0:00:06 > 0:00:13In the final week of the Obama presidency, a Louisiana high school
0:00:14 > 0:00:21marching band rehearses for the big day. We do not see colour, race,
0:00:22 > 0:00:30gender or ethnicity. We see potential. They are one of ten
0:00:31 > 0:00:34school bands chosen to play at the inauguration. There has been a lot
0:00:35 > 0:00:45of talk of how we need healing and sometimes... You just have to do it.
0:00:46 > 0:00:49But as it marks the transition from Obama to Trump, America is having
0:00:50 > 0:00:54two very different conversations about race. This is the live but
0:00:55 > 0:00:57this is the life we live so it is not a conversation about race it is
0:00:58 > 0:01:05just a conversation. And tension over the issues of police killings
0:01:06 > 0:01:13and the involvement of white supremacists. Hail victory, hail our
0:01:14 > 0:01:16President. And for some, talk of a return to the good old days
0:01:17 > 0:01:22signifies nothing good at all. I think that the master has reclaimed
0:01:23 > 0:01:26his house. And even though he allowed the slaves to look after the
0:01:27 > 0:01:31house while he was on vacation, we are still in the same situation we
0:01:32 > 0:01:36have been in. Barack Obama called slavery the original sin of America.
0:01:37 > 0:01:42His presidency once held promise of redemption. That has not happened.
0:01:43 > 0:01:48Is this country enters the Trump era, the divisions between black and
0:01:49 > 0:01:50white America are felt, perhaps, more starkly than they have been in
0:01:51 > 0:02:05a generation. If there is anyone out there who
0:02:06 > 0:02:08still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible,
0:02:09 > 0:02:25tonight is your answer. That was the era of yes, we can.
0:02:26 > 0:02:41When black America seemed poised to claim a confident power apparently
0:02:42 > 0:02:50long denied. # I'm so reckless when I rocklike von she dressed # I'm so
0:02:51 > 0:02:59possess if # My daddy Alabama, my mummy Louisiana... To me it is a
0:03:00 > 0:03:11race war. You have black against white, white against black. From the
0:03:12 > 0:03:15swamps of Washington to do by you of the South. Beneath the surface of
0:03:16 > 0:03:24the post- racial society, fear. Anger. And the deep roots of a
0:03:25 > 0:03:38history still unresolved. The final week of the Obama
0:03:39 > 0:03:43presidency began with the annual commemoration for a man who gave his
0:03:44 > 0:03:49life for the civil rights struggle. America has come a long way since
0:03:50 > 0:03:55then. In New Orleans they mark his memory with a show of sartorial
0:03:56 > 0:04:00pride. Our self-esteem has grown from us knowing each other. Black
0:04:01 > 0:04:08men can see each other in a greater image that has been achieved. In
0:04:09 > 0:04:16this respect, the Obamas scandal free tenure at the White House has
0:04:17 > 0:04:20had huge symbolic value. So you think about a boy like... How old
0:04:21 > 0:04:25are you? You know who the President is? Um, Barack Obama. Do you know
0:04:26 > 0:04:33who the president was before him? See? All he has ever known is Obama.
0:04:34 > 0:04:40His life, like this, it is normal. It is normal for him to see a black
0:04:41 > 0:04:46man at the head of the country. A symbol is a powerful thing. The very
0:04:47 > 0:04:49fact of his unlikely presidency has expanded the concept of what is
0:04:50 > 0:04:57possible for millions of Americans, black and white. But when it comes
0:04:58 > 0:05:00to cold hard statistics, the tree sears that if you are black in
0:05:01 > 0:05:07America the odds are still stacked against you. In 2013, the median net
0:05:08 > 0:05:14worth of a white American household was over $140,000. The black
0:05:15 > 0:05:22households, that figure was $11,000. That is 13 times less. Under Obama
0:05:23 > 0:05:26the wealth gap has widened. Travel up the Mississippi from New Orleans
0:05:27 > 0:05:33and you come to Baton Rouge, one of the most divided cities in the
0:05:34 > 0:05:35United States. For some children of inner-city high schools, the
0:05:36 > 0:05:39education they got on the streets can see more important than what is
0:05:40 > 0:05:47on offer in the classroom. You can go out there tomorrow, have your
0:05:48 > 0:05:54pistol, shoot somebody and you end up in prison for the rest of your
0:05:55 > 0:05:57life. Slim reed is a former gang leader turned activist whose mission
0:05:58 > 0:06:07now is to stop young black men following his footsteps. It is 2017
0:06:08 > 0:06:13and you are still walking around looking and acting exactly like
0:06:14 > 0:06:24slaves. And the world is looking at you as animals. Why? Because you
0:06:25 > 0:06:27live that lifestyle. Barack Obama often told black Americans they had
0:06:28 > 0:06:33to take responsibility for the problems in their own community.
0:06:34 > 0:06:37Silky agrees, up to a point. I am trying to bring a message to black
0:06:38 > 0:06:40people that have black lives do not matter to black people than it
0:06:41 > 0:06:44should not matter to anybody else. That is my message. Like lives have
0:06:45 > 0:06:47to matter to black people first before they matter to the rest of
0:06:48 > 0:06:51the world. Black lives matter focus on police killing but I need to look
0:06:52 > 0:06:57at what we are doing to ourselves and try to resurrect as from the
0:06:58 > 0:07:00spiritual depth we are really for I can worry about the two or 300
0:07:01 > 0:07:05killings taking place by law enforcement. We are dying by the
0:07:06 > 0:07:13thousands and Aaron hands so I am focusing on that and then I stay on
0:07:14 > 0:07:18that. We poverty. I have grown up in poverty and I became a gang leader
0:07:19 > 0:07:25because I was starving. If I am in this house and do not have anything
0:07:26 > 0:07:32to eat I would roll before I style. So when I am finding out that I do
0:07:33 > 0:07:35not have the necessities of life, I will go out and get those
0:07:36 > 0:07:41necessities, regardless of what the world says. I need to survive, just
0:07:42 > 0:07:44like anybody else. There are also inequalities that are systemic and
0:07:45 > 0:07:48ingrained. If you were black you are more likely to be arrested, get a
0:07:49 > 0:07:53longer jail sentence and more likely to be shot dead by police. Obama
0:07:54 > 0:07:59only engaged with this issue late in his presidency and then with limited
0:08:00 > 0:08:06results. Like quarterbacks on the team of white supremacy does not
0:08:07 > 0:08:17help us. The judge have to abide by the law. As far as black folks on
0:08:18 > 0:08:22the whole, politically, when you do the research and you look at the
0:08:23 > 0:08:28numbers then if you and I wanted to get married, we could get married.
0:08:29 > 0:08:33The gays accomplished something, you see what I am saying? I can not
0:08:34 > 0:08:39always just pressure it because at the end of the day we did not ask
0:08:40 > 0:08:43for anything. We did not want to put that burden on the black man in the
0:08:44 > 0:08:47White House. We did not want to give him that burden. If you do not ask
0:08:48 > 0:08:51for anything you get nothing so you cannot be disappointment --
0:08:52 > 0:08:56disappointed. So you say that the black community gave Barack Obama a
0:08:57 > 0:09:02free pass? Exactly. He is one of us. It is over 60 years since the
0:09:03 > 0:09:06Supreme Court ruled that segregation in public education was
0:09:07 > 0:09:10unconstitutional. Ten years later the Civil Rights act outlawed
0:09:11 > 0:09:14discrimination based on race. But today in cities across America it is
0:09:15 > 0:09:21all too obvious that they factored segregation is still very much in
0:09:22 > 0:09:27effect. -- de facto segregation. If you look at a map of bat on Rouge
0:09:28 > 0:09:31you will see that this route here, Florida Street, is a stark dividing
0:09:32 > 0:09:34line. Everything to the north is overwhelmingly black, everything to
0:09:35 > 0:09:40the south is mostly white. Now I spent time in divided cities. Places
0:09:41 > 0:09:46like Baghdad in Beirut, places where they have recently had a war. There
0:09:47 > 0:09:50has not been a war here since the 1860s when the North is thought the
0:09:51 > 0:09:55credit that is the over the issue of slavery. But last summer it felt
0:09:56 > 0:09:59like war was not far away. The killing of a black man, the latest
0:10:00 > 0:10:04in a string of fatal police shootings caught on camera. They are
0:10:05 > 0:10:10shooting right now and there is an officer down. Two days later at a
0:10:11 > 0:10:14black lives matter protest a man opened fire on police killing five.
0:10:15 > 0:10:19Not long after that, more officers were shot dead in Baton Rouge. This
0:10:20 > 0:10:25is a race war, to me. You have black against white, one against black.
0:10:26 > 0:10:28There would not be so many black people against white people, I
0:10:29 > 0:10:33think, if was not so the police brutality. That was pushing that
0:10:34 > 0:10:38situation with some of the people. Nefertiti is part of a growing
0:10:39 > 0:10:42movement of radical black activists. During the black lives matter
0:10:43 > 0:10:45protests she says she too found herself on the receiving end of some
0:10:46 > 0:10:50heavy-handed treatment from the police. Going on a protest down town
0:10:51 > 0:10:58to City Hall and police officers approached me, they'd dislocated my
0:10:59 > 0:11:03shoulder and fractured my finger. More recently and I am recovering
0:11:04 > 0:11:07from that, but all was basically because I am part of a new Black
0:11:08 > 0:11:11Panther party and they assumed that the chapter out there protesting at
0:11:12 > 0:11:15the time, that I was a part of that chapter, but I was not. It is
0:11:16 > 0:11:19perhaps ironic that relations between the police and the black
0:11:20 > 0:11:24community reached their lowest point in a generation during the final
0:11:25 > 0:11:28years of the Obama presidency. The killings by police and a lack of
0:11:29 > 0:11:32prosecutions of officers involved has entrenched a sense here of a
0:11:33 > 0:11:37force that does not serve and protect one that operate with
0:11:38 > 0:11:43impunity. Everybody is an age, OK? We are waiting on a decision from
0:11:44 > 0:11:47the Department of Justice. People want justice and they want
0:11:48 > 0:11:54transparency. So that is the main thing that folks want. Transparency
0:11:55 > 0:11:59and justice. Recently we have had a shooting with ours and sterling
0:12:00 > 0:12:04about two blocks down the street. We had police killings on the highway
0:12:05 > 0:12:07and we had a flood. So our community is broken. We are trying to get back
0:12:08 > 0:12:14together. The Baton Rouge police department is
0:12:15 > 0:12:19acutely aware of the need to rebuild trust. To that end, Sergeant Riley
0:12:20 > 0:12:23Harbour is dispatched of a weekend to do a spot of gardening at an
0:12:24 > 0:12:26inner City School just round the corner from where he grew up. This
0:12:27 > 0:12:31is what passes for community outreach. The citizens here have a
0:12:32 > 0:12:36right to be upset with all the different things that have happened,
0:12:37 > 0:12:41both from the civilian side and from law enforcement. We've had losses on
0:12:42 > 0:12:45both, tragic all the way round, but we still have to come together
0:12:46 > 0:12:48because we've still got to live. Baton Rouge is braced for more
0:12:49 > 0:12:53trouble as it awaits the outcome of a federal investigation into the
0:12:54 > 0:12:56shooting of Alton Sterling. Nefertiti says the tensions between
0:12:57 > 0:13:01the black community and the police have brought an old enemy out into
0:13:02 > 0:13:05the open. Last year, about seven months ago, the Klansmen, the Ku
0:13:06 > 0:13:10Klux Klan Aryan nation put flyers out recruiting members and this was
0:13:11 > 0:13:13particularly right after all than sterling was killed, they had it on
0:13:14 > 0:13:19the news that they were putting notes on people's doors, going
0:13:20 > 0:13:23through the neighbourhood. Nefertiti and Silky Slim rang the number on a
0:13:24 > 0:13:26leaflet, it went through to a pre-recorded message which had
0:13:27 > 0:13:40clearly been updated in the past few days.
0:13:41 > 0:13:47Hail Trump! Hail our people! Hail our victory!
0:13:48 > 0:13:54Not long after the election, a group of white nationalists gathered to
0:13:55 > 0:13:58discuss the new political landscape. The final speaker was Richard
0:13:59 > 0:14:02Spencer who coined the term Albright, a movement associated with
0:14:03 > 0:14:07Donald Trump's former campaign CEO Steve Bannon, who wasn't present but
0:14:08 > 0:14:13who is now one of the most powerful men in the White House. America was
0:14:14 > 0:14:19until this past generation a white country designed for ourselves and
0:14:20 > 0:14:25our posterity. This then is the context in which
0:14:26 > 0:14:28Donald Trump has taken office. America's new president has
0:14:29 > 0:14:34disavowed support from over racists but still in Baton Rouge the
0:14:35 > 0:14:39tranquil surroundings of university leg near the college campus belies a
0:14:40 > 0:14:44sense of unease. Tina Lange and meet Lewis Morris are here for a photo
0:14:45 > 0:14:51shoot. They're expecting their first child in March. They want to
0:14:52 > 0:14:54remember this special time. But they fear their unborn daughter's future
0:14:55 > 0:15:04may not necessarily be brighter than their own. We don't know how it will
0:15:05 > 0:15:10be for African-Americans now to four years down the line, six years down
0:15:11 > 0:15:13the line. Even when Obama was in office you seen officers were
0:15:14 > 0:15:18killing young black males and really weren't getting penalised for it.
0:15:19 > 0:15:23Now that it's Trump, you never know. It'll be hard for us to get those
0:15:24 > 0:15:29opportunities and have that freedom to get the best education and to get
0:15:30 > 0:15:34the best jobs, you know what I'm saying? Just because of our race and
0:15:35 > 0:15:36the perspective that others have on us. That's what I'm afraid of for my
0:15:37 > 0:15:46child. Here in the south the shadow of the
0:15:47 > 0:15:54plantations, the memory of Jim Crow, of America's original sin still loom
0:15:55 > 0:15:58large. It takes more than eight years to dismantle a social system
0:15:59 > 0:16:01that's been in place before the country was even established, before
0:16:02 > 0:16:08the country talked about creating some people equal and allowing some
0:16:09 > 0:16:11to have the pursuit of life and liberty and happiness, they had
0:16:12 > 0:16:15individuals that were even considered human, they were treated
0:16:16 > 0:16:19as chattel. The situation you're talking about is normative for
0:16:20 > 0:16:22America so to see something other than that is to see something
0:16:23 > 0:16:27radically different from actually what America is and how it came into
0:16:28 > 0:16:32being, which is deeply, deeply antiblack. Barack Obama's legacy is
0:16:33 > 0:16:36a subject of fierce disagreement but radically different is not an
0:16:37 > 0:16:39assessment often applied to his record in office. For some the
0:16:40 > 0:16:44election of Donald Trump looks less like a sudden change of direction
0:16:45 > 0:16:51than a resumption of the status quo. I look at it like Master has
0:16:52 > 0:16:55reclaimed his house, I'm at Master's place, I know my place, I'm in the
0:16:56 > 0:16:59field, I don't try to get up to the house, know what I'm saying? You're
0:17:00 > 0:17:03talking about slavery here. Of course. That's the dynamic you're
0:17:04 > 0:17:08talking about. It's the oppression. You're saying it never really went
0:17:09 > 0:17:14away? Know, even though master allows the slaves to look after the
0:17:15 > 0:17:19house when he was on vacation we are still in the same fight that we've
0:17:20 > 0:17:24been in for the last 245 years. In all seriousness, there is a huge
0:17:25 > 0:17:31legacy of slavery but you can't say things haven't changed since the
0:17:32 > 0:17:371860s, since the nineteen sixties? Definitely. There's no forced free
0:17:38 > 0:17:43labour here with the slaves, right? And what America has been successful
0:17:44 > 0:17:49in doing is creating these slums and ghettos, putting you in these areas
0:17:50 > 0:17:53and then making the police still oversee you like we're still on the
0:17:54 > 0:17:57Plantation. So what goes on in the white community don't happen in the
0:17:58 > 0:18:00black community, so when the police come here they say get up against
0:18:01 > 0:18:05the car, I've got rights, shut the hell up, it's a different treatment.
0:18:06 > 0:18:08It's still like the overseers overseeing the plantation, we just
0:18:09 > 0:18:12don't have to go to work. Next up, from Louisiana, it's the
0:18:13 > 0:18:31high school marching band. Inauguration. After the speech in
0:18:32 > 0:18:36the oath of office there's a moment in the spotlight for the high school
0:18:37 > 0:18:41marching band Louisiana. Then the parade moves on. And so America
0:18:42 > 0:18:46begins a new chapter in its long book on race, weaving in the history
0:18:47 > 0:18:49of slavery, on segregation with that of Martin Luther King and of the
0:18:50 > 0:18:55Obama era. From my experience, I think the
0:18:56 > 0:18:59American dream is still alive for anyone who wants to reach for it.
0:19:00 > 0:19:04There are African-Americans in all areas of life that are quite, quite
0:19:05 > 0:19:11successful. I think that the road may be a little narrower and a
0:19:12 > 0:19:14little more Stoney at times, but I think the American dream is still
0:19:15 > 0:19:23achievable for everyone if you work hard and live right and play by the
0:19:24 > 0:19:28rolls then success happens. Jailer, 11 years old, has known no other
0:19:29 > 0:19:34president but Obama. For her and her friend, President Trump was at first
0:19:35 > 0:19:38a frightening prospect. We was all thinking about, like, what if he
0:19:39 > 0:19:42sends us back to Africa? That was your first thought, that you might
0:19:43 > 0:19:49not be allowed to be an American any more? Yes. That sounds like a scary
0:19:50 > 0:19:53thought? Yeah. At first we were all, like, we went through withdrawal and
0:19:54 > 0:19:59we were saying it's going to happen, but we talked about it one day at
0:20:00 > 0:20:05school and we was, like, it can happen unless everybody says yes to
0:20:06 > 0:20:10it. Jaylen is ambitious. After Harvard Law School she wants to
0:20:11 > 0:20:14become America's first black female present, but... I think he is going
0:20:15 > 0:20:18to try and make everything harder for blacks to get in, everything
0:20:19 > 0:20:22harder for Hispanics to get in, everything harder for anybody of
0:20:23 > 0:20:27colour to try to do all be something. Jaylen has one of those
0:20:28 > 0:20:31teachers you remember for the rest of your life, someone who helps you
0:20:32 > 0:20:40make sense of a bewildered ring world. I think that people were sick
0:20:41 > 0:20:46of talking about race. White people or black people or everyone? I would
0:20:47 > 0:20:50say from my experience mostly white people. It's overwhelming, I can
0:20:51 > 0:20:54understand that from the perspective where you've never had to deal with
0:20:55 > 0:20:59it, you don't understand why we keep bringing it up over and over again.
0:21:00 > 0:21:05And I think that especially with the heightened sense of awareness of
0:21:06 > 0:21:10police shootings and police brutality and the injustices being
0:21:11 > 0:21:14so blatantly put in your face because of social media, white
0:21:15 > 0:21:19people started to have a backlash and they started to think that no
0:21:20 > 0:21:23one is representing me, everyone is talking about black people and not
0:21:24 > 0:21:29talking about me, so how can I make it somewhat about me?
0:21:30 > 0:21:33And so the age of Donald Trump began And so the age of Donald Trump began
0:21:34 > 0:21:40as all presidencies usually do with a promise of concealer retreat.
0:21:41 > 0:21:47To rebuild our country and restore its promise for all of our people.
0:21:48 > 0:21:51But Donald Trump's opponents fear quite the opposite. There are those
0:21:52 > 0:21:56who fear that the new president is a man with a vindictive streak who may
0:21:57 > 0:22:01use the power of his office to lash out at those who opposed him. I'd
0:22:02 > 0:22:06like to punch him in the face, I'll tell you. Many liberals...
0:22:07 > 0:22:12Especially white liberals see Trump as an extra ten shall threat. To the
0:22:13 > 0:22:16founding principles of America. -- existential threat to the founding
0:22:17 > 0:22:20principles of America. But from the black perspective things look a lift
0:22:21 > 0:22:24little different. It doesn't scare me, I don't have an issue with Trump
0:22:25 > 0:22:32or whatever he does because everyone gets in there and does the same
0:22:33 > 0:22:36things. When black America contemplates the
0:22:37 > 0:22:38prospect of a hostile perhaps even oppressive state it shrugs and asks,
0:22:39 > 0:23:06what else is new? Well, while some of us
0:23:07 > 0:23:09were shivering on Thursday, for others, for example
0:23:10 > 0:23:12across the North of Scotland,