INTERVIEW: Byron Donalds Talks Black Voters, HBCUs & FAMU, 2026 Midterms + More

Charlamagne Tha God (0:05)

We gon finish or y'all done?

DJ Envy (0:06)

Morning, everybody. It's DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, Charlamagne Tha God. We are The Breakfast Club. Longin Rose is here as well. So is our sister, Angela Rye. We got a special guest in the building. He's running for governor of Florida, ladies and gentlemen. We have Byron Donalds. Welcome, brother.

Byron Donalds (0:22)

It's good to be back. It's, you know, it's good to be with y'all.

DJ Envy (0:25)

How you feeling?

Byron Donalds (0:25)

I'm feeling good. I'm feeling good to be in studio.

DJ Envy (0:27)

You know, it's funny because last time you was in studio, Angela Rye was on Zoom. Now you on Zoom and Angela Rye is in studio.

Byron Donalds (0:34)

Oh, I mean, look, if I had known how to make a special trip to NYC just for that, Angela is good to be back with you. It's been a long time. Indeed.

DJ Envy (0:43)

You know, Byron, you're running for governor. I saw recently David Jolly, he described your policies as anti-black. Now, you are a black man, running to become the first black governor of Florida. So when you heard a white political opponent make that accusation, what's your immediate reaction?

Byron Donalds (1:00)

Gaslighting. The same craziness that happens in every election cycle. When you're a Republican and you have, you know, conservative principles, I think, you know, David Jolly is somebody who, you know, has switched parties, he's done everything. He's been trying to find a political home for 10 years. But what he knows in Florida is that he's been losing black voters to me. So, you know, his only response was to try to use race and the issues around race and politics for voters to have a second guess about being able to support me, specifically black voters in the state of Florida.

But I just think it's the same type of gaslighting that happens every single election cycle.

If you look at what I'm talking about in the state of Florida, it's lowering insurance costs, lowering housing costs. When it comes to our kids, we want them to master math, reading and writing. For the children in our state who aren't going to the universities in our state, which by the way are the best universities in the country. We want them to be able to get apprenticeships and internships so they can have the on the job training skills they need to be able to get a high paying job coming out of high school with no student debt. Those are the things that I talk about in this campaign every single day. If that's anti-black, then I don't know what to tell you. But the truth of the matter is he's gaslighting cause he knows he's losing a lot of black voters to me in Florida.

DJ Envy (2:12)

Well, he says his criticism wasn't about your race, but more so about your positions on voting rights and DEI, minority business funding, HBCUs. Which of those criticisms do you believe he has wrong? What's the evidence?

Byron Donalds (2:25)

Well, to be blunt, he's got them all wrong. When I was on your show, we talked about the Voting Rights Act before. I know Angela and I went back and forth on that. What I'll quickly tell you is if you look at Georgia's voting law and I remember a couple of years ago, you had every Democrat in the country saying that Georgia's voting law was Jim Crow 2.0. But if you look at the outcome of that, Georgia has more black people voting in their elections today than they've ever had in the history of that state. And you think that's because of the state of Florida. Angela, come on. I'm not going to go back and forth with you today. If you talk about what's happening in Florida right now, in Florida, we have the same election laws that they have in the state of Georgia. Black people in the state of Florida have no issues voting.

If you want to talk about minority business, we want to make sure that there's capital formation today in our country. I'm making my final point, Angela. If you want to talk about HBCUs and FAMU, then at FAMU, when I was in the state house, I actually helped them receive $25 million to build their student access building. I want FAMU to be an R1 institution.

Angela Rye (3:24)

However, FAMU has been underfunded to the tune of $2 billion.

However, Georgia has a voting law that is in the center of controversy. And you're talking about more voters turned out, they're turning out because they're frustrated. They're turning out because their voting rights have been challenged. They're turning out because in the Calais decision, before the Supreme Court this year, the Voting Rights Act was fully gutted. And you haven't said anything to stand in the gap for the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the very reason why you can be sitting there right now in that blue suit with that Florida pen. So I'm not going back and forth with you either, but don't just use words without facts, Byron. So let's be very clear about what's actually happening with Georgia. Let us get into it, but let us get into it with facts. So when we talk about reparations, Byron, you don't support that. When we talk about affirmative action, Byron, you don't support that. When we talk about access to education, health care, all of these other things, diversity, equity, and inclusion, you don't support that. You went to FAMU to make a social media post, but you have never fully supported the funding of Florida A&M University.