How NYC’s first Black mayor tried to balance concerns about public safety with demands for a more accountable police force -- and the violent resistance he faced from the police union. Under the Dinkins administration, the crime rate declined, but his complex relationship with the New York Police Department - which grew in size under his tenure - often overshadows his legacy. As voting is underway for the 2021 mayoral race, our senior editor Christopher Werth tells the story of Dinkins’s attempt...
Jun 14, 2021•50 min•Ep 44•Transcript available on Metacast Ibram X. Kendi reflects on a shifting political culture -- and the fierce backlash against it. Plus, a remembrance of the 1921 Tulsa massacre. With five best-selling books, including How to Be an Antiracist and Four Hundred Souls , Kendi has been at the center of the nation’s racial reckoning over the past year. He talks with Kai about the ideas people have found most challenging, and about his new podcast, Be Antiracist , which launches on June 9th. Then, listeners tell us what they’ve learned ...
Jun 07, 2021•51 min•Ep 43•Transcript available on Metacast Jazz pianist Jason Moran brings us an exploration into the life and work of James Reese Europe and how the infamous 369th Infantry Regiment - also known as the Harlem Hellfighters - crossed racial lines and brought jazz to Europe. Joe Young of New York Public Radio talks about how using music as a service member informed his own patriotism Companion listening for this episode: Juneteenth, an Unfinished Business (June 26, 2020) As the nation grapples with a reckoning, we pause to celebrate Junete...
May 31, 2021•1 hr•Ep 42•Transcript available on Metacast New Yorkers reacted to George Floyd’s murder with mass protests demanding police accountability. NYPD met them with targeted violence and abuse. On June 4, 2020, a few hundred people gathered in the South Bronx neighborhood of Mott Haven to protest the murder of George Floyd. They were met with overwhelming force -- in an event that has come to represent NYPD’s steadfast refusal to accept public scrutiny. WNYC’s Race and Justice Unit has been reconstructing what happened that night, from the van...
May 24, 2021•49 min•Ep 41•Transcript available on Metacast We’re finally back in the streets -- but are we ready to reimagine how we share public space? This week, a trip through the century-long fight between cars, bikes, and people. Kai Wright takes us on a bike tour across Brooklyn - alongside Streetsblog New York reporter Dave Colon - to survey the ways in which inequity is built into the blacktop. Former New York City Traffic Commissioner Sam Schwartz a.k.a. Gridlock Sam shares a behind-the-scenes look at the history of the city’s streets and how o...
May 17, 2021•52 min•Ep 40•Transcript available on Metacast We failed her long before the cops killed her. We’re failing thousands more children like her now. In this bonus episode, we meet one of those girls. Girls often land in detention because they have experienced some form of trauma: abusive families, bad experiences in the foster care system, and especially sexual abuse. Desiree is a young woman who has bounced between foster care, detention centers, and residential treatment centers since she was 10. Even though she has been the repeated victim o...
May 13, 2021•33 min•Transcript available on Metacast Erased from history. Ignored in public policy. This Mother’s Day, we ask how to truly value “motherwork.” Plus: The story of one “woke birth.” Gates scholar and author Anna Malaika Tubbs encourages each of us to reimagine our relationships with motherhood and challenge the erasure of mothering figures - starting in the past. Her book, The Three Mothers: How the Mothers of Martin Luther King, Jr, Malcolm X, and James Baldwin Shaped a Nation , tells the stories of the three women who birthed, rais...
May 10, 2021•51 min•Ep 39•Transcript available on Metacast History suggests we shouldn’t laugh off what’s happening in right wing media right now. Plus, profiting off of racism is a business model as old as the news. Nicole Hemmer, an associate research scholar at Columbia University and author of Messengers of the Right: Conservative Media and the Transformation of American Politics , explains how right wing media serves -- and surrounds -- its audience . Then, Channing Gerard Joseph, a journalism professor at the University of Southern California-Anne...
May 03, 2021•49 min•Ep 38•Transcript available on Metacast The answer isn’t simple, but it’s time to ask. Listeners weigh in with stories of their own efforts to solve problems with and without cops. Community organizer and educator Lumumba Akinwole-Bandele joins callers as we reimagine a world without policing, and shares his own stories from decades of police reform activism in New York City. Plus, Dr. Jameta Nicole Barlow , a psychologist, public health scientist, and assistant professor at The George Washington University, explains intergenerational...
Apr 26, 2021•50 min•Ep 37•Transcript available on Metacast A retired NYPD detective says the force’s stubborn, insular culture was built to last. And Elie Mystal explains a 1989 Supreme Court ruling that made killing “reasonable.” Armed with the lessons from a 20-year-long career in law enforcement, retired NYPD Detective Marq Claxton talks about the police mindset and how a badge never shielded him from the fear that so many Black Americans carry everyday. Elie Mystal, justice correspondent at The Nation, grounds the conversation in the history of Amer...
Apr 19, 2021•51 min•Ep 36•Transcript available on Metacast How did Americans come to think so poorly of government? And how did Joe Biden come to be the first modern president who’s even tried to change our minds? Kai talks with three change-makers about the role of government in our lives. Activist Mari Copeny a.k.a. “Little Miss Flint” recounts how a letter that she sent as an elementary school student brought national attention to a public health crisis in her backyard - and inspired her to continue giving back to her community, speaking out and hold...
Apr 12, 2021•51 min•Ep 35•Transcript available on Metacast A gun-toting Black Power advocate was made principal of a Marin County, California school during efforts to desegregate 50 years ago. As they try again, we recount his radical legacy. As the Sausalito Marin City School District continues to grapple with school desegregation, Reporter Marianne McCune brings us the sequel -- and the prequel -- to “ Two Schools in Marin County ”. She takes us back in time to witness how one of the first communities in the country to voluntarily desegregate took an ...
Apr 05, 2021•55 min•Ep 34•Transcript available on Metacast Andrew Cuomo’s just the latest. Why is masculinity so often conflated with domination? And how do we separate the two? Kai turns to a historian and to a novelist for answers. Linda Hirschman, author of Reckoning: The Epic Battle Against Sexual Abuse and Harassment , tells the story of how a small group of women in a room in Ithaca, New York, came up with two words that attempted to change the law, and the workplace, forever. But as you'll hear, victory really has a thousand mothers. Many of the ...
Mar 29, 2021•51 min•Ep 33•Transcript available on Metacast We’ve been here before: A time of national stress, Asian Americans made into scapegoats, and violence follows. The community saw it coming. So why didn’t everybody else? A mass shooting in Atlanta follows a year of warnings from Asian Americans who have said they do not feel safe. But the violence has forced to the surface old questions about where Asian Americans sit in our nation’s maddening racial caste system, and community leaders have struggled to get people across the political and racial...
Mar 22, 2021•47 min•Ep 32•Transcript available on Metacast More than half a million Americans - our family, friends, neighbors, loved ones - have lost their lives to the virus over the past year and our collective grief continues to compound, but communities have come together in remarkable ways to take care of themselves. Grammy-winning singer and songwriter Gregory Porter checks in with us on the first anniversary of the Covid-19 pandemic to talk about grieving his brother lost to the virus , the power of community, and finding encouragement through s...
Mar 15, 2021•50 min•Ep 31•Transcript available on Metacast As Amazon workers conclude a historic unionization drive, we consider the history of collective action -- and the struggle to shield our humanity from the demands of productivity. Labor journalist and Type Media Center reporting fellow Sarah Jaffe breaks down the history of workplace organizing at Amazon and in the Black South. And she talks about her new book, “ Work Won’t Love You Back: How Devotion to Our Jobs Keeps Us Exploited, Exhausted, and Alone ,” as listeners chime in about their own e...
Mar 08, 2021•51 min•Ep 30•Transcript available on Metacast On December 4th of 1969, Fred Hampton -- the 21-year-old chairman of the Illinois Black Panther Party -- was shot dead in his sleep during a raid by Chicago police, but decades of investigation into his death revealed an even more insidious plot. Actor Daniel Kaluuya -- known for his roles in “ Get Out ” and “ Queen & Slim ” -- portrays Hampton in the new film, “ Judas and the Black Messiah ,” which follows Hampton’s meteoric rise through the party, a multiracial class movement and the series of...
Mar 04, 2021•18 min•Transcript available on Metacast A cop in Westchester, NY, was disturbed by what he saw as corruption. He started recording his colleagues -- and revealed how we’re all still living with the excess of the war on drugs. Following months of investigation into allegations of police corruption in Mount Vernon, reporter George Joseph of WNYC’s Race & Justice Unit brings us a story about unchecked power, policing in communities of color and our long national hangover from the war on drugs. Part of George Joseph’s story, “The Mount Ve...
Mar 01, 2021•50 min•Ep 29•Transcript available on Metacast Our Future of Black History series concludes with conversations about self-expression. Because when you carry a collective history in your identity, it can be hard to find yourself. We reflect on the life, language and legacy of renowned writer Zora Neale Hurston with Bernice McFadden , a novelist and contributor to the new anthology, Four Hundred Souls: A Community History Of African America, 1619-2019 . Producer Veralyn Williams then brings us a story about a deep division that continues to pl...
Feb 22, 2021•51 min•Ep 28•Transcript available on Metacast People are excited to replace Andrew Jackson’s face with an abolitionist hero. But Brittney Cooper argues not all honorifics are the same. The Biden Treasury Department has announced that efforts to put abolitionist Harriet Tubman’s portrait -- in place of President Andrew Jackson -- on the face of the twenty dollar bill will resume. It represents an effort to celebrate her and “reflect the history and diversity of our country,” but some believe that this would do more harm than good. Dr. Brittn...
Feb 18, 2021•15 min•Transcript available on Metacast The Senate’s trial and acquittal of Donald Trump left many with mixed emotions. But did it move us any closer to a reckoning with the worst of America’s political culture? Pulitzer Prize-winning historian David Blight returns to the show to help Kai put the trial in historical context. Blight has warned that the former president is trying to create a Confederate-style Lost Cause mythology. So where’s that project stand now? Then WNYC’s Brian Lehrer and The Nation’s Elie Mystal join Kai as he che...
Feb 15, 2021•50 min•Ep 27•Transcript available on Metacast Cultural historian Saidiya Hartman introduces Kai to the young women whose radical lives were obscured by respectability politics, in the second installment of our Future of Black History series. The MacArthur fellow is the author of “ Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments: Intimate Histories of Riotous Black Girls, Troublesome Women, and Queer Radicals ,” which offers an intimate look into some of the Black lives that have been seemingly erased from the history books -- simply for not fitting in...
Feb 08, 2021•50 min•Ep 26•Transcript available on Metacast We’ve got complicated relationships with this annual celebration -- from joy to frustration. So to launch our Future of Black History series, we ask how it began and what it can be. Producer Veralyn Williams invites us into a lively conversation about her annual Black History Month parties -- before COVID-19 social distancing was imposed -- with some friends of the show. Then, Dr. Pero Dagbovie , a University Distinguished Professor in the Department of History and an Associate Dean in the Gradu...
Feb 01, 2021•48 min•Ep 25•Transcript available on Metacast Kai checks in with poet Jericho Brown, historian Kidada Williams, and listeners as we all try to transition out of the Trump presidency. Jericho Brown , recipient of the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for poetry, reads his new work ‘ Inaugural ,’ and reflects upon the power of our words - political rhetoric and prose alike - to strengthen communities. Professor and historian Dr. Kidada E. Williams reflects on the relationship between justice, history and why we must make space for uncomfortable truths abou...
Jan 25, 2021•49 min•Ep 24•Transcript available on Metacast Historian Timothy Snyder offers lessons on what could happen if those who enabled the attack on our democracy don’t face consequences. President Biden was just inaugurated and many Americans are eager to turn the page into a new era. But many are still processing the January 7th U.S. Capitol riot. In this segment from our colleagues at The Brian Lehrer Show , Timothy Snyder , professor of history at Yale University and a permanent fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna, offers hist...
Jan 21, 2021•16 min•Transcript available on Metacast And what MLK’s uniquely Black theology can teach us about the relationship between faith and politics in 2021. Rev. Dr. Yolanda Pierce, dean of the Howard University School of Divinity and author of the forthcoming book “In My Grandmother's House: Black Women, Faith, and the Stories We Inherit,” walks Kai through the history of the Black Church and Dr. King’s place in its evolution. And Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis, senior minister of Middle Collegiate Church , explains how her own ministry -- centered...
Jan 18, 2021•51 min•Ep 23•Transcript available on Metacast January 6, 2021, offered a hyper-condensed version of our country’s entire political history--with all of its complexity, inspiration, and terror. In a special national radio broadcast of our show, we walk through a day that began with the historic election of a Black man and ended with a horrifying insurrection led by white nationalists. Newly elected Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) explains why he’s introduced a bill to investigate white nationalists’ infiltration of the Capitol Police. And Kai take...
Jan 11, 2021•50 min•Ep 22•Transcript available on Metacast An odd racial pecking order puts Indian Americans in a curious place -- outside of whiteness, but distinct from other people of color. How’d that come to be? And is it changing? We explore these questions by revisiting a story from Arun Venugopal , senior reporter with WNYC’s Race & Justice Unit, about how a Kansan community grappled with one of the first widely reported hate crimes following the 2016 election. Then he joins us to check in on that community today and walk through the history of ...
Jan 04, 2021•52 min•Ep 21•Transcript available on Metacast A first draft of history for 2020, told through three very personal efforts to find -- and keep -- human connection amid a pandemic. We hear from 13-year-old Adiva Kaisary about how 2020 has complicated her relationships with her school friends and new neighborhood. Producer Veralyn Williams brings us a story from WNYC’s own reporter Cindy Rodriguez who faced COVID-19 head-on this year - while living alone as so many have. Finally, reporter Jenny Casas checks in with Chicagoan Niky Crawford, fol...
Dec 28, 2020•49 min•Ep 20•Transcript available on Metacast Segregationists gamed the system 57 years ago. But this year, Black organizers may have finally slipped the knot that Jim Crow tied around democracy in the state. Ari Berman , senior reporter at Mother Jones and author of “ Give Us the Ballot: The Modern Struggle for Voting Rights in America ” (2016), joins us to explain the history of runoff elections in Georgia -- and to talk about what might have changed in 2020. We also talk to Nsé Ufot , the CEO of The New Georgia Project , about the organi...
Dec 21, 2020•49 min•Ep 19•Transcript available on Metacast 
