What makes city politics in Baltimore so compelling?

Are we doing the interview now?

Yeah.

Okay.

Always be recording.

Luke Broadwater is a reporter for the Baltimore son.

He grew up in Baltimore. He's the kind of guy with a lot of sources.

And I don't want to trash Baltimore because I love Baltimore. It's my favorite city in the entire world.

But I mean, you look at every single problem in American history, from like redlining to forced segregation, to the laissez-faire economic policy that caused all the industrial jobs to leave, which was replaced by the violent drug trade, failed war on drugs.

I mean, it's like, it's all, it's all, that's the story of Baltimore.

So if you're looking for like a microcosm of how American policy has failed in just about

every part of the gamut, that's Baltimore.

Luke says the people who run this town, they're pretty compelling, too.

Can you tell me about this press conference last week? I think you counted the seconds. You said it was 96 seconds long?

Yeah, that's right. This press conference, it was for the mayor, Catherine Pugh. Luke waited

all day long to hear her speak. But the mayor, she never showed up.

Instead, her attorney Steve Silverman walked out very briskly,

like he was in a great hurry.

He was carrying a manila envelope in his hand.

He announced to all of us he would take no questions.

He called it a sad day for the city of

Baltimore and he read a very brief prepared statement from the mayor. We counted it up. It was

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