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Speaker 1: builder dot com. Welcome to Why I'm Voting, a production
Speaker 1: of I Heart Radio. Listen. You already know this, but
Speaker 1: it's an election year. You might already be tired of
Speaker 1: fearing about it. But here's the thing. Democracy doesn't work
Speaker 1: without you. I'm Holly Frying, and I'm sitting down with
Speaker 1: many of my fellow podcasters from Will Ferrell to Stephanie Rule,
Speaker 1: as well as other luminaries to find out about their
Speaker 1: relationships with the ballot box and ultimately just to find
Speaker 1: out why they vote. I hope you're exercising your right
Speaker 1: to vote, and if you're not, I hope that their
Speaker 1: stories inspire you today. I am a very lucky person
Speaker 1: because I am joined by Tom Collichio, who you know.
Speaker 1: He is a chef and a TV personality. You have
Speaker 1: seen him on shows like Top Chef, and he is
Speaker 1: also currently hosting a podcast called Citizen Chef, which deals
Speaker 1: with food and where it comes from the politics that
Speaker 1: shape that entire system. So he is an absolutely perfect
Speaker 1: guest to join us on Why I'm voting. Tom, thank
Speaker 1: you so much for being here. Sure, thank you. My
Speaker 1: first ques gen out of the gate is do you
Speaker 1: recall when, probably as a kid, you realized that the
Speaker 1: job of government was something that also included a responsibility
Speaker 1: for you as a citizen. Absolutely. My father, UM was
Speaker 1: a union organizer. UM. He was the president of his
Speaker 1: p B A. He was a corrections officer in a
Speaker 1: county jail and he was a president of his p
Speaker 1: b A. UM. I remember him campaigning for people who
Speaker 1: were running for Sheriff's department mayoral races in Elizabeth, New Jersey,
Speaker 1: where I grew up, and so he was very active
Speaker 1: in organizing around politics, and so at a very young
Speaker 1: age I sort of was taught that that voting was important,
Speaker 1: and so, uh, my first election was I remember my
Speaker 1: father watched a lot of news, and I remember sitting
Speaker 1: there watching the news and Reagan was on and I said,
Speaker 1: ask guy, sounds okay, and my father just kind of snapped.
Speaker 1: My father never snapped. He was like, don't you go
Speaker 1: for this. This is your first election. We're Democrats. We
Speaker 1: don't you know, We're not gonna vote for this guy.
Speaker 1: And so that was that was, Uh, that that memory
Speaker 1: is seared into my brain. Um, I think right now
Speaker 1: in our house and I have two non voting children
Speaker 1: that are nine and ten, soon to be eleven, and
Speaker 1: a twenty seven year old, and they're pretty clear where
Speaker 1: we stand. I love it. Indoctrination from the beginning. You
Speaker 1: have to vote. So does that mean that you were
Speaker 1: registered right away as soon as you could be at eighteen? Yes,
Speaker 1: I think I voted in that election, and I've been
Speaker 1: voting ever since. I don't think I've missed an election now.
Speaker 1: I may miss some primaries along the way, although I
Speaker 1: don't miss them anymore. I may miss some you know,
Speaker 1: other local votes and stuff, but I don't anymore. In fact,
Speaker 1: I actually changed my my registration address. I have a
Speaker 1: I live in Brooklyn, but I also have a house
Speaker 1: in Mattatuck, New York, and a small little town out
Speaker 1: in Long Island, and so I actually changed my registrations
Speaker 1: out here where my vote counts a little more than
Speaker 1: in Brooklyn. I love it. You meant Shion that you
Speaker 1: definitely keep up with local elections, and particularly because of
Speaker 1: the nature of the show that you're working on, I
Speaker 1: imagine some of those offices are extremely impactful from your
Speaker 1: point of view in terms of like the food supply.
Speaker 1: What do you do to research those people and make
Speaker 1: sure that the candidates that you want to vote for
Speaker 1: our upholding the ideals that you want to share and
Speaker 1: keep going in the government? Well, I I asked the questions,
Speaker 1: but even for even for those that I don't vote on,
Speaker 1: for those that I support. I mean Antonio Delgado Um
Speaker 1: was running uh in New York. I think it was
Speaker 1: twenty one nothing, it wasn't twenty one nineteen maybe upstate
Speaker 1: in New York, and I was at a fundraiser for
Speaker 1: for him, and I asked those questions. And I didn't
Speaker 1: know him at the time, And you know, the one
Speaker 1: question I asked him was was what committees what he
Speaker 1: likes to be on and he actually mentioned AGG And
Speaker 1: I said, so why agg He you know, gave me
Speaker 1: a great answer. So it's it's not just researching the
Speaker 1: people that I can vote for UM, but it's also
Speaker 1: researching people are support either with just social media support,
Speaker 1: are with UM financial support as well. So I think, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, for me, Uh, it's it's it's important to
Speaker 1: know where they stand. When there's an election coming up
Speaker 1: where maybe people think that the outcome is a foregone conclusion.
Speaker 1: Why would you say it's still important to vote in
Speaker 1: those Oh, it's not a foregone conclusion. Nothing is. Listen,
Speaker 1: this race is going to tighten up like most races
Speaker 1: do I think at this stage of the game, do
Speaker 1: Cacus was up by like fourteen fifteen points? Uh so, Uh,
Speaker 1: it's it's never over till it's over. Although the national
Speaker 1: polls were dead on in the last presidential election, most
Speaker 1: people don't seem to realize that the national polls were
Speaker 1: dead on. UM. Some of those state by state polls
Speaker 1: can change pretty quickly. UM. And we saw that, you know,
Speaker 1: in some cases, uh, forty votes made a difference. I
Speaker 1: think a total of seventy votes made a difference. And
Speaker 1: so yeah, vote votes are are important. And you know,
Speaker 1: staying home and not voting is essentially the same thing
Speaker 1: as voting for the other candidates. So you know, if
Speaker 1: you're a mcrat and you just were Bernie Sanders supporter
Speaker 1: and you decide that, well, you know he didn't he
Speaker 1: didn't get in. So I'm just gonna protest that you're
Speaker 1: voting for Trump. There's there's no doubt about that. And
Speaker 1: so this election, no one can stay home and we
Speaker 1: need to get people out. You know, right now, I
Speaker 1: would say, not only do you need to register, you
Speaker 1: need to register to vote UM via mail right now
Speaker 1: if you can now prior to this unique moment in
Speaker 1: time where we are all theoretically staying home as much
Speaker 1: as possible, did you tend to vote on election day?
Speaker 1: Were you an early voter? Did you already do mail in?
Speaker 1: What was your usual set up? I used to vote
Speaker 1: day of nowadays I'm voting early. You know, up until
Speaker 1: this past mid term, New York didn't have early voting,
Speaker 1: so I couldn't vote early. When I first started voting,
Speaker 1: I voted in New Jersey, UM, where I grew up,
Speaker 1: but I would vote the day of But now last election,
Speaker 1: I voted early, and I think some of the local
Speaker 1: elections I actually voted by mail, when since you vote
Speaker 1: usually ahead of time, I'm wondering if on election day
Speaker 1: you have any rituals as you watch the poll numbers
Speaker 1: come in, as you do you do that with friends?
Speaker 1: Do you like to be alone? Do you wear lucky socks?
Speaker 1: What is election day like for you? I don't wear
Speaker 1: lucky socks, but um, you know, I don't have a ritual,
Speaker 1: although I do watch it religiously. A last presidential election,
Speaker 1: I actually spend at the Javit Center. I was kind
Speaker 1: of in an inner circle. I was a surrogate for
Speaker 1: the campaign. I know, for both of um the elections
Speaker 1: presidential elections. Prior to that, I actually watched them in
Speaker 1: my restaurant and had a group of people and that
Speaker 1: was really exciting. But no, I I don't, but I
Speaker 1: typically glue to MSNBC watching the election returns. So you
Speaker 1: mentioned that you have two kids that are not yet
Speaker 1: voting age. If they start to get up towards eighteen,
Speaker 1: or even if they have passed that age and they're
Speaker 1: a little bit cavalier or maybe lack of days ago
Speaker 1: and not all that interested in using their voice to vote.
Speaker 1: What would you tell them to make sure they get
Speaker 1: their butts to the polls. It's a hypothetical that I
Speaker 1: hope I don't have to deal with because I believe
Speaker 1: that again, we are we have these conversations about the
Speaker 1: importance of voting. My wife especially, she believes in being
Speaker 1: very direct and having these conversations at a very young age,
Speaker 1: and so our children know where we stand. They know
Speaker 1: the importance of voting something that we talk about. So
Speaker 1: I'm hoping when they're a teen that they're gonna be,
Speaker 1: you know, chomping at the bit to sign up um,
Speaker 1: and if they don't, I will drag him down there
Speaker 1: and they can sign up. My eldest sons same thing.
Speaker 1: When he was eighteen, he signed up and he's very
Speaker 1: active and uh follows the issues pretty closely. So so
Speaker 1: I think if you grow up in a household that
Speaker 1: that cares about the process and we don't take a
Speaker 1: cynical approach that it's all bs um. I actually, you know,
Speaker 1: happen to know a lot of politicians and and most
Speaker 1: that I know are there for the right reasons, and
Speaker 1: on both sides of the Aisle there. They are there
Speaker 1: for the right reasons. They are there because they do
Speaker 1: care about the process, They care about helping people. Most
Speaker 1: are there because they're there because they want to They
Speaker 1: want to do some good in the world. If only
Speaker 1: we could get you to drag everybody who doesn't want
Speaker 1: to use their right to vote to the polls or
Speaker 1: to get their their registration done. I hope that that
Speaker 1: makes very clear to anyone listening who is maybe on
Speaker 1: the fence about doing their civic duty, that it is
Speaker 1: that important. Sound Collegio would drag them to the polls.
Speaker 1: It's it's great to be patriotic on on you know,
Speaker 1: Labor Day and fourth of July and and all that
Speaker 1: stuff and to you know, put the flag out and
Speaker 1: to you know, do whatever you do to celebrate that
Speaker 1: and feel good. But but really the most patriotic thing
Speaker 1: that you can do is vote. You know, it's really special.
Speaker 1: And when you see elections, whether they're happening in places
Speaker 1: like Iran and even in Iraq where people go and
Speaker 1: and are really you know, putting their their lives at risk,
Speaker 1: are actually voting at times it's important when you look
Speaker 1: at with the Sefarate jets, how to go through to
Speaker 1: actually get the right for for women to vote, and
Speaker 1: then you're just gonna kind of ignore that and go, eh,
Speaker 1: well it's not that important or it really doesn't matter,
Speaker 1: you know. I I think that that you're you're you're
Speaker 1: not quite understanding what it takes to you know, what
Speaker 1: it means to be an American, and that's what it means.
Speaker 1: And I would go a step further. I would say,
Speaker 1: you know, before voting, get out there and go to
Speaker 1: a rally, go to a you know, if you get
Speaker 1: invited to a fundraiser, you don't have to spend money,
Speaker 1: but you can go and listen to someone. I want
Speaker 1: to hear what Canada has to say. You know, the
Speaker 1: process of watching someone run, watching someone raise money, watching
Speaker 1: someone get out there and put themselves out there is
Speaker 1: kind of, you know, really humbling. Not only getting out
Speaker 1: and voting I think is really important, but really getting
Speaker 1: informed and right now with social media is very easy.
Speaker 1: If there's someone that that you want to follow, uh,
Speaker 1: you can amplify their voice by retweeting. You can engage
Speaker 1: um with them as well. If you want being active
Speaker 1: in the process, not being active in politics, but being
Speaker 1: active in the process is our duty and and uh,
Speaker 1: that's that's why I vote. I love it. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much, fun for taking this time with us today.
Speaker 1: If anybody wants to follow you, where should they do that?
Speaker 1: Make it? Follow me a Twitter, I think at Tom
Speaker 1: CLICKI ar Ti clikio. Also on Instagram and you can
Speaker 1: also subscribe to citizens. You have podcast that I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: I hope everyone does because it's a really good show. Tom.
Speaker 1: Thank you again so much. Hey are you not registered
Speaker 1: to vote yet? But you think it's something you want
Speaker 1: to do? You may still have time. Voter registration deadlines
Speaker 1: vary by state, so to find out the scoop for
Speaker 1: where you are, check out a nonpartisan registration voting site
Speaker 1: like headcount dot org or fair vote dot org. Why
Speaker 1: I'm Voting is an I Heart Radio production. For more
Speaker 1: podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever it is you listen to your
Speaker 1: favorite shows.