January 14, 2022 • 37 mins
Ed talks with CNN legal analyst and author Laura Coates about her new memoir, Just Pursuit. The book details the imbalances in the justice system she’s seen in her years as an attorney. She also explores what should be done to make system more equitable. They also talk about the future of police reform, voting rights and the Supreme Court.
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Speaker 1 (00:22):
Welcome to the latest edition of one hundred The Ed
Gordon Podcast. Today a conversation with Laura Coates. She's a
former Assistant United States Attorney for the District of Columbia
and a trial attorney in the Civil Rights Division of
the Department of Justice. Coaches currently a CNN Senior Legal Analyst,
host of her own radio show on Sirius XM, and
(00:44):
an adjunct professor at the George Washington University School of Law.
If that weren't enough, we can now add author to
that list. Her debut book is Just Pursuit. In the memoir,
she looks at the justice system and how as a mother,
person of color and a woman, she's had to find
ways to navigate and try to correct an imbalanced the
(01:06):
system that is often tilted against people who looked like her.
Just Pursuit. You know, it's interesting because as I as
I read it and I looked at what you put forth,
I have always said, there is the ideal of justice
and then there is the reality of justice. And what
I found interesting when I read the introduction, you say
(01:29):
the pursuit of justice creates injustice. Give me a sense
of you know why you lead with that line and
and what made you write this book? Now, yeah, you know,
this book for me was equal parts catharsis and catalyst.
And I, as everyone else has been watching what's been
(01:50):
unfolding for the past several years and their cries for justice,
the demands for justice as if it's a one size
fits all approach, as if it's a destination that you
can actually reach universally, as opposed to a very individualized
experienced said that I think UM speaks to the idea
of our changing definitions of what justice means and what
(02:14):
fairness looks like, and this sort of cost benefit analysis
that justice really involved. I think it's very jarring to people.
And I found that the emphasis on thinking of justice
in the form of a verdict, or thinking of justice
in the form of it's this particular defendant and this
particular victim, as if in the periphery it's non existent.
(02:39):
I really wanted to focus on what it looks like
when people are demanding to speak truth to power by
telling them what the truth really is about what the
justice system as a vehicle for getting to a destination
really looks like. And so I chose to confront it
um from the perspective of a narrative memoir rather than
(03:00):
I think perhaps the expectation was some dry law school textbook. Um,
and you know, I'm not a you know, a boring person,
I hope you know, and thinking about it, and for me,
it was storytelling as a form of activism and helping
people to have a lens and to fly on the wall,
opportunity to experience what the system looks like, even vicariously. Yeah,
(03:24):
and what you've done, which is really great, I think,
rather than you know, walk a line from a beginning
to end story, you take chapters and you show stories
within those chapters to illustrate some of the issues, because
I think people who only no law through Perry Mason
if you're old or l a law or even um
(03:47):
the high profile cases that are seen on court, TV
and CNN, which I always feel like that ain't real
because everybody's on their best behavior because they know the
world is watching. But the legal system in America is
very much assembly line. Uh, and people missed the idea
of and you talk about it, the characters come in,
you know your role. It's a very much day to
(04:08):
day and it's a very much detached world for a
lot of people. Who are in it every day. But
what I loved about what you did, and I'd love
for you to get into that. But I love that
you also personalized this. You didn't just take stories that
you could have told and left yourself out, but you
personalized it from the very beginning as to you know,
(04:30):
what it meant to you and your family to work
in a system that you knew was imbalanced. Yes, and
I appreciate you saying that, because it was very scary,
honestly for me to be so vulnerable. Um, in the
sense that I have spent my career talking about other
people's experiences and trying to educate on the law of
(04:51):
how the system works, of what it actually looks like. UM.
And there is room for a judgment, obviously in the
cases that I meant on them, asking the court of
public opinion in many respects to come to their own conclusion.
I asked a courtroom in a criminal trial for jurors
to yield the conclusion of a verdict that I wanted
(05:12):
them to have. And in these stories, I and in
my work, I suffer no fools. And I don't leave
myself out of the criticism or leave myself out of
the roles that I've played within the system that I
think desperately needs to be reformed. And I really wanted
the vehicle of introspective thought to come through because I
(05:32):
think that people believe they know who they are, what
they believe. They have a very um wonderful impression of
what they think, they're moral compass where it points. They
believe if that were me, if that had been me,
here's what I would do. They just they can tell
you everything. And there are moments in our justice system,
(05:54):
far too many to count, where we are confronted with
this battle of allegiance, said, this notion of what the
directive is versus what your lived experiences, whether you can
be a patriot and skeptical and question whether you can
be an agent of the Justice Department and see injustices objectively.
(06:19):
And what do you do once you have a seat
at the table? You know, we talked about it. It's
better to be in the room where it happens and
a seat at the table. But we never go past
that step of now that you're here, what is being
asked of you will require a great deal more, perhaps
than you thought. And do you bring your whole self in?
Do you act robotically in your approach to justice. I
(06:43):
never could. I never wanted to. You know what's interesting
to me? And you talk about it, um that we are,
you know, the sum of all of our parts. And
you talk about UM, your parents and what they gave
you and your siblings, UM in terms of not college
and history and why you went into the Justice Department
(07:04):
and the Civil Rights Division and the like. And then
you talked about your children and the world that they
would face, and that had to kind of gob smack
you to a great degree when we're faced with it
in the way we have been over the last you know,
decade or so. UM, give me a sense of those
personal sides in terms of, you know, the kind of
(07:28):
sit down that you had to have with yourself at
at some moment, I think, yeah, you know, I was
very lucky that my parents did not shield me from
the world. They did not act as if it was
the days of wine and roses, with the five days
a year. I knew that I was a black person
in a country that had historically and oftentimes in present
(07:51):
day not embraced me. I knew what it was like
to watch my parents struggle with opportunities to get financing
where their professional colleagues did not. I saw what it
was like to hear the stories of my parents, UM,
you know, with a knock on the door, come to
one of their first apartments and says, excuse me, I'm
(08:12):
so glad you're here. We want to buy you out.
We don't want you here. That's our a duplicity of hello,
and please get out, You're not wanted here. A black family, UM,
I know what it's like to be one of only
a few in um Minnesota where I grew up, and
what that looked like when you were asked to be
(08:34):
the educator of your peers on issues throughout your entire
educational experience. And I knew. I mean, we dined and
in my dining room, we dined under the Norman Rockwell
painting of a depiction of Ruby bridges with an escort
from two federal marshals. We had the picture as well
(08:55):
of them, of the moving day for Norman Rockwell, where
you know, you had the little black girl in the
white dress and holding her cat, looking at the two
neighbors of the black of a white, white son and
a white daughter with her and her brother. And we saw,
we understood, that civil rights was something that was ongoing.
(09:15):
It wasn't something that in our house was let's not
talk about the uncomfortable parts. And so for me in
my rearing, I looked in complete reverence to those who
played a role in getting me to where I was
conceptually in the land of opportunity. Um. And so when
I really wanted to delve into the conflict and the
(09:36):
idea of being gobsmacked, I always thought that as a
mother I would be able to have the luxury a
generation later, hopefully of having what I call almost that
curation experience for my kids. You know when it's like
a museum. Right, We're gonna go into this wing today,
and here's how we're gonna learn about and I'm gonna
(09:57):
help you to write curious the experience. And then when
you're at the requisite late my age of maturity, then
we'll focus on this wing. It's not how it happens,
is it ed? What happens is real life tells you, Boom,
it's time for you to go to this wing and
teach your children about moments that you did not think
you have to get to for years, and when I
(10:18):
have been commenting on the cases like from George Floyd
to what happened to ta Mere Rice and Brianna Taylor
and Elijah McLean and George and of course I mean
I could go on for an hour all the different cases.
I know that my own children are watching me, watching
me give the commentary publicly the talk to the world,
(10:42):
and then asking me for the answers, saying things to
me like mommy, well that ever happened to me? And
as a parent, I have been forced to make the
decision of do I sort of put you under my
wing and comfort and protect or do I protect you
with education even if it means that you'll be robbed
(11:04):
of some level of innocence. And and that's why I
thought this book, and one of the reasons I wrote
it in many respects was as a way from my
children to better understand me, to better understand the world
around them through storytelling. And in particular, you know, I
focused in the book on the period of my time
(11:25):
at the Justice Department, when I was carrying both of
much I had back to back, you know, stair step babies,
and so I wanted them to know I don't I
must have been crazy back then. Obviously there was no
distance learning at the time you wanted more more kids.
But I remember ed thinking, I want my kids to
understand what I was carrying while I carried them as uh,
(11:49):
in homage to parents across the world who grapple day
to day with the world and need to explain it
to their children. Let's talk about something that I, UM
have forever have been truthful. I think in terms of
the industry that I entered into, and I think it
speaks to the law as well. This notion of being unbiased,
(12:11):
I think is something wrong in terms of how we
how we approach it and teach it. None of us
are unbiased. We bring biases to the table every single day.
The The hope is that you can work against them, UM,
and then you can find ways to mute them, if
nothing else. UM, give me a sense of how you
(12:32):
continue to deal with that is one who has been
very realistic about where we sit right now, and I
would think one who tries to continue to be optimistic
in the face of UM reality that says maybe that
optimism is naivete as well. That's a really great point.
And UM, I think about the way in which you
(12:54):
know opinion is opinion, and I try never to offer
an opinion under the guise of the fact. I try
to be very clear when I'm offering an opinion, because
I think there is responsibility in the media, in particular
in an era of misinformation, and when oftentimes opinions are
rewarded when they are disguised, I think that it is
(13:18):
incumbent upon our credibility as an industry. And I'm really
I'm new to this industry. This is something that I
I did not I was not thinking this would be
a part of my career when I was growing up,
or even as a lawyer, um when I decided to
enter into the media and have the opportunities. So I
value credibility above all else. I value straight shooters and
(13:39):
those who call balls and strikes, and so I try
to preserve that. Now. The difficulty, of course, is that
you need to provide people with the mechanisms and the
information to be to give an informed opinion, and sometimes
those can seem like an oxymoron, an informant opinion of things.
But I think you can reconcile that. I think you
(14:00):
can present people with the objective information and the facts
and they can lead to a conclusion that is an
opinion and I'm okay with people deriving an opinion from
information I provide. UM. I'm also comfortable in terms of
giving my opinion, and I think it's because of the
experience I had with the Justice Department and that I
(14:21):
realized that, you know, I never had the luxury, nor
do I think I really ever wanted a luxury of
being able to check your identity at the door to
somehow pretend that you could become a blank canvas and
(14:42):
simply a robot who wants to be I'm not are
talking ed. I am talking and speaking human. I'm an
advocating human, and so UM being a mother, being a
black woman, being a wife of a black man, being
someone with a lived experience into the black woman in
this country as a public servant, all of those things
(15:04):
informed my advocacy. They informed my skepticism, They informed the
way I approached my objectivity as well, and it also
informed the way in which I think it was necessary
to persuade UM people to understand the facts as you
present them. And so I think, frankly, sometimes when it's
(15:24):
when it's disinformation, I'm against it. When it's being straightforward
about here is the substance that I bring and the
identities that can compete. I think you're better for it
in the justice system to approach it that way, and
I think oftentimes you're better in the media to just
be who you are and let the audience decide. Yeah. Well,
(15:47):
I will save my discussion for what the media is
today for another time, but let me ask you for
one who a lot a lot, for one who lived
uh in the Justice Department's world, I'm curious, you know.
I spoke with Eric Holder for for my book, and
we talked specifically about you know, him wanting to do
(16:12):
the right thing and believing that the vehicle of the
Justice Department would allow that. But then you again are
smacked with reality and what that is. One of the
things I'd love love for you to address is I
want to be careful. And I tell folks, and I
use this analogy. We see the convictions in the George
(16:34):
Floyd and the Ahmad Aubrey murders, but I said, we
need to be careful because that does not necessarily mean
we've turned a corner. It's like those same people who said, well,
what do you guys want? Obama was elected, so prejudice
and racism are now gone. Should we not be careful
not to get ahead of ourselves. Of course, I mean
every game is easily reversed. The Voting Rights Act of
(16:57):
nineteen sixty five, people had the impression that it was
set in stone. How is that working out? Every opportunity
to claw back the games are being realized. You've got, um,
this impression that we've got these three co equal branches
of government who are going to stay in their lane
and be respected by one another. We'll really have three
interdependent branches of government. And because of that, politics is
(17:22):
more fluid and seeps into the decisions of other branches.
You see the scripts that Supreme Court nominees give as
if to suggest, oh, I, oh, did I write forty
seven law reew articles on this. I hadn't contemplated this issue, Um,
you know, I wouldn't want to talk about it matter
that I might come before me. This sort of facade
of objectivity that often is in play you talk about
(17:45):
decisions of the Justice Department. Um. And I do think
that there is an attempt to be impartial, there's an
attempt to be compartmentalized. But there is a fear that
there is that there's a fear of the politicists zation
of the Justice Department that often renders their stuff anemic.
(18:05):
And I mean it in this respect. If you're constantly
worried about the perception of partisanship, we're not going to
get a lot done because you're so worried about the
public perception and image as opposed to head down and
the work. And there's justification for coming in an era
in the last four years, well in five years at
this point where because it was a political um department
(18:29):
based on what the prior administration had done, there is
some corrective action to restore faith or maybe even initialize
it for the first time. So there's a reason I
get that. But I think the real frustration is that
we have this impression that democracy, well, just by virtue
(18:50):
of inertia, stay the same that by virtue of the
fact that civil rights was realized in some um often
bygone era, it will continue. But they have to stay
in motion, particularly when external forces interfere, which is what
happens when people try to promote the big lie. It's
what happens when people try to um litigate, litigate, and
(19:14):
legislate non existent problems solutions. It's what happens when we
ask for justice and don't know how to define it
or what happens when you march down the street, knock
on the door, and the answer is, well, how what
do you want? And you give an answer. You give
that answer um, which gives an exit ramp when it
(19:38):
can't be accomplished, as opposed to a litany of all
the ways to do so. And I think that is
part of the frustration of bureau of a bureaucracy. But
it's certainly the frustration um that I expressed in the book.
When we come back lowers thoughts on police reform, voting,
(20:00):
and the Supreme Court. We continued the conversation around the
(20:20):
current climate surrounding the three branches of government. When she
mentioned the idea of the three being interdependent, I raised
my concern about them being more independent and perhaps even
competitive for partisan reasons. If you don't think of yourself
as a part of the government, then you essentially think
(20:42):
that what you do is above the other branches. They
don't think of the cod It becomes hierarchical, and that
is exactly the wrong approach. Certainly, you should have agency
over your constitutional directives, but the idea of I don't
have to consider how my decisions play into our overall democracy.
(21:03):
That's dangerous. Let me ask you what you touch on
and infer in the book. And I've not read the
entire book, but I will. I just got it. I
just got it. But the Kamala Harris dilemma, as I
call it, the idea of needing to do your job,
(21:26):
particularly if you're prosecuting, and oft times as you talk
about in the book, and I remember Ben Crump talking about,
you know, the only three things in the courtroom often
that are black or the judges, robe, the defendant, and
Ben And when you have to deal with that when
(21:47):
you know that a system is imbalanced, when you know
that a system is tilted, when you know that a
system is against those that look like us, Um, how
do you grapple with the pull of not knowing whether
or not that person was just flat out wrong and
breaking a law, or whether that person was not given
(22:11):
the tools needed and the world that we know was
pushed against them and catapulted them to that table. Yeah,
I think, well, you know, I think you you have
to approach it. Well. You recognize, of course that you're
not a sociologist and you're not um a social worker,
and both are esteemed professions and have a great deal
(22:34):
of dignity, but they are not the role of the
prosecutor to consider those aspects at the trial state. Often, though,
the factors you're talking about about the composition of a
human being come into play at sentencing. Now that's pretty
backwards to think about. You only consider the totality of
a human being when it's time to figure out whether
(22:55):
to put them in a cage and for how long.
That says something about our justice system, in our prison
system in particular, which at times can be very distinct um.
But I do think that the approach, and I think
the misconception oftentimes is that the that you are not
able to be objective in your assessment of criminal behavior
(23:19):
because your race precludes that. I got to understand that
although there was a parade of black and brown men
and women coming into the courtroom I'm talking about, I
oversaw thousands of matters of the course of my prosecution experience.
I can count on one hand how many white defendants
I ever saw in the courtroom. And it wouldn't even
(23:39):
require every single digit on my hand, not even it
is Washington, d c. And it's not as if black
and brown people have a monopoly on crime. But it
does speak to the charging decisions, the prosecutorial priorities, the
officers policing priorities as well. Um, But these were black
victims as well. These were black people who were being
(24:02):
harmed as well, the people that were being assaulted, the
communities in which there was drugs, the communities in which
there was homicide, the idea of sexual assault and child abuse.
It wasn't as if, um, you had the option to say, well,
you know what, I've got to choose only one black
person to support in this scenario. That wasn't the conundrum.
(24:24):
The conundrum really was to what extent you approached the
police officers, many of whom did their job remarkably well,
with skepticism. Who was the objectivity and questioning the decisions?
Because when you stood up, when I stood up as
the I and I look at people who have been prosecutors,
(24:46):
including the vice president, with a great deal of reverence. Um,
Because when you stand up and you say you're on
behalf of the people, in my case, people of the
United States, That included the person who was the defendant.
It didn't mean the government and the weight against that person.
So I oftentimes had to I write about in the book,
(25:06):
had to make decisions based on a lack of advocacy
for that defendant, on a defense counsel who was either
uninvolved or not skeptical enough about areas and shortcomings in
my own cases, having to be honest and forthright, um,
knowing the weight of the resources of the federal government,
(25:28):
not using them for ill and recognizing when my officers
or the evidence dropped the ball. And I think that's
the approach as opposed to thinking I'm going to be
a trojan horse. It's I'm going to be a champion
for the defendant if need be. But certainly from my
case and the people of the United States include those
(25:51):
victims and the defendant. I moved our attention to some
current issues and legislation that will shape the political and
social direction of the country for years to come. How
optimistic are you when you look at the partisan nature
(26:12):
of where we sit today when we talk about the
George Floyd Justice and Policing Act and the John Lewis
Voting Rights Act, Um, do you hold out optimism that
we're going to finally see those um, you know, move
past the Senate I do. I'm an eternal optimist. I
don't necessarily believe, as is most legislation, that in its
(26:35):
current state, they'll be unchanged and passed. I think there
will be concessions, some which will be painful and some
which will kick the can of this conversation down the road.
But by virtue of the national and global conversations we're
having about these issues, that gives me hope that there
will be corrective action. The problem is that people will
(26:57):
find sneaky ways to do end runs around what is right.
And I um, my pessimism comes from, in particular the
Supreme Court and the case. It's in unrelated terms of
the nature of my book, but the Texas abortion then
a clear end run around Supreme Court precedent that was met,
not even with a slap on the wrist. So by you,
(27:21):
you delegitimize yourself if you do not enforce your own
precedent or at least have the wherewithal to punish the audacious.
And I think that it's it if I have pessimism.
It's about the approach that some branches of government are
taking in trying to preserve their own legitimacy. You know, um,
(27:45):
and trying to ensure that the precedent is set and
is followed. But I still feel like there's no other
choice but to have optimism. There's no other because if
you if we just are cynics about it, aren't we
just conceding defeat at that point and saying, well, this
is how it's going to be. I imagine if our
great leaders and those who came before us said, you
(28:07):
know what, I some hope is lost. They're gonna roll
back things. I'm gonna take one step forward and they're
gonna kick me ten steps back. We have to continue
to have that resolve, and I I certainly have it,
and I hope that others do too, not because we're
politically naive, but because there is no other choice than
(28:28):
to keep moving forward and demand that we not be constrained.
You must have peaked at my notes. The Supreme Court
was the second portion of that. But let me ask this.
You know, I think people still miss as much as
we've talked about it, the idea of those Supreme Court
appointments are really bigger than who wins the next election.
(28:51):
I mean, these are as, you know, lifetime appointments that
can can change generationally from the way this country is governed.
I think Democrats have been outplayed for the last decade
or two in terms of how to deal with that
court and make appointments and gently maybe move some people
on when they had an opportunity, UM, to maybe make
(29:14):
an appointment for a younger person. To give me a
sense of your overview of the court right now, Well,
you know it's difficult, UM, to disagree with the statement
of them being played. Um. We can recall the behavior
of Senator Mitch McConnell and the decision to look a
president in the eye and say, go kick rocks. The
(29:36):
indignity of having a d C. Circuit Court judge sit
in the hallway and wait to be received. If that's
not a kick in the teeth of democracy, let alone, UM,
believing that you are higher than the judicial branch and
the executive who nominates it. That tells you a great deal.
(29:57):
So I don't think you're wrong in that respect. I
think that the Court has become viewed as a political body,
and that is extraordinarily dangerous, and they do not themselves
no favors and trying to change that perception. I mentioned
the notion of the confirmation hearings when unlike say Justice
(30:20):
the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who was forthright about
what her views were, because that's what I think demanded.
I think people and the people inactives have a right
to know how somebody truly feels. When you're talking about
a lifetime appointment. It doesn't mean that they can doesn't
that they're not going to still rule according to the law.
But this this um, this arrogant sort of approach to
(30:46):
I'm going to fool you all and think that I
have no actual opinion, is just the wrong approach. I
think it really makes people believe even more in the
political notion of the court. I don't think that packing
the court so just week is a realistic possibility. I
know FDR Changed tried to do that and the time.
Certainly he was even a more favorite president at the time,
(31:08):
and there was arguably perhaps even more of a need
during a depression like era than we have now to
to foster a sense of um trust in a in
a body like that. But I do think that term
limits are on the table, and I think that might
be an approach that will be um that would be
championed by many because I think the perhaps the era
(31:31):
of one of one nine member court deciding over the
course of a generation might be politically passe, and um,
I think that there is room for that discussion about
whether a lifetime appointment is still appropriate, maybe something similar
(31:52):
to what the FBI director has um in the sense
of being able to although we saw what happened to
at least one FBI recently. I know I'm speaking. I know,
promar doctor James call me is like, really, actually, Laura,
let's talk about that. That's not the blueprint any longer,
but the idea of figuring out a way for those
term limits to extend beyond the political hook with a
(32:14):
way to do so. But I do think that the
dissenting opinions that are out there seemed to be more
in line by justice, what a mayor and the like
of the really the reality of how do you you know,
what is the credibility you're willing to risk for the
perception of objectivity? What people understand. We're smart, we know
(32:36):
what it looks like. If it walks like a duck
and talks like a duck, don't tell me it's a pig,
and don't tell me I'm wrong. And there's ways for
the court to correct their course of action, and I
think it's incumbent upon them to try. I closed by
going back to the book. I asked Laura what I
(32:56):
told her was admittedly an unfair question, kind of like
asking a parent about a favorite child, because the book
is more a narrative than a wonky guide book. Was
there a particular story or chapter that best illustrates what
she wants the reader to walk away with. Gosh, you know,
I I really run the gamut anywhere from victim blaming
(33:18):
to mistaken identity, to what it's like to monitor elections
in the South, to issue surrounding secondary trauma. But for me,
one of the things that really leads into all these
episodic chapters is the story of what it was like
for me, as a black woman to have a hand
in the deportation of a man. What that was like,
(33:43):
those that battle of allegiance that happened when I thought
I knew what I would do in the face of
a directive that was not in line with my own
personal moral compass, what I would do in the light
of civil disobedience, and what that really looked like, And
(34:04):
it was something that is the confluence of so many
different facets of where we are as society, and think
about coalition building and kindred spirits of similarly treated groups
in America, and alliances that are formed and dismantled. And
that chapter, for me, really is the entree into that
(34:25):
battle of allegiance, and it asks people to put themselves
in the shoes not just of me, but of the
person who is facing a warrant for deportation, has been
in the country for decades and contributing member of society,
and his true crime in the end was reporting another criminal,
(34:47):
not that he himself in the same you could view
the same way. And um, I think that chapter is
really one that I think people will understand a little
bit more about who I am and who I am
um not, and the work in progress that we all
are in our justice system. And the other chapter I
mean being greedy here. But the other chapter I think
(35:08):
that was so um important for me was one about
a young girl who was the victim of sexual assault,
and that victim blaming came from the perspective of a
woman and judge. And in an era of the Me
Too movement, we talked about believe women. That was a
(35:32):
fallacy in the courtroom and what that really looked like
for that young girl to be confronted and challenged in
that way. There are just moments of that, and the
book has those difficult moments, but it also has moments
of triumph at where you see humanity in the most
unexpected places and you see you get a bird or
(35:53):
really not just a bird's eye, but a front seat
view to what it's like to find yourself in the
system and your agency what you can do about it. Well,
the book is uh, just pursued. And I will say
this publicly. I've told you this privately, but I much
(36:14):
appreciate the balanced insight and um approachable intellectual thought that
you bring to the media, which I think is ofttimes
sorely lacking. So congratulations, thank you for that, and uh,
I'm gonna go read the rest of the book, and
I encourage I encourage everybody to do so well. Thank you,
(36:35):
Ed Gordon. And it's so nice to talk to someone
like you. I always have admired you and think of
you as an icon, and you never disappoint And so
there's a whole generation and more generations to colm that
will continue to emulate your excellence. And we hope we
don't fall short, So thank you, thank you again. The
(36:56):
book is just Pursuits and as we like to you
can find it right now wherever books are sold. One
hundred is produced by ed Gordon Media and distributed by
I Heart Media. Carol Johnson Green and Sharie Weldon are
our bookers. Our editor is Lance Patton. Gerald Albright composed
(37:20):
and performed our theme. Please join me on Twitter and
Instagram at ed L Gordon and on Facebook at ed
Gordon Media
Welcome to the latest edition of one hundred The Ed
Gordon Podcast. Today a conversation with Laura Coates. She's a
former Assistant United States Attorney for the District of Columbia
and a trial attorney in the Civil Rights Division of
the Department of Justice. Coaches currently a CNN Senior Legal Analyst,
host of her own radio show on Sirius XM, and
(00:44):
an adjunct professor at the George Washington University School of Law.
If that weren't enough, we can now add author to
that list. Her debut book is Just Pursuit. In the memoir,
she looks at the justice system and how as a mother,
person of color and a woman, she's had to find
ways to navigate and try to correct an imbalanced the
(01:06):
system that is often tilted against people who looked like her.
Just Pursuit. You know, it's interesting because as I as
I read it and I looked at what you put forth,
I have always said, there is the ideal of justice
and then there is the reality of justice. And what
I found interesting when I read the introduction, you say
(01:29):
the pursuit of justice creates injustice. Give me a sense
of you know why you lead with that line and
and what made you write this book? Now, yeah, you know,
this book for me was equal parts catharsis and catalyst.
And I, as everyone else has been watching what's been
(01:50):
unfolding for the past several years and their cries for justice,
the demands for justice as if it's a one size
fits all approach, as if it's a destination that you
can actually reach universally, as opposed to a very individualized
experienced said that I think UM speaks to the idea
of our changing definitions of what justice means and what
(02:14):
fairness looks like, and this sort of cost benefit analysis
that justice really involved. I think it's very jarring to people.
And I found that the emphasis on thinking of justice
in the form of a verdict, or thinking of justice
in the form of it's this particular defendant and this
particular victim, as if in the periphery it's non existent.
(02:39):
I really wanted to focus on what it looks like
when people are demanding to speak truth to power by
telling them what the truth really is about what the
justice system as a vehicle for getting to a destination
really looks like. And so I chose to confront it
um from the perspective of a narrative memoir rather than
(03:00):
I think perhaps the expectation was some dry law school textbook. Um,
and you know, I'm not a you know, a boring person,
I hope you know, and thinking about it, and for me,
it was storytelling as a form of activism and helping
people to have a lens and to fly on the wall,
opportunity to experience what the system looks like, even vicariously. Yeah,
(03:24):
and what you've done, which is really great, I think,
rather than you know, walk a line from a beginning
to end story, you take chapters and you show stories
within those chapters to illustrate some of the issues, because
I think people who only no law through Perry Mason
if you're old or l a law or even um
(03:47):
the high profile cases that are seen on court, TV
and CNN, which I always feel like that ain't real
because everybody's on their best behavior because they know the
world is watching. But the legal system in America is
very much assembly line. Uh, and people missed the idea
of and you talk about it, the characters come in,
you know your role. It's a very much day to
(04:08):
day and it's a very much detached world for a
lot of people. Who are in it every day. But
what I loved about what you did, and I'd love
for you to get into that. But I love that
you also personalized this. You didn't just take stories that
you could have told and left yourself out, but you
personalized it from the very beginning as to you know,
(04:30):
what it meant to you and your family to work
in a system that you knew was imbalanced. Yes, and
I appreciate you saying that, because it was very scary,
honestly for me to be so vulnerable. Um, in the
sense that I have spent my career talking about other
people's experiences and trying to educate on the law of
(04:51):
how the system works, of what it actually looks like. UM.
And there is room for a judgment, obviously in the
cases that I meant on them, asking the court of
public opinion in many respects to come to their own conclusion.
I asked a courtroom in a criminal trial for jurors
to yield the conclusion of a verdict that I wanted
(05:12):
them to have. And in these stories, I and in
my work, I suffer no fools. And I don't leave
myself out of the criticism or leave myself out of
the roles that I've played within the system that I
think desperately needs to be reformed. And I really wanted
the vehicle of introspective thought to come through because I
(05:32):
think that people believe they know who they are, what
they believe. They have a very um wonderful impression of
what they think, they're moral compass where it points. They
believe if that were me, if that had been me,
here's what I would do. They just they can tell
you everything. And there are moments in our justice system,
(05:54):
far too many to count, where we are confronted with
this battle of allegiance, said, this notion of what the
directive is versus what your lived experiences, whether you can
be a patriot and skeptical and question whether you can
be an agent of the Justice Department and see injustices objectively.
(06:19):
And what do you do once you have a seat
at the table? You know, we talked about it. It's
better to be in the room where it happens and
a seat at the table. But we never go past
that step of now that you're here, what is being
asked of you will require a great deal more, perhaps
than you thought. And do you bring your whole self in?
Do you act robotically in your approach to justice. I
(06:43):
never could. I never wanted to. You know what's interesting
to me? And you talk about it, um that we are,
you know, the sum of all of our parts. And
you talk about UM, your parents and what they gave
you and your siblings, UM in terms of not college
and history and why you went into the Justice Department
(07:04):
and the Civil Rights Division and the like. And then
you talked about your children and the world that they
would face, and that had to kind of gob smack
you to a great degree when we're faced with it
in the way we have been over the last you know,
decade or so. UM, give me a sense of those
personal sides in terms of, you know, the kind of
(07:28):
sit down that you had to have with yourself at
at some moment, I think, yeah, you know, I was
very lucky that my parents did not shield me from
the world. They did not act as if it was
the days of wine and roses, with the five days
a year. I knew that I was a black person
in a country that had historically and oftentimes in present
(07:51):
day not embraced me. I knew what it was like
to watch my parents struggle with opportunities to get financing
where their professional colleagues did not. I saw what it
was like to hear the stories of my parents, UM,
you know, with a knock on the door, come to
one of their first apartments and says, excuse me, I'm
(08:12):
so glad you're here. We want to buy you out.
We don't want you here. That's our a duplicity of hello,
and please get out, You're not wanted here. A black family, UM,
I know what it's like to be one of only
a few in um Minnesota where I grew up, and
what that looked like when you were asked to be
(08:34):
the educator of your peers on issues throughout your entire
educational experience. And I knew. I mean, we dined and
in my dining room, we dined under the Norman Rockwell
painting of a depiction of Ruby bridges with an escort
from two federal marshals. We had the picture as well
(08:55):
of them, of the moving day for Norman Rockwell, where
you know, you had the little black girl in the
white dress and holding her cat, looking at the two
neighbors of the black of a white, white son and
a white daughter with her and her brother. And we saw,
we understood, that civil rights was something that was ongoing.
(09:15):
It wasn't something that in our house was let's not
talk about the uncomfortable parts. And so for me in
my rearing, I looked in complete reverence to those who
played a role in getting me to where I was
conceptually in the land of opportunity. Um. And so when
I really wanted to delve into the conflict and the
(09:36):
idea of being gobsmacked, I always thought that as a
mother I would be able to have the luxury a
generation later, hopefully of having what I call almost that
curation experience for my kids. You know when it's like
a museum. Right, We're gonna go into this wing today,
and here's how we're gonna learn about and I'm gonna
(09:57):
help you to write curious the experience. And then when
you're at the requisite late my age of maturity, then
we'll focus on this wing. It's not how it happens,
is it ed? What happens is real life tells you, Boom,
it's time for you to go to this wing and
teach your children about moments that you did not think
you have to get to for years, and when I
(10:18):
have been commenting on the cases like from George Floyd
to what happened to ta Mere Rice and Brianna Taylor
and Elijah McLean and George and of course I mean
I could go on for an hour all the different cases.
I know that my own children are watching me, watching
me give the commentary publicly the talk to the world,
(10:42):
and then asking me for the answers, saying things to
me like mommy, well that ever happened to me? And
as a parent, I have been forced to make the
decision of do I sort of put you under my
wing and comfort and protect or do I protect you
with education even if it means that you'll be robbed
(11:04):
of some level of innocence. And and that's why I
thought this book, and one of the reasons I wrote
it in many respects was as a way from my
children to better understand me, to better understand the world
around them through storytelling. And in particular, you know, I
focused in the book on the period of my time
(11:25):
at the Justice Department, when I was carrying both of
much I had back to back, you know, stair step babies,
and so I wanted them to know I don't I
must have been crazy back then. Obviously there was no
distance learning at the time you wanted more more kids.
But I remember ed thinking, I want my kids to
understand what I was carrying while I carried them as uh,
(11:49):
in homage to parents across the world who grapple day
to day with the world and need to explain it
to their children. Let's talk about something that I, UM
have forever have been truthful. I think in terms of
the industry that I entered into, and I think it
speaks to the law as well. This notion of being unbiased,
(12:11):
I think is something wrong in terms of how we
how we approach it and teach it. None of us
are unbiased. We bring biases to the table every single day.
The The hope is that you can work against them, UM,
and then you can find ways to mute them, if
nothing else. UM, give me a sense of how you
(12:32):
continue to deal with that is one who has been
very realistic about where we sit right now, and I
would think one who tries to continue to be optimistic
in the face of UM reality that says maybe that
optimism is naivete as well. That's a really great point.
And UM, I think about the way in which you
(12:54):
know opinion is opinion, and I try never to offer
an opinion under the guise of the fact. I try
to be very clear when I'm offering an opinion, because
I think there is responsibility in the media, in particular
in an era of misinformation, and when oftentimes opinions are
rewarded when they are disguised, I think that it is
(13:18):
incumbent upon our credibility as an industry. And I'm really
I'm new to this industry. This is something that I
I did not I was not thinking this would be
a part of my career when I was growing up,
or even as a lawyer, um when I decided to
enter into the media and have the opportunities. So I
value credibility above all else. I value straight shooters and
(13:39):
those who call balls and strikes, and so I try
to preserve that. Now. The difficulty, of course, is that
you need to provide people with the mechanisms and the
information to be to give an informed opinion, and sometimes
those can seem like an oxymoron, an informant opinion of things.
But I think you can reconcile that. I think you
(14:00):
can present people with the objective information and the facts
and they can lead to a conclusion that is an
opinion and I'm okay with people deriving an opinion from
information I provide. UM. I'm also comfortable in terms of
giving my opinion, and I think it's because of the
experience I had with the Justice Department and that I
(14:21):
realized that, you know, I never had the luxury, nor
do I think I really ever wanted a luxury of
being able to check your identity at the door to
somehow pretend that you could become a blank canvas and
(14:42):
simply a robot who wants to be I'm not are
talking ed. I am talking and speaking human. I'm an
advocating human, and so UM being a mother, being a
black woman, being a wife of a black man, being
someone with a lived experience into the black woman in
this country as a public servant, all of those things
(15:04):
informed my advocacy. They informed my skepticism, They informed the
way I approached my objectivity as well, and it also
informed the way in which I think it was necessary
to persuade UM people to understand the facts as you
present them. And so I think, frankly, sometimes when it's
(15:24):
when it's disinformation, I'm against it. When it's being straightforward
about here is the substance that I bring and the
identities that can compete. I think you're better for it
in the justice system to approach it that way, and
I think oftentimes you're better in the media to just
be who you are and let the audience decide. Yeah. Well,
(15:47):
I will save my discussion for what the media is
today for another time, but let me ask you for
one who a lot a lot, for one who lived
uh in the Justice Department's world, I'm curious, you know.
I spoke with Eric Holder for for my book, and
we talked specifically about you know, him wanting to do
(16:12):
the right thing and believing that the vehicle of the
Justice Department would allow that. But then you again are
smacked with reality and what that is. One of the
things I'd love love for you to address is I
want to be careful. And I tell folks, and I
use this analogy. We see the convictions in the George
(16:34):
Floyd and the Ahmad Aubrey murders, but I said, we
need to be careful because that does not necessarily mean
we've turned a corner. It's like those same people who said, well,
what do you guys want? Obama was elected, so prejudice
and racism are now gone. Should we not be careful
not to get ahead of ourselves. Of course, I mean
every game is easily reversed. The Voting Rights Act of
(16:57):
nineteen sixty five, people had the impression that it was
set in stone. How is that working out? Every opportunity
to claw back the games are being realized. You've got, um,
this impression that we've got these three co equal branches
of government who are going to stay in their lane
and be respected by one another. We'll really have three
interdependent branches of government. And because of that, politics is
(17:22):
more fluid and seeps into the decisions of other branches.
You see the scripts that Supreme Court nominees give as
if to suggest, oh, I, oh, did I write forty
seven law reew articles on this. I hadn't contemplated this issue, Um,
you know, I wouldn't want to talk about it matter
that I might come before me. This sort of facade
of objectivity that often is in play you talk about
(17:45):
decisions of the Justice Department. Um. And I do think
that there is an attempt to be impartial, there's an
attempt to be compartmentalized. But there is a fear that
there is that there's a fear of the politicists zation
of the Justice Department that often renders their stuff anemic.
(18:05):
And I mean it in this respect. If you're constantly
worried about the perception of partisanship, we're not going to
get a lot done because you're so worried about the
public perception and image as opposed to head down and
the work. And there's justification for coming in an era
in the last four years, well in five years at
this point where because it was a political um department
(18:29):
based on what the prior administration had done, there is
some corrective action to restore faith or maybe even initialize
it for the first time. So there's a reason I
get that. But I think the real frustration is that
we have this impression that democracy, well, just by virtue
(18:50):
of inertia, stay the same that by virtue of the
fact that civil rights was realized in some um often
bygone era, it will continue. But they have to stay
in motion, particularly when external forces interfere, which is what
happens when people try to promote the big lie. It's
what happens when people try to um litigate, litigate, and
(19:14):
legislate non existent problems solutions. It's what happens when we
ask for justice and don't know how to define it
or what happens when you march down the street, knock
on the door, and the answer is, well, how what
do you want? And you give an answer. You give
that answer um, which gives an exit ramp when it
(19:38):
can't be accomplished, as opposed to a litany of all
the ways to do so. And I think that is
part of the frustration of bureau of a bureaucracy. But
it's certainly the frustration um that I expressed in the book.
When we come back lowers thoughts on police reform, voting,
(20:00):
and the Supreme Court. We continued the conversation around the
(20:20):
current climate surrounding the three branches of government. When she
mentioned the idea of the three being interdependent, I raised
my concern about them being more independent and perhaps even
competitive for partisan reasons. If you don't think of yourself
as a part of the government, then you essentially think
(20:42):
that what you do is above the other branches. They
don't think of the cod It becomes hierarchical, and that
is exactly the wrong approach. Certainly, you should have agency
over your constitutional directives, but the idea of I don't
have to consider how my decisions play into our overall democracy.
(21:03):
That's dangerous. Let me ask you what you touch on
and infer in the book. And I've not read the
entire book, but I will. I just got it. I
just got it. But the Kamala Harris dilemma, as I
call it, the idea of needing to do your job,
(21:26):
particularly if you're prosecuting, and oft times as you talk
about in the book, and I remember Ben Crump talking about,
you know, the only three things in the courtroom often
that are black or the judges, robe, the defendant, and
Ben And when you have to deal with that when
(21:47):
you know that a system is imbalanced, when you know
that a system is tilted, when you know that a
system is against those that look like us, Um, how
do you grapple with the pull of not knowing whether
or not that person was just flat out wrong and
breaking a law, or whether that person was not given
(22:11):
the tools needed and the world that we know was
pushed against them and catapulted them to that table. Yeah,
I think, well, you know, I think you you have
to approach it. Well. You recognize, of course that you're
not a sociologist and you're not um a social worker,
and both are esteemed professions and have a great deal
(22:34):
of dignity, but they are not the role of the
prosecutor to consider those aspects at the trial state. Often, though,
the factors you're talking about about the composition of a
human being come into play at sentencing. Now that's pretty
backwards to think about. You only consider the totality of
a human being when it's time to figure out whether
(22:55):
to put them in a cage and for how long.
That says something about our justice system, in our prison
system in particular, which at times can be very distinct um.
But I do think that the approach, and I think
the misconception oftentimes is that the that you are not
able to be objective in your assessment of criminal behavior
(23:19):
because your race precludes that. I got to understand that
although there was a parade of black and brown men
and women coming into the courtroom I'm talking about, I
oversaw thousands of matters of the course of my prosecution experience.
I can count on one hand how many white defendants
I ever saw in the courtroom. And it wouldn't even
(23:39):
require every single digit on my hand, not even it
is Washington, d c. And it's not as if black
and brown people have a monopoly on crime. But it
does speak to the charging decisions, the prosecutorial priorities, the
officers policing priorities as well. Um, But these were black
victims as well. These were black people who were being
(24:02):
harmed as well, the people that were being assaulted, the
communities in which there was drugs, the communities in which
there was homicide, the idea of sexual assault and child abuse.
It wasn't as if, um, you had the option to say, well,
you know what, I've got to choose only one black
person to support in this scenario. That wasn't the conundrum.
(24:24):
The conundrum really was to what extent you approached the
police officers, many of whom did their job remarkably well,
with skepticism. Who was the objectivity and questioning the decisions?
Because when you stood up, when I stood up as
the I and I look at people who have been prosecutors,
(24:46):
including the vice president, with a great deal of reverence. Um,
Because when you stand up and you say you're on
behalf of the people, in my case, people of the
United States, That included the person who was the defendant.
It didn't mean the government and the weight against that person.
So I oftentimes had to I write about in the book,
(25:06):
had to make decisions based on a lack of advocacy
for that defendant, on a defense counsel who was either
uninvolved or not skeptical enough about areas and shortcomings in
my own cases, having to be honest and forthright, um,
knowing the weight of the resources of the federal government,
(25:28):
not using them for ill and recognizing when my officers
or the evidence dropped the ball. And I think that's
the approach as opposed to thinking I'm going to be
a trojan horse. It's I'm going to be a champion
for the defendant if need be. But certainly from my
case and the people of the United States include those
(25:51):
victims and the defendant. I moved our attention to some
current issues and legislation that will shape the political and
social direction of the country for years to come. How
optimistic are you when you look at the partisan nature
(26:12):
of where we sit today when we talk about the
George Floyd Justice and Policing Act and the John Lewis
Voting Rights Act, Um, do you hold out optimism that
we're going to finally see those um, you know, move
past the Senate I do. I'm an eternal optimist. I
don't necessarily believe, as is most legislation, that in its
(26:35):
current state, they'll be unchanged and passed. I think there
will be concessions, some which will be painful and some
which will kick the can of this conversation down the road.
But by virtue of the national and global conversations we're
having about these issues, that gives me hope that there
will be corrective action. The problem is that people will
(26:57):
find sneaky ways to do end runs around what is right.
And I um, my pessimism comes from, in particular the
Supreme Court and the case. It's in unrelated terms of
the nature of my book, but the Texas abortion then
a clear end run around Supreme Court precedent that was met,
not even with a slap on the wrist. So by you,
(27:21):
you delegitimize yourself if you do not enforce your own
precedent or at least have the wherewithal to punish the audacious.
And I think that it's it if I have pessimism.
It's about the approach that some branches of government are
taking in trying to preserve their own legitimacy. You know, um,
(27:45):
and trying to ensure that the precedent is set and
is followed. But I still feel like there's no other
choice but to have optimism. There's no other because if
you if we just are cynics about it, aren't we
just conceding defeat at that point and saying, well, this
is how it's going to be. I imagine if our
great leaders and those who came before us said, you
(28:07):
know what, I some hope is lost. They're gonna roll
back things. I'm gonna take one step forward and they're
gonna kick me ten steps back. We have to continue
to have that resolve, and I I certainly have it,
and I hope that others do too, not because we're
politically naive, but because there is no other choice than
(28:28):
to keep moving forward and demand that we not be constrained.
You must have peaked at my notes. The Supreme Court
was the second portion of that. But let me ask this.
You know, I think people still miss as much as
we've talked about it, the idea of those Supreme Court
appointments are really bigger than who wins the next election.
(28:51):
I mean, these are as, you know, lifetime appointments that
can can change generationally from the way this country is governed.
I think Democrats have been outplayed for the last decade
or two in terms of how to deal with that
court and make appointments and gently maybe move some people
on when they had an opportunity, UM, to maybe make
(29:14):
an appointment for a younger person. To give me a
sense of your overview of the court right now, Well,
you know it's difficult, UM, to disagree with the statement
of them being played. Um. We can recall the behavior
of Senator Mitch McConnell and the decision to look a
president in the eye and say, go kick rocks. The
(29:36):
indignity of having a d C. Circuit Court judge sit
in the hallway and wait to be received. If that's
not a kick in the teeth of democracy, let alone, UM,
believing that you are higher than the judicial branch and
the executive who nominates it. That tells you a great deal.
(29:57):
So I don't think you're wrong in that respect. I
think that the Court has become viewed as a political body,
and that is extraordinarily dangerous, and they do not themselves
no favors and trying to change that perception. I mentioned
the notion of the confirmation hearings when unlike say Justice
(30:20):
the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who was forthright about
what her views were, because that's what I think demanded.
I think people and the people inactives have a right
to know how somebody truly feels. When you're talking about
a lifetime appointment. It doesn't mean that they can doesn't
that they're not going to still rule according to the law.
But this this um, this arrogant sort of approach to
(30:46):
I'm going to fool you all and think that I
have no actual opinion, is just the wrong approach. I
think it really makes people believe even more in the
political notion of the court. I don't think that packing
the court so just week is a realistic possibility. I
know FDR Changed tried to do that and the time.
Certainly he was even a more favorite president at the time,
(31:08):
and there was arguably perhaps even more of a need
during a depression like era than we have now to
to foster a sense of um trust in a in
a body like that. But I do think that term
limits are on the table, and I think that might
be an approach that will be um that would be
championed by many because I think the perhaps the era
(31:31):
of one of one nine member court deciding over the
course of a generation might be politically passe, and um,
I think that there is room for that discussion about
whether a lifetime appointment is still appropriate, maybe something similar
(31:52):
to what the FBI director has um in the sense
of being able to although we saw what happened to
at least one FBI recently. I know I'm speaking. I know,
promar doctor James call me is like, really, actually, Laura,
let's talk about that. That's not the blueprint any longer,
but the idea of figuring out a way for those
term limits to extend beyond the political hook with a
(32:14):
way to do so. But I do think that the
dissenting opinions that are out there seemed to be more
in line by justice, what a mayor and the like
of the really the reality of how do you you know,
what is the credibility you're willing to risk for the
perception of objectivity? What people understand. We're smart, we know
(32:36):
what it looks like. If it walks like a duck
and talks like a duck, don't tell me it's a pig,
and don't tell me I'm wrong. And there's ways for
the court to correct their course of action, and I
think it's incumbent upon them to try. I closed by
going back to the book. I asked Laura what I
(32:56):
told her was admittedly an unfair question, kind of like
asking a parent about a favorite child, because the book
is more a narrative than a wonky guide book. Was
there a particular story or chapter that best illustrates what
she wants the reader to walk away with. Gosh, you know,
I I really run the gamut anywhere from victim blaming
(33:18):
to mistaken identity, to what it's like to monitor elections
in the South, to issue surrounding secondary trauma. But for me,
one of the things that really leads into all these
episodic chapters is the story of what it was like
for me, as a black woman to have a hand
in the deportation of a man. What that was like,
(33:43):
those that battle of allegiance that happened when I thought
I knew what I would do in the face of
a directive that was not in line with my own
personal moral compass, what I would do in the light
of civil disobedience, and what that really looked like, And
(34:04):
it was something that is the confluence of so many
different facets of where we are as society, and think
about coalition building and kindred spirits of similarly treated groups
in America, and alliances that are formed and dismantled. And
that chapter, for me, really is the entree into that
(34:25):
battle of allegiance, and it asks people to put themselves
in the shoes not just of me, but of the
person who is facing a warrant for deportation, has been
in the country for decades and contributing member of society,
and his true crime in the end was reporting another criminal,
(34:47):
not that he himself in the same you could view
the same way. And um, I think that chapter is
really one that I think people will understand a little
bit more about who I am and who I am
um not, and the work in progress that we all
are in our justice system. And the other chapter I
mean being greedy here. But the other chapter I think
(35:08):
that was so um important for me was one about
a young girl who was the victim of sexual assault,
and that victim blaming came from the perspective of a
woman and judge. And in an era of the Me
Too movement, we talked about believe women. That was a
(35:32):
fallacy in the courtroom and what that really looked like
for that young girl to be confronted and challenged in
that way. There are just moments of that, and the
book has those difficult moments, but it also has moments
of triumph at where you see humanity in the most
unexpected places and you see you get a bird or
(35:53):
really not just a bird's eye, but a front seat
view to what it's like to find yourself in the
system and your agency what you can do about it. Well,
the book is uh, just pursued. And I will say
this publicly. I've told you this privately, but I much
(36:14):
appreciate the balanced insight and um approachable intellectual thought that
you bring to the media, which I think is ofttimes
sorely lacking. So congratulations, thank you for that, and uh,
I'm gonna go read the rest of the book, and
I encourage I encourage everybody to do so well. Thank you,
(36:35):
Ed Gordon. And it's so nice to talk to someone
like you. I always have admired you and think of
you as an icon, and you never disappoint And so
there's a whole generation and more generations to colm that
will continue to emulate your excellence. And we hope we
don't fall short, So thank you, thank you again. The
(36:56):
book is just Pursuits and as we like to you
can find it right now wherever books are sold. One
hundred is produced by ed Gordon Media and distributed by
I Heart Media. Carol Johnson Green and Sharie Weldon are
our bookers. Our editor is Lance Patton. Gerald Albright composed
(37:20):
and performed our theme. Please join me on Twitter and
Instagram at ed L Gordon and on Facebook at ed
Gordon Media
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