00:00:00
Matt Nahm, welcome to Allin.
00:00:02
>> Thanks, David. I have no idea who you
00:00:04
are. Who are you? I mean, you're a guy
00:00:06
who kind of popped up running for
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governor of California last minute.
00:00:10
How'd that come about? And who is Matt
00:00:12
Mayan?
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>> Well, David, like everybody, I'm
00:00:14
frustrated with a state that keeps
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spending more and seemingly getting
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less, which is why I jumped in. But to
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back up, I grew up in a little farming
00:00:20
town here in California, a town called
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Watsonville, where your strawberries
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come from. Home
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>> I do work in Watsonville.
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>> Frisco berries. You know it well.
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>> I got green houses. Yeah.
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>> Yeah. Exactly. working-class family. Mom
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was a teacher, dad was a letter carrier.
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My lucky break in life was getting into
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a great college prep high school on a
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work study scholarship. I took buses
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about two hours each way. Worked my way
00:00:39
through high school and college and uh
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came back as a public school teacher
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through the Teach for America program.
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Always was very community oriented, was
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interested in politics, wanted to know
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how to make our city, our world a better
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place. ended up in the tech sector and
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spent about a decade building civic tech
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tools to help people navigate their
00:00:59
democracy.
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>> What did you build?
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>> I was involved with an early Facebook
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application called Causes and then went
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on to start a platform called Brigade
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that was sort of like LinkedIn for
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voters. And the whole premise was to
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build grassroots bottomup power by
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connecting voters around issues they're
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passionate about, outcomes they want to
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see, and help them organize to hold
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their elected officials accountable.
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After about a decade in the civic tech
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space, our company was acquired. I
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decided to run for city council, and I
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went out and knocked on 10,000 doors,
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got yelled at for a lot of things that I
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wasn't necessarily responsible for, but
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I got a real feel for the common sense
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of the residents of California who would
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ask questions like, "If I'm paying
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$20,000 a year in property taxes, why
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haven't my local roads been paved in the
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last 15 years?" And I thought that made
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a lot of sense. So, I went to city hall
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to try to find out
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>> how dysfunctional is California and how
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did it get this way.
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>> Pretty bad. I'm really worried, which is
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why I jumped in. I think the state is
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heading toward an inflection point past
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which there there may be no return. We
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have increased spending in state
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government by 75%. To put that in
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perspective, that's $150 billion more
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this year than six years ago. And as far
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as I can tell, none of the outcomes have
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gotten better. Never mind 75% better.
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Many of them are flat or down over the
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same time period. So there is a real
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lack of accountability in government. We
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don't have a money problem in
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Sacramento. We have an incentives
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problem. We have a structure that allows
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us to keep shoveling more money into
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things that aren't working. Just take
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highspeed rail. If a startup took 20
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years, spent $14 billion, and didn't
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deliver a product, people would have
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been fired a long time ago. And we're
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just not seeing that level of
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accountability in our state government.
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>> Is this theft? Where does the money go?
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$14 billion. Who has that $14 billion
00:02:56
today? It's contractors. It's lawyers.
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Some of it has gone into actually
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building the project. But belatedly,
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what happens in California and the
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reason we can't build, we can't do big
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things anymore, is that we've got
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endless process, years of environmental
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review, the most latigious environment
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imaginable. Anybody can sue under SQA.
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You don't even have to be a resident of
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California to sue under SQUA. And so,
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you just get years of litigation,
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bureaucracy,
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when it comes to housing. Just to
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slightly switch topics, the fees that
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cities can assess, one-time fees can add
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20% to the cost of a project. So, we've
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just we've bureaucratized the state to
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the point where it's total paralysis. We
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can keep spending more and more and not
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getting anything for it. It's like I'm
00:03:41
trying to understand as a citizen and a
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taxpayer, I pay a 53% tax rate living in
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California. I pay my federal tax and my
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temporary California tax, which I've
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been temporarily paying for 11 years,
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and I'm paying 53 cents of every dollar
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I earn to the state and to the federal
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government. I'm like, where'd my money
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go? It's such a mind-boggling number.
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Pick the highspeed rail project alone.
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$14 billion
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>> spent.
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>> Spent. We don't have a rail. We don't
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have anything. Is it lawyers that made
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$14 billion? You mentioned contractors.
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like is this just like there's a whole
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bunch of people that are all making 20
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30 grand and it all adds up to 14
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billion like just help me understand
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where my money went. So on that project
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specifically and I haven't done the line
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item by line item analysis to be totally
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clear but you have years of consultants
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doing environmental reviews and and
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doing all of these studies and reports
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of of the impacts it might have. So tons
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of consultants you have the cost of
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litigation. You have an entire cottage
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industry of people doing design and
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studies and reports and managing
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litigation and buying right ofway and
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managing community engagement processes
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and we just we take years to do to do
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anything and so it just gets vacuumed up
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into this sea of little groups of
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things. So there isn't like one big
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thief like the grandmaster thief of
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California that's taking all the money
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and then it's just like the dysfunction
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is just like everyone's getting a little
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piece of
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>> my sense I mean let's be clear there is
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fraud there has been fraud very well
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documented in California and other areas
00:05:20
during the last 5 years or so roughly
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during the pandemic unemployment claims
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in California that were fraudulent
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totaled over $30 billion that is well
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documented there's emerging
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research right Now that shows that there
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are hundreds if not thousands of hospice
00:05:39
providers who may or may not exist. I
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mean we're just getting this information
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now. This is very real time
00:05:44
investigative journalism. So there's
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fraud I think by an order of magnitude.
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There's even something bigger here which
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is which is waste and inefficiency is a
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system where you just keep incrementally
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growing headcount, growing the size of
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programs, growing the grants that we
00:06:05
give out to nonprofits. And we're
00:06:08
funding and managing around process, not
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outcomes. And I've tried to approach it
00:06:12
very differently in San Jose. I think
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it's why without raising taxes, in fact,
00:06:17
our revenue has actually slowed a bit
00:06:19
the last couple of years just because
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the economy is cyclical, real estate is
00:06:22
struggling. We're very dependent on
00:06:24
local property taxes. But without
00:06:26
raising taxes, we have dramatically
00:06:29
changed the outcomes we're getting. We
00:06:30
have led the state in reducing crime and
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become the safest big city in the
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country. We've reduced unsheltered
00:06:35
homelessness, meaning people living
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outside in tents and vehicles, by about
00:06:39
a third in the last few years. We've
00:06:41
unblocked housing uh production. We're
00:06:44
seeing thousands of new homes under
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construction. In all of those cases, we
00:06:48
had to change existing process that was
00:06:51
in the way, reduce fees, and cut funding
00:06:54
for programs that weren't delivering so
00:06:56
that we could fund other solutions that
00:06:58
were more efficient.
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>> Well, let me also ask about legislation.
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If you look at Washington DC, we have
00:07:04
our nation's Congress, the House and the
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Senate, and there's a Republicans and
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there's Democrats, and they fight. And
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they fight so much they don't get
00:07:12
anything done, which by the way may be a
00:07:15
good thing because in California, the
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legislature passes hundreds and hundreds
00:07:19
of bills a year, and they all um come
00:07:23
from one party, the Democrat party.
00:07:25
Gavin Newsome on average vetos 15 to 20%
00:07:30
of these bills every year which says
00:07:32
something but maybe you can just explain
00:07:35
a little bit your view on how are all
00:07:38
these laws getting passed in California
00:07:40
how are these how does the legislature
00:07:42
in Sacramento where you're vying for a
00:07:44
seat to have the right to veto and the
00:07:46
right to push back how are they making
00:07:48
decisions and what's motivating the
00:07:49
California state legislature
00:07:51
>> yeah and I I would just to be clear as
00:07:53
governor veto even more of these bills
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because there's a a total lack of
00:07:57
accountability. And I think too many of
00:07:59
our legislators think that their measure
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of success is how many bills they can
00:08:03
write, get to the governor, and
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ultimately get signed. What you see is
00:08:07
you actually read what these bills do.
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They generally just add more cost and
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more process. And what the legislature
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needs to be told by our next governor is
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that we're not going to fund failure.
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We're going to publicly set goals. We're
00:08:24
going to measure the performance of
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every dollar we spend. We're going to
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audit the heck out of existing programs.
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Right now, 75% of the audit
00:08:33
recommendations from the state auditor
00:08:35
never get implemented. So, there's just
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there isn't a feedback loop with the
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public or or an accountability for the
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outcome. There is a lot of performative
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politics, a lot of discussion of how
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much good we're trying to do, how we're
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trying to be responsive to everyone. We
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have a tendency, particularly in the
00:08:53
Democratic party, to want to be
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empathetic and tell everyone that we're
00:08:57
working on everything. We try to be
00:08:58
everything to everyone all at once
00:09:00
rather than very strategically saying
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some things matter more than others. The
00:09:04
high cost of housing, the high cost of
00:09:07
energy, the quality of our public
00:09:08
schools, the safety in our
00:09:10
neighborhoods. These are the things
00:09:11
people care about and think that they
00:09:13
should be getting when they pay taxes.
00:09:16
But despite increasing spending in the
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state by 75%, none of those outcomes
00:09:20
have actually gotten better. Some have
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gotten worse.
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>> The irony is that sometimes it may be
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the case, and I think it's very often
00:09:26
the case that less government solves the
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problem better than more government.
00:09:30
Trying to do more to create housing may
00:09:33
make housing more expensive. Sounds
00:09:34
ironic. Trying to do more to make
00:09:36
education accessible makes education
00:09:38
more expensive. The more government gets
00:09:40
involved, the more prices seem to
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skyrocket. How do you get over that with
00:09:44
all the interested groups that are
00:09:46
getting themselves elected in the
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California state legislature by saying,
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"I'm going to do more. I'm going to do
00:09:51
more. I'm going to do more." Because
00:09:52
that's how you get elected. How are you
00:09:54
possibly going to come in and say, "We
00:09:56
should do less, and that's how we're
00:09:57
going to fix some of this stuff."
00:09:58
>> Yeah. Well, certainly, if you're if
00:09:59
you're in a hole, don't keep digging.
00:10:00
And sadly, one of my opponents in this
00:10:02
race, Eric Swallwell, just in a debate,
00:10:05
he said it a couple times now in
00:10:06
debates. When asked what his top three,
00:10:09
we were all asked what are our top three
00:10:10
priorities for the state, said revenue,
00:10:12
revenue, revenue. And to me, that is
00:10:15
just that is a mindset that doesn't get
00:10:18
what has broken down in the state.
00:10:20
You're absolutely right. As Democrats,
00:10:22
we have to own the outcomes we're
00:10:23
getting in this state. And for too long,
00:10:25
our reflexive answer has been, we need
00:10:28
more revenue. if we just have more
00:10:30
money, we'll solve this problem. I I
00:10:32
just don't believe that. And and I say
00:10:35
that as the only current executive in
00:10:37
this race. I'm the mayor of the largest
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city in Northern California, San Jose.
00:10:41
And because of a quirk of history, we
00:10:43
were built as a bedroom community for
00:10:45
the job centers just north of us. We
00:10:49
actually have significantly lower
00:10:51
revenue per capita than many other
00:10:53
cities. We're not a job center. And so
00:10:55
with Prop 13, our tax revenue goes up
00:10:58
more slowly and it is smaller. Our
00:10:59
revenue is about a third less than some
00:11:01
of our neighboring cities. And we're
00:11:03
delivering huge increases in sheltering
00:11:06
people, getting housing built, reducing
00:11:08
crime by thinking differently. But it
00:11:11
all starts with being willing to set a
00:11:15
goal publicly and allow the public to
00:11:18
hold you accountable for spending
00:11:20
dollars in a way that actually achieves
00:11:22
outcomes. And that sounds so simple. I
00:11:24
know most of your audience, I've been
00:11:25
listening for years, are in the private
00:11:27
sector and it almost seems so obvious
00:11:29
that why would you even need to say it?
00:11:31
But the truth is, as elected officials,
00:11:33
we almost never set public goals where
00:11:36
we can actually be held accountable.
00:11:37
Heaven forbid in your next election you
00:11:39
might get called out for not actually
00:11:41
reducing homelessness or reducing crime
00:11:42
or getting housing built. And instead,
00:11:44
to your point, we pass bill after bill
00:11:48
showing that we're doing something. And
00:11:49
half the time, with the the law of
00:11:51
unintended consequences, we make it
00:11:52
slower and more expensive to do the very
00:11:54
thing that we want.
00:11:55
>> Right. Well, let's talk about maybe some
00:11:57
of the competing interests that want to
00:11:59
get capital, that want to pull capital
00:12:01
through the government for their base,
00:12:04
and that would be labor unions. They're
00:12:06
a very powerful lobbying coordination
00:12:10
set of groups in California. They have
00:12:13
significant influence over who gets
00:12:15
elected in the legislature, who gets
00:12:17
elected in city mayor's races, and who
00:12:20
gets elected in the governor's seat.
00:12:22
Tell me your view on the role that labor
00:12:25
unions play in California politics today
00:12:27
and some of this dysfunction in
00:12:29
government and unaccountability in
00:12:31
spending because I know that this might
00:12:32
be a very controversial topic to talk
00:12:34
about because you don't want to piss off
00:12:35
the labor unions, but I'd love to hear
00:12:37
your your candid views on their role.
00:12:39
Yeah, let me start by saying I am not
00:12:42
afraid to take on any organized
00:12:44
interest. And it is not just labor
00:12:47
though. Let's talk about the role of
00:12:48
public sector unions. It's not just
00:12:50
labor that is highly organized. You have
00:12:53
trade associations. You have the doctors
00:12:55
and the dentists. You have the public
00:12:57
sector unions. You have the oil and gas
00:12:59
industry. You fi tech has actually been
00:13:02
late to the party. Tech is starting to
00:13:04
organize. So the the way that I look at
00:13:06
the landscape in Sacramento, and I think
00:13:08
it's largely true in Washington as well,
00:13:10
is you have wellresourced, highly
00:13:13
organized, professional advocacy,
00:13:16
lobbying, and political operations that
00:13:19
essentially defend the status quo. And
00:13:22
you are absolutely right that the single
00:13:24
biggest spender in Sacramento when it
00:13:27
comes to advocacy, lobbying, and
00:13:28
elections is organized labor and
00:13:30
particularly public sector unions. Now,
00:13:32
I don't think it's a monolith. I have a
00:13:33
great relationship with our public
00:13:35
sector unions. Our building trades want
00:13:37
to see the economy grow. So, u many
00:13:39
unions are very pragmatic and all of
00:13:42
them are doing what they're supposed to
00:13:43
be doing. It's spineless politicians who
00:13:46
cave to their aggressive demands who are
00:13:48
the the root cause of the problem here.
00:13:50
So, when the teachers union organizes
00:13:52
and says, "We don't want more
00:13:55
accountability. We don't want to be told
00:13:56
to use evidence-based curriculum. We
00:13:59
don't want more technology in the
00:14:00
classroom." whatever it is they may
00:14:02
advocate for uh presumably on behalf of
00:14:05
or at least what they perceive to be the
00:14:07
interests of their members. It's our
00:14:09
elected officials who need to step up
00:14:12
and say, "Well, for the good of the
00:14:14
community, we're going to push you on
00:14:15
that. We're not just going to give you a
00:14:16
pass. We're not just going to veto that
00:14:18
legislation or stay quiet when we know
00:14:21
that for what we're spending, we aren't
00:14:23
getting what we should be." We've gotten
00:14:24
to the point where Mississippi and
00:14:26
Louisiana are doing a better job of
00:14:29
helping low-income kids get on grade
00:14:31
level for reading than we are in the
00:14:34
very well-resourced, very progressive
00:14:36
state of California. That is a function
00:14:39
of a system that is more responsive to
00:14:42
the highly organized interests than the
00:14:45
people we're elected to serve.
00:14:46
>> Right? That's the fundamental
00:14:48
dysfunction. U some see it as
00:14:51
corruption, and I don't think that's too
00:14:53
strong of a word. I don't mean it in the
00:14:54
narrow sense of anyone breaking the law
00:14:57
or or um you know stealing money but but
00:15:01
the system has become again back to the
00:15:03
core point here that the incentives are
00:15:06
all wrong. The incentive for an elected
00:15:08
official is to cater to highly organized
00:15:10
interests who disproportionately spend
00:15:12
money in elections. Follow what's
00:15:15
happening up in the legislature. Draft
00:15:17
the bill language. Draft the friendly
00:15:19
amendments. get legislators to do their
00:15:22
bidding. And I just I'm running against
00:15:26
the system because it doesn't matter if
00:15:28
you're a Democrat, a Republican, an
00:15:30
independent. We need a high functioning
00:15:32
government that delivers
00:15:36
lower housing costs, lower energy costs,
00:15:38
better schools, safer neighborhoods, an
00:15:40
end to street homelessness. We have the
00:15:42
resources to do it. What we haven't had
00:15:44
is the political will and accountability
00:15:47
to do it. And I don't think that's a
00:15:48
partisan point. And frankly, if the
00:15:50
Democratic Party doesn't start to wake
00:15:53
up and be more responsive to the needs
00:15:55
of our constituents and deliver with the
00:15:57
resources we've got, we're going to see
00:15:59
the pendulum swing all the way the other
00:16:01
way and you're going to see a MAGA-like
00:16:03
movement happen here in California.
00:16:04
>> If I look at California, I can
00:16:07
understand we're not solving certain
00:16:09
problems, but what I'm trying to grock
00:16:11
is how did some of these problems become
00:16:13
the worst in the nation? So there are
00:16:15
statistics and you can debate per capita
00:16:18
statistics versus absolute number of
00:16:20
people but number one in poverty, number
00:16:22
one in unemployment, nearly half the
00:16:25
nation's homeless live in California.
00:16:27
Yeah.
00:16:27
>> How did California go from being bad and
00:16:31
not solving these problems to making
00:16:33
them worse?
00:16:34
>> Well, I think you my my grandmother used
00:16:37
to always say that the road to hell is
00:16:38
paved with good intentions. And I do
00:16:40
think generally speaking, people have
00:16:43
had good intentions but have been
00:16:45
unwilling to look at data and react when
00:16:47
the things that they're championing
00:16:48
aren't working. On homelessness, we've
00:16:51
well, first of all, we've broken the
00:16:52
housing market, which we should talk
00:16:54
about as its own issue. We've also been
00:16:56
incredibly lax when it comes to dealing
00:16:59
with cycles of addiction and mental
00:17:02
illness. We've sort of diluted ourselves
00:17:04
into thinking that leaving someone to
00:17:07
choose to live however they'd like, even
00:17:10
if that means suffering in misery on the
00:17:13
streets and ultimately dying of an
00:17:14
overdose is somehow more important than
00:17:16
intervening and saving their life. And
00:17:18
that's how we've ended up in this
00:17:19
horrific situation that frankly has been
00:17:22
under reportported over the last decade.
00:17:24
We've had 50,000 people die on our
00:17:26
streets in California, about half from
00:17:28
overdose and suicide. These are people
00:17:30
with deep behavioral health issues where
00:17:33
we're kind of just watching them
00:17:35
deteriorate and die because we're so
00:17:38
precious about protecting civil
00:17:40
liberties may also be an excuse for not
00:17:42
spending money in new ways. In San Jose,
00:17:45
we had to move away from spending a
00:17:47
million dollars a door to build a brand
00:17:48
new apartment to get someone off the
00:17:50
streets and pivot to buying sleeping
00:17:53
cabins that can be deployed in small
00:17:55
communities on publicly owned land
00:17:57
hooked up to utilities. all-in cost of
00:17:59
$85,000 a unit. We've added over 2,000
00:18:03
shelter beds in my first three years as
00:18:05
mayor and led the state in reducing
00:18:08
unsheltered homelessness. But we had to
00:18:10
overcome an incredible amount of
00:18:12
opposition from advocates, affordable
00:18:15
housing developers, and and you know,
00:18:16
much of it well intended, maybe some of
00:18:18
it self-interested, but we either are
00:18:20
going to be committed to solving the
00:18:23
problem or we're going to cave to highly
00:18:26
organized interests or a progressive
00:18:28
ideology that needs to be willing to
00:18:30
revise itself when when its ideas and
00:18:33
practice aren't working.
00:18:34
>> Yeah. I mean, it just feels some of the
00:18:36
policies are just crazy. I always
00:18:38
commented on the managed alcohol program
00:18:40
for homeless in San Francisco. They give
00:18:42
away free alcohol to alcohol addicted
00:18:45
unhoused people. And I can't imagine
00:18:48
that that disincentivizes people to
00:18:51
>> No.
00:18:51
>> Right. It's it's like you go to you go
00:18:53
to San Francisco, you get needles, you
00:18:55
get free alcohol. I mean, you get these
00:18:58
things. So, it incentivizes people to to
00:19:00
go to go to San Francisco. The whole
00:19:01
thing just seemed absolutely nuts to me.
00:19:04
Let's get into the housing question. I
00:19:05
mean, what is the core of the housing
00:19:07
affordability problem in California? Is
00:19:09
it that we don't have enough houses?
00:19:11
Because I see a lot of homes for lease,
00:19:13
a lot of houses for sale, a lot of
00:19:14
houses for rent, or is it that we have
00:19:17
regulation that makes it hard to
00:19:20
maintain a house and it's expensive? Or
00:19:22
is there something else going on that's
00:19:24
making housing unaffordable in
00:19:26
California? Like, what's the the core
00:19:28
here?
00:19:28
>> Look, I I think it's fundamentally a
00:19:31
supply problem. We've seen most recently
00:19:32
in Austin. We saw in Seattle, we've seen
00:19:35
dozens of markets around the country
00:19:36
that when we remove barriers to the
00:19:39
market investing in housing to meet
00:19:41
growing demand, you slow down cost
00:19:43
increases. It's economics 101. Part of
00:19:47
our challenge is that we've also made it
00:19:50
impossible to build affordably. So, part
00:19:52
of the challenge was zoning, high fees,
00:19:55
all of the things government imposes
00:19:57
that block housing from getting built.
00:19:59
But we also have a building code that's
00:20:02
incredibly cumbersome. We I mentioned
00:20:04
litigation earlier when it came to
00:20:06
highspeed rail. Same thing is true for
00:20:08
housing. We're not building condos in
00:20:10
California, partly because construction
00:20:12
defect liability allows a trial lawyer
00:20:15
to come in in year nine of a project and
00:20:19
if they see that the paint is starting
00:20:20
to bubble, they'll file a suit and they
00:20:23
they care about the fees. Their
00:20:24
incentive is to generate fees. And we've
00:20:28
created a legal framework that allows
00:20:30
them to do that. And if you try to
00:20:33
change it, the another highly organized
00:20:36
interest in Sacramento, the trial
00:20:37
lawyers will push back on that.
00:20:39
>> I think this is so important. People
00:20:40
don't understand how expensive. Someone
00:20:43
told me it was like a sizable percentage
00:20:45
of GDP in the United States is spent on
00:20:49
litigation and trial lawyers and that
00:20:50
they are the largest donor in certain uh
00:20:54
state elections all over the country to
00:20:56
try and create a legal framework that
00:20:58
allows them to pursue litigation and
00:21:00
earn significant fees. I mean, it's a
00:21:02
multi multi multi-billion dollar
00:21:04
industry.
00:21:04
>> That's right. And California is very
00:21:05
much at one end of the spectrum. I I
00:21:07
mean, I've talked to municipal leaders
00:21:09
in cities that are settling at such a
00:21:12
high amount for a trip and fall that now
00:21:15
they can't afford to maintain the rest
00:21:17
of the sidewalks in the city for the
00:21:18
next few years. So, they're going to
00:21:19
have more trip and fall cases. We are
00:21:21
going to or at risk of allowing
00:21:24
travelers to sue the state into
00:21:25
oblivion. So, that is a it is a major
00:21:27
issue. And on condos, it may seem like a
00:21:30
peripheral issue, but traditionally that
00:21:32
has been how young people get some
00:21:34
equity in society, become a homeowner
00:21:37
for the first time and build that nest
00:21:39
egg to eventually perhaps trade up into
00:21:41
a town home or a single family home.
00:21:44
We've essentially taken that rung of the
00:21:46
ladder away by making it cost
00:21:49
prohibitive to build. You good luck
00:21:51
getting financing or insurance to build
00:21:52
a new condo building in California right
00:21:54
now?
00:21:55
>> Right. Is it fair to say we have a
00:21:56
regulation crisis, not a housing crisis
00:21:58
in California? I mean, is there a way to
00:22:00
kind of reframe this? I
00:22:01
>> I think that's fair. I think regulation,
00:22:04
bureaucracy, a a set of codes and laws
00:22:07
that don't work for people and work for
00:22:10
the special interests in Sacramento.
00:22:11
>> I interviewed this guy, Adam Corolla.
00:22:13
You know him? The
00:22:14
>> I know of him. I know.
00:22:15
>> Yeah. Dr. Drew, what was the term he Oh,
00:22:18
very inappropriate. He called it
00:22:19
gynofascism. He said that all of the
00:22:22
regulatory is a safety thing and it's
00:22:24
like a very feminine safety protective
00:22:26
kind of origin in a lot of the
00:22:28
regulations that have been passed that
00:22:30
make it impossible. Everything's about
00:22:31
safety and more regulation, more
00:22:33
regulation, more regulation and as a
00:22:35
result you can't get anything done and
00:22:36
the lawyers show up and everything gets
00:22:38
sued. What's the right way to think
00:22:40
about the origin? Cuz his argument is
00:22:41
that there's a mindset of safety and
00:22:43
protectionism that's driven this. Is it
00:22:46
just the trial lawyers or like why does
00:22:48
someone keep passing? Why do the
00:22:49
legislators keep passing laws over and
00:22:52
over and layers and layers and layers
00:22:53
and layers that make it impossible to
00:22:56
build and make it super expensive to
00:22:58
maintain because otherwise you'll get
00:22:59
sued.
00:22:59
>> Yeah. Look, I I would take the the
00:23:01
gender content out of it. But I think
00:23:04
the the deeper point that we suffer from
00:23:08
safety, it's actually easier to add one
00:23:10
more rule, one more process. I see this
00:23:12
play out every day with our city council
00:23:14
at the local level and I think it's even
00:23:17
a greater temptation at the state level
00:23:19
where you're not able to point to a
00:23:21
concrete service that you're delivering.
00:23:22
So much of the implementation happens at
00:23:24
the local level. Every time there is a
00:23:28
negative story about something bad
00:23:30
happening in the world, there is an
00:23:32
impulse for a legislator to say, "Let's
00:23:36
create a new rule. We could always be a
00:23:38
little bit safer. let's let's add
00:23:40
another check, another balance, another
00:23:42
process, another rule, another fee,
00:23:45
whatever it is. And the reason for that
00:23:48
in my view is that we have not created
00:23:51
an incentive structure in government to
00:23:54
reward actual performance and outcomes.
00:23:59
And so we are by default rewarding the
00:24:01
performiveness of showing that we're
00:24:03
doing a lot of activity without a lot of
00:24:06
impact. And I just I think that we have
00:24:09
to help voters be smarter about
00:24:13
analyzing what their elected officials
00:24:15
are doing and whether or not it's
00:24:16
working. That's why I want to be held
00:24:18
accountable. I came into office running
00:24:20
on dashboards. I mean, I put up public-f
00:24:22
facing dashboards and said, "Here's our
00:24:24
baseline. Here's how we compare to
00:24:27
others. Here's the goal we're setting.
00:24:28
We're going to reduce homelessness by
00:24:30
10% year-over-year. We're going to
00:24:31
reduce crime. We're going to remove
00:24:33
barriers and get housing built. We're
00:24:34
going to speed up permit reviews. I want
00:24:37
to be held publicly accountable because
00:24:38
I would rather, frankly, have a feedback
00:24:41
loop with the people whose doors I
00:24:43
knocked on than whichever group doesn't
00:24:45
like that we're trying to change
00:24:46
something.
00:24:47
>> What's your metric for being governor of
00:24:48
California as it relates to housing?
00:24:50
What's the dashboard you're going to put
00:24:51
up and what's your goal?
00:24:52
>> So, I think that the the ultimate
00:24:55
outcome has to be that we're building
00:24:56
more housing, but that we're building it
00:24:58
more affordably. We have to pull the
00:25:00
cost out of building because as long as
00:25:02
the state of Colorado can build the
00:25:04
exact same home at half the cost of what
00:25:06
it what it is in the Bay Area, we're
00:25:08
never going to be able to compete. So, I
00:25:10
want to see more housing in absolute
00:25:12
terms get built. We need to start moving
00:25:14
in a better direction. We've gone from
00:25:16
about 100,000 units a year to about
00:25:17
80,000 a year. You go farther back, it
00:25:19
was 150,000 a year.
00:25:21
>> What do you want what do you want to get
00:25:22
to in your term?
00:25:23
>> I think we need to get we need to get
00:25:24
well over a h 100,000. I think the right
00:25:27
way to think about it though is it's
00:25:28
really a ratio with jobs. For every two
00:25:30
jobs an economy creates, you need at
00:25:32
least one home. Part of the reason the
00:25:34
Bay Area and particularly Silicon Valley
00:25:36
is so unaffordable for working people
00:25:38
and we're seeing displacement of working
00:25:40
families is that over the last 20 years,
00:25:43
this incredible economy here, the engine
00:25:46
of of innovation for our country and
00:25:49
really the world has created about eight
00:25:51
jobs for every one new home we've built.
00:25:53
That is a completely unsustainable
00:25:55
ratio. So, I'm a little hesitant to come
00:25:57
out and say we're going to build 10
00:25:58
million homes. I think it's a ratio
00:26:00
thing. It's a it's a rate of change. We
00:26:02
need to be building more year-over-year.
00:26:04
But importantly, we need to pull back
00:26:06
the fees, the long timelines, the overly
00:26:09
complicated building codes.
00:26:10
>> So, each of those get a metric.
00:26:12
>> Yeah, each of those get a metric because
00:26:14
ultimately the per square foot cost of
00:26:16
building needs to go down.
00:26:17
>> What does that need to get to? Where is
00:26:18
it today? Where does it need to get to?
00:26:20
>> Oh, it varies dramatically by product
00:26:22
type and market. So I don't I mean it's
00:26:23
a good question. I think I think we
00:26:25
should we should lay that out. But I
00:26:27
just visited a modular construction f
00:26:29
factory factory built housing. They can
00:26:32
bring down the cost per unit by 20%
00:26:36
speed up overall project timelines by up
00:26:38
to 50% by just industrializing the
00:26:40
production of housing. So we need to
00:26:42
pull the cost down. We should be able to
00:26:44
drop the cost on a per square foot basis
00:26:47
by at least a third with actions that
00:26:50
are within our control as regulators. If
00:26:52
you become governor, you're going to be
00:26:54
fighting against a legislature that's
00:26:56
got all of the various vested interests
00:26:58
tied up in keeping this from happening.
00:27:00
How do you take action without
00:27:02
partnership with the legislature? Cuz
00:27:04
what I think might be very hard is again
00:27:06
to wind things back that all these
00:27:08
incentive systems have been created to
00:27:10
to deliver.
00:27:11
>> Yeah.
00:27:11
>> Are there emergency powers or action you
00:27:14
can take as governor that can just say,
00:27:16
you know what, I'm going to fix this in
00:27:17
a year or do you have to work with the
00:27:19
legislature to solve these problems? a
00:27:21
bit of both. I mean, the the governor
00:27:22
has certain levers that are very
00:27:24
powerful driving the budget process.
00:27:25
There's the veto, the bully pulpit, just
00:27:27
kind of naming and shaming is really
00:27:30
powerful. Executive orders, the the
00:27:33
appointments. I mean, the governor
00:27:34
appoints 3,000 people who run all of
00:27:37
these commissions that have incredible
00:27:39
discretion over how to implement
00:27:41
regulations. But there's no doubt that
00:27:44
ultimately you need the legislative
00:27:45
branch to to change. And I think that a
00:27:48
lot of Democratic legislators, many of
00:27:50
whom I know personally in private, will
00:27:52
admit that things are broken, that
00:27:54
things aren't working. There just hasn't
00:27:56
been that willingness publicly to name
00:27:59
what is going on, say that the system's
00:28:01
broken, the incentives are are
00:28:03
completely backwards. I think, you know,
00:28:05
as governor, I'd be in a position to
00:28:07
change the conversation, help um either
00:28:10
persuade existing legislators to think
00:28:12
differently or elect different
00:28:14
legislators. Do you think it's also
00:28:15
because if they're public about it,
00:28:17
they'll lose their donors and they'll
00:28:20
lose their donor class that's supporting
00:28:21
them?
00:28:22
>> Well, it's hard to step out on a limb
00:28:24
without knowing if you're going to have
00:28:26
support for it. It is difficult to just
00:28:28
go direct to voters in an environment
00:28:31
where money talks. It's a very large
00:28:33
state. Uh it's expensive to deliver a
00:28:36
message. Social media has lowered
00:28:37
barriers. That's part of my bet is that
00:28:39
we can go straight to the voters with
00:28:41
this message and get traction around
00:28:43
around the truth around what it takes to
00:28:45
actually solve our problems. Uh but it's
00:28:48
it's you know I understand why people go
00:28:51
with the sure the sure thing and it's
00:28:53
it's not fun to be labeled. They will
00:28:54
call you everything when you fight for
00:28:57
change. You're a corporate sellout.
00:28:58
You're um you're racist. You're
00:29:01
whatever. I mean there's always some
00:29:03
label that people will ascribe when you
00:29:05
try to fight for change. But I try to
00:29:07
stay laser focused on the real world
00:29:11
outcomes. Housing costs, energy costs,
00:29:13
quality of schools, public safety, the
00:29:15
things that people care about in
00:29:16
neighborhoods like the one I grew up in.
00:29:18
That has to be the north star.
00:29:19
>> Yeah. What causes homelessness?
00:29:21
>> It's a big question. There a few things.
00:29:23
I mean, one, you can't ignore our broken
00:29:25
housing market because in places where
00:29:27
housing is cheap and widely available,
00:29:31
you can have high rates of addiction and
00:29:32
mental illness and most people can
00:29:34
remain indoors even um even with those
00:29:38
challenges. You know, typically what
00:29:40
happens if you if you actually look at
00:29:41
it as a life cycle issue is someone
00:29:43
who's already vulnerable for some
00:29:45
reason. could be of their own choosing,
00:29:47
could be circumstances, but job loss,
00:29:50
health issues, addiction, mental
00:29:52
illness, you know, domestic violence.
00:29:54
There's a range of really awful things
00:29:56
that happen to people and that people
00:29:58
sometimes do to themselves. And in these
00:30:00
circumstances, if the rent is $3,000 a
00:30:05
month, you are just one medical bill,
00:30:08
you know, layoff away from really
00:30:12
having, you know, ending up in your car
00:30:14
very quickly. and and people working
00:30:15
people in California especially don't
00:30:17
have a lot of savings. They don't have
00:30:18
something they can fall back on. So the
00:30:20
macro cost structure of California the
00:30:23
highest housing costs second highest
00:30:25
energy cost with the highest gas prices
00:30:27
which dis disproportionately hurts
00:30:30
working people. Um an educational system
00:30:32
that is preparing far too few of our
00:30:34
children for the jobs of the future. We
00:30:36
can go through that list, but that is
00:30:39
creating these conditions of of sort of
00:30:42
vulnerability or fragility that means
00:30:43
that people living on the edge are much
00:30:44
more likely to end up in their car.
00:30:47
But I would add that we have a massive
00:30:49
public policy failure. Not only did we
00:30:51
break the housing production market,
00:30:52
which is the macro challenge, but we
00:30:55
haven't built shelter and treatment
00:30:56
beds. So for folks for whom an addiction
00:30:59
or mental health issue is the the thing
00:31:01
that has them on the edge, we have far
00:31:03
fewer beds than other states. And then
00:31:05
when people do become homeless, it ought
00:31:07
to be brief and it should not be
00:31:09
outdoors. And yet we we lead the nation
00:31:12
in unsheltered homelessness. Over 40% of
00:31:15
the people living outside in tents in
00:31:17
the entire country live in California,
00:31:19
which is only about 12% of the country's
00:31:21
population. We haven't built shelter. We
00:31:24
haven't built treatment. We're not doing
00:31:26
what we need to do to rapidly rehouse
00:31:28
people, connect them to a case manager,
00:31:31
give them tools to turn their lives
00:31:32
around, and hold them accountable for
00:31:33
turning their lives around.
00:31:34
>> If there's mental illness, should they
00:31:37
be committed to some facility to help
00:31:39
them recover from their mental illness?
00:31:41
>> Yes. In short, I I think you have to be
00:31:44
able to involuntarily hold people for
00:31:47
addiction treatment, mental health care.
00:31:49
if they're repeat if someone is
00:31:51
repeatedly
00:31:52
refusing help, if they are harming the
00:31:55
broader community, which is often the
00:31:57
case, whether that's vandalism, retail
00:31:59
theft. It's been a battle here in our
00:32:01
downtown where windows are constantly
00:32:03
being broken by people who clearly are
00:32:05
suffering from serious addiction and
00:32:07
mental health issues. I think we should
00:32:10
give people opportunities to accept
00:32:13
help. It needs to be dignified. They
00:32:15
need to be alternatives to the streets.
00:32:16
We've stood up over 2,000
00:32:19
indoor placements, interim housing
00:32:21
placements, almost all individual rooms
00:32:23
with doors that lock, giving people
00:32:24
privacy. These are low barrier
00:32:26
alternatives to the streets. Bring your
00:32:28
partner, your pets, your possessions.
00:32:30
We're really trying to meet people where
00:32:31
they are. The good news, twothirds of
00:32:34
people say yes. The bad news, the other
00:32:36
third is so deep in the throws of
00:32:40
addiction to substances like meth and
00:32:42
fentanyl that they can't make a rational
00:32:45
decision about their own self-care. I
00:32:47
believe that that is that it is not
00:32:49
compassionate or progressive to leave
00:32:51
them to endlessly cycle between streets,
00:32:54
emergency rooms, jails, and ultimately
00:32:56
die of an overdose. I think we have a
00:32:58
moral duty to intervene, help them detox
00:33:01
and get connected to a counselor and
00:33:04
give them a chance to turn their lives
00:33:05
around. Drugs are coming from somewhere
00:33:07
fueling this crisis. Can the governor
00:33:10
address the drug crisis? Can the
00:33:12
governor get drugs off the street,
00:33:14
arrest drug dealers? Is that a federal
00:33:16
issue? How do we resolve the fueling of
00:33:18
fentinyl, methamphetamines, prescription
00:33:21
painkillers, etc. that have made their
00:33:22
way onto the street?
00:33:23
>> It has to be all levels of government,
00:33:25
all hands on deck. So much law
00:33:26
enforcement is done at the local level.
00:33:28
We have a police department with about a
00:33:30
thousand officers out on the street
00:33:32
enforcing local laws. They're on the
00:33:34
front lines of this crisis as are our
00:33:36
firefighters, social workers. Certainly
00:33:39
having federal federal tools and um and
00:33:42
and state u we have the National Guard,
00:33:45
we have CHP, we have a variety of of
00:33:48
tools here. What I do know though is
00:33:50
that we can reduce demand by intervening
00:33:54
in public drug use and getting people
00:33:56
into treatment and holding them
00:33:58
accountable for turning their lives
00:34:00
around. If we get people into recovery,
00:34:03
that's one more customer not available
00:34:05
out on the streets to buy these
00:34:06
dangerous products.
00:34:07
>> And how many times do they cycle through
00:34:09
before they have to be held more
00:34:10
permanently?
00:34:11
>> Well, I think it has to scale up over
00:34:13
time. And with Prop 36, I was the first
00:34:15
Democratic mayor in the state to come
00:34:17
out in support of Prop 36. The rule of
00:34:19
thumb there is on your third public drug
00:34:22
offense, you can be given a choice
00:34:24
between treatment and incarceration. And
00:34:26
that's bringing a consequence to a
00:34:28
decision that doesn't just affect you.
00:34:30
We can talk about civil liberties, but
00:34:32
when you are actively choosing not to
00:34:34
engage in treatment, you are more often
00:34:37
than not creating imposing real costs,
00:34:39
real harm on the broader community.
00:34:41
We've seen businesses shutter in our
00:34:43
downtowns, parks where families can't
00:34:45
play. So we
00:34:45
>> It's direct and indirect.
00:34:47
>> That's right.
00:34:47
>> And I think a lot of people don't
00:34:48
account for that, which is critical. I
00:34:50
want to shift topics to energy costs.
00:34:53
There's an Iran war going on. So there's
00:34:55
an acute spike in energy gas prices in
00:34:57
the state, but over the last number of
00:34:58
years, California Governor Nuomo and the
00:35:01
state legislature have pursued an effort
00:35:04
to drive green energy policy in the
00:35:05
state. California has a 70 cents per
00:35:09
gallon roughly tax rate. The California
00:35:13
price for gasoline this week is $5.50
00:35:15
compared to 350 in the rest of the
00:35:18
country. Did we get it wrong? Should we
00:35:20
have taken a different path in the state
00:35:22
versus fighting for green, chasing
00:35:23
Chevron out of the state. Chevron's now
00:35:25
relocated to Houston. They're shutting
00:35:26
down the largest refinery on the West
00:35:28
Coast because of the policies and the
00:35:30
the bureaucracy. And you know, how do we
00:35:33
balance this climate change green
00:35:34
interest? with the real hard cost for
00:35:37
everyone on the price of living in the
00:35:39
state.
00:35:40
>> Yeah, I do think we've gotten our
00:35:41
regulatory solution here approach wrong.
00:35:45
I would reject the notion that it's
00:35:46
either or. I don't think it has to be. I
00:35:48
think innovation is the is the middle
00:35:50
path, the way to do both. Look, Texas is
00:35:53
providing dramatically cheaper power
00:35:56
that is cleaner than California. You see
00:35:59
places like China leaning heavily into
00:36:02
solar, wind, storage, EVs. the the path
00:36:05
is investment in innovation in
00:36:07
infrastructure, a smarter grid. What
00:36:10
we've done in California is is another
00:36:13
classic case of well-intended
00:36:15
regulations leading to massive
00:36:18
unintended consequences. Let's just take
00:36:19
the example of our refineries. The state
00:36:22
has lost most of its refineries over the
00:36:25
last decade because we have
00:36:27
intentionally regulated them out of out
00:36:30
of existence. And so what's actually
00:36:33
happened is we still import oil and gas.
00:36:37
We've just pushed refineries. We have
00:36:39
the cleanest, best regulated refineries
00:36:42
with some of the highest paying jobs in
00:36:44
the sector. We pushed that out of state.
00:36:46
Now we're importing the same amount of
00:36:48
gas from thousands of miles away. It is
00:36:51
dirtier. It has a bigger carbon
00:36:52
footprint. We lost those good,
00:36:54
high-paying jobs. We lost the tax base
00:36:57
of those companies paying local taxes.
00:36:59
It has been a hit on every level. And
00:37:01
actually because climate and climate
00:37:03
change is a global phenomenon, we we
00:37:06
have not actually made the we've
00:37:07
actually made the problem worse while
00:37:08
hurting ourselves economically. So
00:37:10
that's the opposite of what we need. We
00:37:12
need win wins. We should be paying EV
00:37:14
owners today in the middle of the day,
00:37:16
strongly incentivizing them to charge
00:37:18
their vehicles in the middle of the day
00:37:20
when power is so cheap and abundant in
00:37:22
California that we sometimes pay Arizona
00:37:24
to take our excess solar and then have
00:37:27
them plug in at night to power the grid
00:37:29
and get through that roughly 5:00 p.m.
00:37:31
to 900 p.m. evening peak where we've got
00:37:34
to start firing up gas power plants
00:37:36
because there just isn't enough power on
00:37:38
the grid. So, we need to be smarter. We
00:37:40
need to invest in innovation and
00:37:42
infrastructure, not regulate energy
00:37:45
sources out of state that we still rely
00:37:47
upon.
00:37:47
>> But it's hard. So now we've got the 70
00:37:49
cents a gallon tax in California. The
00:37:51
legislators passed a series of bills to
00:37:54
to make that tax go up and up and up.
00:37:56
Now they're talking about increasing it
00:37:57
even further.
00:37:58
>> It's the most regressive tax imaginable
00:38:00
because it's even worse than a sales
00:38:02
tax, which is already fairly regressive.
00:38:04
But as you know, higher income,
00:38:07
wealthier people have already adopted
00:38:09
EVs. They're they're not paying this
00:38:11
tax. It's working folks, particularly in
00:38:13
towns like Watsonville where I grew up.
00:38:15
I mean, when I was in high school, I had
00:38:17
to go 50 miles one way for high school.
00:38:19
My parents went 50 miles the other way
00:38:20
for their jobs. And so, it
00:38:22
disproportionately hurts working people.
00:38:24
My proposal is that we to start
00:38:27
temporarily suspend our gas tax to
00:38:30
provide immediate relief to working
00:38:31
families who are paying the price for a
00:38:33
war that they didn't ask for and they're
00:38:35
disproportionately paying the price. I
00:38:37
would temporarily suspend it, but we
00:38:39
have to be intellectually honest about
00:38:41
this. It is our primary source of
00:38:44
revenue for paving and maintaining roads
00:38:48
and our transportation infrastructure.
00:38:50
We will need to shift how we do this
00:38:53
rather than being a gas tax. First of
00:38:56
all, the general fund is up 75% in the
00:38:59
last 6 years. So, I'm pretty confident
00:39:01
that in a state that's spending $350
00:39:03
billion, we can afford to pave our roads
00:39:06
without punishing working families. But
00:39:08
I also think over time, as EV adoption
00:39:10
increases, we'll have to find a smarter
00:39:12
way of charging a basic user fee so that
00:39:15
people who use the roads pay to maintain
00:39:17
them. One of the other big costs in
00:39:19
California related to housing and
00:39:21
related to this climate change question
00:39:23
is the cost of insurance for your home.
00:39:26
We had this massive wildfire that spread
00:39:29
destroyed a large part of areas in Los
00:39:31
Angeles last year and as a result many
00:39:35
of the home insurance companies have
00:39:36
left the state. I just lost coverage on
00:39:38
my home because I live near a bunch of
00:39:40
trees. So my house is deemed too risky
00:39:42
to have coverage. And I'm fortunate in
00:39:45
that I don't have a mortgage that I've
00:39:47
got to deal with the loss of of
00:39:48
insurance coverage. But this is becoming
00:39:51
an increasing burden for the state of
00:39:53
California because the states had to
00:39:54
step in
00:39:55
>> and create a bigger and bigger insurance
00:39:57
pool that financially and accounting
00:39:59
wise the state can't really afford. How
00:40:01
do we solve this problem of the cost of
00:40:04
homeowners insurance? What's the right
00:40:05
structural solution here for either
00:40:07
incentivizing the return of insurance
00:40:08
companies creating an insurance pool
00:40:10
that's well capitalized and can actually
00:40:12
afford to make the payouts instead of
00:40:14
needing to go to the federal government
00:40:15
when there's a crisis and ask for a
00:40:16
bailout? How do we fix this problem in
00:40:18
California? I think there are a few
00:40:20
components to the strategy going forward
00:40:22
here. Uh number one, we have to rebuild
00:40:25
the private marketplace. 90%
00:40:28
of homeowners, maybe more, can be
00:40:30
covered by private insurance affordably,
00:40:33
and we have to rebuild that part of the
00:40:35
market by bringing them back, allowing
00:40:37
them to appropriately price risk, and
00:40:39
creating more granularity. If you're
00:40:41
willing, and you may not be, but if
00:40:43
you're willing to remove those trees
00:40:44
within 100 ft of your home, you should
00:40:46
pay a lower premium. If you prefer to
00:40:48
have the trees there, you should pay the
00:40:50
higher premium. So more granular
00:40:51
pricing, allowing appropriate pricing of
00:40:54
risk is is just really important. Now,
00:40:57
for the 5 to 10% of homes that are up in
00:41:01
heav, you know, in the in the in the
00:41:03
hills, heavily wooded areas where
00:41:05
there's lots of vegetation,
00:41:07
we'll have to have higher, first of all,
00:41:10
when you build, there's a question of
00:41:11
how much more we should be able to build
00:41:12
out there. Probably not a lot. what
00:41:15
materials you use, they need to be fire
00:41:16
resistant and you'll have to pay much
00:41:19
higher insurance just to cover the true
00:41:21
cost of of the likelihood of a fire and
00:41:23
the cost of replacement. The other piece
00:41:25
of this though is the state has to take
00:41:29
more ownership for vegetation
00:41:31
management. We spend $8 in fire response
00:41:35
and recovery for every $1 we spend on
00:41:38
prevention. And there are plenty of
00:41:39
urbanized areas that are at risk because
00:41:42
they're proximate to dense vegetation
00:41:44
that the state has not taken ownership
00:41:46
for clearing. And yes, it should be in
00:41:48
partnership with the federal government.
00:41:49
If they're federal lands, we should hold
00:41:51
the federal government accountable for
00:41:52
doing it. But I just toured Altadena and
00:41:54
Palisades, met with the homeowners there
00:41:56
who are incredibly frustrated about the
00:41:59
lack of rebuilding. No one is
00:42:02
quarterbacking this. And if you go walk
00:42:04
the palisades today, you will see once
00:42:06
again vegetation that's 5t tall that
00:42:08
hasn't been managed in an area where
00:42:10
people are trying to rebuild their
00:42:11
homes. So the state has to step up. As
00:42:14
governor, I would create a a task force
00:42:18
that just focuses on fixing the
00:42:20
insurance market. And if the state will
00:42:22
invest in vegetation management to
00:42:24
reduce the risk of catastrophic loss,
00:42:26
you're going to see premiums go down
00:42:28
over the long term. I mean, I I think
00:42:29
it's insane that the state sets rates
00:42:31
and then tells the insurance companies
00:42:33
how much to charge and assumes they're
00:42:34
going to stick around and keep charging
00:42:35
it. If they can't make money doing it,
00:42:36
why not let the market decide? There's
00:42:38
hundreds of insurance companies that if
00:42:40
they were able to set their own rates
00:42:42
and not have to have the state dictate
00:42:43
the rate, they would compete for and
00:42:45
price would come down. This idea that
00:42:47
the state should be determining what
00:42:49
companies should charge for anything is
00:42:51
a problem. But fundamentally in the
00:42:53
insurance markets, it's literally chased
00:42:55
every insurer out of the state. I just
00:42:57
don't understand like how this
00:42:58
>> Yeah, these kinds of obvious don't work
00:43:01
in practice as we've seen. And when I
00:43:03
that's what I mean by saying we have to
00:43:05
be able to appropriately price risk.
00:43:06
Insurance companies need to be able to
00:43:08
charge rates that reflect the true risk
00:43:11
and cost. I think they should be
00:43:13
strongly incentivized if not held
00:43:15
accountable for allowing homeowners to
00:43:17
adopt best practices and thereby reduce
00:43:20
their premiums. And I think there's a
00:43:23
subset of folks who may need to be on
00:43:25
and pay into a public option of some
00:43:28
kind because they just won't be covered
00:43:29
by the market or perhaps they have to
00:43:31
choose that based on where they live
00:43:33
they won't have insurance. I I don't
00:43:34
know. But I don't think you can force
00:43:37
everybody else to pay exorbitant rates
00:43:39
to ensure that we cover the last
00:43:41
riskiest home that's going to be the
00:43:43
most expensive to cover.
00:43:44
>> Yeah.
00:43:45
>> It's just it's an illogical setup.
00:43:46
>> Well, look, let's shift to one of the
00:43:48
other big liability questions in the
00:43:50
state. It's the one I care not I
00:43:52
wouldn't say the most, but it's one that
00:43:54
I've observed may end up being a big
00:43:55
driver for what's ahead for us.
00:43:57
California's public employee retirement
00:43:59
system. So, Kalpers and Calsters, they
00:44:02
provide the retirement benefits to
00:44:04
roughly 3 million California public
00:44:06
workers. And there's roughly a trillion
00:44:09
dollars of capital in those two
00:44:11
investment funds that are meant to
00:44:12
support those retirees. They've been
00:44:14
making about 7% a year compared to the
00:44:17
S&P making 11% a year. And the current
00:44:19
accounting estimates that they're going
00:44:21
to be short by some estimates 250 to30
00:44:23
billion by other estimates as high as a
00:44:25
trillion dollars in the years ahead in
00:44:27
paying out the benefits that they're
00:44:29
legally obligated to pay to public
00:44:31
employees as they retire. And you can't
00:44:34
just change those benefits. There's a
00:44:35
state supreme court case that's made
00:44:37
that known that you can't go in and
00:44:40
rescend benefits that you've promised
00:44:41
someone. So you are stuck with that
00:44:43
liability. And because they're public
00:44:45
entities, California's state taxpayer is
00:44:49
ultimately going to be stuck with a
00:44:50
trillion dollar liability if that's what
00:44:52
it comes to. How do we fix this frigin
00:44:54
problem?
00:44:54
>> Yeah, I'm worried about it as well and
00:44:56
I'm intimately uh familiar with it
00:44:58
because we've had to tackle pension
00:44:59
reform in San Jose. We were sort of the
00:45:02
canary in the coal mine quite a few
00:45:04
years ago as our unfunded pension
00:45:07
liabilities began eating up our general
00:45:09
fund. Even today after pension reform,
00:45:13
19% of our general fund in San Jose this
00:45:17
year goes to paying an unfunded pension
00:45:20
liability. That just comes off the top.
00:45:22
That is one out of every $5 goes first
00:45:25
to our obligation to retirees. And
00:45:27
again, I don't blame the retirees or
00:45:30
those who advocated. politicians who
00:45:32
didn't do the math, didn't recognize
00:45:33
when the math wasn't working out, and
00:45:35
swept it under the rug because they knew
00:45:37
they'd be long gone by the time uh the
00:45:39
the bill came due. And so, look, there's
00:45:43
there's really only two options here.
00:45:45
One is to move toward a defined
00:45:49
contribution model as we have in the
00:45:51
private sector. You see all over the
00:45:53
world, the employer and the employee pay
00:45:56
in. It's put in the market. It needs to
00:45:59
grow over time. people need to calculate
00:46:01
their savings and their
00:46:02
>> you see your account you track it
00:46:04
>> you track it you can up your
00:46:06
contribution level if we were to move to
00:46:08
that uh the private sector I'm sorry the
00:46:11
public sector would need to be a a
00:46:13
strong match and I I think the challenge
00:46:16
is this I don't think politically that's
00:46:18
likely to happen what we've done in San
00:46:20
Jose which could be a roadmap for the
00:46:22
state is we negotiated well we had to go
00:46:25
to the ballot we went to there were
00:46:27
lawsuits it was a very messy process I
00:46:29
think it needs to be better handled. But
00:46:30
effectively, we created a a different
00:46:33
pension system for new employees that
00:46:36
said, "As you come in, this is what a
00:46:38
right-sized pension system needs to look
00:46:39
like. We're going to have the employee
00:46:42
and the employer pay in more upfront.
00:46:44
We will be more realistic about the
00:46:46
returns we're expecting. We'll adjust
00:46:49
over time faster if the returns are
00:46:51
underperforming. We've brought in better
00:46:54
fund managers who get who are heavily
00:46:56
incentivized to make smart investments
00:46:58
and grow the the the investment. And
00:47:01
then most importantly, if our if the
00:47:04
returns fall short, the the delta, the
00:47:09
gap is covered 5050 by the city, meaning
00:47:12
the taxpayers and the employee in terms
00:47:15
of loss benefits. So there's shared pain
00:47:18
on the backside if we miss our targets.
00:47:20
And what do we do for what we have now?
00:47:22
>> Well, well, what that has allowed us to
00:47:23
do because of the legal limitations that
00:47:25
you've mentioned is, and I'm not saying
00:47:27
it's perfect, but this is just legally
00:47:29
and politically what we were able to get
00:47:32
to was the best outcome we were able to
00:47:33
get, is that we're on a long glide path
00:47:36
of paying off all of the the the
00:47:39
unfunded liabilities for the tier one
00:47:41
employees, all of those older employees.
00:47:43
It's a 20 year process. By the early
00:47:46
2040s, San Jose will have cleared the
00:47:49
debt. our general funds going to be
00:47:50
flushed. We're going to be increasing
00:47:52
staffing and service levels and and
00:47:54
you'll start to feel that here much
00:47:56
sooner. We are actually roughly at peak
00:47:58
cost for unfunded liabilities today
00:48:01
because we took the medicine and now
00:48:02
we'll start that slow glide path where
00:48:04
each year there'll be a little more room
00:48:06
in our general fund because we actually
00:48:08
bit the bullet and took this on. Well, I
00:48:09
think that's like how do you fund that
00:48:12
glide path? It may be the case that our
00:48:14
budget has some margin for error, let's
00:48:17
say, because of how much we're spending.
00:48:19
Let's just do the statistics. California
00:48:21
Governor Nuome has proposed a $349
00:48:24
billion budget this year in the state.
00:48:26
That's up from 209 billion. So almost 2x
00:48:29
60% 70% 80% more 75% more than the year
00:48:34
before co. And that's up from 110
00:48:37
billion 10 years prior. So we went from
00:48:39
110 to 350. 3 and a halfx is how much
00:48:42
we're spending since, you know, feels
00:48:45
like yesterday, like just a couple years
00:48:47
ago. Yeah. Despite having the nation's
00:48:49
highest tax rates, the largest revenue
00:48:51
base, we're still looking this year at a
00:48:53
$35 billion deficit California state
00:48:57
budget. What happened? Like, how did
00:49:00
this get so bad? And how much of this do
00:49:02
you think is this term of fraud, waste,
00:49:06
you know, abuse? Like, where is this
00:49:08
money going? Well, part of what we've
00:49:10
done is something we talked about
00:49:13
earlier, which is we have increased our
00:49:17
our pay for public sector employees and
00:49:19
our our pension obligations and and post
00:49:22
retirement health benefits at a faster
00:49:25
rate than we could actually afford. And
00:49:27
we haven't been honest with ourselves
00:49:29
about that.
00:49:31
Part of where the money's gone though is
00:49:32
is is really just a sprawling
00:49:35
bureaucracy that when we in good years
00:49:37
have more money, we create new programs.
00:49:40
We add headcount. The state's population
00:49:42
has stayed flat over the last six years.
00:49:45
Spending is up 75% as you point out, and
00:49:49
headcount in state employees is up, I
00:49:51
believe, over 20%. So, we're we're
00:49:54
adding more state workers. We're pouring
00:49:56
more money into public programs that
00:49:59
aren't starting from the premise of what
00:50:01
is the outcome we need and how do we
00:50:02
most efficiently get there. I mean, it's
00:50:04
time for California to go through an
00:50:07
exercise of zerobased budgeting and say
00:50:09
what are the outcomes we need and are we
00:50:11
actually spending dollars to achieve
00:50:12
those outcomes or are we just funding a
00:50:15
sprawling bloated bureaucracy where it's
00:50:17
just easier to add 2% 3% headcount every
00:50:21
year, give everybody a 4% raise and call
00:50:23
it a day. And I think it's it's that's
00:50:24
generally been the approach is whenever
00:50:26
revenue is up, we just kind of give
00:50:28
everybody a raise, hire more people,
00:50:29
initiate a few new programs. We never go
00:50:31
back to basics and say, well, this is if
00:50:34
these are the resources we have and
00:50:35
these are the outcomes we need, are we
00:50:37
really optimizing our spend for those
00:50:39
outcomes? And the answer is no, we're
00:50:40
not. Can you do that riff restructuring
00:50:44
zerobased budgeting as governor or do
00:50:46
you need to do this in partnership with
00:50:48
the legislature that all has their
00:50:49
special programs that they fired up
00:50:51
where money's flowing to their local
00:50:53
county, money's flowing to their
00:50:54
friends, money's flowing to their
00:50:55
donors? How do you actually execute
00:50:57
this?
00:50:59
I think yeah, as I said before, I I
00:51:01
think electing a pragmatic,
00:51:04
independent-minded governor who's
00:51:07
willing to who understands this problem
00:51:08
and is willing to tackle it is step one
00:51:11
and is necessary but insufficient.
00:51:13
Ultimately, we have to build a more
00:51:16
moderate coalition of legislators who
00:51:19
understand how broken the system is, who
00:51:21
are willing to do to do hard things. I
00:51:24
don't I don't think that this just
00:51:25
happens overnight, but the governor has
00:51:26
a lot of tools that he or she can choose
00:51:29
to use that, you know, you do drive the
00:51:32
budget process. Ultimately, you need
00:51:33
legislative support for it. You have the
00:51:35
bully pulpit. You have the ability to
00:51:38
manage state agencies in a very
00:51:39
different way. The governor appoints
00:51:41
3,000 people to run state bureaucracies
00:51:43
that can either come in with the mindset
00:51:45
of business as usual. I'm going to sit
00:51:47
behind a desk. We're processoriented.
00:51:50
Or can be held accountable and maybe it
00:51:52
should be 3,000 employees. Maybe we
00:51:53
should slim how many people it is, but
00:51:55
can be told here are the outcomes we
00:51:57
need. Tell us, you know, go ground truth
00:52:01
these. Go down to the local level, spend
00:52:03
time with the school boards, the cities,
00:52:04
and the counties where all the money
00:52:06
actually meets the constituent where the
00:52:07
rubber hits the road and come back with
00:52:10
answers on how to reform these systems
00:52:12
to get more for what we're spending. And
00:52:15
if you can't hit more aggressive goals,
00:52:17
we'll bring in someone else who can. We
00:52:19
need a different mindset for how we
00:52:21
operate our government agencies.
00:52:23
>> What you're saying is starkly different
00:52:24
from what others are saying. And one of
00:52:25
the biggest points that others are
00:52:26
making right now is that they want to
00:52:28
increase programs and increase spending
00:52:30
particularly in healthcare. So what's
00:52:33
your view on government provided health
00:52:36
care? Should all healthcare in
00:52:37
California be free? There's a big
00:52:39
movement, a big legislative effort to
00:52:41
try and make this the case. Does this
00:52:43
make economic sense? Can we afford it?
00:52:44
How do we actually do it? or do you
00:52:46
think that this should remain a private
00:52:47
market effort?
00:52:48
>> I don't think it's realistic for
00:52:50
California to create a um a single
00:52:55
staterun free healthc care for all
00:52:58
system. I just I I don't understand. I I
00:53:01
know my uh many of my opponents in my
00:53:04
party, Democratic party, are proposing
00:53:07
this. I think we have a pretty good
00:53:10
sense of how to reduce cost. We just
00:53:12
have to be willing to do it. price
00:53:15
transparency and competition could bring
00:53:17
down costs in health care by 5 to 10%.
00:53:21
Preventative care, we should be
00:53:23
incentivizing
00:53:25
insurers and and um health providers for
00:53:30
helping someone get healthier and
00:53:31
reducing their overall demand on the
00:53:33
system over the course of their
00:53:35
lifetimes. things that may seem small,
00:53:38
but getting a hundred thousand plus
00:53:40
people off of our streets and into
00:53:42
shelter dramatically reduces the burden
00:53:46
on our health care system. I I just I I
00:53:49
think that prevention take another one.
00:53:52
Nurse practitioners can do so much more
00:53:54
than we often allow them to do, which
00:53:56
again is a function of this
00:53:58
behind-the-scenes negotiation in
00:53:59
Sacramento over what are doctors allowed
00:54:01
to do, what can nurses do. nurse
00:54:03
practitioners providing preventative
00:54:05
upstream care in clinics in communities
00:54:08
can be far more effective at preventing
00:54:10
long-term chronic illness than what we
00:54:12
do today, which is end up with everybody
00:54:13
in the emergency room needing care after
00:54:16
they're already really sick. So, we need
00:54:18
to restructure our health care system.
00:54:20
California should be demanding and
00:54:21
investing in innovation and better ways
00:54:24
of doing things and bend the cost curve,
00:54:27
not fall back on this lazy answer that
00:54:30
we're just going to find a way to raise
00:54:31
taxes more to fund free services that
00:54:35
will ultimately break just break the
00:54:37
bank.
00:54:38
>> You've been criticized by many for being
00:54:40
against the billionaire tax. I think
00:54:41
you're the only candidate running for
00:54:44
governor right now that has spoken out
00:54:45
against it. I've heard your comments on
00:54:47
it obviously. I think I was probably the
00:54:49
first to identify it and bring it up on
00:54:51
my show when it first came out the day
00:54:53
it was filed. For me, it's fundamental
00:54:55
to private property rights. If you can
00:54:58
take people's assets after they've paid
00:54:59
taxes on it, there's no stopping that
00:55:02
train. I mean, why not take everyone's
00:55:03
assets at some point? Like that, you
00:55:05
know, you pay your income tax, that's
00:55:07
your private property, you get to keep
00:55:08
it. Shouldn't be that the legislature
00:55:10
can later say, "I'll take 10% of what
00:55:12
you own." That just seems wrong to me.
00:55:14
Do you think we need to have a continued
00:55:16
increase? Like do you think we need to
00:55:17
maintain the temporary high income taxes
00:55:20
in California? What's your general view
00:55:22
on revenue? We've talked a lot about you
00:55:24
think hey, you know, we don't need to
00:55:25
rely on growing revenue, but based on
00:55:27
the current tax system in California,
00:55:29
what else do you think needs to change
00:55:31
or do you think it's just like let's
00:55:32
leave it as is, no billionaire tax, no
00:55:35
new taxes, but let's just not go back.
00:55:36
>> Yeah, let me say a couple things. one, I
00:55:38
I think where this push is coming from
00:55:41
is a deep concern about economic
00:55:44
inequality and declining social
00:55:47
mobility. And I think these are
00:55:49
>> real issues. I am worried about economic
00:55:53
inequality. I think in the long run it's
00:55:55
a threat to democracy. I think there are
00:55:58
a number of better solutions to this
00:56:01
than the proposed wealth tax which is as
00:56:04
you point out say aside even the
00:56:05
philosophic arguments it simply won't
00:56:07
work certainly not at the state level
00:56:10
half the people I know have already left
00:56:11
the state
00:56:11
>> right we've seen over a trillion dollars
00:56:13
of capital flight our ongoing revenue
00:56:16
going forward is now going to be lower
00:56:18
that the dirty secret of this proposal
00:56:20
is that it won't be the billionaires who
00:56:22
pay higher taxes it'll be middle class
00:56:25
and working families who are left
00:56:26
holding the bag. So that mean that's why
00:56:28
I just immediately felt that I had to
00:56:31
say something because it's working
00:56:33
people who are going to be hurt by this.
00:56:35
It's not going to be billionaires.
00:56:36
They're the most mobile people in
00:56:38
society. Um so look, I I think first of
00:56:41
all there are things we can do to make
00:56:42
the tax code uh fair. I think there's a
00:56:45
legitimate debate about what should the
00:56:46
absolute rate of capital gains tax be.
00:56:48
There's the phenomenon of very wealthy
00:56:50
individuals borrowing against uh
00:56:52
appreciated assets where you're not
00:56:55
you're sort of you're effectively
00:56:56
avoiding paying capital gains. I think
00:56:58
that's a loophole we can close. There's
00:57:01
the step up in basis upon death. I'm not
00:57:03
sure that um it's very fair for
00:57:06
somebody. Well, let me just use an
00:57:07
example. I'll just say this. I don't
00:57:09
think Elon Musk should be able to pass
00:57:10
on $500 billion of appreciated but
00:57:14
untaxed stock wealth to his children.
00:57:17
And the moment that they inherit it,
00:57:19
it's rebased at current market value and
00:57:21
no one ever pays the capital gains on
00:57:22
it. I mean, there there are a lot of
00:57:24
things we can do to capture billions in
00:57:26
revenue to close loopholes in the tax
00:57:28
code. This is of all the proposals, the
00:57:30
the worst, the least likely to work, the
00:57:32
most likely to hurt working people. But
00:57:34
I also think we have to acknowledge in a
00:57:36
state that keeps asking for more before
00:57:39
we do better, we we've got to
00:57:42
acknowledge that social mobility is down
00:57:44
because of po public policy failures
00:57:46
first and foremost, public schools that
00:57:48
aren't performing, housing that isn't
00:57:50
affordable, energy that isn't
00:57:51
affordable. We when half of people sorry
00:57:55
when most Californians are spending over
00:57:57
a third of their income on housing many
00:57:59
spending over half of their income on
00:58:01
housing that hit social mobility a lot
00:58:05
more than the fact that the tech sector
00:58:09
has had a bunch of growth. It's just
00:58:11
these are fundamental public policy
00:58:13
failures and the sooner we own them and
00:58:16
think differently about our regulatory
00:58:18
environment and our policies so we start
00:58:20
fixing them the the better for
00:58:23
California, the better for the
00:58:24
Democratic party. Uh most importantly,
00:58:26
the better for the people we serve. But
00:58:28
what you're saying makes a lot of sense,
00:58:30
but I think people hate other people's
00:58:32
success. I think there's a lot that's
00:58:34
been going on, this fueling that's going
00:58:36
on with the lack of social mobility, but
00:58:38
seeing a small segment of the population
00:58:39
accelerate. Technology's really had that
00:58:42
driven that. I'll be the first to admit
00:58:44
there's a small population in California
00:58:45
that's done extremely well while most of
00:58:47
Californians have been left behind. Do
00:58:50
you think you're electable in a sense? I
00:58:51
mean, you're not fueling the populist
00:58:54
sentiment that I think every one of your
00:58:55
candidates has found they can tap into
00:58:57
and uh that may put you at a big
00:58:59
disadvantage in this race. Look, I I do
00:59:02
think we we need to take economic
00:59:05
inequality and social mobility much more
00:59:07
seriously than we have. I think we need
00:59:10
to ask and ultimately demand our um our
00:59:14
wealthiest individuals, our tech sector,
00:59:17
industries that do well to be structured
00:59:19
in a way that works for people. Um I I'm
00:59:23
curious what you think. Maybe I'll turn
00:59:24
the tables for a moment. I think that we
00:59:27
need a shared prosperity that includes
00:59:34
people having some sort of equity from
00:59:36
or more direct benefit in the incredible
00:59:39
gains that tech has produced. AI is
00:59:41
scaring a lot of people because it could
00:59:44
lead to the elimination of jobs, further
00:59:47
concentration of wealth. What do you
00:59:49
think is the appropriate role for the
00:59:51
tech sector and those who have profited
00:59:54
immensely from it to ensuring a level
00:59:57
playing field or at least you know some
00:59:58
some notion some semblance of of
01:00:00
equality of opportunity?
01:00:02
>> That's a longer conversation but I do
01:00:04
think giving more people more ownership
01:00:06
is important but I'm not sure people are
01:00:09
going to want to or need to work at big
01:00:11
companies anymore with AI. the longer
01:00:14
conversation. But in the same way that
01:00:16
Instagram,
01:00:18
Shopify, Etsy created a Tik Tok created
01:00:21
new
01:00:23
jobs almost like new roles, new ways
01:00:25
that people could earn.
01:00:26
>> Yeah.
01:00:26
>> I think AI is going to create a thousand
01:00:28
times more new ways for people to earn
01:00:30
than they do today. And they're not
01:00:32
going to have to have the job that they
01:00:34
feel like they're stuck with today. And
01:00:35
AI is actually going to accelerate more
01:00:37
people up the ladder faster than
01:00:39
anyone's really realizing. And I can
01:00:41
give you countless examples of this that
01:00:43
I've seen recently, but I think we're
01:00:45
all going to wake up pretty happy with
01:00:46
the next advance in in economic mobility
01:00:48
that's going to be unleashed because of
01:00:49
AI, not in spite of it. I hope that's
01:00:52
true. It's a very optimistic read. I do
01:00:54
think my read of history is that
01:00:55
technological change while ultimately
01:00:57
producing greater abundance, if you
01:00:59
will, often is really hard on people.
01:01:03
And that's why in in San Jose at least,
01:01:05
we've done we've created AI upskilling
01:01:07
courses for our workers. We've gotten AI
01:01:10
companies to come into our libraries and
01:01:12
provide tools and training. We're really
01:01:15
trying to figure out how we lower
01:01:17
barriers to learning how to use these
01:01:19
tools, apply them in people's lives,
01:01:20
start those new businesses, create the
01:01:22
new jobs of the future.
01:01:23
>> The cool thing is AI can teach people
01:01:25
how to use AI.
01:01:26
>> That's true.
01:01:27
>> Which is where where I I'm starting to
01:01:28
see a lot of people learn how to use
01:01:30
these tools on their own by asking the
01:01:32
AI and engaging. And then there's almost
01:01:35
like you
01:01:41
watching people get knocked down like
01:01:43
bowling pins in terms of wo that wo
01:01:46
moment that I've I've been vis like
01:01:48
visibly seeing people just in the last
01:01:49
couple months
01:01:50
>> is making me very optimistic.
01:01:52
>> That's good. It does though get back to
01:01:54
this basic point that we need our public
01:01:56
education system to teach people to
01:01:58
think critically. When half of our kids
01:02:00
aren't on grade level for reading or
01:02:02
math proficiency, it's going to be very
01:02:04
hard for them to be lifelong learners.
01:02:06
>> I mean, curiosity and asking questions
01:02:09
and learning how to think, not teaching
01:02:11
them knowledge is a massive problem that
01:02:13
we're dealing with in education in the
01:02:15
United States, in my opinion, on its
01:02:16
own. Kids are not being taught how to
01:02:18
question, how to build. They're being
01:02:19
taught facts. Those facts are irrelevant
01:02:22
because they all exist in AI. Now you
01:02:24
don't need to know all those facts. You
01:02:26
It's good to have basis. But what are
01:02:27
you really trying to get? A curious
01:02:29
mind, an engineering mind, a creative
01:02:31
mind, a thoughtful mind, and teach
01:02:33
individuals agency in a world where they
01:02:35
have infinite capacity. That's what AI
01:02:37
gives all of us.
01:02:38
>> But what do you think of Donald Trump?
01:02:39
>> I'm not a fan.
01:02:41
Um,
01:02:43
my concern with Donald Trump, even if he
01:02:46
may get certain
01:02:49
issues right, I think he's channeled the
01:02:51
frustration of working Americans who
01:02:53
feel that they've been left behind, is
01:02:56
that I don't believe he really
01:02:57
understands what makes our country
01:02:59
great. I think that he has created a lot
01:03:03
of fear and division around immigration.
01:03:06
doesn't recognize how many people we
01:03:08
have had in this country in part because
01:03:10
both Democrats and Republicans wanted
01:03:11
access to cheap labor in places like
01:03:13
Watsonville where I grew up who have
01:03:15
been here 20 30 years working hard
01:03:17
paying their taxes otherwise playing by
01:03:19
the rules raising children who are US
01:03:21
citizens who are now living in in terror
01:03:24
because they're worried their families
01:03:25
going to get ripped apart. Um, I I don't
01:03:29
understand and don't support this war in
01:03:30
Iran that I think is a huge uh huge
01:03:32
blunder and it's going to drive up
01:03:34
energy costs and it's it's not clear to
01:03:36
me why we're losing American lives over
01:03:38
there. Um, I just, you know, I think
01:03:41
tariffs, yes, I do believe China, this
01:03:44
is something I think he's gotten right,
01:03:45
has been competing unfairly with the US.
01:03:48
I think a targeted approach to tariffs,
01:03:51
focusing on that issue would have made a
01:03:53
lot more sense than the general
01:03:55
inflation we've seen. So, I mean, I
01:03:57
could go issue by issue, but I just I
01:03:59
worry mostly about the health of our
01:04:01
democracy. I think it requires a um a
01:04:05
real honest dialogue, a respect for rule
01:04:08
of law and the independent judiciary.
01:04:11
Um I just yeah I have deep concerns that
01:04:14
this
01:04:16
not just populist but um reactionary
01:04:19
quasi authoritarian
01:04:21
rhetoric and mindset is the outcome of
01:04:26
declining trust in government when we
01:04:28
don't hold ourselves accountable for
01:04:30
delivering for working people. I think
01:04:33
it's predictable and I think you're
01:04:34
seeing an equal and even um I'd say
01:04:38
equally risky rise in populism on the
01:04:40
left in reaction and these two are
01:04:41
playing off one of one another. And part
01:04:43
of the reason I jumped into this race
01:04:44
was to offer a third way, a pragmatic
01:04:47
alternative. I'm a I'm a Democrat, but I
01:04:51
also recognize that something's broken
01:04:54
in California. The incentives are all
01:04:57
wrong. The highly organized interests in
01:05:00
Sacramento are being taken care of.
01:05:02
Sacramento is working great for highly
01:05:04
organized interests. It is not working
01:05:06
great for regular people. And I think
01:05:09
the best antidote to that is to get back
01:05:11
to basics, be competent, be data driven,
01:05:14
deliver results for people because I'm
01:05:16
worried that if we don't, we're going to
01:05:18
see this epic populist battle on the
01:05:21
right and the left where people are
01:05:22
offering really easy answers, not the
01:05:24
honest answers that we need. rate
01:05:27
Governor Nuome and the job he's done as
01:05:28
governor of California.
01:05:30
>> I think Governor Nuomoe has been a bull
01:05:32
work against some of the worst ideas
01:05:35
coming out of the legislature. You
01:05:37
mentioned that he's vetoed 10 to 15% of
01:05:39
the bills coming out of the legislature.
01:05:42
Uh many of those vetos I agree with and
01:05:45
I think have averted
01:05:47
um real harm. I my my critique has been
01:05:52
around not doing enough to take on the
01:05:54
entrenched interests in Sacramento and
01:06:00
uh and we've we've disagreed very
01:06:01
publicly on certain policy issues, Prop
01:06:03
36, recovery housing,
01:06:06
um some energy policy points, but it's
01:06:10
it's always I mean I try to attack
01:06:11
problems, not people. I'm not really
01:06:14
interested in, you know, evaluating
01:06:17
somebody's intentions or or or their
01:06:20
ideology so much as the results of their
01:06:22
actions. And I think he's done some
01:06:25
really good things. Uh I also think he
01:06:27
he could do even more. And that's been
01:06:29
my appeal to him is let's work together
01:06:31
to drive even more change faster. But
01:06:35
some of the things he's brought forward
01:06:36
like care court, right idea. Now we need
01:06:39
to execute it. We need to actually make
01:06:40
sure that care court's actually getting
01:06:42
people with addiction and mental illness
01:06:43
into care. I think he's got the right
01:06:45
right idea, right intention, but we've
01:06:47
got to follow through and as governor, I
01:06:49
would make sure that Prop 36, Prop 1,
01:06:52
Care Court, uh number of things he's put
01:06:54
in place are actually used to deliver
01:06:55
the intended outcome.
01:06:56
>> Governor Newim's put out a lot of these
01:06:58
memes kind of making fun of Donald Trump
01:07:02
by doing tweets sort of like the way
01:07:04
Trump does truth social posts and yeah
01:07:06
and so on. It's very antagonistic to the
01:07:08
president, at least publicly
01:07:09
antagonistic. At the same time,
01:07:11
California relies on federal funding and
01:07:13
requires a lot of federal cooperation, a
01:07:14
lot of federal land in the state. How
01:07:16
would you interact with President Trump
01:07:18
and talk a little bit about how the the
01:07:20
governor has interacted with President
01:07:21
Trump publicly?
01:07:22
>> Look, I understand what the governor's
01:07:25
doing. He's, you know, been holding a
01:07:27
mirror up to Donald Trump and um
01:07:32
both fighting for California's values,
01:07:34
which I appreciate. I think there's also
01:07:36
just back to incentives. I mean, he's
01:07:38
he's running for president and and
01:07:40
that's where I think this approach is
01:07:43
coming from.
01:07:45
I would take a different approach in the
01:07:47
sense that as governor focused on
01:07:50
delivering for Californians, I will
01:07:53
fight the Trump administration through
01:07:55
through the courts, through the bully
01:07:57
pulpit whenever necessary to protect our
01:08:00
values, to protect our people, to
01:08:02
protect state funding. I also think
01:08:04
though that we need to find places where
01:08:08
we can achieve a win-win with the
01:08:11
federal administration. I'll give you
01:08:12
the example that's top of mind for me. I
01:08:14
just spent time walking through
01:08:15
Altadena, the Palisades where people
01:08:18
have lost everything, over 10,000 homes
01:08:21
lost between the two. People are
01:08:23
desperate to rebuild. They're not
01:08:26
getting the help that they need. And
01:08:27
part of the reason they're not getting
01:08:28
the help that they need is this
01:08:30
hyperartisanship
01:08:32
in which uh California and Washington
01:08:36
are fighting rhetorically and
01:08:38
politically and the people who are being
01:08:40
hurt are the families who have lost
01:08:42
their homes who are waiting on the $40
01:08:44
billion of federal aid that's been
01:08:47
promised and that if it weren't for this
01:08:49
political battle would have already
01:08:50
flowed to help those neighborhoods
01:08:52
rebuild. And I just as governor, yeah, I
01:08:57
I will absolutely fight for our values,
01:09:00
but I'm committed to fixing our
01:09:01
problems, which means finding a way to
01:09:04
make it a win for this president and
01:09:06
this administration to rebuild Los
01:09:08
Angeles. That we have to put the people
01:09:10
before our politics. And as it relates
01:09:14
to ICE and immigration enforcement, do
01:09:17
you consider undocumented immigrants in
01:09:19
the state of California individuals that
01:09:21
you would represent as governor? Is it
01:09:23
part of your job to protect undocumented
01:09:26
immigrants who came here illegally that
01:09:28
ICE would like to remove?
01:09:30
>> Yes, unless they're committing serious
01:09:32
and violent crime. Look, if you're here,
01:09:35
you're not documented, you're committing
01:09:37
violent felonies, I think you should be
01:09:39
deported. But like many of the people I
01:09:42
grew up with, if you were
01:09:45
essentially if ta maybe tacitly welcomed
01:09:48
here because we had an a industry or a
01:09:50
construction industry that needed
01:09:52
lowcost labor and you came, started a
01:09:56
family, started working, paid taxes,
01:09:59
raising kids here who were born here who
01:10:01
were US citizens. The only practical and
01:10:04
ethical solution is for parties to put
01:10:07
the hyperartisanship aside, come
01:10:09
together, and come to a grand bargain in
01:10:11
which we secure the border. We deport
01:10:13
those committing violent crime who are
01:10:15
undocumented, and we create a pathway to
01:10:17
a legal to some sort of legal status. If
01:10:20
citizenship is a bridge too far for that
01:10:22
older generation that came earlier, so
01:10:25
be it. But their kids are US citizens
01:10:27
and they deserve to still live with
01:10:30
their parents. And I think we've got to
01:10:32
find that the the approach that respects
01:10:34
people's humanity and is practical and
01:10:37
ethical. And I'm incredibly
01:10:39
disappointed, frankly, with both parties
01:10:41
for years of kicking the can down the
01:10:43
road. And I will absolutely stand up to
01:10:46
protect undocumented residents who are
01:10:49
playing by the rules, who are doing the
01:10:51
most American thing. And I get all the I
01:10:53
get all the arguments around lawful
01:10:55
immigration. Let's secure the border and
01:10:57
set up a proper system of lawful
01:10:59
immigration going forward. and not
01:11:00
create a bad incentive. So, let's do
01:11:03
that and then create this pathway to
01:11:05
legal status. But what we've seen play
01:11:07
out in in Minneapolis is horrible for
01:11:11
the country. We're seeing citizens
01:11:13
arrested, even killed. This is this is
01:11:15
not this is not working and I don't
01:11:17
think it's ethical.
01:11:18
>> Let me give you the push back that the
01:11:19
Republican party leadership would would
01:11:21
give, which is that many of these
01:11:24
individuals will end up voting for
01:11:25
Democrats. Vast majority of them will
01:11:27
vote for Democrats and that the border
01:11:28
was opened. They were allowed in here
01:11:30
and now this inevitable due to
01:11:32
humanitarian conditions path forward to
01:11:34
citizenship will ultimately increase the
01:11:36
Democratic party's voting base and lock
01:11:38
them into power in DC, lock them into
01:11:40
power in these states, turn more states
01:11:42
blue, etc. How do you respond to that
01:11:44
concern and push back? Put the
01:11:46
humanitarian piece aside, but that the
01:11:48
reason the border and every Democrat I
01:11:50
ask about this cannot answer the
01:11:51
question, why was the border opened? Was
01:11:53
it to lower labor costs? Was there some
01:11:56
other reason that we did it? Was it to
01:11:58
increase the voting base? I mean, what
01:11:59
was the motivation and how do we address
01:12:01
the response that's going to come for
01:12:03
the many years ahead from a Republican
01:12:05
party that's going to have issue with
01:12:07
this?
01:12:07
>> So, my sense growing up in an in an a
01:12:09
town that historically has probably been
01:12:12
about a third undocumented
01:12:15
is that the primary incentive for the
01:12:17
parties to not solve this problem is
01:12:19
that a lot of people became very
01:12:22
wealthy. A lot of industries did very
01:12:23
well by having access to lowcost
01:12:26
abundant labor and plenty of the
01:12:29
business interests that did really well
01:12:31
in a construction and other otherwise I
01:12:34
mean historically this would have been
01:12:35
say meat the meat packing industry right
01:12:38
um they're donors to the Republican
01:12:41
party. So I think both sides have been
01:12:43
complicit. I think the back to
01:12:44
incentives, I think Democrats and
01:12:47
Republicans have played to their base
01:12:48
and actually been politically
01:12:49
incentivized to not solve the problem.
01:12:52
And as a pragmatic moderate, my approach
01:12:56
is to say you're both wrong, but there's
01:12:58
something true in what you're both
01:12:59
saying. Republicans are right that we
01:13:02
should be able we should know who and
01:13:04
what comes in and out of the country. We
01:13:06
should have a secure border and we
01:13:07
should take away any incentive for
01:13:09
people to come here illegally,
01:13:11
especially in a moment where uh we've
01:13:14
got a fentanyl crisis. We've got
01:13:16
international terrorism. We've got nukes
01:13:19
that are getting smaller and smaller. We
01:13:21
should have border security. Absolutely.
01:13:23
If you're not here lawfully and you're
01:13:25
committing serious and violent crime,
01:13:27
deportation is the is the minimum
01:13:30
expectation of what should happen. So,
01:13:32
let's do that. But I just I think both
01:13:34
parties have been complicit. We can sit
01:13:36
around and say who wins electorally or
01:13:38
economically. We can play that game and
01:13:41
continue to have this incredibly
01:13:44
divisive and unproductive situation
01:13:46
where millions of people are living in
01:13:47
fear, living in the shadows, or we can
01:13:49
fix it. And when I say legal status,
01:13:52
maybe that legal status doesn't come
01:13:54
with a with a right to vote. Maybe it's
01:13:57
a green card. I mean, I'm I'm for
01:13:59
compromise and problem solving and
01:14:01
moving the country forward. Both sides
01:14:03
are going to have to give if we're going
01:14:05
to solve this problem.
01:14:05
>> I think that's the best idea possible
01:14:07
for how to solve this, which is a path
01:14:09
to residents without a path to voting.
01:14:12
And that that could solve everyone's
01:14:14
concerns. And and lastly, I just want
01:14:16
you to compare and contrast your
01:14:17
Democrat opponents, Swallwell, Styer,
01:14:20
Porter. Let's just do those three. Give
01:14:22
me a sense on your view on each of the
01:14:24
three of them. Well, look, I I've I've
01:14:27
been in enough debates with them now to
01:14:30
understand that
01:14:33
those three other
01:14:35
leading Democratic candidates are vying
01:14:37
for the same lane. It is the more of the
01:14:40
same lane. It's a platform that says
01:14:43
that the answer to our problems is more
01:14:46
revenue. It's revenue, revenue, revenue
01:14:48
as Representative Swall's top three
01:14:51
goals. And uh look, we need to think
01:14:55
differently. What I'm offering is an
01:14:58
approach that's been working in Northern
01:15:00
California's largest city. I call it
01:15:02
getting back to basics. It's focusing on
01:15:04
fewer things, the things that are most
01:15:07
foundational to opportunity and quality
01:15:10
of life for everyone. It's being humble
01:15:13
about what government can actually do,
01:15:15
not thinking that the answer to every
01:15:17
problem is more revenue and another
01:15:18
government program. It's being radically
01:15:21
more transparent and accountable about
01:15:22
how we spend dollars and rooting
01:15:24
everything in results or or measurable
01:15:27
outcomes and just bringing a a new uh
01:15:31
politics of pragmatism as an antidote to
01:15:33
this incredibly destructive populism
01:15:36
we're seeing on the right and the left
01:15:37
that really risks the the democratic
01:15:40
lowercase d democratic project of this
01:15:43
country. And I just I think that
01:15:45
California has throughout its history
01:15:48
been the the innovative state that has
01:15:50
led the way and changed the world. And I
01:15:53
am hopeful that Californians are ready
01:15:55
for a different kind of politics that
01:15:58
focuses on problem solving. I jumped in
01:16:01
this race because all of the other
01:16:03
candidates across the spectrum had
01:16:05
already been in for a year and uh I
01:16:08
didn't hear anyone talking speaking
01:16:10
honestly about our problems and how to
01:16:11
solve them. And I thought that I had a
01:16:13
unique voice in this race and we're
01:16:16
seeing that. I It's a short runway, but
01:16:19
as I travel around the state, go to, you
01:16:21
know, see the sewage crisis in the in
01:16:23
the Tijuana River on the border that
01:16:24
shut down all the beaches down there,
01:16:26
walk Altadena or go through the
01:16:28
Tenderloin in San Francisco, people are
01:16:30
are responding because all they really
01:16:33
want is for their tax dollars to be used
01:16:35
responsibly. They want their government
01:16:37
to work. They want their life to get
01:16:39
better when they send so much of their
01:16:41
money to their government. And that's my
01:16:43
that's my commitment.
01:16:44
>> Mayor Matt Mayan, thank you for being
01:16:46
here with me today on Allin. Really
01:16:48
appreciate the time and good luck in the
01:16:50
in the governor's race.
01:16:51
>> Thanks, David. I enjoyed it.
01:17:06
>> N
01:17:08
I'm going all in.
