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The 29% Problem: Steve Phillips on Race and Power

Release Date: 06/23/2026

Everyday Conversations on Race

Episode Summary , sociologist, conflict mediator, restorative justice practitioner, and author, joins Simma for a thoughtful conversation about identity, belonging, and communicating across differences. Growing up biracial (half Black, half white) as the youngest of 13 siblings, Angela learned firsthand what it means to feel like an outsider. Those experiences shaped her work in diversity, equity, inclusion, restorative justice, and creating genuine belonging. Together they discuss why belonging is the missing piece in DEI, how microaggressions can become harassment, why calling people in is...

The 29% Problem: Steve Phillips on Race and Power

Everyday Conversations on Race

In this episode of Everyday Conversations on Race, Simma Lieberman sits down with Steve Phillips — national political leader, three-time author, Guardian and New York Times contributor, and founder of Democracy in Color. His latest book is Are White Men Smarter Than Everybody Else? Playing Offense in the Fight for Racial Justice in America (his latest) Key concepts discussed: SWAMP — Straight White American Male Preference: a framework to reframe the equality debate and expose overrepresentation of white men (29% of the population, yet dominant in every power structure) SWAMP...

Dion Lim: The Anti-Asian Hate Story America Forgot

Everyday Conversations on Race

In this powerful episode of Everyday Conversations on Race, host Simma the Inclusionist sits down with Emmy award-winning journalist and author Dion Lim to confront a question too many are avoiding: "Why has the conversation about anti-Asian hate gone silent"? Dion takes us behind the headline-making DM that changed her career — an anonymous video of an elderly Asian man being brutally beaten in San Francisco — and reveals what it took to bring stories like his to light when her own newsroom resisted. From the murder of Vincent Chin to COVID-era scapegoating, she traces the deep...

Frank Carbajal on Latino Leadership: From Migrant Farmworker Son to Silicon Valley Voice

Everyday Conversations on Race

Frank Carbajal grew up the son of Mexican migrant farmworkers in California's Imperial Valley, where summer temperatures hit 115 degrees and his mother worked the fields through her third trimester. Today he's the founder and president of Es Tiempo LLC, a co-author of three books on Latino leadership, founder of the Silicon Valley Latino Leadership Summit at Stanford University, and a former keynote speaker in Ken Blanchard's network. In this conversation with Simma, Frank talks about what it actually means to be Latino in America today — and why that word doesn't fit everyone who could...

Dr. Gina Paige on African Ancestry: How DNA Reconnects Black Americans to Their African Roots

Everyday Conversations on Race

For most Black Americans, the family tree stops at a wall built by slavery. Dr. Gina Paige co-founded African Ancestry to tear down that wall. In this episode, she explains how her company uses DNA to trace Black people back to specific African countries and ethnic groups — not vague regions, not percentages, but actual present-day nations and peoples. Gina walks Simma through the science in plain language, explains why African Ancestry gets results other DNA companies can't, and talks about what happens inside people when they finally know where they come from. She also addresses the...

From Black Panther to Corporate America: Elmer Dixon on Race, Revolution, and Why DEI Is Not Dead

Everyday Conversations on Race

Simma Lieberman and Elmer Dixon go back over 50 years — she was in the Young Patriots, he was co-founding the first Black Panther Party chapter outside California. In this conversation, they cut through the lies, revisionist history, and current attacks on DEI to talk about what the Black Panther Party actually stood for, why erasing Black history will never work, and what it takes to stay courageous when the political winds turn ugly. Elmer shares what it was like to transition from revolutionary to corporate diversity consultant, corrects the record on the myths about the Panthers, and...

Why We Can't Stop Talking About Race: A Conversation with Carole Copeland Thomas

Everyday Conversations on Race

Carole Copeland Thomas has been black all her life — and she's spent decades making sure that means something in every room she walks into. Born in a Black hospital in Detroit during segregation, raised in a middle-class family where college was expected and Black excellence was the air she breathed. Carole became a Certified Speaking Professional (CSP) who helps organizations turn complex challenges into real action. In this conversation, Carole and Simma go deep — on race, history, identity, the current political moment, and what all of us need to do right now. They talk about why...

What Happens When a White Neighbor Writes a Black Woman’s Story?

Everyday Conversations on Race

What happens when two neighbors—one Black, one white—move beyond small talk and start sharing their real stories? In this episode, Simma talks with Sandra Eggleston and Bill Byrne, whose unlikely friendship led to the book MLK to Brother Ray: A Woman’s Adventure of Social Transformation, Political Revolution, and Personal Affirmation. Sandra spent four decades as a United Airlines flight attendant during a time when the U.S. was being reshaped by the Civil Rights Movement and the Women’s Movement. Along the way she met cultural icons, witnessed historic events, and navigated racism...

Do We Still Need to Talk About Race?

Everyday Conversations on Race

In this episode of , host Simma Lieberman welcomes Verna Williams, CEO of , former law professor, and former dean, for a powerful conversation about race, justice, and access to legal representation in America. Verna explains why race remains a necessary topic—not to assign personal blame, but to understand how systems shaped by slavery and segregation continue to influence opportunity and social hierarchy today. She reflects on growing up in the Washington, DC and Maryland area, attending both predominantly white and predominantly Black schools. Those experiences sharpened her awareness of...

Can Women of Color and White Women Be Friends?

Everyday Conversations on Race

From Fear to Friendship: The 30-Year Journey of an Interracial Women's Circle What does it really take for women across race, identity, and experience to move from awkward conversations to real friendship? In this episode, I talk with two people I deeply respect—Julie O’Mara and Dr. Sid Reel—about a women’s circle I’m part of that’s been meeting for nearly 30 years. What started as a conference breakout session turned into something far more rare: a space where white women and women of color stayed in relationship through grief, anger, mistakes, growth, and joy. We talk...

More Episodes

Are White Men Smarter Than Everybody Else? Playing Offense in the Fight for Racial Justice in America (his latest)

Key concepts discussed:

SWAMP — Straight White American Male Preference: a framework to reframe the equality debate and expose overrepresentation of white men (29% of the population, yet dominant in every power structure)
SWAMP Audits — a practical tool anyone can use to assess their organization, city, or institution
Virtual Precinct Captains — building a personal list of 20 people, keeping them informed, and making sure they vote
The demographic transformation of America: from 88% white in the 1960s to 41% people of color today
Why mobilizing the existing diverse majority is more effective than chasing white swing voters

TIMESTAMPS

Time	Topic
0:00	Introduction & show overview
1:08	Guest intro: Steve Phillips — author, political leader, founder of Democracy in Color
2:43	Do we still need to talk about race? Steve says: now more than ever
3:41	The 2015 escalator speech and the politics of White racial anxiety
5:00	Post-George Floyd commitments abandoned — where we are now
6:10	Steve's background: growing up as a child of the civil rights movement in Cleveland
7:10	First Black family on Dartmoor Road; seeing MLK as a toddler
8:35	Simma's personal story: the March on Washington and her junior high school protest
9:08	What's happening with young people today — reasons for hope
10:07	Zohran Mamdani's NYC mayoral campaign as a generational movement
12:03	Young conservatives and Charlie Kirk: the danger of silence on the left
13:00	MLK's quote on the silence of good people
15:13	Simma's personal connection to Steve's books and finding hope
16:36	Brown Is the New White — Obama's election and demographic transformation
19:33	How We Win the Civil War — the Confederates never stopped fighting
21:38	Are White Men Smarter Than Everybody Else? — the book's origin and SWAMP framework
22:20	White men are only 29% of the population — yet dominate every power structure
25:15	The "meritocracy" myth exposed — preferences have always existed for white men
26:35	The Emily & Greg / Lakeisha & Jamal resume study (University of Chicago)
27:58	The Chosen — how elite college admissions were rigged for preferred whites in the 1920s
29:40	Hope and strategy: the majority already exists — why Democrats keep losing anyway
33:11	If all Texans had voted in 2020, Biden would have won Texas
34:42	2024: Democrats spent $1B on TV ads instead of community organizing
37:00	Voter apathy, Nick Cannon, and why people say "there's no point voting"
40:40	Zohran Mamdani's free childcare platform and delivering for voters
42:00	Local organizing wins: Kansas City Tenants Union gets 6,000 votes and passes a bill of rights
43:13	A crusade for democracy: the call for a million precinct captains
46:25	The demographic revolution: U.S. is now 41% people of color (was 12% in the mid-'60s)
48:16	Progressive white allies — a historic tradition and a crucial part of the coalition
50:37	"Fear of a Black Planet Syndrome" and what individuals can do right now
51:57	SWAMP audits — a tool anyone can use to go on offense
54:16	DEI vs. racial justice: Simma clarifies the distinction
55:07	Practical steps: virtual precinct captains and SWAMP audits
56:16	Book recommendation: Practical Radicals by Deepak Bhargava & Stephanie Luce
57:23	Show recommendation: Andor (Disney+) — fighting back against authoritarianism
58:31	Where to find Steve: democracyincolor.com
58:57	Closing thoughts: keep talking about race, build the multiracial democracy

TOPICS