welcome to our daily program called "getting answers." we get you answers in real time. today, we will break down president biden's joint presidential press. also, we will talk to a local restaurant owner who was called a and is now going to put it the name of his new bagel shop.

but first, what you are saying onouscre inveigattothe atof rio gonzalez. that is underway. many of he died in alameda police custody after being restrained on his stomach as he struggled to breathe for more than six minutes. he was unarmed. this incident, as you can imagine, is making national headlines. three officers are now on paid administrative leave. joining us now to talk about this really hot button subject is alameda city council member john knox white. thank you for being here. >> thank you. sorry we are here. >> unfortunately. i am glad we are having the conversation. that is the first step in understanding what is at hand and maybe ultimately when they preventing this from happening again. right away, let's get into the police report itself. i remember, it stated very clearly that there was a physical altercation as officers tried to detain gonzalez. he had a medical emergency.

what did you see? what was your interpretation of this video? >> sure. first, i appreciate that our city staff who issued the press release and whatnot, i think they had a difficult job to try and respond quickly and transparently while at the same time still gathering a lot of information. i think probably most of us can agree that the initial press release that went out was probably not exactly what we would like to have seen. what did i see? i saw the police responding to calls for somebody who was unwell that may or may not have had some potential stolen items in your possession, that when the officers arrived, the person was, and disoriented. you know, things -- as we watch from there.

>> so often times with videos such as these, it's really hard to watch. there is a visceral response, a lot of heartache and confusion of what, for you, was personal? what was your visceral response? >> o. watching the video and knowing where it ends. i think you sit there and wonder, how can it get there? how can it get there? how is it going to end the way we know it is going to end. i, as a father, i really spent a lot of time wishing that the gonzalez family was not going to have to go through watching this video. if there was some way to help them not to do that, that just crushed me absolutely. and then i also definitely, i will say, watching the officers trying to revive him as well brought back some memories of some family stories related to

my godfather's death, which had nothing to do with the police. my father talking about having to resuscitate his own father was heartbreaking to watch everything fall apart as it happened. >> even though the situations are so different with what your own family went through, in a way, these videos are triggering. that is the word i think so often times comes up. it unearths these feelings of these emotions. and in response, what you see on your screen, community coming together and trying to answer questions of what went wrong, , have been prevented. which brings me to the next question. the city council recently voted to pursue a new model where mental health professionals handle calls like this. where is the city with that plan? and what was the inspiration behind some of that. >> the inspiration behind it was an incident that happened in alameda almost a year ago, last labor day. sorry, memorial day. which started off very similarly

. a call went in to the police thing that somebody was having some mental health issues or health issues, and the police were dispatched, and the dancing in the street is unfortunately how everybody in the bay area knows it. at that point in time, we started a situation quickly about how we needed to change the way in which our systemic response to issues in alameda didn't just involve sending police to every issue that went on. we engaged 55 community members in a nine-month committee process to look at what we could do. and as you know, brought the recommendations to us in march. the council unanimously approved moving forward, starting to create a mental health unit that could respond. may 8, we are having -- our counsel is having a special meeting. i expect we will be hearing

more about where we are with that and how we can move that forward even faster. >> somewhat reassuring knowing this has been in the works for quite some time, which is why when incidents such as this most recent one happen, you are able to present a little bit more about it and bring it to the forefront, which i think is, again, reassuring for the public. something else that have come up so often times in these cases is the fact that there is cell phone video, surveillance. all that is so prevalent these days. the saying goes that anything can be captured on camera. if it were not for this body cam video, we may not be talking about the issue as we speak. maybe elaborate a little bit more on how video has changed the discussions surrounding these incidents. in my opinion, it seems like there are many more that need to be unearthed, but there happens not to be video, maybe not involving police, but in other situations of racial social justice.

>> speaking as a member of a wake community, many of us have been aware over the years, the decades that there are issues. but i think that, to your point, video, whether it is cell phone or body cam video, has really brought forth just that visceral mess of what is happening to communities of color in the bay area and across the country. you asked what the impact is. it should not have taken video access for our community, our broader community to really see that there are issues that we need to be talking about. but in terms of access, it has brought forth a greater understanding on an emotional and personal level that i think was missing for a lot of people. >> we see on television sometimes how unfortunate it is that the stories tends to get

attention. they are attention grabbing because of video. i can understand where you're coming from. real quickly, we only have about a minute left. alameda's interim police chief says watching a man lose his life is troubling. the video gives us a lot of information but is, quite, not not the yo sp toat? investigations. . avree the district attorney, the county sheriff, and an independent investigation that has been set forth by the city. to make sure we are putting together a report that reports out to the community what happened. hopefully, from that, we can identify steps we may not be thinking of right now they can be taken to avoid these tragic outcomes in the future. 's mcnutt john knox white, member of alameda city council. thank you for taking the time. pivoting now, up next, we

will talk about the big takeaways from president biden's joint congressional address. where we go

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♪ call one eight hundred, eight million ♪ president joe biden marked his first 100 days by addressing congress. where we go from here? joining us now, lanhee chen, a fellow at the hoover institution . he directs domestic policy studies at stanford university, and he was also policy director for mitt romney's presidential campaign back in 2012. as always, thanks for joining us. >> hi, dion. >> i guess we should start off by asking your first impressions. how did biden do last night? >> look, i thought it was an

opportunity for him to speak to the american people about his priorities. in that sense, i think you capture the moment well. how he did in terms of substance depends on what you think of what he has propose. obviously, progressives have been very pleased with the different proposals they have heard out of president biden, whether it's the initial covid release package or the subsequent infrastructure package, or now a package that really deals with a number of different social issues. i think there are others who are concerned about the spending. they are concerned about how much government expansion we are going to see over the next couple of years. as everything else, in our politics, it is very polarized. the reaction to his speeches follow the general trend. >> one of the reactions on facebook came in from randy who said he watched most of it. he thought he straight from the prepared speech and the points he wanted it should have made. what did he want to hammer home last night? and where did he fall short? >> i think he wanted to convey

a sense that we are coming out of the worst of the covid crisis, which obviously has been a way of life since last march. he wanted to convey that there are plans that he has, that he would very much like the other side, as well as all americans to embrace. at the end of the day, though, joe biden the same joe biden we have seen for a very long time. stylistically, those who take issues with him will take issue with his speech last night. it was a very classic biden speech, complete with his own mannerisms that he throws in here or there. i think all of this is being seen through the lens of our politics. i think people's reactions to it, the way people evaluate that speech, are largely going to be honest on whether they support the president or not politically. >> speaking of the polarization you had mentioned earlier, how has he been successful in bringing opposing parties

together. i know that unity and healing for what he had ran his campaign on. >> i think there, he has been a disappointment. the reality is he did campaign on a platform of bipartisanship. my view is that there have been several opportunities, whether on the initial release package on infrastructure, and now on some of these issues like improving education or childcare , where there is opportunity for bipartisan consensus. granted, it's going to be on a much smaller scale than he wants and what a lot of democrats want. but if his goal was to unify the republicans and democrats and try to move ahead with policy reforms that would be acceptable to both sides, that really hasn't been how he has pursued this. he basically has said on one hand he wants to work bipartisan fashion, and on the other, he has gone along and dumping some partyline votes. there's a little bit of dissonance between what i think

a lot of voters were promised and the reality of what we are seeing with respect to his working with republicans. >> that was something that was echoed by a couple of our viewers on facebook. another viewer named brenda said she was disappointed that there was not will talk of student loans and what is in the pipeline. what do you know on that front coming from the biden administration? >> it's a very big issue. student loan debt is something that many california many americans continue to struggle with. during the campaign, president biden had talked about plans to deal with loan debt, to help people pay that down. his plans were not as extreme as those we heard from, for example, bernie sanders, and even kamala harris to a certain degree when she was running for president, who are looking at large swaths of student loan forgiveness. i imagine it's one of those things that is on the president's agenda. he probably will try to get to it later this year.

what you see in the package of reforms he introduced yesterday are some ways that he believes will make higher education more accessible for more people. obviously, the challenge there is, is he doing it in a way that is fiscally sustainable? is it the right answer? certainly, student loan debt is one issue he's going to have to get to at some point. >> other issues as well. you think you will be successful in actually getting his agenda passed through congress based office the tone and what he was able to achieve last night? >> he does have a couple more opportunities to just use democratic votes to get stuff past. the process called reconciliation, but that is a fancy way of saying that the congress can engage in certain procedures when they are dealing with legislation that has a strict relationship to the federal budget. some of what biden will try to do, he will undoubtedly do on a partyline vote. my hope would be that, again, there are things he can take out of these packages that will get 95, 100 votes in the

senate. things like transportation infrastructure. like trying to improve the situation on paid leave. there are clearly bipartisan consent, many multiples ways of getting to consensus that if the president would lie, he can pursue. more limited than what his packages have laid out, but there is a pathway, nonetheless. >> as we had to break on one last question. if you were to give a grade for his first 100 days in office, do you think he has succeeded in getting what he needs to across? have been going forward into the next 100 days? >> generally i would say it's going to be through a partisan lens. if one is a progressive, they will give him a strong grade. if one is a conservative, they will look and say he didn't work together with anybody, so their grade will be a lot lower. i would like to have seen him work together anymore bipartisan fashion and some of the issues where there is agreement. that has been disappointed.

>> that is diplomatic. what is the grade would give him.'s make a solid b-. there is no curve on my grade. >> fair enough. lanhee chen, always a pleasure having you on the show. moving along , turning an ethnic slur into a bagel shop name. we will meet a local pizza parlor who is using time when he was harassed and turning it into a business. much more on that when we

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thanks for staying with us, everybody. as you know, many of us here at abc7, including myself, have covered a disturbing amount of hate crimes recently , one set of racially motivated. but a local italian pizza maker shop after it. ng a slur he wase joining us now is the owner of tony's pizza, tony

thank you for being with us. >> thanks for having us. >> right away, your new shirt says it all. the name of your new bagel shop. tell me what it is in the meaning of this word before we get started. >> so dago is an ethnic slur they you don't want to hear if you are italian, spanish, or porch agrees, which i am all three. this kind of goes back to covid. there was a gentleman that wanted to shut my restaurants down, who was upset that i was busy during covid, and there were a lot of restaurants that were closed. so there was a lot of conversations, a kind of semi- arguments. one day he got a little crazy and said, you are nothing but a good for nothing dago. let's go around this building. it got pretty emotional. he pointed at my chest, wants to fight me. didn't like that i was italian.

hated me for that. i realized this guy didn't want to shut me down because i was just business trying to make it through covid. i was just trying to get through it like everyone else. this guy really hated italians, portuguese, spanish. it was pretty crazy. i took a step back. >> you did the right thing. so oftentimes i capture people on camera throwing punches and saying equal horrific things back to the person who is using the slur. so you, in turn, decided to name a bakery after this. we are showing a picture i actually took earlier today, you holding up your sign with your car to himself. what prompted you to respond this way versus with lashing out or a physical act of violence? >> yeah, you know, trust me. i wanted to punch the guy. i didn't. i held back. i said move along, man. we have had worse in the past. i went back into my kitchen that day.

i was in front of tony's in little italy. i went back working on this bagel concept, a bread concept. everything slowed down. all the sudden, you know, i'm going to name it dago bagel. i'll show you. every bagel sold, money, proceeds will go to the italian- american cultural society that we are building, the italian athletic club. i am on the board that we're trying to ways awareness, education. not just pizzerias in the northeast. where trying to work on bringing the community back. what's better to get money toward that? i am on the board for it. they are behind me. most of the italians i know are behind me in this neighborhood. come have a bagel. it's pretty amazing. the bread at the bakery in the same building we are opening up on saturday is pretty amazing sourdough bread.

>> it's interesting. you and i had this conversation when i stopped by the shop earlier today about how racism pops up and rears its ugly head in sometimes the most unexpected places, even here in the bay area. for you, were you surprised to hear this? for me, i was surprised coming to this very vibrant, diverse community from a place like florida and north carolina where i used to live, and being called in the middle of day in the middle of the street. >> my last name growing up, nobody could pronounce it. you heard little things about people or critics that might not like you because of who you are or if you are italian. somebody to get in your face, this generally, he was probably in his late 60s or 70s who had this hatred. it was kind of one of those, is

this guy really really i didn't think anything of it. it took me back. i didn't throw it on facebook will promote it at the time. i just said i'm going toi'm goi a business. i'm going to do this. i am going to call it that. i will show you. that is what i did. controversy creates awareness. people need to know. i think it's important to everybody, for every one. the work, too. a lot of people don't know what that word means. when you speak to a younger generation they are light, i don't know what it is. if i tell you, i am meeting with my italian friends, and i am eating like a dago. that's a little different. a lot of cultures and ethnicities, it's a word that you just don't throw around. you have to using the correct way or politically correct way. he said it in a very hateful

way. >> context, right? that makes all of the difference . the education component is something i am a proponent of when i am speaking to victim some asian attacks because they are so scared to talk about it. if you talk about it, that's the first step to educating and having more tolerance. quickly, i do want to ask you this because playing devils advocate, i can see some people may be having the criticism of, how is this different than the eskimo pie folks are the company that had the aunt jemima as the figure in the logo for a company? this, you say, is a totally different issue. >> you know, i own the place. it is italian owned and run and operated. is not a giant corporation that owns this brand. we are a little place in northeast. small-batch production. everything is made by hand. all the bagels we make are formed by hand. is me that started it, and

nobody can say i am not. i am taking the word and using it in a positive way. as long as you understand the back story to understand why i am using that name. it's important to do your research about the business before you start saying, oh, what is this guy doing. once they get it, i think they will say, okay. that's a good one. >> you are getting a lot of love online, by the way, for my facebook friends. and rico saying it is a cool response. kirk saying we love tony. thank you for taking the time to chat with us. >> thank you for having me. i hope you grab a slice of bread a bagel when you come by. good seeing you this morning. >> sounds like

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struck thanks for joining us. today, we talked a councilmember about the in heaven custody death of mario gonzalez. we look to president biden's address and we were tonight, america showing new signs of turning the corner in the pandemic. covid deaths and cas falling across much of the country. the u.s. now averaging more than 52,000 new cases a day and nearly 20% drop in the last week. new york city, once the epicenter ofpandemic, now planning to fully reopen july 1st. america's plunging vaccination - rate. down from its all-time high just one month ago. president biden marking his heels of hisirst address to a e praling t n

president jimmy carter and his wife rosalynn. president biden selling his massive agenda to the american people. more than $4 trillion in spending for infrastructure, uc