Dateline.
YOUTH IN REVOLT.
REPORTER: Dean
Cornish
In a San Diego Hotel room, a young millennial is preparing
to speak to a crowd of hundreds.
If you don't speak up, if you don't cry out,
if you don't advocate for yourself then nothing will change.I remember being in
school - and often times having conflict with those in authority and those in
power, if you don't speak up, if you don't cry out,
if you don't advocate for yourself then nothing will change.
MAN IN ELEVATOR: You look beautiful! Are you a movie star?
MICHAEL TUBBS: No I’m not even.
From Stockton, California – Michael Tubbs is the youngest
mayor ever in his home town.
MICHAEL TUBBS: I’m in office. After you! How are you?
Good to see you man.
And he’s not alone.
Right across America, young people on both sides of politics are
planting flags at the local level. In some cases, they’re just 16 years old.
LONGBEACH
MAYOR ROBERT: He's awesome man. Young
mayors are taking over the country! I
think it's great. I think...
MICHAEL TUBBS: Well he's a young mayor himself! He’s
the Mayor of Longbeach, so…
MAYOR ROBERT: I think the more young mayors we
have the better.
MICHAEL TUBBS: Nice to see you. I liked something about you
on Facebook.
I want to find out what’s behind the millennial mayor
phenomenon. So I’m following Michael Tubbs who’s about to take to the stage at
California’s Democratic Convention.
MICHAEL
TUBBS: “How are you? give me a hug.
JANET: My name’s Janet can I get a quick photo with
you?
MICHAEL
TUBBS: Yeah.
Millennials are known for disrupting old norms
and laying waste to convention…and these Democrats agree that’s what the United
States needs right now…
MICHAEL
TUBBS: See you guys. Thank you.
MICHAEL TUBBS: I was elected on Nov 8 2016. And that was
also the day of the presidential election so I was also elected the same day
president Trump was elected. I actually think
the current president has created in people an urgency that the things we take
for granted – these freedoms – these values – aren’t a given. You have to fight
for them.
SPEAKER: Millennials are organisers. Millennials are entrepreneurs
and millennials are disruptors and I am proud to be a millennial.
But
does a generation often slated for narcissism and a crappy work ethic have the
chops to change America?
OFFICER:
So help me God.
DONALD TRUMP, US PRESIDENT: So help me God.
OFFICER:
Congratulations Mr President.
It is
not just Democrats who are hungry for change. Republicans swept Trump to power
to drain the swamp they call Washington.
DONALD TRUMP:
We are transferring power and giving it back to you, the people.
While
it was mostly older voters who put Trump in the White House, many of his
policies weigh heaviest on the young.
CROWD: The
whole damn system is as guilty as hell!
Whether
they are marching against racism, for women's rights or greater restrictions to
firearms...
ACTIVIST:
Everyone who has been touched by the cold grip of gun violence
understands.
CROWD: Never
again! Never again!
It's
the young who are fighting back.
ACTIVIST:
The adults have failed United States. This is in our hands now and if
any elected official gets in our way, we will vote them out and replace them
ourselves.
In
Holyoke Massachusetts another young mayor has taken the reins of his city. Once
home to paper mills that created American millionaires, today Holyoke's
factories are boarded up and jobs are scarce. Alex Morse wants to turn around
the decay.
ALEX MORSE, HOLYOKE MAYOR: Morning.
WOMAN: Good
morning.
ALEX MORSE:
Your hair is beautiful.
WOMAN: Thank you.
ALEX MORSE:
For the first time in a long time you see new people and young people,
thousands of them all over the country, diverse backgrounds, running for
office, putting in papers to run for office, knocking on doors, organising
around issues so if it took Donald Trump winning the election to inspire
thousands of people to get involved in their local government, I think that is
a positive thing. We have been seeing this in a revolution of sorts of young
people flipping districts and running for office. The whole idea of waiting
your turn has been thrown by the wayside.
Millennial
Mayor Morse was elected when he was 22 years old. He replaced a 67-year-old
woman at City Hall. He's now been mayor for six years.
REPORTER: Got a pretty impressive photo
collection here man. Tell us who you have met so far.
ALEX MORSE:
So, when I first got elected I was 22 and I got an invitation from the
Obamas to join them at the White House for a holiday party. I’ll say he's
probably going to be the best President of my lifetime. I'm still young so you
never know.
REPORTER: Wow,
did you ever think there that
you would be running the place?
ALEX MORSE:
My friends would say yes. Maybe, I remember when I first became mayor
and I walked in the office, the first few weeks, and it was surreal in that am
I really the mayor.
Hi, how are you?
The
novelty of a young mayor hasn't worn off in the small city.
ALEX MORSE:
There is usually, like, a lot of excitement, especially in the Puerto
Rican community about seeing the mayor, it’s kind of cool.
But to
fix the town's crippling unemployment, Alex needs the community to think big.
And in true millennial style, his latest solution is disruptive and, for some,
controversial.
ALEX MORSE:
Well marijuana - It's now legal for both medicinal and recreational
purposes. You know we have all of
this empty mill space downtown that’s the perfect space for growing marijuana,
and it’s also passive use so it’s not like you’ll even know what’s happening
inside some of these factories until you go in.
REPORTER: So how will that help the town?
ALEX MORSE:
Well for us it’s going to be
an economic driver, it’s going to impact real estate. It
will be a job producer, it will help us with workforce development, putting
people back to work.
Alex's
plan to save Holyoke has yet to be fully tested.
ALEX MORSE:
Hello, how are you? Good to see
you.
But
it starts here at the town's first marijuana factory which will start growing
crops in just a few weeks.
PETE KADENS, GREEN THUMB INDUSTRIES CEO: We’ve still got a lot of work to do, If we are going to pass this thing on Tuesday next week...
The
factory is being run by this man, Pete Kadens.
PETE KADENS:
This is the mother room, the most important room in the entire building.
All of our genetics start here.
Pete
runs a cannabis cultivation company called Green Thumb Industries, which
already operates across five US states.
PETE KADENS:
So, we took a 19th Century
pre-war building that was an old paper mill and we turned it into a beautiful,
state-of-the-art facility, invested about $12 million in this building and this
building, starting next week, will be one of the largest facilities in the
state of Massachusetts, growing marijuana. Very exciting!
Together,
Alex and Pete hope the weed factory will employ up to 100 locals. This morning,
they are holding a jobs forum to get the community on side.
ALEX MORSE:
GTI is the first company
that's beginning to invest millions of dollars here and so we're very excited
to have you and your team here Pete we're looking forward to moving forward on
the dispensary and other investments and kind of continue to support your
growth in the city of Holyoke.
But
selling this business in a small town hasn't been easy. While Alex gains
momentum, the City Council is pushing back.
PETE KADENS:
I never seen politics played anywhere else in the United States like
I've witnessed them being played here in Holyoke and they make the mayor's life
very very difficult.
Kevin
Jourdain retired at President of Holyoke City Council, after serving for 24
years. He's helped wage a tireless campaign to prevent the weed industry
setting up shop.
KEVIN JOURDAIN, FORMER HOLYOKE CITY COUNCIL
PRESIDENT: For Holyoke to be now known
as the exporter as our illustrious chief executive would have us believe to
become the mecca of marijuana, that only feeds into the sterotype
of this community. Maybe I will go down there to pick up a bag of weed! I sure
as hell ain’t going to live there.
Kevin is an active republican and Trump
supporter. But claims the issue isn’t partisan. He’d like to attract middle class
families to Holyoke and says the marijuana industry will put them off.
KEVIN JOURDAIN: We need to have a strong redevelopment that
says we're worth more than just McDonald's and gas stations and we need the
mayor to be advocating for that and not doing what he’s doing which is “I’m
going to bring in more vices to harm the reputation.” He needs to address that.
SPEAKER: Mayor Morse has studied economic development
in downtown Ohio like he was getting his doctorate... It's been the school of
hard knocks, too right?
ALEX MORSE: Exactly.
PETE KADENS: The mayor is young, he got elected when he
was 22 and people just had impressions of him because he was young and they
took those impressions and they moulded their prejudice towards Alex.
REPORTER:
Is this just where
somebody who's in their 40s disagrees with someone in their 20s?
KEVIN JOURDAIN: No, I
think what it is is more of experience. This isn't
about some old fuddy-duddy 46-year-old City Council President, I just happen to
listen to common-sense and he doesn't.
ALEX MORSE: I think there was this unspoken resentment
from some members in the community that I at 22 had decided to run for mayor
and won. As young people, it's mistaken for arrogance. In the accusation of
arrogance wouldn't be there if it was a 50 or 60-year-old man in this office.
Not
only is Alex young, he's also gay. Millennials are twice as likely as boomers
to identify as LGBTQ.
ALEX MORSE: I didn't know many people that were gay
growing up in Holyoke and I'm sure others could relate. You would go to bed at
night and you would hope and pray that you would wake up normal.
But
his family stood by him all the way.
DAD: Good to see you.
ALEX MORSE: You, too. Making a salad here?
TRACEY MORSE,
FATHER: Yes. Missing the meat!
The
youngest of three boys, Alex's mum was a childcare worker and his dad a factory
worker.
ALEX MORSE: I know you usually eat by 5:30, so we are
pushing that.
TRACEY MORSE: I know. I'm usually in bed by 5:45.
He
came out to them when he was 16.
ALEX MORSE: When I started talking to people about
running for mayor, a lot of people said don't run for mayor yet, you are not
ready, you are too young. You are gay. People aren't going to vote for a
22-year-old openly gay progressive person that hasn't held elected office
before.
REPORTER:
What did you think
when you found out that he was going to run for Mayor of Holyoke?
TRACEY MORSE: So just kind of prepared the family for trying
to stay calm when they hear, you know, people arguing with him or calling him
bad, you know, things that aren't popular.
REPORTER: Criticising?
TRACEY MORSE: Yes.
REPORTER:
Did that happen a bit?
TRACEY MORSE: Yes, it still does to this day.
His
biggest champion and supporter was his mum who passed away three weeks before
his third term re-election.
ALEX MORSE: Do you want to sit in your room on the bed
and chat? Eventually, I got the courage and said, "Mum, I'm gay." I
think she grabbed my hand and she told me that she loved me no matter what. She
couldn't imagine why anybody wouldn't love their son or daughter the way they
are and that was special to me and I carry that through today knowing that my
mum was that kind of person and instilled those values in me, so…
REPORTER:
You proud of this guy?
TRACEY MORSE: Absolutely. Every day.
MAN: Can I get some food? Thank you.
Not
all millennial mayors are as progressive as Alex Morse. There are young
Republican mayors, too. But it's the Democrats who need to attract the young
the most if they attract the young the most if they are to regain power in
Washington.
Back
in California, I'm meeting up again with 27-year-old Mayor Michael Tubbs.
MICHAEL
TUBBS: This is my office.
This is where we have...
Making
a name as an Instagram mayor, he's been endorsed by Barack Obama and supported
by Oprah. His wedding even made the New York Times.
REPORTER:
Did you have to do any
decorating?
MICHAEL TUBBS: Yes, we did a whole revamp.
The
big debate in the US is gun control and Stockton is no exception. When Mayor
Tubbs was elected Stockton was home to more murders per capita than Chicago and
Afghanistan. For Michael, it's a mix of poverty and easy access to guns that's
no longer someone else's problem to fix.
MICHAEL
TUBBS: Growing up you see
people working hard and fighting and struggling against something but no real
language as to what that something is. And up to the left, that's where...
Michael
moved around a lot as a kid and like many of his generation, watched on as
poverty rates and gun violence in Stockton got worse.
MICHAEL
TUBBS: It's personal for me
because I live there. I knew what it was like to go to sleep listening to
gunshots, not being allowed outside to play because it wasn't safe.
While
Michael was interning at the White House his cousin was shot and killed back in
Stockton. This made Michael want to come back and change his home town. A town
where his own dad still serves a life sentence in prison.
REPORTER:
How old were you when
your dad was incarcerated?
MICHAEL TUBBS: For my entire life, so from the time I was
born until now.
REPORTER:
So you have never known him outside of incarceration?
MICHAEL
TUBBS: He was out for a little
bit when I was younger, like a month or two, but for the most part he's been
incarcerated.
REPORTER:
What was that like?
MICHAEL
TUBBS: I think at first it
was a little bit of an embarrassment, I felt like – cause the way this country
has especially around folks who break the law, I felt like there was a stigma
attached to me or something wrong with me so I would make up all these crazy
lies why my dad wasn't in the picture. I think a lot of my passion especially
around criminal justice and things of that sort stems from that experience.
Michael
Tubbs wants to fix his city's gun problem with a controversial idea. He's
planning to pay criminals to turn their backs on crime.
MICHAEL
TUBBS: Hey, chief?
POLICE CHIEF ERIC
JONES: How you doing?
MICHAEL
TUBBS: I'm good. How are you?
Helping
him is this man, Police Chief Eric Jones.
POLICE CHIEF ERIC
JONES: Obviously wherever there's high crime there are a lot of other things
going on...
Called
Advanced Peace, the idea aims to link potential offenders with social services
to address the root causes of crime.
POLICE CHIEF ERIC
JONES: Long-term, we are not the solvers of the causes of crime.
If
they stay out of trouble for six months, they are paid a stipend of up to
$1,000 a month.
POLICE CHIEF ERIC
JONES: When I first heard about it, I was torn because there is something about
giving cash to guys active in gun violence that just rubs a lot of people wrong
and including me in the beginning. When I began to take a step back, and look
at…if this can actually reduce gun violence, it can stabilise some of these
guys and is a stipend tied to certain things over a certain period of time, if
they can help reduce shootings, then maybe it's a good thing.
Advanced
Peace will roll out in Stockton in the next few months. If it's to succeed, it
needs the community to work with police.
RAYMOND AGUILAR, YOUTH
MENTOR: This is a neighbourhood that's filled with drugs - a drug-infested
neighbourhood, drugs, gangs and like I said, a lot of poverty, a lot of homelessness.
Raymond
Aguilar, mentors at risk teens in some of Stockton's worst areas and I'm keen
to find out if he thinks Tubbs' ideas are realistic.
RAYMOND AGUILAR: If they seen you
guys walking around here, you guys would become victims of a robbery or
something.
Raymond
wants to show me how entrenched the cycle of poverty and crime is here. So we are heading to meet some of Stockton's infamous
long-term drug dealers, or as he calls them "grandma" and
"mum".
RAYMOND AGUILAR: Come on in. This is my mother right here. Don't worry
about it. And this is my grandmother, I said she's in bed, she has had two
strokes.
Raymond
himself was just 16 when he went to prison, spending the next 26 years behind
bars for shooting two men who were stealing from his grandmother.
RAYMOND AGUILAR: This is my sister who stays here.
SISTER: Nice to meet
you.
Recently
freed, he wants to stop others following in his path.
RAYMOND AGUILAR: You know, they make the best of it, of what
they can do.
Nine
people and four generations are in this two-bedroom house.
RAYMOND AGUILAR: What's up grandma, are you OK? Grandma is
feisty. She did some prison time, too. Grandma did about three or four prison
sentences. Big mama cool, she throws it up, yeah,yeah! At a very young age because of drugs, my
mother ended up shooting my father. My mother shot my dad with a 357 and almost
killed him. That was very traumatic growing up. Years later, my grandmother actually
shot my Grandpa, shot him in the head with a gun so these are all traumatic
experiences brought on by drug addiction and often times we, the children, are
left behind to see all the things that are going on, so I'm going to do
everything I can to stop that cycle so that this young man - come here - that
way this young man doesn't go through those type of things.
For
some, Mayor Tubbs' Advanced Peace solution is too radical, dubbed "cash
for criminals" by its critics. But Raymond questions whether it's radical
enough.
REPORTER:
Would that have helped
someone in your situation growing up?
RAYMOND AGUILAR: I think I needed a whole lot of other things
other than Advanced Peace. But Advanced Peace is the start. But there was so
much other trauma in my life that Advanced Peace would be an inkling of the
help that I needed.
Millennials
now outnumber baby-boomers in the United States but they are still
underrepresented in politics. They are going to have to fight hard to upset the
old guard. At their home, I meet Michael's wife Anna. She says millennials are
ready to step up into a political landscape that's been ignoring minorities.
ANNA NTI-ASARE-TUBBS,
WIFE: One of the primary challenges, is years
of leadership that did not represent the majority of
the city and, therefore, marginalised issues were not at the forefront of the
agenda. The fact that Michael is the first African-American Mayor of the city
is crazy. There's been African-Americans here for a very long time and I think
the fact that it happened in 2017 is really indicative
of an issue that we were facing here.
At
25 years old, Anna is now the First Lady of Stockton. Her and Michael's rise to
power reflects the attitude of a generation that isn't prepared to wait.
ANNA
NTI-ASARE-TUBBS: I told you he has a
problem, he always has an excuse! Michael, Michael is obsessed with his phone.
I'm often competing for love between Stockton and his phone.
Having
lived through the tough times in Stockton, Michael's mother and grandmother are
excited for change and are among his biggest supporters.
MICHAEL
TUBBS: I can't wait... How
about a toast to the most amazing woman in my life!
But
as Michael celebrates, there are moves being made to cut short his grand plans
for Stockton.
BRENDA VASQUEZ,
PETITIONER: The crime is the top issue. We don't see him out in top issue. We
don't see him out in the public addressing the crime.
NEWSREADER: A group of
people in Stockton are starting an effort to recall Mayor Michael Tubbs.
BRENDA VASQUEZ:
Neglects public safety resulting in an increase in violent crimes and homicides,
wants to pay suspected violent criminals not to shoot people.
In
Stockton, California, Brenda Vasquez is petitioning to get millennial Mayor
Michael Tubbs sacked.
REPORTER: Wow,
so how many names have you
got there?
BRENDA VASQUEZ: We got
about 3,000 at the meeting the other night.
REPORTER: How
many do you need?
BRENDA VASQUEZ: 15,918.
We are planning going above that number.
Brenda
leads a group of community activists on Facebook. She claims the mayor is
acting irresponsibly with city funds. She doesn't approve of his financial
incentives to curb crime or his love of the limelight.
BRENDA VASQUEZ: The
crime is the top issue. We don't see him out in the public addressing the
crime, or trying to put more police officers...
REPORTER: Mayor Tubbs says he has a very good
relationship with the police chief.
BRENDA VASQUEZ: Yeah,
he does. I believe, doesn't mean that the crime is being addressed.
When
we stop, Brenda shows me the city's annual crime statistics. It doesn't look
good for Tubbs.
BRENDA VASQUEZ: 49
homicides for the last three years, 2014, 15 and 16, 49 each year. This last
year in 2017, we had 55 homicides.
There's the
reasons for signing on the back... If he wasn't out doing publicity and working
more with the Police Department, if he would maybe be on TV and say, we need
more police in Stockton, your re-inventing Stockton but why are you not
reinventing to get more police officers?
REPORTER: Is it an age thing?
BRENDA VASQUEZ: No,
has nothing to do with age.
In
less than half an hour, Brenda has four more signatures.
BRENDA VASQUEZ: Sign. OK.
She
still has four more months to file the petition. With momentum like this,
Michael Tubbs doesn't have long to deliver results.
REPORTER: Should Mayor Tubbs be worried?
BRENDA VASQUEZ: I would say so. I would say, yes. You guys
think Mayor Tubbs should be worried?
WOMAN: Yes. He is worried.
Back
at the Democratic Convention in San Diego, any concern about this petition is a
distant thought as the party looks to the future.
MICHAEL
TUBBS: My grandmother would
tell me that thousands of years ago there's a nation in crisis. I do think of
the need to not prove, but just to be excellent to govern well and to do well
because my performance will dictate the opportunities for people after me,
that’s a big responsibility. These young people you see on this stage are going
to lead the way for us to face the Giants we are facing today.
REPORTER: Millennials are the sleeping giant of US politics.
ALEX MORSE: Absolutely. Millennials are the largest
voting bloc in the United States. If young people turn out and vote at every
election and at every level, from school all the way up to the president of the
United States... The difference we can make is bigger than we can ever imagine.
These
young mayors and their controversial ideas are a long way from proving success,
but one thing's for sure, they are debunking myths about millennials being
politically unengaged and self-centred and they could affect real change.
MICHAEL
TUBBS: When I think of any major social
movement in American history youth and younger people would be at the
forefront, so for example Dr King was 26 when he led the Montgomery bus
boycotts. The whole occupy movement and the Black Lives Matter movements and
now the Parkland shooting movement the #MeToo Movement all these movements have
been brought to the forefront by younger people, so I think we will see
more of the same.
reporter + camera
dean cornish
producers
calliste
weitenberg
naima brown
associate
producer
ana maria quinn
story
editors
micah
mcgown
david potts
editors
micah
mcgown
simon phegan
david potts
27th
March 2018