointed at this point

18:44

in the term. The pattern

18:46

is also similar when it comes to judges

18:48

who are racial or ethnic minorities. Nearly two-thirds

18:50

of the judges Biden has appointed as of

18:52

November 5th, 96 of 145, or just

18:57

66% again, are black, Latina,

18:59

Asian American, or members of

19:01

another racial or ethnic minority

19:03

group. Again, this is

19:05

far more than any other president has appointed

19:07

at the same point in their tenure. For

19:10

example, Trump, who also made a ton

19:13

of judicial appointments, had

19:15

appointed 22 minority judges by the

19:17

same stage, 14% of his

19:19

total at this time. And Obama had appointed

19:22

42, 37% of his total time. Basically,

19:26

they're saying if Biden

19:28

continues at the pattern, he's going to

19:31

be so far ahead of any other

19:33

president in terms of judicial appointments that are women and

19:35

that are women of color. I

19:37

just wanted to bring this, and Pew

19:39

goes through all the data and compares

19:41

all these presidents again, going

19:43

all the way back to Eisenhower. I

19:46

just thought this was so fascinating because

19:49

following this, Biden's the

19:51

one that put the first black woman on the

19:53

Supreme Court, that

19:56

this is crucially important. And

19:58

as we consider... the

20:00

future of the United States, the protection

20:03

of laws, voting rights, women's

20:05

bodies, LGBTQ plus

20:07

rights, you name

20:09

it, these judges

20:11

are going to be integral in

20:14

all of that work, right? And not only

20:17

that, these are lifetime appointments. So these judges

20:19

are in and then continue to ascend in

20:21

the judiciary. So I just, I wanted to

20:23

bring this because I think as we're

20:25

thinking about this election, and I

20:28

know the complexities around this election,

20:31

but things like this are

20:33

so important to ground

20:36

because our day to day protections

20:38

and a lot of

20:41

the work that campaign zero is doing, a lot

20:43

of work that we're doing around organizing, around

20:46

mass incarceration, et cetera, these

20:49

judges are part of

20:51

that trajectory. So I just wanted to

20:53

bring this, I thought it was really fascinating. I don't know

20:55

where I found this. You kind of have to dig for

20:58

things, good things coming out of this

21:00

administration, because you know, they don't know how to message

21:02

anything. So just wanted to highlight

21:04

this. I thought it was fascinating. Please look at

21:06

it. Look at the data, because

21:08

it's fascinating and super helpful

21:10

in the long run. Yeah.

21:13

Thanks for bringing this to the

21:15

podcast, Yara. This felt hopeful

21:17

to me. This felt like building towards

21:19

the future for me. We

21:22

talk a lot about how

21:24

the right plays the long

21:26

game and how, you know,

21:28

these judicial appointments on

21:30

the right have actually been

21:32

catalytic to what we are

21:34

experiencing in our lives today.

21:37

But they didn't start with

21:39

President Trump. Like they have

21:41

actually happened over decades. And

21:43

so this feels like a

21:45

real long-term play. It

21:47

was also sort of interesting. I feel like we

21:49

have heard and said often on

21:51

this podcast that Trump made more

21:53

judicial appointments than any president in the history of the

21:55

United States. And that still may be true.

21:57

This data only looks at the first thousandth

22:00

plus days, but since

22:02

Biden is close, it seems like

22:04

maybe we could change that number

22:06

as well and have Biden with

22:08

the most judicial appointments over

22:11

any president. And that also feels hopeful. And

22:13

I just think for women,

22:16

for people of color, we

22:18

know representation matters. We know leadership

22:20

is different when you come from

22:22

this lived experience. And,

22:24

you know, there are people who are

22:26

experts at their roles, who never got

22:29

the chance because of who they are.

22:31

And so I'm excited. This was an

22:33

exciting piece of news for me and

22:35

it says let's keep going. So

22:37

thanks. This is really interesting

22:41

because it is a big

22:43

one for the Biden administration who's had some some other

22:45

good wins. And we got to figure

22:47

out how to talk about these stories and ways that people get.

22:49

Because, you know, I think about

22:51

in my work in justice, the number of

22:53

people, the number of black people who've had

22:55

an experience of the criminal justice system is

22:58

really high, either by proximity or personally. They

23:00

know somebody they, you know, which is

23:02

not surprising given that we lock up

23:05

so many people and we do it

23:07

disproportionately. So people have

23:09

had even proximate experiences with

23:11

judges. Do you know what I mean? But

23:13

the question never becomes how they get there. People sort of

23:15

and I get it because before I was an activist, it's

23:18

sort of like, well, they just are a judge. You're like,

23:20

are they? And you're like,

23:22

no, somebody pick this person. So

23:24

when you when you think that

23:26

person was racist and unfair in

23:28

your cousin's courtroom, remember that that

23:31

was a choice that somebody made

23:33

along the way that might

23:36

have changed your trajectory of your life or

23:38

your family's life. And we

23:40

got to figure out how to help people understand that

23:43

you actually do have the experiences. You know what I

23:45

mean? Like, I think about the courtrooms

23:47

that I sat in and I'm like, oh, how did

23:49

this this got to be somebody's cousin? Because there is

23:51

no way this is by merit

23:54

and people don't think about their ability to

23:58

be able to change those. things,

24:00

like that's not the way that we've told this story.

24:02

So I'm interested in

24:04

our storytelling abilities here.

24:07

My news this week also has

24:09

to do with the presidential election

24:11

or has to do with President

24:14

Biden and Trump in some respects, and

24:17

it's about voting intentions amongst young people.

24:20

So the Institute of Politics

24:22

at Harvard's Kennedy School released

24:25

a poll last week and the

24:27

poll showed a potential decline in

24:29

participation by young voters. Now,

24:31

we already are worried,

24:34

lots of people are worried about the

24:37

youth vote. And what

24:39

the poll showed was that overall,

24:41

compared to 2020, overall Americans between

24:46

18 and 29 who definitely plan to

24:48

vote for president has decreased from

24:50

57 percent to 49

24:53

percent. And that is a

24:56

significant number amongst Democrats. The

24:58

statistics are consistent with 66

25:01

percent of young people saying that they

25:03

will definitely vote for in the presidential

25:05

election. And that's consistent with 2020. But

25:08

for the Republicans, the figure is down 10 points

25:11

from 66 to 56 percent. But

25:15

with independence, less than a

25:17

third of independent young voters are

25:20

going to vote in the presidential

25:22

election. And what's crazy about

25:24

that is most voters under 30 identify

25:27

as what? Independence. And so

25:29

if independents are not going

25:31

to vote in the presidential

25:33

election, that has significant impacts.

25:35

In fact, the poll shows

25:38

that the person who is

25:40

most likely to be affected by that

25:42

will be President Biden. That a

25:45

decrease in participation by young voters is

25:47

most likely to hurt his chances in

25:49

a matchup against Trump. But

25:51

the poll also shows declines in

25:54

voting intention among young blacks, Hispanics

25:56

and women. And so this is.

26:00

a problem. There is still time

26:02

to correct it. And there are

26:04

lots of people doing great work

26:07

around mobilizing the youth vote. I

26:09

got a shout out my friend

26:11

Diane Robinson, who did a documentary

26:13

called The Young Vote. And

26:16

it examines through the storytelling

26:18

through the lives of four or

26:20

five young people, why

26:22

young people didn't vote in the 2016 election

26:25

and helps to understand some of the

26:27

motivations. You know, these young people talk

26:30

about having a two party system that

26:32

shuts out independence, which is

26:34

critical if so many of them are independent.

26:37

Lots of them talk about undocumented

26:39

youth being locked out and

26:41

having real table stakes in

26:43

what's happening, but not having

26:45

the ability to do anything. And

26:48

largely they just distrust this system

26:50

that they see as rigged against

26:52

them. And so I brought

26:54

this to the podcast because I wanted

26:56

to highlight the fact that we

26:58

still have work to do. They are great student

27:01

youth vote organizations that are doing

27:03

this work. Lots of folks doing

27:05

work on campuses to make sure

27:07

that young people are registered to

27:09

vote and are going out to

27:11

the polls. And, you

27:13

know, you can't be mad

27:16

if you don't participate. And

27:18

so I think this is sort

27:20

of the canary in the coal mine for us.

27:23

And it just means we have a lot of work to

27:25

do around organizing the youth vote

27:27

because it's important. I

27:29

do think that voting in some ways becomes a

27:31

game time decision. So this doesn't make me nervous

27:33

yet as much as it does signal, like you said, we

27:35

got some work to do. Because

27:38

I think that with the right stories, I think people

27:40

will get it. I was just thinking, I've been thinking

27:42

a lot and I texted you about this, about the

27:44

mask bans that are happening. So Philadelphia

27:46

just passed a ski mask ban.

27:48

DC is contemplating one and Atlanta

27:51

is also contemplating one. And

27:53

the framing of a ski mask ban is really

27:56

interesting because people are like, why you wear a

27:58

ski mask? Should we wear a ski mask? mask.

28:00

The language of the law actually

28:02

says that what's banned is anything

28:04

that obscures the face. Well,

28:07

that is a hoodie. That's a Bay of

28:09

the Ana. That is wild. That's a mask,

28:11

a N95 mask, right? That is lots of stuff. It

28:16

could be anything. And they'll have a carve out for

28:18

health, but who gets to decide the police? So

28:21

when you tell people that your council person just

28:23

voted for a hoodie ban, people

28:25

are like, oh, no, not the hoodie, the Bay of

28:27

the Ana ban. People are like, that's wild. And

28:30

it's like that sort of stuff, you

28:32

know, Ferguson taught me anything. It's like

28:35

that people can get mobilized. People like

28:37

young people with the right story, with

28:40

the right target, can do anything.

28:43

And we got to figure it out. That is one

28:45

of my goals as we think about the next year.

28:48

This is so interesting, Kaia. And

28:50

then I also found a Brookings

28:52

report just from last

28:54

week about youth vote polling for

28:57

Biden. And according

28:59

to this report, Biden did worse among

29:02

very engaged young voters than those somewhat

29:04

less engaged. And

29:06

young conservatives are more committed

29:08

to Trump than young liberals are to

29:10

Biden. So I think

29:13

my nervousness around this is going to be the Biden

29:17

campaign play to moderates.

29:20

And the more we play to moderates and

29:22

the more we play to trying

29:24

to court voters like white

29:27

women, white suburban women who have

29:29

not voted for us in the

29:31

last few cycles, the more we

29:33

dump money into trying to get

29:35

those folks as opposed to bettering

29:39

our positioning according to what these young

29:41

people want. That's my

29:43

concern. That is absolutely

29:45

right. I think, you know, the

29:47

poll also showed that young people

29:49

don't trust Trump or Biden on

29:51

most issues. And so the

29:54

behavior is not irrational, right?

29:56

It just has much

29:59

deeper consequences. than you initially

30:01

think, right? And so I need these young people

30:03

to understand that their vote

30:05

counts a lot and that they are

30:07

building the future. You know, in

30:10

a world that is so crazy, the

30:13

young people are the thing that consistently give me

30:15

hope. They have a clear sense of the world

30:17

that they want to live in. They

30:19

have a clear sense of the systems

30:21

and processes that they want to see

30:24

based on what's not working now. And

30:26

so I want them to participate. I

30:29

want them to lead the charge and sitting out

30:31

of the vote does not lead the charge.

30:34

Yeah. So my news

30:36

is about the framing

30:38

is what happens when you have a

30:40

problem and you use a carceral thing

30:43

to try and be the solution. The

30:45

hint is that it rarely ever is

30:47

the actual solution. So in New York

30:50

City, people are frustrated by loud noises

30:53

and not

30:55

just sort of cars that are in the

30:58

air and cars honking, but jackhammers,

31:02

people leaving clubs and bars and there

31:04

are about 50,000 noise complaints caught every

31:06

year with the city's Department of Environmental

31:09

Protection. Now, again, there are probably

31:11

a lot more people who are pissed off, but

31:13

there are enough people pissed off that they filed

31:15

an actual noise complaint. I don't even know who

31:17

you call or where the form is for a

31:19

noise complaint, but that's neither here nor

31:21

there. And then thousands

31:23

of additional complaints are handled by other

31:25

city agencies. And

31:27

the noise generated by cars with

31:31

modified mufflers, low motorcycles and

31:33

drivers who honk are

31:35

just a small fraction of the complaints that people

31:37

get. But of course, the city

31:39

is turning its energy into

31:41

dealing with the cars, even though they're

31:43

a small fraction of the complaints. They

31:47

are gonna put in noise cameras.

31:49

Yes, you heard it right. Noise

31:51

cameras that will be activated when

31:54

it's over 85 decibels, which is about

31:56

as loud as a lawnmower. Now,

31:59

there are a lot of... things that

32:01

could be that loud. And

32:03

this is going to log them. And

32:06

when the cameras will always be on,

32:08

but they will only start recording when

32:10

loud sounds are detected, that's a lie. We've

32:12

been down that road before. And

32:15

the violations cost, here's the kicker,

32:17

the violations cost in between $8,500

32:23

a piece. The

32:26

city currently has

32:28

10-ish of these noise cameras

32:30

that cost $35,000 a piece. And somebody

32:36

in the council supported this and helped

32:38

get it passed. Now, let

32:41

me tell you that if they think this

32:43

is going to make noise go down, it's

32:45

not. Because

32:48

people are rarely making rational decisions

32:50

about consequences when they engage in

32:53

a loud noise. So if I'm

32:55

honking, I'm honking because

32:57

something happens. I'm honking because I need to get

32:59

somebody's attention. Could you imagine getting an $800 ticket

33:02

because somebody was about to hit somebody

33:04

and you honked? That is wild. This

33:07

is technology is agnostic of the

33:09

context. And what happens when

33:11

you criminalize? And yes, it is criminal because what

33:13

happens when you don't pay the fine, then you've

33:16

created a crime. That's how we get to the

33:18

carceral system. And there are a lot of people

33:20

who don't have $2,100 just hanging out

33:22

in their bank account, $800 just hanging out in their bank

33:24

account. But this is agnostic

33:27

of the context.

33:29

There are a lot of times where a honk

33:31

saves somebody's life. There are times when other

33:34

loud noises were not simply because people were

33:36

just trying to piss off everybody, but because

33:38

a loud noise was the only way to

33:40

get somebody's attention. And

33:42

hemming people up in the legal process

33:45

because of it is not the right solution.

33:47

Now, I don't feel compelled right now to

33:50

offer a noise solution because I'm

33:52

not convinced this is a citywide problem in

33:54

that sense. But I

33:56

am certain that the noise cameras are just

33:59

a scam. This is

34:01

so crazy to me. Like, this sounds so

34:03

crazy. First of all, you live in New

34:05

York City, and so what did you think?

34:07

What, like, literally, what did you think? A,

34:09

number one. B, number two, I lived in

34:11

New York City, and I lived in New

34:13

York City from 2017 to 2020, after

34:18

living in Washington for a zillion years. And

34:21

I will say that the noise, it

34:24

was a noticeable difference in terms of noise,

34:26

but I was like, okay, I moved to New York

34:29

City. But it wasn't cars honking,

34:31

and it wasn't big mufflers. It

34:33

was jackhammers at all times

34:35

of the night. It was trash trucks.

34:37

It was all stuff that the city

34:39

actually was doing to pollute the world

34:42

with noise. And so check yourselves before you

34:44

start charging people $800 to $2,500 on this stuff.

34:49

Like, this is bananas. And this lady,

34:51

the, like, expert that they have, no

34:53

shade, but she's an 87-year-old lady who

34:56

is like, kids, you know,

34:59

sleep better when there's no noise.

35:01

Well, okay, yes, indeed.

35:04

And she sits in her noise

35:06

room, an office in her

35:08

Upper East Side apartment where she keeps decades

35:11

worth of research. Come on, y'all. Is

35:13

this what we're spending our time, our money and our energy

35:15

on? Why? Like, help make it make sense to

35:17

me. This is just silly. I don't get it at

35:19

all. And this lady literally says, you

35:21

know why New Yorkers walk very quickly on

35:23

the streets to get away from the noise?

35:26

I have walked quickly on New

35:28

York City streets never to get

35:30

away from the noise. She calls

35:32

noise a slow killer. Y'all, come

35:34

on. Come on. She

35:37

probably lives in the penthouse. She lives in the

35:39

penthouse somewhere. You're right, guys. For real? Thank

35:43

you for bringing this to the podcast. Thank you.

35:45

Because it's also, you know where this takes me

35:47

is just, and I've particularly

35:50

given what's happening online, I've

35:53

been thinking so much about surveillance. Because

35:56

I think this is part

35:58

of it. surveilling

36:00

me because of how much noise I

36:02

make, surveilling me because you think I'm

36:04

about to commit a crime, surveilling me

36:06

because I'm not posting what you think

36:08

I ought to be posting. Now

36:11

when y'all are surveilling, remember

36:14

Simone Brown, who's

36:16

a professor at the University

36:18

of Texas at Austin, wrote a book

36:20

called Dark Matters on the Surveillance of

36:22

Blackness. And her

36:24

work traces surveillance back

36:27

to the institution of slavery,

36:29

and Brown

36:31

talks about how surveillance practices

36:33

are predicated on colonial logics

36:36

of anti-blackness, capital, governance, property,

36:38

and violence. So

36:41

when you start to surveil somebody, think

36:44

about the roots of

36:46

surveillance and what

36:48

surveillance has meant for black bodies. That's

36:51

all I got to say about that y'all. Don't

36:56

go anywhere. More positive people's coming. Did

37:09

you know that more than 38 million

37:12

Americans live beneath the poverty line? This

37:14

week we welcome Pulitzer Prize-winning author Matt

37:16

Desmond to talk about his new book,

37:18

Poverty by America. The U.S., the richest

37:20

country on earth has more poverty than

37:23

any other advanced democracy. Matt

37:25

and I talk about landlords, bank fees, the

37:27

illusion of the middle class. There are a

37:29

lot of things and I just had a

37:32

conversation a week ago about what is the

37:34

dollar amount that denotes poverty, but I didn't

37:36

really understand it until our conversation. Here we

37:38

go. The one

37:40

and only Matt Desmond. It is an honor to

37:43

have you back on the podcast to

37:45

talk about your latest book. How are you doing? I'm

37:47

good, D'Ray. Good to see you as always. Now

37:50

I have a lot of questions and it

37:52

is so timely because I was literally just

37:54

talking to somebody yesterday about the

37:57

poverty rate and I I

38:00

asked them, how much money do you think

38:03

a person earns a year to be like

38:05

on the poverty line? And she wrote

38:07

$40,000. And

38:10

I was like, well, that's not right. And

38:12

then when I was prepping for this, I like

38:14

remembered at the beginning of the book, where you

38:16

talk about how the rate is calculated. Your

38:19

book was the first time I'd ever seen an

38:21

explanation of how we got to the numbers. I

38:24

just knew the numbers really low. And

38:26

then this morning I was like, oh, I'm talking

38:28

about today. So this is like perfect timing. Okay,

38:30

but before we talk about the poverty rate, can

38:32

you tell us how did you get to this

38:34

book? Evicted, obviously,

38:36

incredible book. What was

38:38

the roadmap from evicted to poverty? I

38:41

grew up poor in a little town in Northern

38:43

Arizona. My dad was a preacher and we just

38:45

never had enough money. And

38:47

we experienced some of the most lights

38:50

and pressures of poverty. We got our gas turned

38:53

off. The bank took our home. We lost our

38:55

home to foreclosure. And

38:57

I think that's where my journey started. And

38:59

it put this question inside of me, which

39:01

is, why is this how we handle when

39:04

a family falls on hard times? And

39:07

then from my last book evicted, that's

39:09

when I really saw a kind of

39:11

poverty that I'd never seen before, experienced

39:13

before. Saw like grandma's living

39:16

without heat in the

39:18

winter in Wisconsin, just praying the space heaters

39:20

don't go out, seeing kids

39:22

routinely evicted. And

39:24

so I think seeing that kind of

39:26

hard bottom layer of poverty in America

39:28

really affected me, but

39:31

also convicted me in the years

39:33

after evicted because this is my beat, right?

39:35

I've been writing a research on poverty all my adult

39:37

life, but I felt that if someone stopped me in

39:39

the street, it's like breaking down for me, Matt. Why

39:42

is there so much poverty? And what can we do to

39:44

finally eradicate it? I don't know if I'd have an

39:46

answer. And this book is my answer.

39:49

Boom. Let's start at the

39:52

poverty rate itself and the dollar

39:54

amount that is, I don't know,

39:56

assigned or like that is demarcated as what poverty

39:58

is. Can you walk us through that? because every

40:00

time I look at the chart, I'm like, it is

40:03

wild that it's so little money. Right.

40:05

The poverty line is way too low. And

40:07

so, you know,

40:10

the poverty line is drawn at different income

40:12

levels, depending how big your family is, you

40:14

know, for a family of four today,

40:16

the poverty line is drawn at about $28,000 a year, $28,000.

40:18

Now, 38 million Americans live below that

40:26

line. 38 million. So if the officially

40:28

poor in America got together and formed

40:30

a country, that country would have a

40:33

population that's like Australia's population.

40:35

Huge. But like your friend

40:37

said, you know, at the top of the talk,

40:40

right, it's like, you know, you ask people, well, how much do

40:42

you need to get by in America? They're not going to say

40:44

27, $28,000. They're going to say 40,

40:48

50, $60,000. And it's clear the poverty

40:50

line is way too low. You know, about one

40:52

in three Americans live in

40:54

families making $55,000 or less, one in

40:56

three of us. So a

40:58

lot of those folks aren't officially poor, but like try

41:01

to raise two kids in Chicago on $55,000 or less,

41:03

right? I mean, there's plenty

41:06

of poverty above the poverty line, so to

41:08

speak. And so, you

41:10

know, when you think about what kind of

41:12

problem, property is for me, it's not just

41:14

about that line, right? It's about all the

41:16

stuff that comes with trying to get by

41:18

and such little money. It's about eviction and

41:21

humiliations of poverty, debt collector harassment, your

41:23

cousin getting roughed out by the police,

41:25

your other cousin doing time in a

41:27

cage, on and on it goes. You

41:29

know, so poverty is, it's much worse

41:31

than just an income level. It's like this tight

41:33

knot of social maladies, right? And

41:35

before we go to those things, is there

41:37

a conversation about increasing the number or is

41:40

it, are we, is it just is what

41:42

it is? Do people not know and they

41:44

don't care? Do policymakers fight us on it?

41:46

Like, how are we in

41:48

2023? There's a huge debate and,

41:50

you know, measuring poverty is really hard. And for

41:52

a long time, ever

41:54

since we got this official poverty measure, which

41:57

was kind of calculated on a fly, right? Like,

41:59

London, Johnson announced

42:01

the war on poverty, and we needed

42:03

a way to measure how well we were doing in fighting

42:05

that war. So we came up with

42:07

this really quick and dirty way to

42:10

measure poverty, which is take an average

42:13

amount of families who are spending on

42:15

a bare bones food budget. If

42:17

that amount is more than a third of their income, they're officially

42:19

poor. So this is 1964, right? If you're bringing in $3,000 a

42:21

year and the average cost of food is

42:27

a little over $1,000 a year,

42:30

you're poor. That's the line. That's the poverty

42:32

line adjusted for inflation every year. And so

42:34

for a long time, most folks are like, that's kind of a

42:37

terrible way to measure poverty, right? Like having $20,000

42:39

in rural Mississippi and $20,000

42:43

in LA are very different experiences,

42:45

right? And then there's

42:48

like all the money that the

42:50

government gives some folks, housing subsidies,

42:52

food stamps, Medicaid, that's actually not

42:54

counted in the poverty line. And

42:57

so the government actually announced this other

42:59

poverty line in 2011, it's called the

43:01

supplemental poverty measure. And

43:03

when we announced that, we actually gained

43:05

3 million more poor folks, because

43:08

reductions in poverty that we gained by

43:10

taking into account like government programs, like

43:12

food stamps and housing assistance, were more

43:14

than offset by also taking into account

43:17

rising medical and housing costs. And

43:19

so if you're a politician,

43:21

right, you don't really want 3 million

43:24

more poor folks. And so I think,

43:26

you know, behind all this science and

43:28

technical stuff is also a politics. And

43:30

it's that's kind of the subtext of these debates. Now,

43:33

let's jump into some of the things that really

43:35

stuck with me. Everybody go buy

43:37

the book if you not bought the books,

43:39

I won't give away everything. But

43:41

one of the things you talked about was

43:43

check cashing. Yeah. And

43:47

how if there were not fees for

43:49

check cashing, if I remember the part

43:51

correctly, that almost like a billion dollars

43:53

would stay in people's pockets. Right.

43:56

Now, that is because when you do check cashing, you like

43:58

give up a little bit to get the money. quickly,

44:00

right? Right. You pay a portion of your

44:02

check. Yeah. Is the structural fix

44:04

just used banks? Like a lot of neighborhoods I grew

44:06

up in Baltimore, there were no banks, which is why

44:09

like the first checks I ever cashed were at check

44:11

cashing. Probably my whole high school

44:13

career, I would go across the street to the

44:15

liquor store and they would give me my money

44:17

right there and I was like, I got money,

44:19

you know, I never even, they

44:21

was so easy. Yeah. So

44:24

check cashing fees account for about 1.6 billion

44:26

dollars a year. It's a big number. Overdraft

44:29

fees from banks account for 11 billion

44:31

dollars a year. 11 billion. 11 billion

44:34

dollars. Most of those fees are

44:37

charged to just 9% of bank clients. So who

44:39

are they? They're the poor made to pay for their poverty.

44:41

So, you know, when you

44:44

think of like, well, maybe banks is

44:46

the answer. It turns out,

44:48

you know, if you're struggling, banks are actually doing a

44:50

lot more to nickel and dime the

44:52

poor than even check cashing and payday loan folks are.

44:54

And, you know, you and me are

44:58

probably embroiled in this

45:00

in a way, you know, I get a free check-in

45:03

account, right? In my bank, but it's

45:05

not free. It's subsidized by all

45:07

those fines and fees that are levied on

45:09

the poor. So when I

45:11

think of the fix here, I don't think

45:13

it's necessarily shifting to banks. I think it's

45:16

a bit more about regulation, but

45:18

also about finding ways to make sure

45:20

low income folks can access credit and

45:22

money. That's just a lot cheaper. And

45:25

I wish the faith community would get involved here. You

45:27

know, I wish there was a lot more leveraging

45:30

of capital that a lot of churches and other

45:32

faith communities have to undercut

45:34

this exploitative financial business that the

45:36

poor face every day. So

45:39

when you think about what people anecdotally talk

45:41

about is the co-welfare state, we think about

45:43

TANF. What is your read on

45:45

both the current state of them and

45:47

efforts to make it better? Like, do you

45:49

think we're thinking more progressively about food stamps

45:52

and increasing the amount that families get? Do

45:54

you think that that is a big lever

45:56

worth fighting for? Or, you know, you make

45:58

a strong case for cash assistance? in

46:00

the book and maybe

46:02

they're not mutually exclusive, maybe this is like a both

46:04

and. So this is a big

46:06

question for me. So forgive me if I, you know,

46:09

jump into professorial mode or whatever, but I mean,

46:12

I feel like on the one hand, spending

46:15

on these kinds of programs, including food

46:17

stamps, housing assistance, especially healthcare, they've gone

46:19

up a lot in the last 40

46:22

years. And so

46:24

inflation adjusted, spending on the 13th

46:26

biggest means tested programs increased by

46:28

over 237%, you know, since

46:32

Ronald Reagan, a big increase, a real

46:34

increase, but poverty has still

46:36

been pretty persistent. And so

46:39

we do need to look at

46:41

places where we do need to make these programs

46:43

more generous. This is especially true in housing,

46:45

right? Only one in four families will apply

46:47

for any kind of housing assistance get it.

46:50

And those waiting lists can just stretch not only

46:52

into years, but into decades, right? So

46:55

like if I applied for public housing today in like

46:58

DC, for example, I've got

47:00

two young kids now, I'd probably be a grandpa by

47:02

the time my application came up. So in

47:04

situations like that, it's clearly

47:06

we need a bigger dose, but

47:09

there's also this deeper thing that's going on, which

47:11

is like, we seem to be paying

47:13

more to stay in the same place. And

47:16

so, and this is because many of

47:18

the programs that are directed low

47:20

income families are also programs that interact with

47:23

markets, right? So the biggest thing

47:25

we do to subsidize housing vouchers,

47:27

you know, you can take this ticket, go

47:30

on the private market, live anywhere you want and

47:32

pay 30% of your income. But if rent goes

47:34

up, the price of that voucher is going to

47:36

go up without it expanding to more families. So

47:39

I think we need deeper investments like you're talking about,

47:42

but I think we also need different

47:44

ones, ones that really cut poverty at

47:46

the root kind of attack exploitation on

47:48

multiple levels. Now, you

47:51

know, the idea of direct cash payment

47:53

is not new and more popular today

47:55

than it has been a long time.

47:58

What do you say to people though who... You've

48:00

heard all the arguments, right? The people who

48:03

are like, no, we got to boot stamp

48:05

is better because people spend it on new

48:07

Nikes, right? People will spend it on clothes

48:09

and that's not what, what do you say

48:12

to people who make those arguments? I've heard

48:14

those arguments from not the wild people, but

48:16

from some middle of the road people who

48:19

are sort of against the cash assistance stuff.

48:22

I think from a look at the data point of

48:24

view, that's just not the case, right? When you look

48:26

at how folks are spending like their earn income tax

48:28

credit, right? When it, you know, tax time, our poorest

48:30

paid workers get this wage bump, but it can be

48:32

kind of a big deal, you know,

48:34

thousands of dollars. How they spend

48:37

it, they invested their kids, they pay off

48:39

debt. You know, so from a data point

48:41

of view, this concern is really overblown. But

48:43

like stepping back, I think the bigger picture

48:45

is like, like no one's asking

48:47

me what I'm doing with my mortgage interest deduction, right?

48:50

No one's making sure I don't spend that on alcohol

48:53

or cigarettes, right? No one's asking me

48:55

what I'm doing, you know, with my savings

48:57

for my kids college savings plan, which is

49:00

a huge cutout in the tax code.

49:02

And so it seems like when it comes

49:05

to the welfare state, it's not just about

49:07

welfare, housing assistance, food stamps, it also

49:09

is about tax breaks, you know, which

49:12

puts money in people's pockets and cost the

49:14

government money. And somehow those

49:16

questions go away when it comes to like

49:18

wealth fair, right? The way that the rich

49:20

benefit from the government. And it's only

49:22

the poor that gets that kind of scrutiny. And that's just

49:24

unfair and wrong. Well, this

49:26

is sort of a crossover question. It is

49:30

something that came up in this book, but it

49:32

obviously makes me think of evicted because it's about

49:34

landlords. And there was this part that I was like, I

49:37

didn't think this was true. So you

49:39

talk about landlords in poor neighborhoods make

49:41

more like they make a lot

49:44

of money. Yes. And when I read that

49:46

section, I was it totally

49:48

pushed my thinking because I'm sitting here like, you

49:50

know, landlords in poor neighborhoods, that

49:52

what I hear from them is like, you know,

49:54

it's so costly to be here. And, you

49:57

know, the renovation takes so

49:59

much. And the bit like that is the narrative

50:01

I hear. And then I read this and I was

50:03

like, oh, Matt is doing Matt again, pushing us to

50:05

make deeper. So can you help us understand that? Yeah.

50:08

So this idea came to me in Milwaukee.

50:10

You know, I was living in this mobile

50:12

home park and the landlord opened

50:14

up his books to me. And

50:16

so I could calculate what his rate of return was,

50:19

what his profit margin was. And

50:21

I took into account everything

50:23

like his water bill, his electric bill,

50:25

his overhead, his eviction costs, all his

50:27

repair costs, on and on and on.

50:30

And I learned that the landlord of the poorest

50:33

trailer park in Milwaukee, which was our fourth poorest

50:35

city at the time, was

50:37

taken home about $400,000 a year after expenses. Matt.

50:42

Serious, 132 trailers. And

50:45

his tenants were like on social security,

50:47

right? And SSI, and we're literally collecting

50:49

cans to pay the bills. And

50:52

so I was like, how

50:54

common is this, right? Like, because when I started, I was

50:56

like, why would you buy a trailer park? Like if you

50:58

have enough money to buy a trailer park, I was like,

51:00

why would you do that? And then

51:02

when I left my field work, I was like, oh, why wouldn't

51:04

you do that? This can be very

51:06

lucrative. And so, but then

51:08

I needed to figure out, look, is this just

51:10

a one-off or is this a big pattern? And

51:12

it turns out there's a national database of property

51:14

owners in America. It's called the Rental Housing Finance

51:16

Survey. And so I

51:18

analyzed those data with sociologist named Nate

51:21

Wilmers. And what we found is

51:23

that landlords in poor neighborhoods, like poor neighborhoods,

51:26

like 27% poverty or higher. So

51:28

these are objectively poor neighborhoods. Landlords

51:32

in poor neighborhoods don't just make more than

51:34

landlords in rich neighborhoods, they make double. They

51:37

make double. Wild. It's

51:39

wild. And the reason is their expenses

51:42

are a lot lower, but

51:45

their rents are not that much lower. So,

51:48

you know, you can buy housing a

51:50

lot cheaper if you're, you know, in the

51:52

Oliver neighborhood in Baltimore, right? Than if you're

51:55

in the inner harbor. But,

51:57

you know, the rent isn't that much lower in

51:59

Oliver. And so I think

52:01

that you get this bigger profit margin. And

52:03

I think it's another, you know,

52:06

for me, it's another way that, look, we

52:09

need to think about building more housing. We

52:11

need to think about deepening investments in affordable

52:13

housing, but also like, is that okay? What

52:16

is a fair rate of return? And, you

52:18

know, can we have that conversation as a

52:20

country? I didn't know either until

52:23

I read it, that there was no

52:25

white neighborhood where

52:27

poverty is concentrated above 40%, right? I

52:30

got that right. Yeah, yeah. None, I

52:32

was like, whoa. Yeah, this is

52:35

where like black poverty and white poverty are

52:37

just completely different things, right? So there's a

52:39

lot of poor white folks in the country,

52:41

but they tend to not live in neighborhoods

52:43

with such concentrated poverty. So

52:45

that means their kids go to better resource

52:47

schools. That means their housing is better. That

52:49

means their public services are higher

52:52

functioning. That means their neighborhoods are often

52:54

safer. And so when you

52:56

think about, you know, the average

52:58

white kid below the poverty line, or the black kid below

53:00

the poverty line, you know, they're

53:02

experiencing completely different realities, even though, you know,

53:04

their parents might make, you know, the same

53:07

amount of money every year. And

53:09

this is kind of another reason why the

53:11

book takes on segregation and really

53:13

argues that, you know, turning away from this

53:15

evil embrace of segregation is

53:18

really key to, you know, abolishing

53:20

poverty in the United States. One

53:23

thing I wanted to ask you too, because I had this conversation

53:25

when I was talking about the poverty line yesterday,

53:28

we were also talking about the

53:30

states that didn't participate in the

53:33

Medicare funding, because they

53:35

didn't like Obama or Biden. And

53:38

I wanted to get your take on whether

53:40

you thought that was as big of a

53:42

deal as people think it is. It's

53:45

a huge deal. And what

53:47

we see from states when they kind of

53:50

accept the Medicaid expansion is

53:53

we see that affecting families'

53:56

lives in ways that are way beyond health,

53:59

like evictions go down. on, for example, which when you

54:01

think of it, it makes a lot of

54:03

sense, right? If families aren't forking all this money

54:05

over to basic health needs, they

54:07

have an easier time paying the lights, paying

54:09

the rent, investing in their kids, fixing their

54:12

car up. And so the

54:15

effects of that policy, if we look just

54:17

at the effects on health, it's serious. But

54:20

if you broaden out or look at all

54:22

these other ways those policies affect people's lives,

54:25

but accepting or turning away, rejecting

54:28

this really needed relief for families.

54:31

That was incredibly costly. That cost

54:33

lives and that blunted futures. Now,

54:36

are there any policy solutions that

54:38

are being considered today that you

54:42

think are like right direction? So there are a

54:44

lot of things that people like me would want

54:46

that I know aren't being considered. But

54:49

is there anything on the table today where you're like,

54:51

you know what, this is feels

54:53

a little more likely, either at the

54:55

city, state or national level. And

54:57

it's like a good thing we should be scaling. Yeah.

55:01

So the pandemic, right? It

55:04

has this paradox, which is most

55:07

Americans, I mean, and this really

55:09

speaks to what America is like

55:11

today, most Americans were financially better

55:13

off during the pandemic than before.

55:16

And the reason for that is these three

55:18

enormous relief bills. And I think the American

55:20

Rescue Plan, which Biden released, is

55:23

one we have to take really seriously when it

55:25

comes to this question. So,

55:27

you know, one of the things that was in

55:30

the American Rescue Plan was a child tax

55:32

credit, which reduced child poverty by

55:34

46% in six

55:36

months, 46% poverty

55:38

reductions in six months. And

55:41

so there are proposals to make that

55:43

extended child tax credit permanent, you know,

55:46

and to bring America into the 21st

55:48

century, because we are like one of

55:50

the only advanced democracies without a child

55:52

allowance. And we had

55:55

one for a brief, shining moment,

55:57

and then we let it go away. And so

55:59

I think that bringing back

56:01

some of the policies that were

56:03

rolled out during the pandemic that

56:05

had this historic, incredible

56:08

effect on reducing poverty

56:11

would make a lot of sense. And

56:13

then I think we also have to think

56:15

about ways of addressing exploitation in the housing

56:17

and financial markets. And so

56:19

deepening our investments in social housing or public

56:21

housing make a lot of sense to me.

56:24

Providing more on-ramps for home ownership

56:27

for low income families or proposals that have been on the

56:29

books for a long time that I support. And

56:32

also this kind of new energy around

56:34

unionization and worker power and investing in

56:37

that, especially enforcing labor laws. So I

56:39

think there's a lot of exciting things

56:41

that are going on. There's always really

56:43

exciting things going on here, there, everywhere.

56:46

But it's like the old American problem where we're just

56:48

not dosing the problem as much as we have

56:51

to. One of the other things

56:53

that you write about in the book is in

56:55

the way I thought about it was sort of the illusion of

56:57

the middle class. That's

56:59

sort of the way that maybe our

57:01

language around the middle class is not

57:03

as precise or the middle class isn't

57:05

as real or as potent as people

57:08

talk about it as. Or maybe I read that that

57:10

is that was my takeaway from the book.

57:14

I guess my question is like, are more people actually

57:17

poor and we need to update the definition?

57:21

Or is there truly like a middle class? I

57:23

guess it depends what we mean by middle class

57:26

and what we mean by poor. And the thing

57:28

is like no one says the P word, our

57:30

politicians, even our most progressive politicians,

57:32

they don't say poverty. They

57:34

say families, they say middle class,

57:37

they say workers. And

57:39

even in many of our anti-poverty

57:41

movements with the Poor People's Campaign

57:43

being the exception, they don't organize

57:45

under that banner, that banner of

57:47

anti-poverty. They organize as tenants or

57:49

workers or families. And

57:51

so poverty still remains so stigmatized in

57:54

the country that it

57:56

really kind of silences folks. But

57:58

as Michael Tubbs says, He can't fix a problem

58:00

that you don't name. And I think

58:03

he's right. If we've got a

58:05

third of the country living in homes making $55,000 or less, many

58:07

of those would

58:09

be considered officially middle class by

58:11

some standard. But does

58:13

that feel like economic security to those families?

58:16

I don't think so. And

58:18

so one of the other myths about the middle

58:20

class is that the middle class and

58:23

the affluent are subsidizing the poor. And

58:26

this is another myth that the book takes on. And it

58:28

shows that a lot of us, whether we're

58:30

poor or whether we're secure in our money, are

58:33

benefiting from the government. And in fact, the

58:35

book makes this argument that the

58:37

rich actually get the most from the government

58:40

when it comes to dollars going out the door. And

58:43

so I think this in-balance welfare state is

58:45

another myth we have to confront because the

58:48

implications of recognizing that are huge. And the

58:51

biggest implication for me is it

58:53

makes us reject this scarcity

58:56

mindset or this lie that

58:58

this rich country can't afford to do more. We

59:02

could abolish poverty if the

59:04

rich just took less from the government. Now,

59:07

I'm interested because the book has been out. It

59:09

didn't come out yesterday. It's had a

59:11

life. How has it been received?

59:14

I can imagine it is allow people to talk about things

59:16

in ways that they might not have had the language for.

59:19

But I'm interested, what has it been like as it's been

59:21

out in the world? I think there's

59:23

a real hunger for this book. I

59:25

was actually, frankly, shocked that so many people

59:27

were engaging it and connecting to it. And

59:30

I think it speaks to something that's happening in American

59:33

life right now, where a lot of

59:35

people are just completely dissatisfied with

59:37

all this poverty and all this

59:39

inequality and all this exploitation around

59:41

them. The polls show this. Most

59:44

Democrats and most Republicans now

59:48

believe that the minimum wage is too low, that

59:50

the rich aren't paying their fair share of taxes.

59:52

They're right. It's a result of

59:54

a structural failing, not an individual

59:56

or moral failing. So it's

59:58

like something's changed. And it's like the

1:00:00

old saying where the old is dying, but the

1:00:02

new hasn't been born yet. And

1:00:05

I think that interacting

1:00:07

with audiences and readers and organizers

1:00:09

that are in this kind of

1:00:11

inflection moment has been really exciting.

1:00:15

I think that one of

1:00:17

the things I'm confronting is hopelessness though. There's

1:00:20

a lot of hopelessness and there's

1:00:22

a lot of folks that are like responding

1:00:24

to the book. They're like, I'm

1:00:26

with you. I understand. But, and there's like a

1:00:29

but, you know, but cognitive. I'm not going to Congress or,

1:00:31

but you know, you should see my neighbors. My neighbors will

1:00:33

never get behind this. And

1:00:35

I think that we have to push through that.

1:00:37

And I think that we have to recognize that,

1:00:39

you know, just sheer hopelessness is useless to

1:00:42

this mission. And we have

1:00:44

to find ways of grasping for and working

1:00:47

toward cultivating the language of promise and hope.

1:00:50

And anti-poverty organizers do this all the time.

1:00:52

You know, I mean, if

1:00:54

we want hopeful spaces, like join up

1:00:57

and you know, you'll find folks that are not naive

1:00:59

that are up against it, but if also had real

1:01:01

wins. And I think those are

1:01:04

spaces of beautiful collective strength. And

1:01:06

where do you get your hope from? From

1:01:08

folks on the ground, putting their shoulders to the

1:01:10

wheel. You know, there's a little story

1:01:12

in the book about this group

1:01:15

I was hanging out with right before

1:01:17

COVID. They're called United Adventures for Justice.

1:01:19

They're in Minneapolis. A lot

1:01:21

of undocumented folks, folks who spoke

1:01:23

different languages, communicating across Google translate

1:01:25

app on their phone. And

1:01:28

they were fighting a landlord. They had a landlord

1:01:30

and they found him negligent and they actually went

1:01:32

and asked him for the buildings back. They're like,

1:01:34

sell us the buildings. And the landlord was like,

1:01:37

all right, seven million bucks, you

1:01:39

know? And so the tenants were like, we'll be right

1:01:41

back. And so they started

1:01:43

raising the money, but they also started protesting the

1:01:45

landlord pretty hard. And it kind of

1:01:47

came to a head. They raised the money. They raised

1:01:49

$7 million, but they also were

1:01:51

all threatened with eviction. The landlord had had

1:01:54

enough. It kind of

1:01:56

came to a head this one snowy day

1:01:58

during a jury trial where the tenants were

1:02:00

either going to be homeowners or homeless. And

1:02:03

I was sitting next to this one

1:02:05

tenant, her name was Takara, and we're

1:02:08

waiting for the jury. And she says, you know,

1:02:10

what's taking this jury so long? They're asking themselves,

1:02:13

why do these tenants want this raggedy building? And

1:02:15

it's because people have forgotten how to dream. And

1:02:19

when she said that to me, I was like, gosh,

1:02:22

maybe I've forgotten how to dream, you know?

1:02:25

And maybe I've been all about

1:02:27

what can get through Congress, what's pragmatic, but

1:02:29

like, who gets to say what's feasible? These

1:02:32

tenants didn't think about

1:02:34

those terms. They just sought

1:02:36

something and they won. And

1:02:38

I think that's very hopeful, you know?

1:02:41

And I think it's very beautiful. So I think

1:02:43

being in more spaces like that is incredibly hope-giving.

1:02:46

And as we close, can you tell people how

1:02:48

to stay in touch with who you're doing with

1:02:50

your projects? And is it Twitter? Is it Facebook?

1:02:52

Is it TikTok? You

1:02:55

don't strike me as a TikToker, but. I'm

1:02:57

off all of those, I have to say. I'm

1:03:00

divested from social media, but

1:03:03

I do have a website and

1:03:05

the website is called endpovertyusa.org. So

1:03:09

it's just endpovertyusa.org. And it does

1:03:11

two things. It connects families

1:03:13

to social services and their communities that they really

1:03:15

need, that they deserve. And

1:03:17

it connects all of us to anti-poverty organizations, just

1:03:19

putting in the work all around

1:03:21

the country. So if you're interested in getting involved

1:03:24

with becoming a poverty abolitionist, with

1:03:26

binding your lives in solidarity

1:03:29

with the lives of the poor, with if

1:03:32

all this indignity and poverty offends your sense

1:03:34

of decency, go

1:03:36

to this website and plug in with groups in your

1:03:38

own community. You will not regret it. Boom.

1:03:41

Well, Matt, we consider your friend of the pod a

1:03:43

friend in the work and can't wait to see your

1:03:45

next thing. Thanks, Array. I appreciate you,

1:03:47

man. Thank you for these great questions. Well,

1:03:51

that's it. Thanks so much for tuning in to Positive

1:03:53

People this week. Tell your friends to check it out

1:03:55

and make sure you rate it wherever you get your

1:03:58

podcasts, whether it's Apple Podcasts or somewhere else. And

1:04:00

we'll see you next week. PODTA the

1:04:02

People is a production of Quicken Media

1:04:05

produced by AJ Moultrie and mixed by

1:04:07

Evan Zettin, executive produced by me, and

1:04:09

special thanks to our weekly contributors, Ty

1:04:11

Henderson, DR Ballinger, and Miles Ejernsen.