Our Body Politic

This week, we’re spotlighting a powerful voting bloc: Generation Z. First, Farai interviews Maxwell Alejandro Frost, Democratic nominee for Florida’s 10th Congressional District, about how his Afro-Cuban identity and work as an organizer and musician help shape his political platform and views. Then Farai is joined by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and host of MSNBC’s “Into America” Trymaine Lee who shares what he’s learned about the political interests of young Black voters attending historically Black colleges and universities in his new series, “The Power of the Black Vote.”

This week, Farai speaks with reporter and WAPT-TV news anchor Troy Johnson on Jackson, Mississippi’s recurring water crisis, and why catastrophes like this so often happen in communities of color. Then, we share again Farai’s conversation from April with Carmen Yulín Cruz, former mayor of San Juan, Puerto Rico, about how she guided her people through the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. And on our weekly segment, Sippin’ the Political Tea, Farai is joined by Kim Wehle, law professor and advisor at Protect Democracy and Tammy Patrick, Senior Advisor to the Elections program at Democracy Fund to discuss election security ahead of the 2022 midterms.

This week, we’re re-airing some of Our Body Politic’s most noteworthy and illuminating political interviews from the past two years. In preparation of the 2022 Midterms, we’re looking at how some of the most pressing political issues continue to shape our nation by revisiting conversations with key public officials like New York Attorney General Letitia “Tish” James, who shares insights on holding Jan 6 insurrectionists accountable, scholar Geraldo Cadava, who breaks down the history of Hispanic Republicans, and Bertica Cabrera Morris, a longstanding Republican organizer and businesswoman. We also hear from U.S. Senator Mazie Hirono of Hawai’i who shares how being the only immigrant in the U.S. Senate shapes her politics, and Wes Moore, the current Democratic nominee for governor of Maryland, who shares how his ancestors’ experience with white supremacists and his service in the U.S. military inform and inspire his political career.

This week, Farai interviews Dr. Sayu Bhojwani, civic entrepreneur and founder of Women’s Democracy Lab, about what it takes to create a more inclusive democracy and what current intraparty tensions reveal about the election field ahead of the midterms. Then, we re-air a conversation from “One With Farai” featuring Dr. Melissa Harris-Perry and her 2011 book “Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in America.” And in this week’s segment of ‘Sippin’ the Political Tea’, Farai interviews Bobby Ghosh, Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering foreign affairs and Hagar Chemali, foreign policy expert and host of “Oh My World!” on YouTube, about the death of Queen Elizabeth II amidst the United Kingdom’s energy crisis.

This week on Our Body Politic, creator and host Farai Chideya interviews Anita Kumar, longtime reporter and first-ever senior editor of Standards & Ethics at POLITICO, on the 2022 midterm elections landscape. Farai and Kumar delve into how issues like political violence and extremism, abortion rights, and even media coverage are playing for the upcoming elections. Then, Farai interviews Carmen Rita Wong, writer, journalist, finance expert and author of the new memoir “Why Didn’t You Tell Me?” Wong candidly shares how discovering a series of family secrets surrounding her heritage led her to re-examine her race and culture, while also forging a path for discovering and living as her most authentic self.

This week on Our Body Politic, creator and host Farai Chideya interviews Bryan Greene, consulting producer on the Oscar-winning documentary, “Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised),” and Vice President of Public Advocacy at the National Association of REALTORS. Farai and Greene discuss how events like the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival serve as opportunities for Black Americans to thrive in the face of social and housing discrimination. Then in our series, “Our Body Politics Presents…” we feature the podcast Truth Be Told with host Tonya Mosley who interviews author and scholar Dr. Marcia Chatelain and founder of Feed Our Soul Adrienne Wilson about how Black Americans are seeking and achieving equity by decolonizing their relationship to food.

This week, Farai interviews Steven Thrasher, LGBTQ scholar, journalist and author of “The Viral Underclass: The Human Toll When Inequality and Diseases Collide.” Thrasher offers insights from his new book on how systematic marginalization determines who is most affected by public health crises like HIV/AIDS, COVID-19 and now – monkeypox. Then, Farai speaks to Howard Polskin, president and founder of “TheRighting,” a newsletter, site and social media feed that compiles and disseminates far-right political commentary to cross pollinate the divided media audiences in the U.S. and combat disinformation in the news.

This week, Our Body Politic celebrates its 100th episode. Host Farai Chideya reflects on some of the show’s most impactful moments of news and political coverage over the past two years with OBP regular contributors Karen Attiah, columnist for the Washington Post and Tiffany Jeffers, associate professor at Georgetown University Law Center. The trio examines the current political atmosphere, its origins, and reflect on how issues like reproductive rights, the COVID-19 crisis, and the aftermath of the Jan. 6 Insurrection could impact this year’s midterms elections and why cultivating hope and safeguarding democracy is more important than ever.

This week, host Farai Chideya interviews longtime TV and film producer and now co-director of the Sundance award-winning documentary Aftershock, Tonya Lewis Lee and one of the film’s featured subjects, reproductive justice advocate Shawnee Benton-Gibson. Benton-Gibson’s daughter died in October 2019 after giving birth – one more fatality in a long epidemic of Black maternal mortality. Farai also speaks to Lewis Lee one-on-one about how her work in media and experience as a children’s author led to her work as a maternal health advocate. Then, in our weekly segment Sippin’ the Political Tea, Farai interviews legal analyst and NYU Law professor Melissa Murray and University of Pennsylvania Ph.D History candidate Kimberly St. Julian-Varnon about the impact and implications of the highly politicized conviction of WNBA star Brittney Griner in Russia.

This week, Our Body Politic re-airs a timely episode from November 2021. Host Farai Chideya talks with author and China expert Leta Hong Fincher about how feminists face up to the country’s authoritarian regime and the similarities with gender-equality struggles in the U.S. Sixto Cancel, CEO of the non-profit Think of Us, shares his experience in the foster care system and what their organization is doing to reform it. Chef Kia Damon explains why she prefers the term “food apartheid.” On Sippin’ the Political Tea, Farai dives into the details of saving for retirement as Black women with Michelle Singletary of the Washington Post and Gwen McKinney of the media platform Unerased: Black Women Speak.