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No worries Alright, we are beginning the stream. Alright, you're live. Hello everyone and happy Tuesday welcome to turn up Tuesday brought to you by the leadership conference on civil and human rights and powered by and still I vote in all voting is local. We're so thankful that you're able to join us today. We know everybody is slammed the back-to-back zoom calls you've got kids running everywhere and even some parents who have already started to uh teach your kiddos school. I know I don't know how to teach their grade at home, but thank God for those teachers. So thank you so much for your time today and today's special segment. uh we're gonna be talking about incarceration and voting rights and the overlaps some awesome work that has happened on restoration of rights for formerly incarcerated peoples and what does that look like and what is at stake for this election? I wanna take a moment um to just make sure that we pause and we lift up the family and lift up take himself and his family as they're going through a. A hard time right now due to shooting of police shooting from police officers um again the leadership conference on civil and human rights condemns any type of violence by the state and in this instance we do include um at the hands of police so again, please lift up take a break and his family uh in this moment. Okay, big breath Alright. So I am so excited to welcome the two speakers that we have today, they are great in their field and they're gonna really tell us not only what is happening in the area focus but also what's happening in the states and so Neil holes our deputy director of the Florida Rights Restoration campaign. Hey Manny Hi. hi. What's up? Thanks for having me of course and Dominic Whitehead National Civic Engagement director. Vanessa thanks for having me, Yeah. Thank you both so much for coming on. I wanna be sure that folks even understand what this intersection is and I want us to really talk about you know some people feel like if you have been incarcerated you've kind of lost your right to vote um and I think that is something we should talk about right cuz that kinda sets the table for the whole conversation and so before we get into this one quick plug if people have questions or comments, please throw them into the chat and through the miracle of technology they. Their way to me and then I have to ask our speakers. so let's get into that a little bit. What do you say to people who have that perspective for formally incarcerated people? Neil? Yeah, I mean, I think we've we've seen this idea kinda rear. It's ugly head just in the last couple of days in Tennessee, where you have let legislation that's been introduced that would take away a person's ability to speak through the voting process uh for the rest of their lives for taking part in protests and and and and uh so we know that that idea is alive and well in the country um and in certain places at the same time, I think that we have to acknowledge um especially here in Florida uh where we find ourselves in this kind of uh dual. Space Where on the one hand you've seen this massive expansion of democracy uh through the passage of Amendment, four in 2018 and at the same time, the hurdles and the barriers that we see for so many people who are impacted by that uh constitutional amendments in terms of not being able to fulfill uh the the the spirit and uh the expectations uh for so many folks at the same time. so I feel like we're in this place where it's like we see in disenfranchisement uh being changed uh. State across the country and positive way um, but the the the the the the the the idea behind it this idea that punishment should include taking away your ability to be a citizen and and and and fully participate in the Democratic progress is alive and well and we and we see it pop up here and there so I think we need to remain vigilant and uh and and the struggle uh just just continues but there are there are reasons to celebrate uh even in this moment. great. Thank you. And Dominique can you speak to what you tell people when they say well, they did something wrong and this is a privilege and they got they should no longer be afforded that privilege. What do you say? yeah. Um it's no uh NAACP. We are one we are the oldest of civil rights organization um in the country um and we have always stood for and forefront of fighting for the civil rights um if you will even human rights if you will uh for all. As we know, people of color and black folks, uh we think through many of our returning citizens um most of those folks are folks of color um and the folks may comment or make statements and say hey um they did something wrong or they committed this crime or whatever the case may be um that has nothing to do with someone has completely um went through their process. um they serve their time and their their their uh come back out. Be a productive citizen of society, and if you be a part of being a productive citizen of society is participating in democracy, a part of being a productive citizen of society is having and coming back to society is having all of your civil rights restored to you right all of your rights that folks have fought for whether uh we the voting rights uh we fought for civil rights. So when we hear folks say that at the NAACP we always connect those dots that directly to uh the civil rights because it. A civil rights for folks to actually exercise their right to vote to lift up their voice and to participate in a democracy um to make AA country their state their locality um a better place for them and their families as they live. Yeah. Thank you so much and thank you so much for emphasizing this is a right um and so you cannot take a right away from people um they are still in this country. They are still Americans they have the they should be able to exercise that right 100% and so we have. With this Higgins who's actually campaign manager for the Leadership Conference Education Fund policing campaign, Hey changa. How are you? I'm good? How are you guys doing good good? Thank you so much for joining us. so let's go ahead and get through this a little bit. I think Neil as you mentioned the Amendment four in Florida other Floridians overwhelmingly voted to restore the voting rights of formerly incarcerated individuals, but unfortunately, that wasn't the end of the story. So can you give us a little update? What's the current status of the fight and how many people are actually affected? um if you have the stats um. By the passage of amendment for Uh the zoom life, I was sorry um yeah. Thanks for that question. Uh yeah, Amendment four uh when it passed it impacted uh 1.4000000 people uh with past felony convictions in the state of Florida and uh you know I think the important part of the conversation is just a reminder that the time we were one of four states that permanently bared people for the rest of their lives in voting and Amendment. four broke that wall down uh what we've seen since then uh is is legislation that has been signed in the law uh variety of court cases. Both the state federal the federal systems uh that have impacted uh that process and basically what we're looking at and the way I always describe this, we have community events uh we're in our local communities talking returns and the returning citizen uh I'm somebody with past spelling conviction um and how we're basically now find ourselves in two places at the same time where about half of us hundreds of thousands of us are eligible to vote right. The democracy is on the march and half of us 700. 4000 of us are not yet eligible to vote primarily because we owe fees costs some sort of financial obligation and so you know that's why our organization is is is working so hard to try and help people pay their fines and fees, especially in this last month going into the election. um so the people who do you know are desperate to have their voices heard exercise their right to vote uh that that's a pathway that's available to them because unfortunately in the court system, what we've seen is in uh the decision a couple of months. A federal judge ruled that it was unconstitutional for somebody to pay their fees and costs and it was unconstitutional to make somebody pay their fines and restitution if they're unable to vote and the judge even uh prescribed direct remedy for people and basically said look if you had a public defender in your last case, that means that you are unable to vote right in that moment when you most needed somebody representing you in the courtroom, you were unable to pay for that person. So. With redeem you eligible to vote um and for about 6 weeks we had this process in place where we really began to see what was possible in our amendment for unfortunately the governor uh the government uh request to stay uh as as this thing progresses to the eleventh circuit, the state was granted that made its way all the way to the United States Supreme Court and they upheld this day. So now we're in a situation in which there were hundreds of thousands of us who went to bed, you know. 6 weeks 8 weeks ago, thinking they're gonna be able to vote in this year's elections and now our primary just passed on Tuesday and the things don't look good for them going into November, so the fight is real, The fight impacts Real people's lives and the truth is we're just incredibly frustrated to people who are not acting as public servants, not caring about the real lives of real people and instead of playing politics uh with uh the vote and our rights as we've all outlined. uh yeah. Thank you for that. I think often people think that when you are released from incarceration the images like now. And just show up and vote, and that is absolutely not the case and so in an already uh an environment without a safety net for folks and to help them uh really get back and jump in. we are now finding them before they can even take steps to correct. and so there's this continuous uh linkage to money and boating and you know allowing that right to go forward. so thank you for lifting that up. It's not an automatic thing for folks. Now and I appreciate that the last thing I said, like no place should we force uh uh uh a person to choose between putting food on the table for their families and voting and how immoral is that. Yeah, we wrestle with a lot of those questions uh food on the table and voting health health care and safety and voting. Yup. um so I wanna bring Chanda into the conversation cuz Changa is also on the ground he is working at the local level to advocate for police reforms. He works uh with police departments and tries to hold them accountable junkie. Can you tell us a little bit about your work? and then can you tell us a bit more about the connection that you see between the criminal justice system and these barriers to voting. You're on AMC. Thanks for having me um and I'm sorry for being late technical difficulty but um uh yeah so I work here in the Dallas Texas. I'm uh the campaign manager for Leadership Conference Education Fund uh police and campaign here where we're doing several different projects um from supporting the work of uh oversight um the oversight work that has happened here recently with uh. April 2019 We got a victory with the implementing over uh a new oversight board and Office of police oversight, as well as um, so we're helping um we're working on supporting the implementation fully of that oversight office and in the board, as well as um, we're doing uh we have a community empowerment project right now, we're taking everyday people and folks in black and brown communities that have been impacted by policing and we're giving them basic data. And it lit basic data analysis skills to um to be able to uh look at policing data um open data analyze it and use it to be able to tell their own stories and um has kinda like birth a whole new core of people who wanna do data activism here locally and in Dallas. so um we're we're doing that along with um just uh recently. Started another project to analyze Low-level ordinances low level um rest uh through data and then to look at that and use it to make some recommendations about removing quality of life ordinances from um from the city code and so uh all these things uh may seem you know not connected, but they are very connected to uh uh create that create a police and creates a lot of barriers to um. To uh voting for a lot of folks in um in our communities in Dallas and across Texas, I mean um we still here have list that are being maintained that uh won't allow people to get IDs um uh particularly driver's license but not IDs and um, of course, as you know like um you have to have some form of ID valid ID in order to get uh to be. Vote here and so you know it's like uh like most deaf says. Why do I need ID to get ID? So like a lot of people are finding themselves in that situation from our from from black and brown communities where they can't get the proper identification to be able to vote um and just what goes along with that whole thing is you know the over policing in our community? predatory police. That are going on right here in Dallas locally um although Dallas um black uh black folks make up uh around 30% of the population there their over half of the arrests um here in the city of Dallas um uh there are over seventy. 70% of the um I'm trying to remember exactly the number but um it's around two thirds of the use of force here. Uh against African-Americans and black folks here in Dallas so um you know anytime you see those type of things you also see you know as we see in other parts of the country voter suppression tactics being weapons against people who are vulnerable to the criminal justice system um vulnerable to uh not have I d's being under um having you know under utilized. US to to um different services and and and different things that comes with not having an idea or not being able to get IDs So um you know we see this across the board and it all connects so modern you know police and as we know it actually creates is is a weapon um that is used a lot of times to be to be uh weaponized against folks in targeting folks in certain communities, particularly black and brown communities. Um yeah, I know thank you. Okay, I wanna make sure you get in cuz we have a we have a question and thank you for lifting up the intersectionality of these things right. It's not like when you first put in jail that it's just it's a Silo incident right. There's a lot of systems that come at you at that place at that point and they're gonna impact your life going forward and so to talk about it as a one time thing just isn't true to what actually happens for folks and so I wanna get to the question that we just got in from a viewer. Thank you so much. What about people that are in jail that have not gone to court yet, and they have not been proven guilty. What about their rights to vote? Are you really innocent until proven guilty? Dominic Do you have a do you have something to say back to that one? What about people who are who are in jail and have not yet gone to court? Yeah. uh that's uh let's say uh a really good question right um given the fact that we are heavily election season and the just a second ago um the for the primaries for last Tuesday, we still have a few more primaries before we get to November. And I think folks um if you are under arrest or in jail um but have not been convicted, I believe um both still have and should have the opportunity to uh to vote um with that being said, I think that's just the reality um given that like there's a lot of folks who are in jail um or have been arrested have not been in court. Uh I have not been found guilty any of that stuff. Um and they should still have the same opportunity because they are still considered um a full-fledged law abiding citizen um of the state of the United States on that particular state that they're actually in so from my perspective uh folks from jail um that have not been convicted. uh she still have the right to vote the just uh that's just the reality of that um and given that and it just goes back to a bigger conversation that we need to just have around our criminal justice system as a whole right uh where we have. Uh who are in prison right uh our prison system. We talk about the crowds of our prison systems. um it's just another piece of the democracy. That's a different conversation that we we should I unpacked um but having folks um who are unfortunately arrested, have not been found guilty um but they're in jail due to whatever reasons they can't post bail. Uh they can't um you know uh have adequate attorney or legal representation to. Them home with their families out they're missing work um so like all of these things are happening in the criminal justice system on top of that. I'm also can't I'm an election um and I'm haven't even been um a way that make sense. So it's just a larger conversation. I think all of this connects and in it's own way when we talk through um just the criminal justice system as a whole and turn it back to the rights of individuals. Yeah. absolutely. thank you so much that brings up an important point um lack of information. Some folks are betting on so no matter where you are in the system no matter if you're not in the system, please make sure that you check your where you registered to vote. Please make sure that you check if you can still request a vote by mail ballot that if you do have that ballot sitting on the coffee um on the coffee table on your desk, please know that in today, we really need to make sure those ballots get mailed in or if you want, you can also still just drop it off. There are some seats that have drop boxes Please go do that right now we. Calling for all support for the United States postal service, that is an all fight right now because it is a system in which we depend on for our votes and so we really ask for you to please if you have that vote by mail City on the table, please get that in right away. um you can also find more information about all of this um and so I vote or the leadership conference campaign website, and of course the leadership conference for civil and human rights as well. Um. As we're in our final minutes, I wanna ask the big question. Um we end everyone by saying what gives you hope but I'm gonna ask you to please lift up your work and your email address because I think it's really important for our audience and then tell us what gives you hope and again everybody always says the youth, which is very true um but you know he got some other stuff that would be great too. So I'm gonna kick it to you first. Uh well uh thank you. Vanessa. This is this has been a great conversation uh and uh my email at the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition is Neil at Florida RRC.org Neil NE IL at Florida RC.org and what gives me hope uh again. I'm I'm mentioning this two sides of this coin that we're living with right now with folks who are really not there. They're not they're not able to vote and we spend a lot of time there. I will say what gives me hope or the the texts and the emails and the other side of the coin that I get almost every day. Hey, I'm voting for the first time you know Desmond our executive director at the vote. 30 years on Tuesday, uh so that kind of thing I got to vote for the first time in 16 years on Tuesday, so that those are the kind of things that provide us hope and we know that if we have hope uh we can we can struggle on and and keep fighting for our brothers and sisters. Uh that's amazing. Thank you that gives me hope and congratulations. Thank you. Thanks. Hey Dominic Email Organization Name website. Sorry you don't need to give your email but website and what gives you hope. Yes, uh Dominic Whitehead again uh thank you, Vanessa and the leadership conference for inviting us on this um national civic engagement and directed by the NAACP um and then um in terms of um NAACP, you can follow us on NAACP.org My email address is DY NAACP Net.org again, D Whitehead at NAACP net.org. Uh what gives me hope um I think over these last few years I've been doing organizing work for a very long time I've been in the church in Florida. uh no that's been very well and and and love the work that uh of our city is doing there. I would say give me hope is now starting to see the true intersectionality between um community right um truly building community on the ground. Um I hate that I had to take this last 4 years. I hate that I had to take at nineteen. I hate that I had to take um to continue to see uh you know um young black and brown black men being murdered in the hands of bad actors of a police officers, but we're starting to see communities across the. Space um really uplift each other, we're starting to see folks uplift people of color um in a different way that I haven't seen before since I've been doing this work so that really gives me hope um that we're driving for a better democracy for all um because we're all family and some ways working together and thinking through this together fighting together on one agenda. uh thank you so much you're you're so right the intersectionality we've been seeing lately so it feels good and also feels like. What took so long? Alright, if you can tell us what gives you hope. Well, what gives me hope is the conversations across the country going on that are shifting the conversation locally and nationally about uh solving problems in our communities and and and ending the the the the Center view that is centered on um on policing that's being you know the the end of be a solution to public safety um and so that gives me. Now, you know we've been talking a lot about reimagining public safety in a new era of public safety, and of course, um you know the leadership conference campaign that uh I work on is about the new era of public safety and so to see those conversations actually turning in to like tangible uh reforms and you know even if they're incremental just to see the conversation in the narrative changing around the country and here locally in Dallas about. What you know the benefits of policing um uh how we need to reimagine policing defunding police and in some instances doing away with police departments. So um I think all of that those conversations are like moving the needle enforcing elected officials and other people to to reassess what their their their thoughts and and the way they've thought traditionally about police and so um that that gives me hope great. Thank you so much and this has been uh wonderful. Insightful conversations as well and just as this have thank you all so much for the work that you're doing in communities and in states we definitely appreciate it um again you have been tuned in to turn up Tuesday with the leadership conference on civil and human rights brought to you by all voting is local powered by and vote uh both campaigns of the leadership conference. Please get your vote by mail ballot In now, please make sure that you are registered to vote and please make sure that you and Five friends make a plan to vote because as you heard not everybody is given that right back and we need to continue to fight for those who cannot vote. so make sure that you do your part, get your business done and we'll see you next Tuesday. Thank you everyone. Thanks everybody.