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Melissa Harris-Perry: Welcome to The Takeaway. I'm Melissa Harris-Perry. I'm glad to have you with us. Brittney Griner is free and has returned to the US. On Thursday, her wife Cherelle spoke at the White House.

Cherelle: Over the last nine months, y'all have been so privy to one of the darkest moments of my life and so today I'm just standing here overwhelmed with the emotions, but the most important emotion that I have right now is just sincere gratitude.

Melissa: In a short video released by Russian state TV on Thursday, we can see Griner seated on a plane. The long locks which had been her signature style for years are shorn, but she's smiling and looks relieved.

Speaker 1: [Russian language]

Speaker 2: Do you know where they're heading to?

Speaker 3: No.

Speaker 2: No.

Speaker 1: [Russian language]

Speaker 2: You fly back home?

Speaker 3: To the US.

Speaker 1: [Russian language]

Melissa: In order to bring Brittney home, the US released Russian national Viktor Bout. Bout was sentenced to 25 years in prison for illegal arms trading and plotting to kill Americans. He'd served 11 years of that sentence. The deal did not secure the release of other Americans, like former Marine Paul Whelan or teacher Mark Fogel.

Cherelle: Today, my family is whole but as you all are aware, there are so many other families who are not whole. BG is not here to say this, but I will gladly speak on her behalf and say that BG and I will remain committed to the work of getting every American home including Paul, whose family is in our hearts today.

Melissa: We don't exactly know what Britney Griner experienced or the lasting effects she may have to manage in coming weeks, months and years, but the love and support that her wife, family, friends and teammates have displayed throughout this ordeal tells us she's not going to be facing it alone.

Cherelle: Thank you, everybody, for your support. Today's just a happy day for me and my family. I'm going to smile right now. Thank you.

Melissa: Joining me now is Amira Rose Davis, Assistant Professor of Black Studies at the University of Texas, Austin and co-host of Burn It All Down, a feminist sports podcast. Professor Davis, thanks for coming back on The Takeaway.

Amira Rose Davis: It's always good to be here.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Also with us is Jemele Hill. Jemele is all the things including author of Uphill: A Memoir, and contributing writer for The Atlantic. Jemele, so good to have you back with us.

Jemele Hill: Thank you for having me.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Amira, I want to start with you. I just want to begin with your reaction Thursday when you heard. What were you feeling?

Amira Rose Davis: Immense relief with a sprinkle of surprise. I think that this has been 294 days in a process that's had many more questions than answers almost all the time and just relief at knowing that BG was freed and coming home. That smile on Cherelle's face said it the best. It was just joy and a moment that I hoped for but didn't necessarily know when it would come.

Melissa: Jemele, I want to really give you a chance to weigh in on that as well.

Jemele Hill: It was the same. For so long, especially as a prolong, I think there was a dismal reality that set in and then to wake up to the news that she was out, it was really overwhelming. Based off everything I've read but keeping up with the scenes, and certainly talking to some of her people behind the scenes, it was just a really wonderful moment.

Melissa Harris-Perry: I've been asking every guest that The Takeaway have been lucky enough to have to talk about Russia and Ukraine, and almost every person who had any expertise on Russia would say, "What do you know about or what do you predict in this case?" I got to say, overwhelmingly, I was getting, "This isn't going to happen. It's not going to happen anytime soon. There's every reason for it not to happen." I'm wondering, Amira, as I come to you, when you're looking at this moment, the joy, the surprise, are you also at all surprised by the number of people or the categories of folks who did not seem pleased about news of her release?

Amira Rose Davis: Not surprised by that reaction at all. A lot of that reaction is coming from people who didn't seem to care that Brittney was being held in the first place, who has very little understanding of the case at hand and really traffics in outrage politics. It was disappointing, but certainly not surprising to see takes coming from segments of people on social media that wanted to say, "We should have left her there. This was a bad deal or a bad trade," like this is a fantasy game, that Brittney is not a human. I think that it was certainly right on par for the same discourse that has been coming from them for the last 294 days, that she deserves to be over there and that the United States shouldn't intervene at all to bring her home, to bring an American citizen home, to bring a sister, a wife home.

Wasn't surprised but it was one of those things where you had to block it out because it was joyous and we didn't want to sacrifice that moment.

Melissa Harris-Perry: A bit on that topic, Jemele, let's take a moment and listen to the president at the White House on Thursday.

President Biden: She endured mistreatment in a show trial in Russia with characteristic grit and incredible dignity. She represents the best America and best about America, it is across the board, everything about her.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Jemele, that language, she represents the best about America, across the board, everything about her. Much of the critique or the concern articulated in some corners was that she didn't represent the best of America, that she had been critical of the US in the context of the movement for Black lives and that somehow by having this residual oil in a vape cartridge, that represented not the best of America. Can you speak to that?

Jemele Hill: That's one of the more disappointing narratives is this idea that Brittney Griner is unpatriotic. She served this country well. She's represented this country in the Olympics. She's been an incredible basketball player representing the US on a world stage. People have to understand that critique does not mean that she doesn't love this country. Critique means that she wants this country to be better because she knows it can be better. Her being vocal in the social justice space has nothing to do with how she feels about living in America, being an American. It has everything to do, much like a lot of Black people, with wanting the country to be its best self.

I really hated that that narrative was something that persisted, like Brittney Griner doesn't love this country. It's not true at all. All she's done is represent this country to the fullest and all she has done is want this country to be better.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Amira, we know that she has avoided this nine-year sentence but the last conversation I had around this topic was with Dave Zirin, who'd been reporting from The Nation talking about specifically the conditions in Russian gulags and Russian prison work camps. I have to say I was a little startled to see her without her locks. I'm wondering if you have any sense of what the next weeks and months might mean for Brittney?

Amira Rose Davis: I think that the family has asked for space and peace to process and I think that really needs to be granted. As you said before, we really have no way of knowing the full experiences that Britney has faced. I'm sure, as Dave pointed out, everything was very exaggerated. The sentence she got, even comparable to Russian sentences, was exaggerated, moving to penal colonies of the places she was held. I was also startled seeing her locks cut off. We don't know how that came to be but we do know that cutting off Black hair has long been used as a way to dehumanize, as a way to exact control and to humiliate.

To even see that image was a stark reminder that this has been 294 days of hell. I think that rest and peace and whatever BG and Cherelle need in this process is exactly where we find ourselves. Over the next few weeks, there's going to continue to be a lot of conversation about Russia and about the WNBA players playing overseas and continued discourse around this but I do hope within that there is at least peace for BG and her family.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Your point about her hair, I kept thinking of indigenous girls and boys who were sent to the boarding schools and among the first things that happened was that their hair was shorn. Again, we don't know exactly how that came to be but it is hard to imagine that whatever happened in that context wasn't painful and carried some emotional and physical resonance for her. Jemele, I'm wondering, as we look at the trade, that BG was traded for a bit of a notorious arms dealer, who the Biden administration did initially seem reluctant to give up and wanted to get additional Americans home in this trade, I'm wondering how much that affects our sense of this as a win.

Jemele Hill: I think it does. It's unfortunate but People have to understand something about this. He was getting out in 2029. This was not somebody who, despite the criminality, who did not have a daylight path that was ahead of them. I know a lot of people are weighing, "Why did we do this? What was the cause? Is it too extreme to do it?" I understand those things, but as somebody who is already getting out, it's like, well, whatever you think of this person, they were going to be free. Then you have to say, "What is the cost of having her out and having this exchange now versus later?"

I obviously personally think it was worth it, but I do understand why some Americans are looking at this and saying, "Was this really something that we had to do?" The answer is yes. Even when Trevor Reed was released prior to Brittney in the spring, there was a cost to that as well. We have to understand that, obviously, as a public, we don't know all the details, but when we're weighing American lives, there's going to be a cost to that. We have to be comfortable with giving that up.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Amira, do you want to weigh in on that one as well?

Amira Rose Davis: Yes. I think one of the things we see with that whole narrative is it actually is exactly the reason why Cherelle and the WNBA players and people have been raising their voices about this, because it is this idea that she would've been disposable and not worth enough. What is the amount, how do you quantify that? I think that all of what you're seeing in that discourse is exactly the reason why people were so adamant about raising up Brittney's name and making sure she wasn't forgotten about and understood that she did have worth and value.

Melissa Harris-Perry: We're going to take a quick break right here. When we come back, we're going to talk a little bit more about this, but we're going to talk about who was left behind and the sense of survivor's guilt. There's more on The Takeaway just ahead.

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Melissa Harris-Perry: Welcome back to The Takeaway. I'm Melissa Harris-Perry. We've been talking with Professor Amira Rose Davis and Jemele Hill about the release of Brittney Griner. Now, clearly, there are Americans still there who did not come home. I'm wondering, Jemele, do you have a sense of the extent to which, for Brittney, this might also lead to a bit of survivor's guilt, that she's the one who got out?

Jemele Hill: Yes. The one thing I did love about when her wife spoke, as she was with the president, is that she made it very clear we can't forget about Paul Whelan, who is the other American prisoner whose name and case has come to light through this. I think that's the part that I hope that her and her family pay attention to. Is, if not for her detainment, we actually wouldn't know these names. We wouldn't know about Paul, we wouldn't know about Trevor Reed. As much as she might be feeling that, the good that's come of it is the fact that, in the public consciousness, we've been able to raise other names that people can be aware of, that people can hold the administration accountable for for getting out.

Of course, there's going to be some of that survivor's guilt that you talk about, but I think the greater good is the fact that we have been able to raise their profiles and to make, I think, Americans a little bit more aware of what this process is like, who's being detained, how things happen. I think it's raised a great deal in the public consciousness.

Melissa Harris-Perry: I'll raise, also again, the name of Marc Fogel, the teacher whose circumstances were fairly similar, a long sentence for a very small amount of what was medical marijuana that had been prescribed to him. Amira, I am also wondering here about the circumstances. Obviously, BG was in Russia to work in the off-season. Initially, we had a fair bit of conversation about what it meant that the superstar player, as a college player, as an Olympian, as a WNBA player, still needed to work in the off-season to earn that income. I'm wondering if there are any policy changes coming?

Amira Rose Davis: Well, the WNBA has indicated that they're going to continue to support players playing overseas in Russia, although individual players, like Jonquel Jones, Breanna Stewart, have indicated that they personally will not be doing that. I think there absolutely is a conversation, and it's a conversation that's been ongoing, about the conditions of labor of women athletes in this country, about what support is required by domestic leaves to prevent migratory labor in this way, to prevent going overseas in the off-season because that's how you supplement your income.

I do think the WNBA play such an important role here, not only in the conversation about that but also, to Jemele's previous point, the WNBA Players Association, even in their statement yesterday, also talked about how they are reaffirming their commitment to the Bring Our Family Home campaign. I think what the W has shown that they're able to do is fight for their conditions and improvement on their side in terms of labor, in terms of a league, et cetera, while also laying a blueprint for advocacy and activism that helps everybody, whether we're talking about the Georgia Senate race, or we're talking about something like raising awareness to detained Americans.

I think that all of those conversations will continue to be ongoing because the W has shown that they are going to keep talking and keep using their platform to address all of these issues.

Melissa Harris-Perry: One exactly this point, Jemele, the folks who were sounding the alarm, her teammates, other players of the WNBA, and just more broadly, Black girls. Can you talk a little bit about what BG means to Black girls?

Jemele Hill: That's such a good point that was raised. The women of the WNBA deserve a lot of credit for continuing to be vigilant about, obviously, getting her out, their advocacy. I think that this is because what we have to realize about BG and all the Black women, especially in the WNBA, is they're built different. They are used to having to fight for respect. What she means and why she became a symbol, she's one of the most beloved players in the league. A lot of people know her personality and knowing that, despite being 6'5" or whatever she is that she's very much a gentle giant. I think that was part of why this resonated within that league. She has extraordinary skill, she's one of the best players to ever come through the league, was an incredible college athlete.

She changed the games in so many ways. I think, because of the way that she played, because the way she's received, that's something that resonated with a lot of people, an extraordinary talent that was one of the brightest stars. We can't applaud them enough for the way that they have stood behind this woman because this is a fight they're used to picking. They're used to standing for their respect, they're used to having to really claw and fight for dignity. This was a fight that was very in their wheelhouse. I think that's part of this whole narrative and diatribe that we're having right now.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Amira, put that in the broadest context for me. We often hear, and Jemele has talked about this as well, that notion of just, "Shut up and play," or, "We don't want politics in our sports." Is there a possibility here of an even broader and deeper connection between social activism and sport coming out of this?

Amira Rose Davis: Yes, absolutely. The WNBA has been leading the way, and in many ways, the blueprint for that. Politics and sports has always been intertwined, it will continue to be intertwined. I think that you see here, Black athletes, Black women athletes, are sitting at this intersection of domestic conversations of international and domestic politics, of culture wars, and all these things. The WNBA, as Jemele said, are fighters. They have stepped into that and said they are going to continue to insist on dignity and respect and just being able to be fully human. That joy on Cherelle's face, just the joy of existing and playing and laboring how they love.

All of those things are part of the battle, are part of the fight, and there's absolutely no stopping, no end in sight. I think that this is a joyous moment and I think you're going to continue to see these voices step into that sphere and insist on their full humanity, their dignity, and respect.

Melissa Harris-Perry: From all of us here at The Takeaway, welcome home Brittany Griner. Amira Rose Davis is an assistant professor of Black Studies at the University of Texas, Austin, and co-host of Burn it all Down. Jemele Hill is the author of Uphill: A Memoir, and contributing writer for The Atlantic. Thank you both for joining us.

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