Afroman on Becoming the 2028 Libertarian Presidential Nominee
Afroman discusses his free speech court victory, why he thinks he could unite America, and whether he feels pressure to always be high.
This week, Andrew Heaton is joined by Grammy-nominated rapper Afroman, who recently turned a police raid on his home and the lawsuit that followed into an unlikely free speech victory and a new chapter in his career.
Afroman explains how officers raided his house, damaged his property, seized cash, and then sued him after he used the security footage in his music videos to mock them. He argues that the real issue was not just the raid itself, but the lack of accountability that followed, and says the verdict was a win for ordinary Americans who want the right to criticize public officials without getting dragged into court.
Heaton and Afroman also discuss a possible presidential run, smaller government, patriotism, and why his unifying message could break through in a divided country. Along the way, they talk about Flavor Flav as a possible running mate, Lemon Pound Cake, and how this viral comeback can become something even bigger than his music. Plus, Heaton asks what fans have wondered for years: Does Afroman feel pressure to always be high?
0:00—Teaser
0:39—Introduction
1:42—What should the police have done following the raid?
3:20—The inspiration for Lemon Pound Cake
5:20—The defamation suit against Afroman
11:15—Afroman's stolen money and "crooked cops"
14:46—Afroman's court win as a victory for free speech
17:15—Presidential aspirations
21:37—Patriotism and the American identity
24:23—Does Afroman feel pressured to be high?
25:02—Who would be Afroman's running mate?
27:11—The effects of the trial on Afroman's music career
Transcript
This is an AI-generated, AI-edited transcript. Check all quotes against the audio for accuracy.
Andrew Heaton: Hey, Afroman, good to have you on.
Afroman: Yes, sir. Good to be on, good to be on.
Ok, so I've been watching bits of the trial. Congratulations, by the way.
Thank you.
I've been watching bits of the trial, and it seems like the whole thing got out of hand multiple times. So I'm curious: If I think you've kidnapped somebody and I break into your house, but I apologize and I fix the door, would we be ok? Where is the bright line with the cop? What could they have done to make the situation ok?
Treated me like an American citizen. I'm a black man in America, and a lot of times another black man is doing something wrong, possibly, and a cop may get me and him confused. So he may put me through some unfair treatment, let's say. But once they find the other guy or realize I'm not that guy, an apology is the first humane step. It's ok to make mistakes in this lifetime. It's not ok to not apologize for making those mistakes. They put erasers on the end of pencils because they expect you to make mistakes. I expect a human being to make a mistake, but when a human being knows they made a mistake and they're unapologetic and they're arrogant about it, then that takes you down a whole nother road. It's a whole different feeling toward a person that's not apologetic about the wrong they have done.
So how much of the album that you made was to try to recoup monetary damages for the gate and for having cash seized versus just being angry at how you were treated and the attitude they had when they did it?
Well, it was all for the same purpose, you know. It was all, for one. I got freedom of speech, so I had to say whatever I wanted to say about the cop and make it funny and entertaining. At the same time, I was selling this, and it was about them. It was inspired by them, and it was a way that I could monitor the financial progress I was making off of their inspiration.
So they break down your door, they seize some of your assets, it causes like $20,000 worth of damages, that's what I've heard. You do your album, but they end up suing you. What were they suing for? What was their claim?
Several things I may or may not remember. I'll name as many as I can: humiliation, emotional distress, loss of reputation. And there were like, like seven or eight more titles like that.
Like, because I'm not an attorney, even though I sometimes dress like one. So it wasn't just straight-up defamation and libel? It was like emotional damages and, "I feel bad, I'm embarrassed," like that was the bulk of it?
Yeah, they had all kinds of stuff. They had emotional distress. They had humiliation, loss of reputation, defamation of character. And yeah, it was a few more that I can't quite remember.
So with those, like most of them seem like they'd be very easily dismissed. We can go into some of the other specifics, like one or two of them. I'm like, "that's a serious accusation." But like calling somebody Beatle Bailey or Gomer Pyle or whatever, like that's obviously nonfactual opinion. Like, why do you think that they thought this would work? I would assume the threshold for this is so high that it was very unlikely they'd pull it off.
Yes, I believe they live in a small world. Being government officials, they control that small world. The police department is inside of the courthouse. They all meet up at the snack machine and laugh, and they got ongoing relationships with each other. They are accustomed to bullying the civilians of Adams County. They are accustomed to influencing the jury with intimidation or just the whole—the police are always right every single time under every single circumstance. They are accustomed to those types of people. So they figured that they could violate me and then sue me and then win. I think they're very small, and they're accustomed to getting their way in that little county.
All right, so when the trial concluded, I've seen photos of you coming out. You're resplendent. You're wearing your American flag suit. I think maybe you even had a white coat, but you look like you're thrilled, you're happy. This is a victory for freedom of speech. What did they look like? Like, what was their reaction? Did you get to see the expression on their faces?
You know what? There's a side of me that's a sport. And after basketball games, I was taught to shake people's hands. I know they didn't wanna shake my hand. I held the bathroom door open for their lawyer. He didn't say thank you or nothing, he whisked by me. And I picked up on the fact that he was a poor sport. And they're all poor sports. I couldn't be one like them. After I won, I didn't look at him. I bowed my head and I thanked God that he didn't let him take my money from me. I told God that I thought what I did was my best-case-scenario, financial, peaceful solution. And I didn't look at him. I didn't want to be that type of dude. And I know I should've. In the cardinal realm, to the average human being, I should have went like, "Ah, yeah, ah." But I know I come off as a dirty rapper and I don't come off as a gentleman and a sport, but I thought it would be unsportsmanlike to look at them and intimidate them.
Yeah, to gloat. I think that that's a very honorable position. You got what you wanted, and don't—be the bigger man. I really like that.
Yeah, they say, kick a man while he's down. Like, you know, like, I didn't, I wanted to be class. I try to be a classy person, whether people know it or believe it or not. Like, I try to be a classy guy. I try to be a gentleman. And I didn't think it was classy, sportsmanlike, or gentleman-like to, you know, to stare him down or to look at him and to, you know, do them like they would have done me. You know, I think they're unsportsmanlike, I think they're unclassy. So I didn't wanna match them to a third degree. Yes, sir.
Well, can we go over some of the accusations you have? So like, they broke down your door, probably freaked your kids out, I believe they were there. They took money, but they didn't give all of it back. These are very serious things. Makes total sense that you'd want restitution and an apology.
I was trying to figure out who were the people walking around in my house. So with my camera, I zoomed in on their faces and I took snapshots. I posted the snapshots on the internet, and people began telling me who those people were. When I posted Brian Newland's face, his brother, William Newland, is a convicted pedophile that got fired from the Peebles Police Department. It's a town, it's in Adams County also. It's a town, there's all, there's like four or five towns in Adams County. It's four or five little towns. So, you know, his brother is a pedophile, convicted, registered sex offender. So you know all that stuff, you know, birds of a feather flock together, the apple don't fall far from the tree, you know. Here again I'm just trying to figure out what kind of man is walking around in my house, stealing my money, reading my bank statements.
I watched your album on YouTube and I just, you know, saw bits and pieces. And so I had sort of thought it was just you're making fun of him in general. He looked like a pedo or something like that.
Everytime, it would come up, the judge would magically jump in the conversation and save him. If you go back and watch the court footage, you know, every time my attorney is about to say, "Hey, you don't know your brother's a pedophile? You know, oh, this," that, the judge would jump in and save him, and he'd sit there with that little smirk on his face.
You talk about them being crooked cops multiple times. I read that they took $4,000 from you, they returned $3,600. Is it the $400 that were missing, that's why you call them crooked, or is there more to it?
There's more to it now. You know, it hit me, it didn't hit me till I was on the stand, that I actually had $5,000 in my pocket and I never spent none of that money because I forgot it was in there. You see what I'm saying? Like, when they handed it to me at the Red Rocks, I took it and I put it in my pockets. I got drunk and had a good time and I forgot it was there. Now they reported $4,600. They said they found $4,600, right? Then they said $400 from the $4,600 came up missing. Are you still with me?
Yes, so they, that's, you have $5,000.
I got $5,000.
$4,600 and they lost an additional $400. So there's $800 you're out.
$800. They actually stole $800. I thought it was $400 this whole time. They admitted to coming up missing $400, but I remembered I had $5,000 in my pocket. So now I'm knowing not only did he take the $400 that the sheriff said they had, he took that invisible $400 that I had in my pocket, because I had, it was $5,000. So they said they got $4,600. They didn't pay me $4,600 at Red Rocks. They paid me $5,000. So before he sealed the bag, he took $400. And then he must've took $800 and wrote $46 on there because $400 was missing from what they said they had. And I know I got $5,000, so I'ma put another $400 on top of the $400 that they didn't know was missing and all that. So it was actually $800 he took from me. Just to, yes, sir.
Yeah, yeah, no, no…
No, no. At the end of my investigation, that's what I realized he took…
Wait, dumb question. If they lose 400—ok, if I like got ahold of your wallet or something, right? And I called you and I was like, "Hey, Afroman, I got your wallet. Oh, I lost $20." I would give you $20 of my dollars to make up. It's not like the bills themselves are nostalgic. It is the subtotal, right? So do they just literally say, "We lost the 400, we can't do anything about it"?
No, they're just tapping their—they're just playing dumb. They're just looking up in the air, acting like I don't exist. They still owe me right now. They haven't given me my $400 yet. And the judge, Jackass Jonathan, he's making me pay half of the court costs.
Can he hold you in contempt of court for calling him a jackass, or is that just when you're in court that they can do that?
Contempt of court? I have freedom of speech. I'm allowed to ridicule and criticize public officials.
Makes sense to me. I mean, like, that is kind of the point of your case, right? Like, this is all on First Amendment grounds from your perspective and from the case that your attorney pushed, yeah?
Yes. We the people, the government is for the people, by the people. The people supervise the government. I am the government supervisor. I have the right to criticize, critique my government, my employees.
Right, yeah. Do you think this is going to be emboldening for people in terms of free speech in general? Like, do you think that this is gonna have positive impact beyond your own life?
Yes, sir. Yes, sir. But, you know, it's nothing that I gave the people. It was something that the Founding Fathers of America gave the people hundreds of years ago. I just microwaved it and reinstated it. You know what I mean? Just reminded people about it. You know what I'm saying?
Is there anything about your trial that people don't understand? Like, everybody's celebrating this, everybody loves you, you've become like a national icon and everybody loves Afroman, but we're all getting bits and pieces. Is there some part of the story that we're not getting correct that you want to set straight?
I don't think so. I think everybody get it. The police raided my house. Didn't find nothing, was sarcastic, ornery, and unapologetic about the damages they did. I did the most peaceful, positive thing I could do, made songs about them to raise money for the damages they caused. They had the arrogance and the audacity to try to sue me. I told them that I had freedom of speech. They lost.
And you won, as did the First Amendment…
Beautiful American story. Beautiful American story!
100 percent. Can I ask you a couple of questions about the album, like not the trial itself?
Yes, sir.
So I went through the album in preparation for this. It looks to me like you had two parts to it. There was probably, you were working on something prior to getting your house broken into and all of that. And then you had the other stuff. So like "Sign My Titties," "Wet Tight Energy," and "H.A.D.," "Hard Ass Dick." I watched that and I'm like, are there really ladies hanging around your house all the time, or is that just a persona thing?
A little bit of both, you know what I'm saying? Sometimes girls, so I got some girlfriends, sometimes they come over, you know what I'm saying? And then sometimes there's nobody at my house.
Are you married?
I am not.
Oh, ok. Oh, so you can have ladies just come hang out with you and have that kind of cool, hot person party lifestyle.
Yes, sir.
Ok. All right. Did you run for president in 2024? Did I miss that? Like you…
Yes, yes, yes, 20-20 Fro. My slogan was "Weed Shall Overcome." My main platform was medical cannabis, and I wanted to get it recreational in all 50 states in America.
I think that that would be a very winning strategy. Are you going to run again next time?
I'm getting some good vibes. I don't know. I'ma, you know, I'm gonna talk to everybody. If America—if I can help my country and America feels like I can help my country, I'll step up and do the best I can. I don't know. I gotta, you know, I'm going to talk to some more people and see if I could help, you know?
I think you should, man. Easiest to get on the ballot, Louisiana. If you wanted to go down there, you could do that. Here's what I'm thinking: You can reconstitute the Whig Party, like that is name recognition, it kind of fits in with the Afro, and get on ballot. Or if you ran in Maine, if you got on the ballot up there, they do individual electoral votes, so you could come in third place and get electoral votes. There's also a very small chance if there was a deadlocked election that Congress could elect you. So there's an odd zero chance, I don't know, I think it's worth considering.
Yes, sir. I sure will. I will consider it.
If you do run again, would it be weed legalization? Would you also want to get into police reform? What kind of stuff would you want to have in it?
I'm gonna do a whole lot more with freedom of speech, corruption in the government. I want a smaller government. I want to get crooked judges and police officers out of the government. I want better character, people. I want people with integrity. And what I think the definition of integrity is, the desire and ability to do right without someone having to tell you or supervise you or make you do it. You wanna do right just because it's right. Like I didn't wanna stare them cops down after I won. My integrity didn't want me to, it wasn't right. They say don't kick a man when he's down. So even though the man that's down might kick me when I'm down, my integrity tells me not to do it when he's down.
If you end up running on legalizing weed, getting rid of corruption, and pro-free speech, like probably have my vote. I think there's a lot of people that would very much resonate with that message.
Hey, man, you know, I'm not a scholar on paperwork, but I think this world is missing common sense, and I'll bring it back. Everything will be all right. People might think about me being the president, they might roll their eyes and think that's the most absurd thing. However, if I was, whatever, whatever. Everything would be—I would calm all this craziness down. And I believe I can unite America. I've been in every circle, every circle. Circles that you might feel I shouldn't be in. And I realized that we're not as different as we think we are. And just with that knowledge, I believe that I know how to move in a way that will unite us. We was united when I was celebrating freedom of speech. I had Republicans jumping with me. I had Democrats jumping with me. I had Libertarians jumping with me. I had white people. I had country hillbillies with long beards and overalls jumping with me. I had, you know what I'm saying, some thugs jumping with me. I believe I can unite America, I love everybody, and a lot of people love me, you know, of course, everybody ain't gonna love everybody. But I believe I can unify the country, get the patriotism going again, get the spirit going again, and bring us all together.
I agree, man. Look at you, like you're wearing an American flag suit, like you love America. And like I look at you—every time I see a photo of you, I'm like, it's like a fun patriotic joy. It's like you're enjoying America, you're enjoying free speech. It's like I want to be a part of that party. There's something fun going on, and I wanna be in that room.
Hey, man, well come on with me, man, let's be family. And this is home, and when a place is home you wanna make it the best because that's where you're spending the most of your time. You know? You know, I had some guys tell me to go back to Africa, and I've never been there, and I thought about it real hard. I can't, I'm not. It's like, you wouldn't take a lion in the zoo and put him back in the Serengeti. And I'm just not saying—I'm of African descent, but I'm from over here. I am an American. I'm more American than whoever you think American is.
Yeah.
And there's a lot of people like that. And, yeah.
No, 100 percent, like one of the things…
So when this is home, you wanna fix up home and make home comfortable.
Well, one of the things that I love most about our country, that I'm very proud about, is that you and me are 100% American. There's no seniority present here. It's a civic identity. If somebody becomes an American citizen, they're 100% American. It's not an ethno-state. It is not by blood. It's by ideas, like freedom of speech, the thing that you've been promulgating, like liberty. Those are the things which make us American. It doesn't have anything to do with ethnicity. And that's very different than a lot of other countries, and it's part of what makes America really cool and really great.
Yeah, yes. You know, there's different opinions about America in America, but that rebranding is the key piece. You know, liberty and justice for all.
All right, here's what I want, I want you to run for president…
We got to make the country live up to that, you know?
Keep me on the short list for ambassador. I feel like I'd be a very good spokesman for you. I feel I'd be a good, like, I've got middle American game show host energy that could complement what you're doing. And I could like, I'm with you on all of this. This sounds all really good. Give some thought, like I don't know. You said you don't like filling out paperwork. I think the Libertarians would probably be very excited to have you on the ticket, and then you'd be in 48 states. So like, I don't know, keep it in your back pocket.
Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Yes, sir.
Couple more questions before we sign off. I know you prior to this, I knew you as the "Because I Got High" guy, which I heard back in high school. Do you, are you pressured to be high? Like, do you feel like people want you to be high or how do you navigate with that?
Oh yeah, you know, somebody, people always wanna smoke joints with me and they wanna pass one with me. They wanna take a picture with me and a joint. Oh, yeah, I sung about getting high. So everybody—I'm a tourist attraction. I'm a marijuana tourist attraction when they see me there. They wanna pose and take pictures.
I'm going to go back to the president thing. If you run for president, who would be your running mate?
I thought about Flavor Flav.
Yeah, that'd be great.
He's, dude, I know, he's a smart dude. He's like one of these dudes you think are dumb, but they're really smart. You know what I mean?
I bet he's very entrepreneurial, I bet he's made a lot of money.
He is not no fool. He plays the piano like Liberace. I don't even know if people know. Yeah, yeah, like people don't know. He will sit down and crack his knuckles and play like elegant piano.
If you ran with Flavor Flav, that'd be a lot of earned media attention, too. I don't know. I think you've got a great start, man. I was going to suggest Dolly Parton, but I feel like you've already got, like, because ok, truly, you and Dolly Parton would unite America. If you and Dolly Parton, president, vice president, like everybody would, there's no one that would dislike that. It would be great.
I will reach out to, will you please help me reach out to her and let her know that I was just playing in that rap song where I said those things. I was trying to be cool and tell her I apologize and tell her to call me and let's unite America.
Afroman, I am on this. I am a good hostage negotiator type personality. I'm gonna go ahead and smooth all this out. I can turn down the temperature. It's gonna be great. Don't worry about this. I got this covered. Ok, well before we wrap up, what's next for you? I feel like you've had multiple legs of your career and this is sort of an unexpected, meteoric second rise. I know you never went away, but it's changed the game and accelerated it. So what happens next? What's the next few years look like before you get into the White House?
Official freedom of speech clothing, a Lemon Pound Cake line, movies, documentaries, and then just enjoying the success of the music and the videos that I've already written. But yeah, I…
You perform a lot, don't you? You're on the road like 250 days a year or something like that.
Yes sir.
Yeah. So I would imagine that this just, like, either you've got more gigs or you've got more people in the gifs from all of this.
Yes, I put these shows pre-trial. And now these poor little clubs are getting just like, like, holy, you know, whatever, they're getting overrun and everything because we got this big surge of people we wasn't expecting that yet. You know, normally I pull 2-300 people out, and so now there's like 2,015, like just like hey yo. It's crazy, but it's a beautiful thing.
No, that's great. I'm very excited for you because like you've already had a couple of very large moments in your career and I don't know where you are, whether it was steady incline or plateau or what, but for that to suddenly, like from all of this, for that to result in you becoming a national icon.
Oh, man, I feel like Tina Turner. Just when everybody thought it was over, here I go. Hey, "What's Love Got to Do With It" and now, what I like is, I'm 50 years old. I tell a 25-year-old, I've been you twice. And this time around, I'm gonna do it right. You know what I'm saying? So everything I messed up at 20 and 25, you know, God has given me the opportunity to do it again, and this time do it with some sense. So like, when I blew up with "Because I Got High," "Because I Got High" was an audio file. I got popular with a audio file. People knew this song, but they didn't know me. Marijuana is bigger than my song. My song was bigger than Afroman. And that, so bam, bam, bang. And it was, people was just in love with a sound wave. They didn't know where that sound wave was coming from. But the sound wave, that was my first popularity. But this time, technology was all in this new viral comeback. People are in love with more than just a sound wave. They got the visual. They see the American suit, the American glasses, the fur coat, the whole court trial, the cops crying on the stand, the dude that don't know if I humped his wife a lot, in real time. Like this is so much bigger than that one little audio file I had. Like I am so much, I had, I was in Cracker Barrel today and there was a line of shivering silver white-haired ladies knowing me, wanting me to sign their lemon pound cake, you know, pictures, and I'm at Cracker Barrel like, man, like, you know, everybody knows me now.
Cause like when I first came out, only a fraction of humanity listens to hip-hop. Then only a fraction of hip-hop listens to Afroman's hip-hop, so I was only so big. I'm bigger than hip-hop right now. I'm bigger than music. I'm bigger than politics. This is big, this is a whole, so this is great, you know, this is great. And it's like Deion Sanders catching the ball and running it all the way back. Deion Sanders didn't get lucky and just intercept the ball and high-step it all the way down the field. He had to work hard to get in a position to intercept the ball and high-step down the field. I had to work hard to get in a position to go viral.
Hey, I'm gonna pat you on the back. I'm not just saying this because I'm your future secretary of agriculture. I'm merely saying this as your friend. I think you did work very hard at it. It's great that this worked out for you. And on top of that, you've put yourself in a position where you can capitalize on it. It sounds like the first go-round you weren't. Like you had a viral moment in an audio form, but there was no way to really funnel that. When I lived in New York, there was Pizza Rat. The guy that took the photo was a comedian. He didn't have any way to make it into a thing. But you had a net ready for when all of this fell out of the sky because you've been working on that net for 20 years and like, congrats, enjoy the windfall.
Thank you, thank you. Blessing in disguise from God. The Lord works in mysterious ways. This is the hand I was dealt. When you play chess with a guy, you can't tell him what pieces to move. He's gonna move the piece that does the most damage to you. So life dealt me a hand, and I played it the best I could. And to watch it all come out like that, it's heartwarming, and I'm happy, and I'm grateful to God because I think this is too good to be true. He had to have something to do with this.
So we'll wrap up here, Afroman. In the year of our Lord 2026, a lot of people are stressed and worried about the state of the country and the future of the county. I feel like you are a unifying figure and just kind of a presence of joy and celebration. So for people that are worried about America or worried about our future, what would you tell them?
Every day we wake up is a good day to start doing everything right. You could have done everything wrong all your life, but you can wake up today, take a deep breath, and figure out how to do things right. I believe we should manufacture a lot of things we use. I believe we should employ each other. I believe we should nurture our economy and nurture America. And I believe that if we stop worrying about a lot of stuff abroad and we focused on home, we'd make it better.
Hey man, that sounds great, make America better. Let's focus on home, free speech, criminal reform, get out the crooks, quit bombing other countries, and then maybe make me secretary of the interior. We'll see, I just feel like this is all coming together.
It is, brother. It is. It is.
All right, thank you very much, Afroman. Travel safe and make it to your next gig.
Yes, sir. Thank y'all. Appreciate you.
- Producer: Paul Alexander
- Audio Mixer: Ian Keyser
