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Speaker 1: Hi, everyone, it's Sophia and welcome back to Work in Progress.

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Speaker 1: Today's guest is a personal hero of mine and is

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Speaker 1: almost a poster child for overcoming adversity and the power

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Speaker 1: of the human spirit. He's a community leader and educator,

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Speaker 1: a former mayor, a Truman Scholarship recipient, essayist, and more

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Speaker 1: recently an author, as well as Special Advisor for Economic

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Speaker 1: Mobility and Opportunity for the State of California. I am

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Speaker 1: so honored today to sit down with Michael Derrick Tubbs.

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Speaker 1: Michael has broken records in broken ground pretty much everywhere

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Speaker 1: he's gone in his life, from his start growing up

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Speaker 1: in poverty in South Stockton, to the national debate competition

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Speaker 1: stage in Cincinnati, to Stanford University, and back to Stockton

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Speaker 1: once more, where he served as both the youngest council

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Speaker 1: member and the youngest mayor in the city's history. Recently,

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Speaker 1: Michael published his memoir The Deeper the Roots, which is

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Speaker 1: already receiving glowing praise from publications and figures all over

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Speaker 1: the country, including Work in Progress guest Dr Ibramex Kendy.

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Speaker 1: I'm looking forward to talking with Michael Tubbs, not only

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Speaker 1: about what he's overcome on a personal level, but also

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Speaker 1: what he's helped his community, his city, and his state

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Speaker 1: overcome and dream of and what we can all do

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Speaker 1: to push forward toward a better future. Let's get started. Hi, Michael,

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Speaker 1: so good to see you. It's so nice to see you.

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Speaker 1: How are you. I am good, like content, happy, tired,

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Speaker 1: but really good. Yeah, that's tired. Have to do with

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Speaker 1: having a new baby. Yeah, two kids, other two and

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Speaker 1: also just so much going on. There's also so much

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Speaker 1: happening in the world and so much you feel like

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Speaker 1: you have to respond to and so much. It's a

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Speaker 1: lot of good and it's a lot of work. But

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Speaker 1: but noble plates. Yeah, I feel that. I wonder if

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Speaker 1: you've been experiencing, you know, your own version of what

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Speaker 1: I have. I've I've found that my my anxiety has

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Speaker 1: been feeling high lately. But it's it's that specific kind

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Speaker 1: of thing where the energy almost of you've just been

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Speaker 1: called to the principal's office. I have this feeling of

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Speaker 1: I've done something wrong because I feel like I can't

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Speaker 1: possibly do enough in response to what's going on in

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Speaker 1: the world right now. And I've always I've always felt

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Speaker 1: called to be a doer, a solver, a helper, a

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Speaker 1: person who shows up, And lately I feel like I'm

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Speaker 1: I feel like I'm falling behind because there's so much,

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Speaker 1: and I'm worried that I'm not doing enough for that

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Speaker 1: I don't know enough. And I wonder if you, as

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Speaker 1: a person who I look got as such a helper

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Speaker 1: and such a problem solver and such a leader, if

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Speaker 1: you're feeling some of that kind of you know, pandemic

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Speaker 1: and social crisis anxiety as well. Yeah, I think my

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Speaker 1: manifest almost in a sort of is it futile? Like?

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Speaker 1: Is it is everything I'm doing worth it? Right? Like?

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Speaker 1: And I think particularly it's been more cute since the baby,

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Speaker 1: because so much like me, like babies need attention and

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Speaker 1: babies need time. It's like, well, the time I spend

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Speaker 1: doing a I could be spent like playing with my daughter,

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Speaker 1: I could be spent just being fully present with my

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Speaker 1: with my son. I think particularly this last sort of

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Speaker 1: a couple of weeks with the child tax credit, and

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Speaker 1: it might be cut out of legislation and thinking of

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Speaker 1: all the work and efforts spent to get a majority,

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Speaker 1: and so it's hard and I have to remind myself

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Speaker 1: that this is, this is part of their complexities and

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Speaker 1: messiness of democracy, but also of humanity in sort of

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Speaker 1: just being really grounded and and understanding that um, I'm

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Speaker 1: only accountable for that which I can do, UM, and

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Speaker 1: have to trust everyone's been what they can do, and

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Speaker 1: that my pastor always says, you can't pour out of

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Speaker 1: an empty cup, so that you have to just make

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Speaker 1: sure you're doing ta care ofselves. You could actually not

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Speaker 1: be half of you try to help a million things,

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Speaker 1: but be all of you. So now, but so yeah,

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Speaker 1: I think it's been more of a like where's the

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Speaker 1: light at the end of the tunnel, sort of fasil,

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Speaker 1: Like you're on this journey and you know there's a

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Speaker 1: destination and you know you're moving in the right right direction,

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Speaker 1: but you're at the part of the tunnel where it's

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Speaker 1: just dark and you're tired, you don't see it. And

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Speaker 1: I think that's kind of what I feel mostly now.

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Speaker 1: It's interesting to me that thing that you said, balancing

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Speaker 1: for you fatherhood with showing up and you can't pour

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Speaker 1: from an empty cup. I think honestly part of where

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Speaker 1: it comes from a bit for me is in my

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Speaker 1: own version of family building. You know, I have been

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Speaker 1: such a an individual focused on the collective for so long,

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Speaker 1: and um, really, after some experiences, you know, at the

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Speaker 1: earlier part of this decade I find myself in was like,

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Speaker 1: I'm good on my own. I show up for other people.

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Speaker 1: I've got my my friends who I love, and this

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Speaker 1: is just what we do. And now I'm I'm entering

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Speaker 1: into this new stage in my life and you know,

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Speaker 1: getting ready to get married and think about what family

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Speaker 1: looks like. And I have another person who I show

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Speaker 1: up for every day, and so I am less available,

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Speaker 1: and I am not reading the news for the four

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Speaker 1: to five hours a day that I was. I'm only

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Speaker 1: in it between being on set and being you know,

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Speaker 1: at home, I'm only in it for maybe an hour

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Speaker 1: and a half or two hours a day. And I

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Speaker 1: have this panic that I'm not doing enough. And two

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Speaker 1: of the things actually that have been really helpful for

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Speaker 1: me to remember our lessons I've learned from other activists

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Speaker 1: who remind me that we're in a relay. You know,

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Speaker 1: we're passing the baton all the time. You're not meant

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Speaker 1: to carry it all the time. And I just watched

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Speaker 1: Patrice Colors give a talk discussing how every time we

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Speaker 1: enter into these eras of immense progress, there is a backswing,

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Speaker 1: you know, the agencies of power realized they're being challenged

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Speaker 1: by the people, and we so far outnumber them that

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Speaker 1: they get really vicious in the pushing towards the past.

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Speaker 1: And it helps me to remember that it's cyclical, that

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Speaker 1: this is something we have seen before. Granted we haven't

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Speaker 1: seen it with the power of digital disinformation and foreign

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Speaker 1: nations meddling in elections, and um the the pr machine

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Speaker 1: behind policing in the carcerale system in quite this way.

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Speaker 1: You know, even here in l A, we see you know,

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Speaker 1: our our d a getting blamed for policies that he

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Speaker 1: literally doesn't enact or have control of at all. He's like,

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Speaker 1: that's actually not my jurisdiction, but you guys are saying

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Speaker 1: it's my fault, and you want to recall me for

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Speaker 1: stuff that other people are responsible for here because people

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Speaker 1: are scared that he's progressive. So so it's it's it's

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Speaker 1: good to understand how it happens, these these sorts of

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Speaker 1: machinations of historically abusive power. But it's hard to just

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Speaker 1: feel like a little person who's trying to stand up,

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Speaker 1: you know, being the David did the goliathe You're like,

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Speaker 1: come on, when do we When did the David's win? Yeah?

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Speaker 1: And And honestly, the most intent of those feelings happened

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Speaker 1: when I lost reelection, because even with the disinformation, even

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Speaker 1: with all the craziness and the lies, I just thought

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Speaker 1: that as I was doing the right thing, because we're

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Speaker 1: making progress, because I had did it. I wasn't my

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Speaker 1: first campaign, so I knew how to win campaign. You

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Speaker 1: have to raise the most money. Check. You have to

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Speaker 1: have the most endorsements. Check. You have to knock on

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Speaker 1: the most doors. Check, you have the most volunteers. Check.

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Speaker 1: So doing all that and then reducing homicides like objectively

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Speaker 1: good stuff and still losing it just felt so fundamentally unjust.

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Speaker 1: And I remember being very sort of angry, um and embarrassed,

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Speaker 1: and thinking was the last my entire twenties were spent

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Speaker 1: in the sexiness of local governments? Did I just throw

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Speaker 1: away my my my twenties for for for what? Remember?

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Speaker 1: After like a lot of prayer and thinking and meditation,

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Speaker 1: and I think a lot of insights you shared became

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Speaker 1: clear to me and people would ask me, or what

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Speaker 1: did you learn or what what? What? Lessons do you

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Speaker 1: have from from from the loss, And the biggest one

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Speaker 1: was that I recognized that aggrest comes at a price,

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Speaker 1: and if you're going to really push things forward, the

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Speaker 1: stats quo is not the status quo because it just happened.

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Speaker 1: The stats quotas the stats quo with intent, meaning that

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Speaker 1: there's gonna be a pushback. And being so young and

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Speaker 1: winning city council, winning mayor winning all these policy fights,

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Speaker 1: I was just like, well, maybe that's maybe I figured

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Speaker 1: it out, maybe I've cracked the code, and it's just

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Speaker 1: a starts reminder that when you do this work, you

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Speaker 1: have to be built in sort of resilience for then

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Speaker 1: ever they pushback and the and I think what's what

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Speaker 1: was telling for me, and I talked about a little

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Speaker 1: bit in the book, was that the fact that I

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Speaker 1: was shocked, the fact that I was hurt because I

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Speaker 1: was fundamentally did not anticipate that as even an option.

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Speaker 1: And I realized that naivety was very dangerous and it

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Speaker 1: was good to have lost. So now in continuing these fights,

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Speaker 1: I have much more clear eye. It only comes with experience.

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Speaker 1: I don't know, this winning streak is not forever, Oh no,

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Speaker 1: like it's just like this, losing is not forever, right,

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Speaker 1: and these are temporary states. We have to be really

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Speaker 1: focused on the goal. But would've learned that if I

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Speaker 1: had one again. I'm like, oh, you guys, come on,

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Speaker 1: it's not that hard. You just have to talk to

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Speaker 1: people that work. It's like, yes, you have can do that,

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Speaker 1: but there's going to be some kindlic and it's not

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Speaker 1: going to be linear. And that was such a great lesson.

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Speaker 1: And it's after being angry and upset. After about a week,

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Speaker 1: I was okay, still a little bit hurt, very embarrassed,

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Speaker 1: but I have some clarity. Um that's to what's next.

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Speaker 1: And I think I've learned at least part of what

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Speaker 1: I'm supposed to learn from that experience. Yeah. I think

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Speaker 1: when you forget the size of the system you existence,

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Speaker 1: that's when you have that naivete like last year, really

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Speaker 1: going hard and I think I've always gone hard on politics,

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Speaker 1: but really going hard about um, the authoritarian and fascist

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Speaker 1: risk democracy that is Trump is um. I became a

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Speaker 1: target for Breitbart and suddenly I was like, WHOA why

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Speaker 1: am I getting shadow band on Instagram? And why am

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Speaker 1: I receiving thousands of death threats a day? Not like

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Speaker 1: a couple of day, which I'm used to like thousands

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Speaker 1: and thousands. You know, I've got like guys from the U. S.

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Speaker 1: Marine Corps who are oath keepers, like telling me they're

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Speaker 1: going to hunt me down on a pack and you know,

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Speaker 1: make me pay, like really scary shit. And some people

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Speaker 1: framed it to me, which is kind of insane um

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Speaker 1: but sort of a way where you have to think

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Speaker 1: again about these sort of perspectives. They were like, well,

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Speaker 1: you know, you're really messaging effectively against that kind of

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Speaker 1: state sponsored violence when that violence comes for you. And

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Speaker 1: it was my realization much like you had to go, oh,

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Speaker 1: I am a man who's been running progressively against the system.

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Speaker 1: I went, oh, I am I am progressively messaging against fascism,

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Speaker 1: and fascism wants to step on my neck. Whoa. And

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Speaker 1: it just wasn't I didn't have the perspective. And a

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Speaker 1: friend of mine, similarly, you know, the people I went

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Speaker 1: to for counsel, said you have to understand that when

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Speaker 1: you have a microphone to five million people a day

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Speaker 1: across you know, three social channels, you're a threat, babe.

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Speaker 1: And I was like, oh man, here I am just thinking.

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Speaker 1: I'm like in it to win it with all my

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Speaker 1: all my friends on the front lines. I forgot. I

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Speaker 1: forgot what my ability to grab a megaphone might mean

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Speaker 1: to the people who don't want people like us to

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Speaker 1: have a megaphone. And it really made me have to

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Speaker 1: sit and take stock and think about how how do

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Speaker 1: I continue to work in a system when I see

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Speaker 1: how dangerous the system is, and when I have very

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Speaker 1: rational individual fear, but I have an even greater desire

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Speaker 1: for collect deliberation. How do we learn to balance bigger things?

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Speaker 1: How how when we step outside of our I'm just

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Speaker 1: one and we realize how big these these sort of

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Speaker 1: battles between light and dark are, how do we take

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Speaker 1: ownership in that space? And for me, I found some

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Speaker 1: fuel in looking at history and and in knowing you

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Speaker 1: and knowing your story, and and diving deeper in your

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Speaker 1: story in your book. And this might feel like a stretch,

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Speaker 1: but it's a question I've really been thinking about as

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Speaker 1: I've been wondering about each of our individual but you know,

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Speaker 1: in the same bucket journeys over the last couple of years,

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Speaker 1: in particular, I wondered, did you take stock looking back

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Speaker 1: even at your own life, because I think of your story.

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Speaker 1: You know you, you began and South Stockton. You grew

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Speaker 1: up in a single parent household. You've talked about growing

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Speaker 1: up through the difficulty of poverty and and the looming

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Speaker 1: malaise of your father's incarceration, and and did you did

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Speaker 1: you look back at your childhood and as the man

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Speaker 1: you are today say, oh, everything in my life set

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Speaker 1: me up to lead for people like me. Did that

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Speaker 1: give you fuel when you were in the moment of

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Speaker 1: inspecting during your own reckoning? Yeah? No. I remember my

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Speaker 1: first or second city council meeting. I was tween two

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Speaker 1: years old ent City council twenty to Michael, and I

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Speaker 1: was terrified. I was scared as hill. I was like,

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Speaker 1: I don't want to get up here and look stupid.

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Speaker 1: I don't want to sound stupid. I want to be embarrassing.

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Speaker 1: I don't want anyone to see actually he's a fraud.

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Speaker 1: And then I remember sort of waiting for someone else

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Speaker 1: to speak. We were talking about policing, incarceration. As waiting,

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Speaker 1: I was going to wait for the elder councilman to speak,

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Speaker 1: and no one did, so I remember clicking the button

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Speaker 1: and saying, well, actually, I think we have to be

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Speaker 1: very focused, like it's like the whole, the whole spill.

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Speaker 1: And in my colleagues agreed with me, and I was like, oh, courage,

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Speaker 1: be yet courage and accale. And I realized back then

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Speaker 1: that sort of my experiences gave me a unique insight

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Speaker 1: and that it wasn't enough for me to be there

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Speaker 1: as a representative if nothing was changing, if the conversation

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Speaker 1: wasn't different. And then when I became mayor, I was

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Speaker 1: adamant that, particularly being the youngest and the first, that

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Speaker 1: we had to it had to be different, like government

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Speaker 1: should look different, governing should like different. Priorities took different

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Speaker 1: because I'm different, and I I think that's where you

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Speaker 1: gave me the courage to do like basic income and

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Speaker 1: to do the work of reducing like I think all

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Speaker 1: that just stemmed from I trust my people and and

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Speaker 1: and these are the experiences I had so so and

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Speaker 1: actually writing the book, it also was helpful to sort of,

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Speaker 1: you know, I haven't been around that not long. It

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Speaker 1: was helpful the chart even for thirty years, how all

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Speaker 1: the setbacks and disappointments were almost like slingshots that were

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Speaker 1: stretching for even further, propelling and so then cause I

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Speaker 1: finished the book in October, then November I lost three elections,

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Speaker 1: so I to write again, and going back and reading

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Speaker 1: it was also helpful. I say, well, look like you

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Speaker 1: didn't get this fellowship and like what happened next she

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Speaker 1: was on city council. You didn't into this school, end

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Speaker 1: up loving going to Stanford. You didn't get I have

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Speaker 1: thought about all the times I messed up or something

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Speaker 1: that happened, and I was like it sucked at the moment.

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Speaker 1: It was actually just a stretching function to prepare to

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Speaker 1: go further and I can even imagine so so slide

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Speaker 1: also really helped. But the last thing, I'll say connect

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Speaker 1: to the first thing we started with. But I also

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Speaker 1: I'm trying to learn not to put as much pressure

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Speaker 1: on myself because I realized now I'm so much happier

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Speaker 1: because I don't have I put so much pressure on

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Speaker 1: myself to be not just a representative for the city,

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Speaker 1: but it representative for entire generation. I'm represented for an

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Speaker 1: entire point of view. I just felt like I had

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Speaker 1: to like, like, if I don't do it, no one

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Speaker 1: else like me may ever get may not ever get

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Speaker 1: this position. Again, I realized I was just just be

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Speaker 1: more gentle with myself because I was just so much

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Speaker 1: to carry and when manifesting how I interact with my

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Speaker 1: friends and how to dreamt of my family and even

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Speaker 1: how I interact with the people I want to serve,

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Speaker 1: because inside I had just all this anxiety fear like well,

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Speaker 1: if it doesn't work or if you fail, what if

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Speaker 1: nothing changes? And it just created a lot of extra

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Speaker 1: stress on top of the stress of doing what you

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Speaker 1: said into the challenging dominant paradigms. M H. I wonder

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Speaker 1: why that is that we have such a tendency to

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Speaker 1: put pressure on ourselves in that way, because you would

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Speaker 1: never do it to your friends. You know, we celebrate

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Speaker 1: our friends wins, even if their baby wins. We're like,

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Speaker 1: look at you, you did it. And then with ourselves

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Speaker 1: like if I don't solve this crisis, I have failed.

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Speaker 1: We we forget that our incremental contributions add up to

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Speaker 1: the sum of our life. You know, I'm really fascinated

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Speaker 1: by your early story, and of course it doesn't surprise

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Speaker 1: me one bit that we just like jumped into the present.

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Speaker 1: It was like, tell me exactly what's on your heart

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Speaker 1: and soul right now? Of course, but normally I start

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Speaker 1: with people, and I do begin at their beginning, because

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Speaker 1: there are plenty of people who can, you know, see

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Speaker 1: you on today's pot and go, oh my god, I

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Speaker 1: love Michael Tubbs, or they'll go, hey, I've heard about

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Speaker 1: that guy, or who is that guy? You know, wherever

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Speaker 1: they fall on the spectrum of awareness. And I always

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Speaker 1: like people to meet you and all of our guests

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Speaker 1: as they began, and I would love for you to

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Speaker 1: offer our listeners a bit of an overview of you know, young,

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Speaker 1: young Mr Michael Tubbs. You know how you grew up

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Speaker 1: in and how your perspective began to be shaped by

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Speaker 1: what was around you, um in your city. I think

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Speaker 1: it's I think it'll it'll help connect the dots of

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Speaker 1: how did this man become a city council member at

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Speaker 1: the young age of twenty two. So will you paint

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Speaker 1: a little bit of that picture for the folks at home. Yeah, so,

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Speaker 1: first and foremost, Stockton, California. Born and raised in stock

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Speaker 1: In California. That's home. Even to live in stock anymore,

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Speaker 1: that's still home. It's still so much part of sort

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Speaker 1: of who I am and who I become. It's a

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Speaker 1: it's a challenging place, but a beautiful place. Um and

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Speaker 1: my mother, my aunto my grandmother. There were like three

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Speaker 1: I called like the three walls of mothers like that,

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Speaker 1: all three of them equally made it their charged a

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Speaker 1: parent because my mother was sixteen when she had when

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Speaker 1: she was printing with me in seventeen when I was born,

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Speaker 1: and my father he was in all attention for so

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Speaker 1: then when I was born and has been car straded

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Speaker 1: for twenty six or three years. I've been alive, including

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Speaker 1: ever since I was six years old. So the part

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Speaker 1: of it, I mean, part of it's like it's a difficulty,

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Speaker 1: but part of it was also just a phenomenal effort

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Speaker 1: that my mama, hunting grandmother put in. And I realized

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Speaker 1: now as a parent what they did that was so

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Speaker 1: special is that they literally gave up their life for

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Speaker 1: me and my cousins and my little brother. They just

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Speaker 1: ceased to have It was work, kids, work, There was

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Speaker 1: no because I think about myself and I'm like, okay,

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Speaker 1: after this event, so I need someone to watch the

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Speaker 1: kids for this time. I have to go here, I

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Speaker 1: need to travel there, And they had none of that

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Speaker 1: their life there, they made it their whole focus and

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Speaker 1: mission of life was the parent and they did such

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Speaker 1: a phenomenal job. And I feel in many ways my

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Speaker 1: kids are so in a better material position than then

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Speaker 1: I was in, for sure, but I still in terms

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Speaker 1: of internal balance I have with myself now, part of

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Speaker 1: it is like, man, am I like I can't give

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Speaker 1: up everything and just like make them my life. I

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Speaker 1: was like, man, that's that really helped me. Um and

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Speaker 1: I went to public schools, and I guess early on

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Speaker 1: really recognized that for a lot of people just had

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Speaker 1: expectations of me and my ability or who I would

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Speaker 1: become just based off the fact that I didn't have

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Speaker 1: my father wasn't present, or just based off the fact

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Speaker 1: that my mom was young, or just based off the

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Speaker 1: fact that I was black, or just based on the

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Speaker 1: fact that's from South Stopping. And I noticed that some

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Speaker 1: people would like internalized that and sort of act out

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Speaker 1: in ways that fulfilled are confirmed those low expectations, and

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Speaker 1: I just resolved to do the exact opposite, but to

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Speaker 1: the hundredth degree and just making like proving wrong, poop

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Speaker 1: were wrong, Phop, We're wrong. And a lot of that

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Speaker 1: came from my mom, and then I also my grandmother

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Speaker 1: was like a spiritual bullwark. So I spent a lot

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Speaker 1: of time in church that I was like a child

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Speaker 1: preacher essentially for the time I was like seven to fifteen.

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Speaker 1: And I mean, I think that also was a great experience,

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Speaker 1: but it also put a lot of pressure or because

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Speaker 1: I feel like, Okay, if I want to be in

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Speaker 1: front of congregation, I do everything perfectly. I can't make

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Speaker 1: I can't. You know, it's there's so much pressure and

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Speaker 1: so much like you need to be the example, you

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Speaker 1: need to be the one people like I want to

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Speaker 1: follow his lead. But I think that leadership and that

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Speaker 1: I built in the in the opportunity to be in

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Speaker 1: front of congregation speak really helped preparing me for for

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Speaker 1: us later. So longer story short, ended up going to

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Speaker 1: Stanford and that's when my life it was like a slingshot.

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Speaker 1: That's just when my life just took off because it

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Speaker 1: was the first time in my life, which sounds really basic,

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Speaker 1: but it's true. It was the first time in my

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Speaker 1: life where all the basics were taken care of with

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Speaker 1: no stress, like I knew I was only eat three

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Speaker 1: times a day, no stress, like there was no constant

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Speaker 1: economic stress and anxiety over how you gonna pay this mortgage?

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Speaker 1: How you gonna pay these lights? Because you work? Actually

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Speaker 1: I was help. It was just just all that was

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Speaker 1: off the table. So all I have to do was

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Speaker 1: write papers and read books. And my classmates would be

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Speaker 1: so stressed, and I would be like, yeah, this is

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Speaker 1: such a privilege, Like all we have to do is

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Speaker 1: read a book, and even if you fail, this class

403
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Speaker 1: will get a job because you're at Stanford. Like this

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Speaker 1: is I said, you guys, this is not pressure. This

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Speaker 1: is so easy. And I think from there that's when

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Speaker 1: I also recognized that my classmates were smart, but they

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Speaker 1: weren't necessarily smarter than the people I grew up with,

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Speaker 1: and stopped it, Like my classmates worked hard, but they

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Speaker 1: didn't necessarily work hard. Like it just really dissuaded me

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Speaker 1: of all these notions I had going in that I

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Speaker 1: was successful because I was special because I worked hard

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Speaker 1: and I was exceptional and and I do everything right

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Speaker 1: and and that's why I'm successful. And I pulled myself

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Speaker 1: up on my bootstraps and I got to college and

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Speaker 1: met people who smoked all day every day, who did

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Speaker 1: hard drugs, who just didn't do their home, like we're

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Speaker 1: still successful, And I was like wait, or who were

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Speaker 1: very lazy? You know, it's like wait, and they're successful too.

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Speaker 1: And that's really where I began to think about sort

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Speaker 1: of Okay, well, why do I have to work twice

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Speaker 1: as hard to get to the same place as someone

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Speaker 1: who doesn't have to work at all because their parents

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Speaker 1: happens to be on the bird of trust fee And

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Speaker 1: that is and that's what droving a policy. So I

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Speaker 1: spent all my time in college focus on policy policy,

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Speaker 1: where how did how did this happen? Like if it's

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Speaker 1: not an act of God? Where are the actual rules

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Speaker 1: on the books? And then interned in the White House

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Speaker 1: and the President Obama and while they're one of my cousins,

430
00:24:37,520 --> 00:24:40,520
Speaker 1: Danielle James, was murdered at a house party. And it

431
00:24:40,680 --> 00:24:46,560
Speaker 1: was really that sort of juxtaposition between like being at

432
00:24:46,680 --> 00:24:49,960
Speaker 1: Stanford and the White House like the height of American

433
00:24:50,040 --> 00:24:53,600
Speaker 1: success and feeling very powerless to do anything to help

434
00:24:53,720 --> 00:24:57,080
Speaker 1: my family that it's like, well, what's even the point

435
00:24:57,119 --> 00:25:00,680
Speaker 1: of me being here? What's like is everything meg I

436
00:25:00,760 --> 00:25:03,920
Speaker 1: mentioned earlier, what's the point? Like, is there any that

437
00:25:04,040 --> 00:25:06,560
Speaker 1: do I do I need to care about the world?

438
00:25:06,680 --> 00:25:08,600
Speaker 1: Can I just be out for me? If this if

439
00:25:08,600 --> 00:25:11,160
Speaker 1: it's gonna be pain and suffering anyway, like, why not enjoy?

440
00:25:11,560 --> 00:25:14,679
Speaker 1: Why not grab these moments of joy and individual success?

441
00:25:15,720 --> 00:25:19,840
Speaker 1: I think going back home, I made the crazy decision

442
00:25:19,920 --> 00:25:22,320
Speaker 1: of the twenty one year old that during my senior

443
00:25:22,400 --> 00:25:24,240
Speaker 1: in college, I'm gonna run for office. And it was

444
00:25:24,440 --> 00:25:28,200
Speaker 1: really to work out feelings of survivors guilt. Um. It

445
00:25:28,320 --> 00:25:32,760
Speaker 1: was really to channel that pain and that anger in

446
00:25:32,840 --> 00:25:35,520
Speaker 1: a way, that way to be self destructive or hinduistics.

447
00:25:36,640 --> 00:25:40,600
Speaker 1: And the older I get, the more I'm like trying

448
00:25:40,600 --> 00:25:44,359
Speaker 1: to rationalize, are you sure? But year I was like, no,

449
00:25:44,440 --> 00:25:46,480
Speaker 1: this one I'm supposed to do. I feel it like

450
00:25:46,680 --> 00:25:50,000
Speaker 1: this is exactly what I'm supposed to do. And long

451
00:25:50,080 --> 00:25:53,359
Speaker 1: story short, I referen city council. UM, end up winning

452
00:25:53,400 --> 00:25:57,600
Speaker 1: and spend my twenties in local government. I'm trying to

453
00:25:57,680 --> 00:26:01,399
Speaker 1: make my hometown better. I love it. So there's a

454
00:26:01,440 --> 00:26:05,520
Speaker 1: couple of things that jump out at me. This notion

455
00:26:05,960 --> 00:26:09,440
Speaker 1: that you talk about when you were at school looking

456
00:26:09,520 --> 00:26:14,440
Speaker 1: around one of the things that fascinates me, especially in

457
00:26:15,160 --> 00:26:18,720
Speaker 1: reading the works of all of the civil rights giants

458
00:26:18,760 --> 00:26:21,080
Speaker 1: who have come before us. Who's you know, shoulders we

459
00:26:21,160 --> 00:26:24,000
Speaker 1: stand on and who we study to try to build

460
00:26:24,080 --> 00:26:27,040
Speaker 1: on in our own generation is that some of us

461
00:26:27,119 --> 00:26:32,840
Speaker 1: are granted the permission to experiment and make mistakes and

462
00:26:33,040 --> 00:26:37,600
Speaker 1: like be wild kids, and some of us are not.

463
00:26:39,160 --> 00:26:43,879
Speaker 1: And when you talk about what you witnessed, you know,

464
00:26:44,000 --> 00:26:46,359
Speaker 1: getting to Stanford and going, oh, wait a minute, like

465
00:26:47,200 --> 00:26:49,720
Speaker 1: that guy smokes weed all day, that guy parties hard

466
00:26:49,800 --> 00:26:54,440
Speaker 1: on the weekends. Like in in certain social circles, those

467
00:26:54,520 --> 00:26:58,359
Speaker 1: things are seen as fine, and in other circles, you know,

468
00:26:58,520 --> 00:27:00,879
Speaker 1: God forbid you ever have weed on you. You're going

469
00:27:00,920 --> 00:27:02,480
Speaker 1: to get a charge and be in the system for

470
00:27:02,520 --> 00:27:05,119
Speaker 1: the rest of your life and maybe be jailed, um

471
00:27:05,359 --> 00:27:08,119
Speaker 1: for decades for something that people are now you know,

472
00:27:08,760 --> 00:27:12,159
Speaker 1: selling and hips, your packaging. Um. None of that is

473
00:27:12,240 --> 00:27:15,960
Speaker 1: lost on me, you know, the difference in how we experience.

474
00:27:16,600 --> 00:27:20,119
Speaker 1: And I've also seen you know a lot of people

475
00:27:20,480 --> 00:27:24,280
Speaker 1: from those worlds, you know, the Stanfords, the Harvard's, the

476
00:27:25,000 --> 00:27:28,480
Speaker 1: grad schools that are fancy, the people who wind up

477
00:27:28,520 --> 00:27:31,879
Speaker 1: working on Wall Street, who really get upset when we

478
00:27:32,160 --> 00:27:37,800
Speaker 1: have conversations about privilege. And one of the ways I

479
00:27:37,880 --> 00:27:41,119
Speaker 1: like to think about it is stress is stress, right,

480
00:27:41,280 --> 00:27:46,040
Speaker 1: Like what you're going through affects your body. You stepping

481
00:27:46,080 --> 00:27:49,920
Speaker 1: out of Stockton and into Stanford had a larger per

482
00:27:50,000 --> 00:27:56,120
Speaker 1: view worldview on the stressors that affect people like you mentioned,

483
00:27:56,359 --> 00:27:57,760
Speaker 1: how are we going to pay this mortgage? How are

484
00:27:57,800 --> 00:27:59,200
Speaker 1: we going to keep these lights on? Who's going to

485
00:27:59,240 --> 00:28:01,640
Speaker 1: carry extra show? So you get to a world where

486
00:28:01,680 --> 00:28:03,639
Speaker 1: people are only stressed about how am I going to

487
00:28:03,720 --> 00:28:05,919
Speaker 1: make my grades? Do this paper live up to all

488
00:28:05,960 --> 00:28:08,119
Speaker 1: the expectations I have on this campus? And you're like,

489
00:28:08,840 --> 00:28:12,480
Speaker 1: that's it, and and I have had to think about

490
00:28:12,520 --> 00:28:14,800
Speaker 1: that in my own world. I grew up in a

491
00:28:14,880 --> 00:28:17,639
Speaker 1: household where it's like the American dream, immigrant story, right, Like,

492
00:28:17,720 --> 00:28:20,480
Speaker 1: my dad moved to the US, he went to school here,

493
00:28:20,640 --> 00:28:23,119
Speaker 1: he hustled hard, he started a business, he became an

494
00:28:23,160 --> 00:28:25,399
Speaker 1: employer of a hell of a lot of people. He

495
00:28:25,560 --> 00:28:28,280
Speaker 1: is an immigrant success story. So I grew up in

496
00:28:28,320 --> 00:28:31,720
Speaker 1: a household where we weren't like loaded, but I didn't

497
00:28:31,960 --> 00:28:34,480
Speaker 1: worry about where my next meal was coming from or

498
00:28:34,520 --> 00:28:36,200
Speaker 1: if my parents were going to keep the lights on.

499
00:28:37,400 --> 00:28:42,840
Speaker 1: And now when I am experiencing the stress of the

500
00:28:42,960 --> 00:28:46,800
Speaker 1: expectations of my world, my career, what everyone expects of me,

501
00:28:46,960 --> 00:28:48,880
Speaker 1: what I'm supposed to do, what I'm supposed to be,

502
00:28:48,960 --> 00:28:50,440
Speaker 1: the kind of leader I'm supposed to be I'm always

503
00:28:50,440 --> 00:28:52,520
Speaker 1: supposed to be Available'm always supposed to be happy. I'm

504
00:28:52,520 --> 00:28:54,560
Speaker 1: supposed to know all my lines and everybody else's. And

505
00:28:54,760 --> 00:28:58,760
Speaker 1: do you know medical procedure, rehearsals, um during my lunch breaks,

506
00:28:58,800 --> 00:29:03,640
Speaker 1: And like all of these things, I'm stressed. And the

507
00:29:03,760 --> 00:29:07,760
Speaker 1: way I think about it when I check in with

508
00:29:08,040 --> 00:29:13,200
Speaker 1: my own relative privilege, I don't dismiss my stress. But

509
00:29:13,320 --> 00:29:17,360
Speaker 1: what I do remind myself of is, you know what

510
00:29:18,240 --> 00:29:23,040
Speaker 1: these are champagne problems. I am so lucky to have

511
00:29:23,240 --> 00:29:27,160
Speaker 1: stress from my dreams coming true on my plate m

512
00:29:28,360 --> 00:29:31,960
Speaker 1: and so I acknowledge what my body is experiencing. But

513
00:29:32,080 --> 00:29:39,080
Speaker 1: I always try to be deeply grateful about the perspective

514
00:29:39,320 --> 00:29:42,880
Speaker 1: of stress I am not going through. How can we

515
00:29:43,000 --> 00:29:47,239
Speaker 1: be more gracious with each other? And I believe if

516
00:29:47,280 --> 00:29:50,040
Speaker 1: we come from that place of more graciousness for the

517
00:29:50,120 --> 00:29:54,200
Speaker 1: experience of our friends and neighbors and community members, then

518
00:29:55,640 --> 00:29:59,200
Speaker 1: we get into how do we create not only sound

519
00:29:59,280 --> 00:30:01,760
Speaker 1: or treatment, but between me, you and each of us,

520
00:30:02,480 --> 00:30:07,240
Speaker 1: how do we get into shaping policy to create graciousness

521
00:30:08,240 --> 00:30:10,800
Speaker 1: for communities? Because that's what I think of his policy.

522
00:30:11,280 --> 00:30:13,520
Speaker 1: You know you said it. Everybody goes you do really

523
00:30:13,640 --> 00:30:16,760
Speaker 1: unsexy long term political work. And I think that's why

524
00:30:16,920 --> 00:30:21,440
Speaker 1: progressives lose sometimes because everybody expects the own the progress

525
00:30:21,520 --> 00:30:24,920
Speaker 1: to come as fast as like Ted cruizes ship talking tweets.

526
00:30:25,960 --> 00:30:29,440
Speaker 1: But the garbage comes fast and hot because it's easy

527
00:30:29,560 --> 00:30:33,320
Speaker 1: to turn over. Progress is long and it requires dedication,

528
00:30:33,920 --> 00:30:38,040
Speaker 1: you know. Garbage politics are like trashy one night stands

529
00:30:38,080 --> 00:30:43,040
Speaker 1: on bad late night TV. And and progressive love is

530
00:30:43,200 --> 00:30:46,400
Speaker 1: like committing to getting married. Man, It's long and you've

531
00:30:46,400 --> 00:30:51,200
Speaker 1: got to do the work. And so I'm I'm curious

532
00:30:51,280 --> 00:30:57,640
Speaker 1: about how you might frame if we think about about

533
00:30:57,720 --> 00:31:00,880
Speaker 1: it as love, how do you frame the study of

534
00:31:01,080 --> 00:31:05,520
Speaker 1: policy for people listening? Because your policy has so clearly

535
00:31:05,600 --> 00:31:10,200
Speaker 1: always been rooted in loving commitment, and I want other

536
00:31:10,320 --> 00:31:15,000
Speaker 1: people to to experience that inspiration to take that charge

537
00:31:15,760 --> 00:31:19,040
Speaker 1: um for policy in their own communities. Yeah, and and

538
00:31:19,240 --> 00:31:22,480
Speaker 1: first let me just say, um, I love the way

539
00:31:22,480 --> 00:31:25,520
Speaker 1: in which you talked about grace um and grace being

540
00:31:25,680 --> 00:31:29,440
Speaker 1: sort of a worldview and also manifests itself in policy.

541
00:31:30,200 --> 00:31:32,240
Speaker 1: I used to tell my staff all the time, they'd

542
00:31:32,240 --> 00:31:35,320
Speaker 1: be annoyed with me, like give grace, Let's give some grace,

543
00:31:36,520 --> 00:31:40,280
Speaker 1: some grace, it was a very annoying Yes, they should

544
00:31:40,280 --> 00:31:41,880
Speaker 1: have had typos and the thing when I deal with

545
00:31:41,960 --> 00:31:44,440
Speaker 1: the issue, but let's just give grace. They're not terrible people,

546
00:31:45,320 --> 00:31:47,480
Speaker 1: um even some of our adversaries. But no, I think

547
00:31:47,600 --> 00:31:53,080
Speaker 1: for me sort of love is what animates the kind

548
00:31:53,120 --> 00:31:55,680
Speaker 1: of how I think about policy. But it really comes

549
00:31:55,800 --> 00:31:59,840
Speaker 1: from like not like an anemic love, but like the

550
00:32:00,040 --> 00:32:02,680
Speaker 1: love you describe, like the love that's a verb, the

551
00:32:02,920 --> 00:32:09,680
Speaker 1: love of humanity that leads to anger at mistreatment of humanity,

552
00:32:09,920 --> 00:32:13,040
Speaker 1: like that, like the love of all people. So that

553
00:32:13,680 --> 00:32:16,520
Speaker 1: injustice just really makes me up, like I'm frowning now,

554
00:32:16,640 --> 00:32:20,560
Speaker 1: like makes me upset, And it's also perplexing, like why

555
00:32:20,600 --> 00:32:22,640
Speaker 1: would we want to live in a world with so

556
00:32:23,040 --> 00:32:26,640
Speaker 1: with poverty when we actually don't have to have poverty?

557
00:32:26,920 --> 00:32:30,200
Speaker 1: Like love is what animates to work for basic income,

558
00:32:30,240 --> 00:32:32,560
Speaker 1: because like I would love to see everyone have the

559
00:32:32,600 --> 00:32:37,160
Speaker 1: opportunity to provide the basics, Like I would love for

560
00:32:37,280 --> 00:32:39,640
Speaker 1: people who have the ability to dream. I would love

561
00:32:39,720 --> 00:32:42,320
Speaker 1: for people to have the opportunity. I love what you

562
00:32:42,400 --> 00:32:45,400
Speaker 1: said earlier. It's not about not having stress, because everyone

563
00:32:45,480 --> 00:32:48,040
Speaker 1: has stress. It's about the source of that stress. And

564
00:32:48,080 --> 00:32:50,640
Speaker 1: I would love for people to be stressed about their

565
00:32:50,720 --> 00:32:53,400
Speaker 1: dreams coming true and the responsibility that comes with that,

566
00:32:53,880 --> 00:32:57,400
Speaker 1: Like that just sounds like such an incredible world to

567
00:32:57,520 --> 00:32:59,840
Speaker 1: be in. And I think sort of that that ethos

568
00:33:00,000 --> 00:33:02,400
Speaker 1: comes from my faith tradition. I just remember growing up

569
00:33:03,000 --> 00:33:05,560
Speaker 1: and Sunday School and hearing like God is loved and

570
00:33:05,920 --> 00:33:09,240
Speaker 1: hearing that you should love your neighbor like yourself. And

571
00:33:09,840 --> 00:33:13,480
Speaker 1: I'm a super practical person, so I took that phase value.

572
00:33:13,800 --> 00:33:17,400
Speaker 1: It's like, like, I should love my neighbor as myself.

573
00:33:17,480 --> 00:33:19,520
Speaker 1: So what's good for me is good, it's good for you,

574
00:33:20,240 --> 00:33:22,800
Speaker 1: and so about my How I tried to govern when

575
00:33:22,840 --> 00:33:25,800
Speaker 1: I was mayored, and my world view remains the same

576
00:33:25,880 --> 00:33:29,640
Speaker 1: as that. I just want everyone, regardless of effort, to

577
00:33:29,800 --> 00:33:32,520
Speaker 1: have the same opportunities I have and didn't let their

578
00:33:32,600 --> 00:33:37,200
Speaker 1: effort dictate what happens with that opportunity. I want every

579
00:33:37,360 --> 00:33:40,400
Speaker 1: kid to have the ability to get the great education

580
00:33:40,480 --> 00:33:43,560
Speaker 1: that my kids will receive, regardless of what their parents

581
00:33:43,640 --> 00:33:47,720
Speaker 1: do for a living. I want everybody to have the

582
00:33:47,840 --> 00:33:53,400
Speaker 1: opportunity to go to a great school and that they're

583
00:33:53,400 --> 00:33:58,200
Speaker 1: all given a great preparatory training and they have qualified teacher.

584
00:33:58,240 --> 00:34:00,520
Speaker 1: Like I, I just really think what's good enough for me,

585
00:34:00,600 --> 00:34:03,000
Speaker 1: it's good for everyone. It sounds very basic. That's really

586
00:34:03,080 --> 00:34:05,960
Speaker 1: how I would read policy briefs, how I would govern,

587
00:34:06,200 --> 00:34:09,200
Speaker 1: how a composty ideas. It's like, well, what would I

588
00:34:09,239 --> 00:34:12,480
Speaker 1: want and how to extend that same And the last

589
00:34:12,520 --> 00:34:15,120
Speaker 1: thing I say is, and this has come up repeatedly,

590
00:34:16,080 --> 00:34:20,080
Speaker 1: particularly all the basic incomparliti start happening, is I have

591
00:34:20,160 --> 00:34:21,799
Speaker 1: to say the same thing over and over. So if

592
00:34:21,800 --> 00:34:25,160
Speaker 1: you have to tell people that, are you surprised by

593
00:34:25,200 --> 00:34:29,080
Speaker 1: the findings, I'm like, no, because people are people, and

594
00:34:29,200 --> 00:34:32,359
Speaker 1: we can't think of people as the most extreme case

595
00:34:32,440 --> 00:34:36,680
Speaker 1: that people we've met, which is true, but they're they're anomaly.

596
00:34:36,760 --> 00:34:39,160
Speaker 1: There's like you on both ends. I think we want

597
00:34:39,200 --> 00:34:44,600
Speaker 1: people we like really govern and think of our country

598
00:34:44,680 --> 00:34:49,320
Speaker 1: and our world as polar exceptionals like exceptionally great people

599
00:34:49,400 --> 00:34:52,919
Speaker 1: who come from nothing and through blah blah blah blah,

600
00:34:53,280 --> 00:34:56,680
Speaker 1: and then exceptionally bad people who are creating harm and

601
00:34:56,760 --> 00:34:59,719
Speaker 1: don't want to work and just still and just take.

602
00:35:00,239 --> 00:35:04,120
Speaker 1: And we make those two poles the center of our

603
00:35:04,160 --> 00:35:07,239
Speaker 1: political discussion, say either people are this or that, when

604
00:35:07,280 --> 00:35:09,759
Speaker 1: that's like literally the extremes. Most of us are like

605
00:35:11,239 --> 00:35:14,919
Speaker 1: in the middle where people who are going to spend

606
00:35:15,000 --> 00:35:20,120
Speaker 1: money on our kids. Who what a decent house? Yeah,

607
00:35:20,600 --> 00:35:24,000
Speaker 1: money to go out to eat means by our kids.

608
00:35:24,080 --> 00:35:27,719
Speaker 1: Some things. It's that fun on the weekends like we like,

609
00:35:28,920 --> 00:35:31,600
Speaker 1: and people get on my nerves. Were like, that's so

610
00:35:31,760 --> 00:35:33,680
Speaker 1: weak and the needing. But I think that's the harder,

611
00:35:33,840 --> 00:35:36,400
Speaker 1: harder work because it makes us think about sort of

612
00:35:37,360 --> 00:35:39,320
Speaker 1: why do we have a society or why do we

613
00:35:39,400 --> 00:35:43,920
Speaker 1: have a world where those things aren't happening beyond individual's efforts,

614
00:35:44,080 --> 00:35:49,239
Speaker 1: beyond individual ability. And that's much more harder conversation and

615
00:35:49,360 --> 00:35:52,799
Speaker 1: just saying well, people work hard like my dad did,

616
00:35:52,880 --> 00:35:55,080
Speaker 1: they'll be fine. Or people made different choices that my

617
00:35:55,160 --> 00:35:57,000
Speaker 1: dad did, they wouldn't be in jail. It's like that's

618
00:35:57,080 --> 00:36:00,200
Speaker 1: so simple, so reductionistic. But it was love that really

619
00:36:00,239 --> 00:36:02,440
Speaker 1: got me to think about, No, there has to be

620
00:36:02,520 --> 00:36:06,319
Speaker 1: something deeper here, like this, this, this, That explanation doesn't

621
00:36:06,360 --> 00:36:10,879
Speaker 1: make sense. No, it really doesn't. And I think when

622
00:36:10,960 --> 00:36:16,160
Speaker 1: we consider how to come back to the middle where

623
00:36:16,239 --> 00:36:19,279
Speaker 1: everyone lives. Look, you can be an exceptional person and

624
00:36:19,400 --> 00:36:23,640
Speaker 1: have a bad day. You can be an exceptional person

625
00:36:23,760 --> 00:36:28,279
Speaker 1: who screws up and gets arrested. I know a lot

626
00:36:28,320 --> 00:36:31,320
Speaker 1: of exceptional people who have gotten arrested just because I

627
00:36:31,400 --> 00:36:36,719
Speaker 1: read the news, you know, and and vice versa. There's

628
00:36:36,760 --> 00:36:38,759
Speaker 1: a lot of people who have been written off who

629
00:36:38,800 --> 00:36:45,160
Speaker 1: have proved that they're capable of exceptional things. And I'm curious.

630
00:36:46,360 --> 00:36:49,880
Speaker 1: You know, we talk a lot about your work as

631
00:36:49,920 --> 00:36:52,239
Speaker 1: a city councilman and becoming mayor, and I really want

632
00:36:52,280 --> 00:36:54,719
Speaker 1: to get into all the u b I work that

633
00:36:54,840 --> 00:36:57,239
Speaker 1: you helped to pilot, and for folks at home, you

634
00:36:57,320 --> 00:37:00,680
Speaker 1: know that's a reference to universal basic income. But but

635
00:37:00,800 --> 00:37:05,640
Speaker 1: before we moved into that, I am really curious what

636
00:37:05,760 --> 00:37:08,120
Speaker 1: it was like for you. You know, you mentioned that

637
00:37:08,560 --> 00:37:11,680
Speaker 1: while you were at Stanford, you interned in President Obama's

638
00:37:11,680 --> 00:37:17,560
Speaker 1: White House. What did that enable you to see? Because

639
00:37:18,320 --> 00:37:23,360
Speaker 1: there's a man who ran on this idea that we

640
00:37:23,680 --> 00:37:26,600
Speaker 1: can show up for each other, who had a lot

641
00:37:26,680 --> 00:37:30,360
Speaker 1: of really visionary goals, and who has met with a

642
00:37:30,440 --> 00:37:33,160
Speaker 1: lot of railroading, and you know, who also is of

643
00:37:33,360 --> 00:37:36,200
Speaker 1: human who can't be perfect on every issue all the time,

644
00:37:36,840 --> 00:37:42,640
Speaker 1: but transformational for the nation undoubtedly. What what did you

645
00:37:42,880 --> 00:37:48,680
Speaker 1: learn within that space that you took with you as

646
00:37:48,800 --> 00:37:52,680
Speaker 1: you then went home to forge your early political career. Yeah,

647
00:37:53,000 --> 00:37:57,600
Speaker 1: it's really a couple of things. Um Number one, like,

648
00:37:57,719 --> 00:38:01,960
Speaker 1: my first vote was for President Obama. My I had

649
00:38:02,080 --> 00:38:07,000
Speaker 1: like seven Obama hoping change shirts. I was Obama organizing

650
00:38:07,160 --> 00:38:09,759
Speaker 1: fellow so entering in our White House this was such

651
00:38:09,800 --> 00:38:14,960
Speaker 1: a wow, wow wow. And while there I learned Number one,

652
00:38:16,600 --> 00:38:19,000
Speaker 1: this isn't really basic, but it was revolutionary to me.

653
00:38:19,680 --> 00:38:25,280
Speaker 1: Government is not like some impersonal institutional bureaucracy. Government is people.

654
00:38:25,960 --> 00:38:29,440
Speaker 1: And I would see sort of decisions being made one

655
00:38:29,480 --> 00:38:32,800
Speaker 1: way or another depending on what happened the night before

656
00:38:33,239 --> 00:38:35,560
Speaker 1: or depending on this someone had their coffee this morning,

657
00:38:35,560 --> 00:38:38,120
Speaker 1: You're depending on where's people attention? It was. I would

658
00:38:38,239 --> 00:38:42,879
Speaker 1: see grants and applications and resources go just two people

659
00:38:43,040 --> 00:38:46,240
Speaker 1: that have a relationship with someone in the building, because

660
00:38:46,320 --> 00:38:50,000
Speaker 1: I mean, there's no it's very subjective. In many cases,

661
00:38:50,040 --> 00:38:52,239
Speaker 1: there's no way anyone can know everything. So it's like, okay,

662
00:38:52,280 --> 00:38:54,920
Speaker 1: who are the cities and mayors the people that are

663
00:38:55,000 --> 00:38:56,640
Speaker 1: top of mind and how to be support them because

664
00:38:56,640 --> 00:38:58,320
Speaker 1: it's hard to help everyone. And that was that was

665
00:38:58,520 --> 00:39:00,399
Speaker 1: that was game change, Like, oh my god, is all

666
00:39:00,480 --> 00:39:05,400
Speaker 1: people in relationships that seemed much more doable than this

667
00:39:05,560 --> 00:39:10,160
Speaker 1: like big and personal institution that exists. It's ubiquitous. But

668
00:39:10,280 --> 00:39:12,960
Speaker 1: I can't quite get in. I don't quite know who

669
00:39:13,200 --> 00:39:15,320
Speaker 1: is government. It's it's a it's a building. It's like, no,

670
00:39:15,440 --> 00:39:18,640
Speaker 1: it's people. And that was revolutionary. And the second thing,

671
00:39:18,760 --> 00:39:22,760
Speaker 1: and you mentioned this earlier, just the pace of change.

672
00:39:24,239 --> 00:39:26,040
Speaker 1: I was there in two thousand and ten, and I

673
00:39:26,120 --> 00:39:31,520
Speaker 1: remember so vividly where sort of the Tea Party had

674
00:39:31,560 --> 00:39:35,000
Speaker 1: just taken the House, which is which is funny because

675
00:39:35,040 --> 00:39:37,400
Speaker 1: back then that was like the worst political thing ever, like,

676
00:39:37,480 --> 00:39:39,799
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, the Tea Party and those I would

677
00:39:40,560 --> 00:39:44,759
Speaker 1: take the Tea Party over insurrectionists every day and the week.

678
00:39:44,800 --> 00:39:48,080
Speaker 1: The Tea Party seems weak in anemic compared to this,

679
00:39:48,360 --> 00:39:51,080
Speaker 1: these crazy insurrectionists. And then he had to make a

680
00:39:51,200 --> 00:39:54,720
Speaker 1: deal where he extended the bush air At tax cuts

681
00:39:55,200 --> 00:40:00,680
Speaker 1: in exchange for extending unemployment insurance. And I remember the

682
00:40:00,880 --> 00:40:03,280
Speaker 1: interns interms, we think we know everything, so we're debating

683
00:40:03,320 --> 00:40:06,840
Speaker 1: the marriage like we have any saying the decision. And

684
00:40:06,960 --> 00:40:09,800
Speaker 1: I remember being torned because it was like those bushingur

685
00:40:09,800 --> 00:40:12,520
Speaker 1: At tax cuts like that was contributing to our deficit.

686
00:40:12,600 --> 00:40:14,759
Speaker 1: It was like I wasn't going to regular people. It

687
00:40:14,840 --> 00:40:17,719
Speaker 1: was just against everything he had ran on and hope

688
00:40:17,760 --> 00:40:20,880
Speaker 1: and change. But then remember unemployment insurance. I thought of

689
00:40:21,080 --> 00:40:23,200
Speaker 1: like family members in Stockton who have been laid off

690
00:40:23,280 --> 00:40:26,880
Speaker 1: during the recession who really needed that unemployment check for

691
00:40:26,960 --> 00:40:31,440
Speaker 1: the winner. And that's why I realized that, Wow, politics

692
00:40:31,520 --> 00:40:35,840
Speaker 1: is so messy and so pragmatic, and your values are pure,

693
00:40:36,000 --> 00:40:38,600
Speaker 1: but the outcomes oftentimes aren't. And that was just a

694
00:40:38,719 --> 00:40:42,400
Speaker 1: huge realization as a twenty year old, because before I

695
00:40:42,520 --> 00:40:44,560
Speaker 1: was like, I was starting to get disillusion like, man,

696
00:40:44,640 --> 00:40:46,880
Speaker 1: it's not working, Like we still have all these problems.

697
00:40:46,920 --> 00:40:48,919
Speaker 1: He's been in office for two years and we still

698
00:40:49,000 --> 00:40:51,439
Speaker 1: have all these things that haven't been done. And it's

699
00:40:51,520 --> 00:40:54,640
Speaker 1: like now I'm like, wow, he did a lot in

700
00:40:54,760 --> 00:40:57,560
Speaker 1: two years, and thank god he did because they were't

701
00:40:57,560 --> 00:41:00,160
Speaker 1: gonna let him do anything. As progress comes at the right,

702
00:41:00,239 --> 00:41:03,960
Speaker 1: at some point it's like that's enough. Pastor britanniis related though.

703
00:41:04,120 --> 00:41:06,400
Speaker 1: Those are two biggest things, and you know, and the

704
00:41:06,520 --> 00:41:09,600
Speaker 1: last thing I learned was that oftentimes the people who

705
00:41:09,640 --> 00:41:14,960
Speaker 1: make decisions come from very insular worlds. They oftentimes they

706
00:41:15,000 --> 00:41:18,200
Speaker 1: all go not just the same colleges, the same dawn

707
00:41:18,280 --> 00:41:22,160
Speaker 1: boarding school, the same damn high school. Like so there's

708
00:41:22,160 --> 00:41:25,160
Speaker 1: nothing wrong with that, but in particular worldview, a particular

709
00:41:25,560 --> 00:41:29,640
Speaker 1: like habitutes around it that really sees the rest of

710
00:41:29,719 --> 00:41:33,120
Speaker 1: the country through a prism of a paper or a

711
00:41:33,200 --> 00:41:37,800
Speaker 1: prism of a briefing versus like actual real people, like

712
00:41:37,920 --> 00:41:43,279
Speaker 1: the people making decisions oftentimes have no real direct contact

713
00:41:43,600 --> 00:41:48,040
Speaker 1: with anyone or no real relationship with anyone actually impacted

714
00:41:48,080 --> 00:41:52,080
Speaker 1: by same policy. I solved that I couldn't believe. I

715
00:41:52,200 --> 00:41:55,000
Speaker 1: was like, wait, like, I wouldn't dare make a decision

716
00:41:55,040 --> 00:41:58,760
Speaker 1: on this issue without least talking to somebody who's affected

717
00:41:58,840 --> 00:42:00,640
Speaker 1: by this issue, because I hadn't know. But I would

718
00:42:00,640 --> 00:42:02,600
Speaker 1: see that all the time. It's like, well, what's the

719
00:42:02,640 --> 00:42:05,640
Speaker 1: reports say, or what's the recommendation or what's the easiest thing?

720
00:42:05,840 --> 00:42:09,879
Speaker 1: And it's like that's wow. Yeah, it's crazy to think

721
00:42:09,960 --> 00:42:14,319
Speaker 1: that that we can all just be reduced to statistics.

722
00:42:14,800 --> 00:42:18,160
Speaker 1: You know, statistics helped me make sense of my feelings

723
00:42:18,200 --> 00:42:21,080
Speaker 1: a lot where I'm like, Okay, what does the math say?

724
00:42:21,160 --> 00:42:24,600
Speaker 1: Because emotions are not mathematical and math is not emotional.

725
00:42:25,320 --> 00:42:28,160
Speaker 1: But I think the math has to be the doorway

726
00:42:28,239 --> 00:42:30,400
Speaker 1: through which we then meet people. And a lot of

727
00:42:30,440 --> 00:42:35,640
Speaker 1: people stop at the door, and you know, you're you're

728
00:42:35,800 --> 00:42:37,839
Speaker 1: very polite when you say it's fine that all these

729
00:42:37,880 --> 00:42:40,040
Speaker 1: people go to the same boarding schools. I'm like, funk, no,

730
00:42:40,160 --> 00:42:43,120
Speaker 1: it isn't. But I will say it's not to criticize

731
00:42:43,640 --> 00:42:47,160
Speaker 1: the school, the educational institution, the opportunity, that's not it.

732
00:42:48,080 --> 00:42:50,680
Speaker 1: The person who phrased it the best that I ever heard.

733
00:42:50,760 --> 00:42:54,160
Speaker 1: I listened to Oprah interview this woman's sister, Joan, who's

734
00:42:54,200 --> 00:42:56,880
Speaker 1: like this, you know, you know, it's just like an

735
00:42:57,160 --> 00:43:00,560
Speaker 1: icon of feminist leadership out of the have the church,

736
00:43:00,640 --> 00:43:04,000
Speaker 1: which seems like a paradox, but it's true. And she

737
00:43:04,200 --> 00:43:07,560
Speaker 1: talked about wanting to usher in, you know, an age

738
00:43:07,600 --> 00:43:12,239
Speaker 1: of female leadership, and Oprah pushed back. I was like,

739
00:43:12,360 --> 00:43:15,120
Speaker 1: but the church is a patriarchy, Like how does this work?

740
00:43:15,480 --> 00:43:17,640
Speaker 1: And she said it so beautifully. I was like, God,

741
00:43:17,640 --> 00:43:19,760
Speaker 1: I can't wait to be ninety two and wax poetic

742
00:43:19,840 --> 00:43:23,000
Speaker 1: in five words right, because I'm very long winded at

743
00:43:23,040 --> 00:43:28,640
Speaker 1: this point. She just said, you can't have which we

744
00:43:28,760 --> 00:43:32,800
Speaker 1: currently do, the men. You can't have people with fifty

745
00:43:33,320 --> 00:43:38,520
Speaker 1: of the information making a percent of the decisions. Women

746
00:43:38,600 --> 00:43:42,600
Speaker 1: have the other fifty of the information. So imagine what

747
00:43:43,120 --> 00:43:46,560
Speaker 1: what community is living on the poverty line the information

748
00:43:46,680 --> 00:43:49,040
Speaker 1: they hold that the that the communities who go to

749
00:43:49,080 --> 00:43:52,040
Speaker 1: prep schools just don't have. It's not a criticism of

750
00:43:52,160 --> 00:43:56,840
Speaker 1: either side if you can recognize that everyone's information in

751
00:43:56,960 --> 00:44:01,000
Speaker 1: totality can be the key. I love that, and that

752
00:44:01,160 --> 00:44:03,400
Speaker 1: was actually inside I was trying to articulate with my

753
00:44:03,520 --> 00:44:06,680
Speaker 1: three points, was that sort of you have people making

754
00:44:07,040 --> 00:44:15,920
Speaker 1: decisions for everyone with very very very diluted, specific micro

755
00:44:16,520 --> 00:44:20,440
Speaker 1: information and the way that the sisters saying it's brilliant.

756
00:44:20,520 --> 00:44:22,680
Speaker 1: I'm still that so thank you. I love it. I

757
00:44:23,280 --> 00:44:25,200
Speaker 1: just I constantly make the point and go, I gotta

758
00:44:25,200 --> 00:44:28,680
Speaker 1: give credit to this lady, But I just I love it.

759
00:44:28,840 --> 00:44:34,080
Speaker 1: It really Um. It codified something I understood to be true,

760
00:44:34,120 --> 00:44:36,919
Speaker 1: but I didn't quite know how to explain either. When

761
00:44:36,960 --> 00:44:40,719
Speaker 1: you you think about what you learned about politics just

762
00:44:40,840 --> 00:44:44,480
Speaker 1: being people and how imperfect that can be. UM and

763
00:44:44,600 --> 00:44:49,520
Speaker 1: certainly these reduced perspectives in many of those rooms, how

764
00:44:49,640 --> 00:44:52,080
Speaker 1: did you then bring all that home, that that more

765
00:44:52,239 --> 00:44:56,920
Speaker 1: personalized understanding of a system and and then run for

766
00:44:57,000 --> 00:44:59,520
Speaker 1: city council and then decide to run for mayor? Like

767
00:44:59,760 --> 00:45:06,360
Speaker 1: what is that journey? Yeah? Well, perfect, coming back and

768
00:45:07,000 --> 00:45:09,400
Speaker 1: realizing that people were getting because that was at the

769
00:45:09,480 --> 00:45:13,080
Speaker 1: time Senator Booker was mayor of Newark, and Newark was

770
00:45:13,120 --> 00:45:15,320
Speaker 1: gonna all this love, and I thought there was some

771
00:45:15,600 --> 00:45:20,160
Speaker 1: like mathematical equation that showed that investment in new work

772
00:45:20,280 --> 00:45:22,640
Speaker 1: was the best way to invest in atleast eight, nine,

773
00:45:22,719 --> 00:45:25,719
Speaker 1: ten reasons which may or may not be true. But

774
00:45:25,760 --> 00:45:28,439
Speaker 1: it was all because the Korey Booker like. People liked

775
00:45:28,560 --> 00:45:30,160
Speaker 1: Korey Booker, and people wanted to be a part of

776
00:45:30,239 --> 00:45:33,160
Speaker 1: what he was doing. And I realized that although not

777
00:45:33,600 --> 00:45:36,560
Speaker 1: a perfect way for change for sure, that at least

778
00:45:36,600 --> 00:45:38,960
Speaker 1: in the political system, the right leader could excite and

779
00:45:39,080 --> 00:45:42,520
Speaker 1: motivate people to look at a situation a city a

780
00:45:42,640 --> 00:45:45,879
Speaker 1: different way. And that's what sort of made me think

781
00:45:46,239 --> 00:45:48,600
Speaker 1: running for office and stoff and could do something because

782
00:45:48,920 --> 00:45:51,160
Speaker 1: I felt even if I don't know anything, I could

783
00:45:51,200 --> 00:45:53,759
Speaker 1: bring in people who know something and sort of also

784
00:45:53,840 --> 00:45:55,759
Speaker 1: bringing some of that community wisdom, and we could govern

785
00:45:56,360 --> 00:46:01,240
Speaker 1: and do some things. And just in often was interesting

786
00:46:01,280 --> 00:46:04,480
Speaker 1: because it's small, much smaller than the entire country. That

787
00:46:04,680 --> 00:46:07,759
Speaker 1: was like easier to organize and like, Okay, I need

788
00:46:08,840 --> 00:46:10,880
Speaker 1: there's seven people in the city council to see council

789
00:46:10,920 --> 00:46:13,759
Speaker 1: sets policy for the city. I need three other people

790
00:46:13,800 --> 00:46:16,000
Speaker 1: to agree with me, and we get anything we want done.

791
00:46:16,680 --> 00:46:19,239
Speaker 1: I was like, so I set out to build relationships

792
00:46:19,280 --> 00:46:22,239
Speaker 1: to make sure anytime I had an idea, whether there

793
00:46:22,320 --> 00:46:25,400
Speaker 1: was a Republican, my councils three Republicans, three Democrats, but

794
00:46:25,480 --> 00:46:28,520
Speaker 1: I was city counselor and four Republicans and two Democrats.

795
00:46:28,560 --> 00:46:30,399
Speaker 1: When I was mayored, it was like, well, I seem

796
00:46:30,400 --> 00:46:32,320
Speaker 1: to always have four votes. And then so it was

797
00:46:32,360 --> 00:46:35,640
Speaker 1: just it helped me really organize and make this my

798
00:46:35,960 --> 00:46:39,160
Speaker 1: macro issue of how you trained stocked and really small. Well,

799
00:46:39,239 --> 00:46:41,799
Speaker 1: you need four votes. Put to do anything, you need

800
00:46:41,880 --> 00:46:45,840
Speaker 1: four votes, And that was helpful. And then it also

801
00:46:45,920 --> 00:46:48,200
Speaker 1: taught me like I don't have all the information, and

802
00:46:48,239 --> 00:46:52,080
Speaker 1: particularly you're in office, because everything is filtered. You're so busy,

803
00:46:52,120 --> 00:46:54,400
Speaker 1: your attention divided, you don't get you get the report,

804
00:46:54,440 --> 00:46:55,800
Speaker 1: and you have to make a decision based on some

805
00:46:56,040 --> 00:46:58,960
Speaker 1: some some something you read. So I was very addative

806
00:46:58,960 --> 00:47:02,280
Speaker 1: about building relationship community members and community groups and building

807
00:47:02,320 --> 00:47:05,719
Speaker 1: sort of community power and a feedback loop. So I

808
00:47:05,800 --> 00:47:07,799
Speaker 1: just wasn't hearing from city staff. I was also hearing

809
00:47:07,840 --> 00:47:10,600
Speaker 1: from community and it wasn't still a hundred percent, but

810
00:47:10,719 --> 00:47:14,239
Speaker 1: had more of the information and a lot of those

811
00:47:14,280 --> 00:47:17,480
Speaker 1: community folks really shaped my priorities. Um the Star. When

812
00:47:17,520 --> 00:47:20,479
Speaker 1: I was writing for city council, all the consultants said,

813
00:47:20,680 --> 00:47:23,560
Speaker 1: only talk about the city's fiscal bankruptcy. That's what people

814
00:47:23,600 --> 00:47:25,759
Speaker 1: care about. And you're twenty one years old, so don't

815
00:47:25,800 --> 00:47:27,600
Speaker 1: take pictures for kids, Like, no, one needs to be

816
00:47:27,680 --> 00:47:31,400
Speaker 1: with my younger age. Been talking to community folks, They're like, oh,

817
00:47:31,480 --> 00:47:35,800
Speaker 1: we've been the bankruptcy. Yeah, there were. The city's financial

818
00:47:35,840 --> 00:47:38,960
Speaker 1: bankruptcy wasn't even top five issue for them. There was

819
00:47:39,000 --> 00:47:41,960
Speaker 1: talking about absence of leadership, all these very big issues

820
00:47:42,040 --> 00:47:44,719
Speaker 1: of crime and violence, et cetera. And then they all

821
00:47:44,880 --> 00:47:48,200
Speaker 1: love the fact that I was young. The older, the older.

822
00:47:48,239 --> 00:47:50,080
Speaker 1: The person was more than love the fact that I

823
00:47:50,120 --> 00:47:51,640
Speaker 1: was between one years old, and they're like, no, we

824
00:47:51,760 --> 00:47:53,520
Speaker 1: want you to be We love the fact you're young.

825
00:47:53,600 --> 00:47:56,520
Speaker 1: We need some young blood in there. And so we

826
00:47:56,600 --> 00:47:58,680
Speaker 1: had people who have been in there, hadn't been fixing

827
00:47:58,719 --> 00:48:01,840
Speaker 1: the problem. Hello, So we had pictures with me and kids.

828
00:48:02,000 --> 00:48:03,800
Speaker 1: We were talking me and talked about the bankruptcy and

829
00:48:03,920 --> 00:48:05,920
Speaker 1: all of the city. We talked about more of a

830
00:48:06,040 --> 00:48:09,719
Speaker 1: moral or leadership bankruptcy where the top vote getter. That

831
00:48:09,840 --> 00:48:11,759
Speaker 1: came from listening to community and then when I was

832
00:48:11,800 --> 00:48:14,680
Speaker 1: on city council, I had all these grand plans and

833
00:48:14,800 --> 00:48:19,359
Speaker 1: spreadsheets and dogs and talk to the community. They said, listen,

834
00:48:19,560 --> 00:48:22,520
Speaker 1: closed down this liquor store across the street, we need

835
00:48:22,560 --> 00:48:25,440
Speaker 1: a health clinic and open up a bank, and those

836
00:48:25,480 --> 00:48:29,160
Speaker 1: are all like big things, but I don't aren't the

837
00:48:29,360 --> 00:48:31,440
Speaker 1: key issues. We need to do this, we need to

838
00:48:31,560 --> 00:48:34,720
Speaker 1: do that. But listening to them, we did those things,

839
00:48:35,000 --> 00:48:36,880
Speaker 1: all those things they have been trying for like fifty

840
00:48:36,960 --> 00:48:39,080
Speaker 1: years to do them. And we also did some of

841
00:48:39,120 --> 00:48:41,080
Speaker 1: the other stuff I wanted to do that I thought

842
00:48:41,239 --> 00:48:44,640
Speaker 1: was more structural. And then after doing that for three

843
00:48:44,640 --> 00:48:48,560
Speaker 1: and a half years, the police chief and the head

844
00:48:48,640 --> 00:48:52,680
Speaker 1: of the Chamber of Converse approached me same tubs, we

845
00:48:52,719 --> 00:48:56,120
Speaker 1: want you to run from Mayor. I was like me,

846
00:48:57,520 --> 00:49:00,200
Speaker 1: because I expect my folks to be like times. You

847
00:49:00,200 --> 00:49:02,560
Speaker 1: should run from maryor. Everyone tells you that, you know,

848
00:49:02,680 --> 00:49:04,600
Speaker 1: you're cool, you're smart, you can talk, you should be married,

849
00:49:04,600 --> 00:49:06,520
Speaker 1: you should be president. But I was like, not the

850
00:49:06,680 --> 00:49:10,040
Speaker 1: business council and not the police chief. So when they

851
00:49:10,120 --> 00:49:14,640
Speaker 1: had that conversation with me, I thought to myself, there's

852
00:49:14,680 --> 00:49:17,719
Speaker 1: a winning formula here. If I got the two most

853
00:49:17,880 --> 00:49:21,440
Speaker 1: unlikely people to say times you need to run where

854
00:49:21,480 --> 00:49:24,759
Speaker 1: you run, like begging me to run, like we need

855
00:49:24,840 --> 00:49:27,520
Speaker 1: you to run. And not because they didn't know me,

856
00:49:27,600 --> 00:49:29,320
Speaker 1: but because they did. They had seen me worked for

857
00:49:29,440 --> 00:49:32,359
Speaker 1: four years, and I was not just as crazy as

858
00:49:32,400 --> 00:49:35,359
Speaker 1: I am now talking just talking very much the same

859
00:49:35,400 --> 00:49:38,120
Speaker 1: as I talked today. And they were like, you know,

860
00:49:38,239 --> 00:49:40,800
Speaker 1: like we don't agree with you on everything, but we

861
00:49:40,920 --> 00:49:42,439
Speaker 1: do agree that you're that you'd be the best person

862
00:49:42,480 --> 00:49:44,360
Speaker 1: for mayor for the city. We really want you. And

863
00:49:44,520 --> 00:49:47,160
Speaker 1: that's what made me run from here. But I was terrified.

864
00:49:47,320 --> 00:49:50,200
Speaker 1: I had we talked about sort of stupid mistakes. I

865
00:49:50,280 --> 00:49:52,360
Speaker 1: had just been arrested for a d u I while

866
00:49:52,440 --> 00:49:55,640
Speaker 1: on city council two years previous. I was like, if

867
00:49:55,680 --> 00:49:59,040
Speaker 1: I run, you know that's gonna come up. And black

868
00:49:59,120 --> 00:50:02,000
Speaker 1: man committed on there's a mug shot, Like do I

869
00:50:02,120 --> 00:50:06,600
Speaker 1: really want that heat like restaurant? Right? So how did

870
00:50:06,680 --> 00:50:09,520
Speaker 1: you get over that? That's a really interesting point. We

871
00:50:09,640 --> 00:50:13,040
Speaker 1: said this earlier. Lots of exceptional people have bad days,

872
00:50:14,000 --> 00:50:18,040
Speaker 1: and if we look at the rates of DUIs across

873
00:50:18,080 --> 00:50:20,600
Speaker 1: this country, lots of people think, oh, I'll just have

874
00:50:20,680 --> 00:50:22,359
Speaker 1: a drink at dinner, I'll be fine by the time

875
00:50:22,400 --> 00:50:26,960
Speaker 1: I drive home. Clearly not true for so many of

876
00:50:27,040 --> 00:50:30,200
Speaker 1: our neighbors. How do you reckon with that? How did

877
00:50:30,280 --> 00:50:33,080
Speaker 1: you reckon with that both as a city council member

878
00:50:33,120 --> 00:50:35,640
Speaker 1: and then approaching your run for mayor? How do you

879
00:50:35,840 --> 00:50:38,640
Speaker 1: how do you explain to people? Yeah, well, well when

880
00:50:38,719 --> 00:50:47,319
Speaker 1: it happened, I was I was just so embarrassed, still

881
00:50:47,400 --> 00:50:50,600
Speaker 1: embarrassing now, like even now cringe, like, yeah, do I

882
00:50:50,680 --> 00:50:56,480
Speaker 1: mention it? So embarrassed? Um? And part of it was

883
00:50:56,640 --> 00:51:00,040
Speaker 1: because I've always tell myself, I always talked my so

884
00:51:00,239 --> 00:51:02,040
Speaker 1: I would never end up like my dad. I would

885
00:51:02,120 --> 00:51:04,800
Speaker 1: never be in car sort, I would never be in jail,

886
00:51:05,160 --> 00:51:07,239
Speaker 1: I will never get in trouble with the law, I

887
00:51:07,280 --> 00:51:10,600
Speaker 1: would never fulfill these stereotypes, etcetera. And then to actually

888
00:51:10,880 --> 00:51:15,640
Speaker 1: do it, it's like, oh my gosh, and but terrible decision.

889
00:51:15,840 --> 00:51:17,920
Speaker 1: But what was helpful and when I learned from it

890
00:51:18,640 --> 00:51:21,160
Speaker 1: was what you said earlier. And it's Bryance Stevenson says

891
00:51:21,200 --> 00:51:23,480
Speaker 1: this all this time, all the time, Like, imagine we

892
00:51:23,600 --> 00:51:26,680
Speaker 1: lived in the society where we recognize that we were

893
00:51:26,800 --> 00:51:29,879
Speaker 1: all more than the worst thing we've ever done, which

894
00:51:30,000 --> 00:51:33,000
Speaker 1: which doesn't mean no accountability. Like I still had to

895
00:51:33,040 --> 00:51:34,640
Speaker 1: go to my d U I classes I still have

896
00:51:35,080 --> 00:51:38,080
Speaker 1: still paying high insurance. No, I think I just stopped

897
00:51:38,120 --> 00:51:40,840
Speaker 1: my last high insurance payment last year, back to normal

898
00:51:41,280 --> 00:51:45,240
Speaker 1: insurance payments. I UM, I couldn't drive for two months.

899
00:51:45,400 --> 00:51:48,919
Speaker 1: I had to have my mom take me to city

900
00:51:48,960 --> 00:51:52,640
Speaker 1: council meetings because I couldn't drive. How embarrassing, right, actually

901
00:51:52,800 --> 00:51:56,560
Speaker 1: just being constantly reminded of that. But I also recognized

902
00:51:56,640 --> 00:51:58,759
Speaker 1: that we spent a lot of time telling people what

903
00:51:58,920 --> 00:52:01,400
Speaker 1: happens when you do every thing right, But it's not

904
00:52:01,640 --> 00:52:03,880
Speaker 1: enough time spent talking about what I was when you

905
00:52:03,960 --> 00:52:06,680
Speaker 1: mess up, like you shouldn't mess up, but as a

906
00:52:06,760 --> 00:52:10,759
Speaker 1: human being, you probably will, and how do you actually gettned?

907
00:52:11,480 --> 00:52:14,360
Speaker 1: How do you actually repent? So I was very adamant

908
00:52:14,520 --> 00:52:18,000
Speaker 1: I can make any excuses, all right, People like you

909
00:52:18,040 --> 00:52:19,799
Speaker 1: were set up? I was like, I was not set up.

910
00:52:20,120 --> 00:52:21,840
Speaker 1: I set myself up. I shouldn't have drank and I

911
00:52:21,840 --> 00:52:24,200
Speaker 1: shouldn't have drove like that, Like that that is the setup.

912
00:52:24,239 --> 00:52:26,080
Speaker 1: It to me, there was no plot to get me,

913
00:52:26,719 --> 00:52:29,040
Speaker 1: and even if there was, I I still made the

914
00:52:29,160 --> 00:52:33,160
Speaker 1: choice right, um, And I was actually sorry though, I

915
00:52:33,320 --> 00:52:36,680
Speaker 1: actually was so sorry. I'm so embarrassed for the city.

916
00:52:36,920 --> 00:52:39,880
Speaker 1: I was just embarrassed. I was like cringing, and and

917
00:52:40,080 --> 00:52:43,920
Speaker 1: I had I thought that that mistake would preclude me

918
00:52:44,920 --> 00:52:47,000
Speaker 1: from Why would run from it's only even two years

919
00:52:47,000 --> 00:52:49,160
Speaker 1: and run for a different office? The mayor has so

920
00:52:49,320 --> 00:52:54,960
Speaker 1: much But in talking to people and seeing the support

921
00:52:56,080 --> 00:53:00,040
Speaker 1: and also recognizing that a big part of service and

922
00:53:00,120 --> 00:53:06,440
Speaker 1: of service leadership is being selfless, right, And I recognized

923
00:53:06,480 --> 00:53:12,960
Speaker 1: that my fear of running was centered on me and

924
00:53:13,040 --> 00:53:16,400
Speaker 1: centered on my feelings, and center on me not waiting

925
00:53:16,480 --> 00:53:19,200
Speaker 1: to have to relive that painful moment, or me not

926
00:53:19,360 --> 00:53:22,680
Speaker 1: having to explain it over and over again, or me

927
00:53:22,920 --> 00:53:26,640
Speaker 1: not waiting to see me on my mug shot on

928
00:53:26,840 --> 00:53:30,960
Speaker 1: TV or in the mail on Facebook. And I recognize

929
00:53:31,040 --> 00:53:38,319
Speaker 1: that as a leader, you have to think about us,

930
00:53:38,920 --> 00:53:43,400
Speaker 1: we them, right, And I was like, well, what happens

931
00:53:43,440 --> 00:53:45,480
Speaker 1: if I don't run? Look at the people who are running?

932
00:53:45,520 --> 00:53:47,719
Speaker 1: And you mean to tell me a little bit of

933
00:53:47,920 --> 00:53:50,000
Speaker 1: perch feelings are You're in because you made a stupid

934
00:53:50,040 --> 00:53:52,920
Speaker 1: decisions and stop you from serving all these people you

935
00:53:53,000 --> 00:53:55,120
Speaker 1: plan to love who are asking you to step up

936
00:53:55,160 --> 00:53:57,719
Speaker 1: and serve. And that's where how the decision was made,

937
00:53:57,800 --> 00:53:59,960
Speaker 1: and and and my worst suspicions where it comes from

938
00:54:00,920 --> 00:54:02,560
Speaker 1: I remember I talking about this in the book. I

939
00:54:02,600 --> 00:54:05,000
Speaker 1: remember working out and I hate working out, so the

940
00:54:05,040 --> 00:54:06,520
Speaker 1: fact that I was at the gym was a stretch.

941
00:54:06,560 --> 00:54:09,360
Speaker 1: I was already uncomfortable and I was already feeling insecure.

942
00:54:10,200 --> 00:54:12,840
Speaker 1: And then I'm looking up at the damn TV and

943
00:54:12,960 --> 00:54:16,200
Speaker 1: you know, gyms have like twenty TVs, all the TVs.

944
00:54:17,200 --> 00:54:19,920
Speaker 1: You just see my bugs shot and I'm like, I

945
00:54:20,000 --> 00:54:22,520
Speaker 1: just want to shrink. I'm like, and I sent them

946
00:54:22,640 --> 00:54:25,880
Speaker 1: and it's like Michael Tubbs takes because I was I

947
00:54:26,040 --> 00:54:28,719
Speaker 1: was working with folks who are formally incarcerated to help

948
00:54:28,920 --> 00:54:32,160
Speaker 1: with criminal justice policy. It's like, who does Michael Tubbs

949
00:54:32,239 --> 00:54:34,960
Speaker 1: listen to? And it showed my face in the mug

950
00:54:35,040 --> 00:54:39,200
Speaker 1: shot and after it's like he has, uh he listened

951
00:54:39,200 --> 00:54:45,120
Speaker 1: to Yeah, sympathy anxiety for you, And oh my god.

952
00:54:45,920 --> 00:54:47,560
Speaker 1: It was the one thing I was at home, Sophia.

953
00:54:47,640 --> 00:54:49,839
Speaker 1: I was literally at the gym. I hate the gym.

954
00:54:50,000 --> 00:54:52,879
Speaker 1: I felt very self conscious already being at the gym then,

955
00:54:53,760 --> 00:54:58,080
Speaker 1: so anyway that it happened and it sucked, but I

956
00:54:58,200 --> 00:55:01,560
Speaker 1: was in right like it's but it was like okay,

957
00:55:02,120 --> 00:55:05,040
Speaker 1: And I was like okay, and isn't that interesting? You're

958
00:55:05,080 --> 00:55:07,680
Speaker 1: like Oh, this is so horrible. But wait, the world's

959
00:55:07,719 --> 00:55:11,440
Speaker 1: not ending. I just keep going. I keep going on

960
00:55:11,520 --> 00:55:13,680
Speaker 1: this treadmill. And then I also keep going in this race,

961
00:55:13,840 --> 00:55:17,160
Speaker 1: like what I left, I got I don't even ask

962
00:55:17,200 --> 00:55:22,839
Speaker 1: me that, but no, And then like it became not one,

963
00:55:22,960 --> 00:55:24,840
Speaker 1: do you why? But I have four d U I

964
00:55:25,080 --> 00:55:28,759
Speaker 1: s or had? It became so silly. And then I

965
00:55:28,920 --> 00:55:32,040
Speaker 1: recognized and what we talked about earlier, that part of

966
00:55:32,120 --> 00:55:34,520
Speaker 1: it was that was a real threat. That part of

967
00:55:34,560 --> 00:55:37,080
Speaker 1: it was like the forces that be, the people who

968
00:55:37,120 --> 00:55:39,880
Speaker 1: are used to contry to be politics. I didn't know

969
00:55:39,960 --> 00:55:43,840
Speaker 1: what to do with the young activists from the South Side,

970
00:55:44,440 --> 00:55:47,040
Speaker 1: with the dad in prison who went to Stanford, who

971
00:55:47,160 --> 00:55:51,400
Speaker 1: has all the business support, the police chief support in

972
00:55:51,560 --> 00:55:54,840
Speaker 1: the act, like they're like, what, you couldn't divide and

973
00:55:54,920 --> 00:55:57,160
Speaker 1: conquer the way you usually would in the political system,

974
00:55:57,160 --> 00:56:01,359
Speaker 1: because like everyone, it's really a really huge, big tent. Wow.

975
00:56:02,600 --> 00:56:06,319
Speaker 1: So there's so many questions I had about that moment

976
00:56:06,400 --> 00:56:09,680
Speaker 1: in your life. I mean, what what did it feel

977
00:56:09,760 --> 00:56:13,920
Speaker 1: like to win? And I know it's important to acknowledge

978
00:56:14,239 --> 00:56:17,080
Speaker 1: what you're saying. You had support from every vertical in

979
00:56:17,160 --> 00:56:21,600
Speaker 1: the city, so I understand that it didn't it probably

980
00:56:21,719 --> 00:56:24,960
Speaker 1: wasn't a total shock, but but to win by such

981
00:56:25,000 --> 00:56:28,000
Speaker 1: a staggering percentage and to be so young, like what

982
00:56:28,120 --> 00:56:32,840
Speaker 1: did that feel like? I mean, particularly in the primary,

983
00:56:33,800 --> 00:56:36,000
Speaker 1: use it was like nine people and I want the

984
00:56:36,120 --> 00:56:39,399
Speaker 1: primary by like nine points. And I was the only

985
00:56:39,480 --> 00:56:42,440
Speaker 1: person being attacked because the people the second and third

986
00:56:42,480 --> 00:56:46,200
Speaker 1: place candidate, I showed a consulted it made a hat

987
00:56:46,360 --> 00:56:49,600
Speaker 1: to knock me out the first round and then they

988
00:56:49,600 --> 00:56:51,680
Speaker 1: would just figure out and how they run against each

989
00:56:51,719 --> 00:56:53,719
Speaker 1: other in general, but let's get Tabs out. We both

990
00:56:53,920 --> 00:56:57,759
Speaker 1: went him out. So I was shocked because at that

991
00:56:57,920 --> 00:57:00,560
Speaker 1: time for the primary, it was of sure if I

992
00:57:00,640 --> 00:57:02,080
Speaker 1: was going to make it to the top two. It

993
00:57:02,200 --> 00:57:05,400
Speaker 1: was its like he might, he might not. And and

994
00:57:05,880 --> 00:57:09,359
Speaker 1: you know, just always naysayers like well Stoft has never

995
00:57:09,440 --> 00:57:11,560
Speaker 1: had a black mayor, why do you think you'll be

996
00:57:11,640 --> 00:57:14,239
Speaker 1: the first, Or there's never been a mayor this young

997
00:57:14,400 --> 00:57:17,120
Speaker 1: at any city of over a hundred thousand people, what

998
00:57:17,240 --> 00:57:19,080
Speaker 1: makes you think you're going to be the one. Or

999
00:57:19,800 --> 00:57:22,280
Speaker 1: or you didn't kiss this ring, or you voted this way,

1000
00:57:22,440 --> 00:57:26,040
Speaker 1: And so there was really and then there's I mean

1001
00:57:26,240 --> 00:57:29,160
Speaker 1: politics about power. There's also people very angry that I

1002
00:57:29,280 --> 00:57:31,560
Speaker 1: was even running like how dare you think you could run?

1003
00:57:32,040 --> 00:57:37,680
Speaker 1: So that felt so like wow, like wow, once again

1004
00:57:37,800 --> 00:57:40,440
Speaker 1: I listened to that little small voice that was like

1005
00:57:40,640 --> 00:57:43,000
Speaker 1: you should do this, And it felt scary and it

1006
00:57:43,120 --> 00:57:47,560
Speaker 1: felt crazy and it seems inevitable now, but it wasn't then.

1007
00:57:48,160 --> 00:57:50,240
Speaker 1: And also because when I ran, it was either run

1008
00:57:50,360 --> 00:57:52,720
Speaker 1: for mayor or run for city council, Like my seat

1009
00:57:52,800 --> 00:57:55,840
Speaker 1: wasn't safe for if I lost, I was done. If

1010
00:57:55,880 --> 00:57:58,560
Speaker 1: I lost, I had no seat. Some people are like,

1011
00:57:58,600 --> 00:58:00,440
Speaker 1: why would you take such such a rid You could

1012
00:58:00,520 --> 00:58:02,880
Speaker 1: run in four more years or eight more years. You're young.

1013
00:58:03,480 --> 00:58:07,000
Speaker 1: So it felt so validating. And then when I won

1014
00:58:07,120 --> 00:58:09,320
Speaker 1: in the general, we knew we were going to win,

1015
00:58:09,440 --> 00:58:12,240
Speaker 1: but by the margin send me two percent. On the

1016
00:58:12,360 --> 00:58:17,160
Speaker 1: same night Donald Trump was elected, I just felt like wow.

1017
00:58:18,320 --> 00:58:21,600
Speaker 1: I felt so proud for my mama, unto my grandmother.

1018
00:58:22,040 --> 00:58:26,000
Speaker 1: I felt so proud for the city. I just I

1019
00:58:26,120 --> 00:58:29,440
Speaker 1: just felt like, wow, we have turned the page. And

1020
00:58:29,520 --> 00:58:31,760
Speaker 1: it also I felt a little bit overwhelmed. I was like,

1021
00:58:31,840 --> 00:58:35,240
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, all these people's hopes and expectations and

1022
00:58:35,360 --> 00:58:37,960
Speaker 1: this is not Beverly Hills, this is this is this

1023
00:58:38,200 --> 00:58:44,240
Speaker 1: is like real structural issues, real challenges and and being

1024
00:58:44,320 --> 00:58:46,440
Speaker 1: on city council before I also knew the limitation of

1025
00:58:46,520 --> 00:58:48,440
Speaker 1: the office. I was like, I can't even solve all this,

1026
00:58:48,720 --> 00:58:51,000
Speaker 1: like like all this stuff I'm not sure I'm need

1027
00:58:51,040 --> 00:58:53,920
Speaker 1: to be able to get to and also thinking about

1028
00:58:54,160 --> 00:58:56,920
Speaker 1: imagine coming back one day and being the mayor of

1029
00:58:57,560 --> 00:59:00,640
Speaker 1: Los Angeles, are passing be there like like imagine like

1030
00:59:00,880 --> 00:59:04,240
Speaker 1: just the feeling you have, like can you remember the fair?

1031
00:59:04,480 --> 00:59:08,160
Speaker 1: You remember the community sitting there, and you're thinking about, Okay,

1032
00:59:08,200 --> 00:59:09,840
Speaker 1: how do I take care of those things? So it's

1033
00:59:09,880 --> 00:59:12,439
Speaker 1: also like our favorite word today, it was a love

1034
00:59:12,560 --> 00:59:15,840
Speaker 1: thing to like, wow, I love my city so deeply,

1035
00:59:16,280 --> 00:59:19,479
Speaker 1: but my city also loves me and and the people

1036
00:59:19,560 --> 00:59:24,680
Speaker 1: trust me. So it was it was such a overwhelming feeling,

1037
00:59:24,800 --> 00:59:28,960
Speaker 1: a pride, a little bit of fear, a lot of

1038
00:59:29,080 --> 00:59:35,880
Speaker 1: excitement and sort of confirmation like Okay, that was the

1039
00:59:35,960 --> 00:59:40,880
Speaker 1: right decision. How when you when you achieve something like that,

1040
00:59:41,160 --> 00:59:44,040
Speaker 1: and to your point, now you're responsible for your whole city,

1041
00:59:45,000 --> 00:59:48,000
Speaker 1: how do you set your priorities as mayor? And what

1042
00:59:48,200 --> 00:59:54,520
Speaker 1: were yours? Yeah? I um, it's tough because it's an

1043
00:59:54,560 --> 00:59:58,480
Speaker 1: elected position, so it has to be community priorities, but

1044
00:59:58,680 --> 01:00:02,120
Speaker 1: communities that have complete information so it's like okay, or

1045
01:00:02,160 --> 01:00:05,400
Speaker 1: what would be a priority actually may not be the

1046
01:00:05,440 --> 01:00:08,360
Speaker 1: most important thing for the solvency and the safety of

1047
01:00:08,760 --> 01:00:11,640
Speaker 1: the city. UM. So I tried to do a nexus

1048
01:00:11,760 --> 01:00:17,200
Speaker 1: between sort of what was doable, which isn't the sexy stuff.

1049
01:00:17,400 --> 01:00:22,120
Speaker 1: It also want to be aspirational. So definitely crime, education

1050
01:00:22,840 --> 01:00:26,160
Speaker 1: and poverty, which sort of my my three things, knowing

1051
01:00:26,280 --> 01:00:28,960
Speaker 1: that we could have the most direct impact on crime

1052
01:00:29,000 --> 01:00:31,920
Speaker 1: and education UM as a mayor of a city, and

1053
01:00:32,080 --> 01:00:34,120
Speaker 1: poverty we would have to try experiments, we have to

1054
01:00:34,240 --> 01:00:37,560
Speaker 1: try different things. But that was like my root cause

1055
01:00:37,560 --> 01:00:39,760
Speaker 1: analysis of the of the issue. And then also just

1056
01:00:40,440 --> 01:00:43,320
Speaker 1: this unsexy stuff of being our fiscal house in order

1057
01:00:43,600 --> 01:00:46,320
Speaker 1: and making sure we had a reserve policy, and making

1058
01:00:46,360 --> 01:00:50,000
Speaker 1: sure we had finances and and and and and making

1059
01:00:50,080 --> 01:00:54,000
Speaker 1: sure that we were that money was being spent in

1060
01:00:54,080 --> 01:00:57,120
Speaker 1: a way it was supposed to. Because no one cares

1061
01:00:57,240 --> 01:00:59,400
Speaker 1: but me. I was so proud to be chure of

1062
01:00:59,480 --> 01:01:02,360
Speaker 1: the audit Committee when I was on city council. So

1063
01:01:02,440 --> 01:01:05,480
Speaker 1: I was like auditing the books and new where things were,

1064
01:01:05,480 --> 01:01:08,720
Speaker 1: how are these are being spanning? Me corrected like one

1065
01:01:08,800 --> 01:01:12,680
Speaker 1: material deficiencies and anyway, no one cares, so I care

1066
01:01:12,840 --> 01:01:14,880
Speaker 1: that's the stuff I love. Do you know what I think?

1067
01:01:15,040 --> 01:01:18,280
Speaker 1: Somebody asked me once, because obviously we're all very involved

1068
01:01:18,320 --> 01:01:21,880
Speaker 1: in political activism, somebody said, okay, well, let's say, Boom,

1069
01:01:21,960 --> 01:01:24,160
Speaker 1: snap your fingers. Tomorrow you're the president. What's the first

1070
01:01:24,200 --> 01:01:25,480
Speaker 1: thing you do? And I said, I would do a

1071
01:01:25,560 --> 01:01:28,240
Speaker 1: fiscal audit of the entire United States budget and every

1072
01:01:28,280 --> 01:01:30,880
Speaker 1: state budget in the country. And everyone was like what.

1073
01:01:31,040 --> 01:01:32,480
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, yeah, I'd bring in the friends

1074
01:01:32,520 --> 01:01:35,400
Speaker 1: of auditors who like Sue Movie Studios. That's what I

1075
01:01:35,440 --> 01:01:39,320
Speaker 1: would do. Where is the money? Where's the money? We

1076
01:01:39,440 --> 01:01:41,240
Speaker 1: have so much money? Why don't we spend it on people?

1077
01:01:41,280 --> 01:01:44,040
Speaker 1: What are we doing? And everyone was like, oh ship.

1078
01:01:44,720 --> 01:01:46,760
Speaker 1: So when you're like I was on the audit committee,

1079
01:01:46,760 --> 01:01:50,480
Speaker 1: I'm like, how did the numbers look? I love that stuff.

1080
01:01:50,520 --> 01:01:52,960
Speaker 1: I want to know. Yeah, and it's and I think

1081
01:01:53,240 --> 01:01:56,560
Speaker 1: this is not even ask your question. But I also

1082
01:01:56,680 --> 01:01:59,920
Speaker 1: recognized from doing that work that the answer isn't all

1083
01:02:00,200 --> 01:02:02,920
Speaker 1: is more money, like the spend like I took it

1084
01:02:02,960 --> 01:02:05,800
Speaker 1: all the time. I'm good for more money, but let's

1085
01:02:05,800 --> 01:02:08,240
Speaker 1: make sure we're spending what we have and we spend

1086
01:02:08,360 --> 01:02:10,080
Speaker 1: that in a way that's good. And then if it's

1087
01:02:10,120 --> 01:02:11,920
Speaker 1: not enough. Let's get more money. But right now you

1088
01:02:12,000 --> 01:02:14,200
Speaker 1: can and tell me what the delta is. You came

1089
01:02:14,200 --> 01:02:15,520
Speaker 1: and tell me how much more we need. You just

1090
01:02:15,560 --> 01:02:19,600
Speaker 1: saying we need more. I can't sell that, especially because

1091
01:02:19,680 --> 01:02:21,760
Speaker 1: clearly it's not just about more, it's about the fact

1092
01:02:21,800 --> 01:02:23,840
Speaker 1: that we're just setting a bunch of it on fire.

1093
01:02:24,440 --> 01:02:27,000
Speaker 1: So like, let's take away the matchbook. Maybe that's where

1094
01:02:27,040 --> 01:02:29,520
Speaker 1: we start. Well, let's make let's make you spend the money.

1095
01:02:29,600 --> 01:02:33,040
Speaker 1: I see. It's so annoyed when we would have surplus

1096
01:02:33,320 --> 01:02:36,960
Speaker 1: and oftentimes because they would budget, but they would budget

1097
01:02:37,080 --> 01:02:39,560
Speaker 1: for staff positions that they knew they weren't for the hire,

1098
01:02:39,640 --> 01:02:42,000
Speaker 1: but they just have that extra money and then they

1099
01:02:42,040 --> 01:02:43,640
Speaker 1: would carry over to the next year and they just

1100
01:02:43,720 --> 01:02:46,520
Speaker 1: become part of budgets. So that's like away folks are

1101
01:02:46,560 --> 01:02:49,240
Speaker 1: able to increase their budgets. In local government, it's it's crazy,

1102
01:02:49,320 --> 01:02:51,880
Speaker 1: like there's all these things people do. It's gonna spend

1103
01:02:51,960 --> 01:02:56,200
Speaker 1: the money we have alloc this year, this year, especially

1104
01:02:56,240 --> 01:02:59,760
Speaker 1: when you're supposed to go to people stuff. Oh that's wild,

1105
01:03:00,040 --> 01:03:03,000
Speaker 1: that's wild. So I want to ask, when you talk

1106
01:03:03,040 --> 01:03:07,240
Speaker 1: about spending the money and getting the money spent on people,

1107
01:03:08,480 --> 01:03:13,960
Speaker 1: how did you make a ubi happen. Yeah, well you

1108
01:03:14,080 --> 01:03:17,320
Speaker 1: mentioned sort of priorities, poverty being where I had a

1109
01:03:17,440 --> 01:03:21,520
Speaker 1: team of fellows, and I'm a nerd, so I don't

1110
01:03:21,720 --> 01:03:23,640
Speaker 1: it sounds like I just talk and I just do things,

1111
01:03:23,680 --> 01:03:26,160
Speaker 1: but I do actually read and think before, not before

1112
01:03:26,200 --> 01:03:28,400
Speaker 1: I speak before, I do at least think and read.

1113
01:03:29,280 --> 01:03:32,160
Speaker 1: And I said, research, how can we how can we

1114
01:03:32,240 --> 01:03:34,840
Speaker 1: in poverty? I just went in poverty, like we in poverty.

1115
01:03:35,160 --> 01:03:37,320
Speaker 1: We're good. They're like what, I'm like, seriously looked up

1116
01:03:37,360 --> 01:03:39,280
Speaker 1: how to end poverty? And I told them, I said,

1117
01:03:39,720 --> 01:03:42,280
Speaker 1: I want a policy, not a program. But I know

1118
01:03:42,400 --> 01:03:45,640
Speaker 1: about career to college. I get that werena do that

1119
01:03:45,680 --> 01:03:48,320
Speaker 1: stuff too, But what's the policy? And they came back

1120
01:03:48,320 --> 01:03:50,600
Speaker 1: to this idea of guaranteed income. But it was like

1121
01:03:50,640 --> 01:03:53,080
Speaker 1: in two thousand seventeen and a lot of guarantee income

1122
01:03:53,600 --> 01:03:57,920
Speaker 1: things happen. We're happening abroad at like one dollar, two dollar,

1123
01:03:58,080 --> 01:04:01,919
Speaker 1: three dollar a day increment. So I remember reading about

1124
01:04:01,920 --> 01:04:04,520
Speaker 1: basic income in college. I knew Dr King was a proponent,

1125
01:04:04,600 --> 01:04:08,560
Speaker 1: and I've always was curious as to why have we

1126
01:04:08,640 --> 01:04:11,320
Speaker 1: not like right want to talk about it. So then

1127
01:04:11,320 --> 01:04:12,960
Speaker 1: when they came back to that, I said, okay, but

1128
01:04:13,600 --> 01:04:16,800
Speaker 1: you guys, I'm hearing everything's like internationally, like I get

1129
01:04:16,920 --> 01:04:18,960
Speaker 1: people are in poverty, but I'm not sure three dollars

1130
01:04:19,000 --> 01:04:22,040
Speaker 1: a day in stock that's gonn't do. Like I can't

1131
01:04:22,160 --> 01:04:24,040
Speaker 1: roll out like that for my folks, so that they're

1132
01:04:24,080 --> 01:04:25,560
Speaker 1: like no, no, no, no, no, would be bigger here,

1133
01:04:25,600 --> 01:04:27,440
Speaker 1: I said, but no, one's doing it bigger. Everything is

1134
01:04:27,480 --> 01:04:29,360
Speaker 1: like three dollars a day, a dollar a day in

1135
01:04:29,800 --> 01:04:32,720
Speaker 1: micro financing and stuff. I said, We'll go do some

1136
01:04:32,800 --> 01:04:36,840
Speaker 1: more research. And then the next week I was at

1137
01:04:36,840 --> 01:04:39,360
Speaker 1: a meeting with my friend Nattie Foster from the eCOM

1138
01:04:39,400 --> 01:04:43,480
Speaker 1: Security Project and she said, um, hey, may have you

1139
01:04:43,560 --> 01:04:45,760
Speaker 1: heard a guaranteed income? I said, oh, yeah, we were,

1140
01:04:46,280 --> 01:04:49,080
Speaker 1: I'm familiar with it. And then she said, we're looking

1141
01:04:49,160 --> 01:04:51,920
Speaker 1: for a city to partner where to pilot a guaranteed income.

1142
01:04:52,520 --> 01:04:54,000
Speaker 1: And I said, oh, yeah, you know, I have a

1143
01:04:54,080 --> 01:04:56,720
Speaker 1: task force. We have a task force seriously looking at

1144
01:04:56,800 --> 01:04:58,520
Speaker 1: this and figuring out how to be implement it, like

1145
01:04:58,640 --> 01:05:00,400
Speaker 1: really trying to sell her like we're thing and about it.

1146
01:05:01,040 --> 01:05:03,520
Speaker 1: We end up working together and it gave. It's just

1147
01:05:03,560 --> 01:05:07,640
Speaker 1: a politically different time. And in Stockton was just recovering

1148
01:05:07,680 --> 01:05:09,840
Speaker 1: from bankruptcy. So that's why that all this stuff was

1149
01:05:09,880 --> 01:05:11,760
Speaker 1: so important. And I knew we did not have like

1150
01:05:11,920 --> 01:05:14,560
Speaker 1: we just did not have money extra money we could

1151
01:05:14,560 --> 01:05:16,960
Speaker 1: pay for what we could pay for. And then they said,

1152
01:05:16,960 --> 01:05:19,000
Speaker 1: you know what we're doing philanthropically, so they put in

1153
01:05:19,040 --> 01:05:21,200
Speaker 1: a million dollars and we're like, well, with a million dollars,

1154
01:05:21,280 --> 01:05:23,960
Speaker 1: we can't serve everyone, but we get to a hundred

1155
01:05:24,000 --> 01:05:26,200
Speaker 1: twenty five people and build the evidence case and later

1156
01:05:26,320 --> 01:05:29,160
Speaker 1: groundwork for a policy. Um, so that's what we did.

1157
01:05:29,240 --> 01:05:32,880
Speaker 1: So we And it's funny now because the group I

1158
01:05:32,920 --> 01:05:35,920
Speaker 1: started called MERIST for Guarantey Income every marriage and Guaranteed

1159
01:05:35,920 --> 01:05:38,640
Speaker 1: Income pilot. Now it's like it's not not noteworthy now

1160
01:05:38,720 --> 01:05:41,840
Speaker 1: people a getting like annoyed that over another basic income pilot.

1161
01:05:42,240 --> 01:05:45,960
Speaker 1: But back then, no one was doing it. So it

1162
01:05:46,160 --> 01:05:48,920
Speaker 1: was like, Wow, it was a little bit scary because

1163
01:05:49,520 --> 01:05:51,800
Speaker 1: I'm not an economist, and I had all these economists

1164
01:05:51,840 --> 01:05:53,920
Speaker 1: like trying to battle wrap me on Twitter or writing

1165
01:05:53,960 --> 01:05:59,080
Speaker 1: op eds about how stupid idea it was. I had, um, folks,

1166
01:05:59,160 --> 01:06:02,120
Speaker 1: even leaders and Democratic Party, We're saying that's not the

1167
01:06:02,200 --> 01:06:04,080
Speaker 1: way to go. And I would like, I know, I'm

1168
01:06:04,120 --> 01:06:06,400
Speaker 1: not smarter than all these people, maybe some of them,

1169
01:06:06,440 --> 01:06:09,080
Speaker 1: but not all of them. So if I'm missing something

1170
01:06:09,280 --> 01:06:11,840
Speaker 1: or are they missed, like what? What? What? How? Does

1171
01:06:12,080 --> 01:06:14,840
Speaker 1: everyone think this is a bad idea? And I'm like, hmm,

1172
01:06:14,920 --> 01:06:17,240
Speaker 1: I think this could work. And in doing so, I

1173
01:06:17,400 --> 01:06:19,360
Speaker 1: realized what we've been talking about a lot on this

1174
01:06:19,560 --> 01:06:23,360
Speaker 1: podcast that part of my fundamental belief is that if

1175
01:06:23,440 --> 01:06:27,160
Speaker 1: government is nothing but people, the most important investment that

1176
01:06:27,240 --> 01:06:31,200
Speaker 1: government can make is in people like that, that's that's

1177
01:06:31,320 --> 01:06:33,720
Speaker 1: how we governed, or how we should govern I saw

1178
01:06:33,840 --> 01:06:37,680
Speaker 1: this stat yesterday that went over the newly approved defense budget.

1179
01:06:38,200 --> 01:06:40,880
Speaker 1: You know, it's like seven hundred and sixty billion dollars,

1180
01:06:41,960 --> 01:06:46,320
Speaker 1: and it just shows like childcare would be fifty billion

1181
01:06:46,400 --> 01:06:49,640
Speaker 1: a year, healthcare increases would be a hundred and twenty billions.

1182
01:06:49,760 --> 01:06:53,320
Speaker 1: We have the money, and people say we can't spend it.

1183
01:06:53,440 --> 01:06:56,920
Speaker 1: And so it doesn't surprise me that economists were saying, well,

1184
01:06:56,960 --> 01:06:59,120
Speaker 1: you can't spend money this way. It's like, well, says

1185
01:06:59,160 --> 01:07:02,640
Speaker 1: who and why we actually have the money to pay

1186
01:07:02,720 --> 01:07:05,800
Speaker 1: for all of these things. And and it was so inspiring,

1187
01:07:05,960 --> 01:07:09,280
Speaker 1: as you know, and Angelino, and also as a fan

1188
01:07:09,400 --> 01:07:12,720
Speaker 1: of yours, to watch what you were doing with the

1189
01:07:12,840 --> 01:07:18,080
Speaker 1: UBI pilot program in Stockton, because it has papered the

1190
01:07:18,240 --> 01:07:21,880
Speaker 1: data for UBI programs all over the place, and it

1191
01:07:22,000 --> 01:07:26,479
Speaker 1: references what you said earlier. If you can take out

1192
01:07:26,600 --> 01:07:30,480
Speaker 1: of the bucket of stress that people experience, the stressors

1193
01:07:30,600 --> 01:07:35,200
Speaker 1: over survival, people can then apply stress to pressure test

1194
01:07:35,240 --> 01:07:39,000
Speaker 1: their dreams. They can apply stress to pressure test small businesses.

1195
01:07:39,280 --> 01:07:42,480
Speaker 1: They can apply stress to open community centers, they can

1196
01:07:42,600 --> 01:07:48,000
Speaker 1: do other things. And and that I find to be

1197
01:07:48,120 --> 01:07:50,920
Speaker 1: so inspiring. It was your work that got me, you know,

1198
01:07:51,080 --> 01:07:53,920
Speaker 1: out there advocating in the public for the for the

1199
01:07:54,000 --> 01:07:57,040
Speaker 1: Compton Pledge, you know, to to get a UBI program

1200
01:07:57,120 --> 01:08:00,000
Speaker 1: and Compton, and people said like, you didn't grow up

1201
01:08:00,000 --> 01:08:01,640
Speaker 1: and Compton, what do you care? And I was like, yeah,

1202
01:08:01,680 --> 01:08:04,680
Speaker 1: but I went to USC, I bordered Compton. These are

1203
01:08:04,760 --> 01:08:07,640
Speaker 1: my neighbors. I don't care if I actually live next

1204
01:08:07,680 --> 01:08:10,640
Speaker 1: door to people or not. I want people to have

1205
01:08:10,920 --> 01:08:15,800
Speaker 1: room to dream instead of lives of worry. And we

1206
01:08:15,840 --> 01:08:18,920
Speaker 1: should want that for all of us. That should be

1207
01:08:18,960 --> 01:08:22,880
Speaker 1: the tenant of our of our life, of our of

1208
01:08:22,960 --> 01:08:26,479
Speaker 1: our communities, of our activism. Why wouldn't I want you

1209
01:08:26,920 --> 01:08:31,640
Speaker 1: to have better? Why? And you see what l A

1210
01:08:31,880 --> 01:08:35,479
Speaker 1: is doing now too. L A City and County So

1211
01:08:35,720 --> 01:08:38,320
Speaker 1: l A City is doing a thirty five million dollar

1212
01:08:38,560 --> 01:08:41,759
Speaker 1: basically compilt for a thousand families. In l A County

1213
01:08:41,880 --> 01:08:46,280
Speaker 1: is doing a forty million dollar program for a thousand families.

1214
01:08:47,400 --> 01:08:51,080
Speaker 1: And and and I think for listeners, what what I

1215
01:08:51,160 --> 01:08:54,839
Speaker 1: hope people take from it is that they get encouraged,

1216
01:08:54,880 --> 01:08:58,240
Speaker 1: begets courage. And it started really small like that. The

1217
01:08:58,600 --> 01:09:02,840
Speaker 1: issue was like poverty, how do you solve party? And

1218
01:09:02,920 --> 01:09:07,640
Speaker 1: that's extremely overwhelming, And we said, we can't solve poverty,

1219
01:09:08,200 --> 01:09:10,640
Speaker 1: but let's try a basic income for a hundred and

1220
01:09:10,760 --> 01:09:15,479
Speaker 1: twenty five people. Yeah, And starting there has led to

1221
01:09:15,720 --> 01:09:18,960
Speaker 1: the wonderful Compton fledge. The things in l A like

1222
01:09:19,040 --> 01:09:23,679
Speaker 1: literally pilots being led by marriage and eighty guaranteed income

1223
01:09:23,760 --> 01:09:27,160
Speaker 1: heights in this country in a child tax credit, which

1224
01:09:27,200 --> 01:09:29,320
Speaker 1: is a guaranteed income for families with children. But it

1225
01:09:29,400 --> 01:09:33,200
Speaker 1: literally started with a hundred and it started with no

1226
01:09:33,439 --> 01:09:36,160
Speaker 1: right answer. It started without knowing if it would work

1227
01:09:36,240 --> 01:09:39,320
Speaker 1: or not. It started with the risk of looking dumb.

1228
01:09:39,400 --> 01:09:41,439
Speaker 1: And I tell people all the time that part of

1229
01:09:41,560 --> 01:09:44,760
Speaker 1: leadership or part of making change is you have to

1230
01:09:44,840 --> 01:09:47,120
Speaker 1: be will. You have to find things you're so passionate

1231
01:09:47,120 --> 01:09:50,439
Speaker 1: about you're willing to be wrong for them, like I might.

1232
01:09:50,880 --> 01:09:53,320
Speaker 1: I care about this issue, so this is my answer,

1233
01:09:53,360 --> 01:09:55,000
Speaker 1: and if I get it wrong, I'll iterate for it.

1234
01:09:55,080 --> 01:09:58,639
Speaker 1: And I think often times we have all this pressure

1235
01:09:58,680 --> 01:10:01,799
Speaker 1: to be right and that paralyzes us so we do nothing.

1236
01:10:02,000 --> 01:10:04,760
Speaker 1: And then what you said, I'm going to steal and

1237
01:10:04,800 --> 01:10:06,719
Speaker 1: I'm gonna make sure I got it right. You said

1238
01:10:07,360 --> 01:10:10,680
Speaker 1: I want people to live lives of dreams and not

1239
01:10:10,920 --> 01:10:17,040
Speaker 1: lives of worry, And that was actually Sophia, I mean

1240
01:10:17,080 --> 01:10:20,720
Speaker 1: emotional thinking about it. Now. That's what I learned the

1241
01:10:20,920 --> 01:10:24,479
Speaker 1: most from basic income work, from doing this work, is

1242
01:10:24,600 --> 01:10:27,160
Speaker 1: that because you know, you grew up in poverty if

1243
01:10:27,200 --> 01:10:29,799
Speaker 1: I was a child, right like I wasn't the adult

1244
01:10:29,880 --> 01:10:33,599
Speaker 1: and poverty. And I've never even though mayor don't make

1245
01:10:33,600 --> 01:10:37,200
Speaker 1: a lot of money, I never worried about like everything

1246
01:10:37,280 --> 01:10:41,439
Speaker 1: was on the auto pay, you know. So so when

1247
01:10:41,479 --> 01:10:43,920
Speaker 1: I would see other people in my age, other people

1248
01:10:43,960 --> 01:10:48,680
Speaker 1: in my community, who said, by the sheer luck of

1249
01:10:48,800 --> 01:10:51,840
Speaker 1: being one of the hundred twenty five people given five

1250
01:10:51,920 --> 01:10:54,040
Speaker 1: undred dollars a month, I am now a better parent,

1251
01:10:54,920 --> 01:10:58,280
Speaker 1: I am now healthier. I'm now able to stay home

1252
01:10:59,000 --> 01:11:01,080
Speaker 1: and not have to go to work during COVID like

1253
01:11:01,640 --> 01:11:05,080
Speaker 1: it was inspiring. It also been very sad, like how

1254
01:11:05,240 --> 01:11:10,519
Speaker 1: we divulge as a society where it's acceptable for us

1255
01:11:10,600 --> 01:11:14,800
Speaker 1: to have the means to solve a problem, but we're

1256
01:11:14,880 --> 01:11:17,920
Speaker 1: fine with it not being solved in a problem that

1257
01:11:18,439 --> 01:11:21,000
Speaker 1: would make the solution to make all of our lives better.

1258
01:11:21,080 --> 01:11:24,640
Speaker 1: Because if you're dreaming about starting a small business, that

1259
01:11:24,760 --> 01:11:29,080
Speaker 1: might be the small business that employs me or exactly.

1260
01:11:30,120 --> 01:11:32,320
Speaker 1: And that's what people miss. They say, Well, people shouldn't

1261
01:11:32,360 --> 01:11:35,759
Speaker 1: have handouts, you should work harder. If we do a little,

1262
01:11:36,360 --> 01:11:39,559
Speaker 1: we get a lot. If we invest in families, they

1263
01:11:39,640 --> 01:11:43,439
Speaker 1: invest eightfold in the economy. If we paid women equally,

1264
01:11:43,640 --> 01:11:46,560
Speaker 1: our GDP would grow by twelve whole ask points. We

1265
01:11:46,640 --> 01:11:49,400
Speaker 1: are missing one point for trillion dollars out of the U.

1266
01:11:49,520 --> 01:11:54,000
Speaker 1: S economy because we subjugate women. Hello, Like if we

1267
01:11:54,200 --> 01:11:58,920
Speaker 1: put in we return in multiples. And and that's the

1268
01:11:59,040 --> 01:12:00,840
Speaker 1: thing I wish we were lear on. But but what

1269
01:12:01,000 --> 01:12:03,759
Speaker 1: it is is it's fearmongering for change. The same people

1270
01:12:04,200 --> 01:12:07,280
Speaker 1: who wanted to publish your mug shot from your worst day.

1271
01:12:07,640 --> 01:12:11,040
Speaker 1: I want to say that people are in poverty because

1272
01:12:11,040 --> 01:12:13,240
Speaker 1: they're not working hard enough. Because they don't want us

1273
01:12:13,280 --> 01:12:17,439
Speaker 1: to know that poverty is a designed system, and it's

1274
01:12:17,560 --> 01:12:21,400
Speaker 1: on us to figure out how to dream bigger for

1275
01:12:21,520 --> 01:12:25,880
Speaker 1: each other. I know that if other people around me

1276
01:12:25,960 --> 01:12:28,720
Speaker 1: are doing well, I will do well. I know that

1277
01:12:28,840 --> 01:12:30,479
Speaker 1: when I do well, I want to make sure other

1278
01:12:30,560 --> 01:12:33,240
Speaker 1: people do so when I get an opportunity, I figure

1279
01:12:33,240 --> 01:12:35,040
Speaker 1: out how I can hold the door open for as

1280
01:12:35,080 --> 01:12:37,960
Speaker 1: many people I love as possible. And you're doing well

1281
01:12:38,080 --> 01:12:40,880
Speaker 1: doesn't mean I have to do bad. Exactly. You doing

1282
01:12:40,960 --> 01:12:45,080
Speaker 1: well has no material well being on my success. I

1283
01:12:45,160 --> 01:12:47,800
Speaker 1: felt you like you're doing good doesn't hurt me. But

1284
01:12:47,960 --> 01:12:50,640
Speaker 1: we've been cultured to think there's a finite bucket of

1285
01:12:50,720 --> 01:12:54,200
Speaker 1: resources because the people who control the buckets don't want

1286
01:12:54,280 --> 01:12:56,120
Speaker 1: us to know that while they keep our bucket the

1287
01:12:56,200 --> 01:12:58,840
Speaker 1: same size, their buckets are growing, and their buckets are

1288
01:12:58,880 --> 01:13:02,639
Speaker 1: growing because they invent because they literally look at things

1289
01:13:02,720 --> 01:13:07,759
Speaker 1: as long term investments. And and that's why for my folks,

1290
01:13:07,800 --> 01:13:10,040
Speaker 1: I've gotten to be on the side of basic income

1291
01:13:10,080 --> 01:13:12,240
Speaker 1: who come from that world. It's been literally that conversation

1292
01:13:12,320 --> 01:13:15,920
Speaker 1: what you said, it's like you guys, take the if

1293
01:13:15,960 --> 01:13:19,000
Speaker 1: you don't give the humanitarian arguments enough for you, think

1294
01:13:19,040 --> 01:13:22,639
Speaker 1: a bunch of investing, like think about like you put

1295
01:13:23,200 --> 01:13:26,280
Speaker 1: six thousand dollars in something and you get all this

1296
01:13:26,400 --> 01:13:29,200
Speaker 1: stuff from it, like why would you not? Could we

1297
01:13:29,280 --> 01:13:31,559
Speaker 1: pay for it anyway? On the back end for not investing,

1298
01:13:31,640 --> 01:13:36,080
Speaker 1: we pay for it in hospital bills, incarceration, cause lost productivity,

1299
01:13:36,640 --> 01:13:39,800
Speaker 1: we pay for it, and sort of problems that probably

1300
01:13:39,840 --> 01:13:42,519
Speaker 1: haven't been solved yet because the answer is with someone

1301
01:13:42,600 --> 01:13:46,320
Speaker 1: who's working two jobs and driving tests and driving uber

1302
01:13:46,920 --> 01:13:50,040
Speaker 1: and has no time to think. The cure for cancer

1303
01:13:50,160 --> 01:13:52,320
Speaker 1: is probably with someone who's like doing domestic work at

1304
01:13:52,360 --> 01:13:55,439
Speaker 1: someone's house right now, who is brilliant but just can

1305
01:13:55,520 --> 01:13:57,439
Speaker 1: never have the time even think and try because she

1306
01:13:57,600 --> 01:14:01,720
Speaker 1: has to work for me, your existence. And then I

1307
01:14:01,800 --> 01:14:04,160
Speaker 1: think the last thing I'll say I put back point

1308
01:14:04,240 --> 01:14:06,920
Speaker 1: on this all day is that I do think we're

1309
01:14:07,080 --> 01:14:13,519
Speaker 1: we all are deserving more than just a bare minimum

1310
01:14:13,640 --> 01:14:18,160
Speaker 1: eat meager existence. But so sick of a living wage. God,

1311
01:14:18,200 --> 01:14:20,519
Speaker 1: I'm sick of that term. Let's and we're out here

1312
01:14:20,560 --> 01:14:22,880
Speaker 1: advocating for it. People deserve to make a living wage.

1313
01:14:23,280 --> 01:14:25,360
Speaker 1: Fuck a living wage. I want people to make a

1314
01:14:25,720 --> 01:14:31,519
Speaker 1: thriving wage. I want people to make a dreaming wage.

1315
01:14:31,640 --> 01:14:35,559
Speaker 1: I want people to be able to do more than work,

1316
01:14:35,720 --> 01:14:39,320
Speaker 1: eat and sleep. What about as you said, taking your

1317
01:14:39,360 --> 01:14:42,000
Speaker 1: family out on the weekends. What about going to a

1318
01:14:42,160 --> 01:14:44,479
Speaker 1: museum to learn something? I think about, you know, the

1319
01:14:44,560 --> 01:14:48,679
Speaker 1: era and my dad came up in when there weren't

1320
01:14:48,840 --> 01:14:52,120
Speaker 1: trillion dollar tax cuts for the super wealthy and the irony.

1321
01:14:52,200 --> 01:14:53,640
Speaker 1: Like people always yell at me, they're like, you're a

1322
01:14:53,680 --> 01:14:56,599
Speaker 1: new you're one of those people. I'm like, bro, I'm

1323
01:14:56,680 --> 01:14:59,040
Speaker 1: not like the super wealthy or in a class you

1324
01:14:59,120 --> 01:15:01,599
Speaker 1: can't even have bet money people have. That's who we're

1325
01:15:01,600 --> 01:15:03,600
Speaker 1: talking about when we say tax the rich. Like and

1326
01:15:03,680 --> 01:15:05,400
Speaker 1: by the way, if I was rich, Like, if I

1327
01:15:05,479 --> 01:15:07,320
Speaker 1: had money like those people, I would be happy to

1328
01:15:07,360 --> 01:15:10,280
Speaker 1: pay my taxes. What are you talking about? It's like

1329
01:15:11,080 --> 01:15:13,519
Speaker 1: I think people get the difference between like one per

1330
01:15:13,560 --> 01:15:17,640
Speaker 1: cent and point zero one. They don't get it. And

1331
01:15:18,280 --> 01:15:22,040
Speaker 1: and it's interesting to me to look at the landscape

1332
01:15:22,040 --> 01:15:23,920
Speaker 1: because like when I you know, my dad talks about

1333
01:15:23,960 --> 01:15:27,400
Speaker 1: how when he was my age, you know, CEO has

1334
01:15:27,439 --> 01:15:30,400
Speaker 1: made something like a hundred and twenty five times what

1335
01:15:31,120 --> 01:15:34,559
Speaker 1: their average worker made. And look, if you're the CEO

1336
01:15:34,800 --> 01:15:37,920
Speaker 1: of a company that employs eight million people, like, I

1337
01:15:38,040 --> 01:15:41,640
Speaker 1: get it. You have a big job. But now CEOs

1338
01:15:41,720 --> 01:15:45,880
Speaker 1: make like hundred times what the average worker makes, and

1339
01:15:45,920 --> 01:15:47,880
Speaker 1: the average worker still makes what they were making when

1340
01:15:47,920 --> 01:15:49,920
Speaker 1: the CEO only made a hundred and twenty five times

1341
01:15:49,960 --> 01:15:52,880
Speaker 1: what they made or sixty times or whatever. And I'm like,

1342
01:15:53,240 --> 01:15:55,759
Speaker 1: that's why you used to be able to be middle

1343
01:15:55,840 --> 01:15:59,080
Speaker 1: class and have like a cottage on a lake somewhere

1344
01:15:59,280 --> 01:16:02,880
Speaker 1: and to callers and like a decent existence. And now

1345
01:16:03,720 --> 01:16:06,720
Speaker 1: CEOs have three jets and everybody else is like living

1346
01:16:06,760 --> 01:16:08,800
Speaker 1: in multi family homes trying to figure out like who

1347
01:16:08,840 --> 01:16:11,439
Speaker 1: gets to take the car on a Saturday. And I

1348
01:16:11,560 --> 01:16:13,439
Speaker 1: think there's just a way that we could equalize it

1349
01:16:13,520 --> 01:16:16,400
Speaker 1: a little more. I'm not saying don't be successful. I'm

1350
01:16:16,439 --> 01:16:18,320
Speaker 1: not saying don't be a CEO. I'm not even saying

1351
01:16:18,360 --> 01:16:23,160
Speaker 1: don't be rich. I'm saying don't be like an aristocrat

1352
01:16:23,320 --> 01:16:27,479
Speaker 1: turning your employees into like, you know, Marie Antoinette, you're

1353
01:16:27,520 --> 01:16:32,080
Speaker 1: a peasants who are suffering while you're like throwing food

1354
01:16:32,120 --> 01:16:34,920
Speaker 1: away because it's funny to you, like what are we doing?

1355
01:16:35,120 --> 01:16:38,800
Speaker 1: How did we get here? And it's also what's and

1356
01:16:38,840 --> 01:16:41,840
Speaker 1: people say people are self interested? So I'm just confused

1357
01:16:41,880 --> 01:16:44,760
Speaker 1: because if I had that much money, I would look

1358
01:16:44,840 --> 01:16:48,200
Speaker 1: at history and recognize that's just not sustainable that all

1359
01:16:48,240 --> 01:16:52,200
Speaker 1: those stories in very badly. They end in some sort

1360
01:16:52,200 --> 01:16:55,120
Speaker 1: of revolution. They like people. Just what you're saying is

1361
01:16:55,160 --> 01:16:57,519
Speaker 1: you would remember that the guillotine happened, and you would

1362
01:16:58,760 --> 01:17:03,639
Speaker 1: yet fixed thing, like maybe I don't need I'm cool

1363
01:17:03,680 --> 01:17:06,720
Speaker 1: with one, Like yeah, yeah, maybe one is enough. When

1364
01:17:06,760 --> 01:17:09,680
Speaker 1: you're in the bees, I think you're good. Like you know,

1365
01:17:09,840 --> 01:17:11,880
Speaker 1: Elon Musk is out here trying to say that, you know,

1366
01:17:12,120 --> 01:17:14,439
Speaker 1: texting people's wealth is ridiculous. I'm like, bro, you have

1367
01:17:14,520 --> 01:17:18,280
Speaker 1: a trillion dollars. You're not even gonna miss it. You

1368
01:17:18,479 --> 01:17:22,360
Speaker 1: can't even do anything without like no, it's too crazy

1369
01:17:23,560 --> 01:17:26,080
Speaker 1: making more money on it. So like why these guys

1370
01:17:26,160 --> 01:17:28,800
Speaker 1: think they want to colonize space? And I'm sitting here

1371
01:17:29,000 --> 01:17:31,760
Speaker 1: thinking like, first of all, maybe look at history and

1372
01:17:31,800 --> 01:17:34,760
Speaker 1: stop colonizing. Second of all, you're telling me you want

1373
01:17:34,760 --> 01:17:36,800
Speaker 1: to go to Mars. So what you're saying is you

1374
01:17:36,840 --> 01:17:39,960
Speaker 1: want to go to prison. You will never go outside,

1375
01:17:40,400 --> 01:17:43,000
Speaker 1: you will never hug a tree, you will never smell

1376
01:17:43,080 --> 01:17:45,760
Speaker 1: fresh air, there will be no ocean, there will be

1377
01:17:45,920 --> 01:17:49,120
Speaker 1: nothing that makes this planet magical. What you're telling me

1378
01:17:49,680 --> 01:17:52,040
Speaker 1: is you just want to build yourself a prison cell.

1379
01:17:52,240 --> 01:17:54,479
Speaker 1: I know it's gonna look like an art museum, but

1380
01:17:54,600 --> 01:17:57,920
Speaker 1: you're still going to be in prison. And you don't

1381
01:17:57,960 --> 01:18:01,280
Speaker 1: even know. You've never experienced it. You've never visited someone

1382
01:18:01,320 --> 01:18:05,040
Speaker 1: who's been stuck in the carcerole system. You've never been without,

1383
01:18:05,600 --> 01:18:09,160
Speaker 1: so you don't know that you're building a self for yourself.

1384
01:18:09,880 --> 01:18:12,040
Speaker 1: You think it's a dream and it's just going to

1385
01:18:12,120 --> 01:18:13,920
Speaker 1: be a nightmare. Why don't you fix the planet we

1386
01:18:14,000 --> 01:18:17,000
Speaker 1: live on? Why don't you support the people who live here?

1387
01:18:17,080 --> 01:18:19,800
Speaker 1: Why don't why don't you campaign for clean air and

1388
01:18:19,880 --> 01:18:25,040
Speaker 1: water so that our children can go outside and breathe? Like,

1389
01:18:25,280 --> 01:18:28,680
Speaker 1: how have we missed the plot so much? And it

1390
01:18:29,479 --> 01:18:32,160
Speaker 1: but think of the irony right like and said like wow,

1391
01:18:33,479 --> 01:18:36,760
Speaker 1: like you are. It's it's almost like a fable. It's

1392
01:18:36,760 --> 01:18:40,000
Speaker 1: almost like some like story where it's hard growing up

1393
01:18:40,320 --> 01:18:44,080
Speaker 1: where you take take, take, and you get get get

1394
01:18:44,320 --> 01:18:47,720
Speaker 1: in the place you're leaving is so correceive. So you

1395
01:18:47,920 --> 01:18:52,280
Speaker 1: build for yourself in a different place, something that's actually

1396
01:18:52,439 --> 01:18:55,760
Speaker 1: imprisoning you. Because the issue wasn't the people or the earth.

1397
01:18:55,880 --> 01:18:59,519
Speaker 1: It was like your greed and your insatial appetite for more, well,

1398
01:18:59,600 --> 01:19:03,639
Speaker 1: and how bifurcated you became from your own society, like, yeah,

1399
01:19:03,680 --> 01:19:05,200
Speaker 1: of course you think you want to move to another

1400
01:19:05,280 --> 01:19:07,439
Speaker 1: planet if you don't go outside and meet people. Ever,

1401
01:19:08,800 --> 01:19:11,880
Speaker 1: if you're only surrounded by whatever your version of your

1402
01:19:11,920 --> 01:19:14,160
Speaker 1: prep school friends, you only have a tiny piece of

1403
01:19:14,200 --> 01:19:18,040
Speaker 1: the information. What if you suck out? What if you

1404
01:19:18,080 --> 01:19:19,800
Speaker 1: went out in the world and chose to seek out

1405
01:19:19,880 --> 01:19:23,920
Speaker 1: other people's experiences and perspectives. What if you spent time

1406
01:19:23,960 --> 01:19:25,960
Speaker 1: with families and stocks in or Compton. What if you

1407
01:19:26,520 --> 01:19:33,720
Speaker 1: what if you went to the indigenous community spaces in

1408
01:19:34,280 --> 01:19:36,920
Speaker 1: Utah or Arizona and learned with these people who don't

1409
01:19:36,960 --> 01:19:41,400
Speaker 1: have internet connectivity or addresses, need the people who literally

1410
01:19:41,520 --> 01:19:44,600
Speaker 1: deserve to be here, most who we have segmented the

1411
01:19:44,680 --> 01:19:48,120
Speaker 1: worst in our society. What if they had access to healthcare?

1412
01:19:48,280 --> 01:19:51,439
Speaker 1: What if they had access to actual voting rights? What if?

1413
01:19:51,720 --> 01:19:55,640
Speaker 1: What if that's who the most powerful people in our society?

1414
01:19:56,439 --> 01:20:01,519
Speaker 1: We're focused on what could we do then? And you know,

1415
01:20:02,320 --> 01:20:05,320
Speaker 1: people ask, and you know, the bright bart people yell

1416
01:20:05,640 --> 01:20:07,840
Speaker 1: about like what do you know? And and you know,

1417
01:20:07,920 --> 01:20:10,919
Speaker 1: what's not lost on me is people in my industry,

1418
01:20:12,200 --> 01:20:15,400
Speaker 1: we exist in a system. If I make money, my

1419
01:20:15,479 --> 01:20:19,120
Speaker 1: whole team makes money. Whatever money I make, I keep

1420
01:20:19,200 --> 01:20:22,919
Speaker 1: twenty of it because everybody eats when I eat, including

1421
01:20:22,960 --> 01:20:25,040
Speaker 1: the United States government. By the way, I pay way

1422
01:20:25,080 --> 01:20:27,560
Speaker 1: more taccess than Elon Muskin. It's not lost on me.

1423
01:20:28,000 --> 01:20:32,439
Speaker 1: But but that's true. Like when when when I make money,

1424
01:20:32,520 --> 01:20:34,720
Speaker 1: this person and this person and this person, everybody gets

1425
01:20:34,720 --> 01:20:38,360
Speaker 1: a percentage, everybody gets a cut, and a beautiful existence

1426
01:20:38,400 --> 01:20:41,600
Speaker 1: and survival is possible on that. And so when I

1427
01:20:41,720 --> 01:20:44,680
Speaker 1: look at people who have who who would sob if

1428
01:20:44,760 --> 01:20:47,880
Speaker 1: they had my bank account tomorrow, they'd be like, what

1429
01:20:48,040 --> 01:20:51,839
Speaker 1: happened to my life? I consider myself to be so privileged.

1430
01:20:51,880 --> 01:20:54,439
Speaker 1: I'm so proud of what I've built and made by

1431
01:20:54,520 --> 01:20:57,519
Speaker 1: myself with my hands and I and I look at

1432
01:20:57,560 --> 01:20:59,160
Speaker 1: them and I'm like, what about the team? You could

1433
01:20:59,200 --> 01:21:01,599
Speaker 1: be supporting and you'd still be so rich, you'd still

1434
01:21:01,640 --> 01:21:06,960
Speaker 1: have planes, you'd still be good, Like, you know, I

1435
01:21:07,080 --> 01:21:09,800
Speaker 1: had somebody on I came home yesterday from my job

1436
01:21:09,880 --> 01:21:12,400
Speaker 1: in Toronto and this guy next to me was like

1437
01:21:12,560 --> 01:21:14,880
Speaker 1: so surprised that you know. I was in the aisle

1438
01:21:14,920 --> 01:21:19,040
Speaker 1: seat in road twenty four and I was like, bro, yeah,

1439
01:21:19,760 --> 01:21:21,920
Speaker 1: you know, holiday fights are expensive. What do you want

1440
01:21:21,960 --> 01:21:24,160
Speaker 1: from me? And he was just laughing. You thought it

1441
01:21:24,240 --> 01:21:28,519
Speaker 1: was so funny, and I thought, you know, I'm okay,

1442
01:21:30,200 --> 01:21:34,240
Speaker 1: I feel great. I I know I'm not by any

1443
01:21:34,320 --> 01:21:37,280
Speaker 1: means perfect or I don't know everything, but but I

1444
01:21:37,400 --> 01:21:40,439
Speaker 1: see programs like the one you enacted. I see things

1445
01:21:40,560 --> 01:21:43,559
Speaker 1: we can do when we show up together. I've seen

1446
01:21:44,160 --> 01:21:46,560
Speaker 1: what I'm capable of. Rather than saying like, well, I

1447
01:21:46,600 --> 01:21:48,840
Speaker 1: could write a check this big for a charity this year,

1448
01:21:49,439 --> 01:21:51,720
Speaker 1: what if I donate my birthday to that charity and

1449
01:21:51,840 --> 01:21:54,920
Speaker 1: we raised ten times as much money? You know, what

1450
01:21:55,040 --> 01:21:58,160
Speaker 1: if we do things as a team. And everything I've

1451
01:21:58,200 --> 01:22:00,280
Speaker 1: ever done as a team has brought me immense joy.

1452
01:22:01,120 --> 01:22:03,400
Speaker 1: And when I get too stuck in being just little me,

1453
01:22:03,680 --> 01:22:07,720
Speaker 1: by myself individual in the world, I feel isolated and sad,

1454
01:22:07,920 --> 01:22:10,439
Speaker 1: and I lose the plot a little bit. So I

1455
01:22:10,479 --> 01:22:12,600
Speaker 1: don't know. I think, if, if, if any of us

1456
01:22:12,680 --> 01:22:18,479
Speaker 1: can encourage um, you know, dreams over worry, community over self,

1457
01:22:19,520 --> 01:22:23,439
Speaker 1: we're doing something really special. And and yeah, I know

1458
01:22:23,560 --> 01:22:25,200
Speaker 1: that it can put a target on your back. I mean,

1459
01:22:25,240 --> 01:22:28,479
Speaker 1: I know that everything you did as mayor made a

1460
01:22:28,560 --> 01:22:30,760
Speaker 1: lot of people try to come for you and and

1461
01:22:31,040 --> 01:22:34,560
Speaker 1: run a lot of weirdness against you and um and

1462
01:22:34,680 --> 01:22:36,920
Speaker 1: that you did experience that loss. But look, what it's

1463
01:22:37,000 --> 01:22:40,400
Speaker 1: led to. You know, even you're sitting now as a

1464
01:22:40,479 --> 01:22:43,000
Speaker 1: special advisor to Governor Newsom, you're working on issues for

1465
01:22:43,120 --> 01:22:48,360
Speaker 1: the state. You proved something in your hometown that one

1466
01:22:48,400 --> 01:22:51,360
Speaker 1: of the you know, fifty states in our country said, oh,

1467
01:22:51,439 --> 01:22:55,439
Speaker 1: we need that guy on our team. So so the

1468
01:22:55,560 --> 01:23:00,120
Speaker 1: sling shot the loss into the bigger propulsion. What is

1469
01:23:00,200 --> 01:23:04,360
Speaker 1: that bigger propulsion for you? Now? What is this new phase? Now? Yeah,

1470
01:23:04,400 --> 01:23:08,679
Speaker 1: I think it's really sort of unburdened by what's been

1471
01:23:09,240 --> 01:23:14,160
Speaker 1: or sort of political limitations. Is really a beautiful word. Wow,

1472
01:23:15,080 --> 01:23:19,200
Speaker 1: It's really just UM using all the tools from media,

1473
01:23:19,840 --> 01:23:25,560
Speaker 1: UM to storytelling, to policy, to UM innovation, to to

1474
01:23:25,720 --> 01:23:28,600
Speaker 1: create a world that has opportunity for everyone in that

1475
01:23:29,120 --> 01:23:33,720
Speaker 1: sees and affirms everyone's basic human dignity. UM. So it's

1476
01:23:33,760 --> 01:23:36,439
Speaker 1: just I'm able to do so much more now because

1477
01:23:36,479 --> 01:23:38,760
Speaker 1: I have this complete control over my time. So I

1478
01:23:38,840 --> 01:23:41,960
Speaker 1: could do stuff with narrative. I could work with other

1479
01:23:42,080 --> 01:23:44,240
Speaker 1: merrits and other cities. I could help the governor, I

1480
01:23:44,280 --> 01:23:48,240
Speaker 1: could help companies, I can go places like, there's so

1481
01:23:48,400 --> 01:23:50,400
Speaker 1: much more I can do because I don't have to

1482
01:23:50,600 --> 01:23:53,080
Speaker 1: do the pot holes, I don't have to do the

1483
01:23:53,400 --> 01:23:56,880
Speaker 1: I T system I don't have to do the audience,

1484
01:23:56,920 --> 01:23:59,959
Speaker 1: so everything that makes sense looking backwards and looking backwards,

1485
01:24:00,040 --> 01:24:04,160
Speaker 1: it's almost a year to the date, I'm still I'm

1486
01:24:04,200 --> 01:24:07,800
Speaker 1: not happy at the way I lost, but I am

1487
01:24:08,120 --> 01:24:12,000
Speaker 1: happy for what the loss taught me in sort of

1488
01:24:12,240 --> 01:24:16,920
Speaker 1: all the really just blessings that have come my way since,

1489
01:24:17,040 --> 01:24:20,439
Speaker 1: and the real opportunity and also the real affirmation and

1490
01:24:20,560 --> 01:24:23,679
Speaker 1: validation that the issue wasn't with sort of the work.

1491
01:24:24,439 --> 01:24:27,720
Speaker 1: The issue wasn't with performance, That wasn't it, And that

1492
01:24:28,320 --> 01:24:31,400
Speaker 1: it was also a reminder that my purpose is bigger

1493
01:24:31,400 --> 01:24:34,320
Speaker 1: than the title, and my purpose is not tied to

1494
01:24:34,439 --> 01:24:37,840
Speaker 1: a position, like the positions and the opportunities are a

1495
01:24:37,920 --> 01:24:40,519
Speaker 1: means to an end, but the end is really the

1496
01:24:40,600 --> 01:24:42,439
Speaker 1: purpose and to never lose sight of that. So I'm

1497
01:24:42,439 --> 01:24:45,240
Speaker 1: gonna learned that at thirty and that like at sixty

1498
01:24:45,439 --> 01:24:48,880
Speaker 1: or seventy well, and it makes me excited for where

1499
01:24:48,920 --> 01:24:54,000
Speaker 1: you're going, especially seeing that purpose and having that lesson

1500
01:24:54,920 --> 01:24:57,160
Speaker 1: at the moment you did you know you mentioned earlier

1501
01:24:57,200 --> 01:24:59,160
Speaker 1: it was while you were writing your book, and I

1502
01:24:59,240 --> 01:25:03,320
Speaker 1: mean it. I assume everyone's sitting listening, you know, at

1503
01:25:03,360 --> 01:25:05,439
Speaker 1: home or on their community is like very ready to

1504
01:25:05,520 --> 01:25:08,479
Speaker 1: read your book. Look it up, folks. It's called The

1505
01:25:08,560 --> 01:25:12,800
Speaker 1: Deeper the Roots. It was published just this November. I mean,

1506
01:25:13,880 --> 01:25:16,040
Speaker 1: writing it while in such an immense phase of growth

1507
01:25:16,280 --> 01:25:18,639
Speaker 1: and a phase that came with a reckoning as well.

1508
01:25:19,960 --> 01:25:22,920
Speaker 1: What was that, Like, what what motivated you to write

1509
01:25:22,960 --> 01:25:27,120
Speaker 1: it when you did, and and how does it feel

1510
01:25:27,160 --> 01:25:29,840
Speaker 1: to have it in the world now. Yeah, well it's

1511
01:25:29,880 --> 01:25:32,280
Speaker 1: gonna sound really basic, But what motivated me to write

1512
01:25:32,280 --> 01:25:35,080
Speaker 1: it was the birth of my first child. A first

1513
01:25:35,200 --> 01:25:37,960
Speaker 1: child because child care is expensive, and I was like, well,

1514
01:25:38,520 --> 01:25:40,519
Speaker 1: I'll make this much as mayor, you make this munches

1515
01:25:40,520 --> 01:25:44,200
Speaker 1: as a high school counselor. I don't see where the

1516
01:25:44,240 --> 01:25:46,679
Speaker 1: actually to one two thousand a month for child hare's

1517
01:25:46,680 --> 01:25:52,720
Speaker 1: gonna come from, Like I really do it. And I

1518
01:25:52,880 --> 01:25:54,680
Speaker 1: was like, oh ha, but have this book deal and

1519
01:25:54,760 --> 01:25:57,040
Speaker 1: if I write this book, I get my advance and

1520
01:25:57,160 --> 01:25:59,920
Speaker 1: that'd be enough to pay for child So I was

1521
01:26:00,000 --> 01:26:02,479
Speaker 1: really what started it. And but then while writing it,

1522
01:26:03,000 --> 01:26:06,800
Speaker 1: it just allowed me to reflect on my parents and

1523
01:26:07,080 --> 01:26:09,439
Speaker 1: it was just a very a great space. And I

1524
01:26:09,520 --> 01:26:12,680
Speaker 1: wrote most of it in which is just such a

1525
01:26:12,800 --> 01:26:15,160
Speaker 1: crazy year but for me, one of the most still

1526
01:26:15,320 --> 01:26:18,600
Speaker 1: years I've had. I was home, I was governing and

1527
01:26:18,680 --> 01:26:21,040
Speaker 1: leading into a pandemic. But I wasn't flying everywhere I

1528
01:26:21,160 --> 01:26:23,599
Speaker 1: was home. I was every night I was in my bed,

1529
01:26:24,439 --> 01:26:27,679
Speaker 1: you know. And that that never because I was sixteen

1530
01:26:27,720 --> 01:26:31,240
Speaker 1: years old, had had that. So it provided some real

1531
01:26:31,560 --> 01:26:35,120
Speaker 1: sort of forcing function to think about what I want

1532
01:26:35,200 --> 01:26:38,759
Speaker 1: my children to know, think about the city, connect dots.

1533
01:26:39,080 --> 01:26:41,960
Speaker 1: But then in October the book was done. It was

1534
01:26:42,120 --> 01:26:44,880
Speaker 1: a good book, most of it as is was written

1535
01:26:44,880 --> 01:26:47,840
Speaker 1: in October. But then when I lost it unlocked something

1536
01:26:47,920 --> 01:26:53,360
Speaker 1: else because that first directory of the book was tough

1537
01:26:53,520 --> 01:26:57,559
Speaker 1: upbringing a couple of mistakes in the middle. But everything's good.

1538
01:26:58,439 --> 01:26:59,840
Speaker 1: This isn't when this is the when you do that,

1539
01:27:00,080 --> 01:27:02,120
Speaker 1: you do this, you do this is where you end

1540
01:27:02,160 --> 01:27:05,240
Speaker 1: of the high note, And that's not life. That might

1541
01:27:05,320 --> 01:27:11,240
Speaker 1: be a movie, but that's not life. So losing it's like,

1542
01:27:11,320 --> 01:27:13,320
Speaker 1: oh shoot, this is not a fairy This is a

1543
01:27:13,880 --> 01:27:18,080
Speaker 1: not a fairytale ending. It ends with an uncertainty, with

1544
01:27:18,280 --> 01:27:22,040
Speaker 1: a confidence that better is coming. But before I knew

1545
01:27:22,120 --> 01:27:24,080
Speaker 1: what this year would hold, it's before I knew I

1546
01:27:24,120 --> 01:27:27,080
Speaker 1: have special advisors to the governors. Before I knew sixty

1547
01:27:27,120 --> 01:27:30,800
Speaker 1: mayors would be doing basic it was last November. All

1548
01:27:30,840 --> 01:27:32,519
Speaker 1: I knew was that I lost. I need to figure

1549
01:27:32,520 --> 01:27:35,519
Speaker 1: out what was next, and writing from that kind of

1550
01:27:36,400 --> 01:27:39,960
Speaker 1: point of view in perspective, I think sort of reading

1551
01:27:40,000 --> 01:27:43,200
Speaker 1: it now, I'm like wow. If for nothing else, the

1552
01:27:43,280 --> 01:27:45,519
Speaker 1: loss just made the book feel to me much more

1553
01:27:45,640 --> 01:27:50,200
Speaker 1: real and much more like ship. This is hard work.

1554
01:27:51,160 --> 01:27:53,120
Speaker 1: And you can do all that and still lose. And

1555
01:27:53,160 --> 01:27:54,880
Speaker 1: how you keep your confidence? You can do all that

1556
01:27:54,920 --> 01:27:56,960
Speaker 1: and still lose, and how you keep your faith? How

1557
01:27:57,000 --> 01:27:59,599
Speaker 1: do you do with loss? It's easy to say everything

1558
01:27:59,640 --> 01:28:01,519
Speaker 1: works out out for good or well when it went

1559
01:28:01,680 --> 01:28:03,479
Speaker 1: back and you don't know what the good is yet

1560
01:28:03,520 --> 01:28:07,639
Speaker 1: and how you talk. So it was very cheap therapy. Honestly,

1561
01:28:09,240 --> 01:28:13,920
Speaker 1: it's getting me time and and and think um and

1562
01:28:14,000 --> 01:28:17,120
Speaker 1: also this a process like that missed a side and right,

1563
01:28:17,200 --> 01:28:18,840
Speaker 1: I was like, oh yeah, maybe I should realize this.

1564
01:28:18,960 --> 01:28:21,639
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, maybe when maybe when the entire city council

1565
01:28:21,720 --> 01:28:25,040
Speaker 1: voting gets me on masks at man Nates, maybe that

1566
01:28:25,160 --> 01:28:27,080
Speaker 1: should be a red flag. And it should have been,

1567
01:28:27,120 --> 01:28:29,840
Speaker 1: because I was gonna say, Council, I had only lost

1568
01:28:30,080 --> 01:28:33,559
Speaker 1: one vote in eight years, and I don't put things

1569
01:28:33,600 --> 01:28:35,400
Speaker 1: on the gender if I if I don't have the votes.

1570
01:28:36,280 --> 01:28:39,120
Speaker 1: So when every single person vote against it, I was married.

1571
01:28:39,880 --> 01:28:42,400
Speaker 1: I should have said something wrong, but instead I was like, oh,

1572
01:28:42,680 --> 01:28:46,519
Speaker 1: they're scared of COVID like like but then riding and

1573
01:28:46,600 --> 01:28:48,479
Speaker 1: I was like, no, that was an inflection point. That

1574
01:28:48,640 --> 01:28:50,360
Speaker 1: was a time you should have thought it called the

1575
01:28:50,439 --> 01:28:52,880
Speaker 1: campaign tea know, like, something's weird going on? Are we

1576
01:28:53,320 --> 01:28:55,920
Speaker 1: sure do need to pivot strategy? But so that, I

1577
01:28:56,000 --> 01:29:00,720
Speaker 1: think the clarity of looking backwards was very helpful. It's

1578
01:29:00,760 --> 01:29:05,920
Speaker 1: interesting because that kind of clarity that you mentioned really, um,

1579
01:29:07,160 --> 01:29:10,760
Speaker 1: makes me think about the backside. We were referencing, you know,

1580
01:29:10,880 --> 01:29:15,679
Speaker 1: what we've seen, Um, we're seeing it after defeating Trump,

1581
01:29:15,720 --> 01:29:18,759
Speaker 1: and were watching what's happening, you know, the Virginia election

1582
01:29:18,880 --> 01:29:21,400
Speaker 1: and what might be coming in the midterms, and and

1583
01:29:21,560 --> 01:29:25,839
Speaker 1: the way that this this right wing disinformation machine seems

1584
01:29:25,880 --> 01:29:30,920
Speaker 1: to like keep it coming, whereas progress proving progress is

1585
01:29:31,080 --> 01:29:35,680
Speaker 1: slower because it actually requires legwork, it's not just you know,

1586
01:29:37,800 --> 01:29:46,680
Speaker 1: viral tweets. Um. I'm curious what you think is important

1587
01:29:46,760 --> 01:29:49,800
Speaker 1: for us to remember as we move forward, because there's

1588
01:29:49,840 --> 01:29:54,080
Speaker 1: so many lessons in your book about not giving up,

1589
01:29:54,240 --> 01:30:00,439
Speaker 1: about how we can illuminate ourselves and our community. And

1590
01:30:01,920 --> 01:30:06,080
Speaker 1: I just wonder what do you see when you talk

1591
01:30:06,120 --> 01:30:09,479
Speaker 1: about those inflection points those lessons. How do you think

1592
01:30:09,560 --> 01:30:12,639
Speaker 1: we need to better talk to each other to keep

1593
01:30:12,680 --> 01:30:17,679
Speaker 1: our you know, our foot on the gas towards better

1594
01:30:18,040 --> 01:30:21,840
Speaker 1: rather than going backwards. Yeah, my grandma used to always say,

1595
01:30:22,080 --> 01:30:24,840
Speaker 1: I didn't understand it, and I'm still understanding it now,

1596
01:30:24,880 --> 01:30:26,960
Speaker 1: it's like it older. But she would always say, don't

1597
01:30:27,000 --> 01:30:30,920
Speaker 1: get weary and well doing for in due season, you

1598
01:30:30,960 --> 01:30:33,120
Speaker 1: will reap a harvest when you if you fain not

1599
01:30:34,439 --> 01:30:38,759
Speaker 1: um and and it's just a reminder that I didn't

1600
01:30:38,800 --> 01:30:41,400
Speaker 1: say when. It just says in due season, like when

1601
01:30:41,439 --> 01:30:46,559
Speaker 1: it's time. And also this idea that you can't faint

1602
01:30:46,720 --> 01:30:49,599
Speaker 1: like it like. And I think that last clause if

1603
01:30:49,640 --> 01:30:53,400
Speaker 1: you fain not is an admission that fainting or quitting

1604
01:30:53,479 --> 01:30:57,160
Speaker 1: makes sense, that fainting and quitting is a logical response

1605
01:30:57,880 --> 01:31:00,439
Speaker 1: to waiting for a harvest. But but you'll this out

1606
01:31:00,560 --> 01:31:03,160
Speaker 1: if you quit, So that's always been helpful. And I

1607
01:31:03,200 --> 01:31:07,479
Speaker 1: think number two, just learning from those value experiences. I

1608
01:31:07,920 --> 01:31:11,519
Speaker 1: think sort of you could get to the mountaintop, but

1609
01:31:11,640 --> 01:31:14,840
Speaker 1: without the perspective gain from the valley, don't really appreciate

1610
01:31:15,320 --> 01:31:17,680
Speaker 1: sort of you don't have the skills to climb to

1611
01:31:17,720 --> 01:31:19,400
Speaker 1: get to the mountain, You don't appreciate it once you

1612
01:31:19,479 --> 01:31:21,920
Speaker 1: get there. So I think, regardless of what happens in

1613
01:31:22,000 --> 01:31:25,160
Speaker 1: twenty two or etcetera, let's take stock and not just

1614
01:31:25,320 --> 01:31:27,960
Speaker 1: be angry about what happened, right excited about what happened,

1615
01:31:28,000 --> 01:31:30,920
Speaker 1: but let's learn what can we learn? What can we

1616
01:31:31,000 --> 01:31:33,880
Speaker 1: do better? What? What's the lesson here to prepare us

1617
01:31:33,960 --> 01:31:37,840
Speaker 1: for for what's next? How do you as you look

1618
01:31:37,920 --> 01:31:42,639
Speaker 1: forward to think about what you want your new mission

1619
01:31:42,720 --> 01:31:45,360
Speaker 1: to be? You know, what are the marching orders you're

1620
01:31:45,400 --> 01:31:47,680
Speaker 1: giving to yourself? How how do you want to go

1621
01:31:47,800 --> 01:31:51,320
Speaker 1: into the next year inspiring other people the next year?

1622
01:31:51,439 --> 01:31:54,880
Speaker 1: I want to be laser focused on having a through

1623
01:31:54,920 --> 01:31:57,880
Speaker 1: line between everything I do about just uplifting human dignity,

1624
01:31:58,840 --> 01:32:01,519
Speaker 1: about giving people the courage to dream about the world

1625
01:32:01,640 --> 01:32:06,040
Speaker 1: where everyone has enough to dream about the world where

1626
01:32:06,640 --> 01:32:10,080
Speaker 1: we don't have to have pervasive poverty, we don't have

1627
01:32:10,240 --> 01:32:14,240
Speaker 1: to have endemic homelessness, we don't have to have ubiquitous

1628
01:32:14,240 --> 01:32:18,719
Speaker 1: white supremacy and racism like oh, and just remind people

1629
01:32:18,800 --> 01:32:21,880
Speaker 1: that that's what we deserve, that yes, we're fighting for it,

1630
01:32:21,920 --> 01:32:23,840
Speaker 1: but we're not fighting for it to prove that we

1631
01:32:24,040 --> 01:32:26,800
Speaker 1: deserve it. We're fighting for it because we do deserve it,

1632
01:32:27,240 --> 01:32:32,120
Speaker 1: and and that um, there is an entitlement to dignity,

1633
01:32:32,320 --> 01:32:35,400
Speaker 1: there is an entitlement to self determination, there is an

1634
01:32:35,560 --> 01:32:38,920
Speaker 1: entitlement to live fully human and reminding people we're not

1635
01:32:39,120 --> 01:32:41,479
Speaker 1: fighting for things that we don't deserve, for things that

1636
01:32:41,560 --> 01:32:45,599
Speaker 1: are crazy. We're fighting for what's ours, our birthright, our

1637
01:32:45,760 --> 01:32:48,400
Speaker 1: gift for being born on this very beautiful but messy planet.

1638
01:32:50,400 --> 01:32:54,160
Speaker 1: I love that. I love that. I like the idea

1639
01:32:54,360 --> 01:33:01,960
Speaker 1: of a true and positive entitlement that feels like something

1640
01:33:02,040 --> 01:33:04,560
Speaker 1: we need to learn how to claim. Yeah, because we

1641
01:33:04,600 --> 01:33:06,640
Speaker 1: also think of in timements is backing, but now we

1642
01:33:06,720 --> 01:33:09,200
Speaker 1: are entiled to some things life, liberty in the pursuit

1643
01:33:09,240 --> 01:33:12,040
Speaker 1: of happiness. That's what they wrote all those years ago,

1644
01:33:12,200 --> 01:33:21,720
Speaker 1: not believing dignity, respect, opportunity. Yeah, I'm really curious. So

1645
01:33:21,960 --> 01:33:27,160
Speaker 1: much of who you are is centered on this idea

1646
01:33:27,320 --> 01:33:31,000
Speaker 1: of progress and the kind of progress that honors who

1647
01:33:31,120 --> 01:33:34,560
Speaker 1: people are, where they've been, all of the facets of themselves.

1648
01:33:34,680 --> 01:33:39,800
Speaker 1: And you know, I started this podcast to meditate on

1649
01:33:40,080 --> 01:33:45,200
Speaker 1: and enquire how to work on and within our own

1650
01:33:45,280 --> 01:33:50,960
Speaker 1: potential for progress. So I wonder, especially as we're now

1651
01:33:51,120 --> 01:33:54,880
Speaker 1: you know, wrapping up a year and a big year.

1652
01:33:56,200 --> 01:33:59,360
Speaker 1: What feels like a work in progress in your life

1653
01:33:59,560 --> 01:34:04,160
Speaker 1: for you in this moment of reflection, Yeah, the biggest

1654
01:34:04,240 --> 01:34:08,960
Speaker 1: work in progress for me is sort of showing up

1655
01:34:09,360 --> 01:34:14,679
Speaker 1: fully in all the different hats I wear as a father,

1656
01:34:14,960 --> 01:34:18,200
Speaker 1: as a husband, as a friend, as a son, has

1657
01:34:18,800 --> 01:34:25,360
Speaker 1: um the leader, as an advisor, as a strategist, as

1658
01:34:25,840 --> 01:34:30,040
Speaker 1: you know, how do I make sure I'm showing up

1659
01:34:30,080 --> 01:34:33,800
Speaker 1: in my best self in all those different roles. It's

1660
01:34:33,800 --> 01:34:37,679
Speaker 1: still a work in progress. Um. And in the book,

1661
01:34:37,720 --> 01:34:40,719
Speaker 1: I end with one of my favorite scriptures that says

1662
01:34:40,840 --> 01:34:43,599
Speaker 1: um basically about being a work in progress. It says,

1663
01:34:43,640 --> 01:34:47,040
Speaker 1: I'm confident that he who began a good work in

1664
01:34:47,240 --> 01:34:52,680
Speaker 1: me will continue that work until completion. And that's absolutely um,

1665
01:34:53,000 --> 01:34:57,400
Speaker 1: sort of where I am. And Yeah, so I'm confident

1666
01:34:57,560 --> 01:35:00,800
Speaker 1: that sort of the Michael tells you here now will

1667
01:35:00,800 --> 01:35:05,040
Speaker 1: be even wiser and better in two, with more lessons

1668
01:35:05,160 --> 01:35:10,120
Speaker 1: and more insights and hopefully a more humanity and more

1669
01:35:10,200 --> 01:35:15,640
Speaker 1: of the language to articulate that that humanity. Yeah, it's beautiful.

1670
01:35:17,280 --> 01:35:22,080
Speaker 1: It makes me hopeful for what's to come if we

1671
01:35:22,200 --> 01:35:25,160
Speaker 1: can center that kind of wholeness in our conversations. As

1672
01:35:25,240 --> 01:35:29,599
Speaker 1: you said to to create a rising tide that lifts

1673
01:35:29,640 --> 01:35:36,080
Speaker 1: all ships to serve and center are stricken communities, are

1674
01:35:36,080 --> 01:35:40,759
Speaker 1: communities and poverty, you know, our black and brown communities, women,

1675
01:35:41,439 --> 01:35:45,120
Speaker 1: all of the people who have always been pressed into margins.

1676
01:35:45,400 --> 01:35:49,120
Speaker 1: If they can be the people for whom we create

1677
01:35:49,280 --> 01:35:56,559
Speaker 1: our most inclusive policy, life gets better for all of us,

1678
01:35:56,840 --> 01:36:01,600
Speaker 1: for everybody. And you have helped lead a charge that

1679
01:36:01,800 --> 01:36:04,880
Speaker 1: has clarified how to do that in a way that

1680
01:36:05,200 --> 01:36:13,160
Speaker 1: centers that entitlement to the pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness.

1681
01:36:14,479 --> 01:36:18,120
Speaker 1: And you've proven that it's possible both as a moral

1682
01:36:18,280 --> 01:36:21,920
Speaker 1: core and also as a fiscal policy, which is what

1683
01:36:22,120 --> 01:36:28,519
Speaker 1: is required. And and I'm deeply grateful, you know, for

1684
01:36:28,680 --> 01:36:31,599
Speaker 1: your charge, for your example, for your book, my God,

1685
01:36:32,280 --> 01:36:34,400
Speaker 1: and and for the work that you continue to do,

1686
01:36:34,680 --> 01:36:38,639
Speaker 1: because my hope is that it will it will help

1687
01:36:38,720 --> 01:36:41,280
Speaker 1: to get the yelling that often happens in the margins

1688
01:36:41,360 --> 01:36:44,479
Speaker 1: on those extremes we talked about earlier, to calm down

1689
01:36:44,720 --> 01:36:51,519
Speaker 1: and bring people to meet for a sane conversation about

1690
01:36:51,960 --> 01:36:58,280
Speaker 1: how to serve our community's best. Thank you, thank you,

1691
01:36:59,120 --> 01:37:01,519
Speaker 1: and thank you for coming on today, and you know,

1692
01:37:01,640 --> 01:37:04,200
Speaker 1: blessing us with your time and your words. And your ideas.

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01:37:04,320 --> 01:37:08,439
Speaker 1: It's um, it's a conversation I will continue to cherish.

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Speaker 1: So thank you.