Over the last four years, this show has focused a lot on my dislikes. But this week, I thought
I’d share some things I do like with some people I really like: the activists and organizers
who led to Democrats to victory in 2020. Like my vice president said:
- We did it, Joe. And it's all thanks to five key states that
flipped in 2020—and Steve Kornacki. To celebrate this joyous occasion, I took off my cynical
hat and went somewhere no other late night host has gone before—the sunny world of
daytime! Welcome to Sam's Favorite People. We’re talking to, you guessed it, my favorite—not
related to me and not legally binding—people. Today I’m talking to: Nada Al-Hanooti, who
works out in Michigan for the Muslim led organization Emgage; Luis Velasquez from Voces de La Frontera
in Wisconsin; Tara Benally, who helped organize Navajo Nation in Arizona with the Rural Utah
Project; 18-year-old Sheyla Street from Vote That Jawn in Pennsylvania, who couldn’t
even vote this election, but managed to organize 95% of her high school; and representing Georgia,
we have Cliff Albright and LaTosha Brown—I’ll have her introduce them.
- [singing] Well the first thing I did right was the day I started to fight. Keep your
eyes on the prize and the hold on. - Cliff and I are co-founders of Black Voters
Matter Fund. [singing] We’re singing and we’re voting.
Sing… Okay. I’ll stop. Why am I trying something
new? ‘Cause Joe Biden showed me anything is possible if you try three times. But his
fight came with some extra help. People of color voted for Biden in unprecedented numbers,
and these organizers helped do that. Tell me about the miracles that you performed this
year. - You know, I get this question asked a lot.
I told people, if you want social change, we gotta knock on the doors. Well I mean,
we didn’t knock on doors this time because of COVID. But we made the calls. We made the
text messages. We registered people to vote. We had 16- to 27-year-olds organized who could
speak multiple languages, so we represented the Muslim community speaking Urdu, and Arabic,
and we called like grandmothers. We were like, “Hey, we want you to vote. You matter.”
And that was special. Okay, maybe it would be quicker if you just
gave me a list of things that you did not do. From knocking on doors, to virtual town
halls, to creating a really cool bus, our organizers did it all.
- People would walk up, and sometimes they wouldn’t walk up. They would be across the
street and I would be like, “Yo you, in the orange shirt, I’m talking to you.”
People would be like, “Who are you? Are you talking to me? I’m a grown ass man,
like are you asking me to register to vote?” And I’d be like, “Yeah, and I’m 17 years
old and I can’t even vote! So you should take advantage of your right.”
I love what you’ve done with catcalling. I knew the youth would save us. And in places
like Navajo Nation, registering to vote is difficult to navigate due to the lack of traditional
street addresses. But you guessed it, Tara figured it out! Which is why she's one of
Sam's Favorite People! Sorry, go ahead Tara. - We partnered with Google and implemented
the plus code. It’s just a shortened version of geo-coordinates. And so that made it so
much easier for people to, community members to see where it was they reside and which
district that they needed to vote in. I’m kind of picturing you right now driving
and criss-crossing across multiple states. Every day for a year.
- My day started most times about 3:30 in the morning and ended about, oh, anywhere
from 7:30 to 8:30 at night. You’re making me look very bad. You’re
making me look like a very lazy person. - Samantha, that's what we gotta do around
building democracy. We gotta really understand how fragile democracy is in this country.
And that even part of our work, what we say in Black Voters Matter, is our work is 365
days out of the year. When do you actually get a day? Is there a
breather involved? - Cliff, when are we going to take a breather?
- Well, technically today is our vacation day. So. You see how that wound up.
Ugh, vacations during COVID are the worst! - It’s not only about Biden. It's about
our lives. When we voted, we voted for Breonna Taylor. We voted for our Yemeni neighbors
that are getting deported every single day. And we voted for the children that are locked
up in cages. - Here I am, a DACA recipient, a person who
cannot vote but who does have that influence on others. So I encourage people, even if
you are not a person who can vote, you do have that voice and you can encourage others
to vote for justice and to vote for compassion. Justice? Compassion? Daytime TV really does
make you cry! Because of groups like these, more people voted than ever before. Which
makes them heroes, even without the spandex. So the voting happened. What happens next?
- So when you ask the question about, you know, what’s next, think about what’s
taken place. Black voters literally decided who the Democractic nominee would be at the
beginning of 2020. And then played a major role in that nominee getting elected in November
2020. And then in January of 2021, made it possible so that that nominee—now president-elect—would
actually have a Senate that would help him get through an agenda and issues that were
already organizing around. Saying thank you to Black voters and thank you to Black women
is great, but actually following through and holding folks accountable and following through
on the issues that we’re passionate about, that would be the biggest thing. ‘Cause
that’s what we’re looking forward to in 2021.
I couldn’t have an Emmy-worthy daytime show without giving out gifts! So we made donations
to each of their organizations on behalf of all of America. Thank you, organizers! We
owe you one. And by “one,” I mean democracy.