In this compelling episode, we delve into the intricate dynamics of running for Congress, as shared by our distinguished guest who likens the experience to launching a business. The conversation unfolds to reveal the surprising aspects of this political endeavor, particularly the invaluable connections forged within diverse communities. We explore the pressing economic challenges faced by constituents, emphasizing the need for policies that prioritize affordability and opportunity, especially in education and healthcare. Our guest articulates a profound commitment to restoring democratic principles, countering the current administration's detrimental impacts, and fostering an inclusive environment for all citizens. Ultimately, this discussion serves as a clarion call for civic engagement, underscoring the significance of every individual's voice in shaping the future of our democracy.

The dialogue traverses the intricate and multifaceted terrain of contemporary political dynamics, particularly as they pertain to the experience of running for Congress. The guest elucidates his journey thus far, revealing that the endeavor is akin to launching a business, rife with unexpected challenges and opportunities for community engagement. He emphasizes the importance of understanding local issues within a diverse constituency, which comprises numerous towns and cities, thus underscoring the democratic value of direct interaction with the electorate. The discussion further delves into the incumbent administration's policies, contrasting them with the aspirational goals of the guest. He articulates a vision for a more inclusive democracy, one that prioritizes the rights of the vulnerable and ensures equitable access to essential services such as healthcare and education. The conversation culminates in a nuanced examination of the necessity for balance within government, particularly in light of current political polarization. The guest's commitment to serve the public interest above personal gain resonates strongly, offering a refreshing counter-narrative to the prevailing political rhetoric.

Takeaways:

• Running for Congress is akin to launching a business; it requires strategic positioning and a robust support system.
• The campaign experience is enlightening, revealing the profound challenges and rewards of engaging with diverse communities.
• A commitment to democracy necessitates prioritizing the needs of the people over personal or partisan interests.
• Addressing economic disparities involves innovative solutions, particularly in housing and education, to enhance community well-being.
• The political landscape demands a return to bipartisan collaboration, as polarization hampers progress and effective governance.
• Engagement in the electoral process is crucial; every vote counts towards shaping a fairer, more equitable society.

Foreign.

Welcome.

Thank you.

Thanks for having me.

Nice to meet you.

It's nice to meet you, too.

So before we.

We started recording, I asked you what was running for Congress like, and you had said that it.

It was something that you had to be in the right place for, and it was a lot like starting a business, you know.

For those of us who've never run for Congress and may never run for Congress, what would you say is the most surprising part about running for Congress?

Just meet all people.

We have 39 cities and towns in the district, and it's really to be president.

The community understand what these issues are.

So, you know, I'm only a few weeks in here, but already, you know, getting up to speed.

You know, I think it's, again, it's kind of an interesting experience in terms of what it takes to run a campaign of this scale.

It does take a lot of people, but I think it's also the best of democracy.

We have a wide open field, and it's going to be.

I'm looking forward to the race and getting my message out during the course of the campaign.

So we currently are involved, I would guess, just based on your background, that you're in a precarious position, at least a little bit.

Am I correct on that one?

In terms of what?

Well, we have a quote, unquote businessman in the White House who has positioned himself as an outsider.

Um, and we've kind of seen how that's gone.

And speaking from someone who is definitely an outsider, it does not seem to be going well for us.

And so there, there's, there's been in the past, I'm old enough to remember, you know, the Ross Perots and some of the other candidates that were outsiders that tried to come in and, and work, try to be different than the system, and it didn't go well for them.

And now we have one that's an outsider that came in and is trying to ruin.

So I guess my question is, how are you going to be combating that differentiation without the possibilities of similarities, given that you are the businessman coming in as the outsider?

Yeah, well, I think it's a matter of priorities and a matter of what you actually want to accomplish when you get into office.

And we've seen what the Trump administration has been, and what they have done is taken away basic rights and attempted to destroy democracy and taking things away from the most vulnerable people and cut back on things like health care and education and certainly not solve the economic issues.

And so, you know, that's the reason why I'm running.

And yes, I do have a legal background and business background.

I've been a lawyer for over, you know, 25 years.

And in financial services regulation, I started my own business from scratch, you know, built my business from the ground up, was able to employ several people and get things done from that perspective.

But really the reason why I'm running is I want to give people opportunity and want to kind of move forward in helping rebuild our economy.

I mean, any metric you look at, affordability is a real concern.

Especially here in Massachusetts in the 6th district, people can't afford to live, they can't afford housing, they can't afford child care, basic items such as groceries and whatnot.

Education has been cut back.

We need to rethink and reform education, provide people opportunities, everything from vocational schools, across the board board and different types of ways to build a career and build a business.

And then healthcare under any metric, we've seen the prices of healthcare, we need to protect healthcare, we need to expand the Affordable Care act, we need Medicare for all.

And so really it's priorities.

One is difference for me from.

And I've been frustrated what's going on not only with the Trump administration, but politicians in general, politicians with broken promises, politicians acting in both best their own self interest versus the interests of others.

You know, I remember when government was public service and you know, that's the way I look at it in terms of if I'm lucky enough to be elected, I'm going to be going in to serve the people and serving the best interest and creating opportunities for others.

Now, where the business comes in is that it's a whole different perspective.

I'm someone who's had a career in private sector and been able to accomplish things by building coalitions, by working with other people, which you don't see in Congress today.

You see real disconnect.

You see a polarizing of politics where you have the far left and the far right and nobody's meeting in the middle.

So I think the ability to get things done and I've done that in business sector.

I worked with emerging technologies and created new regulations.

I worked on financial services regulation post financial crisis and implementing consumer protection regulations.

I think taking that experience and bringing it into government is a real positive thing and it gives a whole other dynamic because right now, politics and the government in general, and certainly the Trump administration is not working for everyone.

No.

And I think it's important that you note that, you know, the.

I think you're acknowledging one of the issues that I found with The Trump administration is.

It isn't just that he's an outsider, it's that he's an outsider and he seems to be intent upon breaking the system, not making the system better.

And I think that that's an important distinction that needs to be made from any candidate coming in, is that, you know, the system isn't perfect.

And the whole purpose of this podcast is to work on perfecting the union, knowing that that may or may not ever happen, but that we can work towards those goals, that we can come up with the ideas that are going to make a more just, equitable, and certainly beautiful country and society.

But, you know, burning the house down to accomplish that goal isn't the answer.

Is it incremental?

I mean, you have a leg.

Background precedent is there for a reason.

It's to build on and to continue to build ideas that will help move the society forward.

It's a slow process, it's a frustrating process, but I think it needs to be for the sake of the benefit of the country, because moving too fast and breaking things has gotten us a trillion dollars more in debt than we needed to be.

We've had departments like DOGE that ended up costing more than what they saved that basically just break.

And now there's questionable data privacy issues and some other miscellaneous things that are problems.

And I guess when you're combining all of those things, you're going, we want the country to be better, not broken.

And I think that that's a big difference between what the right versus the left is talking about.

Should we be progressing faster, further?

Yeah, certainly.

I think that we're moving too slow in some areas and not slow enough in.

Tell me about, you know, as far as what your goals are for Congress, like, what is your purpose in running, rather than just you're going to be better than someone else.

Yeah, well, you raised a lot of good points.

I mean, I agree with you.

One, that our democracy is under attack.

And we do have.

But we do have a great form of government, right?

We have these three branches of government, but right now there's no checks and balances.

So it's important and incumbent upon us, especially as Democrats, to take it back.

You know, we're seeing the courts being heavily politicized and whatnot, and so there's no checks and balances.

And what we're doing is, you know, we're destroying the great ideals that we have and the great parts of parts of our democracy.

And my goal, really is to make sure that we protect democracy, make sure that we're providing people opportunity.

It starts with those kitchen table issues which are, you know, what do everybody, everybody, you know, whether you're Democrat, Republican, you care about the same things when you wake up, wake up in the morning, is make sure that I have a good job, that I can take care of my family, that I can have a good education.

So I'm really focused.

Job one is for me is the economy, right?

Affordability.

We need to bring costs down.

We need to work on making sure that people here in Massachusetts, we have a beautiful community.

Our sixth district, we have coastal communities, we have a lot of great cities and towns in our district.

But now, right now, you can't afford to live here.

And any metric you look at, you know, the cost of living across the board, it's really too high.

So we need to figure out, you know, especially housing in particular, we need to increase our housing supply.

We need to make sure that we can bring the cost of housing down and other costs in terms of providing credits to people, in terms of providing incentives for people to stay in the state.

In fact, you know, with this, young people are leaving the state in record numbers between ages 26 and 35.

There's been a lot of discussion.

So I think we need to make sure make a destination again here, especially in Massachusetts, but across the country, we need to be looking at how can we encourage businesses within our communities of all shapes and sizes or all the way from small business that are being very difficult for small business owners to get lending programs and access to capital.

It's very difficult to get a workforce in those spaces and larger corporations.

We need to encourage in the innovation economy.

Something that I care about a lot is leaning into technology in a way that it helps people and creates jobs in other ways as well and the infrastructure surrounding it.

I think we see a lot of our infrastructure across the country, especially in Massachusetts, are outdated rail system, our public transit and other areas which make it more difficult for the society to be mobile and for our economy and to thrive in general.

And so one job, one is the economy.

And really digging in on that and making it better for everyone and making people, working families especially be able to thrive within our state.

And then second thing is education.

There's alternative forms of education that we need to lean into, expand our curriculum.

We need to provide people real world opportunities, everything from financial literacy to vocational programs to other apprenticeship and training programs.

We need to also expand the education to take some of the pressure off working families, whether it's universal, pre K after school programs and whatnot.

And then we have something in Massachusetts which is tuition free community colleges, which I think should also be a nationwide program.

So I think it's rethinking all these ideas to the end of the day that will help people and provide.

I think what's lacking right now is people don't think the American dream is achievable.

We need to make sure that people have opportunity and hope, and that's what we're going to do.

And that's really what I want to focus in on.

And I think I have the background to be able to have done it in the private sector, and I can bring that to Congress and really make a difference.

And one of the things that I have to say is that I think certain the frustrations are Congress could stop what's happening with Trump in a minute.

Like, we're, we are enduring this absurdity for no good reason.

There, there, there isn't, like, for instance, his tariffs that he's taking $12 billion to bail out the farmers because he's screwed that over so bad with the tariffs that, that now we're spending money that we didn't need to spend on something that didn't need to.

And Congress is the ones that are in charge of the purse strings.

It will never.

It will never.

I cannot express how much it blows my mind that Congress would simply abdicate its authority under the Constitution for him, when all they would have to do is push back gently.

I mean, they wouldn't even have to do that much work on it, and they choose not to.

I mean, and they're literally not following the Constitution for him.

And as someone who follows closely to politics, that's really frustrating because I don't have the power to make those choices.

I have to depend on my legislation.

We have to depend on the Supreme Court to make these decisions that would push back on his agenda.

And yet both Congress and the Supreme Court have basically said, nah, you're cool, dude, we don't mind at all.

You're like, what happened to checks and balances?

What happened to the Founding Fathers meant for us to have three co equal branches of government, not one more powerful branch than the other.

Yet the Supreme Court in their decisions keep on coming out and saying, nah, it's cool, you know, King Trump basically without the king.

And then they wonder why we call him fascists and dictators and all this other stuff.

And you're like, how do you derive any other conclusion than that?

Is it a perfect fascistic government?

No, we're not there yet.

But if we keep Letting you do the things that you're doing, it's going to get there, you know, and yet there's more of us than there are of them.

There's 70.

What, 77.

It absolutely blew my mind that people wouldn't have gotten out to vote for this, for this election of all the elections not to get out to vote for.

And the whole both sidesism drives me up the flipping wall when people start saying, well, both sides do it.

I'm like, no, they don't.

I'm not saying both sides are perfect, but both sides are not doing it.

Both sides are not trying to attack the Constitution.

Both sides aren't trying to give, you know, unalive people in boats simply because they're in a boat off the coast of Venezuela.

Right.

Like the, the absurdity that this is it just like, it just keeps, like one day seems to be an entire year these days.

And they, and I think we've only been doing it for what, 300, like 20 days or something crazy like that.

300 days.

I don't remember the, where we're at in the year, but it's just nuts.

What, what steps will you take if you get to Congress that will stop?

Like, what, what will you do to help make it so that we can sit back and say John was the right choice because he's standing up to Trump, he's standing up to the, the Republican agenda.

He's not letting the, you know, letting them just run roughshod all over the.

Yeah, yeah.

Well, it's also why I say, you know, I think they do need outside.

You look at anything that's happened over the last 18 months or system.

You look at what's going, what's going on the justice lawyer in terms of not having.

And you see now that people in Congress are actually resigning or leaving office, governors just because.

Right.

And so what I bring to this is like, first of all, we need to Democrat because that's the one, one first asset objection.

Balance.

To start, we need to make sure that there's a balance within the Congress.

But then once you get that is about, you know, you know, bringing back, you know, administration level, which is policies working with the different states and making sure that we get back to prioritizing things that, you know, are important to people.

I mean, you look at, you talk, want to talk about things that were avoidable, this shutdown, which is avoidable.

We do have, You know, look at the recruit that look what would happen to people.

You know, food insecurity is real thing.

So many people and tend to really vulnerable people being interesting is a real shame.

So I think me going in there really focusing on those issues that most and working Congress, working with other stakeholders is important.

I think that we are so disconnected.

We have to rebuild our community certainly within Congress, but within as a nation, I think we're so there, we're so disparate right now.

I think we really need to come together and that's really focusing on common goals, focusing on those things that people care about and finding common ground.

And that's again, what's something I'm focused on.

I've been able to do it throughout my career and I think I would be able to do it as I go into Congress.

But again, it's also not going to take one person.

It's going to take a village, as they say.

And I think at this point we're starting to see people fight back.

We're starting to see obviously you see rallies, you see people, you see in terms of approval numbers.

But I think they need to get young people create our own movement which was a movement of positivity, movement of opportunity and hope and a movement of actually taking back to marmarcy and that's what we'll do.

There was another point that I was going to make and we have to understand context that as a freshman congressman, I understand that your abilities are significantly different than a senior congressperson.

So we have to look at context and go with that too.

I guess my next question would be about bodily autonomy.

What is your position on women's rights to choose?

Yeah, yeah.

Well, I should have also mentioned to high cycles and you know.

This is.

To protect her and I talked about her and you know, obviously they will be the mother on land and think they need to go back.

We need make sure.

Many have been banished.

Of course, when you get back.

Yeah, I'm a father of six myself.

I have five graves.

Yeah, I love my.

I love my babies.

I, you know, and when, when Dobbs came out, my heart broke because as a, as a father, we, we are in a unique situation.

I believe that we know men, for lack of a better way of saying it, and the idea that my, my daughters have less auton.

Especially over something like that, when the idea of any of my daughters being hurt by another man and then forced to deal with those repercussions because another man is telling them what they can and cannot do with their Body just, it angers every part of me.

And it's interesting because, excuse me, I am not, you know, it, you know, Republicans are like, oh, you're pro, you're, you're pro death because, you know, you want to have abortions and stuff like that.

And I said, no, I'm not pro death.

I am pro my daughter and her physician and if she so chooses, the clergy should be making those choices that we shouldn't be putting women and making them be incubators.

Did you hear about the woman in, I believe it was Georgia who was forced, who was brain dead and was forced to carry to term the baby that she had had, that she was pregnant with before she became brain dead.

And so she was basically a human incubator for, I want to say, like six months or something crazy.

And you're like, the idea that my daughter could be forced in another state, thankfully I live in California where that's not an issue that they could be forced to carry a baby just absolutely breaks my heart thinking about that.

And, and that they're less free than I am, you know, just angers me.

And it was so done so flippantly.

You know, it's also, you know, we live in something like this.

The states are so, so different.

And I've been in Massachusetts and we've been at the forefront of having rights for human rights for a long time.

You know, we were first with gay marriage.

We were first.

We've had, before there was Obamacare, we had mass health care for all.

And we've always had very social issues, liberal policies.

And I think it's, you know, it's important.

I think I'm a big protector of human rights.

And I think we need to make sure that we assure, you know, ensure across the board that, you know, part of democracy is making sure that people have the ability to pursue the, have the pursuit of happiness and have the pursuit of free will and making their own way.

And that's the very best of democracy.

And I think our policies across the board should match that along with providing people opportunity and to be able to make a good life.

And so I think going into Congress is important to continue to promote that and look at all these things from that viewpoint.

Do you have any particular programs that you're thinking of that you would want to implement that?

Because, you know, one of the things that drives me nuts about the pro life agenda is that they discuss, well, I'm pro life, but then they don't have any programs or systems in place for women to make a Choice that says, I would rather keep the child or to.

To prop that up without endorsing it.

Right.

Because there's a.

There's a difference between recognizing choices need to be made or even if they are, who cares?

It's your, you know, your choice to have a child, whether it's through you want it or unfortunately, if it's thrust upon you and you make that decision.

But what programs like SNAP, and here in California it's called Medi Cal, that exist, but what other programs can you think of or that you've decided that you would want to implement to help promote the family and move it forward, even in those, you know, circumstances?

Yeah, well, I'm looking at different areas within healthcare to, you know, not only promote family to really, again, to help people, especially people in need.

Right.

So one of the biggest areas that I've been focused on is mental health and addiction.

So I'm working on something I'm calling the get back on your feet program.

I think I'm.

With a lot of these issues, we.

We tend to not look at the root cause of things, or we tend to just try to treat things, or we don't know what people need to do with folks that are suffering.

And I've had this in my own family and had this.

And, you know, people I know, especially with mental health and addiction, I think we need to focus, you know, more holistically in terms of really, it's not only about making sure that people get well, but also can they really live a full life?

And making sure you get back on your feet around, you know, job programs and education and support from a family perspective.

And so that's just one example, but taking that and replicating it in other areas as well, when you look at education, it's the same type of thing.

I mean, making sure that people can get through an education system, that's very difficult.

When people are, you know, can't afford to live, or they're relying on SNAP programs and they're, you know, the child's going to school hungry or their child, you know, we can't, you know, the parent is around or it's difficult because, you know, they can't get after school care or things like that.

And so, you know, making sure.

And then getting people to make sure that they have the ability to get through school and get through, whether either it's through a vocational program or go on to higher education to make sure that you can have a holistic approach to that, that you build out these programs that not only, again, deal with one small, discrete area or this and that, but you're looking at in total, that really does provide people the opportunities there.

And that's, you know, from a government perspective, that's what's really important is, you know, prioritizing.

You know, there's only so much, you know, when you think about a business or you think about anything.

You mentioned Doge.

Right.

I agree.

There is a lot of fat in government.

You know, you see it, but you can't just deal with it by taking a sledgehammer to it.

You got to look at it closely.

You got to make sure you're managing it appropriately in a way, and prioritizing the right things.

When you're allocating funds or you're thinking about providing grants or you're thinking about providing incentives to people to be able to live, you got to look at those areas versus just arbitrarily cutting a Department of Education or just arbitrarily cutting programs that people rely on a daily basis.

And that's, you know, those are the things that I'm thinking about when I'm thinking about certain programs that I want to build out or to potentially bring forward.

That's the legislation.

Yeah.

In fact, was it.

Someone was saying that they are taking the.

Taking certain parts of the Department of Education.

Not certain.

They're taking all of it and putting it into different parts of the government.

Almost as though they're hiding it.

Right.

Like they're moving it into, like, the Department of Labor, certain programs.

I don't remember the specific ones off the top of my head, but it was interesting because basically what they were doing is not defunding it, but defunding it all at the same time.

They were bringing it so that it wasn't front and center, it wasn't prominent.

And I thought that's such an interesting thing to do.

And I don't mean that in a good way.

I mean that as in a why are you being despicable?

Sort of way.

Just to be clear.

Because there's interesting and then there's, like, what the Trump administration's been doing.

And it's shocking, but what is it?

Shocking but not surprising or surprising but not shocking.

Shocking, but not surprising.

There we go.

And, you know, the reason why they.

They're doing it is so that they don't have to spend money on these valuable programs and services for people.

And I, I have to wonder, like, what's the long.

I mean, I understand what the long term effect will be from that.

We will have a less, you know, equitable, society.

We'll have fewer people that.

With disabilities, that systems that they need.

It'll be less public.

Right.

Because you can't have, you know, there's only so many resources to be doing.

And, and I wonder why the Department of Education is one of the departments that they've chosen to go after in such a violent way, like they did with usaid.

Right.

They.

They went after these departments and, you know, the idea that we wouldn't want to.

To prevent disease abroad, to save a few pennies here blows my mind.

Because you're like, well, you do realize diseases are, I don't know, transient.

Like, they move from society to society.

And like, what happened with the pandemic?

Do we want more of that?

And the answer has to be no.

But then why are they doing it?

Right.

It doesn't make fiscal sense, but it also doesn't make moral sense.

And I mean, that's saying they have any morals whatsoever.

Which kind of brings me to my next point or my next question.

What is, what is your take on crypto?

And, and I ask that because of your financial tech background.

And, and because right now, you know, we're seeing Trump basically make a mockery out of it.

I get the value behind it.

I don't completely understand it, to be honest, But I do understand its purpose is to keep, you know, financial things out of government's big hands.

But that's also allowing, which is ir.

More waste, fraud and abuse by the people that are trying to keep the money out of the government's purview.

Right.

Nobody wants the IRS spying on them.

And I completely understand that.

But then how do we reconcile that with.

With Congress and, And crypto.

Right.

Like, how do we handle that?

Yeah, well, let's put aside, you know, Trump's personal interests of crypto, but just crypto in general or technology.

I mean, I think it's important for us to look at these technologies and study.

Sure.

And pull the best from them and make sure that their technology.

There's a lot of great things happening both along the blockchain and currency, along artificial intelligence.

But a lot of these things, and where I spent a lot of my time over the last 12 to 13 years is making sure that we have proper regulations around it, making sure that we don't stifle innovation, but we innovate in a responsible fashion and make sure that we can use this and utilize these things in ways that actually help people that create jobs.

And there's many ways that, you know, cryptocurrency, there's Things like stablecoins and other ways that improve our payment system, that provide access to capital, access to the banking system for unbanked and underbanked.

So those are the areas that we should be supporting and those are the areas that we need to look at.

But it's also important to be educated on these areas.

You know, if you're in Congress or you're coming up with legislation, you're coming up with regulations, you really need to understand the benefits and the risks of all these things and how we address both of those areas.

But I do think there's an opportunity here for what I call the innovation economy if we do things the right way.

And I think we need to make sure that we lean into that.

If we technology is here, I don't think it's going anywhere.

And I think we need to make sure that we're addressing it and doing it responsibly, but also making sure that there are a lot of good things.

And you know, AI, of course there's probably a lot we don't know about it.

I know a lot of, you know, people use it in their day to day lives now.

I mean, you know, I have a business and I know most my folks in my business utilize some form of AI to help them enhance or their delivery of their work.

And so, you know, that's the way I see it, more as an enhancement tool than a replacement tool.

And but I think we, again, we need to make sure we understand it and that we're doing it in a responsible fashion with some level of regulation nation.

Yeah, and I think that's the key.

Several years ago, gosh, it's been seven or eight right after I graduated law school.

Took the bar, passed the bar.

But it was in that, in between when I took the bar and when I found out I passed the bar, I was working for a company doing doc review, which for people that have never, that aren't attorneys know, doc review is just basically sitting in a room going through documents all day and one of the least fun jobs you can have in law at all.

I mean even motion practice is slightly more fun than doing Dr. View.

But one of my friends, because my background, so to give you a little bit of context, my JD is focused on business and securities law.

And then also I have an MBA in financial management.

So I'm more, I was more in the crypto world, if you will, than the average person.

And even I didn't, I mean I understand how it works, but I don't.

Um, I, my, my friend asked Me, he's like, would you invest in this?

And I was like, and this was, you know, seven, eight years ago, so this wasn't, you know, just yesterday.

And I was like, you know, there's just so many unregulated portions of it that's.

It's the wild, wild west of things.

I don't know that I would.

I think it was.

It's important that you, you know, if you're really looking for a solid investment, work with what.

What's currently existing.

You know, if you have spare money that you don't really.

Sure.

If you don't lose.

If you lose it, then you've.

You've lost it and you've.

But you haven't lost your life.

But he's like, well, I wanted to invest, you know, a lot of money.

And I was like, but do you have that to lose?

He's like, no.

Said.

That's your answer right there.

That's your answer.

Yeah.

Don't invest what you can't afford to lose in something that's as unregulated as securities or as unregulated as crypto was.

Well, well, we've come a long way.

We do have some level of reg.

So I also teach.

I'm an adjunct professor at Boston University School of Law, and I teach courses around financial services regulation and I think crypto and coin.

There's been some recent legislation around stablecoin, but I think that's just it, you know, you know, especially from an investor.

Investor protection standpoint, consumer protection standpoint.

It's like, you know, a traditional markets, you know, we have regulations to make sure that, you know, the investors are educated, they understand the risks, they understand what's happening and that they have disclosures and whatnot.

And you need the similar types of things in cryptocurrency or any type of investment.

So I think that's where we need to get to because you're right.

Otherwise it's.

You're taking on a lot of risk.

And we want to make sure that that's all kind of addressed in terms from a regulatory perspective.

And.

But we also, you know, we believe in free markets and believe in people being able to.

People, you know, investors protecting issues where people don't understand what they.

Yeah, I'm sure we could probably have a fairly interesting discussion in.

In securities laws and stuff of that nature.

We won't go there because I'm.

Most people would be bored out of their minds from it.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

I teach adjunct at a community college.

Business law, so obviously different But I love teaching.

It's probably one of my favorite things to do.

I get more out of that than I do sometimes practicing law.

So I guess one of my other questions would be, are you.

Are you in favor of passing legislation for.

Oh, I. I want to.

I want to say this correctly.

I don't want to say outlaw.

That's not the right word.

Regulating members of Congress from trading stocks.

Yeah, right.

We have trade laws.

Right.

But I think in particular, you have access to somebody's issue of access to.

Pablo.

Doesn't.

Doesn't.

And it's just.

I mean, You know, it just doesn't seem to make sense, people.

So I would see support, you know, thinking enough to be in government in Congress.

Like I said that I mainly live in public.

Should be.

If you want.

Yeah.

And I think it's important.

That builds trust.

Right.

Like, it builds that you're not making decisions.

You're making decisions based upon what's right for your constituents, not what's right for your pocketbook.

And if.

If you want to make decisions that are right for your pocketbook, then go do something that involves that, you know, don't.

Like.

Public service should not be a means to.

I'm not saying you can't make money.

Right.

I don'.

Want people to think.

I think you have to be in poverty to be in public service.

That's not what I think at all.

But I don't think that that should be the.

That you should be able to quadruple your net worth by going to Congress.

Right.

Like, I think that should not.

You know, I think there needs to be more safeguards in there to prevent members of Congress and other members of other areas.

Like, I would love to see an ethics for the Supreme Court, like an enforceable ETH policy, not the stuff that they've currently done.

It broke my heart so many ways that the Supreme Court has just degraded that institution where I used to look up to it and thought, oh, to argue in front of the Supreme Court or to be on the Supreme Court would just be the highest of honors.

And they've taken it and they just kind of smeared it with disgustingness.

And I had.

Do you know who Leah Lippman is?

Okay.

She's a constitutional law professor in Michigan, and she's in a podcast called Strict Scrutiny, and she has Supreme Court SCOTUS's Lawless is the her.

She has a recent book out.

And, you know, it's just so sad to see this fine institution that, you know, most of us from that went to law school Grew up admiring and I wouldn't say idolizing, but yeah, to a point.

Looking at it and then to see them making these decisions based on outcome that they wanted rather than based upon the law or based upon what should have been made.

And the founding fathers did an amazing job, but they didn't anticipate this.

And my wife looked at this, she's like, why is this allowed to happen?

And I said, sweetheart, I love you.

But in all the Congress, in everything the founding fathers did, they thought people would behave honorably.

They truly did.

They'd never thought that there would be enough people in all three branches of government that would make these types of decisions.

And you really don't have to shake your head because you would have thought that there would be enough people that would have honor and integrity and say, no, we're doing it because the law says to do it the right way, or we have precedent for a reason.

We have these separation of powers for a reason instead of no, that's good.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, that's it.

I mean, I think that's, you know, not to be overdramatic.

We need checks and balances.

The courts are the last action amendment.

And then we have people in office and people in office willing to vote conviction and voting hard lines if they're willing to step up on the dam, stand up to people.

I think that's again, people office.

I am.

You know, my other is that the D swing is vastly up.

You know, I do want the Democrats re.

We also need to make, we know, go over the other thing we need to release.

We need to bring back, you know, you know, focusing on things that people care about and those types of things, getting all the things.

But I think.

And that will be a country forward.

And I echo.

I want to echo one of your concerns, but in a different way.

My concern is that we will legislatively swing the pendulum the other way as.

As well.

And that we will clamp down so hard on certain things that we will frustrate growth in other ways.

Right.

Kind of what happened with.

And I completely understand why.

But now that we've seen this tyranny on such a grand scale, how are we combat it without losing our souls?

Right.

Like to go the complete opposite direction and bring it back to sinner without overcorrecting, to go too far to the.

And I don't want to say too far to the left.

I don't mean that I mean, overcorrecting to the point where now instead of it being a fair, just society because we've corrected for what Trump's done, now we're on the other side of it where we're an unfair and unjust society because now it's a rule by the masses where the minorities aren't being protected or looked out for.

And I think that that's a very important part, is that we don't over correct on anything.

We correct enough to fix the issues that we see without taking away the value of the people and the individuals that we're here to serve and help.

Because the idea that now we, it's like, may disagree with what you say, but I will fight for the right for you to say it is, you know, very badly paraphrased.

But that idea that we need to maintain that again.

Right.

We need to come back to saying that, yeah, you might be a disgusting, you know what, but you can still say it.

Right?

John, do you have any last minute thoughts?

I know we've been going for a little bit now.

I wanted to see if there were any ideas that you wanted to express to your potential constituents that we haven't touched on so far.

Yeah, I just think it goes back to the whole understanding of we just need to get back to common D and be able to understand.

I mean, this was a.

You know, I come from, my grandparents came to this country from Italy, you know, some of, you know, a family of immigrants.

You know, I know a lot of people.

That's what this great country was built upon.

I think it comes down to making sure, for me, in this campaign or for me, what's going on with this country over the next year or so into this election, again, it comes back to making sure that we protect our democracy and we create opportunity and hope for people and just focusing on those issues that people care about.

And that's what I really want to do and I think I can do in the selection.

And I know I'm excited about it.

I'm, you know, I'm still very optimistic and hopeful, maybe too idealistic for my, my age.

But, you know, I do think, you know, I'm seeing people step up.

I'm seeing some momentum with recent elections.

I'm seeing people, you know, they're saying, okay, it's time for, to get involved, to get into the process.

You know, hopefully we can bring in more young people, we can bring in more other people to, from different walks of life to say, all right, you know, we just want to bring this back and start to rebuild our community.

We want to, you know, really make a difference.

And I think we can, I think we will.

I think we're ultimately, people believe in this democracy.

They believe in, you know, our country and they're not going to take it.

And you know, I think when come, come this time next year, we'll be sitting here and I think we'll, we'll feel better, we'll feel on the path to where we should be as a nation.

You know, I'm looking forward to being a part of that.

And, you know, I'm fortunate enough to be elected.

I'm looking to really digging in and working hard to help not only the people in this district, but, you know, people this country.

Because I think, I still feel like we have a bright future and that we can do great things.

Yeah, I agree.

And I tell my class all the time, I say you guys by sheer number are a greater portion of the demographics than what's left.

And if they showed up in mass to vote, they could change the world in a single election.

And that's my goal because there's too many people I think that feel like, oh, it doesn't matter what I do, it doesn't matter if I vote or not, not I'm gonna, you know, that it doesn't affect the outcome.

We saw significant, significant how much, you know, it came down to simple votes that was just people came out and it was amazing to watch because, you know, it was for the Democrats to take the amount of votes that they did was nothing short of a miracle.

And if the midterms are anything like it, it won't just be a blue wave, it'll be a blue tsunami.

And I think that even there's enough Republicans and non maga people that are so tired of what's happen right now that they may have made a mistake and voted for Trump thinking he would become more moderate or he would be a decent human being.

And they found that he's the same person he was before, which hasn't, in fact worse in my opinion.

I mean really, he went from bad to worse.

I'm not sure if that's the dementia talking or the malignant narcissistic talking, but it's probably a little bit of a everything but, you know, and I've told them, you know, you guys show up and you can change elections.

And I think that's so important that we get out the vote.

We get these people to understand how important their vote is, and that, you know, while certainly I hope they vote for the right candidates and whatnot, I also recognize that I would rather you show up and vote, even if I disagree with your vote, simply to get you into the habit of making votes.

I had a scholar on, her name's Lindsay Cormac, who talked.

Talked about that principle that a lot of people aren't in the habit of voting, and so they don't vote.

Right.

And so it's something that parents need to do is, you know, when your child's 18, you need to take them to the voting place or you need to get their ballot and help them vote so that they understand their role rather than just hoping society teaches them.

Because, unfortunately, we found that they don't.

Right.

Because politicians are not the same thing as voters.

And we need to remember that when we're helping people vote is that the goal is to be educated and informed voters so that they can make the right decisions and vote for the right people, whoever those may be.

Yeah.

We've even stripped out civics and part of our curriculum for kids and whatnot.

And my.

My daughter just Dean.

And I'm, you know, encouraging her to participate.

She's certainly going to vote.

So I guess I got at least one vote next year, which is great.

But, you know, at the end of the day, there really is important for young people to get involved generally.

And, you know, for me and for my kids, you know, why I'm doing this is for their future.

And I want to be able to look at them at the end of the day, say, I did everything I could to fight for you and your future and all of our futures.

And I think it's important for everyone to feel that way.

This is important.

This is part of democracy.

It's part of the process.

You have the right, and you should exercise it in as many ways as you can.

Yeah.

And I think that's so valuable.

Did.

Have you ever watched the West Wing?

Oh, yeah, sure.

It's one of my favorite shows.

It actually is.

One of the things that got me excited about politics again and kind of got me through Trump's first term was seeing that there was positive that even if it's a fictionalized account.

Right.

That someone imagined a government that was Magnanimous as the Bartlett White House that someone had the imagination to come up with these beautiful things to say that could represent government.

And I understand it's a fictionalized form of government.

I'm not saying it's real, but at the same time, why can't we work towards that fictionalized version of government?

Why can't we work towards a more perfect union or a perfect union that's pending, as the case may be?

Because why not?

Why can't government be a source for good and a source to help others and to pretend?

I would certainly.

My tax dollar.

I would rather have my tax dollars go towards helping my fellow man than the billionaires that I will never, ever have anything in common with, no matter how much money I make.

Right.

Like I will never have.

Because my moral code is very different than theirs when it comes to these types of things.

And I would much rather my tax dollars help the people in need, the mother that's struggling.

This idea of welfare queen is such a misnomer, it's such a travesty that we pick on the most.

Man, the words escaping me.

Vulnerable.

Vulnerable.

There we go.

Exactly.

People.

Yeah, yeah.

It's not about.

It's not about.

It's not about handouts.

It's about opportunity and hope and people want.

And people work hard.

I mean, you look at people who are taking snap benefits.

These are not people.

These are people who are working, who are trying, many times working multiple jobs, trying to care for their family.

They're not looking for handouts.

They just want hope and opportunity.

And so, you know, but the other thing is for politicians is we just can't use.

Use those as latitudes.

We gotta walk the walk and we gotta, like you said, prioritize the things that will make this happen.

And those are the things that, you know, I've been talking about again and again.

This is, you know, rebuilding our economy and talking about educational opportunities and bringing.

Providing access to healthcare and bringing down the cost of healthcare and so.

And having real ideas behind that and then coming together and actually getting things done.

And so, yeah, it's about having the will as well.

Right.

For politicians actually have the will.

And so, you know, again, it's okay to use these words and talking.

Yeah.

And I think that's so important is that, you know, it becomes more about doing and less about talking.

Because, I mean, no offense, politicians love to talk.

I'm not saying I'm not guilty of it myself, but at the same time, I like to think that I walk the walk too, that I Don't just say things and that I'm open to learning and growing, but also putting my money and my actions where my mouth is.

That's actually where perfect union pending came from, was I couldn't just sit back.

And while I don't have the resources to be the next Prof. G. Or whatever, I do recognize the value of speaking up and inviting people like yourself on here to help get out the word and help educate people about different people that can help our society, help it move forward, that, you know, we shouldn't just sit back and relax and let others do what we can do for ourselves.

You know, helping others comes in many different forms.

And I think most importantly, and to kind of go back a little bit to your immigration discussion, helping them know that they're not alone, you know, helping them know that there are.

And for lack of a better way of saying it, I'm just going to say it.

There are white people that are not bad, right?

That there are white men that genuinely, genuinely care for our Latino brothers and sisters and our black brothers and sisters and our people that are different than us, that we can celebrate their differences and recognize the value that they bring to society and that they're not scum to be gotten out of the country.

The President Trump was discussing the other day about the Somali people breaks my heart.

I mean, just, it makes me hurt to think that these beautiful people are being scapegoated and put in the limelight for no reason other than he doesn't like them.

And the damage that he's doing and causing to these people is just beyond absurd, as though they've done anything to him that he could possibly complain about that's had any type of negative effect.

Effect the boy with the golden spoon and can't handle the people that have been given nothing.

It's the epitome of hypocrisy for someone who's been given literally everything in his life.

He wants to take away the good from the people that have had nothing given to them.

They had to fight their way here to get it, and now he wants to take that away from them.

It's just disgusting.

Anyway, John, again, thank you.

I know we were going to wrap up, but then I was like, oh, I wanted to talk about it.

Yeah, great, great.

I agree.

I think that that's the type of people we've been blessed and fortunate to have the sense want to give back.

But, you know, I think that's what we need to do.

I think that, you know, at the end of the day, it's important for politicians, for the listeners and non elector and to also be of what's going on.

So, you know, I, I really, you know, thanks again for having me, for being Oasis and having me program.

And you're very welcome.

Thank you for coming.

I appreciate it.

Yeah, take care.

Thanks.

Bye.

19.