Born in Southern California in July, 1941, Joe began his journey in the civil rights movement as a young man during the 1965 Watts Riots in Los Angeles, initially as a militant leftist in the Black Power movement. He famously debated former Klansman David Duke on the issue of affirmative action at California State University, Northridge in 1996. By the mid-1990s, however, Joe began a lengthy re-examination of his political views that resulted in dramatically-altered political positions. Joe's contemporary political views often stood at odds with the beliefs with which he was long associated, and for the past several years, he identified himself as an independent political conservative.
http://www.laobserved.com/archive/2016/08/joe_hicks.php
LA Observed