Karen Hunter (Photo via Simon & Schuster)/Marc Morial (Photo via X/Twitter)
In a recent episode of “The Karen Hunter Show,” host Karen Hunter conducted a probing interview via video with Marc Morial, the president and CEO of the National Urban League. The conversation covered a range of topics, including racial equity in America, the role of the National Urban League, and homeownership as a means of wealth-building in the Black community.
Hunter is a journalist, talk show host, and the co-author of several books, including “Confessions of a Video Vixen,” “On the Down Low,” and “Wendy’s Got the Heat…” “The Karen Hunter Show” airs on SiriusXM Urban View.
Morial, a political and civic leader, is the current president of the National Urban League. Morial served as Mayor of New Orleans from 1994 to 2002 as the city’s youngest mayor, President of the United States Conference of Mayors in 2001, and as a Louisiana State Senator from 1992 to 1994.
During the interview, Morial emphasized the pressing issue of domestic terrorism posed by white supremacists in the U.S., citing various tragic incidents that underscore the gravity of this threat.
“The greatest threat to America today is domestic terrorism by white supremacists, and it’s exactly what we saw in Jacksonville. It’s exactly what we saw at Mother Emanuel [chruch]…Buffalo, all of these places,” he said.
He also highlighted the pivotal role of homeownership in building wealth, acknowledging the challenges posed by high-interest rates and housing prices. He spoke about the National Urban League’s efforts to empower communities through education and entrepreneurship, particularly in the realm of homeownership. Morial stressed the importance of educating potential homebuyers to prevent them from being exploited in the housing market.
But Hunter pressed him on the organization’s relationship with financial institutions, some of which have been found to discriminate against Black homeowners.
“Why isn’t anybody from Wells Fargo or these other banks that literally destroyed Black wealth in jail, like why did they get a free pass? And then I see people in bed with them,” Hunter said.
In 2022, the National Urban League and Wells Fargo announced a $5 million grant to create the Diverse Appraiser Initiative, a new program, according to a press release, “that aims to increase diversity and reduce barriers to entry in the home appraisal industry.”
The grant is expected to be allocated over five years with a goal to certify up to 260 diverse appraisers. In addition to supporting the certification of trainees, the initiative included entrepreneurship and small business development components focusing on creating 130 potential new businesses.
Morial sort of skirted the question and instead clarified the League’s role in preparing individuals for homeownership through education and emphasized their focus on community empowerment.
“What we do is we have to build our wealth through homeownership…this is a difficult time to build wealth through homeownership because interest rates are high and housing prices are high and that there’s been a failure of public policy in that regard but nonetheless I still believe firmly that homeownership is foundational to building wealth,” Morial went on, adding that the Urban League offers homeowners educational classes.
“You have to educate yourself, or you can get abused and used in the housing markets. You can buy the wrong house in the wrong place. You can be tricked into a high-priced predatory loan,” he explained. “We have to self-empower, and we also have to self-empower our children.”
He touted an affordable housing project the nonprofit is doing in New York City.
“Our project is the first of its kind…every unit is affordable. No one else has done that. We’re the owner of the building,” he said. “We’re greenlining, not redlining….we’re the owner of the building.”
Hunter dug into the funding behind the Urban League and asked how much the group received in federal funding.
Morial admitted he wasn’t sure of the amount but offered, “Federal dollars have come to us, come to us only for programs–workforce programs, housing programs, minority business programs, after-school programs. The federal money is very limited in what you can do with it…and how you have to spend it …to get the federal money, we have to compete for it. We have to compete through recreational proposals. It’s highly competitive.”
Still, Hunter called for more evidence of the work the Urban League is doing for Black people.
“It feels like the ’50s, ’60s,” she noted, adding that “we have affirmative action being overturned, Black people getting killed.”
Morial seemed to take offense at this.
“When people who live today start talking about what happened in the ’60s, they’re talking about not what they experienced. They’re talking about what they read, what they heard. We have to be very, very present about this idea…we were not there. We were not participants…We have to build a movement today for today,” he emphasized.
During the interview, tensions arose, particularly regarding Morial’s responsibilities as the leader of the National Urban League and the perception of so-called “pedestal leadership.”
Morial said his “responsibility is to provide institutional leadership. I lead an institution. I’m not just a person who’s a leader, right I’m an Institutional leader. I have a responsibility for, you know, 150 employees. I have responsibility for 92 affiliates across the nation to ensure that this institution runs effectively, fulfills its mission, and gets results. It’s my first and most important responsibility and I take that responsibility very seriously.”
He continued, “I have a real problem with pedestal leadership putting so-called Black leaders on some sort of pedestal as though they’re gods and goddesses. Moses can part the waters and lead people to he promised land. Martin Luther King was great, but Martin Luther King himself will say the 1963 March on Washington was not about him. It was organized..by a coalition.”
Hunter expressed disappointment at what she saw as a lack of depth in the discussion and accused him of being defensive to her questions. She said she had hoped for a deeper dive into the issues concerning Black America. Then she quipped that she was very pointed in her questions, and that he didn’t even ask about Morial’s salary. The exchange got heated, with Morial ending the conversation.
According to CharityWatch, the National Urban League paid Morial a total compensation of $1,192,775 based on fiscal 2020 reporting.
“I’m not defensive. I’m gonna ask questions, no no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, this is your show,” he shot back, and when she mentioned that he had not asked about his salary, he said, “No, no, no, no, sister, no, no, no, no, no, I’ve done many interviews. You can’t get that. You can’t take a cheap shot and pull it back.”
Morial thanked Hunter and left the interview.
Karen Hunter (Photo via Simon & Schuster, https://www.simonandschuster.com/authors/Karen-Hunter/1854156)/Marc Morial (Photo via X/Twitter, https://twitter.com/MARCMORIAL/photo)
