Hello everyone. Welcome back to another episode of The People's Brief. I'm your host Lenay Venay, and today I am sitting down with the host of The Don Lemon Show, the CEO of Lemon Media Network...
Mr. Don Lemon himself. [laughter] How are we doing today?
Doing it right. Thank you. So good to meet you in person.
Yes. We've had a conversation once over digital.
Yeah, yeah. It was great. And I've been in rooms where you've been, but you know, we got things to do.
She's beautiful. No filter. Naturally gorgeous. Intimidatingly so.
Thanks. I appreciate that. [laughter]
I like to call you... You said Lenay Venay. People call you Lenay Venay 'cause it rhymes. Does that tick you off? You know what I mean? It does? You don't like it?
Well, I mean, 'cause my name is pronounced as it's spelled phonetically. There are no accents anywhere. It's just Lenay Venay.
I'm from New Or— I'm from Baton Rouge, so you know, we like to be fancy with stuff. Lenay, I say Lenay Venay, Lenay Venay.
It's okay. It's okay. I appreciate it. Thank you.
That rhymes, too. Lenay Venay. It's got a rhythm to it.
It does. It does. That's why I chose it.
So actually, when we were talking about what the mission, what the goal for this season would be, it would be for me to sit down with elected officials and organizers to talk about this road to the midterms, so people can get an in-depth look at what politicians are having conversations about, how organizers are organizing, so they understand that the way that we do this thing, the way that we defeat Donald Trump is twofold. Yes, we get in the booth, but we also get in the field. And what does that look like? So, you are the first journalist that I'm sitting with, and I think that's interesting. Why do you think it's important for us, and not just you and I, but journalists to be speaking to each other in times like these?
Well, because one, I'm not saying it's number one, but it's at the top of my list is the attack on the First Amendment.
The attack on freedom of the press. And I believe without us, everything crumbles. Whenever a dictator or an authoritarian figure tries to turn whatever they are doing, whatever place they are, into an authoritarian state or dictatorship, they get rid of the information, and the journalists are usually the first to be attacked. That's what's happening in this country now.
They're trying to not only neuter, I believe, get rid of the freedom of the press. They want the press to be state-run media. So it's important for us to stay in communion or in community with each other and to be talking to each other and having a connection because obviously there's safety in numbers.
And we all have to stand on business. And if you're standing on business, you need to know what that business is.
Speaking of standing on business, one of the people that I feel like has stood on the most business ever in life is Toni Morrison.
Yeah. I want to get her quote right, but she says that she believes the role of the writer is a vital political and moral necessity, that it translates trauma into meaning, disrupts social oppression, and protects freedom of expression against authoritarianism. I assume you agree.
How do you see your work compounding on that lineage?
Well, I see number one for me is it stems around what I was arrested for.
Right? For covering a story.
And since that happened, I've been saying this is way bigger than me. I hope you guys understand that. This isn't just about me. This isn't just about people saying, 'Oh, this is the best thing that happened to him.' That's BS.
I think it is whatever it is, it's a call to action for people to understand what's happening with the First Amendment. Because it's not just about journalists. Toni Morrison informed people through writing. And so this affects publishing, this affects whether it's magazines or books, this affects broadcast television, late-night hosts like Jimmy Kimmel or Stephen Colbert.
It affects people who are, whether you're an opinion journalist or, you know, someone who's, you know, this whole idea that we're supposed to be non-biased. Everybody has a lens, right?
So it affects every aspect of anyone who has a public-facing job where they inform people, where they write things down, where they broadcast things. If our government can start telling someone like Toni Morrison what she can write about, who she can write about, how she can write about it, they don't like it, so they're going to try to shut her down or arrest her, right? If someone tells, if the government is telling journalists where you can report, who you can report on, how, right? And give you a reason and say, 'Hey, listen, like the Pentagon is doing, you have to sign this form and we have to approve everything that goes out.' Then it's over.
The First Amendment is the bedrock of our Constitution. And without it, everything else fails because there's no transparency in our leaders, our oligarchs, the rich people, the people who have control in society, the people we're supposed to be holding accountable. And so, yeah, Toni Morrison is 100% right. I think having a free press and freedom of speech is what sets us free. That's what makes us free.
Speaking of your arrest, you were arrested with another journalist, Georgia Ford.
But you definitely have a larger platform, a bigger history as far as like public notoriety.
That doesn't matter. She's a journalist just like me, you know?
Absolutely, absolutely. But what I'm saying is I think people definitely flock to your platforms because they began to see you. And also, there's a little sexism at play in that as well. They started to see you as this emblem of anti-authoritarianism, like this not martyr, but representative of freedom of speech, freedom of the press. And do you agree with this pedestal folks have placed you on?
Yeah. Well, look, I'm glad that you are... I don't know about agreeing with it. I'll get to that. But I'm glad that you mentioned Georgia because Georgia is an important figure in this as well. I think that the people have realized that Georgia is an important figure as well because to me, a journalist is a journalist is a journalist, whether people know my name or face or your name or face or not. We're doing the same work. However, I think that the folks who are reporting on this in the sense that they think that Georgia and I did something wrong, I am a much more prominent figure.
So if they put my name in the headline of the story, then they're going to get clicks. That's what that's about. But I think the people have realized that we're on equal footing, right? So, but do I agree with that I've become, you said, an emblem of the First Amendment or...
Anti-authoritarianism. Yeah.
I'm not an activist. I've always said I'm not an activist journalist. I'm not because I've never actually participated in a protest in my life. I am a journalist through and through. If I am an advocate for anything,
it's for the First Amendment in this time that we're in right now. So I receive that and I accept it, but it's not some ego thing like I think I'm speaking for whatever. I am fighting for the First Amendment. And so whatever pedestal that people put me on, they can do that. I don't see myself that way. I see myself in the fight. I'm in the struggle. And if anybody's in the struggle right now, it's me because they're trying to put me in prison.
So whether that puts you on a pedestal or not, I don't know. But, you know, everyone else can say Don is on a pedestal, but at the end of the day, these are very serious charges. And if the government gets their way, they want to silence me and put me away so that my voice will be gone.
I only bring it up because I think especially when you are a prominent figure, public figure, everybody's putting someone on some type of pedestal, you know, whether they should be [clears throat] or not. And with that sometimes comes this pressure or feel like there's an onus or an obligation on yourself to show up in a particular way. So I'm just wondering how have things changed for you...
How's it impacted your journalism?
I feel you. Well, it's every commitment. If anything, I've double, triple, quadrupled down on telling the truth and being authentically Don. Like I don't have all the cons...
I don't have all the constraints that I had in corporate media where you, oh my gosh, you can't say this, you got to say this, you got to, you know, what's, how will people write about this if I say this? Are they going to think I'm biased? It doesn't, I don't care. What I do now is focus on the truth and informing people, and re-doubling that commitment to be able to do that. And so every single day I wake up saying, 'Okay, today how do I inform the people? Today how do I show up?' And I show up whether that's in an arena show going around the country with D.L. Hughley,
or if it is in my daily lives every day, or if it's in my social media posts that I do. The one that I just did before I came to your studio where I stood there and I said, 'Piers Morgan wants to live stream a firing squad and execution.'
And so, because people get their news and get their information that way anyway. So I just want to show up where the audience is to be able to inform people because I think transparency is everything.
It's a cliché. Sunlight is the best disinfectant.
And that's what the Trump administration, or the Trump regime as I call them, that's what they don't want. They don't want that sunlight.
Beautifully put. I do have to say, I think you show up... I think what you just said about your commitment to the truth and doubling down on it, I think you give that off, and for that reason people trust you. They put a lot of trust in you. They look to you for verifiable information, as you said that a lot of people are looking to the internet for their news sources. And with that being said, I have to say I was a little surprised when you were covering Jasmine Crockett and Van Jones giving Chris Brown a congressional record. When you were in your street interviews, the conversation felt like you were saying that whatever Chris did happened in 2009 and it was one woman. And I'm not going to say that doesn't feel like the truth because that is an emotional statement, but it's just not the truth. And I found it difficult to digest as someone who is inspired by your work because we're in a climate right now where we have all these people in positions of power, where we're discussing the Cornell 7, and I'm not... this conversation isn't about Chris Brown in particular, but just about the general consensus of power men seem to have particularly over women. And so I just wondered, were you genuinely unaware of Chris Brown's record of abuse?
No, no, no. I think you... I think I could have stated it better, but let me just say a couple of things here. There were people who said that I was too hard on Chris Brown, and there were people who said I let Chris Brown off the hook. The same number, very similarly, 'you were too hard on Jasmine Crockett and you let Jasmine Crockett off the hook.' I think that people receive things through their particular lens sometimes. I am keenly aware of the power that men have in society and the vulnerabilities of women. So I'm able, though, to separate the two, and because I'm also speaking from a Black man, I can't tell you about a woman. I'm not letting Chris Brown off the hook. Chris Brown still has charges. He's, you know, I don't believe that he has made restitution to society, the same thing I believe Diddy hasn't either.
However, there is a question that comes from this that people are discussing, is when do you allow people not to be defined by the worst parts of themselves or the worst parts of their past? That was my question, and as I was speaking to people on the street, most of them said, 'If she is honoring him for his contribution to music, then I'm okay with that, but I'm not okay with her honoring him for any other reason.' And so that was my question. So I think that people may have misread that, and especially as a survivor...
of sexual abuse, I happen to understand the nuances of that, and I understand how hard it is sometimes moving forward, but I don't in any way, I don't think that I was letting Chris Brown off the hook.
Well, the first video that I saw, and that's actually something we have in common. I too am a survivor of sexual assault, also of childhood sexual assault. And I think...
one thing... Yeah, I saw that. I think one thing that we agree on, you actually said this in an interview, is that we know people don't report.
And so the first video I saw was you asking a gentleman how he felt about it, and he said, 'Oh, Chris Brown, the man who beats women?' And you were like, 'Well, Rihanna.' And then you were like, 'Well, that was in 2009.' And so that conversation in and of itself, even if you have the contextual information, somebody seeing that, they are affirmed in, 'Oh, this person did something wrong one time.' And to the point about not facing restitution or not actually modeling any restitution, that's the part I feel like gets left out of the conversation because no, we don't have to hold people accountable for the worst versions of themselves, but I think that forgiveness and grace comes when they choose to stop being the worst version of themselves. And I think this conversation is so important because it's irresponsible conversation where we're not hyper-vigilant about the way we discuss these things. That sort of misinformation, of course, it influences people's political actions and the voting booth, it shapes their political views.
Well, I think my point was that that's the one that people know him for.
That's what people... And that's the other thing. Just because something is public knowledge, that doesn't mean it completely encapsulates a person's situation. And so once again, my biggest issue, I don't care that he has his concerts, he fills stadiums. If people are having a good time at a show, that's fine. The recognition he got was a political one, and that's what stresses me out about the whole thing.
I don't disagree with you at all about that, but I think that when you ask me how I show up, I think that what I was going to say before we moved on is that I show up in a place that's a place of vulnerability where I am trying to facilitate conversations to get people to listen. I am not always perfect in my approach, and you should not expect me to be that, but you are certainly 100% allowed to question me in that. However, I am also allowed to explain what I meant. I understand Chris Brown, and I understand that Chris Brown has not made restitution, but sometimes when I'm speaking to people, I allow them to have their points of view, and then I will correct them if I think it's necessary. But I 100% agree with you on Chris Brown, but that was not my intention, nor am I ill-informed about what Chris Brown is or who he is. I actually thought it was a miss for Jasmine Crockett to do what she did. I think that especially in this time when we're dealing with what we're dealing with, there are other people, other individuals that we could be honoring now that are doing things. I don't understand why she chose Chris Brown or Usher. I have nothing against Usher. I think he's a fine individual. I think he's a talented artist. But I thought it was a miss for her to do that.
Do you think the situation, or I guess I'm asking you to speak freely, not even in a journalistic capacity...
That doesn't mean that I don't support other things that she did.
That's why people like you supported other things that I did, but you didn't agree with me on how I presented the Chris Brown thing. And that's perfectly legit. Yeah.
Yeah, I think Jasmine and I have had many conversations, and we are aware that we don't agree with one another on everything, but something we do try to model is being able to disagree and still be in community, 'cause I think that's what's necessary for us to, you know, push everything over the line.
I'm not here to fight with Black people right now. I'm not.
I'm in agreement.
I'm not in the comments fighting with people. I'm like, I'm not fighting with you. I get it. I'm not fighting. I love you. We're all in this together. You're not perfect. I'm not perfect. And if you have something that you disagree with me on, then just say it. That's it.
Okay. I wonder how you think, and this is me asking you to speak freely as Don, not as Don the journalist, how situations like this one impact folks' attitudes on elected officials, 'cause one thing that I kept getting back was, 'Oh, can y'all worry about Donald Trump first?' Hey, both at the same time, you know?
Yeah, but there's some truth to that.
You have to have a sense of proportionality. I mean, we have people who are, we are arguing about tone and, 'Well, I disagree with you somewhat, but usually agree with you on whatever.' There's very little, if anything, that I agree with the Trump administration on. It is a repressive regime. And so I do think that we should spend more time trying to inform people and fight against an oppressive regime rather than pouncing on the people who we most of the time agree on, that we have the same mission and we're in the same mindset. We just happen to have a nuanced disagreement about something. That's different. Those two things, one is here and one is there.
Yeah, they're also connected though. 'Cause I think a lot of the conversations that spark in popular culture, I'm on Threads, and most of the time I'm just a witness. I give one-word responses: no, yes, both, maybe. I think why there are still so many contentious arguments like on a ground level is we're trying to get people to agree on the things that inform our political decisions at the end of the day. We're trying to get them to understand how flawed certain perspectives are because we know they're going to impact how people move to the voting booth. So when we have the situation where, and again, I hate to keep making it about him 'cause I know his fans are going to be in the comments like, 'Why don't y'all let him rest?' This is just an example, but we have folks who are ready and willing to allow him to continue to make music, not show any restitution or recourse. And we have a president in the White House who is calling women piggy, who has a Supreme Court that just reversed Roe v. Wade, who is taking Black women out of positions of leadership. All of this pushing for the SAVE Act, which would have impacted married women's ability to show up to the voting booth. So we have all of these things on a large scale, you know, that are affecting women, and we have things in our day-to-day culture that are also affecting women, and we're trying to say, 'Hey, maybe if we fix this, that won't happen anymore.' So it's not like, 'Oh, worry about Donald Trump and his allegations.' We are worried. We are worried about the culture that props this up, which is why we're trying to have this conversation.
So what you're saying is right, and that was part of the thing that I was trying to convey. Maybe I could have conveyed it better. You have this person who's in the White House who is an adjudicated sexual abuser, which the judge later said was akin to rape. Okay? 34 criminal counts. He can't conduct certain business in New York anymore because it was fraudulent. All the things that he has, the discrimination against Black people in housing that he had in the '70s, all of these things that he has, and we are paying more attention sometimes to Chris Brown, not that what Chris Brown did was right, but there is truth to that. This person gets to be president of the United States, and we are allowing that to happen. Why are we allowing that to happen? And then we have Chris Brown who has done terrible things. Why are we focusing so much on that? So that's, I think that's a legitimate conversation. I think most people, whether they understand it in the sort of way that you understand it, but the average person may not be as connected as you are, that's what they are talking about. That's the way they're thinking about it. And if we can inform them, I think that that's great. However, most people don't think about it, quite frankly, as deeply as you do.
And you're not wrong, and I think there is a culture of urgency in trying to solve [clears throat] all these problems that makes us skip a lot of steps in connecting with people. And I think sometimes people think, myself included, I'm of the school of thought, if you meet somebody on an issue that they care about, it is much easier to get them on your side.
As I used to be a high school teacher, and something they told us all the time was nobody cares what you know until they know that you care. And so maybe not on these issues 'cause their minds are already made up, but we're trying to find ways to reach people on the ground to show them how something impacts them personally, to show them how something that impacts them personally also impacts the world. So then they see all these other things differently. So I still just think it's all connected. Maybe we have to find better ways to talk to one another, but there's the Christian Noel situation, there's the Cornell 7, there's a young woman at LSU. Rape culture is about.
You know? And it is the very reason we have... It's like a microcosm. The school protecting the Cornell 7, just having them write an essay at first before...
anything said anything about it is the same way in which Supreme Court is protecting Donald Trump from facing any actual like
But I think the best way we do that is what we're doing now. We need to do that with each other. But I don't think we do that by... Look, I think if people can give their opinions, but I don't think we do that by fighting with people in the comment section. I just don't think that that's productive.
I think having a productive conversation. That's just like when I watch on the few, the very rare occasion that I'll watch cable news now and I see people fighting. I'm like, what is that? What is that doing? It's not constructive at all. So I think it's okay for people to have conversations, make mistakes in conversations, but just to put yourself in a position that you are open and vulnerable enough to have those conversations, I think is very, very important. We don't do that. And we don't allow for sometimes for ourselves to be wrong or for other people to be right.
And two things can be true. Both of us can be right in what we're thinking, and at some point both of us can be wrong, or we can just be missing each other.
Yeah, I think so.
I want to get back on the topic of misinformation because I think something that is also connected to what we're talking about is this the manosphere, but also like men's rights activists and this sort of aspirational oppression. And so with a lot of this anti-woman red pill content also comes the anti-trans content, the pro-Trump, whatever. You got people showing up to WNBA games that don't care about WNBA, causing more fighting like an actual person.
So, I'm wondering, we have platforms, Facebook specifically, have you seen the social film series, like The Social Dilemma, Social Network?
Okay. There's a new film coming out called The Social Reckoning, and it exposes basically what was written in the Facebook files about how Facebook, before it was Meta, knew full well that its algorithm was introducing people to these extremist hate groups.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so, I wonder what you think our role is in combating a literal machine to sort of neutralize a lot of this hateful, idiot ideology.
I think we have a role in that, and that's why we can't get bogged down in the, you know, in the minutia of the things that are... It may be important to us, that some may be important to win an argument.
But it's not important in informing people. And I think at the end of the day, when you have all of this misinformation, the way to combat it is through what? It's facts, and it's really through conversation.
Well, people don't believe in facts. And so, to get back to the point of the men, a lot of these men in support of the Cornell 7 are like, 'Oh, like 60% of women who accuse men of rape are false accusers.' No, they're not. You just made that up. You literally just made that up.
And so, what do we do when facts don't move people, and they're willing to create their own facts to prove a point? And these are the people that are also winning politically.
But that doesn't mean that we stop telling facts. That doesn't mean that we stop in our mission for the truth, because if we do that, then they win. Then the misinformation wins. Then the people who believe that 60-some percent of women are, you know, falsely accused.
It's only 2 to 10% by the way, in case anybody was wondering.
Depending on the study.
