Joy Reid

Absolutely.

Well, I first want to thank the panel for having me.

It's great to be with this panel.

And thank you, my friend, Don Lemon, who I've been texting.

I am not Don Lemon's mom or auntie, but I've been texting him like, Don, are you OK?

Like, I probably feel like I text him once an hour just to make sure no one is coming at him.

So I appreciate everything you did.

I want to echo every word that Colby said, because had you and I still been working at our corporate media jobs, and I recall being sent

to South Carolina to cover the agonistes over bringing down the Confederate flag.

And it was a huge fight over that.

There were people who literally were all but chaining themselves to the Confederate flag monument and refusing to get away from it because they didn't want that flag brought down.

Can you imagine if the protesters on both sides of that issue, if Governor Nikki Haley had said, go and arrest the journalists, who I was interviewing people who were in full regalia of the Confederacy.

They were wearing their Confederate uniforms, their throwback uniforms.

And we walked up to them and interviewed them because that is our job.

When I was there, because I was in the midst of these protests on either side of that issue,

That is not a crime.

It is literally the job of journalism.

And what you've been doing in going to these sites of protest and interviewing people, as Colby said, including the pastor, including the people who were on the other side of that issue, and including some of the people who organized that protest.

I'm not sure what Pamela, Pam Bondi thinks journalism is, but that's what it is.

And I really just want to quickly, and everyone knows this, but I just want to read the First Amendment.