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Welcome back to Questions You Didn't Ask with
me, Naisha Frey, and my guest, Jesse McCoy, as
we continue the series, Justice. or just us how
law health and equity collide in america let's
pick up where we left off you have brought up
exactly the thing that really pushed me to have
this series and invite you on we have a presidential
candidate with multiple felony convictions yep
running in the 2024 elections and more on the
way and This is an obvious inconsistency and
exception to the rule and law that we are experiencing,
right? Because the compromised Supreme Court,
as you mentioned earlier, and probably some other
judges that were appointed by 45 as well, said
it was okay for him to be a presidential candidate.
It's okay for a convicted felon to run for the
highest office. in this land and potentially
in the world but like you mentioned jay kwan
and uh tanisha cannot get a bond insured certificate
in order for them to become a barber yep they
cannot qualify for housing they cannot qualify
for food stamps They are going to get released
from prison. They might get a program to support
them for the first six months, even though this
conviction is going to be on their record. And
not even just a conviction, the charge. They
might have beat the conviction. The charge is
going to be on their record for the rest of their
lives. But the only support that is available
for them is within the first six months of release.
There's no support if you beat your charge. And
you had to miss work to fight the charge. The
job's gone. But this rich white man, this is,
you know, for those people that are not sure,
and I don't think that these people listen to
my show, but for those people that are not sure
if white supremacy and institutionalized racism
doesn't exist, if they are still, you know, in
the fantasy of the idea that we are a post -racial
society. This example of the 45th president running
for the presidency again after January 6th, after
inciting a riot on our Capitol, which I took
personal offense to, and I think most Americans
should because that's our Capitol building. Who
are you to go in there and trash it? What are
you talking about? Not to mention. People who
are Africans who were enslaved built it in all
of its glory. And you chose to unleash a violent
coup on our Congress and your vice president.
And the police. Don't forget the police. And
the police. Blue eyes didn't matter that day.
Right. But, you know, you've got this extreme.
inconsistency and exception. What are some of
the inconsistencies and exceptions to the rules
that you've observed over the course of your
career? And how does it make your work easier
or harder when you're working for the human and
civil rights of people in our community? I think
that all rules have exceptions, right? Part of
being a lawyer is people give you 30 ,000 books
of rules, statutes and stuff in cases, decisions.
But at the heart of it is challenge everything,
right? Challenge everything. Now, there are some
battles that I challenge that I do not win, right?
There are some battles that I challenge that
they might consider it and think it's the right
thing to do, but it's not the law, right? And
then there are some battles that are in line
with the law. So you're all over the place. But
what I'll say is I have personally observed.
That rules are designed for the masses. Like
they're not designed for the elite. They're not
designed. There's always a workaround for everybody
else. Right. On top of that, rules are only as
good as their enforcement mechanism. And if the
enforcement mechanism is busy looking one way
while people are doing it on the other way, then,
you know, it is what it is. So when you think
about things like, you know, I can remember.
the wall street brokers that were getting tarp
money and having cocaine fuel yacht parties with
tax dollars right like so and it was like ah
going hard in the pain right you know whereas
with this uh you know ppp loan fraud they were
coming out to people throwing folk in jail uh
with the exception of who yeah absolutely absolutely
so my thing is everybody you know understands
kind of these systems work only to the benefit
of those who put them in place and who know the
loopholes to get around them. That's why everybody
gets lawyers to try to figure out what the loopholes
are. But the loopholes themselves don't even
help you. They only help you if you are what
Paul Mooney would say, the complexion for protection,
right? So it's sad. But again, I've always said
that I think America's biggest problem is...
Like we do not want to let racism go at all for
some reason, because if we had an even system,
most of these rules would be fine. But even our
Supreme Court. Right. A lot of people are shocked
now because the Supreme Court is now seemingly
compromised. You've got Alito with the stop the
steal flag flying at his house. You got luxury
trips and yachts from conservative donors, all
this stuff. Even with that, this isn't the first
time that the United States Supreme Court has
been compromised. Right. Right. When Dred Scott
argued all the way from St. Louis to the Supreme
Court that he should be a free man. Justice Tanney
said a black man has no right, said a white man
has the honor. Right. And that was law for 50
years. Right. So I think what I have have developed
kind of a mentality of is. I'm never going to
allow a court system to have the final say on
how things operate. The way our system is set
up is the courts get to make decisions that are
in their purview. Legislators get to make rules
that they feel like are in their purview. And
the executive gets to enforce the things that
they care about. Right. What it means to me is
you need to have hooks at all three branches
of government, right? And when the court don't
want to act right, make sure you got an executive
that's going to be okay. When the executive don't
want to act right, make sure you got a Congress
that's going to be okay or a General Assembly
that's going to be okay. And I know that's a
lot of work. Vote in every election, please.
Not just every four years, every two years. And
vote down ballot because a lot of people, again,
at the bar. Local elections matter the most.
Yes, people get upset with me and they be like,
no, you need to tell you need to tell Joe like
I know Joe Biden personally. You need to tell
Joe that he need to do X, Y and Z. And I'm like,
well, first off, Joe don't control Durham public
school system. So that's nothing to do with Joe.
I'd be wasting his time if I said that. Yeah.
Iran is invading North Carolina. That's different.
Right. Right. So, you know, one is just trying
to give people the civics education of like,
where do you go? But then once you get the information
following through. Right. And I think the thing
that I love about local elections is that those
candidates are accessible. Right. You may never
meet the president. Right. You may never see
a president in life outside of TV. Right. But.
Your mayor, your city council, you see them.
They're at the grocery store. They go to the
same school your kids go to, unless they, you
know, these weird charter, charter. Your kids
go to your school, you know, so they are approachable.
And you can hold them accountable at the meetings
or if you see them out and about and they're
not doing what they're supposed to be doing.
Right. You may or may not see a governor, but
you probably will feel the impact. of the governor's
enforcement policies. One of the things that
I was really happy for was during the period
of COVID when we were at risk of mass eviction
because folks weren't working, we had a governor
who was bold enough to step out from everybody
else and say, no, I'm going to do my own moratorium
on eviction. stop people from being a big deal.
And he paid for it because then you had the crazies
that went to Jones Street and went to downtown
Raleigh and, you know, complaining and threatening
them or whatever. But at the same time, he did
something that was from a position of leadership
that he should have done that I appreciate. Right.
You know, so it's there are so many levers. And
I think it's easy to get discouraged when you
want the person to be on the top of that ticket
to win. And when they don't win, you know, like.
the Hillary laws, I was done with America. I
was like, oh, I can't believe that y 'all going
to let this man who ain't never worked in federal
government be a president of the United States
and this lady spent her whole career here? Whatever.
You can love her, hate her, cool, but you can't
tell me she's going to want to qualify. We got
another qualified one that he's going to have
to run against, so we about to see. We about
to find out. This is even worse because this
is not just qualified, but it's like HBCU educated.
If you've been to a homecoming, If you've been
to a staff show, if you've been to anything associated,
I don't care if you went to eat at Olean's or
any restaurant. Talk about Olean's! You need
to be the first one up in this election. Don't
even wait until November 5th. Early vote. Go
ahead, early vote. In North Carolina, early voting
starts October 17th, by the way. Thursday, October
17th. You don't have to wait until November 5th.
And actually, I think this is going to air in
November. But either way, we are promoting. We
are promoting. We are encouraging. And this is,
again, this isn't just about every four years.
This is, look, you don't like what happened in
2024? Gear up and get ready for 2026. And like
Jesse just said, hey, all power. This is the
other thing. All power to the people who are
brave. enough to run for office. And if you happen
to be one of those people who say, I've had enough,
I'm tired of talking about it at the hair salon,
I'm tired of hearing my husband talking about
his conversations at the barbershop, I'm ready
to do something. Put your name down and let us
know that you're out there because we need you.
Absolutely. And don't feel like you have to be
on your own either. I think that's what the coalition
is about. If you've already been putting the
work into your community, then your community
should show up for you when you do stuff. If
they if they rock with you like that, have you
been like half behind doing it? I don't know
about that. You know, it happens to community.
Community keeps you home. Community keeps you
humble. Community keeps you focused. Community
can cut you down as much as they can build you
up. Right. So I think it's important to be grounded.
I don't think that running for office should
be the first time. that people in the community
see you out and about. I think if they already
know you and they see you running for election,
they probably going to have a certain level of
enthusiasm about seeing somebody they know getting
into the position. You already going to get questions
about things and privileges that they want you
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your continued support. And let's keep the conversation
going. So let's start talking about some solutions
then. You know, I come from, of course, the public
health background and focused on health equity
and deeply involved in this space. And we often
look for systems -based solutions. I often look
for systems -based solutions to improve the condition
of vulnerable populations. What legal or policy
interventions do you think could have the most
meaningful impact on improving health and life
outcomes for people, especially those with felony
convictions? So felony convictions, I'll say
again, I'm not an expert on those things. At
this point, I'm more of a housing guy. So I can
definitely tell you the housing. Yeah, talk about
it. One, right to housing. We need to revamp
how we do housing in America. There are nations
who have rights to housing. who are doing this
better than us. So we need to revamp our right
to housing. That's followed by a right to counsel.
So anytime that somebody is getting evicted,
they need to be able to be provided an attorney
who can help them because 90 % of the landlords
are going to have attorneys and most people who
go to the eviction court don't. And that's why
the eviction numbers and rates are what they
are. And then up next, development policies,
right? So there's a lot of issues around this
term affordable housing. Affordable housing is
kind of a misnomer because affordability as it
stands right now is dictated based on HUD value,
which is a national measure. But a lot of people
in Durham County don't make what somebody at
the national level would be. So affordable housing
is essentially based for people who make $65
,000 a year. What are you in Durham County? You
make a 22 .5, right? Right. it's not going to
be affordable for you. So we need to make a more
localized metric for how we deem things to be
affordable and then stand behind the encouragement
of development for those places. And if developers
don't want to come into those places because
it's not a profit motive, well, we need to look
at the inventory we already have and say, well,
what's being abandoned? What can be used, right?
So I think those are like policies to help in
the housing space. Now, in criminal justice space,
I think that the first thing is I'm a big, big,
big proponent of diversion programs. I don't
know, like at this point, since I haven't done
criminal defense in a long time, I don't know
how far they've expanded them. But we used to
have people go to food banks, Salvation Army,
whatever the case may be. And instead of us throwing
you in jail or putting a record or giving you
a record, you would do. work for let's say 10
hours 20 hours whatever and then get a letter
from the supervisor at that facility and i think
that was helpful for a couple different reasons
so one it was helpful because it kept you from
getting a record number two it was helpful because
now you have a connection to the community there's
somebody if you ever say i got some free time
on my hands let me holla at don at the food bank
like let me like you you can you have people
now right right number two Sometimes those same
places turn around and need people that they
can employ to work with. So if they have some
funds they come into and they know that you're
a hard worker and you enjoy just being there,
they might have a job for you. So now you got
less time to be out in the street doing what
you do and more time to be doing something productive
and build a relationship with someone who can
write a recommendation for you if you want to
go to school or whatever the case may be. And
then on top of that, like I know this sounds
crazy, but. Especially in Durham County, we have
a lot of progressive judges who look like us.
Right. And one of the things that I hear in the
back door when we talk in the chamber, people
don't want to see a vote that look like them
in the jail. Right. They will. They will. Don't
get it twisted. They will. But they don't want
to. Right. If you can have a legitimate reason
for what happened, for what you did, we can provide
an alternative. I think people are more apt to
accept that. We want jails to be for the people
who just determine that they're not going to
make it work. Right. Right. You want to threaten
the whole society. You want to be a danger to
everybody. Yeah. Maybe you belong in jail or
prison. That's different. But most people like
I did criminal defense for a long time. The number
of people I represented who did the class ABC
felony stuff. Very small. Very small. The number
of people I represented who did property crimes
or who did crimes of poverty or something like
that, astronomical. If you took out the people
who had substance abuse issues and the people
who had property crimes issues, you wouldn't
have a jail. You wouldn't have a jail at all.
And then there are so many people, because I
did criminal defense in Durham and Wake County.
In Wake County, The homeless population commits
crimes in October, November when it gets cold.
Because it's cold, right. So they can have three
meals and a place to live. That is the saddest
thing in the world. Like, I don't want somebody
going to jail just so they can have security
and a place to live. Like, we need to do better
about caring about our fellow men and investing
in things that are going to create housing, create
opportunity. So those are the immediate policies.
The next policy is an employment policy. I think.
People deserve a livable wage. Yes. And I think
that livable wage is relative because, you know,
like what is livable in Durham may not necessarily
be Charlotte. Right. But I think it's important
that people be able to feel like they have some
kind of incentive to participate in the economic
system. Right. So I would love a world where
people are able to pay their bills. And have
money to go to the DPAC every now and then, right?
Right. Like, enjoy it. See the fruits of your
labor. See what you work for. And for those of
you outside of North Carolina, the DPAC is the
Durham Performing Arts Center. We do have a global
audience, thank the Lord. So we're talking about
going to see, you know, concerts and music. Enrichment.
Enjoy your life. Because, you know, it's not
all about, it's not all about, I say it because
I'm just so frustrated. It's not all about working
and just paying the bills. Health and wellness
is also about enjoying your life, enjoying your
world, enjoying your community, having time to
connect with your loved ones, having time to
make a new friend. This is how we have social
cohesion. And when we are cohesive, then we help
each other. And when we help each other, you
have a lot less people in trouble. And with a
lot less people in trouble, you don't have as
many people in the court system and in the incarcerated
system. And yes, that means that maybe some of
those prisons and jails, as Jesse said, might
go out of business and be no longer necessary.
But I say to them, just like I say to a lot of
nonprofits, your job. is to go out of business.
That should be, in my humble opinion, that should
be the objective of all of these types of institutions
that separate people or are there to fill the
gap for people. We want everyone to eat. And
as Jesse said earlier, one way or the other,
they're going to eat. And so what we want is
for them to be on the right side of the table
and not the wrong side of the table. But I interrupted.
I'm sorry. You were talking. Oh, no, no, no.
That was great. That was great. I'm snapping
my fingers. That was great. You know, but I agree
with you. The biggest thing for the people who
have financial ability to do so, I would strongly
encourage you to travel outside of the country.
Right. Just like you said, I think we are bred
into this work mentality. Work, work, work, work,
work, work, work. And then next thing you know,
you work at a job for 20 years. You pass away.
They're going to replace you in a week. Right.
And keep the work going. But the people who really
matter, like your family, your friends, like
those are the people that can't replace you.
Right. So you need to go out here and see. What
is life? I can guarantee you guys, you can go
to Ghana, you can go to Spain, you can go to
the Caribbean. There are people who ain't living
like this, right? Oh, wow. It's a whole life.
You can really, really enjoy yourself, have cultural
events, all this stuff. There's a world of stuff.
And I think it changes your perspective when
you come back to realize that if you do something
here, you should do it. Of course, everybody
has to make their money. I get that. But you
should do it either because you're passionate
about it. Or you should do it because it's a
means to an end for something else that you're
trying to expose your family to. And I just think
we are misled just because they're going to make
it seem like, you know, we got the stigma of
being lazy on us. So we got to work double hard
and not do that. And then we got to keep up with
our bills. It's ever increasing and whatever.
All those things are metrics that are being used
to control and manipulate your contribution to
the society. Right. So as we wrap up and this
conversation is hard to wrap up, like I said,
Jesse, I might be in your inbox again asking
you to come back because this has just been so
wonderful and rich and touched on so many things,
doorways and pathways that we could go down for
the enrichment of our audience and our community.
I appreciate it so much. And one of the other
things I appreciate about you is that you have
built a coalition and you invest in your coalition.
And so as you partner with other lawyers, professors,
students, courts, community organizations, government
entities, what gives you hope and what organizations
or advocacy efforts inspire you the most? So
that's a great question. What gives me hope?
I work with law students and law students who
come to me who don't always know how litigation
work or how law works. they get a chance to spend
a semester with me and learn by doing right so
we put them in court to advocate for the people
and oftentimes it exposes them to folks in a
way of life that they've never seen before and
they realize that it didn't take that much of
your personal time to make a huge difference
in the life of somebody else right and you take
that skill with you to wherever you go because
most of my students are going to go to new york
los angeles london or tokyo Right. So you take
that skill with you wherever you go. And that
skill is going to propel you once you get your
financial resources and all that to do good for
the community. So I've got the first female attorney
in Pakistan was one of my students. What did
she do after graduation? She went to Pakistan
and created a pathway for women who wanted to
be attorneys. Like that's powerful stuff. And
they come in with a lot of notions about who
they want to be. like what they want to change.
And I want to encourage and nurture that. So
one, I'm always going to be optimistic because
every year the students get younger and younger
and technology and they always want to do cool
stuff as far as organizations. So this I may
be a bit old school about, but I try to read
at least once a month about the old battles for.
Thurgood Marshall, Carol Moseley Braun, like
all those old school like NAACP civil rights
movement legal defense fund cases. Because to
me, the things that I'm dealing with, while they
may be equivalent in magnitude, they are not
equivalent in day -to -day struggle. Like what
folks had to deal with when Thurgood Marshall
got a flight or got a drive into the city and
get out before the newspaper article come up.
So I feel like those are the things that inspire
me. It's like, OK, I can get through this. Nobody's
trying to firebomb my car and all that. I can
get through this. The other thing is I also look
at kind of the trends. So I'm like, look, at
a time when they were doing this. It was a small
cadre of Black people who Charles Hamilton Houston
had picked up to do these cases. But now we got
Black people everywhere. Like, it's folks doing
all kinds of cool stuff. And they might not necessarily
be able to give time for litigation efforts at
the federal level, but they might have money
to support it. They might have a good word they
can put in the newspaper or some publication
to support it. They might call their friend who's
a congressperson to support it. So we have a
lot more resources to be able to navigate some
of the changes that we want to see. As far as
people who are on the ground, I'm always going
to give a special shout out to another federal
rattler of ours, Dawn Blagrove over at Emancipate
NC. All right. She is awesome. Phenomenal. So
if you all don't know Dawn Blagrove at Emancipate
NC. They have a small offshoot, but they are
actually doing everything to combat over policing,
to protect the community, to file lawsuits, to
appeal things to the highest level when they
need to, and to make sure that the community's
voice is heard in all things that are happening
in Wake County. So Emancipate NC, I really love
what they do. If, you know, if things were different,
I probably would have tried to talk at work.
But, you know, I'm in my passion that I'm enjoying
what I do. But, yeah, I'm exposed to students
at all levels. So mentoring. middle and high
school students. I oftentimes talk to college
kids. I have a pre -law fellowship program at
Duke that I direct that has college kids who
are interested in law school. They come and I
get to learn the college kids. I got law school
students. So me, as long as I'm going to be around
students, I know that there are somebody who
at least has notions of changing something. And
all I have to do is empower them with the information
and education to be able to do it. Lastly, I
do want to give a shout out to People, the good
folks at Legal Aid in North Carolina, because
I learned most of my housing law work from them.
The great folks at the Durham County Public Defender's
Office, because I learned how to be criminal
defense attorney from them. Shout out to Dawn
Baxter over there. And, you know, really, I want
to embrace North Carolina Central, Wake Forest
and Duke for giving me opportunities to be able
to teach because they didn't have to bring me
in. Right. They could have told me no when I
applied. But they saw value in bringing me in
and exposing me to their students. And last but
not least, all of those things would pale in
comparison to Florida A &M University. They came
out and got me out of North Carolina and was
like, come on down here. We don't care what you
look like. We don't care you broke. We're going
to make you into something. Right. And they honored
their promise. Yes, indeed. I will always look
for the A &M for that. And it's the best network.
Arguably, I think the best HBCU, but that's just
me. You're not the only one. Okay. Just checking.
Just checking. But yeah, so definitely happy.
And I'm glad to see that, you know, we're continuing
to expand. I read an article earlier about, you
know, record enrollment at all HBCUs. Yes. That's
great. And so hopefully, you know, this is just
a focus of what we're going to be doing in the
future. And lastly, I want to make sure that
everybody knows don't go where you are tolerated.
Go where you are loved, right? Nourished and
loved. Yes, indeed. I love it. I love it. I love
it. So this is in conclusion of our awesome series
with Jesse McCoy. And I just want to say thank
you. Thank you. Thank you for being here with
this and for just pouring so much into me. pouring
so much into our audience. And, and also those
shout outs, those shout outs are awesome. We
love giving shout outs. And we just want to just,
I just want to say thank you. Well, I appreciate
you for having me and you know, I'm a fan. I
know you're always out here doing good work anyway.
So anytime you need me, just let me know.