Coronavirus in the Delta, Episode 1: Greenville

Dr. Satvinder Singh finds something comforting in the long stretch of flat fields and row upon row of crops that he sees as he drives around the Mississippi Delta. Reminds them of where he grew up. I'm from a small town from India, my dad was a farmer and due to help him in the farms. I don't do farming here, I don't have time, but when I came here, I see the surroundings and everything, the way I brought up. But recently, starting in March, the drive that Dr. Singh takes through the Delta really started to stress him out, because Dr. Singh is an infectious disease doctor. As best I can tell, he's one of the only infectious disease doctors in the entire Mississippi Delta, an area just a little smaller than the state of New Jersey. And so, Dr. Singh, perhaps more than anyone else, knew what could happen when the new coronavirus came here. This virus is spreading so fast, it's very difficult to control it. Our Mississippi is less than 1,000 right now, but I'm not sure how long we will be holding it. If we don't stop, it is just overwhelming. By late March, there were about 188,000 cases of coronavirus in the United States. In here in Mississippi, there were nearly 1,000 cases and 20 deaths. But the story of the virus in the Delta was only just beginning. This is in the dark, coronavirus in the Delta. I'm Madeline Baren. Most of the time, I'm the lead reporter and host of an investigative podcast. Our last season was about the case of Curtis Flowers, a man in Mississippi who was on death throw. After a reporting came out, Curtis' conviction got overturned, he's now out of prison and living out of state. The in-the-dark team had been working on a third season about something completely different. But then, the new coronavirus hit the United States and everything changed. I started hearing from people I'd met when I lived in Mississippi, getting texts and calls, not about Curtis Flowers, but about the virus. And it made me wonder what life was like there now. In this place, I'd gotten to know so well, so I decided to find out. I spent the past two months, along with the rest of the in-the-dark team, reporting on coronavirus in the Mississippi Delta. The poorest part of Mississippi, one of the poorest places in the entire country. Of course, we can't go to Mississippi right now, so we've been talking to people on the phone instead. All right. I am recording. Hi, this is Natalie. And this is Parker, hi, this is Madeline Barron, calling from Minnesota. We've been gathering stories about people living through this unprecedented time of fear and anxiety. We wanted to look at how life has changed, yes for a nurse in the ICU, or a doctor in the ER, but also for a football coach, a musician, a guy in prison. We've all read the big stories, the terrifyingly overwhelming stories. We wanted to try something different, to tell individual stories, one by one, of people trying to live in this really hard time, trying to make decisions, trying to get by, in a situation that none of us have really faced before. Well, we're surviving. We're pretty much their family. It is out of control, you know, let them do whatever they want to do. So you've written a song like in the last week? I'm telling you all right now, we're going to play football. You guys are trying to graduate all the time. It's critical right now that you stay on top of this. I get what you're saying, but it's like, given the pandemic, I mean, like, he could die in there. What if that happens? It's a judge. Episode one, Greenville. Dr. Singh ended up in Mississippi through a kind of unexpected path. Back at the start of his career, he wanted to be a doctor in California, but the process to get licensed was taking so long. I did everything, give all the documents, and I was still waiting. He started getting calls from a recruiter, talking to him about a place he'd never even heard of. Greenville, Mississippi. The local hospital there was looking for a doctor. I said, well, I'm not going to miss you, okay? I have not heard about that state, and I don't know how to spell it, but, you know, he was just telling me, you know, you don't have to spend a penny. You just get an experience of how to interview for a real interview, okay, you just try it. No, I said, no, I don't want to try it. So you know, he was so stubborn, he used to call me every day, in the morning, every day in the morning. Finally, one day, Dr. Singh decided he was sick of just waiting around, and when the recruiter called him the next morning, Dr. Singh told him, actually, I will come down for an interview. He figured that if he got the job, he'd stay maybe a few months. I asked him only one question, that if I leave how many months or weeks advance notice, I give you. That was 16 years ago. Dr. Singh took the job in Greenville and never left. It's a small town, but it meets my requirement, you know, big towns, you don't know anybody, nobody knows you, but this is good, actually, I have a good relation with town. Most people know me, I know them, I get the graduating from here in the schools, I don't feel like a stranger here. Dr. Singh cares for patients with all kinds of infectious diseases, pneumonia, heart infections, brain infections, and his job is basically non-stop. When it's the middle of the night, and a nurse wants to know what to do about a patient whose infection is suddenly getting worse, they call Dr. Singh. So that's what he's been doing for years. But then three months ago, Dr. Singh started tracking the striking new virus, the new coronavirus that was spreading in China. And what he was hearing was frightening. This virus is so contagious, it just needs this very small amount and it just takes over the whole body. The first time we talked with Dr. Singh was late March. Already, there were a few cases of coronavirus in Greenville, including some patients at the hospital where Dr. Singh works. By that point, Mississippi had already taken some steps to slow the spread of the virus. The state's governor, Tate Reeves, had shut down the schools. He'd urge people to wash their hands regularly. And Governor Reeves had advised people to follow the guidelines issued by the CDC. The people should avoid crowds and keep at least six feet away from each other. But as we were talking with Dr. Singh in late March, it was clear that that wasn't what Dr. Singh was seeing as he drove around town. I'm not sure how much the community understand the impact of their disease. I mean, I just came from the hospital, but I saw on my way in the Wal-Mart, it is full parking load. It is full. Wal-Mart, Kroger, Lowe's, the parking load was full like it's a black Friday. Dr. Singh knew what could happen. All these people who seemed healthy right now could be spreading the virus. And he was especially worried about them spreading it to people who are already sick. People with compromised immune systems. People at a higher risk of dying from this disease. And Dr. Singh felt he needed to do something. He needed to convince the city of Greenville to shut down. Keep in mind, this is before the Governor issued a stay at home order. This is before lots of places were forced to shut down. Dr. Singh started making calls and having other people in his office make calls too. He started with a kind of business that was urking him almost as much as the megastores with their full parking lots. Greenville's gyms. Or people were still gathering to work out. Right now it's not time to train for witness. Right now it's to stay healthy at home. First, Dr. Singh called the manager of Extreme Fitness 24/7. And he was a nice guy in the morning I called him at 5 o'clock. He called me back. And he said he closed until for the notice and that's good. Then Dr. Singh actually sent his office manager in person to the local YMCA. The manager talked to a trainer there who didn't love the idea of closing up shop. But eventually the YMCA shut down too. And Dr. Singh called the mayor of Greenville, Mississippi. A man named Eric Simmons. Simmons is all about unity. He ran on a platform of uniting the town. His campaign slogan was "We Are One", which was also the name of his campaign song. The mayor Simmons is a Democrat and he's black and that's the norm here in the Delta to have black elected officials who are Democrats. The Delta is majority African American and unlike most of the rest of Mississippi, it's a pretty blue place. Mayor Eric Simmons runs a law firm with his brother, his twin, Derek Simmons, Eric and Derek. [BLANK_AUDIO] and Simmons law firm. When he first ran for mayor in 2015, he won his seat with 73% of the vote. No one even bothered to challenge him when he ran for reelection last year. I tried to reach the mayor when I started reporting this story, but he didn't call me back right away. Dr. Singh had the same problem when he tried to call the mayor. I support his secretary, I told him the problem. I said, I just passed by Wal-Mart, Lowes and they're all full like Black Friday. So we need to do something, but he didn't call me back. So two days later, I called him again. We again left a message with the secretary and he did not call me. The mayor wasn't returning his calls and Dr. Singh was getting frustrated. The thing is there is no other priority. There is no other important thing that needs to be taken care of and he should respond. And even if he does not like our idea, he can give us some idea and we can work together. I have not heard anything from him. On March 30th, Mayor Eric Simmons finally did something that made Dr. Singh feel a bit better, though they didn't end up talking until later. The mayor's office released a three-page statement announcing all kinds of new rules to try to slow the spread of the coronavirus in Greenville. The city announced it was closing all city tennis courts, golf courses and outdoor basketball courts. It was limiting access to city hall and it was clarifying an earlier order that prohibited people from gathering in groups of more than 10. The statement clarified that it applied not to just going out, but also to any private gatherings. The statement also strongly encouraged people to self-quarantine for 14 days if they'd recently traveled. And these all seemed like good ideas, common sense policies, to help keep the people of Greenville as safe as possible. But then, a week later, the mayor went a step further. He announced an order, a new rule for the town. "Effective immediately today, April 7th, 2000." That quite rapidly would lead to civil disobedience. "This is the most important story right now in America." Roadblocks set up by police. "I'm a city of license, I'm giving you out the turn of this law." "It's totally outrageous." Thousands of dollars in fine. "Your constitutional rights are gone now. Well, I don't know what country he thinks he could live." A lawsuit, and even the involvement of the U.S. Department of Justice. All in the small city of Greenville, Mississippi, population 29,898. "Effective immediately today, April 7th, 2020. The Greenville City Council puts in place an executive order that all church buildings cloned for the mayor of an incredibly religious city right in the middle of the Bible Belt. And basically just canceled church." "Hi, this is David Remnick. This fall, join us for the 27th annual New Yorker Festival, returning October 23rd through the 25th. 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The City of Greenville's full order clarified that churches could still use their buildings to broadcast services online provided that the production team was fewer than 10 people. But everything else had been banned. And not just regular in-person church. There's a kind of service that sprung up at churches across the country in the past couple of months, drive-in services. The idea is that people can pull up in front of a church in their cars, windows up, turn on their radios, and listen to their pastor preaching over a radio signal. It's a way to go to church without going in church, social distancing for Sunday mornings. The city's order banned those kinds of services too. Hi, I was trying to reach Pastor Scott. Arthur Scott is the pastor of a church called Temple Baptist in Greenville. While back, he was listening to Christian radio, and he heard a story about a church in South Carolina that was using low-frequency radio to do drive-in services. Not possible. That's a great idea. They can do it over there. Why could we do it here? And so we fixed the thing where I can preach in my pulpit and the people can drive up in their cars. And I preached on the radio for about a half an hour, and then my folks drive home. We've been doing it for the last three weeks, because most of our folks are over 65, 70 years old. I'm 82 years old, and most of our people are older people. And so most of them don't have all that Facebook, and if I don't preach to them like that, they won't be able to give me anything. So you're not having contact, like physical contact with any of your parishioners? No, I preach in the pulpit, in the church, and then the people drive up in their cars and listen in their cars, and then they drive home. So you're preaching in an empty church? Well, I was, but some of us my daughter and some of them put Mickey Mouse in there and Big Bird and Bears, and so I preach in the stuffed animals. In the pews? In the pew. Oh my gosh. Did that help you kind of better visualize your parishioners? Yeah, well, they just did it kind of as a pick me up for me, because I can't preach to no one by people in the church. Yeah, it's weird. It's gotta be weird. And then then last Wednesday night, I was preaching on the Queen of Shiba in the Bible. I was preaching on the Queen of Shiba. Pastor Scott was in the church, so we had no way of knowing what was going on in the parking lot outside. Chris Owens was in the parking lot of Temple Baptist that night, listening to Pastor Scott Sermon on his radio. As soon as Owens saw the police pull up, he turned on Facebook live and started recording. Is this an official ticket? Yes, it's official ticket. You get a copy. The court date, eight June of 2020 and 9 a.m. at 302 Main Street. Thank you, sir. You have blessed night. Just handed a ticket by a man with no gloves. gave me an ink pen to sign it that he was not wearing gloves. They forced us to make human contact. Your city dollars that work for you. We had 20, 25 cars and everyone got one. And some were two in a car and husband and wife got them. Oh, they each got one. Each got one. Yes, I got a $500 ticket too. And my wife, hey, listen, my wife's got lung cancer and they gave her a $500 ticket too. Was she in the car or was she inside the church? She's in the car. No, she's in the car. Oh wow. Okay, so you've got a $1000 total fine here. Yeah, I do. Are you going to pay it? No. How come? I'm not paying tyranny. To me, that's tyranny. Try to stop the word of God. I'm not promoting that. I'm not going to pay it. I mean, listen, I and 35 countries around the world and a lot of communist countries and I've never seen nothing like that. We're meeting in cars with the wind is up. You drive, "Hey, you drive, every place you go, you drive." I mean, we'll be the difference, driving up the church, you're driving up to Wal-Mart's. I don't understand because the static restaurant's right down the street and you can drive down there and sit in the car, but then you can't come to church and do that. To me, it's important because people need Jesus and so we're just trying to preach a gospel and get folks saved and trying to be a blessing. That's all we're doing. Has the mayor called you or have you talked to the mayor? I've tried to call the mayor. I got a secretary. I never did get him. I haven't seen anything personal against him because I don't even know. You can't have something personal against people if you don't know him. I don't even know him. I've been here 45 years. I've never made a complaint, never been to the city hall, right, but about nothing. I'm not going to war with nobody. I'm not trying to fight nobody. I'm not trying to. I'm not bitter against the mayor or anybody else, but we can't take this land down when they try to stop you from preaching. But the bad part about it is my preacher for him to cross town. They've sent 20 cop cars over their last night to his church and they shut him down. They shut him down all together last night. Wow. What church was that? This is the King James Bible Baptist Church, Aaron Greenville. After I got off the phone with Pastor Scott, I looked up King James Bible Baptist Church. It's a super small church. The entire congregation is just like 30 people. The church's slogan is a place where the excitement hasn't exited. Yes, this is King James Bible Baptist Church, where Pastor Hamilton, where I'm the pastor of the church at. I'm a good citizen. I ain't breaking no law, ain't selling no drugs. I'm just preaching the word of God. Unlike Pastor Scott, Pastor Hamilton goes outside to preach to people in their cars. And Pastor Hamilton was about to do his regular drive and service when the cops showed up and the pastor took out his phone and started recording. Look at this y'all. See the Greenville on the church property. Look at all these police cars here. They got more police here at King James Bible Baptist Church and they do nests of street, Kayla Street, Carver Circle. Look at all the police cars. In the video you see a row of Greenville police cars. There are tons of them, nine or more. Look at this y'all. It's more, it's more police pulling up. Ain't they done? A police officer gets out of one of the cars. He's wearing a face mask and he has a piece of paper in his hand. Maybe a copy of the city's order. We're gonna get tickets. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Another cop walks up and starts talking to Pastor Hamilton. No. The police officer was saying we have an order that says your rights are suspended. Our right don't come from authority. It comes from the blood Bible. So the authority does not have the right over the Constitution. The U.S. Constitution that was given to us by our forefather, take it away. Eric Simmons can't take it away in order police officers. It can't. It's hard to make out, but the police officer just said that your rights can be suspended by the military. No, it can't. Hey, look at y'all. They don't have this when I'm murderers in Greenville, y'all. When I sold drugs, I never seen this man police officers. When I was a drug, I never seen that man, y'all, come here. Never. We in Greenville, Mississippi, the Bible built, the Bible built of America, y'all, Facebook. Look at all these police officers. When people come in crimes, they hear a mess with a church. They hear a mess with a pastor, one of the best citizens. Now even more officers have gotten out of their cars. They're standing around watching Pastor Hamilton. Look at this, y'all. Detective and everything. Every officer on duty is at the King Jane Byer byer church. It's all the police here. Hooper's on the streets. Pastor Hamilton turns his phone around, so he's looking right at the camera. What happened to America, Facebook? I just want to let y'all know this. We have 20 police cars come to the church on the church property. Trying to tell us we can't have service. If y'all don't wake up America, our freedom can be revoked. This is America. This video from this tiny church blew up on Facebook. People commented from all over the country. And in the world of conservative media, this video was big. The story made the daily caller and the federalist and the Washington Examiner and even Tucker Carlson show on Fox News, where an audience of approximately three million people was introduced to Pastor Hamilton. Pastor, thanks so much for coming on. I would like to know, and if you know the name, I hope you'll say it on the air, who made this decision to hassle your church with armed police officers? What politician decided that was a good idea? Eric Simmons. He's a mayor. He's a supporter of Joe Biden. He made a decision to not have drive in service. I can tell you, when 20 plus cars came to our church, we felt intimidate. We felt frightened. And I heard about this in China. I heard this about income. After seeing all this, I called Pastor Hamilton's church, King James Bible Baptist. But the voicemail was full. Later that day, my phone rang. Hello, this is Madeline. Pastor Hamilton had seen my number on his church's caller ID and called it back. In the last couple of days, we'd had hundreds and hundreds of calls, but I'm trying to call you about it back. I was like, what's about to call me back? I don't know. We live up to date, but we try. Pastor Hamilton told me this had been the busiest 48 hours of his life, but he told me he felt like God had prepared him for this moment. I mean, call the pastor and call the priest. That's my calling. That's not something I volunteer for. It's not a career. To me, it's a calling. Is that your phone ringing off the hook in the background? Yes, I know. I need to do. I need to unhook this phone. Some of my phone calls. Oh, no, no, no. I didn't mean to. It's just a sign of how busy this day is. How many phone calls you're getting? Yes, but it's a blessing. I talked to my manager. I see a car at a dealership in Bigsburg, and I'm manager. He respect me. In fact, my manager is going to start coming to church here. Okay. Yeah. And so, but he said, Charles, embrace the publicity you're receiving and use the platform in a great way. So I'm going to embrace what the Lord is doing. In the days that followed, Pastor Hamilton's Facebook audience continued to grow. And then, pastor Scott from the church across town filed a lawsuit against Mayor Simmons. The lawsuit asked the court to declare the city's order unconstitutional and overturn it. I tried calling the mayor again, but I couldn't reach him. And all of this was happening in the days leading up to the biggest holiday in the Christian religion. Easter. An Easter that had somehow, in just a few days, turned from a solemn religious holiday to something else, some kind of showdown. So what do you think's going to happen tomorrow, Easter? I don't know what going to happen, but we will have service. And how are you feeling about the fact that you're going to be back there tomorrow? I'm excited that we have a service tomorrow, but in the back of my mind, I'm wondering like, will they come again? I have no idea what's going to happen. Your guess is as good as mine. Across town, Pastor Scott was also getting ready. All I'm going to be doing Sundays, what I've done for 45 years, get up and preach, you know? Yeah. There's some hills just not worth dying on, but this, this hill's worth dying on. And so, are you willing or prepared to go to jail for this? I'm willing prepared and able to go to jail. Have you thought about that? Yeah. I've thought about it that jail don't scare me. Well, it scares me. People dying that don't hear the word of God and dying and going to hell burn forever. That scares me worse than going to jail. And then it was Easter. Testing, testing, testing. It is Sunday, Easter morning. I am in my apartment. And this is the weirdest Easter I think I've ever had. Normally, I'd be with my family. Instead, I am about to watch a Facebook live video of a Baptist service in Greenville, Mississippi alone. All right. Let me see if what's going on at Temple Baptist Church, the White Baptist Church. Oh, they are alive with their Easter Sunday service. Welcome to the Sunday morning service of Temple Baptist Church. Sister, Jesus has risen. Pastor Scott is at the pulpit inside the church, up at the altar, in front of a large wooden cross. He's wearing a bright yellow suit jacket. On the front of his podium there's a tidy little sign. It says don't quit. I have a little statement that I'd like to read. There's many of you are aware of a lawsuit was filed on Friday and while I don't want to take up much time on this, I felt I must briefly comment on it. We filed suit to protect our fundamental freedoms. Our fundamental right to worship our Lord and Savior. This is absolutely nothing to do with monetary gain. This is everything to do with our freedom. Nothing more nothing lasts but freedom. So with that, let's get on to the main reason we're here today to worship Almighty God to thank him for sending his son so that we might employ meanwhile across town. Pastor Hamilton is on bike outside in the rain like under this like covering in the elbow. So he's wearing his suit and he's talking right to the camera. Okay I just looked online and there's a tornado watch effective right now. Heavy thunderstorms. The rain is coming down. He is teaching in a thunderstorm in the Delta with a tornado watch on Easter Sunday in the middle of the global pandemic. There is a lot happening. Oh my gosh. I'm gonna go in y'all. And Pastor Hamilton turns as the thunder is crashing down and runs inside. Easter morning had come to a close in Greenville, Mississippi. No one had gone to jail. No one had gotten arrested. No one even got a fine. The day after Easter, Mayor Simmons gave a press conference to address the controversy about driving church services. He walked out a city hall wearing a surgical mask. Walked to the podium and took the mask off. Thank you all for coming to this press conference. A train rumbled by. The mayor said so the thing had gotten out of control. Recently a smear campaign against me in the city that I love has begun to suggest that I would take an action to unlawfully deny someone the practice of his or her faith is ridiculous. He said he'd actually gotten death threats. The recent threats on my life are incomprehensible, incomprehensible, helpful, and divisive in a time where we should be recognized. And he announced that in an effort to quote, move forward in a united front. The city would not require anyone to pay the fines issued on April 7th for the violations of the city council order. But the mayor was adamant about one thing. The Greenville City Council order expands and will stand at this time. In the city of Greenville, Mississippi, driving church services were still illegal. The next day, the US Department of Justice, led by the highest law enforcement official in the country, Attorney General William Barr, got involved. The department filed a statement of interest in the lawsuit that Pastor Scott had filed against the mayor. The DOJ was on the side of Pastor Scott. The statement said that the facts of the case quote strongly suggest that the city's actions target religious conduct. The Attorney General was saying that it appeared that the mayor had singled out churches for more strict treatment than other kinds of places, like fast food drive-thrues. The statement said it appeared that what the mayor had done violated the Constitution. The very next day, the mayor announced that the city would allow driving church services, as long as parishioners stayed in their cars with the windows rolled out. The driving pastors had won. I finally reached Mayor Simmons after the order had been walked back. He was at his law office in Greenville. I tried to ask him why he changed his mind. I wondered if he thought he'd made a mistake, but what the mayor really wanted to talk about was how unfairly he felt he'd been treated in this whole thing. Well, for me, I'm here as a Christian, as a vessel to do God's will, and I'm serving people. You know, I ain't used to protect that over 30,000 folks that we have here in the city of Greenville. You get what I'm saying. People had Jesus Christ and the folks who did were Christian folks. You get them telling you, and then they crucified them. And they crucified. Why is this gotten so heated? You know, you have, I think, a false narrative. The false narrative you're talking about is people saying that you are trying to attack religion. Yeah, and when I ran for mayor in 2016, I ran a mayor to put on the whole armor of God, and put on the best breastplate, and I'm going all of that. I'm a God fear Christian. A wife, a kid, we prayed them on into no day in the evening. We attend church every week. And what I'm charged to do is do the right thing. You know, the commandments and love their neighbor is that stuff. It would be rest and love for us to see fallations, for us to know of those fallations, for us to know that people live up in place that reason, and for us not to act. Oh, we're here to make sure that we protect and save the lives, and that's everybody. That's everyone. We're charged to do that for everyone. Despite their motivation or their agendas or false narratives that they're continuing to put out. And you had mentioned, I think, at a press conference that your family had received death threats, is that right? Yes, we have a series of death threats. We have a Facebook post of someone saying that they wish they blew a hole in my chest, and they would do that. They will hole in your chest. Yes, I'll hole in my chest. Yes, ma'am. And right now, we do have a detailed security at my home, yes, ma'am. Oh, wow. So you actually have had to have security at your house? Yes, yes, ma'am. It's just insanity. The mayor told me that the city issued its April 7th order, because some people at drive-in church services weren't being particularly careful. We had a number of violations of driving services. Did that folks get out their cars, congregate in the hood, and doing things like that? All right? Uh-huh. Not following all your distancing. They just did not tell you. And mayor Simons told me the city didn't have enough police to monitor every church and town on Sundays to make sure people weren't getting out of their cars. As for why the city changed the order, according to the mayor, it didn't have anything to do with the media attention or the lawsuit or the hundreds of comments on Facebook condemning him. Basically, the mayor said that the week after Easter, he asked the governor of Mississippi for guidance on how to handle driving church services. And he said the governor told him that driving services were actually safe, as long as people keep their windows up. The mayor didn't say the order was a mistake or went too far. And he said, if you want to know whether the city of Greenville is doing a good job handling coronavirus, you should look at the numbers. You know, we look at transmission rate. We have done a great job in reducing that. If these orders were not in place again, we have not taken those both steps. I think we will be well over 100 cases. And what are your numbers right now? We have 71 cases. We have three deaths. And I cannot play politics with the lives of folks here at the city of Greenville. And I will not play politics. I interest the health and safety of over 30,000 residents in the city of Greenville in order to prevent and spread COVID-19 and protect and save last. This is exactly what I will do. After Mayor Simmons announced that the order had been changed, it gave Pastor Hamilton a call one last time. We talked about the Bible study he'd held the night before and about the mass of storms that had rolled through on Easter Sunday. What was going on out there? Man, it was thunder and lightning storm. It almost seemed like the tornado is about to come and sweep the place up. It was so dark. And like the more I preached louder, the thunder in that. And I'm not, I don't like that thunder and lightning. I'm like a big kid. I run when I hear thunder and lightning. So I kept trying to preach, kept trying to preach after a while. I like, man, I can't preach outside. But to me, I know God made lightning and thunder and but they're bringing a little fear. When I reached him, Pastor Hamilton was still celebrating the news about the driving services. Today, been a very emotional day. He saw it out this morning. I was very emotional in my car. And now today, I can see back like, man, God have really performed a miracle. Like last Friday, the sound was in a fight. This Friday, we had a victory. So to me, like, seven days have brought back a, brought about a big difference in seven days. And today, I'm really actually able to look back and see what I have done just in a short few days. Are you talking to me, by the way, from your job at the car dealership? - Yes, I'm at this, I'm at work right now. - What's it like juggling, selling cars and dealing with the drive the insurance service? What's it been like? - Last week, honestly, I've got all what's going on. My mind was going on and Greenville was going on. The legal process was going on with the city, what's going on with this and that. And so I haven't really been interested in selling the car. Like that drive really just came back yesterday. Like, you know what, I need to sell some car. - What are you gonna do the rest of your day? - Hopefully right now, I'm just came from Chick-fil-A. And I sold one car so far today. Hopefully I can sell two more before the day out with and hopefully the rest of the day, I want to sell a few cars. - All right, well, it's been great to talk to you and yeah, I wish you all the best. - Thank you so much for giving me opportunity to be doing an interview with you. I pray that God bless you for it. - This past Sunday, both Pastor Scott and Pastor Hamilton, held their drive in services. - Welcome to the Sunday morning service. Temple Baptist Church hearing this time. The sun was out. The cops were not. - He's always glad to have folks listen to preaching. - Pastor Scott thanked his parishioners for joining him though he couldn't see them. - He had to win his up. - It's so glad to have you today. - And he introduced a song that made its way from the church through the radio to the speakers of the cars of his parishioners outside. ♪ All of my friends that I love yesterday ♪ (singing in foreign language) - In the dark, coronavirus in the Delta is reported and produced by me, Madeline Barron, managing producer Samara Fremark, producer Natalie Jablanski, associate producer Raymond Tungacar, and reporter Parker Jesko. This series was edited by Catherine Winter. The editor-in-chief of APM reports is Chris Worthington. This episode was mixed by Corey Schruppel. Music for this series is by Gary Meister. Coming up next week, we'll take you inside parchment prison and hear from inmates about how they're trying to stay safe. ♪ As it worked here was done ♪ ♪ Gone home, gone home ♪ ♪ Gone that gone home ♪ - Hi, this is David Remnick. We'll be joined by Conan O'Brien and Patrick Michael Douglas, Colson Whitehead, Matthew Brotteret, King Princess, Aaron Sorkin, Hannah Einbinder, Lorna Simpson, and many more. You can see the full lineup at NewYorker.com/festival. - Hi, I'm Nicole Feltz, global fashion news and features director at Vogue and co-host of the run-through podcast. and Cho Manati. - From Vanity Fair, I'm Mark Aduchis, and I want to tell you about their new show, Fair Game. On every episode of the Fair Game, I'll sit down with a leading character in our culture, from the worlds of Hollywood, politics, style, Silicon Valley, and beyond. Fair Game is a deep dive into some of the personalities that shape our world and the stories that you need to hear. Think everyone and everything that you'd read about in the pages of Vanity Fair. So join me, Mark Aduchi, on YouTube, VanityFair.com, and wherever you listen to podcasts. It's all fair game.