- (female announcer) Production funding for Behind the Headlines is made possible in part by the WKNO Production Fund, the WKNO Endowment Fund, and by viewers like you, thank you.

- Updates on the election, the school takeover, and much more, tonight on Behind the Headlines.

[intense orchestral music] I'm Eric Barnes with The Daily Memphian.

Thanks for joining us.

I am joined this week by a roundtable of journalists talking about some of the biggest stories of this week and past weeks.

That includes Laura Testino from The Daily Memphian.

Thanks for being here again.

- Thanks.

- Kailynn Johnson from The Memphis Flyer.

Thank you for being here.

- Thank you.

- Sam Hardiman from The Daily Memphian.

Thanks for being here.

And Katherine Burgess from MLK50.

Thank you for being here again.

We got a lot going on.

We'll try to talk about all kinds of things.

Let me do a quick just note at the start here.

As we tape this it's Thursday, this will air on Friday.

Early voting ends on Saturday, and then election day is August 6th.

That's the county general.

So the kind of final races for county government, excuse me, county mayor, county sheriff, County Commission, school boards.

We'll talk about a bunch of those races.

And then the primaries for federal races like the US district, the new redistricting, House seats, senator, and so on.

As we get past August 6th, we'll start trying to get folks on who've won those primaries for the federal and state.

So elections moving towards November 3rd, so more to come on that.

On two of the big races for county, we did have the two candidates for county mayor, Mickell Lowery and John DeBerry on the show.

We also had the sheriff candidates, Anthony Buckner and Brad Less.

You can get all those at wkno.org, The Daily Memphian, or YouTube and learn more about those.

But I'm going to start, I think, with you, Katherine, just some, let's, again, we're going through early voting.

I think, I know through some, the first six days, I think you have more updated numbers, the numbers were way up compared to some years ago.

Give us a take on where we are in the election.

- Yeah, yeah.

So the early voting numbers have been up, which is really exciting.

We know we've historically had very low voting totals, when you consider the total number of registered voters in Shelby County.

So it's exciting to see that they're up.

Right now, we're on pace, if you look at the early voting numbers, to surpass our voting totals from 2010, which I believe was about 96,000 voters.

The question is, if you have a lot of people who turn out during early voting, how many people are you gonna have turn out on election day?

- Right.

- So hoping for a good number of people to actually turn out.

- I think, but Bill Dries, who isn't here today, obviously, but had through the first six days, Democratic voting in Shelby County was up 32% versus 22.

And a Republican turn out was down at that point in Shelby County 12%.

It's different, though, because we've got these big super districts that go across half the state.

You've been covering some, I mean, again, we've, Shelby County has been divided now into three different districts.

Which parts have you been focused on in this new district?

- Yes, of course, 5, 8, and 9 are all fascinating in their own right.

We've got really strong candidates in each of them, really interesting candidates in each of them, and they're all really sprawling districts.

I've been focused on 9.

That is, of course, previously was Memphis's district represented by Steve Cohen, and now it stretches all the way from Memphis up into really the outskirts of Nashville.

So I've been lucky enough to follow the Democratic candidates a little bit on the trail, specifically London Lamar and Justin Pearson, the two front runners.

And went and followed them all the way to Bedford County, where I've really been able to watch and see how they're trying to connect with this district that is much more sprawling.

It is much more rural and it is much more white than the district, than district 9 has been.

So they've really been working on their messages of affordability, tackling data centers, tackling maternal health issues, as they've been just going across this huge district.

- Who does that play to, do you think, that it is a more diverse district?

Because previously, 9 was essentially Memphis and a little bit of Millington.

So I mean, does it help Justin Pearson who's clearly been on MSNBC or MS Now, whatever we call it these days, has been a figure in the fight against data centers nationwide, you know, so much national media, or does it help London Lamar who's, you know, more grassroots and maybe more known in the old district?

- Yes, that's a question I've been asking and I really don't have an answer yet.

As I've talked to people around the district, I've heard a lot of people who know of Justin because they know of the Tennessee Three.

They know of the expulsion.

They saw him on national news.

And actually he had been organizing people in very rural counties, even prior to him announcing his run for US Congress.

So he's been very well known.

But then London Lamar is more of your traditional Democrat.

She's not the progressive, she's not backed by AOC, and that does resonate with more conservative voters, who might be likely to cross over.

I've heard quite a few people who say they love her stories.

How she's used her personal story of pregnancy loss, which is a huge issue across Tennessee, especially in rural areas, where you've had 16 hospitals close.

So it really seems like both have had the opportunity to really resonate with voters.

- I'm having a brain freeze because of the redistricting, and this is probably willful brain freeze.

Who is the main candidates for the Republican side in district 9?

- Yes, the main candidates for the Republican side, there's of course Brent Taylor, but then I've also been seeing a lot of signs.

We, of course, know about Charlotte Bergmann.

She's been running for this for many, many years.

- Annually.

- Yes, frequently.

[indistinct speaking among panelists] - She is, of course, running as well.

And then there's also Todd Warner and Jeremy Thompson.

I have heard a lot of attention around Todd Warner, but Brent Taylor's generally considered to be the front runner.

- Okay.

And that's not, that's, do it again.

That's district 9.

- 9.

- District, Chaz Molder is.

- Yes, so that's 5.

- Democrat in 5 and running against.

Who's the?

- Well, there's actually several Democrats in 5, - Okay, yeah, yeah.

- including Yolanda Cooper-Sutton, DeVante Hill, - Thank you.

- Rachel Hurley and Carrie Iacomini, and then of course, Chaz Molder.

And then the Republicans are Charlie Hatcher, and of course, Andy Ogles.

- Okay, that's where Andy Ogles is.

The people - Yes.

- who's in the House now, US House now.

- Yes, correct.

- Okay.

- And then we've got 8.

- 8 is Democrats.

- And the Democrats there are.

- Kustoff's district.

He's a Republican and the Democrats are?

- Yes, yes.

Gordon Dewey Bryan, I've been seeing a lot of signs around for him.

Yes, a lot signs in Memphis, especially East Memphis.

It is pretty saturated with signs for him.

Jordan Henderson, Heidi Kuhn, and Leonard Perkins.

- Yeah.

- So those are the names.

I have not been following that race - Yeah.

- nearly as closely.

I know.

- Okay.

- Yeah, I haven't been following it nearly as closely.

- Again, we've got our voter guide on Daily Memphian that breaks down all these races that are all real complicated, as we move towards election day, again, early voting ending on Saturday.

Any other thoughts?

- Yeah, one of the interesting things is, Katherine, and I've been thinking about this, is like if, whomever wins the Democratic primary and faces Brent Taylor, most likely Brent Taylor in District 9, is probably on paper not the favorite, because of just the way the district's drawn.

That's how gerrymandering works.

They're both on the ballot to retain their seats in the State House.

- Yes.

- And I find that really interesting that they are essentially on the ballot in two places on election day, - Yeah.

- When you look at the sample ballot, that they could just go right back to the State House when this is all over.

- Right.

- Yeah, for sure.

- Let's move to, as confusing as that was, then, we have the school board races, which are confusing, in the sense that there is a state takeover board, we can call it whatever we want, that is in the middle of a lawsuit with the existing school system, school board.

But all of Memphis-Shelby County School Board seats?

I'll just turn to Laura.

Talk about the election and the dynamics with the takeover and the lawsuit.

- So here at the County General, usually it's the big race for Memphis-Shelby County School Board seats, because they became partisan seats.

This is less of the big race this time.

Incumbents Michelle McKissack and Joyce Dorse-Coleman won their seats.

You know, they don't really have competition this time, but the newcomers in 6 and 8 will each face, those Democratic nominees, will each face an Independent.

No Republicans ran.

There was a possibility that it was going to be all 9, but there was a lawsuit that prevented that from taking place.

But the big question is sort of just what authority these elected board members will have?

We'll get a better idea of how the takeover lawsuit moves forward, when it will be heard in a Nashville federal court this Friday.

So check out The Daily Memphian for an update on when that might happen.

Probably another month, or two.

- Really?

- six to seven weeks before that happens, I think.

The state is really pushing back on the judge, as much as it is pushing back on the arguments that the school district has made, basically saying that the judge didn't appropriately issue the status quo order for the temporary restraining order, which has put a pause on everything.

And so it's possible that there's another order on that before we get to the preliminary injunction hearing, which would be the longer - Right.

- Stay.

But it's not necessarily clear whether that will happen.

- Is the takeover board meeting, are they acting?

Are they just completely on hold until this is resolved?

- They are on hold.

They are not meeting.

They canceled the meeting that they had planned.

They had a committee meeting in the morning on July 1st.

The order came and then they canceled their afternoon meeting, where they were going to do some, you know, potentially pretty big steps.

- Yeah, sure.

- Talk about - Yeah.

- District leadership, begin to request data.

- One more question.

- Mmm-hmm.

- The start of school is not on hold, right?

- No.

- I mean, the school district moves on.

The kids are gonna be back in school.

Teachers are gonna be back.

- Yeah.

- Roderick Richmond is the superintendent, like.

- Correct.

- What is that like?

You talked to lots of people over there.

What is, for lack of a better word, what is the vibe?

I mean, are they just head down?

Are they looking over their shoulders?

How do they do?

I get, they can start, I'm being, I'm joking a little bit.

They can start school.

But in terms of longer-term planning around capital construction, changes in curriculum, I mean, are they just moving forward, as if they're gonna have full control?

- They are.

I think that it was shakier as the takeover board began meeting.

Certainly some people were beginning to wonder what might happen, especially once the agenda came for that July 1st meeting that had a leadership item on it, where the takeover appointees would consider leadership at the district.

I think since the stay has been issued, people are really focused there - Yeah.

- On the start of school and don't seem to be as concerned of trying to maneuver around the hypotheticals.

That's something that Superintendent Richmond has said a lot.

And one of the main arguments that the district made in its argument for pausing the takeover was that the additional layer of bureaucracy from the appointees would slow down the start of school.

- Yeah.

- Everybody, the example that they used knows about, it's very hot at the beginning of August in Memphis.

HVACs can stop working.

- Yeah.

- School has to stop, if you don't have an HVAC, if you make an emergency purchase over $50,000, they can't really move forward with that purchase until the takeover board says yes or no.

There's a 15-business-day holding pattern.

- Yeah.

- There's a process that the takeover should have, board had yet to put in place, so there was just a lot of questions about what they would actually be able to spend money on.

- But now with the stay in place, they're just gonna go and theoretically, you know, hypothetically replace that HVAC?

- Oh yeah, - Yeah right.

- With a stay in place, nothing changes.

But that was sort of the big argument was it would get in the way of starting school.

- I'll say we have outgoing county mayor Lee Harris on the show next week.

We actually just taped that earlier, and he talks a lot about this, right or wrong, and it was a very interesting take on how he thinks it's gonna go and people should tune into that next week.

I'm gonna come back to maybe some election stuff and some county finance stuff, but I wanna get Kailynn involved and jump over to City Council, SpaceXAI, and a story you've been covering.

- Yes.

So during the past City Council committee meetings, Mayor Paul Young and his administration presented the proposals, I'll say, for what they plan on doing with the tax revenue from the xAI data centers.

They passed an ordinance recently, where a portion of the tax revenue would go towards the people in the zip codes that directly are affected.

I believe it's a five-mile radius.

And they used data from community surveys collected, I can't remember the exact time period, but those were actually a point of contention at one point, because they had an advisory board filled with community members and City Council members, where they basically talked about what the community wanted to see.

But environmental groups were present in these conversations, and they felt like there were discrepancies between what the city survey had said and what they had talked to community members about.

Basically pushing, they wanted more of that money to be, I guess compensated to these residents for potential health concerns that may come as a result of this.

And so what the mayor and his administration presented was a majority of the money will go to home repairs, which is exactly what the city survey and those residents that took that survey said they wanted the money to be used for, blight remediation.

They're actually doing a workforce program as well, where residents will actually be paid to clean up and revitalize this neighborhood.

- We come around to xAI.

We're gonna come back to the schools, and it's SpaceXAI now, and I keep shortening to xAI, I'm sorry.

And obviously, Katherine mentioned it in the race with Justin Pearson, who's fought, you know, environmental issues in that neighborhood for years.

Sam, you've covered SpaceXAI a ton.

I mean, I don't know.

I mean, we've talked in the hallway before.

It's interesting how this is a national issue now.

I mean, these fights about these data centers is now nationalized, right?

I mean, in races all around the country, local mayors, local House, Senates, all that.

Thoughts on where we are with SpaceXAI right now in this election season.

- I mean, what do you mean by where we are?

- I don't know.

That, is there growing regret among political people?

Are people, the people who supported the data centers and the tax revenue that Kailynn was talking about, are they still fully supportive of it, or is that national, what sometimes feels like a national pushback against data centers, are we feeling that more and more here?

Is it making people change their minds?

- I mean, I would love to actually poll - Yeah.

- On SpaceXAI and actually know what the entirety of the public thinks, because I think it would be pretty nuanced and interesting.

I also think that, like, there was never a decision point for local government with SpaceXAI in Memphis.

There was never actually a decision point.

There were administrative processes that were followed, in terms of permitting, in terms of hooking up utilities.

There was never an actual vote.

- Because there's no tax incentive.

- There was no.

- No enabling.

- SpaceX, the fact that we're talking about, - Yeah.

- Let's be clear.

We're talking about 3.2 million, which is 25% of 1 year's taxes from one xAI data center, SpaceXAI data center.

When we get to next year, - Yeah.

- Which when we publish later today, more things on The Daily Memphian about where we are, in terms of the company's investment in the city, like, we're talking maybe $10 million next year, in terms of a quarter of that going to five miles around these areas.

Like, they've quickly become the largest taxpayer in the community.

And so to separate the environmental concerns, which are very real, and we're talking about real air pollution that has been added to a city that already doesn't have good air quality, all right?

SpaceXAI did not create air quality issues in Memphis, Tennessee.

There was a coal plant in that neighborhood for decades that contributed a ton to the air quality and the health issues around there.

And let's not forget that that coal plant was still running 10 years ago.

- Well, and there's a refinery.

- There's a natural gas plant.

- There's an airport.

- Yeah, exactly, but like.

- It's not to make it okay.

- No, but the pushback, the pushback is real.

It is very much like people have very valid feelings.

It is much more about like the idea of regret here is what is there to regret?

There was nothing to really stop.

- Yeah.

- The only thing that the government really decided that was real in this case is what the health department said about allowing temporary turbines at 3231 Paul R Lowry Rd, which is the same determination the state of Mississippi has also made.

And so regulators signed off on these things, despite what is told to the public over and over again.

- Yeah.

We could do more and we will do.

And Sam has been writing, other folks writing, but Sam obviously has stuff coming out by the time you see this.

Let's do a quick thing on the schools, but it is important.

The promises that were made by then xAI to help some schools in the area around the plant.

What's the update there?

- Yes.

The facilities officer called the promises from last year, an amazingly long list that would've helped HVACs, athletics, classroom additions inside four schools near the two data centers in Memphis in the Whitehaven and Westwood areas.

So far that has looked like some painting and outside improvements at John P. Freeman.

And majorly a locker room and gym renovation in Fairley High School.

There's a $5 million cap that's been introduced in the last year.

The company, you know, didn't necessarily recommit to doing the entire list, but is continuing in conversations.

Memphis-Shelby County Schools representatives have told me that sort of aligned with the acquisition of SpaceX and xAI, talks died down.

But that there's been a much more positive and consistent relationship with SpaceX executives since the merger.

- Yeah.

The five million dollar cap, some people are a little like, "Where did that come from?"

And is that per year, right now?

Is there, like, you know, define that cap.

- Sure.

That existed in an MOU that expired at the end of June.

Neither SpaceXAI nor MSCS would comment about where it came from.

There's not necessarily a guarantee that the MOU will look exactly the same next year.

So it's a little bit up in the air exactly what will happen in the future.

- You wanna segue into the audit?

I mean, the audit - Sure.

- That came out since we've last had you on the show.

You've written about it extensively.

But it was in part the backstory to the takeover.

I mean, that's a gross simplification, but it was certainly some would say used by state legislature to say, "See, see, see, we need to take over this school district."

Other people have said it's a $2 billion budget and the things found are, you know, maybe typical when a district that's gone through all the change.

I don't know where it stands, but talk - Sure.

- About the audit.

- Yeah.

You know, the findings show that most of the, you know, major evidence of abuse, which was the most significant, I think, finding, is tied to a, excuse me, cleaning contract for the district from 2022.

And I think, you know, the district's response has been, "Well, we referred some concerns about this contract to the FBI."

That was two years later.

So the FBI, since 2024, has had a referral of concerns about potentially associated kickbacks with this contract.

The audit skewered the district over how it would, the procurement process for it.

So a little bit different what went to the federal, what went to FBI versus what came up in the audit.

The one instance of fraud is something that is currently being litigated in local court around water bottle filling stations, which people may have remembered from COVID era, which were to replace water fountains.

The district is saying that this vendor basically installed them without correct permits in ways that could have potentially electrocuted students.

The vendor, you know, has denied some of those claims in court and said that they basically understood the district to be doing the permits.

But I think larger picture here, there are some questionable, I think, processes and internal controls that the district will have to respond to.

And I think understanding sort of how they manage contracts, manage all of their records, those are the kind of shifts that we'll be seeing in the future years.

- They have generally said, you know, the district, the elected officials, and the administration that, you know, we welcome the results of the audit.

We'll go through that and we're gonna try to take corrective action and we're gonna learn from it.

Is that, whether or not they do, but that's been their reaction to it.

- Yeah, I mean, they'll have to support, to respond with a corrective action plan no matter who's in charge to the state comptroller's office.

- We've got five minutes left here, and I wanna get some reporting.

Again, we're jumping around today, so I appreciate everybody's patience.

But with Memphis Safe Task Force, ICE, and some of the, walk through some of the reporting you've done and we'll chime in on that.

- Yeah, so, the task force has of course been here for quite a significant amount of time now.

It won't be too long when they'll have been here for a full year.

So I think what that has allowed us is to really dig deep into what they've actually been doing.

We've talked before on the show about the lack of transparency.

When you have 31 different agencies, it's hard to dig into what each of them are doing both individually and then where there's overlap.

So the last story I did on the task force, I was able to obtain body camera video from the Tennessee Highway Patrol of an MPD traffic stop.

MPD has not yet provided me with the video.

They say it's going to take a year and $400.

But THP provided me with video.

And what that showed was that Homeland Security Investigations agents were in cars with MPD when they made a traffic stop that resulted in the arrest of an 18-year-old high school student, who was then detained for some time, before a judge ordered his release.

And I think what's particularly interesting about this situation is we've had the city say MPD is not working with ICE on immigration issues.

And yet, the video shows that they're in the car when the traffic stop is made, and it shows HSI, which is a division of ICE, actively helping MPD and working together, and MPD actively helping them, both to identify this 18-year-old, a high school student, and then MPD holds him and some other students in the car, while HSI figures out where they should take him.

So it clearly flies in the face of what we've been told about how MPD and immigration enforcement are working together, and I think there's a lot more to find out that all of us media entities in town are really digging into.

- Thoughts, anyone on Safe Task Force where we are?

- No, I mean, I would just ask, I would ask Katherine this is like, you know, how can we as journalists figure out how isolated this incident is?

Because it probably isn't isolated, right?

Like from the footage that you had, it seemed pretty almost routine, - Yes.

- Right?

And so like there's maybe a workflow that they've worked out.

- Yes.

- And then that's also curious of when the mayor said to the public that this wasn't happening.

Did the mayor misspeak, or did the mayor not think we were gonna find out?

And that's what, I would love to know that, because how much visibility does the mayor have to the thousands of traffic stops that occur in this city every day?

- As for the mayor, I can't answer that question.

I did send questions certainly to the Mayor's Office.

MPD gave me a very brief statement, did not answer specific questions.

The Mayor's Office did not respond at all.

So they certainly had an opportunity to clear that up and did not choose to use that opportunity.

As for whether it's an isolated incident, I think we're going to have to dig deep into the fact that there have been many traffic stops, and there's video out there somewhere.

And we need to work really hard, all of us media entities, to be getting the video, watching the video, talking to the people who have been impacted by these stops, all of these different things that are very hard and take a lot of time and money to do.

The video that I did find was interesting because in many ways it was routine.

They talked about it in a very routine sort of way, but there also were anomalies.

You could tell they weren't happy about it.

They didn't really wanna be dealing with high school students.

There were conversations about which entity is even allowed to transport this 18-year-old to detention.

So there clearly was some chaos and some confusion, even while it was treated as a very routine sort of thing.

- I'll just editorialize and say, you know, we've had people on the show who are very supportive of Memphis Safe Task Force, some who aren't, some who are supportive of everything but ICE.

I mean, it's been this mixed bag.

And a lot of the proponents of it, or people say, "Look, it's been effective."

They'll point to the crime numbers being down year over year, year to like Crime Commission, Shelby County Crime Commission shows violent crime down.

I'm looking at the number, something in the, you know, 40, 50% compared to 2011.

Like big numbers down.

But the lack of transparency should support the proponents of the plan.

I mean, transparency would, if you support this, then put it out there and say, "This is what we've done and this is why."

If you're opposed to it, it should go both ways.

There should be more transparency on this.

- Well, just to chime in here, like, the body camera footage we're talking about, we pay for as taxpayers.

- Yeah, 100%.

- The City of Memphis pays $11 million a year - Yes.

- For Axon Enterprise's body cameras and cloud storage.

We pay that as taxpayers with interest, because we actually borrow the money through CIP.

THP, we also own that footage.

So like.

- We own the federal footage.

- Everyone, everyone.

- We all pay federal taxes.

- Everyone, everyone should give us the footage.

- If there is footage that exists, which there isn't always.

- There isn't always.

Like the.

- DA, right?

- Mr., yes, Mr.

Pigram who died at his workplace in Burger King in Frayser.

There was no Drug Enforcement Administration.

- Yeah, even go back to the Tyre Nichols incident and that it was something that, the law enforcement community locally did really well is got that video out very quickly and it was horrible to watch, but we, then we could deal with the reality of what had happened.

So we are out of time though.

Thank you everyone for being here.

We appreciate it.

Thank you for joining us.

If you missed any of the show, you can get the full episode online at wkno.org, The Daily Memphian or YouTube.

You can also download the full show as a podcast.

Again, early voting ends on this Saturday and election day is August 6th.

So check out our voter guide on Daily Memphian, and we'll see you next week.

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