SPEAKER_00 0:02

Hey everybody, and welcome back to today's show. Very excited to be talking with Republican Congressman Bob Lada of Ohio's Fifth Congressional District. Sir, thank you for joining me this afternoon.

SPEAKER_01 0:13

I really appreciate it. Thank you very much.

SPEAKER_00 0:15

So I want to talk to you about President Trump's summit to China. He is there now for the next two days. And my first question is what would you like to see him come away from this summit with, particularly as it relates to energy, since that's the committee that you focus most of your work on.

SPEAKER_01 0:32

Well, you know, uh Communist China uh is is out there in the world today. And you know, our committee has so many different areas that uh we we see where communist China is everything from uh autonomous vehicles, their EVs uh with their vehicles there. We look at uh where communist China is on uh drone production, uh we think about routers, when you think about all of the different areas with uh critical minerals, about 86% of all critical minerals are are out and uh coming from China, uh, that are being processed. And also a lot of our pharmaceuticals today, uh penicillin, a lot of our basic medicines are not coming from China. And what we found that during COVID, of course, is that we saw that we had a real uh problem with our supply chain and needing to pull that back. So I think a lot of it's gonna be uh what the president needs to be talking with the communist Chinese are on the issues of trade and uh where they're gonna be going, and uh, you know, are they gonna be uh a uh a partner in the world or are they it's gonna be pretty much communist China or against the rest of us? And they're but I think that's really gonna be important.

SPEAKER_00 1:46

Do you imagine that well, I guess the question is, do you view China right now more as a foe or potential friend?

SPEAKER_01 1:55

Well, you know, again, our our uh committee deals so much with issues dealing with China. Let's go back to TikTok. Uh and uh again, uh when I was chairing the Communications and Technology Subcommittee, um I asked uh Mr. Chu, who was uh at uh the head of TikTok if anything could uh this Americans information could be uh transmitted to uh communist China. And uh it turns out, yeah, it could be. And so uh if you look at the who are who we consider uh quote unquote adversaries that are out there, you're looking at uh uh Russia, I Iran, North Korea, and communist China. So, you know, I I'm not sure you can say that uh you know they would be what I call a friendly trading partner because they they're listed they're they're listed as an adversary. So I think that's really important that we always have to remember.

SPEAKER_00 2:52

You mentioned uh China about their EV, but domestically here I know there's something that you're involved in called the Self-Drive Act. So can you tell my listeners a little bit about that bill, what's in it?

SPEAKER_01 3:04

Well, the Self-Drive Act is dealing with autonomous vehicles, and uh we've been working on this, and I've been working on this for for 10 years now, five Congresses. And what we're looking at is the uh having a national standard when you're looking at and uh uh on autonomous vehicles out there, why is that important? Well, first of all, you know, we've had over uh over 40,000 people losing their lives every year. 94% of all accidents that occur out there are because of driver error. A lot of the error out there today is people doing what? They're looking at their cell phones. And a lot of these horrible accidents are occurring. And so what we're seeing is uh this horrible trend out there. We can reduce a lot of that trend by saying that, you know, if we get the autonomous uh vehicle uh technology in our automobiles, it'll help save lives for one thing. And it's also gonna help uh senior citizens and people with disabilities be able to uh have more mobility. But we need to have a bumper to bumper, just like we do on vehicles today, uh, that have a federal standard out there, because again, we can't have 50 states in the District of Columbia saying, we're gonna have our own uh uh standards on autonomous vehicles, because if you do, you're gonna end up in a situation where you're driving down the road and you're getting close to the state line, the car is gonna say, I can't cross the state line in autonomous mode. Either you take control of the vehicle or uh you know the car is gonna pull itself off the side of the road and shut itself off. So that's why it's really important. And we also know this that uh in the Chinese technology out there, that uh the reports right now are saying that uh the Chinese will have about 20% of all their vehicles will be autonomous by the year 2030. And it's important that we develop the technology in America and that it doesn't come from communist China, because again, we want that technology to be technology that Americans can depend on, because we've seen a lot of things that come from Communist China that again, uh as with Huawei and ZTE, with their uh uh communications technology that we're spending billions of dollars to rip out of this country because it's not it's it's technology we cannot trust. And I've worked on other legislation for uh when it comes to uh like high power lines, that uh you've got to make sure that uh that technology is safe, that's out there. So we don't want to have the Chinese technology there, and we sure don't want it in vehicles. We want people to be able to say, I trust my vehicle and I trust where this technology came from.

SPEAKER_00 5:41

This is very interesting. You said that this is something you've been working on now for about 10 years. Are you currently getting any traction with this bill?

SPEAKER_01 5:48

Yeah, we we're working on it right now, and uh, we were hoping that by the end of this Congress we can have it uh out because what you know, several Congresses ago, uh the legislation passed out of the Energy Commerce Committee unanimously. It was like I think it was 51 to nothing. The voice that it was voice voted on the floor, and so it got over the Senate. Unfortunately, it didn't move in the Senate. So, you know, it's uh it the day is here. It's we gotta get this done. Because again, uh we've we've got to have the uh federal preemption out there. We have to make sure that we develop the technology. You go back ten years, you were talking about well, there could be South Korean or uh Japanese or Great Britain, uh, you know, go across Europe, the different countries that were working on uh autonomous vehicle uh technology, but now it's really down to the United States and Communist China.

SPEAKER_00 6:43

Another energy debate that's currently going on revolves around the data centers. I'm currently in Indiana where there's actually a very strong local debate happening about whether or not to put in a data center here. Obviously, we're going to need these if we want to stay competitive in the AI revolution. But where do you stand? How are we able to hold accountable the energy companies so that the local people who live there don't get screwed over basically in some astronomical increases in their energy bills?

SPEAKER_01 7:12

Well, you know, I the the president said several weeks ago that uh, you know, we we've got to have the data centers because again, it's the the technology. We're in an AI race with Communist China. As I tell people, there is no second place. You're either going to win this or you're gonna lose it. And we want it to be again U.S., not Communist Chinese. So uh what we're what the president said, of course, was in meeting with uh quite a few of the companies was that look, if you want to put in a uh a data center, you're gonna have to, you know, pay pay for the cost, and local consumers are gonna see an increase in their billing. We had a hearing in our subcommittee uh a few weeks back, and all the witnesses said the same thing that uh you know the uh data centers are out that you know we're gonna have to have the data centers, but at the same time, the companies are gonna have to pay for it. And because with the data center, you're looking at multiple things. They have to have uh the uh electricity, they've got to have the uh water uh to keep pardon me, to keep the uh uh units cool, you have to, in a lot of cases, have the gas lines, and so all these things come together well out of one spot. So uh the other issue is out there is the placement, because a lot of people don't want them uh placed in their backyard. As you know, if as the technology goes forward, you know, things that uh that I would really want to see happening is that let's say you have an old co-fired plant that's no longer in use, that you could actually put a data center in there because you have all pretty much the utilities right there. You could have, you know, you might have water, you might have the electric electrical lines. But the other big uh area was gonna be on the nuclear side, so small modular reactors, that you could uh power that plant. A data center also is gonna need uh three different sources of power. You're gonna have your main and two backups, because you can never have a glitch in power at one of these. So it's really making sure that uh the the consumer out there is not paying for the uh the data center with increased costs and the utility bills, and that uh that hopefully that that we can start seeing data centers being located where you might say in spots where your people aren't going to see them.

SPEAKER_00 9:23

My last question for you, sir. As I mentioned, you represent Ohio's fifth congressional district, and I ask everyone this who comes on my show, is there a spot in your district, whether that's a restaurant, a local business, uh uh nature preserve, that if one of my listeners visits your district, you would say, Oh, make sure you stop by here if you're in in my neck of the woods?

SPEAKER_01 9:42

Well, you know, there's so many places if I pick one, and it's like picking one of your kids over another. But uh, you know, we have everything in Northwest Ohio. And uh even if you're not in my district, you know, it used to be in my old state senate district, where I had half the county. The uh the this week is the largest birding week in America, believe it or not, is occurring. Uh you have about 80 to 90,000 people going from around the country and around the world just to be there for this one week to see all the different birds that are uh in one spot. Uh but we do, we have so many different attractions uh and things to do, and there's a lot of history in my district that uh I I can't really pick one place over another. But uh I just tell everybody to come on uh up to uh the fifth congressional district and we can show them a lot of different places to go.

SPEAKER_00 10:32

All right, Congressman. Well, I want to thank you very much for coming on. I enjoyed the conversation and hope to have you back in the future.

SPEAKER_01 10:38

Well, thank you very much.