- Just ahead on Black Issues Forum, a look at the effectiveness of red flag laws, what's in the state budget for North Carolinians, also thoughts about new information around Emmett Till's murder.

Stay with us.

[upbeat music] ♪ Welcome to Black Issues Forum.

I'm Deborah Holt Noel.

I really don't want to speak this into the universe, but it seems mass shootings are becoming a part of our American lives.

Many of us are now aware that on the 4th of July, a gunman opened fire on a crowd in Highland Park, Illinois, killing seven people and injuring dozens of others.

The suspected gunman, Robert "Bobby" Crimo III, was chased down by police later that evening and apprehended.

Crimo is a white male, age 21, and had legally purchased the gun used in the shooting.

Highland Park is a community that's about 1/3 Jewish and they have a local ban on weapons like assault rifles and large capacity magazines.

With all that, it makes you wonder what can reduce this type of carnage?

The recent federal gun legislation signed by Joe Biden provides $750 million to states to institute red flag laws.

And here in North Carolina, as you might imagine, there is a partisan divide in our General Assembly, with Democrats pushing for red flag laws and Republicans maintaining that they do not want any law that touches the Second Amendment rights.

Let's talk about it.

I want to welcome Senator Natalie Murdock of Durham, Mayor Carlton Stevens of Wilson, the Chairman of the Durham GOP, Emmanuel Jarvis, and political analyst Steve Rao.

Pleased to have all four of you joining us today for this important conversation.

I want to open with you, Senator Murdock.

What would red flag laws look like here in North Carolina?

- Yes, thank you so much, Deborah.

We are fortunate in the General Assembly.

We have three retired judges that serve with me in the General Assembly and all three of those judges as legislators have pushed for red flag laws.

They have countless stores unfortunately, like the incident we saw in Highland Park, where family members knew that that individual was a threat to themselves, to society at large, or to their partner.

We also have an issue with domestic violence and gun violence being utilized against their own partners.

So there are oftentimes tools that you can go to the court and make a petition to say "I do think that they are a threat to themselves or the community at large" and that judge, through a red flag law, would have the opportunity to say that they do not need to acquire a gun at that time.

I'm also glad that the federal law included dealing with the boyfriend loophole, which will deal with the issues that we've seen with domestic violence.

But definitely in Highland Park, it is a textbook case of how if individuals that see those signs that know that an individual can be a threat to society at large, they should have the ability to make that petition to the court.

That is not taking away anyone's rights.

It is public safety in helping us to keep our community safe.

So I'm glad that we were able to come up with a federal bipartisan solution.

I hope the state will follow suit and utilize these federal dollars.

Senator Tillis was another Republican that was at the table for this legislation.

So I think here in North Carolina, we need to utilize that money and institute our own red flag laws here in North Carolina.

- Emmanuel, but there is some resistance to doing this.

What can you share about the concern over Second Amendment rights and what Senator Murdock has stated about the good things about protecting citizens with red flag laws?

- Well, thank you for having me on.

I really appreciate it.

It's interesting that when you look at the 19 states that already have red flag laws on the books, including the District of Columbia, Illinois is one of those states.

So we look at a situation that happened just a couple days ago that was literally horrific, the ending of innocent lives, and there are laws and regulations on the books that are supposed to do just what did not happen.

It's interesting that out of the top five states that have the most mass shootings, four of the five have red flag laws already on the books.

So we have to look at, are they actually being utilized, first of all?

Second of all, we have to just understand that although this tool can be used for public safety, depending on the hands of which this tool resides in, it could also be weaponized.

I'm not talking about Natalie.

I'm not talking about people who have the greatest intentions to keep people safe now.

I'm talking about in the future.

Who's coming behind some of these people?

And we always have to make sure that due process is always upheld.

If an individual has the ability, whether it's a boyfriend or a coworker or a medical professional or even law enforcement, to have the ability to petition a judge for a red flag law, they also have the ability to petition for a warrant.

And so we want to make sure that people are presumed innocent and not presumed guilty.

And if we have enough time to go before a judge to be able to confiscate based upon a threat to themselves or other people, then we should be able to have the preponderance of evidence to do the same thing with a warrant.

- Those are some really good thoughts from both of you, Senator Murdock and also Emmanuel.

Mayor, what are your thoughts about red flag laws and how they constrain people's abilities and freedoms and how they protect?

- Well, good morning.

And I want to say thank you for allowing me to be on this show.

This is really near and dear to me.

I am a mayor and we run nonpartisan, but I'm a strong Democrat and so my thought process you would think would be we need red flag laws.

And I do think to an extent they help, but I'm gonna be honest with you.

I had this conversation the other day with a friend of mine.

I am a gun store owner and I'm an NRA member.

I'm an NRA instructor.

I love guns, period, the end.

And I don't know that the red flag laws are gonna do what needs to be done.

Anything extra will help, but it's asinine that I can get an 18 year old to come to my store and he wants to purchase a 22 revolver.

I can't sell it to him, but he can turn around and say, "Well, Mr. Carlton, I want that AR-15 that shoots the 556."

I fill out a 4473 and he walks out the door with it.

- Why is that?

How does that happen?

- Because at age of 18 you can buy a rifle, you can buy a shotgun, and an AR-15 is considered a rifle.

- Yes.

- But you cannot purchase a handgun until you're 21, and you also cannot purchase it until you go through your sheriff department to get a permit to purchase, which the sheriff does a background check.

So what I do when I do my 4473, I call it into the feds and they ask a few questions and I sell the gun to 'em.

Now, if a red flag law has been implemented and this young man doesn't have the ability to buy, the feds may not know at the time.

So he's walkin' out with a gun, even though the red flag law said, no, you can't purchase one.

But if the feds don't know, and they probably wouldn't know, he's walkin' out with a gun.

So that's why I have a issue with that.

I really do.

- Sounds like a bad loophole.

- It's a very bad loophole.

- Steve, let me get your - It is.

- thoughts on everything - And it's one - that's been said.

- we should work on at the state level, is the fact that an 18 year old can get an assault weapon.

That is another issue that we really need to get a handle on.

- Yep.

Well, thank you senator.

Well, Deb, my thoughts are this.

I mean, I've been researching this issue a lot.

I mean, first of all, I wanna just remind everybody that in the countries, we're talking about gun control versus gun rights, and I do respect that people have a right in this country to purchase a gun, but in the countries that have gun control laws, they have less gun homicides.

So today the United States has 4% of the population with 50% of the guns.

So I think the second amendment was, at the time it was founded it said "A well-regulated militia for the security of a free state, comma the right to bear arms."

So I believe that when speaker Moore says it's about law abiding citizens, I think red flag laws actually enable us to have gun laws that keep our public safe, while at the same time having the ability to have guns legally.

So I don't think the founders of our constitution wanted someone to get a gun whenever they wanted and kill hundreds and thousands of people.

So I think that's the issue, and I think we need to pull together, and Senator Tillis, his predecessor, a speaker in North Carolina legislature, has led the efforts in the working group.

So, I think that's my thought on it in the time that I have on this issue, but we've gotta get it done.

This is a public safety issue and gun rights have to be balanced with what's in the interest of the public safety, and right now the guns are getting in the wrong hands.

- I wanna take just another minute, or give everybody another maybe 15 seconds to respond on all that's been said.

Senator Murdoch?

- Yes.

I agree with the councilman there.

There's just so much more that we need to do, and red flag laws are really just one of a number of tools.

Governor Cooper actually proposed a lot of budget measures that would be helpful.

He proposed a million dollars for a gun locks.

I talked with leadership about that in Durham County just a few weeks ago.

We gave out 200 gun locks for free.

Who knows how many lives were saved as a result of that.

Unfortunately had a friend who has a family member at four years old who found a gun in the home, shot herself at four years old and died.

So we also have to get a handle on guns that are in the home.

We have to deal with safety in addition to making sure we keep guns out of the hands of the wrong people.

- Emmanuel, what do you think can be done?

- What can be done?

It's a sad situation.

I'm a gun owner as well, and I believe that when we're looking at these laws, we're looking at laws because we want our community to be safe, but by definition, law abiding citizens also want that and they're going to abide by whatever laws are put out there.

The problem is, is those that are causing these heinous acts are not law abiding citizens.

So creating a law for a non law abiding citizen does not affect that particular individual because they have evil as an intent.

What it does do, it restricts the ability of those who are trying to do things that are right.

And so those are the things that we always have to look at.

So again, I'm not looking at the individuals who are in our government today, but what I am understanding, and our framers understood this of the constitution, is that we always have to be looking forward of what could happen in the future, who can be empowering the future that could utilize these laws for their own political weaponry.

And that's the thing that's concerning.

- Yeah, so the conversation has got to continue.

People have to continue talking to one another about this to make everyone safer.

While all of us continue to bemoan gas prices and inflation, Governor Cooper has a decision to make regarding the state budget.

It has passed both the House and the Senate, and it's waiting for a signature, but how does it help him deliver on some of his goals concerning healthcare provision and education?

Senator Murdoch, what's in the budget that's working for North Carolinians right now?

- Yes, I think the best way to describe this budget is it is a continuation budget, it has a lot of the elements that you saw in the previous budget.

It is not quite at $28 billion, I believe it's at 27.9 billion.

There are some good highlights in there.

First I'll begin with education.

I have been a huge proponent of non-certified staff, so those are your custodial workers, your bus drivers, a lot of folks that keep the school running and really pour into those children.

My grandmother was a cafeteria worker, so I fought really hard to get wages raised for those non-certified staff.

We were successful in that.

They will be getting $15 an hour.

I filed an amendment that didn't make it in a previous budget, so it is now in this budget.

We were able to get some raises for teachers, raises for state employees, a 1% cost of living adjustment, some funding for economic development, as well as water and sewer.

I think where the budget falls short still is with public education.

We still need to fully fund Leandro.

And the numbers that we have crunched, we are not quite doing that, and I think if we are raising funding for private school vouchers by 59%, the least that we could do is do more than a 6 to 7% increase for our public schools, that is in our constitution.

That we are to provide all of our children, with a sound basic education.

We also have the base salary of public teachers, at $37,000 a year.

That's still not on par with a lot of other states, in the Southeast.

I still think we will be the lowest in the Southeast, with that.

We're doing better with principal, and assistant principal pay, but we still have a ways to go with teacher pay, so.

I was unable to support the budget, because I think we need to do more with public education.

I'm still very concerned, about very harmful pregnancy crisis centers.

They received another $3 million in this budget.

They provide misinformation, as we deal with the aftermath of Roe V. Wade, being overturned.

I think there's a lot of other things we could do, to support women's health, that do not include harmful pregnancy crisis centers.

And also, back to those gas prices.

There's so much that we could do, to get that money back in the hands of taxpayers, that are dealing with struggling to fill their tank, literally being on the side of the road, because they don't have enough gas.

And so the Democrats, we propose not a gas tax holiday, we wanted to keep that money here in North Carolina, by providing rebates to taxpayers, that do have a license that are over 18...

Excuse me, that just have a license.

So that they can get some of that money back, in their pocket.

So I think, since we do have over $6 billion, in surplus in a rainy day fund, if we do not consider today's times a rainy day, if not a tsunami, I don't know what we're going to do, with the fact that all that money is just sitting there, in reserves.

There's more than enough for us to give some of that money, back to taxpayers, and still ensuring that we have the reserves that we need, as we prepare, unfortunately, for another recession, in a few years.

So I do think the budget missed the mark, but the governor will have until Monday to decide, if he will sign it or he could leave it there.

- Gotcha.

- And just allow it to go in the law.

- Let me pull Emmanuel in here.

What are your thoughts about the budget?

Where we are and the governor's decision.

- Yeah, I appreciate the work, that the state legislature has done, and also, I said it to Murdoch and the work that she's done, to try to really put things in that she believes in.

You know, when we look at inflation, we look at recession looming.

Not only do our personal accounts, have to be recession proof, meaning saving money for repairs on cars, repairs on buildings, repairs on things like that, the government also has a responsibility to do that as well.

And if they don't do that, then when things go bad, they can't pay teachers, they can't pay state workers, and things like that, and so...

When conservatives and liberals have different philosophies, on what they should be doing with money, and we see that a lot of times, Republicans immediately, they wanna stash money away, and some people consider that heartless, some people consider that mean.

We have plenty of money, we should give it back to people, but there is a large responsibility.

I would say that the largest employer in North Carolina, is actually North Carolina State Legislature, and so... Not the legislature, but all the employees that reside and rely on that money, every single month that we have to make sure, that we are judicious and that we're good stewards, with that money.

So regardless of what happens in our world, regardless of what happens in our state, regardless of what happens in our country, we can still make sure that we can write those checks, to hundreds of thousands of people across the state, that are depending on it, that work every single day for North Carolina, and deserve to get paid.

And that's one of the things, that is one of their priorities.

- Mayor Stevens.

What are your thoughts about the budget, and what Emmanuel said and also Senator Murdoch, with regard to this rainy day fund?

- I'm stuck in the middle again.

- 'Cause you represent a small town, but...

So you might have some unique needs.

- Well, you know, it's... Well, you know, Wilson is the biggest city, in North Carolina anyway.

But, um...

I see both sides, right?

Yeah, we wanna be recession proof, but at the same time, you know, the Word even says, when I was hungry, you did not feed me, you know?

So, you know... We have to look out and help those that need the help.

But at the same time, we have to find a way to spend our money smarter.

I would say smarter.

Right?

But also I think we, as regular citizens, we've got to do better.

You know, I know so many people, that whenever they were getting all the extra money, from the government, they just kind of...

Okay, I'm done.

Vacation for a year.

And now they are...

They have nothing, you know.

You have nothing.

And if I'd have been fortunate enough to get that, I would've saved it all, right?

So, I think it's a combination of personal homes, and doing what we should do, and our government does have a responsibility to teachers, and I'm a former teacher and principal, you know so... Well, to them, to our state employees.

But we also have to make sure that we're ready for... Like we say, a rainy day.

You never know when Noah's Ark is coming.

- [Woman] So, you gotta have the balance.

It's not just black and white.

You gotta have... - It's not-- - I like your word, you know, smart kind of solutions to this.

Steve, what are your thoughts?

- Well, and I think first of all, there was bipartisan support for things, that Senator Murdoch talked about, which is good, you know.

School resource training, broadband, 5 million increase in broadband, water and infrastructure, those kinds of things.

But I think-- [speaking indistinctly] Said just a few days ago to me, it's a timid budget, you know.

And I think in the areas of education, fall short, in terms of not paying teachers enough, we have 10% attrition rate, 20% vacancy rate, at the state government in the middle of a pandemic, rising prices, inflation.

Doesn't, you know, fund the school improvement plan, for Leandro.

We've talked about in the show, minorities and black communities, can't advance without a solid education.

The elephant in the room is Medicaid.

I mean, we had a chance to join the 12 states, to expand Medicaid, and now we're depriving healthcare, to half a million North Carolinians.

In addition to being a half a billion dollar short, on education.

And the other thing that we haven't mentioned, is underfunding democracy.

You know, I find it interesting, that in a state board of education, responsible for a 100 counties in the state, and they fell 3 million short of funding, just cyber security personnel, election modernization, you know, systems modernization.

This is a time when we need to make sure, that we're doing what we can, especially when everyone's claiming election fraud, election monitoring, that we're investing, and making sure, so.

I think those are a few things, that haven't already been mentioned, but I think the governor would be better off just, you know, either signing it by letting it turn into law, and let's make sure in the next session, that the Senator and her colleagues can do what they can, to get North Carolina, you know, providing the education that we need, the jobs that we need and on the heels of a pandemic.

Particularly focusing on the healthcare needs of our citizenry in North Carolina.

- Thank you, Steve.

On the 30th of June, investigators discovered in the basement of a Mississippi court, an unserved warrant for the arrest of the woman, who fabricated a story that led to the lynching of Emmett Till back in 1955.

Since then, demonstrators and civil rights activists have called for action and most recently entered a nursing facility in North Carolina, searching for the now 80 plus year old woman.

Natalie, Senator Murdock what do you think should happen as a result of the discovery of this warrant?

- Yes, first continued prayers and support for the entire Emmett Till family.

It's still really fresh for me.

I know a lot of us have not only watched the documentary, but visited the African American Smithsonian recently.

And every time I go to that museum, I go and physically see the casket that has been donated to that museum, how he was unrecognizable and the bravery of his mother to say, "I wanna have a open casket funeral.

I want people to physically see what was done to him, to physically see what racism and hate looks like at 14 years old."

And just thank you for her bravery.

It really set off what now has become the Civil Rights Movement.

When people were physically able to see that folks all over the nation became galvanized in ways that they had never become galvanized.

Before they thought, "Oh, that's the south.

They need to deal with it."

That's when folks all over said, "Wait a minute, what is going on?

We all have to figure out a way to push back."

So support their family's efforts to continue to seek justice.

We do know the DOJ opened up the case again and said that they did believe the Statute of Limitations ran out.

So with this new piece of evidence, I think that they should review that.

And from what we heard from the DA here in Wake County, that a warrant would have to be issued out of Mississippi before they could say that she would need to be transported there to possibly see what else law enforcement would do.

But I think that her family has every right to continue to seek justice.

- I'm sorry to interrupt you Senator.

I do wanna get everyone else in here.

Let me get your thoughts about this Immanuel.

- Yeah, this is, you know, I know that I'm supposed to be giving political perspective, but there's no political perspective to this.

This is something that we see evil in the hearts of men.

It's been around since the beginning of time, since the garden and it's continued on.

And we see it manifest in sometimes the most horrendous, the most heinous ways that we can ever imagine.

And this is one of those situations in our American history, where it's right in front of our face.

And so what do you do about it?

I don't know what to do about this.

I know that there's legal processes and things that we should be doing that is dictated to us by law.

But there's one thing I do know that regardless of here or in the life after, no one gets away with anything.

Justice will be served because I believe that I serve a God who is just, and so regardless if we see justice on this side or on the other side, I know no one gets away with anything.

And so that's my hope, because so many times we see in the news, we see the articles of people seemingly get away with such atrocities.

And it feels as though sometimes they live their life, they die, and they're never brought to justice.

And my hope is not only in the American or our governmental system that has laws and justice.

But my true hope is that there's a God, who will not rest his head until justice is served.

- Steve, let me bring you in about 30 seconds.

What do you think should happen?

- I think we need to just bring back a prosecution.

I know that, you know, the challenges are sometimes these arrests have a statute of limitations that run, but I think we have to do the right thing and all people need to be held accountable.

And I know she's 80 years old but in this situation, I think that, I would move forward with a prosecution.

And I think that, I got moved when I watched the movie "Just Mercy" and saw, you know, that movie, I mean I think justice is something that we always have to honor in the US.

And I think that this is an evil that must be corrected, a wrong that must be made right.

- Thank you for that.

Mayor Stevens.

I concur with what everyone has said.

I think it's gross injustice, what happened, but I'm going to put it into the hands of the judicial system.

We're not dealing with the same judicial system that we had years ago.

I think what is here, due process will take place.

- I wanna thank today's guests for joining us and we invite you to engage with us on Twitter or Instagram using the hashtag #blackissuesforum.

You can also find our full episodes on pbsnc.org/blackissuesforum, or listen at any time on Apple iTunes, Spotify, or Google Podcast.

For Black Issues Forum, I'm Deborah Holt Noel.

Thanks for watching.

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