The Breakdown with Shaun King

My People. My People. Please let me teach you an important lesson today. I've already learned it and it took me far too long to accept. Politicians and political parties make HUGE mistakes. They even do evil shit. All of them. And the moment you are unwilling to believe this truth is the moment that you've been duped. ALL OF US must be willing to look at both Democrats and Republicans with a criti...

Well, this is a HUGE mess for Joe Biden and for his DOJ.As you may have heard, classified, TOP SECRET documents were just found in an old office Joe Biden was using before he became President. But Democrats don't even seem to care...at all. After all of the outrage about Trump, I don't think I've seen a single prominent Democrat speaking out about Biden doing the SAME EXACT THING that they called...

For me, this news is devastating. And I take it personally, because above all else, it means that in spite of our best efforts to reduce the number of people killed by police, what we are doing is just not working. Listen, I don't even think that we have been wrong for fighting to hold police accountability and change policies on the city, county, state, and federal level, but what he must conclud...

As you no doubt saw - conservative Brazilian supporters of their recently ousted President, Jair Bolsonaro, inspired by the January 6th insurrection 2 years ago in the United States, just attempted to take over the Congress, Supreme Court, and Presidential Palace in the Capitol of Brazil. Almost 2 years to the day, under almost identical circumstances, these conservatives attempted and failed the...

As you may know, nearly 20 ultra conservative members of Congress are doing something that we have not seen in America since before the Civil War. They are REFUSING to vote for the Speaker of the House nominated by most of their party. They’ve literally had 12 different votes and they refuse to budge. They want a long list of concessions and even prefer for Kevin McCarthy to step down altogether....

Now, let's be real, the NFL, and it's good 'ol boy network of owners, are not known for doing the right thing, or the compassionate thing, when it comes to its players. But to be real - I don't even think it's safe for them to play this weekend. I damn sure know it's not safe for the Bills to play this weekend. Those men are traumatized. Their brother is fighting for his life in the hospital and t...

This week I learned that Amber Carr, the sister of Atatiana Jefferson, who is just 33 years old and has two young sons, has been told that she may not live until this weekend. Her heart is failing and it has impacted every other organ of her body. It was Amber's own son who was in the room playing video games with Atatiana when she was shot and killed. And in the months that followed Atatiana's mo...

Happy New Year my friends. It's good to be back. But as sports fans, and just good citizens, it's a painful day after what can only be called a catastrophic near death experience that happened on live TV last night. Damar Hamlin, a young defensive player for the Buffalo Bills, went into cardiac arrest after a hard hit, and appears to have basically died right there on the field until he was finall...

Happy holidays everybody! For the next few episodes, we're going to be playing some of our greatest hits. This is one of them. Every day I see people rightly ask why more "good cops" don't speak out on police violence. Well - today I'll show you why. This brave officer posted his professional opinion about the murder of George Floyd - and just got fired over it. Learn more about your ad choices. V...

Happy holidays everybody! For the next few episodes, we're going to be playing some of our greatest hits. This is one of them. Today I want to share a painful, personal story about a lesson that I learned about organizing for change as an outsider and organizing for change as an insider. In the winter of 2014, I found myself in a deep funk after failing in so many fights for families fighting for...

Happy holidays everybody! We will be playing some of our most downloaded episodes for the next few days. This was released the day after Kyle Rittenhouse shot and killed three men, two fatally, during protests in Kenosha, Wisconsin back in August of 2020. Last night in Kenosha, Wisconsin armed white supremacists literally worked directly with local police, sharing water and refreshments, and strat...

Happy holidays everybody! For the next few episodes we're going to be playing some of our greatest hits. This is one of them. The United States does not have one justice system or one legal system. We often talk about changing the system, but in reality, we have 30,000 micro systems. Each micro system has its own set of rules, laws, and politics, which is simultaneously great news in our fight to...

Happy holidays everybody! For the next few episodes, we're going to be playing some of our greatest hits. This is one of them. Today I'm going to be a bit nerdy/wonky and talk about metrics, by asking the question "How do we measure success for Black America?" What are the outcomes and numbers we should be able to agree really show whether or not we're moving in the right direction as a people? Is...

Happy holidays everybody! For the next few episodes, we're going to be playing some of our greatest hits. This is one of them. I'm fighting for it. You are fighting for it. But let's take a moment to define what justice really means for families impacted by police violence and racial terrorism. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Happy holidays everybody! For the next few episodes we're going to be playing some of our greatest hits. This is one of them. One tool of the oppressor is to throw so much oppression your way that you can't possibly be effective at fighting back any of it. For most of the past year, I was irritated by white people organizing to ban what they were calling Critical Race Theory, but I am already comm...

Hey everybody! I'm taking the next few days off to spend some time with my family and just wanted to drop by to wish each of you well. I know sometimes this holiday season can be tough if you are suffering through grief or loss. I am praying for your peace and strength and healing. See you all back here next Tuesday! PS: If you have not already subscribed to our podcast on Apple Podcast or Spotify...

In fact, Donald Trump is the least accountable human being in America. But it's his whiteness and his wealth that are at the center of what has effectively been a force field around this man for his entire life. Going all the way back to the early 70s, Donald Trump and his family have been accused of criminal wrongdoing. And in every single decade since, Trump has been accused of sexual assault, s...

That's where we are right now. That's how critical the problem is. It's worse today than it was during the 80s and early 90s. It's setting records. And ravaging families, communities, schools, and cities all over the country. First, I need us all to accept that it's a complex problem. And that no simple solutions exist. Anybody saying otherwise is either misinformed or lying. But we've addressed a...

After saying for months on end that he wanted Twitter to be the "Town Square of the World" and that he believed in what's called "free speech absolutism" - which is basically the belief that all speech should be allowed all the time - Elon Musk made a deeply disturbing pivot. After weeks of bringing back conservatives to Twitter that were actually suspended for repeated violations of Terms of Serv...

Trump is struggling. At life. At politics. And, of particular note today, he's struggling IN THE POLLS. Multiple new polls have Trump tanking. And for good reason. He was like poison to every major candidate he endorsed in the mid-terms. He was seen as such a liability to Herschel Walker, HIS HAND PICKED CANDIDATE for Georgia, that in the final days, the Walker campaign basically told him to stay...

This is absolutely infuriating. On Sunday, the New York Times released an explosive new report detailing how thousands of children all over the country are being enrolled into the JROTC without their permission. These kids are literally showing up at school, getting their schedules, and finding out that they've been signed up for the military against their wishes. And it's happening almost exclusi...

This weekend, at an ultra-swanky banquet hall in the middle of Manhattan, white nationalists and white supremacists from all over the world, including US Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, gathered together as a sign of solidarity and support for one another. That fact alone is a disturbing sign of the normalization of bigotry and racism, but Marjorie Taylor Greene said something that is so dis...

While Republicans were expected to have a blowout in this past month's elections, it didn't quite happen that way. Nonetheless, Republicans will now take over the House next month, which is going to mean that almost any chance of serious legislation passing and getting signed into law is slim. Today I want to talk about the 3 primary ways that Democrats are going to have to fight for change in 202...

Hours ago we learned that WNBA star Brittney Griner was released from a Russian prison in a prisoner swap with the United States. This is GREAT NEWS, of course, but today I want to unpack and explain what all of this means. I have 3 observations and conclusions that I want to share. Let me unpack and explain it. To listen to today’s FULL EPISODE of The Breakdown go now to Apple Podcasts or Spotify...

I don't know if I'm more glad that we won't have Herschel Walker in the Senate or that we will have Raphael Warnock in power! That's just how bad Herschel Walker was. But I see so many lessons that we can take away from what went down yesterday. The one thing I just can't shake, though, is that without the near-unanimous support of Raphael Warnock, and even of Joe Biden for that matter, Democrats...