Hey @Mjbcs and welcome to the forums!
Kali is a really good distro, but it’s configured for penetration purposes, AKA hacking. If you’re not careful, you can get in trouble with it.
The most secure (defensive) distros I’m aware of are Qubes (due to its heavy virtualization), Kodachi, or Tails.
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Hey @vasileios
About the link at the end of your post - I had already found that article and followed those instructions but I was given the black screen. So basically everything else is moot. If I can’t even boot a little flash drive to ‘try’ Ubuntu I won’t be able to install it. The instructions you’ve given on partitioning are very appreciated though.
The distros you suggested might work as an alternative to Ubuntu though. I may check them out after I take a breather.
Just to be clear, when you say ‘safe’ mode you mean ‘recovery’ mode? Or are those two different things?
Thanks!
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Hey @Fire!
I tried the above boot method on my 2019 MacBook Pro 16" which has the T2 chip and it worked. Which makes me think that your Mac didn’t like either the app you used to flash the USB or the USB thumb drive itself. I’ve encountered both situations before, several times.
Also, when I mention “safe”, yes, it’s the recovery mode. This is mentioned different per distribution. Some call it “fallback” - others call it "recovery’. 
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Who’s building and maintaining the tools in Kali?