- Just ahead on "Black Issues Forum," with 2024 elections just months away, we'll take a close look at the state of Black voters and some of the key issues driving them to the polls.

We'll also dig into the ongoing conflict in Palestine, where tensions continue to escalate amidst renewed violence and calls for international intervention.

And it's been 70 years since Brown versus the Board of Education, just how much have things changed?

We'll find out next.

Stay with us.

- [Announcer] Quality public television is made possible through the financial contributions of viewers like you, who invite you to join them in supporting PBS NC.

[dynamic music] [dynamic music continues] - Welcome to "Black Issues Forum."

I'm your host, Kenia Thompson.

May 17th marked the 70th anniversary of the Brown versus Board of Education historical ruling, marking a new standard of American education.

But recent educational developments have some asking if we've come as far as we'll go.

We'll talk about it with our guests, along with recent developments in the Palestinian War, and its impact on the US.

But first, we're heading into the warm summer months, and we're inching closer and closer to the 2024 election season.

Conversations about what lies ahead is causing some concern for Black voters who are considering what's next and what it means for their local communities.

My guests here today on the couch are ready to talk about it all.

So let's welcome them to the show.

I have with me today, the deputy director of the North Carolina Black Alliance, Mr. Marcus Bass.

And sitting next to him is his wife, American filmmaker and national community activist, Bree Newsome Bass.

Welcome.

[laughing] - Thank you for having us.

- Thank you.

- So when we think about all the things that are going on right now, we are here heading into June, conversations about elections are ramping up, and some are saying that Republicans may be gaining some ground on Black voters.

There's a peer research that shows that there's a slight increase, just a little bit, about 5% since last year, of Black Republican voters.

So we're about 12% now.

Marcus, are we seeing more Black Republican voters, and what does that mean?

- Well, I think that's a great question to start off with.

I think both parties are seeing disenchantment from their base.

We're seeing both parties pulling further and further away from the core message.

We see the day-to-day lives of those individuals in both parties not being met by those in elected office.

And I think the small bump that we are seeing of Black voters in the Republican field, first, we have to acknowledge how few Black voters are already in that field.

So a bump of any size- - Is significant.

- two or three percentage points is significant.

But by and large, I think you have a larger number of Black individuals that are still on the fence waiting to see who is going to represent them in elected office at every level of the ballot.

And by and large, those in power, those who are seeking power, don't seem to match the message ID of the majority of the base of either side, Republican or Democrat.

- Yeah.

Bree, when we think about Republican or Democrat, historically, Black people have not been on the Republican side for the last, what, 20 to 40-ish years?

But a long time ago, there were a lot of Black Republicans.

What made that shift happen?

- Mm-hmm, yeah, I think the reality is, right, that political parties change, platforms change.

And people bring this up a lot, you'll hear people say, "Well, weren't the Democrats the pro-slavery party?"

Yes, they were, and Republicans were the party of Lincoln.

The reality is though, that during the '60s, during the civil rights era, the Democrats ended up being the party that supported civil rights, passed civil rights legislation, passed the Voting Rights Act.

And in response to that, many white Americans who were opposed to integration switched to the Republican Party.

So a lot of that change really happened more in the late '60s, '70s, '80s.

And so a lot of the division between Republicans and Democrats since then has really been about the issue of civil rights.

And it continues to be about Brown v. Board of Education and voting rights and all of these things, schools.

- Right, DEI, right?

Which we'll get into in a little bit.

When we look at our candidates now though, some people are making the decision if they're even going to vote, because they're not very hopeful for the options.

What are your thoughts on that, Marcus?

- So initially, I think that's a very interesting point.

The reality is, there are far more voters who are being suppressed in communities across North Carolina, in as much as we champion ourselves as being a Tobacco Road state, a lot of North Carolina is rural, not in Durham, not in Charlotte, not in Raleigh.

And so when we look at the changes that have happened, this rapidly moving changes in election laws, every single year, there are new laws being introduced, like voter ID, for instance, when we look at the barriers that these new pieces, like voter ID or like changes in early voting, have on working-class voters, there is a strong sense of bills that are being introduced that are trying to restrict voters.

On top of that, we look at January 6th, where a number of individuals actually tried to attempt a coup, a failed coup in DC, a large number of those individuals lived in North Carolina.

Some of them actually are running for office or are in state government already.

And so I think-- - Which is why we should know who we're voting for.

- Absolutely, absolutely.

- Yes.

- And I think it points to a bigger situation than just apathy alone.

There is an intentional process going on to undermine the vote.

And I think some voters see that happening, not hearing a party respond to those elements of voting rights, and they're dejected from the process altogether.

This not because they are not politically engaged or don't wanna be politically engaged, but they see the system operating against their best interest in regards to voting rights.

- Yeah.

Bree, every election season, we say, "Go vote, go vote, go vote," and it's a very simple conversation, but also a complicated one.

But why do people need to go out and vote?

I think what he mentioned about January 6th and those people living in this state running for positions is a key indicator why you should know who you're voting for and to vote.

- Yeah, absolutely.

Voting is essential.

I mean, if there is no voting, there is no democracy, how do we have any form of self-governance?

And that's why we fought for the vote, that's why people fought and protested, and in some instances, died trying to secure the right to vote.

And so voting is important, at the same time, I think there's a lot that has to happen in addition to voting, right, that often gets neglected.

So yes, we have power in our single vote, but we also have more power if we move as a block, right?

If we are organized as a block, we say, "This is what we're going to vote on, this is what we stand on."

We make it clear to candidates who are running for office, "If you want our vote, this is what you must do."

I agree with Marcus, I think the larger issue really is voter disenfranchisement and voter suppression.

We have high voter turnout.

- What does that mean for those that don't understand that.

- Yes, so disenfranchisement means that you really should, as a citizen of the country, be entitled to participation in the government, be able to vote, be able to petition, be able to have your needs met, right?

Disenfranchisement is the deliberate effort of making it impossible or difficult for people to have equal participation in the society.

So that's what we have been fighting over all this time is the deliberate disenfranchisement.

And that continues beyond the voting booth.

It's not only when we vote, it's when we elect people, and then they refuse to do what we elected them to do.

And so yes, we have to turn out to vote, but I think that where people are getting frustrated is in not recognizing the amount of political action that has to happen in between voting.

- Yeah, you wanted to add something?

- And just to add, this is not solely about the Black community.

North Carolina has a very rich history of Black and white individuals working together to build economic and political power in this state.

And as late as the 1800s, that power, that multiracial power, was being undermined by a ruling wealthy class of individuals that created a system of laws, not to better govern society, but to make sure that the progress was tamped down so corporations could have more influence in the political space, which is why, now, historic numbers of dollars are gonna be put in these elections at every single level of the ballot.

The everyday working farmer of the 1800s could never compete at the same level that we're seeing in politics today, and that's by design.

And so it's not just about marginalizing Black participation, working-class white families, brown families, indigenous communities here, all are suffering at the hands of this political system that is benefiting corporations in North Carolina, not the people.

- Yeah, good points.

Bree, you mentioned earlier protesting.

We've seen a lot of that happening across the country, here locally.

What are some of the pain points that are causing people to be up in arms and just fed up?

- Yeah, I think it's really a broad set of things, honestly, when you really look at what people are protesting over, what they're speaking of.

But I think it's all tied by a more fundamental issue, which is really taxation without representation.

I mean, it really goes back to the original issue that kind of led to the formation of the country to begin with, which is, "I'm working, I'm paying taxes, where is my tax money going?"

Right?

Because regardless of how people feel about different issues, they may not be aligned politically in terms of what they think should happen, but where you see broad agreement across the spectrum is that the government is not meeting the needs of the people.

There are basic things that we need, affordable housing, access to healthcare, schools, clean air, basic things.

- Clean air.

[laughing] - Clean air.

- Clean water, yeah.

- Yeah, and so it raises this question of, "Well, where's the money going?"

We know that we have a lot of money in this country, we know that we're working, we know that we're paying taxes, but where is the money going?

And so the protests that you see happening around Israel and Palestine, for instance, ties back into that, because it's a question of funding priorities and agenda priorities.

Here we are, we are bombing Palestine, right?

But we haven't secured voting rights.

There's a number of things that we were looking to happen at the beginning of this administration, and that's not what we're seeing.

And to Marcus's point, I think you're seeing a version of that on both sides, where the needs of the people are not being met, because, again, back to what Marcus said, you have a wealthy minority basically that has a monopoly over our politics.

And it's very hard for people not only to vote, but to participate, to run for office.

It's cost prohibitive, you have to have lots and lots of money.

And that's a lot of what we're coming up against.

- Yeah.

Bree, kind of covered high level some of the pain points or issues that are bringing voters to the polls, but, Marcus, in your observation, what are some of the pain points within the Black community that are going to drive people to the polls, or at least ask the questions of what are our representatives doing?

- Absolutely, we have to start first with justice, right?

For the past 20 years, actually for the past 150 years, since before emancipation, I think the criminal justice system, the system of policing, has caused undue burden and stress on the outcomes of Black people in general.

Overpoliced, the burden of policing at every single level, from community to schools, is creating a situation where the living conditions of residents across the state is undermined by this system of negative police engagement.

And so criminal justice reform is on the ballot, not just in policing, in regards to the judicial system.

We've seen a number of individuals in the judiciary attacked.

Just this year alone, when we think about Justice Anita Earls, who was almost removed from the bench from speaking about the treatment that she received on the bench.

The intentionality of attacking these individuals, and Black women across the country that are standing up defending democracy now are being attacked, those are issues of criminal justice reform.

So from those that are engaged in the system by way of drug activity or gang violence to those that have some of the highest degrees in the land are being undermined by this criminal justice system.

It's one of the first areas on the ballot.

Secondly is education.

I know we're here to talk about the 70th anniversary of Brown and that decision and how far we have or have not come, and 30 years removed from Leandro, but education is still the great equalizer.

You cannot properly vote if you can't read a ballot.

If you can't do some of the basic things in society to properly educate our community, you are causing more harm than good.

When we talk about the inequities in our school system, rural communities, children with disabilities, individuals that are English second learners, there are a larger and larger number of populations that are being underserved.

And in response, the state, instead of properly, adequately funding public schools, are diverting and divesting from the same sound public education that made North Carolina a thriving environment.

We're here at the centennial of Duke University, and if it wasn't for the benevolence of philanthropists like Duke, we wouldn't have the investment in working in social spaces.

So the white philanthropic community has always supported public education.

It's only until recently where this legislation has undermined our ability to really govern correctly and adequately fund all students based on this new influence of race and class.

- Let me interject there, because recently, we've talked about UNC's Board of Governor's decision to eliminate DEI positions.

Speaking to what you were just referring to, in Franklin County recently, they made budget-cut decisions, and part of that decision was to eliminate librarian roles, right?

So then does that take us to this critical race theory conversation?

Bree, what are your thoughts?

We're here at the 70th anniversary of Board vs. Brown of Education, and that question that I posed before, have we come far enough?

- Absolutely not.

[laughing] [Kenia laughing] Absolutely not.

And worse than that, we're actually going backwards, because in reality, we have fewer civil rights protections today than we did like 15 years ago.

I mean, I was here protesting with the Moral Monday march when the Supreme Court began its attack on the Voting Rights Act.

And I think the reality is, we kinda operate with a narrative that's not entirely true, right?

Which is that we had a civil rights movement and everyone agreed that segregation was wrong, and we desegregated, and then we moved on.

And that's really not true.

Yes, we desegregated, but there has always been a very strong, persistent element in this country that has never accepted the idea of racial equality, that has never accepted the idea of our participating equally in the system.

And that's what all of this ties back to, the banning of books, the demonizing of critical race theory, which it has no connection [laughing] to anything that's taught in public schools, right?

The attacks on Black history, getting rid of librarians.

I mean, all of this is about, we used to not be allowed to go into the libraries at all.

- Right, that's right.

- Before that, we were not allowed to read.

I mean, all of this ties back to our ability to be engaged, active citizens and participants in the government.

And education is so fundamental to that, that it's always at the center of those conflicts.

- Yeah.

Recently, in response to the 70th anniversary of the Brown vs. Board of Education, Clarence Thomas, recently, he had the following to say about the decision that took place.

He said "A boundless view of equitable remedies," when the Supreme Court told schools in 1955 how they needed to comply with the initial 1954 decision.

I was trying to interpret it, that statement, "Boundless view of equitable remedies," what is your interpretation of that?

- Good luck trying to interpret Clarence Thomas.

[Kenia laughing] So I think his remarks follow a narrative that we're seeing even here in North Carolina, where in some way, shape or form, even though there's documented research, even though these instances of race and the implications of systemic racism have been studied and unpacked, there is still this denial of the basic truths of the harms that this country has faced because of racism and because of racist policies.

Clarence Thomas having this interpretation of the remedy of Brown being boundless or overstretching beyond imagination into this false reality, it's a false narrative that Black people have benefited on behalf of the system being benevolent.

And that's not the case.

The fact of the matter is, there were two Brown rulings.

There was Brown I, the original ruling in court that mandated that the schools were not properly educating students using the basis of race.

And then the second ruling really implemented a remedy, because the ruling itself was not good enough for the states to really implement or create a sound basic education based on the Constitution.

Thankfully, in North Carolina, our constitution, which was rewritten immediately after slavery ended, immediately after emancipation, put a mandate in for that sound basic education, which is why a third Brown, what we call Leandro now is still trying to force the state, force the Constitution to follow this mandate.

But interestingly enough, Clarence Thomas thinks if the court puts out a ruling and there should be no teeth behind that ruling, as if there's really no system of checks and balances to begin with, these are just independent bodies that just happen to know each other, but not necessarily interact with each other.

And I think that logic and that rhetoric is not fueled by his own beliefs or even his own background, but it is fueled by, again, corporate interest, his opportunity to use a sounding board on a national platform, and being one of the highest-ranking officials in the judiciary, also being embedded with this kind of corporate interest.

And he is speaking not directly to the individuals that need to be educated in society, he is spewing a talking point that really is devaluing the importance of the constitutional mandates for education in this country and in our state.

- Yeah, you said it.

I mean, I think that, like you said, it's hard to decipher a lot of things that he said.

But the bigger issue is, again, going back to the question of have we come far enough?

And like you said, I don't think we have, and there's a lot that needs to be addressed.

When you talk about budget, we can kinda slide into the war in Palestine now, we've seen all the aid that we've pulled together for this.

And obviously no one deserves to have lives lost in this manner, but there's a lot that needs to be remedied at home.

And the argument is, "Well, these are different buckets," but what truly is the impact of our assistance, the United States assistance to wars like this, how does that impact us, and then specifically the Black community?

- Mm-hmm, so I'm gonna be very direct.

Obviously, I'm wearing my keffiyeh- - [laughing] Please.

[Bree laughing] - I came to be very direct.

The reality is that Israel represents, in many ways, the last stronghold of apartheid systems, racial apartheid, okay?

Israel is an occupying force, it has been an occupying force in Palestine for 76 years, I believe, at this point.

What the United States is providing to Israel is weapons and political support for a genocide.

It is genocide.

I understand that there are a lot of people, particularly in the United States, who, in their positions, they do not feel like they are able to say that, there are a lot of people facing threats of unemployment.

I have had invitations rescinded to speak in places because of my willingness to be vocal and say that what is happening here is genocide.

As for how it connects to our situation as Black Americans, it's one struggle.

Malcolm X spoke to this, Nelson Mandela, of course, spoke to this.

Israel was one of the primary supporters of apartheid in South Africa.

Israel trains police officers on tactics that they use on us here in America.

Israel is using armed drones against the Palestinians.

That same weaponry is now being sold to police in Louisiana.

So we're really talking about one system.

We need to understand that, okay?

When we're talking about the struggle for racial integration in America, that is the same struggle as that of indigenous South Africans fighting against apartheid there.

It is the same struggle as Palestinians.

The reality is that the United States is and has always been the main enforcer in the world of racial inequality and white supremacist systems.

And that's what's happening right now.

You see other nations, our allies in the West, who are recognizing that we have to put some kind of conditions on Israel, at the very least, at the very least.

I, of course, believe that Israel needs to be dismantled because it is an apartheid state.

It was created as, essentially, like a white settler colonial state.

And they continue to take land that does not belong to Israel, Gaza is not a part of Israel, and they're continuing to take land and annex it and build settlements there.

And so my last point that I want to make is that it's not over there, it's not all the way over there.

And I think this implication that we get, especially as Black Americans, that it has nothing to do with us, that it's not our business, is not only incorrect, that also is racism.

Because what is that to say that Black people, we don't have any concerns out of what's happening right around us, we can't have an analysis about what's happening globally?

The reason we don't have all the things that we were listening before, affordable housing, healthcare, is because all the money is going towards bombing children.

And it's mostly children that are being killed over there.

So I really thank you for the opportunity to come and say that, because I really do want people to understand, we have to be very clear, there's not a both sides in this conflict, there's not.

There are some things that are complicated, there are issues, there are wars that are complicated.

That's not what this situation is.

That's what we are told this is so that they can get our support for something that we know is a crime.

The International Criminal Court has already issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu.

So what are our fundamental values?

That's the last thing I wanna say, right?

Do we respect democracy?

Do we respect human rights?

Because the reality is that genocide is the most extreme form of racism.

So there's no way that we can say that we are defending democracy and human rights and civil rights and all of these things, and we're sponsoring genocide.

They don't... - We just have about 30 seconds left.

Before we part, share your website with everyone in case they wanna reach out.

- Yes.

So the best way to get in touch with us, safevoternc.org, ncblackalliance.org.

Those two sites can give you all the information you need.

- Thank you, thank you.

Marcus Bass, Bree Newsome Bass, thank you for being honest.

- Thank you.

- Thank you.

And we thank you for watching.

If you want more content like this, we invite you to engage with us on Instagram using the hashtag, BlackIssuesForum.

You can also find our full episodes on pbsnc.org/blackissuesforum, and on the PBS video app.

I'm Kenia Thompson, I'll see ya next time.

[dynamic music] [dynamic music continues] [dynamic music continues] - [Announcer] Quality public television is made possible through the financial contributions of viewers like you, who invite you to join them in supporting PBS NC.