'JIM CROW 2.0': Congressman RAGES after Virginia Supreme Court strikes down voter-approved map

0:01 SUPREME COURT STRUCK DOWN THE CONGRESSIONAL REDISTRICTING

0:04 APPROVED BY VIRGINIA VOTERS 17 DAYS AGO.

0:07 IT IS A BIG BLOW TO DEMOCRACY AS VOTERS THERE OPTED FOR THIS NEW MAP,

0:12 BUT IT'S ALSO DEMOCRATIC PARTY AHEAD

0:14 OF THE 2026 MIDTERMS AS THEY SEEK TO COUNTER

0:17 THE GOP EFFORTS TO GERRYMANDER THEMSELVES

0:20 IN A VICTORY AT THE BEHEST OF DONALD TRUMP.

0:23 IN A STATEMENT, VIRGINIA'S ATTORNEY GENERAL J.

0:25 JONES said this, quote, today the Supreme Court of Virginia has chosen

0:30 to put politics over the rule of law.

0:32 This decision silences the voices of the millions of Virginians

0:36 who cast their ballots in every corner of the Commonwealth.

0:40 And it fuels the growing fears across

0:42 our nation about the state of our democracy.

0:44 My team is carefully reviewing this unprecedented order,

0:48 and we are evaluating every legal pathway forward to defend

0:51 the will of the people and protect the integrity of Virginia's elections.

0:56 As California Governor Gavin Newsom put it on social media,

0:59 quote, no vote in Tennessee plus one GOP seat.

1:04 No vote in Florida plus four GOP seats.

1:07 No vote in Missouri plus one GOP seat.

1:11 No vote in North Carolina plus two GOP seats.

1:15 No vote in Texas plus five GOP seats.

1:18 Virginia's voter approved maps thrown out.

1:22 MAGA has rigged the system.

1:24 And at the same time as Virginia's democratically passed maps have been blocked,

1:30 Republican state legislatures are moving full

1:32 steam ahead in passing maps specifically

1:35 designed to eliminate majority black congressional

1:38 districts without consulting their voters at all.

1:41 It happens after the U .S.

1:43 Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act earlier this week.

1:46 Today in South Carolina, senators debated a proposal that would allow

1:50 a special redistricting session to go forward.

1:52 That would eliminate the state's only black

1:54 district held by longtime Congressman Jim Clyburn.

1:57 While in Alabama today,

1:58 a protester was removed from the gallery at the legislature by state

2:03 troopers there as lawmakers debated a bill

2:06 to facilitate redistricting in that state.

2:09 It was signed into law earlier today.

2:11 In Tennessee, lawmakers have already approved new maps

2:15 which abolished the state's only majority black district.

2:19 While Tennessee State Representative Justin Pearson called it, quote,

2:23 a political lynching that violated the rights of every Tennessean.

2:27 Here he is on the floor of the state house.

2:32 This state has legislated and legalized the worst things in humanity,

2:37 including our enslavement, and we are still here.

2:42 Right in this country where,

2:44 as one black woman said, your clancestors enslaved us,

2:47 denied us of our rights, called us three-fifths of a person,

2:52 and yet we are still here.

2:54 You put us on cotton plantations and tobacco plantations.

2:59 You denied our human rights and our right to exist as children of God,

3:03 and we are still here.

3:05 You destroyed Tulsa.

3:08 You killed and lynched black folks on poplar trees.

3:11 Shelby County, Tennessee had the most lynchings of anywhere

3:14 in this state where you're taking this district, and we are still here.

3:19 You've had three strikes laws, mass incarceration denied us of who we are,

3:25 and we are still here,

3:26 and today you will take the only but majority black district from us.

3:31 But I want you to know, and I want my nephew,

3:34 sons, and the future to know, no matter what you do,

3:37 no matter how much you try and break us and make us bend and make us quit,

3:43 we will still be here.

3:50 We will still be here.

3:51 We will still be here.

3:51 That message, that delivery of that message,

3:54 that articulation of resilience and resistance on a day in which

3:58 democracy took a very serious hit is where we start the hour

4:03 with democratic congressman maxwell frost of florida and joining me

4:05 at the table host of politics nation president of the THE REVEREND SHARPTON.

4:11 REV, LET ME START WITH YOU.

4:13 I THINK THAT WE ARE SEEING THE END OF THE SECOND RECONSTRUCTION,

4:18 THE RAWNESS AND INSENSITIVITY THAT IS BEING

4:23 DONE SHOWS THAT THESE PEOPLE ARE DELIBERATELY SAYING

4:28 THAT AS WE CALL ON the world to celebrate

4:32 the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence,

4:35 the very principles that we claim the country has started

4:39 because everybody in the country was not the same status.

4:42 Blacks were slaves 250 years AGO, WOMEN COULDN'T VOTE.

4:46 BUT WE'RE NOT EVEN GOING TO PRETEND

4:48 DURING THIS ANNIVERSARY THAT THIS IS ABOUT DEMOCRACY.

4:51 WE ARE GOING TO, AS IT WAS PUT UP BY GOVERNOR NEWSOM,

4:56 WE'RE GOING TO do with no votes, change what we want.

5:00 And if the people in Virginia vote,

5:02 we'll just flip it over in the Supreme Court.

5:05 So we are approaching this 250th anniversary I DON'T THINK WE ARE GOING

5:13 TO RULE NO MATTER WHAT AND WE'RE GOING TO RULE NO MATTER WHAT.

5:18 WE'RE GOING TO RULE NO MATTER WHAT AND WE'RE GOING TO USE RACE AS ONE

5:21 OF THE WAYS THAT WE'RE GOING TO WHIP everybody in line I might remind people

5:26 the black majority district in Tennessee is represented

5:30 by white blacks vote for whites blacks vote

5:33 for blacks so it's not like just black

5:34 representation the congressman in tennessee the black district

5:39 is white i'm having them on the show

5:42 this weekend and justin who's running against him so i mean the whole idea of us

5:47 bringing the country together they're ripping the shreds

5:50 and they're doing it gleefully and they're

5:53 doing it openly the question is will we

5:55 be able to come with the same force that our forefathers did what does that even

6:00 look like right now i think you've got to organize and mobilize there are groups

6:03 i've been on the phone all day with nash action network and then acp head

6:07 and others we need to be doing everything

6:10 from the streets to doing local decentralized organizing

6:13 if you get you you must remember

6:16 but nicole martin luther king uh fanny lou hamer

6:20 all of them that brought us to voting rights act they didn't have the technical

6:25 techniques that we have they didn't have social

6:27 media model of the you can't never knew what a cell phone was never had even

6:32 better though that people were together and they

6:34 were in the streets it was better if we're not using more ways to communicate i

6:39 think our challenge is that if they didn't

6:41 have the the options we have to organize

6:44 then that means that we are falling down on the job not that the job

6:49 is insurmountable they were getting lynched goodman cheney

6:52 swearna viola poluisa all of them were killed

6:55 for trying to get the right to vote we're talking about we may miss a day

7:00 or two of relaxation at home there is no excuse blacks whites and everybody else

7:06 not to be on the front lines trying

7:09 to save democracy not just for blacks they're

7:12 going to do it all across the board they don't even want to start with us

7:16 congressman you're one of your party's best communicators

7:34 this isn't happening in a vacuum this isn't

7:37 a plan that just came up because donald trump said to go redistrict this is

7:41 the product of a 60 plus year plan to bring this country into jim crow 2

7:47 0 .0 an era where they've traded in the hoods for suits and ties an era

7:53 where they are trying to use our democracy against us to take away not just

7:57 our right to vote but our right to protest our right to privacy our right

8:01 to health care all right to be able to actually have life liberty in the pursuit

8:05 of happiness in this country and they see the south as a threat and that is

8:10 the reason why some of the worst voter

8:12 suppression tactics we see are in the South.

8:15 Over 40% of these nation's black residents live here.

8:19 Most of this nation's civil rights and mass movement,

8:22 people-centered movements started in the South.

8:26 So we, we see that they put us right in the middle of the bullseye

8:30 because they know that we will rise up and we will fight back.

8:33 I want to associate myself with the dog barking along with us.

8:38 I'm sorry about that.

8:39 Don't be sorry don't ever apologize for the canines in your lives.

8:43 I want to ask you this has been we were talking

8:47 before we came on the air this has been a bleak week

8:50 of news in terms of the anti-democratic forces sort of logging some

8:57 legal victories and now taking those and and ramming through gerrymandered maps.

9:03 What is your message in terms of sort of dusting,

9:07 dusting ourselves off and continuing the fight for democracy?

9:12 Well, the first thing I'll say is what our opposition wants us to do

9:15 is throw our hands in the air and say there's nothing more left.

9:18 There's nothing we can do.

9:19 We shouldn't take a part in this system.

9:20 If we walk away from the fight, our adversaries and our opposition,

9:24 they are more than happy to step into our political power for us.

9:28 So we can't run away.

9:29 That is what they want.

9:31 We have to continue to fight.

9:33 And now we understand that we have to do it in very creative ways.

9:37 And I love what the reverend had brought up.

9:39 It's all about grassroots organizing and making sure

9:42 that we're going out into the communities and empowering people,

9:45 and we have to understand, and I think this is important because

9:48 what I'm about to say might be misconstrued.

9:50 We have to understand that we asked people

9:52 to go to the ballot box to protect democracy,

9:54 and the Supreme Court said we're throwing it out.

9:57 We have to understand that as a result of that, a lot

10:00 of people are going to feel like it doesn't matter anymore.

10:03 Us as organizers, us as leaders understanding that isn't so that way we give up,

10:08 but SO WE UNDERSTAND IN THE WAY WE MESSAGE

10:11 THAT WE HAVE TO VALIDATE THE ROOT OF OUR PEOPLE'S CONCERN.

10:13 YES, THIS IS A BROKEN SYSTEM.

10:15 YES, I UNDERSTAND THAT YOU MIGHT NOT FEEL GREAT ABOUT

10:18 OUR DEMOCRACY RIGHT NOW BECAUSE THEY'RE TRYING TO BREAK IT.

10:21 IT WILL BEND BUT WE WILL BE THE ONES TO ENSURE THAT IT DOESN'T BREAK AND I

10:25 THINK THAT ACKNOWLEDGEMENT GOING FORWARD IS IMPORTANT.

10:28 WE CAN'T GASLIGHT PEOPLE WHO HAVE SEEN WHAT HAVE

10:31 BEEN GOING ON ESPECIALLY IN THE SOUTH OVER THE LAST

10:34 100 YEARS BUT WE HAVE TO SAY THAT WE ARE

10:36 NOT UNIQUE IN THIS MOMENT LIKE THE REVEREND BROUGHT UP

10:39 OUR ANCESTORS HAVE BEEN HERE BEFORE THOSE BEFORE US

10:42 WITH LESS AT THEIR DISPOSAL AND THEY DID A LOT

10:45 WITH LESS AND WE CAN DO THE SAME THING

10:47 AND WHAT I DO BELIEVE THERE'S GOING TO BE A MOMENT

10:50 WHERE WE'RE LOOKING BACK ON THIS ON THIS ERA

10:53 AND THAT WE'RE THANKFUL THAT WE KEPT MARCHING AND THAT WE

10:55 KEPT MOVING FORWARD BUT IT'S GOING TO TAKE ALL

10:57 OF US AND IT'S GOING TO TAKE ELECTED OFFICIALS AND I

11:00 HAVE TO SAY THIS ELECTED OFFICIALS NEED TO STOP

11:02 JUST TRYING TO KNOCK DOORS AND ORGANIZE THREE MONTHS BEFORE

11:05 ELECTION DAY YEAR ROUND DON'T BE RAISING MONEY AND KEEPING

11:09 IT IN AN ACCOUNT FOR SOME RACE THAT MIGHT COME.

11:11 SPEND IT YEAR ROUND ON THE DOORS COMMUNITY EVENTS BUILDING POWER

11:15 SO WE WIN NOT JUST THE NEXT ELECTION BUT THE NEXT 10.

11:18 THAT'S WHAT THE RIGHT WING HAS DONE IN THE SOUTH.

11:21 THEY DON'T MAKE SHORT-TERM PLANS,

11:22 THEY MAKE LONG-TERM PLANS AND I THINK IT'S IMPORTANT THAT WE

11:25 DO THE SAME AND IF WE DO THAT, I BELIEVE WE CAN