Welcome to Assembly Required with Stacey Abrams from Crooked Media.

I'm your host, Stacey Abrams.

That's fine, dude.

I'm not mad.

Those were the words Renee Nicole Mackling Good offered in conciliation to the government agent

who would shoot her dead moments later in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Ice agent Jonathan Ross shot her in the face in an act of extraordinary cowardice that was documented on the scene and has been

replayed millions of times since the murder.

This was a graphic, grotesque example of state violence, step seven in the ten steps

to autocracy and authoritarianism, which I've laid out in the Ten Steps campaign.

You see, state violence is a key tool for authoritarian's.

Its purpose is clear.

It's a stark, deadly reminder to not resist, not protest.

Simply accept their demands or face the consequences.

And at this stage of democracy's collapse,

state violence becomes a regular feature of government. And so to normalize this horrific example

of state violence, the Republican regime at various levels of government, not just the federal

government, has quickly activated its preferred

method of containment. One, mislabel, two, mislead, and three, misdirect. They begin by mislabeling,

starting with who Renee Good actually is in order to strip her of her humanity. We're told to ignore her identities, that she's a mother, a wife, a poet, an activist, a U.S. citizen.

Instead, we're told to recast her as a danger to America, a troublemaker, a domestic terrorist, a criminal.

They do that because they want to cloak it in

...