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The PapaZoe Show
The Papazoe Show is where Miami culture, real stories, and powerful conversations collide. Hosted by city icon Papazoe alongside his day-one co-host Walk Da Walk—a brotherhood built long before the spotlight—the show brings raw authenticity, wisdom, and unfiltered energy straight from the heart of South Florida. With roots stretching from Haiti to Miami, Papazoe’s journey through the streets, the music industry, and mentorship circles gives the show a perspective you can’t fake. From guiding rising stars to building relationships with major names, his experience sets the tone for conversations that go deeper than surface-level talk. Together, Papazoe and Walk Da Walk create a space where real voices are heard. From local artists and entrepreneurs to celebrities, politicians, and influencers, every episode taps into the culture, the grind, and the truth behind the headlines. Directed by Adrian Ferg, with production by HiiighCriteria Productions and Cordero Media, The Papazoe Show is quickly becoming one of Miami’s most impactful platforms—giving the city, and the world, something real to connect to. Powered by brands like Sovereign, Belaire, Bumbu, and SMARC Cigars, this isn’t just a podcast—it’s a movement, a network, and a voice for the culture. Tap in. Stay locked. This is The Papazoe Show.
The PapaZoe Show
DESMOND MEADE
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Yo yo, what up, what up, what up? You already know who it is. It's your man, man, Papa Zoe, the Papa Zoe show with my co-host.
SPEAKER_03Walk the walk, baby. Walk the walk is in the building. Hey, Zoe. Yes, who do we got in the building today? Tonight.
SPEAKER_00Yo, yo, man. Hey, yo, man. Hey. The next governor. I like that one. Desmond Mead in the building. I like that. How you doing, my brother? How you doing? Good. Good to have you, man. Good to have you on the show, man. Yes, good to be home amongst my brethren. That's what it is. That's what it is. That's what it is. Let me ask you that. For the people, right, who may not know your story, who's who has that minimum and what brought you to the point where you're running for governor of Florida? Man, let me tell you, I'm gonna start from August of 2005 when I was standing in front of railroad tracks on 22nd Avenue, waiting on the train to come so I could jump in front of it. That day I stood there, I was homeless. I was recently released from prison. I was addicted to drugs, and I didn't see no light at the end of the tunnel. I was roaming the streets a little Haiti, then somehow I ended up over 22nd Avenue, and I was ready to check out. But the train never came. You know, I tell people today it had to be God, right? And because that was a busiest railroad track, because that track led to the port of Miami, to the fruit district, to, you know, the garment district. So it was a train coming maybe every 10 minutes, but that day didn't come. And so I ended up crossing the tracks, and I walked a couple blocks further, and I checked myself into this uh central intake facility that was part of the Jackson healthcare system, and they got me into a drug treatment program uh that was right off 32nd Avenue and 78th Street. It was a place called Jack O'Ranch. And I spent the next four months there really getting clean and experiencing a transformation of my life. And so once I graduated from that program, I moved back into a homeless shelter. Because I've been homeless for quite a few years. And uh while at the homeless shelter, I decided I wanted to do something to change my life or to change a trajectory of my life. Because if if any one of you all ever knew about somebody that had a drug addiction or alcohol addiction, you know, they could stop for a little bit and their life started to improve, but then something happens and they'll pick up the drug, or you know, they would pick up a drink. And next thing you know, they're right back where they started from, even worse. And so I was just tired of that cycle. And so I wanted to do something different. So my different was going to school. And so I enrolled in Miami Dade College, Wilson Campus downtown. Uh, got into the paralegal program, ended up graduating at the top of my class. Uh my professor was like, don't stop, get it, get it. And so I quit it. I pursued uh a couple more degrees at Miami Dade and ended up getting a bachelor's, right? I got a bachelor's in public safety management with a concentration in criminal justice. Okay. And I I chose that subject, right, because I had a lot of experience getting arrested, paying before judges, going to jail, in and out of jail and prisons. So I figured that experience may help me do well in class. Right, right. And it actually did. Okay. And I ended up graduating again with with highest honors. Uh, and eventually I got accepted into FIU College of Law. Okay. In May of 2014, I walked across the aisle with a jurisdictorate degree from FIU.
SPEAKER_01That's what's up.
SPEAKER_00Right. And so now that's just the that's the appetizer. That's just the appetizer. So we're gonna take a breath right now. That was just the appetizer. Oh, hold on. Before how old were you when you when you was ready to check out? How old were you? Man, I was in my uh early 30s. Yeah, I was, yeah. Okay. I was a little seasoned, you know. Wasn't a young butt. But um, like I said, I I I looked at, you know, I'm telling you, let me tell you a quick story though. When I crossed the tracks, um, I did stop and I looked back and I asked myself if I were to have died, if the train would have came and I would have died, how many people would have come to my funeral? And the for me the answer was nobody would have came. You know, I would have been buried in the pauper's grave. You know that pauper's grave they have over there off um Miami Avenue. Miami Avenue. And that was a bad feeling. That was a lonely feeling. Um and then I I changed the scenario and said, okay, I died, and and my name was on the uh front page of the Miami Herald, Desmond killed by train. You know, and I asked myself that question again, and you know, I only came up with four people, uh, one of whom is here tonight with me, uh, one of my nieces, you know, um, and that was a very lonely feeling because I was like, man, after all these years of having friendships and traveling the world, only four people would care if you died. And I asked myself, has my life been that insignificant? And that was the question I took with me when I went into drug treatment. And it was while I was in drug treatment, I dealt with that question. And I discovered uh what I like to say was a joy that I was chasing all my life and didn't realize I was chasing it, and that was really understanding what God's purpose for me was. All right, why am I here? You know, uh what's my purpose in life? And and I quickly discovered what that was, and it's been off to the races. So when I tell you that I graduated from law school, that was just the appetizer. You know, the good stuff came even after that, you know. Uh, because before I graduated from law school, I started an organization called Florida Rights Restoration Coalition. And it's an organization that's made up mainly of people who've been impacted by the criminal justice system, people who've been catching felonies, uh, been incarcerated, uh, people who have their loved ones, whether their son, their mother, their father, their favorite uncle, have been impacted by the criminal justice system. Those type of individuals formed the membership of my organization. And in 2014, I launched a citizens initiative, a ballot initiative to actually change the Constitution in the state of Florida. Now that was unheard of. You just don't just do that so easily. It's very, very difficult. We've seen uh Recreational Marijuana. They spent $150 million to try to get it passed, and they didn't even come close to passing, right? Well, I create I led the effort to restore voting rights to people with felony convictions. Right. See, because before Florida was one of four states that once you caught a felony, you lost the right to vote for the rest of your life, you lost the right to serve on the jury, run for office, you know, you lost your gun rights, all of that. And it was something that just didn't sit well with me, with that. And so I actually came up with the idea. I like to say, God gave me the vision to actually do what everybody said was impossible. Right? And I set out to amend Florida Constitution. And in 2018, we did exactly that. And over 1.4 million people in the state of Florida was able to get their voting rights restored because of those efforts. Now we get into the meat, right? Because because of that effort now, so now we just that was the largest expansion of voting rights this country had ever seen in over 50 years at the time. Wow. Right? 1.4 million. That's like more people in the population of a lot of states, right? And countries. You know, so as a result of that, uh eventually Time magazine named me one of the 100 most influential people in the world. Um the MacArthur Foundation named me a genius fellow. I I was uh citizen of the year in Florida, uh Central Floridian of the Year, you know, and then the Creme de la Creme, you know, was in 19, you know, in 2023. My organization was actually nominated. You ready for this? For the Nobel Peace Prize. What? By the same organization who nominated Dr. Martin Luther King. And now today I'm sitting with you as an MPA candidate for governor of Florida. And that is that guy that was standing in front of those railroad tracks back in 2005, hooked on drugs and ready to check out. So that's who Desmond is in a nutshell. I gotta get some water. The abbreviated version. I gotta get some water.
SPEAKER_01I gotta get some billionaire water real quick to my sister.
SPEAKER_00I gotta fix my flag. It's serious. That right there is serious, man. I have to I gotta get myself together for the next question. Walk, you walk, you got a question for him because I I gotta I gotta get myself together, man. I'm just listening to him and I gotta get myself together right now. Listen, you can you can ask whatever you want. Nah, man, ask whatever you want, man. My life is an open book, man. I I even wrote a book and I had it out there for a couple of years. It's called Let My People Vote. Um Let My People Vote. Let My People Vote. Yeah. As a matter of fact, if you ever been to the Roots Collective, right, you probably find my book there right there on 15th. 15, yeah. Yeah. And if they don't have it, I'm gonna be delivering some anyhow in a couple days. Okay.
SPEAKER_03So could definitely do that. So how how how was growing up?
SPEAKER_00Man, I mean, I was I was born in St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands, you know. But I came over here at a very young age. Right, right, right, right. You know, um uh I was around like five. I ended up going to Martin Luther King Primary School that's right there off of 12th and 71st. 71st, yeah. Yep. And then from there I went to uh Holmes Elementary. From Holmes Elementary, I went to this uh other school that you had to be an old head to know the school. It's called West Dunbar. West Dunbar. Yeah, it was a school that was only in existence for a couple of years. Dunbar, West Dunbar. But it's now the old, it's now the Lindsey Hopkins. Lindsay Hopkins. But that used to be an elementary school. Over there in uh down, was it downtown, yeah. Yeah. And then familiar. Used to be a green building, used to be green building. I don't I can't remember that. Yeah, it used to be a green West Dunbar, yeah. So you're telling your age now, probably. Hey, I'm 61 this month. I'm 61 at the end of this month. Oh, yes. Yes, sir, yes, sir. It's a blessing. God, thank you, God.
SPEAKER_03So Dad, so so what what okay, for you to get to that point that you just want to stand in front of the well road track, right? What what what obstacles in life got you to that point that you just like figure it I'm done?
SPEAKER_00Well, I mean, I think first and foremost, most most, if not all of my troubles, uh came out of the fact that I had a substance abuse problem, right? Um, you know, there you have some folks that can experiment with drugs and you know, may try it once or twice or whatever, and just leave it alone. Uh, but sometimes, and I do believe that it's a lot of us that, you know, I think part of it is because of some of the medication that they try to put us on as little kids or whatever, uh, can have a propensity to get addicted to to the feeling of that drugs can produce. And so with me, you know, at the end of the day, I was just, bottom line, I was just addicted to drugs. Um, and I use drugs, especially in my older age, they're really to to escape the misery, escape whatever issues I may have been dealing with internally. Um and, you know, a lot of folks would be like, why can't somebody just quit? It's n it's not that easy. You just can't quit smoking, you know, and and that is an addiction too, that that that is that is tough. You just can't quit drinking. Um, and so, you know, when that addiction hits you, man, it's you have to go through a process. And at some point, you know, some of the folks in the room say you have to hit rock bottom. You know, and I think for me, I did. I think my rock bottom was when I was standing in front of those railroad tracks.
SPEAKER_03Wow. Definitely some information that I'm after related to uh uh uh family f a family member of mine is that hey, as long as you keep doing this here, what he's doing, you're gonna have to hit rock bottom because I'm I'm I'm sorry. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00And you can't stop you can't you can't stop him because here's the thing, right? When you falling, you can't get up until you what hit the ground. Hit the ground. You gotta hit the ground first. First, then you can get back up, but you you don't see nobody, too much people go to fall and then. And then they did they automatically get like that. No surreed. So you you have you have like you know, deep roots and connection to Miami. What has Miami taught you, you know, about the struggle, resilience, and potential of everyday Freudians? Man, you know, it it it it it actually reminds me of this this I I guess you call it a mantra. Uh I think that was attributed to the NAACP back in the days. And it goes from like, we the we the we the willing, led by the unknowing, and doing the impossible for the ungrateful. We've done so much for so long with so little, we're not qualified to do anything with nothing, right? And so what I what I learned, right, growing up is that Miami is an immigrant community, man. You know, I mean, we got folks from the entire Caribbean. Yeah, yeah. And and man, you would see time and time again that people could come here with nothing. Boy, and make something out of it. You know, we know how to make a dollar out of 15 cents. Yeah, right. And then we know how to do it in a way that, you know, listen, we've had we've had our struggles, internal struggles, right? But even in spite of our internal struggles, even between the different groups of folks, the different island of folks, that there was still this bond that, man, when we stepped out of like Dade County, you know, no matter, I mean, we seen it even during during incarceration, right? That when you when you're outside of Dade County and you run into another brother or sister from Dave County. From Dave, you're gonna show love. Because there's there's that bond there. And so South Florida, particularly Dade County, has always been a very unique melting pot that shows uh the the benefits of resilience. You know, and and and that's the kind of resilience that we probably need nowadays, man, because it's rough out there, it's rough, yeah. It's rough and crazy. Yeah, all all all that in one. Yeah, boy.
SPEAKER_03How important it is for that education. I don't even know how important it is for education, no matter what field it's in.
SPEAKER_00You know, so let me tell you so one thing that my mother told me was that you know, education is something that nobody could ever take away from it. You know, they can take away material stuff, right? But could never take away that knowledge, what's in your head. Right. Then I just so I also know though, not all education is in the classroom. Right? So I tell people a law degree. Yeah. I told people I had a I had two doctors' degrees. I had a doctor of law and a doctor of the streets, right? And then understanding, especially for folks who who understand the streets, is that a lot of degrees that those other folks in the universities have, you can get all those degrees. Right. But some of the degrees that you got from those streets, they can't get it. You can't get it. Right. And so now that creates a dynamic to where actually you're more empowered, right? Because you got a degree from the streets and you've been through some struggles that other people haven't, you know. And and and and I tell people even now today, even when looking at even what I'm involved in now with this race, is that you that there's a lot of folks that say I want to lead, but they ain't never been through none. Understand that now. You got folks that want to lead you, but they ain't never been through anything. They ain't never been trying, no trial, tribulation, no type of stuff. They ain't never been knocked down and had to get back up. You know what I'm saying? It was somebody maybe that caught them or they was able to slip that blow or whatever. Right. But when you talk about, you know, what I know for me, when I want to, if if I had to pick somebody to lead me, I I need to pick somebody that been through something.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_00Have already demonstrated that they're able to overcome and that they're not, that they're gonna have courage in the time when courage is needed the most. Right. Right? And not just lead me blindly. And so, you know, it's, you know, at the end of the day, man, that's, you know, I'm grateful for what I've gone through. Uh and I'm gonna be 100% with you because if I didn't go through it, I wouldn't be able to be who I am today. I say that. I wouldn't be able to have the empathy that I have today. And what I mean by that is that, like, my story says, screams loudly that, man, when you see that crackhead on the street, or you you see, you know, uh a person that maybe have a felony conviction, that you can't look at them and say that they can they would never amount to anything.
SPEAKER_03You can't count them out.
SPEAKER_00You can't you can't count them out. And for the person that's going through that, that they could see my story and be like, man, it's not the end of the world for me because I caught this charge or I had to do this time, or I got this felony on, or, you know, I have I have a record with with drug uh uh uh charges and whatever, that anything is possible, right? And you could be you're able to overcome whatever you want put your mind to overcoming. And I to me that is a message that a person only a person like me can give, a person that's been through it. You know, it's it's hard for that guy who never, you know, who never came up in the projects, who who never had to make a uh a sugar sandwich. Maloney sandwich, that was a that was a luxury. A mayo, mayo, mayo, mayo and sandwich. Try trying to sprinkle some sugar on the bread and put that together and try to eat that. Yeah, you know, and so if you ain't never been through that, then you had to figure out how to how to get your electricity all kinds of other ways because mama can't afford an electric bill or whatever. I mean, if you've never been through that, how you gonna lead somebody through moments of crisis, right? We we're we we're in moments now to where people find it hard to to survive. They're they they they can't keep their home. They they gotta try to get out of the area because they can't afford to live. The prices are too high and stuff like that, right? How do we how do we how do we empathize with those folks and find a way out of it? Well you have to bend you have to have gone through something to be able to relate. So okay, so you you spent decades doing community work without you know political office. I mean what what have you learned from being doing that? Oh man, I mean I've learned a lot. First of all, I learned that God is good, and and and let me tell you the biggest thing, right, that I've learned is that when you do God's work, God take care of you. Right? A lot of times we we get into this mentality, and society kind of creates these environments where it's all about us, what we can get out of it. Gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme, right? But you know, that is actually not the secret to life. The secret to life is learning how to give back. That's when your life actually becomes more vibrant because you can see somebody who seems like they have it all, but on the inside, man, they're miserable as hell. You know, they're they're they're they're they're they're void of life. You know, I always like to use the story of over in the Middle East, you had these two bodies of water. You have the Dead Sea and the Sea of Galilee, right? And the Dead Sea is exactly what it is. It's dead, there's no life there, right? Right? And the Sea of Galilee, however, is a vibrant body of water, right? That I mean, you go there, you jet ski, you fish, the whole Nayala is very vibrant. And the question that was posed was that those two bodies of water actually got their nutrients or their blessings from the same source. So the question was, how could it be that these two bodies of water that get their blessings from the same source or their nutrients from the same source be so drastically different? Simple answer. The Dead Sea is a self-enclosed body of water. So that meant that everything it got it held on to. Gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme. Let me stockpile. And what happened was it became oversaturated with these blessings and it ended up killing itself from within. While the Sea of Galilee had tributaries. So whatever blessings it receives, it passed on to others like a filtration system. You try, if you have a fish tank, you try it. You try to keep everything within that fill in that fish tank and prevent. Soon everything dies in it. But when you're able to filter out that fish tank, then you keep that water clear and you keep life vibrant. And so, in doing the work that I've been doing for the past, like say 20 years in this community, from the time, I mean, from the time when I moved into the homeless shelter, I joined the organization called Homeless Formerly Homeless Forum. Right? And that was the organization that advocated to end homelessness in Dade County. And so I became a member of that organization and started doing work with them. Because of my work with that organization, I was eventually given the opportunity to serve on Miami Dade Homeless Trust that was in charge of basically reducing the homeless population in Dade County, which we did. At one point we had it under 800, I believe, right? So I was also a part of that, right? And so it was about what is the next thing? And so from that, just really getting involved in learning more about felon disenfranchisement, right? And then eventually starting my own organization. We used to partner with the state attorney's office when I was in school. I formed the organization called the Society of Law and Community Service. And one of our highlights every year was we would do a toy drive with the state attorney's office. And we would collect thousands of toys. But one key was we didn't go where everybody else went. You know, toys for Tots had their special places. We went in the off-beaten path, right? We were all up in Lil Haiti in those little centers that nobody would ever. Want to go to. Yeah, yeah, wanna go to. That's where we would go. Uh senior citizens' homes and stuff like that. And so I would organize students from Miami Dade College to team up with uh the attorneys from the state attorney's office. And we did that for years. I even played Santa Claus. A lot of kids got to see a black Santa Claus for the first time. You know, and they were very well pleased. He came bear again. But those kind of things were things that I dove into, right? Because I realized, and this other thing with recovery, the key to recovery is service. And they'll tell you that. When you're on the road to recovery, whether it's uh uh alcohol or drug abuse, the key, one of the key elements is how you're giving back. And so I I definitely was um I dove headfirst into that. You know, what can I do to make this world a better place? What can I do to make my community a better place? What can I do to make somebody's life a little bit better? And I found out that when I focused on that, improving the lives of other people and not focusing on my life, man, I got blessed beyond measures. I mean, the things I have, I I wouldn't even, I couldn't even dream about it in my wildest dream. Right? But I got that all because I stayed focused on doing God's work, and God's work was very simple to give back. I like that, I like that. You you you running with no you run with no party affiliation. What did you decide not to uh you know uh identify with either a major political party and what does that mean? I mean, let me tell you how I and that's just my personal opinion. I think both parties have failed Floridians, and they've failed Floridians for quite a long time. You know, I also believe that, you know, what we're seeing today is a government that, you know, especially when you're talking about the governor's office, you know, I think if you want to be the governor for a state, you should be a governor for the entire state. Right? Point blank, right? Even if the people don't vote for you, you need you're in charge of making sure that the people that live in your state can live with dignity. Dignity, yeah. Right? Well, good. That that and that their humanity is recognized. Right, right. But what we've been seeing is that we've been seeing govern uh a government that only caters to part of the population. You feel what I'm saying? And you see government that only like only moves based on the voters who voted for them, or at least a section of the voters who voted for them. And so when you see, like, say, Florida, where you may have, say, you may have like, say, and I'm I'm just guessing at this, maybe anywhere between nine to ten million registered voters, right? Right. And, you know, if if you split them in three three different sections evenly, you know what I'm saying? It's saying you have three million voters for each party. Right. And so any one of those parties when, say the Republican Party wins, right, that's because a portion, because remember, everybody don't vote. Like this last election, maybe 25% of the voters came out. So out of three million, right, out of three million, maybe 900,000 people actually voted. And out of those 900,000, the person had to get, say, uh the majority. And so out of 900,000, they got 451,000 votes. You with me?
SPEAKER_03Yes.
SPEAKER_00Those are the people right there, the 451,000 people, right? That are the people that a politician is gonna cater to because he knows that these are the people who got me in office. And if I don't do what they want, if I don't please them, right, they can get me out of it. You feel what I'm saying? And so, just but just think about it 451,000 people in a state with a population of over 24 million. So that means less than 10% of the population is pushing policy that is impacting the other 90 plus percent of the population. Which tells me that you we've been having a governor that mainly cares about what that less than 10% and don't even see us, don't even fight for it, don't even want to, don't care if we live or die, don't care if our people are getting deported, don't care if we're losing jobs, don't care if we're becoming homeless. That doesn't matter to them because what matters most are the people who voted for them. You you get what I'm saying? And so when you're seeing that we're having all kinds of problems, like when do you see like our government actually bring people together from all walks of life to talk about a problem and come up with a solution? That don't happen. They only go to their own people to get direction on where to go. And so, in this hyper partisan uh political environment right now, right, I knew that I had to be very intentional. Like, my love, man, listen, I grew up here in Florida. I've hit my rock bottom in Florida and I've reached the highest heights in Florida. And I've served in Florida for over 15 years. And during that time, man, I've developed a strong love not only for the state, but for the people in it. Right? Because there are times that you you know it. There's some folks that don't look like you that you're cool in hell with. Right? There's some folks that may not agree with you on some stuff. You may have different religious views or political views, but you and that dude actually kick it. Right? That's your dude, right? And so what I've discovered was at the end of the day, in spite of the things that divide this state, that man, there are people from all walks of life, right, that have families just like I do, right, right, that are scared just like I am, that want the best for their children just like I do, right? And they're trying to figure that out, right? And so they're all of those concerns should be valid. Not just the concerns of the people who vote for you, right? And so I I I intentionally ran as a no-party affiliated candidate because I want to tell folks, man, that as governor, I want to answer the God and the you. That's it. I don't want to, I I should not be putting political interests or special interests ahead of the people. Because look, I mean, the first three words of the Constitution is what? We the people. Period. Not we the politicians, not we the political party, not we the special interests, we the people. And so I know deep in my soul that when people elect someone to be their public servant to represent them, that the priority should be the people. And that has not been the case since Florida. And so as an MPA, we can wipe that slate clean. We could get all we could get rid of all of those things that politicians prioritize before they think about the people. Let's get rid of all those distractions. And let's make our number one priority the people. And I think once you make the people the number one priority, things improve a great deal. I know it because I've done it and I've gotten success with it because of it.
SPEAKER_03I like that. I like that. He's taking all the all the questions I can ask him. I mean, I'm not gonna say motivation, but I already know that what inspires him is God. You know? He took what inspires you out of out of the day. Yeah, you can't even ask that.
SPEAKER_00I mean, you know, you can ask me that, right? Because in addition to that, man, let me tell you, bro, like when you know, like, you gotta remember, man, I wanted to jump in front of a train because I felt that my life was worthless, right? Like, I was raised in a Christian family, and I knew I shouldn't have been in front of those railroad tracks, but there I was. And I felt like I disappointed my family, I disappointed my friends. I didn't, I didn't want nobody I went to school with seeing me in that situation. I was a huge disappointment. I had promise, right? And so the thing was I had little value of my life. And so what like inspires me is, man, those moments, man, when a person can come and say, man, because of you, dog, man, this good, this good thing has happened to me, right? Like, there's like over a million people right now in Florida that can say, because of something that you did, Desmond, something positive happened in my life. Right. And I've done a lot more other things that I hope we we get to talk about. Right, right. But those moments, like, man, for real, it's like having an old man tell me, had us thinking that he was gonna die before he got his right to vote back. And when we passed the initiative, he hugged me, crying me, telling my man, now I could vote. Because that is something that restores dignity. Being able to vote restores dignity in people. Right? Let them know that their voice is, does matter. It is worth something. And this man was living a whole bunch of years without that dignity because the state of Florida told him he couldn't vote. You know why? Because he drove too many times on a suspended license. Right? Yeah. You know, and so that man thought he was gonna die before getting being able to vote again. But when we passed amendment four, man, he was hugging me crying. Those moments like that, man, it inspired me. Or when somebody they went to law school because they read my story and they realized that just because they had a felony conviction couldn't it couldn't stop them from going to law school. Those things mean the world to me, knowing that I could feel better, knowing that I did make an impact. Now, all of the pain and suffering that I went through, that pain and suffering that led me to those railroad tracks, all of that became worthwhile. Because I impacted at least one life and I passed the one, I'm having my cake and eating it too. What's what's what's the procedure though of uh convicting a felon, uh uh getting their rights back? Yeah, I mean, right now, you know, uh because of Amendment 4, if a person has not been convicted of murder or a felony sexual offense, and when you're talking about felony sex offense, we're talking about child molestation or something like rape, you know, sexual battery, you know, things of that nature. If they were not convicted of any of those offenses, right, whenever they complete their sentence for the other offenses, whatever, that um upon completion of sentence, they automatically had the right to vote back.
SPEAKER_03Federal or state.
SPEAKER_00Huh?
SPEAKER_03Feds or state.
SPEAKER_00Feds or state. If they live here, if they serve their time and their conviction was not a murder or a felony sexual offense, they can vote in the So they could go register for a vote. They can register the vote. Now, let me tell you, there's a caveat there. Because when we passed that initiative, Florida legislature uh said that, wait a minute, before y'all could do that, if y'all got any outstanding fines and fees, right, or court costs, you got to pay those first. And then after you pay those things, then you can go in and register the vote. Now, the good news and the bad news, what you want the bad news first or the good news? Yeah, the bad news. You want the bad news is that that impacted over 770,000 Floridians. That they had some type of legal financial obligation that you know they had to pay before they was able to be able to vote. So I'm I need to go ahead and go register the five. What's the good news? What's the good news? That was a joke. Scratch that we need to go to Geico right now in this one, right? But no, the good news is that means that there's over 600,000 people that's living in Florida that don't have outstanding fines and fees who are eligible to vote right now. Right? And so um it's it's a process. And so my former organization uh used to help people like that. We help determine whether or not you have to pay your fines and fees or whether you don't have any fines and fees to register to vote right now. There's a couple people that probably been on your show that I probably work with, but I can't say nothing because of confidentiality. Right, right. But there's some folks who've been walking around here for quite some time. Um who's the thing, wanted to vote, wanted to have the right to vote back. And some of them was actually because of the pain of being excluded, right, may have not de-emphasized, may have de-emphasized voting. But the minute they found out that they can vote, man, that was like it was a whole new, it was a whole new setup there. And so the two things can happen. So for people who don't have outstanding fines or fees, it's just a matter of you just going and and registering the vote. And so if you know your charges, you can go online and look it up to see if you owe anything. And if they tell you you don't owe anything, then you should go ahead and vote. If they do find out that you owe something, then you've got to pay it. Right? And so what we did, right, with my organization, and I led the effort. I went ahead in 2020 and I raised, you ready for this? Almost $30 million. Wow. I did that. And you know what I did? I got on the bus and I went from Pensacola all the way down to Key West, stopping at various counties, busing checks. Right, busing bands so people would be able to vote, right? For real. Popping bands, that's what they say, popping bands. Right. Literally was writing checks in Dade County. I think I wrote a check for over seven million dollars to pay off people's fines and fees. Wow. Right? And so there are people now living in Dade County. And Brower County did the same thing. Palm Beach County did the same thing. There are people living in these counties whose fines and fees have already been paid by my organization, right? And sometimes, I remember there was a couple times we called some folks to say, hey, we paid your fines and fees. They thought it was a scam or hung up on it. Yeah. You know, uh, ain't not much we can do about that. But, you know, we try our best to locate those folks and and let them know that listen, you don't have any fines and fees. If you want to register the vote, you can do it now, you know. The other thing that uh uh came up uh that happened because of that was there are a lot of people, you know, when you have any outstanding legal financial obligations, sometimes they'll suspend your driver's license.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_00When we paid off folks filing the fees, some of the folks can't, their driver's license got reinstated. They was able to now, they was able to move around better, be able to get better jobs and things. Or some of them started their own like cleaning company or whatever, now that they can drive. And so, yeah, we did that. We did that. You know, um, you know how folks, Janet, they'll do a Janet Jackson, what have you done for me lately? And I tell folks today that anybody come in your community asking for your vote, that's the number one question that you should ask. What have you done for me lately? Right? And so I'm that leader that has already done, right? I've already I got receipts, I've already done the work, like you said. Right? And so you have you have a history of me actually doing the work, you know, uh, throughout the state of Florida. And it wasn't just for one type of person. I cleared the way so people from all walks of life with felony convictions, whether they're white, black, brown, whether they're the independent, Republican, or Democrat, it don't matter. That everybody deserved a second chance that once you do your time, that you should have every opportunity to succeed in life. Not only vote. My efforts, we we we created efforts to f to make sure that we remove barriers so people will be able to get jobs even with a felony conviction. So they can get housing even with a felony conviction. You know what I'm saying? So they could be able to get an education even with a felony conviction. So they'll be able to live with dignity in spite of the fact that they have a felony conviction, right? And and and I led those efforts, right? And and a lot of those efforts impacted people in our community, people in Lil Haiti, Brown Sub, you know, you name it, from the Bajas. Oh, they still got the Bajas? The Bajas yeah, the Bajas. And so, for real, I mean from Monroe County in Key West all the way up to the I've touched. So, so so right now, right now I could go ahead and go register the vote right now. Well, what you first thing you do is find out if you have any outstanding legal financial obligations. And if you don't, and you were never convicted of murder or you were never convicted of a felony sex offense, you are eligible to register the vote.
SPEAKER_03That's it. What about if the um not me, but listen, I'm not giving legal advice.
SPEAKER_00I'm just repeating what the law, what is it? Yeah, yeah. Right, when you go to the division of elections or the par uh of the State Department, right, Secretary of State, I'm I'm just repeating what's there. I'm repeating what's actually in our constitution right now.
SPEAKER_03Okay. No, because we all know when I when I do relate to the information, they're gonna be like, hey, what about child support?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. They're gonna get you. No, but child support, unpaid child support does not stop you from being able to vote. The only thing that stops you from being able to vote is if you have a felony offense and if you're locked up, if you haven't completed your sentence, or if you still have outstanding fines or fees. If you still have outstanding legal financial obligations, you cannot From your conviction. From your conviction. From that felony conviction. Oh, yeah. So a person may have what I'm gonna give you a good example. That's why there's over 600,000. Like, I may catch a couple of charges, right? One of the charges be a f was a felony, the other two charges were misdemeanors. But when I go to court, they downgrade my felony to a misdemeanor. Right? Now, in my head, you know, I was charged with a felony, right? And I'm thinking, man, I can't vote, right? The whole time. I'd never lost the right to vote because they were all misdemeanors.
SPEAKER_03It was all misdemeanors.
SPEAKER_00You know what I'm saying? They started you with charged with a felony, but the final conviction was you were convicted for a misdemeanor offense. And you know what's you know what's crazy? You know what's crazy? I I mean, you I think, I think, you know what I'm saying, you know, your your niece to to you know, to have you come on the show because I never knew that. I never knew that. So now I'm like, man, I need to go, you know what I'm saying? Because my wife's gonna love this when I tell her this. So that that was part of that was part of our uh our struggle back, like say in 20, in 2020 and 2024, right? Because, you know, we heard the story of Juneteenth, right? That when when when uh after the Emancipation Proclamation, two years later was when the folks in Brownsville, Texas, finally learned that they were free, right? And that's why Juneteenth, right? And I think we have that same issue here in Florida because we passed Amendment 4 in 2018, November of 2018. So as of January 2019, there's at least 600,000 people living in the state of Florida right now who can actually register the vote, but they're walking around here thinking that they can't. And don't even know. I definitely didn't know. Right. And so the the the the the the the the challenge we had was how do we get that word out? Because I can't get a list of names and go on a radio show and say, hey, Tom, Jerry, whatever. You don't put no people, you can't put people's business out there like that, right? And so the only way we could do it is get on like podcasts like this, you know, do little radio shows here and there, and let people know, hey, your rights may be restored. You should check this site out or whatever to find out. And at the time, for for quite a few years, I had a uh a tour bus. And I was driving around the entire state of Florida. We would we would collaborate with the League of Women Voters, we would collaborate with Faith in Florida, which uh organizes a lot of our black churches. Uh, we would do events at those churches, we'd do events uh at uh with with Miami Dade County with with uh Mayor Kava and her No Wrong Door um initiative. So we would do we would do events like that. We would connect with uh Commissioner Keone McGee uh to do some work and have events in their communities where we invite the public out. Come and find out, man, you know, because or come and sign up to get your file. And fees paid or come and find up, sign up to get your fines and fees waived. So you will be able to move on with your life. And that's federal conviction also. Federal, state, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. If you're living in the state of Florida, we can work with you. Well, it can't, it's not we no more because I resigned to run. But as governor, as governor, I will make sure that we have the best uh clemency policies out there and that we do not deny people, uh, especially folks who serve their time. Once you did your time, man, once the debt is paid, it's paid, right? Right. You ain't you're not looking to get any more bills when you done paid off your mortgage. You know, so you just ain't. So when people have paid their debt, you know, and that's what Florida voters wanted, right? They should be able to vote. And uh listen, I am, they say I'm the gu the champion of democracy of voting rights. Um there's no one else in the country that has expanded voting rights more than me right now, right? And I'm right here in Florida, right? You're a resident expert, and I'm telling you that if I'm governor, you you best believe that we'll continue to do everything to make sure that democracy is available to every citizen, eligible citizen that's out here in the state of Florida. What uh what's some of the obstacles you experience? You know politics. Oh, politrics, I should say. You know, they're like and and and one of the many reasons why I'm running as an MPA, because I I can I can matter of fact, I can give you a good example, right? And you see it in our communities. Like, at the end of the day, it's lack of accountability for special interest groups, lack of accountability for politicians. We see it in Lil Haiti, you know, or or in every other community. You have developers come into your city and say, hey, let me get that land right over there. Let me get that public land, and then break me off some of them tax credits, break me off them dollars, right? And what I'm gonna do is that I'm gonna build this $20 million multi-use uh uh uh facility complex. And in that complex, I'm gonna build 200 housing units, right? And out of those 200 housing units, I'm gonna set aside 30% for low-income families and for first responders. You with me?
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_00So basically, that developer is saying, give me taxpayers' dollars, let me let me get into the bank account, let me get their money out of the bank, give me their land, so then give me that, and in exchange for me, for you giving me taxpayers' dollars, I'm gonna build this beautiful thing and set aside 30% of the housing for low-income families. What do you think happens when they complete the project? What percentage do you think it ain't that 30%? 30% is much lower. So automatically they did what? They reneged. Right? Now, my mom always told me the man wants to be a big thing. Polytrix. Yeah, Polytrix. His bond. And so what happens is they can get away with it, right, because politicians allow them to get away with it. You you feel what I'm saying? And so there is a lack of accountability. I mean, and we could man, we could talk about so many other things, right? Even the insurance industry or environmental industry and stuff like that. There's so many things that you can talk about to where you see that the solutions to our problems ain't that difficult. But politicians, what they would do is that they would distract us, right, and and create these environments to where it's neighbor against neighbor, right? And when we're so busy fighting each other that we ain't taking the time to realize that the whole time we fight each other, they pick in our pockets, right? Right? Raising tax, picking our pockets, giving the money away to their homies and to themselves, right? They come back and ask us, or we gotta raise taxes because we need to do this and need that. Well, damn, what happened to the one the taxes I gave you? Like, you ain't flip that? They don't flip our taxes. They don't give us a return on investment. They give our taxes to their homies, and their homies flip it and get their own investments, but we don't get none of that. We we we don't get, but they're using our money. What do you think like insurance companies do when you pay your when you pay your premiums? They take that money and do what? They flip it. The same thing, the same thing on the streets. You know, we hey, what we do? We get we get an eight-ball, we flip it into a ounce, we flip the ounce into a brick, and we flip that brick into 10. That's what they do with our money. And we don't see no proceeds from that. And then when the time comes, when hurricane comes and mess our house up, they want to renege on the deal and clear out and leave and leave the state and leave us hanging dry, wait two years, change their name and come back. Come on, how you gonna how you gonna do that to us and come back under different name like we don't know? Come on, man. And so it all comes back to all of this stuff is happening because, not because they can do it, because it with the housing thing, there was a contract, there was an agreement. But when our elected officials are not holding them accountable to that contract, because they're getting probably sliding some bread. There you go. Campaign contributions and stuff like that. That happened. So that's why with my campaign, I'm not taking special interest. Like, you know, I'm I gotta depend on, you know, mom and pop to drop a few coins in it, you know, um, because once again, I think that I should only have to answer to God and to the people of Florida, right? And the minute I take money for special interests, like you got a candidate that took $20 million for uh uh from data centers. Do you think data centers is gonna have some some some priority in his policies? I mean, come on, somebody just cut him a check for 20 million. You know, I give you a $20 million check, you're gonna take my call. Oh, yeah, oh yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01What's up? Well we're gonna go.
SPEAKER_00There you go, what you need, right? And so to keep avoid from being complicit in that, I said, you know, I'm just limiting my my my contributions to grassroots contributions.
SPEAKER_03What's the moment that you that you most what what what yeah, what's moment or time of your life that you most proud of?
SPEAKER_00Whoa, man. I'm gonna say and this is not cheesy. I think one of the proudest moments, the most significant moments in my in my life was when I married my wife. Right. Um, and the reason why I say this, right, is because I I tell folks this all the time. When I met my wife, I recognized the fool she was, and that was God's gift to me. Right? Let me tell you something. I got a bad wife, man. For real, for real. And here's the thing, we both have stories of overcoming so many obstacles. Right. And I remember when I proposed to her, I told her that God had brought us together for something that was bigger than us, individually or combined. Right? And today my wife leads, she's like one of the top like five or ten female executives in the country. And she leads an organization called the Clean Slate Initiative. Now, let me tell you what the Clean Slate Initiative does. If you ever got arrested, if you ever got in trouble, that stuff stays on your record forever and a day. Forever. For the rest of your life, basically. Right? Unless you can get it sealed or expunged.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_00And that is a very difficult process. And sometimes it can be expensive. What she's done is she's gotten over 14 states, about 14 states, to pass legislation that automates the record clearing process. And so, because of her efforts, over 18 million people now have a pathway to a successful reentry. Their records would not be held against them for employment, for housing, for school, for whatever. Whatever. Because their records would be sealed. That's federal too. Anything. Listen. Their records will be sealed. I'm just telling you. Now, let me let me clarify this. They're working on federal legislation now. But any state charges, it's sealed. 18 million people now have a pathway. And so when you talk about the proudest moment, and I say it's proud because that, number one, I was I I'm gonna pat myself on the back. I was smart enough to listen to God and marry this woman, right? But I'm proud because of the impact that me and my wife have had across, actually across the world. Oh, okay. Right? Um, you know, yeah, my effort, you know, it re-enfranchised 1.4 million, her effort cleared the pathway to 18 million. And then there's so many other people, young ladies, like my my wife is a teenage mom, you know. And there's so many young ladies that think because they had may have had a child or uh at you know, at a young age, whatever, that they're relegated to only doing certain things. Man, nah. There are people who think that because they was addicted to drugs or got arrested, they only could go so far. It's like, nah, it's not. You know, you got the brother that's running for governor, and you got a sister that's leading a national uh uh uh organization, man, that's doing the doggone thing on a worldwide level. A worldwide level. She was just a special guest for the deputy prime minister of England. Like, that's like the vice president being like, no, I need to meet this amazing woman. That's the type of wife that I have, you know. Um, and that's the type of life that we live. But we got that where because we went through something.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_00And then we took what we went through and we flipped it and used it for good. Like Lauren, like Lauren Hill talked about, right? How you turn a negative into a positive. And that's what we've been doing. And I think that when you if you want to pick a leader, you need to pick somebody that got experience taking a loss and turning it into a win. You feel what I'm saying? Not somebody that ain't never been through nothing. And so that's why I stand, I stand on solid ground when I say, yeah, I'm running for governor of Florida, and I do believe that I'm the best person, I'm the most qualified person to actually be the next governor of Florida because I've already done the work. I've already showed you what time it is with me. And the receipts are there.
SPEAKER_01That's for sure.
SPEAKER_00Like, ain't nobody running for governor right now other than me that's been one of Time magazine's 100 most influential in the world. Ain't nobody running for governor other than me that's been citizen of the year in Florida or a Central Floridian of the Year because the work that he does is for the community, right? Ain't nobody that's running for governor right now other than me has been named a Macarthur Genius Fellow. And there's definitely nobody, you can put them all together combined, who's never ever been nominated for no man. You got presidents of the United States trying to get nominations. And I already got it. I got receipts. And all of those receipts you can't buy. You know what I'm saying? Those things come because of the work that you've put in and the impact that you've had in communities. Ain't nobody that's running for governor, you can put them all together, has ever put a dollar in Lil Haiti. If anything, they may have taken somebody out of money. Right? Ain't nobody put a dollar in overtown. I put hundreds of thousands of dollars in overtown, hundreds of thousands of dollars in Carroll City, hundreds of thousands of dollars in Miami Gardens, hundreds of thousands of dollars in Liberty City. I've done that, right? Nobody else running for governance even can even tell you that they even did something to help our people out. And so when it comes to voting for who should be leading your community, to me it's a no-brainer. I stand on that. And I challenge anyone to challenge that. I feel you on that.
SPEAKER_03He already gave me the information. I never voted. I never voted in my life because of the situation. But the information he just gave me, the first time I'm gonna vote, know who's for the first one.
SPEAKER_00Well listen, hurry up and go to listen, hurry up and go to www.florida rrc.com. FloridaRRC.com. That's my old organization's website. And there's there's a link on there that will say, you know, uh, do you want to know if you're eligible to vote or whatever? And you can click that. And um, they should be able to get you an answer. And if they can't get you an answer, they got a connection with the Secretary of State, Division of Elections, that will help you get that answer.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00And so you gotta be registered by October, um, I think October 5th or something like that, if you want to vote in this year of election.
SPEAKER_01Okay, okay.
SPEAKER_00I need to unless, yeah. I'm gonna, yeah, I'm gonna have the wife. Maybe come on, let's go. She's gonna go crazy. Man, my listen, Miami is is like one of the most cultural uh diverse places in Florida. How would you your your you know your administration approach issues affecting community such as black Freudian, Asian Freudian, immigrant, working family, and young people? Yeah. I mean, you know, first of all, I think Riventide lifts all boats. So what no, matter of fact, let me let me go ahead and rephrase this. Go a different direction. A chain is only as strong as weakest link. All right, y'all heard that before, right? And so if you got if you got you got a chain that got four links in it, and out of those four links, three of those links could hold a ton of weight, right? And one of those links could only hold 50 pounds, how much chain could that weight bear? 50 pounds. Because it's gonna snap on a link that can only hold 50 pounds. But now if you take those other three that could hold a hundred pounds and you strengthen them so they can hold two tons, right? How much how much weight can that chain hold now? And the answer's still gonna be 50 pounds. Right. Because you ain't did nothing with the weakest length. That's where it's gonna pop at. It ain't gonna pop where it's strong, it's gonna pop where it's weak. That's the the the the the fracture of our community, right? And so if we want our communities to be stronger, more vibrant, then we have got to find ways to empower those in our community that have been most weakened. If we can get them stronger, right, we can carry more weight, right? We can accomplish more, we can be more fruitful. Uh, I got a couple quick examples. Um one of them is like when you talk about even with the economy and that there's there's not enough money pouring into our communities. One of the things that I tell people is that uh when you live in living in Florida, Florida loses almost $30 billion a year. 30 billion. So that means over the last 10 years we've lost over 300 billion of dollars. You know what for? For what? Because we had these crazy antiquated laws that makes it harder for people with a felony conviction to get a job. Right? Because I have a previous felony conviction, instead of me getting that $30 an hour job, maybe I'm only getting a $10 an hour job. Exactly. You feel what I'm saying? Yep. And why could I not make $20? Because I have a what does it have to do with my skill set or my, you know what I'm saying, my aptitude to actually earn, I have the capacity to earn $30 an hour. And so you're talking about $300 billion that could be in our economy that is not simply because of crazy rules that prevent people with felony convictions. And people with felony convictions are often those people in our community that's most marginalized. Because everybody wants to look down on them because they want to say that they're the F-word, right? And that they like, so what everybody made mistakes. Only difference is we got caught in it. You know? And so the the type of rules that allow people to, like, for instance, I can't, because if you have a felony conviction, it's hard for you to buy a house, especially in some homeowners' associations, right? And if I'm not able to buy a house, then I'm not able to help stimulate the economy because every time a house is bought, it it put it pumps $122,000 into the local economy. And so if you got over six million people in the state of Florida that can't buy a house because they got a felony conviction, say if half of them was able to buy a house, you multiply three, four million times one hundred and twenty-two thousand, and you're gonna come to close to half a trillion dollars that could have been pouring into our economy. And so it doesn't, we don't improve our conditions by strengthening folks who are already strong. Right, right, right. We improve our conditions by strengthening those who've been weakened. Last thing I would share with you is that I've worked hard for over 10 years. I've worked to bring gun violence reduction policies to the state of Florida. Right? There's one that's happening right now in Dade County that's ran by the Circle of Brotherhood, right? That's doing amazing work. And then I ran one in the city of Orlando, right? I'm gonna speak on mines. In three years, right, we were able to reduce homicides in the city of Orlando by over 88%. 88%. Now let me let me give it to you a little bit more plainer. Before we started the program, there was over 140 murders in the city of Orlando. By the time we concluded the program, there was only five. Understand that, right? Now, what that meant was more of our shorties are living now, and more families are getting to keep their lovers intact and see their kids grow up to go to school, to go to college, right, to start a career, whatever, right? So we're I'm invested in that piece. But let me tell you about, remember we talked earlier about the return on investment. To run that program, it was an average of $2 million. For that $6 million over three years, you know what the return on investment was? We saved the city of, we saved the city of Orlando, we saved the state of Florida, we saved taxpayers over $216 million. Right? So a $6 million investment, we were able to flip it into a $216 million savings. Right? Just think about it, because if you get shot, what you gotta do? You gotta go to the emergency room, all that's money. Right? Investigation, money. We go catch the guy who shot you, more money. Prosecution, money, incarceration, money, lost time from your work, from your job, money. You know what I'm saying? Now, if you died, that's a certain level of uh of loss. Now you're talking about a lifetime that your family is not gonna be able to get your your income to help them out. And so every life that we prevent from being lost through gun violence, it's a win. Everybody. So this is not something that's theoretical, bro. I've done this already. Like the numbers don't lie. Yeah. Right? And so to be able, when you talk about what I will do to communities, I would do the things that empower those who've been most weakened. And you know who actually was at the center of running those programs? People who've been at a high risk of shooting or being shot. OGs. Who might have done some time, right? OGs like me. And so the other part to that is saying that just because a dude did some time, that don't mean that ain't nothing he can't contribute to our society. Nope. Man, he could contribute a lot more, actually, because who can get those Jits to listen to him? An OG that got mad rep on the streets, or some dude coming out of Cornell or Harvard with a few degrees and a nice bow tie. Absolutely. They ain't never been in the hood, ain't never been through nothing, ain't never had to fight through nothing, ain't never been knocked down. You know, the same thing we talk about, the type of leaders, right? But then we get when we have an OG that's been in the game and them Jits knew he was a he was a beast in the game, and he's he didn't find the game. They're gonna listen to him. And now they wanna they want to put something positive back into the community, those are the type of brothers that government need to be investing into. Yep. Right? Because they have a lot to give. And so, you know, I know that if we were able to reduce homicides by 88% in the city of Orlando, and I'm pretty sure that uh the Circular Brotherhood, they've had some impressive reduction numbers too as well. That what would it look like to make sure that programs like that are instituted throughout the state of Florida? Right? How many lives would be saved? How many billions of dollars would be saved so it wouldn't be wasted burying people or treating people, or you know what I'm saying? And so that's the type of uh of a vision that I have uh for the state of Florida, right? And it's a vision that impacts everybody, not just one brand of folks, not just African Americans, not just whites, not just Democrats, not just Republicans, but every person living in this entire state. And that's what a governor should do. I'm just saying. You're saying a lot, brother. Yeah. You're saying a lot. Let me, let me, let me, when you okay, so when you talk about putting people over politics, what does that actually look like when you are sitting in the governor office? I mean, it's the it's the thing that we say like right now. Like, if if if say for instance, if I'm if I'm over community, right, you elected me to have your back, right? I'm your representative. Right. And so that person made a deal with you. Insurance company made a deal with you, right? And you kept your end because you know if you miss the insurance payment, what they gonna do? They'll cancel your policies in a minute. Right? And so if they reneged on their end, me, my job is like, yo, you can't come in my state and just do my people any kind of way and think it's okay. And on top of the dad insult the injury, he had all he needed was $2,000 to fix his roof. You took 10 times that the payments over five years. And then you took his money and made millions off of his money. So you and now you don't want to eat. Even pay the little pennies, you gonna bug that? Oh, that can't happen, right? Same thing with contracts. You know, you got you get your vehicle and you got you got five years to pay your car, and you paid your car for four and a half years, hit a rough spot. They're gonna come get it. They're gonna come get it. They're gonna come get it. They ain't gonna take part of your car? They're gonna come get it. They're gonna come get it. They're gonna break you off something, right? Nah, they're gonna take the whole car, sell it, like make it. That almost happened to me back in what 20 years, what 20, what I was? Uh uh I was working at low, at Home Depot. Uh, uh, uh, maybe about like 10 years ago. I tell you, they try to come get my magnum. Yeah, about 10, 15 years ago, they tried to come get it because I they were getting I almost was done. Yeah, you know what I'm saying? But I had fired. I got fired. Like I said, what you want to fight? They would not have to be a few. They would try to come. I think I owe like six payments. That was it. They were trying to come get my magnum, boy. And they were gonna sell it for full market value you can get for it, and they were gonna keep all that money, right? Yeah. And so, if that's the case, what's good for the goose is good for the gang. You feel what I'm saying? And so you asking me what I would do, I would make sure that if anybody is using, because here's the thing. Anytime we give a corporation or anybody a tax break, it's taxpayers' dollars. Right? And so politicians gotta stop giving away other people money like it's theirs. It ain't your money. Yeah, it belongs to the people of Florida. Right. And whenever you take, whenever you go and get a loan out of a bank, you got to do what? Pay it back. Pay it back. But do you just pay back what you borrowed? Okay, you know the law of the streets now. If I'm gonna break you off something, you gotta all in. What's up, boy? You got bring me back. Boy, you got bring me back. So yeah, yeah, yeah. Right, so how if if someone is going into the people to floor the bank account and making a huge withdrawal, right? It's my job to make sure that they do what? That they pay it back. That's how you put people first. Right? When you're not putting people first, you let them get away with it because they already broke you off. There's a little few thousand for your election campaign. Right? Keep it quiet. So now I'm good. You know what I'm saying? I'm not about to I'm not about to pull the strings. But when you're for the people first, the minute they renege, the minute they default on the payment, I'm gonna treat them like they would treat you. Let me get that property. Eminent domain, let me get that real quick. You are in breach of contract. That property belongs to me now. I belong to the people. Right? Because here's the thing. If you're letting people get away with not providing safe and affordable housing for our poor communities or for our first responders, now more and more people are becoming homeless, right? And then we're gonna criminalize the homeless, right? Then we got first responders that can't even afford to live in the city that they serve. They got to find somewhere else, two, three counties away, right? We were just talking, matter of fact, we just talking with my niece. Yeah, with your niece. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Shout out to your niece. She's in the building, Duchess in the building. Shout out, shout out. But the the the how how you, you know, you working and you're serving the city of Carol City, but you got to go all the way down to homestead? Like, you ever seen that traffic? Going back and forth to homestead. But but you got to do that because you can't afford to live there when you work, right? And a lot of that comes from politicians allowing developers to get away with stuff, right? And then we've got to foot the bill and we've got to pay more taxes, right? And we're getting less return on our investment the whole time. Their homies that took their money and got away like a fat cat, getting paid. Years and years. Years and years. So people first is making sure, listen, we want our businesses to thrive. We want small businesses to thrive, we want corporations to bring jobs and everything here to help stimulate the economy. But what we don't have to accept is them taking advantage of Florida taxpayers. What we don't have to accept is the special interests reneging on their contracts, right? Because if they're holding us accountable, we should be able to hold them accountable. Right.
SPEAKER_03Exactly.
SPEAKER_00Man, it's simple. It's simple. It's when politics get in it that it gets complicated. But it's some simple one plus one is two. And we can get back to that. With my administration, I'm not a politician. So I ain't gonna talk with those complex terms and all these uh crazy stuff that folks use to make folks think that they're smart or that they care or they know what they're talking about. I'm gonna talk to you in plain English because it's some simple solutions to these problems. It's the politics that complicated. That's why I say people over politics.
SPEAKER_03People over politics.
SPEAKER_00So uh I mean, I I'm gonna say I got one, I got one, I got one one one last thing to say to you. I mean, if okay, if someone is listening right right now, okay, who has lost faith in government and isn't sure their vote matters and and then and then and he understand about you running what you what what's your message to them? I mean, if uh if somebody lost faith in government, I can't really blame them, right? Because government has really let us down. Right. Right. But what I can tell that folks that's listening is that I'm here to restore that faith. Okay. Right? And and I if you if you're gonna bet on something, bet on your home team. Right. You know what I'm saying? That's been through something. Yeah. Don't bet on a stranger that ain't never been in your community. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. Bet on somebody that's lived in the same streets, walk the same streets as you. Right? You go anywhere else, you bet on anything else, that's on you. Yeah right. You gotta live with what you get.
SPEAKER_01Yeah right.
SPEAKER_00But the other piece too, as far as those people who may think that they vote don't count, right? I just tell them, if your vote didn't count, they wouldn't be trying so hard to stop you from voting.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Right. Let me tell you, and here's the thing, right? You know, a lot of times we we say things that it just sound good. Right. You know, I remember, you know, even in the joint where, you know, somebody like me, I'll die for mine, man. I'll die for mine. You know, they you know, they like talk about for their kids. And one of the things that that that that that you know the the brothers, conscious brother would throw back at him, well, would you live for him?
SPEAKER_01Would you live for?
SPEAKER_00You know what I'm saying? Because if you're willing to die for your for your son, then everything that is required of you is less than death, right? That means that you need to be there for your son because you it's very little you can do if you're behind bars. Yeah. Right? And we always talk about putting respect on our ancestors, right? But we we we don't do that when we don't go vote. Because you gotta remember something. Our ancestors, I and I don't care where. You know what I'm saying? Let me tell you, even from Tucson, right? Tucson put it on the line, and so many people put it on the line for what? Freedom, freedom, liberty, right? For us to take it for granted now is basically saying that that brother died in vain. He wasted his blood on us, right? And so here in the United States, we had so many of our ancestors that they had to walk what I call the gauntlet of death, which means that they were getting hung. They were threatened. Like, if you go to try to register the vote, we're gonna hang you, we're gonna burn you, we're gonna burn you alive, we're gonna put dogs on you, we're gonna spray you with files. And they walked through all of that just to go register the vote and then have to walk back. Now, both times they're going, they got people already hanging. As a reminder, you better not go do this. But they went ahead and did it. So they went to go register the vote, they walked back through it to go back home, and then when election time came, right, they had to walk through it again. Why? Why did they do that? And I'm telling you, they didn't see any inner uh no insight for them. They did that for us, right? They did that and they knew that I'm willing to put my life on the line because I know I'ma have a son or a grandson or a granddaughter that's coming down the line, right, that needs to have a better life. And I'm willing to put my body online for that. You know? And so to have people willing to give their life so we now we don't even have to go through that same thing. They try to stop us from voting, but we can register the vote online. We can vote by mail, we don't even have to go out in the streets. You know what I'm saying? All we gotta do is get to the mailbox. That's it. And so for you to have the right to vote and not utilize it, you're basically saying to all your ancestors that when you protest and you bucking the system and you jeopardizing your life, for me, it was a waste of time. You know what I'm saying? Oh, I mean, come on. Like you, if you if you work two jobs to get your son some fresh jerseys, and this dude got it laying outside in the yard in the dirt, letting the dogs play with it when you get home. Yeah. The very next day, what you gonna do? Yo, man, give me that. Don't get mad. Yeah, because you know, you you sacrifice for this. You just gonna take what I sacrificed for and just treat it like it's nothing. No, you can't do that. So that's the same way with voting, man. And so, and then the other piece to that, and I end with this, is that, but then on the other end, too, is that I think that the people who are running for office or are part of this system also have to give us something to get excited about, too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right? Because if you're just only sending tricksters in our community, if you're only sending people who ain't never been in our community and never did anything, then you know it's gonna be hard for me to get excited about voting for that person.
SPEAKER_01Right, right.
SPEAKER_00I ain't never seen it. But you know what? Every rare raider, right, ought to be excited as hell to get the vote for one of their alumni. Everybody that's you know, I walk those streets to Lil Haiti, like crazy. They call it Haiti High now. Okay, Haiti High. You know, that any folks coming up by the little Haiti, NMB, you know, all of ought to be excited. Anybody gay kind of period. Yeah. Because I'm one of their own. I'm I'm one of their own. And I've been here, I've done the work, I got receipts. You don't have to question the bottom five, just right there. And you can always Google me. Google. Just I'm Google, right? And so that is something that folks should be excited about, right? And knowing that I've already done the work, and the way I've done the work has always been lifting up and strengthening the people that's been weakest in our community. That's how we thrive. And hey, thank you. So thank you so much for coming on the Popazo show and blessing us with your present, man. Thank you, thank you. Good luck to you. I'm definitely now, when I get home, I'll tell my wife, baby, come on, let's go do this, help me. Whatever, I gotta go to. I go ahead and vote. And much love to the Duchess for making it happen. Most likely. That's the plug. That's what made this happen right here. Shout out the Duchess of Miami. Already, already. It's number love, man. Appreciate you. Ew!