Good morning, Peepsen, and welcome to Okay f Daily with Meet your Girl Danielle Moody recording from the Home Bunker. You know, folks, we are just a handful of days until the State of Georgia makes its decision in their runoff election about who is going to represent them. Now, I have had such deep feelings about what Republicans have
done in the State of Georgia. I've had such deep feelings about the political apparatus that is even allowed for Reverend Warnock to have a fighting chance in the State of Georgia because of the work that's Stacy Abrams, Blackpack and other on the ground coalitions have done to create a get out the vote apparatus that is bar none and should be replicated in every fucking state in this country, regardless of how red we think that it is, because what Democrats do and have done is just seed states,
full states, full fucking regions to Republicans and say, oh, we could never instead of getting on the ground three hundred and sixty five days a year talking to people, organizing with people, building up momentum, and building a pipeline of candidates that could potentially whether it is in five years and ten years or in twenty years, turn that state from red too fucking purple too blue. Right, That's
the kind of elbow grease. Is the kind of fortitude, that is the kind of persistence that black women have, that have been at the forefront of shaping and changing Georgia that Democrats need to have up and down this fucking country if they want to, in fact, preserve and
expand our democracy. What do I mean by expand? I mean that we live up to our creed where all people are treated equal, where everyone has access to liberty and justice and freedom and happiness, and that these are not just words and parts of our constitution, but that we live these ideals, and these ideals are present in our policies. Right. That doesn't happen when we keep ping ponging back and forth between the white nationalist Republican Party
and the Democrats. Right. So when we look at this race, this Senate race, and you know, I've heard some people say, well, oh, it's not that consequential anymore, because we already have the Democrats have already won the Senate. And I say to them, are you dumb? Because the more Democratic senators we have, the more things that we actually get done. So no, we don't just throw up our hands and say so
we won. We don't need another seat, Yes we fucking do. Frankly, we need sixty in order to get all of the things done that we actually want to get done in this country and can't because of the archaic racist filibuster that is in place and because of Joe Manchin and Kursen Cinema that deny us the ability to get rid
of the filibuster. So we can codify you know, women's rights and voting rights into this country, so that we nullify the damage that the Supreme Court is doing now that it has been weaponized and radicalized by the white
supremacy Republican Party. So when I look at Georgia and I look at a herschel Walker that is a empty vessel puppet for white supremacy and the Republican Party that they would lift up this man that has near a brain in his head, it's clearly I mean not even under I don't even what is the worst word, rather than underqualified for a job, right like he is, whatever
that word is, that is what herschel Walker is. Herschel Walker couldn't even be I think in charge of coaching a little league football team, because the man does not
have control of his mental faculties. You listen to him and in Warnock's latest ad, which is by far the most brilliant thing I have seen, and again I'm like, if Democrats at the national level are not paying attention to one the apparatus that has been put in place to get out the vote in Georgia, and to two the way in which Reverend Warnock has decided to fight back against the white supremacists in Georgia, they're not paying
attention his latest attack ad looks like this. It looks like a bunch of Georgians, different races, different ages, sitting in a white room like a focus group, and they have headphones on and they're watching herschel Walker in his own words at rallies. They're watching clips of him speaking. The entire ad is just them reacting to herschel Walker speaking. It is brilliant. They're listening to herschel Walker talk about vampires and werewolves and how he wants to be a werewolf.
Now they're watching videos of herschel Walker just run on about bad air in China and good air in the United states, and like we have enough good air, so they're bad air, won't get I mean it is. And then the people are reacting and their reactions go range from ways of embarrassment to anger, to frustration to this is how little And this is what I have been saying, This is how little the Republican Party thinks about the people of Georgia. That all they want is a yes man.
All they want is somebody to hit the yes button. Not somebody that is going to think about them, that is going to lead them, that is going to be supportive of them and actually understand their needs. No, they just need an empty vessel in there, a empty black body that they can point to and say, boy, you go ahead and go do that. Boy, you go ahead
and vote like that. And I spoke about this that a good reverend down in Georgia went viral for his video lambasting Herschel Walker, lambasting white nationalist racist in the state of Georgia, saying that they don't want you to have a man that is of philosophy. They want you to vote for the man with a football. You don't
need a walker, you need a leader. You need somebody that is about running this state putting us on the map, right, And I gotta tell you that herschel Walker bodies exactly what it is the Republican Party thinks about black people, what they think about people of color, how very little they think about us, right. And you can tell by
the company that these motherfuckers keep. You know, they say nothing still with regard to Donald Trump dining with a white supremacy and known white supremacis and anti semi in Nick Fluente's end in Kanye West, they say nothing because they don't want to upset their base, which is built on white supremacy and white supremacists. Their silence tells us who they are. And this is the thing and I did to TikTok about this earlier in the week, which said this, you don't need to announce that you are
a racist. You do not need to announce that you are an anti semi. All you have to do is pay attention to what people say, what they don't say, and who the fuck they rock with. That will give you all the information that you need. I don't need Donald Trump to stand up on a stage and say that he is a racist. I know that Donald Trump is a racist. I know it from the ways that he ran his fucking rental buildings in New York City
and was sued for it. I know the way in which he had spoken about black people, that's my good black over there. I know the way that he has spoken about African nations and nations are built by people of color as shiphole countries. I know the ways that he has treated undocumented people in this country. I know the ways that he has spoken about Mexicans in this country, how he has said that those that come in here should be from good places like Finland or Norwegian. Right
like we know who Donald Trump is. It is willful ignorance that has us believed that this Republican Party isn't
just a well funded, well organized, fucking hate group. So it is more important than ever, more important than ever, that we elect people who look like this country's demographic shift, and not just look like them in the way that the Republican Party has put up this empty vessel known as herschel Walker, that doesn't just have the complexion, but has the character and the fortitude and the will to match what we need in order to preserve our democracy,
in order to actualize our freedoms in this country, Coming up next, it's my conversation with Dalida Hosha, who is the executive director of renew US, which is an organization that is about endorsing progressive, Black, Indigenous people of color candidates across America and giving them the skills and the ability to be able to not only run as candidates,
but to run campaigns as well. So I will talk with Delida about a whole host of things and why it is important that organizations like renew US exist, folks. I am very excited to welcome to woka F Daily for the very first time Dalida Hosha, who is the executive director of renew US, say an organization that is dedicated in working with down ballot progressive candidates. Dalida, please tell the WOKAF audience a bit more about renew USA and how what integral part you played in in the
midterm elections. Yeah, sure, Danielle, thank you for having me. Um So, as you said, renew USA really trying to make sure we identify the gaps that progressive um you know, the left has been missing in order to really build true power. Right, we have seen how since the seventies the far right really invested in state they had, you know, this strategy to invest in state power. UM, while the far left we just thought that you know, DC was the goal, right and UM, at a national level, things
have not changed. So UM Renew really wants to focus on building that power locally, UM to make sure that power rises up right, to make sure that we can change things on a local and state level, because that's where it truly matters, like that's where impacts our day to day life, not so much at a national level, where most of the things get stuck, you know, and we don't see change that really impacts our life and
push us forward towards justice. So Renew have been able to identify the gaps and we have been able to provide the service to close that gap and really really invest in candidates at a local and state level to build that long lasting progressive power that we desperately need in order to save our planet, in order to change you know, our lives, everyday lives for immigrants, lgbtqu Native Americans, you know, just really really change the lives of those
who have been the most marginalized in this country and and honestly worldwide. Let's talk a bit about the fact that Democrats for far too long have ceded state influence to the right. Right, like you said, you know, democrats will the democratic establishment has always told us, okay, we need representative representation in Congress, in the Senate, um know,
at the governorship, the presidency. And so what has happened by virtue of that is that folks have kind of allowed what is happening at the state, uh and local level to kind of fall by the wayside. Can you speak to some of the candidates, UM that you all were helping in the races that you were helping in, and why it's important for folks who may only be invested at the national level to understand the intricacies of
about what happens at the state and local level. Sure, Um, so VERNUA is in twelve different states, right, so we had candidates UM in various uh in all the twelve states and UM progressive candidates. For example, in North Carolina, we had we endorsed Carla who first Latina would become the first Latina to be elected, uh, you know to the state house. UM. We indorsed for example, my district
right here in Massachusetts. UH, we worked on Robin Kennedy for state Senate right, um, and progressive candidate um who is now thankfully my my state senator. Um. So, we we had just amazing candidates that we indorsed um all over the country. And obviously when um, when you're going for progressive candidates, it also means that you're going to lose a lot, right, You're gonna lose them because you gotta be if we're not built to to lose, then we're not built to like really be in the fight
we you know, um so. And the important is um candidates um As I say, the power flows up right, So candidates at a local and state level most likely there is a pipeline for them to then go to Congress. Right. So if we're not investing at a state level, local and state level, then we're really not looking forward to the power that we could build towards, right, um. And that's what the far right did. They like invested so
deeply in local and state level. And then we wonder sometimes we caught off guardens like how did we get that that person as you know, a US Congress uh, you know, representative, oh senators, just like well they've been building while we've been, um, you know, the the left been pretending that we're just like going straight to um, you know, Congress in White House to get the power.
Then they've been building because they know the power is going up instead of like you're not seeing your US representative or US senator leaving that position to come down and become your state senator. Right, that's not happening, right, And that is why it's so important for us to build local and state level because most likely those are the folks that are going to be representing you at the national level. UM. And and the changes that truly
happens at a local and state level. UM. Take immigration form you know an example, and I'm taking immigration. I'm an immigrant right from Kate Bird, which is west coast of Africa. We continue to hear that immigration is national, you know, it should be debated and it should be so called fixed at a national level. Right in the meantime, you know, the system is broken. Nothing is getting done on a national level. So that means we have to
be able to do it at a state level. And in order to be able to do it at a state level, we have to be able to work with progressive candidates, get them in office so we can get those laws change at a state level, and that is going to impact what happens on the national levels, not the other way around, as we've been pretending that it
is right. So, you know, one of the things that I think has been really important to me as I've been looking and trying to educate people on why they should care about state and local races is what's happening with the school boards right. For instance, school boards have been taken over by the far right and they are banning books. Right, two thousand books have been banned across you know, k through twelve schools across this country. They
are banning curriculum, they're banning words. And I'm saying if you're a person, regardless of if you have kids in the school system or not, right, you should care about how young people are being educated. So, how does RENEW get people activated and interested in either running for office themselves or being trained to go and find folks that
are interested in running for office and then running their campaigns. Yeah, so RENEW is really focused on recruiting our own I call it our own people, right, regular people who are nurses, parents, advocates, activists. We're really recruiting people who wouldn't think that they are fit to be an office, they are fit to represent. We have activists on the ground every day organizing, trying to change um uh you know uh laws and trying to put in place things that it's going to better
our lives. But a lot of them don't think that they have the skills or they have what it takes to actually be a public um, you know, servant in that way of like representing their constituents. Right, So we are going out there identifying those those folks who have been doing the work for so long and having you know, just conversations, Um, have you thought of yourself as someone
who can run for office? Um? And you know they say it takes at least seven times when you ask a female identified the person um for them to say yes, um. And that is um. You know it's it's not that's not by accident, right, that is not by accident. So we are taking a time to make sure that it's not a one time conversation. UM. It's you know, we are building a community as we recruit folks. We are building a community and we are creating the conditions for
them to claim and reclaim their power. We don't have the power to give anyone right you have. We can only create the conditions for people to recognize their power and take it. And that is exactly what Bruneau is doing. We are recruiting candidates, we are providing the trainings that they need and apologies if you hear my dog, we are providing the trainings that they need because it's not just getting that person to say yes, right, it's also
providing them with the trainings that they need. Because a lot of the times that is why a lot of folks get discouraged from running. They get someone to recruit them and then it's kind of like, oh, now you have to figure out on your own what you need in order to run a campaign, and that's not fair to them. And then when you know the campaign is not quote unquote successful because they're not elected, then they
get discouraged and they sort of like go away. And that is we continue to lose people in our movement, and that is why the folks who are left are getting burnt out because we're just like constantly viewing too much. Right. So we are providing the trainings that they need, and
we also providing trainings for campaign managers. Right. We renew noticed that there was a gap, right, we not enough people of color, lgbtqu members of the community have been um, you know, have been sort of allowed at the opportunity to learn the skills needed to become campaign managers, which means that we have an issue with the pipeline because most of the people who become campaign managers eventually, um either you're becoming chief of staff or becoming a staff
member of whoever is elected, and then that opens the door for you to then later on run. Right, So like the that is a game, that is a gap, like when you have a lack of you know, uh leaders in the pipeline to be able to represent us.
And that is what renew is doing. We training campaign managers all across the country and then connecting them to progressive candidates not only for them to be supported with their campaign with progressives, but also to create that pipeline to then have more of our people, I continue to say,
our people representing us. Tell us a little bit about what you're training, particularly for campaign managers, because I do remember, you know, working on Capitol Hill and I was a part I went to Capitol Hill as a member of the Congressional Black Caucuses fellowship program, and the whole purpose of that was to bring more black people to Capitol Hill because in many ways in Washington, DC, that pipeline was fueled by people who were afforded the ability and
privilege to do unpaid internships. We don't do that kind of thing anymore, but because of unpaid intern ships, that the assumption was that your families had money, right, and and you didn't have to spend any time working and you could uh kind of get your foot in the door. Um. And so the CBC recognized that there was a huge gap in terms of black and brown people being represented on Capitol Hill for that reason. So I want to talk a little bit about your the campaign manager training,
uh trainings and programs. What are some of the things that you offer and how do people find the program if in fact they are interested uh in in getting in getting that experience. Yeah, so some some of the trainings included in the curriculum UM fundraising. Right, and we know whether folks want to have an open conversation about it, UM. We know UM that bipop folks have have had a sort of UM streaming relationship with with money. Right. I For example, book UM was one of the things that
I shy away from is asking is organizing money. We don't see it as organized money. A lot of the times we're seeing as you know, bagging, so we shy away from that. So that is part of fundraising, is part of the training really um you know uh, teaching our participants to look at it from a different angle. It's about organizing money, um, that you need to do in order to achieve a goal, right um. And UM we also training on you know, uh comms right um.
As a campaign manager, messaging extremely important, right. So we have messaging training, we have fundraising training, vote builder, uh, anything that you will need in order to um, you know, confidently run a campaign um. Which is as you said, uh and an issue because a lot of folks who can afford to do interference internship and paid internship, you know, they gained those skills, but for the rest of us who cannot afford to do that, we continue to be
left behind. And then there's this constant narrative of just like, um, folks are not coming to the table. It's just like they can't come to the table if they don't if they thinking about how I'm not going to meet my knee Yeah, where's my where's my mail coming from the next day? How I'm not going to feed my family. You can't come to the table like that. Yeah. You know, one of the things that has been on the rise in this country over the last several years is political violence,
threats of political violence. I mean we just you know, uh saw the attack on Paul Pelosi, Speaker Pelosi's husband. We have seen other members of Congress be shot. We have seen other you know, threats of the FBI and bombing and all of these things. How does the rise
in political violence? We saw the polsters that volunteered in Georgia in the twenty twenty election have their entire lives turned upside down and are living in fear because of the former twice impeached presidents tweets and attacks on them. So how do you talk about how does RENEW kind of talk about this the reality of political violence while also seeking to find candidates and volunteers that want to
run for office and work on campaigns. Yeah, so that first, the acknowledgement that fear can paralyze one is something that RENEW. That was the first thing we acknowledge that it's not as easy of just asking someone for you know, to step up and run for office. We care be fears, fear, not body right, especially for us who have a descendants
of slaves. While other people want to acknowledge it, have open conversation, that's a separate thing, but the fact is that it's in our DNA so so fear paralyzes, especially when we see what we're seeing in the media or the experiences that we have in an everyday life. Right. So we knew that we couldn't just UM be out there asking people to run without considering the fact that some people really fear for their lives, especially if you're from a marginalized group. UM, that we need to have
more representative representation of right UM. So renewed UM partnered with puerpoint UM, a national UM UH organization that provides UH you know, security consulting UM and UM can UM provide can really walk with you UM all the steps whether it is you've you've been hacked or you've been UM you know attacked on social media physically attacked. They you know, they Jessica walks with you UH throughout the steps UM for counseling UM and to help you put the safety net in place in order for you to
feel secure to what this is. Uh. And it's not just for candidates. Let me be clears for movement leaders. Yes, it's for movement leaders. I myself for example. UM, I've worked on immigration issue and other issues for a while, and I was working on the you know, driver's license bill here in Massachusetts for undocumented immigrants. When we first filed the bill in twenty nineteen, I started receiving threats.
This the bill passed June of this year, September ninth, Republicans opposition had gathered enough signature to bring it to the ballot. We were going to be the first state. Um, we became the first state where they collected enough signature to bring it to the ballot and potentially repeal it. So it became a ballot campaign from September ninth through November eight, not even enough time. UM, and I faced
threats again. UM. Even my neighbor down the street from me were following me as I was canvassing for Yes on four. I was the I was the field director for the Yes on four campaign, and he was following me, right, And that is you know I already have trauma from Yeah, I already had trauma from when we first filed the bill, when I was receiving emails, social media message and even people making videos about me. Right, it's a violation of my privacy and is exposing me to the world. Right.
So like I carried that fear and my body, so I recognize the fear that other people carry. So to then turn around and for someone to say, hey, do you want to run for office even though you have been so many times without the safety net in place, we can't do that to our people. So that's that is why we have partner with peer Point to provide the service that our movement leaders need in order to claim that power and be in the forefront of the movement.
Sela with the men at ourselves that we have left. You know, what advice do you give or encouragement to people that you know have a voice, they have a position, but they're on the fence about running for office. They're on the fence because of the heightened threats because of putting themselves or their families at risk, but they feel like they need to do something. What advice do you give to them? Seek a community? Right, We cannot do
this alone. Renew cannot do this alone. Candidates cannot do this alone. We need to have a community where we feel held, where we feel we can come to for support, emotional support, physical support, you know, So seek a community, do your research. As I mentioned renew US. You can visit the website renew us dot org and we have the security program and it's for movement leaders. It's not
just for candidates. So you consider yourself a movement leader, you consider yourself someone who has a lot to offer. Send us a message, will you know will help you put in place the steps that you need to feel safe insecure, because if not you who didn't? Right Like, we need up people and we need to build a community, and that is what renews trying to build a community of a political community, a community of movement leaders, because that's the only way we're going to achieve change is
by being together. Yes, the Lada Hostsha, thank you so much for making the time to join. Willk F, thank you for the work that you're doing with renew USA. Folks, check out renew usa dot org for more information on how to get involved if you're interested in running for office, because we need good people to run, and we need good people to run campaigns. Thank you so much for making the time for us today. Appreciate you, thank you, and renew us. Renew us okay, renews dot yeah, okay,
thank you. Thank you so much for having me, Danielle. Absolutely bye. That is it for me today. Dear friends on Woke a f as always Power to the people and to all the people power, get woke and stay woke as fuck.