Speaker 1: You're listening to Comedy Central. Stacy Abrahams, Welcome back to
Speaker 1: the show. Thanks for having me again. I don't even
Speaker 1: know where to start, because every time I see you,
Speaker 1: I feel like you're doing more and more things. So
Speaker 1: let's start with the book. Okay, Level Up? Um, very
Speaker 1: few people can say that they have run for governor.
Speaker 1: And also is it a three times New York Times
Speaker 1: Best set up or four? Well, forgive, I mean it's
Speaker 1: as counting four times four times New York Times besiness
Speaker 1: have an advocates and my I love that? Um, you like? Yes?
Speaker 1: He's my first question? Maybe is that as like you
Speaker 1: do so well writing, why why stress yourself with politics?
Speaker 1: I love writing, but I also love people, and people
Speaker 1: do better when they have good leadership. People do really
Speaker 1: well when they have leaders that like them, and so
Speaker 1: I want to be one of those people who actually
Speaker 1: likes people and wants to help them from the office
Speaker 1: of governor. Okay, people feel that. Level Up a book
Speaker 1: about essentially small businesses and how to grow them in
Speaker 1: challenges that you do. You share the fact that you
Speaker 1: had businesses that failed. Most politicians will always just be like, no,
Speaker 1: that didn't fail. I pivoted it's the pivot. People love
Speaker 1: the pivot. One of the big things you learn about
Speaker 1: when reading the book is just how many small businesses fail. Now.
Speaker 1: I don't know if I'm in the minority here, but
Speaker 1: I sometimes wonder if there's too much of an obsession
Speaker 1: with starting your own business in America. Like it. It
Speaker 1: feels like there's this thing. I don't know if it's
Speaker 1: attached to the American dream, but it feels like everyone
Speaker 1: is told you have to start your own business. Is
Speaker 1: there a reason you chose to start your own business
Speaker 1: and not to just work in a field that was
Speaker 1: already you know, business that already exists. Oh, I like paychecks.
Speaker 1: They made me very happy. I was checks. I was
Speaker 1: a tax attorney, and that was a nice paycheck. And
Speaker 1: then I began what my mother has called my trajectory
Speaker 1: of downward economic mobility. When I left there, it became
Speaker 1: deput a city attorney for Atlanta when I decided to
Speaker 1: run for office, though I couldn't. I didn't feel right
Speaker 1: staying in my job as a lawyer for the city
Speaker 1: when I was running for a political office, and so
Speaker 1: I left and I became what I call a redeluctant
Speaker 1: entreprene to her, I had to find a way to
Speaker 1: pay for my mortgage since I was going to leave
Speaker 1: my job, and that's when I started my business. And
Speaker 1: for a lot of people, starting a small business isn't
Speaker 1: this Horatio Alger story. It's not because they all want
Speaker 1: to be many moguls. It's often circumstances. A mom who
Speaker 1: needs to take care of her kids but also needs
Speaker 1: to make a living, and so she starts a business
Speaker 1: in her in her front, in her kitchen. It's people
Speaker 1: who need opportunities. And so my mission is to say,
Speaker 1: regardless of why you start your small business, here's what
Speaker 1: you need to know about it, because these are the
Speaker 1: things no one's going to tell you. Shark Tank is
Speaker 1: not going to happen for most of us. So here's
Speaker 1: what we need to do, and that it's going to
Speaker 1: be difficult in Georgia right now. Of the businesses in
Speaker 1: Georgia are small businesses. Of the employees are employed by
Speaker 1: small businesses. And so if we don't understand small businesses,
Speaker 1: we're in a lot of trouble. And if we don't
Speaker 1: do our work to prop them up and to help them,
Speaker 1: support them as they grow, and more importantly, help them
Speaker 1: scale then we're actually hurting the very people we say
Speaker 1: we want to help in our economy. If you were
Speaker 1: to become the governor of Georgia, people are screaming as
Speaker 1: I say that and cheering right now. If you were
Speaker 1: to become the governor of Georgia, what are some of
Speaker 1: the first steps you think you would take to help
Speaker 1: small businesses? If you say them, awesome, all businesses in Georgia.
Speaker 1: What do you think could change? Where can government step
Speaker 1: in and and and wei should that? Um? You know,
Speaker 1: sort of that marriage end between the government helping a
Speaker 1: small business whilst also making a business of business. First
Speaker 1: thing we need to do is to expand medicating Georgia,
Speaker 1: which sounds like a completely counterintuitive answer to the question
Speaker 1: you ask. It does, but Georgia spends billions of dollars
Speaker 1: and what's called uncompensated care we pay for people who
Speaker 1: can afford healthcare. Part of that is the fact that
Speaker 1: we have failed to take money that belongs to Georgians
Speaker 1: and reinvested in healthcare. But Medicaid expansion and george will
Speaker 1: create sixty six or sixty thou new jobs. When you
Speaker 1: expand medicaid, you create small businesses and it's an infusion
Speaker 1: of capital that comes from commerce, not from loans. Number two,
Speaker 1: we should we should teach young people how to start busicists,
Speaker 1: even if they don't ever want to start one of
Speaker 1: their own. They should know what it looks like and
Speaker 1: then should it makes them better employees. If you understand
Speaker 1: how business works, then you understand why your boss who
Speaker 1: has two employees cannot pay you what your friend at
Speaker 1: Coco Colonics. And so it's it's creating that that lexicon
Speaker 1: in that understanding. And the third is encouraging financial systems
Speaker 1: to actually loan money when you have to do that
Speaker 1: in communities that don't have it. After the Great Recession,
Speaker 1: Black communities in particular lost banks and they never came back.
Speaker 1: And so when the p p P loans came out
Speaker 1: a good intention of government, the money went to places
Speaker 1: that we're not willing to lend to the very communities
Speaker 1: that needed. And as governor I would pay attention to that.
Speaker 1: I would say, we need to use these small these
Speaker 1: Black owned banks, or these Latino owned banks, these community banks,
Speaker 1: we need to use those as depositories. So when money
Speaker 1: comes the next time, there's someone in the community who's
Speaker 1: ready to loan it. Let's talk about politics, which is
Speaker 1: everything in America all the time. Um, you are running
Speaker 1: for a seats that in a state that has become,
Speaker 1: i mean, one of the lightning rodents of American politics, Georgia.
Speaker 1: What's interesting about this race is the fact that Governor
Speaker 1: Kemp has put into place multiple restrictions on how people
Speaker 1: can vote, when people can vote. He's reduced the availability
Speaker 1: of voting for people. Republicans will argue the same thing.
Speaker 1: They will say, no, all we're trying to do is
Speaker 1: shore up the vote, even though we agree there has
Speaker 1: been no widespread voter fraud. How do you begin tackling
Speaker 1: an issue like this where A you're running, so you
Speaker 1: want to make it better for yourself slash fair for everybody.
Speaker 1: But how do you how do you how do you
Speaker 1: find that balance of saying, two people, listen, I'm trying
Speaker 1: to do this for everybody, and I know that I
Speaker 1: hope I will benefit. But you get what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: There's that there's that paradox of of of the messaging
Speaker 1: that you're trying to get out. I reject the paradox voting.
Speaker 1: The process of voting is nonpartisan. Everyone should have access
Speaker 1: to the ability to vote. It should be easy to vote,
Speaker 1: it should be accessible. There should be a freedom to vote.
Speaker 1: Any impediment to that is wrong. That's full stop. I
Speaker 1: don't care who you vote for when I'm focusing on
Speaker 1: the voting system. My focus should never be on who
Speaker 1: you cast your ballot. For voting itself, the process is nonpartisan. Now,
Speaker 1: when you get in there, I'm going to do everything
Speaker 1: in my power to convince you I'm the person to pick.
Speaker 1: But the fight for the right to vote is something
Speaker 1: that should cut across every demographic, every ideology, every community.
Speaker 1: We are a stronger nation when we allow people to participate.
Speaker 1: And if we've ever doubted that the war that Putin
Speaker 1: is waging against Ukraine, President Zelinsky said it, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: paraphrase them, and probably poorly. So this isn't a war
Speaker 1: in Ukraine, is a war on democracy in Ukraine. When
Speaker 1: we allow democracy to be overtaken by those who want
Speaker 1: to choose who can be heard, and those choices are
Speaker 1: not based on anything other than animous or inconvenience, then
Speaker 1: that is wrong. My mission is to make certain that
Speaker 1: everyone can cast the ballot, even people who don't like me,
Speaker 1: especially those folks. They should be able to go and
Speaker 1: cast their ballots. My job is to make sure that
Speaker 1: more people who like me show up. But that's campaigning,
Speaker 1: that's not voting rights. Before I let you go, I
Speaker 1: have to talk to you about the mosque, yes, because
Speaker 1: I mean I was, I was on social media and
Speaker 1: then I see the picture of the mask. Then the
Speaker 1: picture gets deleted. This is what I found interesting, and
Speaker 1: maybe you'll correct me wrong. It's like it feels like
Speaker 1: with politicians. You have a team around you. Everyone's trying
Speaker 1: to figure out how to solve the crisis or fix
Speaker 1: a problem. People say ridiculous things like God said it
Speaker 1: was like I hold my breath when I take the
Speaker 1: picture I and and it creates this weird um uh.
Speaker 1: It creates a situation where people feel like leaders on
Speaker 1: following the rules, or people you know are punished differently
Speaker 1: from leaders, etcetera, etcetera. Why did you say, yeah, I
Speaker 1: messed up, and and that's that and going forward? Do
Speaker 1: you think you'd be able to maintain that without at
Speaker 1: the same time letting your enemies use that as your
Speaker 1: you know, like, don't vote for Stacey Abrams. She messes
Speaker 1: up my responsibility In that instance, if I created any
Speaker 1: appearance that I did not take children's lives. State seriously,
Speaker 1: that's a mistake. But your job fundamentally is to acknowledge
Speaker 1: when you make a mistake and try to make it right.
Speaker 1: We have this this narrative that we have invincible leaders.
Speaker 1: That's just not true. What we have our humans who
Speaker 1: want to do a job, and we have to hold
Speaker 1: them accountable for the job they do. But we have
Speaker 1: to have grace when they make mistakes and trust that
Speaker 1: their intentions were right. But you can't trust someone's intentions
Speaker 1: if they never tell you what they were saying I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: Saying I made a mistake is about being honest about
Speaker 1: your intention. I intended to do something I did not
Speaker 1: quite do it. So let me tell you about the gap,
Speaker 1: and let me tell you how I'm gonna make it
Speaker 1: better the next time. I need to remember that for
Speaker 1: the next time I mess up. I have a lot
Speaker 1: of practice. I wrote a book about it. Yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: just I'm just gonna pivot. That's what I'm gonna do.
Speaker 1: All I think of when I read it, says level Up.
Speaker 1: It's the first book I can dance to when I
Speaker 1: just read the type, level up, Level Up, Level Up,
Speaker 1: Stacey Abrams, thank you for taking the time, Thank you
Speaker 1: for joining us on the show. Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: Stacy Abrams and Laura Hodgson's book Level Up is available
Speaker 1: right now. What's the Daily Show weeknights at eleven ten
Speaker 1: Central on Comedy Central and stream full episodes anytime on
Speaker 1: Paramount Plus. This has been a Comedy Central podcast