Ep. 42 - Hallie Shoffner's Arkansas Senate Race: Wiping the Slate Clean

Corporate monopolies and unchecked tech expansion are draining the wealth straight out of rural America. With supply chains fracturing and local businesses taking the hit for political posturing, the need for practical, numbers-driven leadership has never been more urgent. U.S. Senate candidate and sixth-generation farmer Hallie Shoffner joins the show to discuss her boots-on-the-ground campaign to bring economic common sense back to Washington.

We sit down to unpack the real-world impact of failed federal policies on local infrastructure and agriculture. Our conversation digs into the mechanics of the H2A visa program, the aggressive tactics of private equity data centers entering the Arkansas Delta, and the immediate economic threat facing a rapidly aging population heavily reliant on a degrading Medicare system. Shoffner’s core philosophy is that true representation requires total financial transparency, detailing her plan to place all personal assets into a blind trust to eliminate congressional conflicts of interest.

The harsh reality of modern governance is that local town mayors are routinely outmatched by out-of-state corporate lawyers when negotiating community benefit agreements. Resolving these massive systemic imbalances demands serious operational sacrifices and a willingness to reject the standard partisan playbook. Listeners will walk away with a clear blueprint of how grassroots political pressure can shift focus back toward tangible, standard-of-living metrics instead of abstract stock market performance.

If you care about local economic protection, systemic healthcare reform, and true congressional accountability, you’ll get a lot from this. Please subscribe to the Radical Moderate podcast and share this episode with anyone tired of standard political rhetoric. What is the single most critical structural issue you believe career politicians are completely ignoring in your community right now?

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Welcome back, everybody, to the Radical Moderate Podcast. I'm your host, Pat O'Brien. And this week I've got the same guest as I had last week, U.S. Senate candidate Halle Schaffner. Welcome back to the show.

SPEAKER_01 0:21

Thank you. Glad to be back.

SPEAKER_00 0:23

So I want to summarize last week to say we did a deep dive on farming. I say we, you did a deep dive on farming. I asked a couple of questions. I I would say you're you're clearly an expert in the field. So it's not that I don't want to talk about farming at all in this episode, I but I do think we have an opportunity to get into some other issues. So the first thing I'd I'd I'd like to ask is, you know, you you well, you were pretty bald in the last episode saying you will win this race. Why why do you believe that? Like what are you are you hearing something or do you know something that that should should can back that up a little bit?

SPEAKER_01 1:05

Yeah. The reason is is because it does not matter what space I'm in. It could be the county party, the Democratic County Party meeting that they do every month. It could be a farm shop, it could be a diner in any part of rural or urban Arkansas. I'm hearing exactly the same thing. People are tired. People are tired of the rhetoric of left and right and liberal and conservative because we're real people. We have real problems. And we are crying out for someone who believes that the purpose of government is to create opportunities and make progress and not just posture around for the next election. We feel that Washington is so broken that we need to wipe the slate clean. And what I am hearing over and over again is we vote for the person and not the party. We vote for the one who wants to get the work done. And Tom Cotton is not getting the work done.

SPEAKER_00 2:06

Well, I'm gonna, I'm gonna preface my next question by saying, you know, I was the president of the Arkansas Young Democrats when I was in my mid-20s. I was the Democratic nominee for Arkansas Secretary of State. I've given money to Democrats and maybe just a handful of Republicans. Like literally, my accountant uh was a Republican, and I gave him money one time. But I've always, I did vote for uh, by the way, I voted for the first Bush in 1988. It was my first presidential vote. But I've been associated with the Democratic Party really the rest of my life. But this show is not called the, you know, Democrats are great. It's called the Radical Moderate because I'm I'm more about I've it's country first. And I'm a big capitalist. So it's country capitalism. I would argue that the definition of I have of capitalism is different than what some others do. And then party and other things come next. Having said that, have you given money to Democrats before? Have you campaigned for Democrats? And if so, are you trying to change the Democratic Party or what is your role in that? Because you you've never been elected official, but are you an outsider? Like, talk to us about what is your history pre-making the decision to run for U.S. Senate?

SPEAKER_01 3:22

I mean, not a big history in terms of, you know, being involved in politics um or campaigning. But no, I I I really all I'm interested in is the people of Arkansas. Uh Democrat, Republican, Independent, whatever, libertarian, anywhere in between, which most people are somewhere in between. I just want to help my state. You know, I just want to make sure that that people can afford uh the basic necessities and and have a good job. And more than that, you know, can afford to go out to eating every once in a while or go to the beach for a week or get their kids what they want for Christmas. I want to make sure that that farmers can stay in business and that we're producing food, affordable food that people can eat. I mean, it's it's it's all about Arkansas.

SPEAKER_00 4:09

Was there a reason why, though, you ran for the Democratic Party nomination as opposed to another pathway?

SPEAKER_01 4:15

I mean, I think that I'm a Democrat because I believe that if you work hard and you do everything right, you deserve success. That's the American dream. I don't believe that corporations should have all of the power in America. And in our last episode, we talked about how corporate consolidation within agriculture and the food industry is a real problem for the industry as a whole. But I mean, think about it from any other industry's perspective. Um, manufacturing, technology, um everything is consolidated. Everything is becoming a monopoly. Um and that means that American consumers have no power. It means that Arkansans have no power. Because if companies don't have to compete for our business, then they can create a crappy product, less of a product, or really crappy customer service, or all three. And what are we going to do about it? Because we're a captive audience. There are no other choices. That's what I want to fight against as a Democrat, is this corporatist capitalism that Tom Cotton likes, where the only metric of success is whether or not the stock market is doing well. I want to measure success by quality of life and standard of living for the people of Arkansas.

SPEAKER_00 5:35

Is there any current US senator, Democrat or Republican, who you might want to model your, your tenure at if you get if you get elected?

SPEAKER_01 5:46

No, because it just seems to me like they're very out of touch because they've been there so long.

SPEAKER_00 5:51

What about John Fetterman? He he's kind of broken ranks with the, you know, the the mainstream Democratic Party in some ways. I mean, is he even somebody who you would you would say make because you're gonna have to have some allies, right? It when you go to what when you get to Washington.

SPEAKER_01 6:08

I mean, I would hope that the allies that I create are people who want to do what's right. And like I tell people on the campaign trail, if it doesn't work for Arkansas, it doesn't work for me. I don't care who proposes the idea. Similarly, if it's a great idea and it does work for the people of Arkansas, I'm all for it. I don't care who introduced it, whether it was a Democrat or a Republican. And when it comes to modeling myself after someone, honestly, I think it would be Mike Beebe or um Marion Barry. He was my congressman for a long time. And he was just one of those, one of those politicians who worked across the aisle. Um, Senator Blanche Lincoln, she was also very good at that. And she did a lot of work for farmers and the farming industry in Arkansas.

SPEAKER_00 6:57

She did. In fact, if I remember correctly, she was the head of the ag committee. The first woman to serve, yes. And in 2010, she lost pretty resoundingly as an incumbent. Let's let's talk about this. You're traveling, there's 75 counties in Arkansas, you're going all over the state. You you believe you're gonna win. Are you meeting people by definition? You have to be meeting people who said, I previously voted for Tom Cotton, but I'm gonna change my vote to you because the number, these were close elections. I mean, all the Republicans since 2010, and certainly at the federal level, have been winning, been winning the state by 20 points. Are you meeting people who have who've actually said, I used to vote for Tom Cotton, but I am now voting for you?

SPEAKER_01 7:47

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 7:48

And and what is their what's their rationale? Is it they think he's changed? Were they were they misled? You know, like give me some context here.

SPEAKER_01 8:01

The thing I hear most is that he forgot where he came from. You know, he went to DC, he pulled the ladder up behind him, he got real cozy with these corporate lobbyists, um, you know, uh cashing in on Arkansas's distress, essentially. And because that's that's what's happening. Arkansans are struggling right now because, again, pull it out of our pockets and there's nothing in them. We're not making enough money, everything costs too much. And we feel like he's cashing in by, you know, taking these corporate campaign donations and making book deals and calling a stock broker.

SPEAKER_00 8:38

And what do you mean calling a stockbroker?

SPEAKER_01 8:40

Well, I don't believe that that folks in elected office or even appointees should be able to could should be able to trade stocks.

SPEAKER_00 8:47

I haven't done the research. Has he made a significant amount of money trading stocks since he's been in the U.S. Senate?

SPEAKER_01 8:53

Oh, I actually I don't know. But I mean, they they have all had a pretty significant increase in uh in wealth.

SPEAKER_00 9:01

Well, and I just want to, you know, to be fair on on that question. I honestly, honestly don't know. Let me ask you this. I I tried to do some research for the episode. I don't hear you talk about President Trump much. Am I mistaken? Or, you know, what are your thoughts on President Trump and the job that he's doing?

SPEAKER_01 9:20

It's like I said, I want to support anybody that has good ideas. And if it works for the people of Arkansas, then I'm for it. Um, I was disappointed that the housing bill didn't pass. Um, I thought that was a really great idea. And the president signed an executive order to that effect. He also signed an executive order to declassify uh marijuana so that, you know, universities could do more research on its effects on, you know, using it medicinally. I mean, those are good ideas. He just signed an executive order on regenerative agriculture and promoting it. Those are good ideas. The tariffs, that was a terrible idea. I completely don't agree with that. Um, immigration policy, I think it went too far. Don't agree with that either. But see, that's the thing about, you know, feeling like you're on one side or the other. Most people are in the middle. I mean, this is called radical moderate. Absolutely. Because most people live in the middle. You can't, you can't call someone a conservative or a liberal when most of the time it's issue by issue. You can't put people in little political boxes. That's not how being human works.

SPEAKER_00 10:29

Well, what what about the I'm gonna call it a war in Iran? I mean, we're when you're launching missiles and doing military action, I think it's a war. What did you think of his decision, the President Trump's decision-making process and how that has played out? And had you been in the U.S. Senate, like what if he would have talked to you about it, what advice would you have given him on these matters?

SPEAKER_01 10:53

And see, this is what drives me crazy about Tom Cotton. Because Tom Cotton says that he has the president's ear. Okay. Then he should have stood up and said, listen, I want to keep the U.S. safe. But right now, we're talking about a war that is going to drive up diesel prices and fertilizer prices. And the farmers in my state are going to the field to plant corn. It's our largest industry. If we're going to do this, maybe let's not do this right now. And I don't buy this sense of urgency because Tom Cotton went on TV and said that Iran has been an imminent threat for 47 years. That's not the definition of imminent. 47 years is not the definition of imminent. The U.S. Senator from Arkansas, the U.S. Senator from Illinois or California or wherever, they stand up and they say, what you're doing is going to impact my state in this way. Because that is the lens, always. And he didn't do that. He didn't stand up for us.

SPEAKER_00 11:54

Let's talk about some other issues. AI, you know, it is, it is becoming a massive thing. I am using it more and more. There's data centers, there's just the idea that it's not particularly regulated. When you become U.S. Senator, I'm taking your tack that you're going to win. What do you, what, if anything, do you want to do about AI? Or would you call it a lower priority in terms of things that need to be addressed?

SPEAKER_01 12:21

No, I would call it a priority for a couple of reasons. I am not anti-progress or anti-business or anti-AI because I mean, AI has a lot of really interesting applications, particularly in medicine. One of the things I've talked about recently on social media is early detection of breast cancer, because I'm in a high-risk program at UAMS. There is some possibility that AI could help early detect breast cancer, which if you look at the statistics, I mean, women who do not catch it earlier are at much higher risk of passing away. And a lot of those women are black or Hispanic and live in rural areas. I think AI has a lot of potential. My concern about AI is twofold. Number one, I have a son who is seven years old. I am very, very concerned about AI's ability to spread misinformation, its ability to essentially become people can become overly dependent on it for information. And that's dangerous because I know for a fact, having used AI, that it is not always accurate. The second issue I have is these data centers. Data centers, I understand, are necessary to have AI. My concern is that these tech companies are coming into our state and they're putting these data centers in places they can't fight back. A community should always be able to say whether or not they want a data center. That's a decision that the community should be able to make. But there's a story of a mayor in the Delta who said that he'd been approached by a private equity company that builds data centers. And they were going to send down some lawyers to meet with him and his chief of staff. And I said, Well, who's going to be in the room with you? Someone from the state? No. The feds? No. The Public Service Commission? No. Negotiating a community benefit agreement with the mayor of a town of 5,000 people, even if that mayor is absolutely amazing. I mean, uh uh 5,000 people in the Arkansas Delta in one of the poorest regions of the country, they're not going to have as much civic engagement. They're not going to have the kind of processes that uh Little Rock or Conway have. If I'm the U.S. Senator, when I'm the U.S. Senator, someone from my office is going to be in that room. Because I'll be dang if any tech company comes into my state and extracts wealth from any community without giving something back.

SPEAKER_00 14:50

I I like that. I think that's a great example and just knowing that area of the state. I mean, who who could possibly, you don't have the resources. You're not, you know, you couldn't be prepared, but you would also you wouldn't want to tell them not to come because it could maybe be a game changer that could, you know, create a higher tax base and and all of and so that you know it's I could see the conflict there. Um, I want to talk foreign policy. One of the things that my perception of Tom Cotton is that he spends a great deal of time thinking about foreign policy and and maybe trying to put himself out there as an expert on it. Let's put him to the side for a second. You're a sixth-generation farmer. Uh, not to say that you can't have opinions about foreign policy, but tell us, I have no idea. Have you traveled the world? Do you have what is your philosophy? I mean, what should our country be doing when it comes to matters of whether Iran is enriching uranium or uh whether it's our policy toward China or Russia? I mean, there's a war in Ukraine that we've been supporting financially. Like, give us some thoughts on US Senator Halley Shoffner's first year in office and what you would want to tell people about foreign policy.

SPEAKER_01 16:15

Right. So what I tell people is that I know way more about foreign policy than Tom Cotton does because I know how globalization and global supply chains work. Obviously, I'm a farmer. I've been growing a product that, for the most part, gets exported somewhere else. Um, we our inputs are imported from somewhere else. I understand exactly how global supply chains work. Tom Cotton is economically incompetent when it comes to foreign policy because the first question is always does it keep America safe? But the second question should always be how is it going to disrupt disrupt disrupt the economy? How is it going to impact the people of Arkansas? Is it gonna jack up gas prices? Is it gonna jack up fertilizer prices? Should we maybe have a plan in place before we do anything that negatively impacts the largest industry in the state of Arkansas? I view foreign policy in the same way that I view agricultural policy. And that is supply chains. We are heavily globalized. Everything we do everywhere has a ripple effect. Is it going to materially damage the lives of the people of Arkansas? That would be my first question. And the United States, my second question.

SPEAKER_00 17:37

Let's talk uh immigration. I think you alluded to it earlier. I'm a big proponent of or a person who would say that our current system is broken, it's not efficient, et cetera, et cetera. Give a give us your uh view of what what is the right immigration policy? What would you do? Because there's been votes on this multiple times to reform it. It's just never passed, finally. What do you want to do with immigration?

SPEAKER_01 18:07

Oh, it's so broken. It's kind of like our healthcare system. Immigration is so broken. And I I mean, I do. I lay the blame at the feet of both parties. We've been at this for a while with no kind of reform. Um I'm for securing the border. I think we should. I mean, I think that's the right of any country to determine who gets to come in. My biggest concern is twofold. Number one, we're not treating people like people. Um, I mean, basic human dignity. I mean, come on, the United States is supposed to be the moral standard in the world. I mean, human rights is it's in our constitution. I think any any immigration policy, you have to start with are we treating people like people? I think the second thing is again, how does impact the economy? And what we know in agriculture, of course, is that we're heavily reliant on the H2A visa program, which has been disrupted because of the immigration policy we have right now. And if you can't get enough people to pick your crops, they rot in the field, which of course is going to negatively impact anyone who eats that food or uses that to, you know, create ethanol or animal feed. What I think we should do is create an immigration policy that does a couple of things. So besides treating people like people, why don't we go to the industries and businesses that rely on immigration to function? Like, why don't we ask them what they need? Why don't we go to farmers and ask them, what do you think about the H2A program? How can we make it more efficient? How can we make it so that you're happier and your workers are happier? Same thing in construction. I mean, same thing in any industry. I mean, we have Tyson here that's heavily dependent on immigration and migrant workers. I mean, I feel like Tyson might have some ideas about what we could do. And then I think the final thing is to understand that we're a nation of immigrants. And just because someone is brown or they speak a different language does not give you the right to pick them up, especially since we're capturing U.S. citizens in this mess. I mean, I think those are some fairly basic things that we can do. And if we approach the problem in that way, I think we could pretty easily find a solution.

SPEAKER_00 20:22

Well, I I pretty much agree with all that. I'd say I'm probably going to be more radical than you are about immigration, because I just think not only is it just completely broken, I think it leads to so many other issues, such as we are a nation whose birth rate has gone down and we really need younger workers to come here. Uh, I think that, yes, absolutely the history of immigration and me, we've always been a nation of immigrants. And I I really literally do not see the downside to an efficient immigration process and would love to have someone on who wants to counter that because the one thing that I do think we run into is there are some people who get uncomfortable when certain people who look different than them come to this country. I'm half Irish, and we all know the Irish tradition of going to this country, and my mother was uh Hispanic, both Spanish and Mexican blood. I'm like, I'm not, yeah, I'm an American, of course, but that I didn't start off that way. My parents didn't start off with A. So don't even get me started. Let me talk about let me ask about Social Security. I have heard you uh read some stuff where you know you want to protect Social Security. I think we all do. There's a bill, I believe, that's been filed, uh, Senator Warren, a Democrat, I believe Senator Moreno from Ohio, that if I understand it correctly, it they simply want to lift there's a cap. There is a cap on that. Why don't you explain the bill and where do you stand on that bill?

SPEAKER_01 21:54

Well, and and it's it the the long and short of it is you know, Elon. Musk is paying the same amount into Social Security as a small business. I mean, it the playing field is not level. And it's the same thing when it comes to an effective tax rate. This is simply an idea that the folks paying into the system are doing so at a rate commensurate with their income and their wealth. And that's just the long and short of it is. And I agree with that.

SPEAKER_00 22:23

I completely agree with that. I think the current cap's maybe 180,000. And then you quit paying the FICA taxes. And I think, if I understand the bill correctly, if you make $5 million, you would keep paying the same rate of FICA taxes up until $5 million. Whereas right now, your cap, do you have you read the bill? Do you like the bill? Would you vote for the bill if it's still there?

SPEAKER_01 22:45

I've read a summary of the bill. I haven't read it in detail, so I can't say whether I'd vote for it or not. My only concern about um tax reform and you know payroll tax reform is what we consider to be a small business. And I say this because farmers make a lot of money. I mean, I've seen, you know, farms bring in $20 million a year. Uh, but the profit margin is basically zero. And so I want to make sure that when we talk about what a small business is, that we're not going to end up overtaxing someone who runs a business that makes $20 million a year but doesn't have a good profit margin, if that makes sense.

SPEAKER_00 23:26

Sure. You mentioned healthcare earlier. Uh, I'm sure we could spend hours talking about health care. Let me start with a question, Obamacare. Do you think that that is something that needs to be tweaked and improved? Do you think it's something that just hasn't worked and needs to be thrown out? Like what are what are your thoughts on Obamacare?

SPEAKER_01 23:50

I mean, I think we may need to start from the beginning again, unfortunately. And I think that's just because our healthcare system has degraded so much more since Obamacare was passed. My my primary concern for the state of Arkansas is is not it is healthcare overall, but it's specifically Medicare. And the reason I say that is because in four years, we are going to have 825,000 seniors out of a population of between three and 3.5 million. We are not ready for that. Not in any way, shape, or form. Um, my dad has dementia. He's had it for a long time. It's very slow progressing. But in recent years, we've priced memory care and in-home care both. And memory care is $6,000 plus dollars a month. My parents cannot afford that. And so what we do is in Arkansas is we force seniors to divest themselves of everything that they own so that they can afford assisted living on Medicaid. And Medicare does cover some stuff, but it doesn't cover enough. And one of the things it doesn't cover is in-home care. And what we know is that in-home care is going to be cheaper than assisted living. And in-home care actually reduces the medical cost to Medicare by half because it reduces acute episodes that Medicare pays for. So it's like Medicare will pay for the hospital bed you end up in, but not the care that keeps you out of the hospital bed. So when we talk about health care, specifically in Arkansas, I think Medicare should start covering in-home care because I think it is, I think it behooves us to save Medicare the money by keeping our seniors at home longer. Plus, it's good for the economy. Seniors who stay at home spend more money. I mean, they have home repairs and car repairs and they pay gas and groceries and all that. If you're in an assisted living facility, all that money goes to the assisted living facility. That's number one. Number two, uh stopgap measure. We have to extend the ACA subsidies. Um, I'm one of those people because we have an LLC. We have an open marketplace plan that now costs $24,000 a year. And I'm not willing to roll the dice. I mean, I had an appidectomy two years ago, and the hospital build my insurance company 40 grand, which means if you lose your health insurance because the ACA subsidies were not passed, which is a lot of small business owners, it's like a 160,000 Arkansans. Um, you're just one medical emergency away from bankruptcy.

SPEAKER_00 26:21

Let me ask you, and and you can use whatever term you want, but the terms that are used typically are single payer or Medicare for all, but essentially something that's more like a European model. Universal healthcare. Universal health care. Where do you stand on that as a concept? I'm all for it.

SPEAKER_01 26:41

Okay. For economic reasons. Um, I mean, healthcare is a human right, first of all. Let's just, you know, put that out there on the table. But for economic reasons. So here is a scenario that we are looking at as the state of Arkansas. So we are hemorrhaging folks in rural communities because of the farm crisis. And a lot of communities rely on farming. And when farms close, so do all the other businesses that support them, which means they're laying off folks who are now moving into urban centers to find jobs. These are the folks that are going to have uh no insurance because the ACA subsidies were not passed or because they lose their insurance through their job. And they're going to go to hospitals and have unpaid medical debt. The hospital is going to absorb that debt. And in order to do so, they're going to raise the rates on everybody else. So if a senior needs a you know shoulder surgery or hip replacement, that's going to cost way more than it would before. The insurance companies are going to see those costs increase, they're going to respond with high premiums. The only way for us to levelze our healthcare costs is for us to expand the rest school. Young, old, sick, healthy. We all got to have health insurance. Because if we don't, you're going to be on the hook for your neighbor's medical bills. It is not charity for us to all have health insurance. It is basic economics.

SPEAKER_00 28:06

Well, I can tell you, as a person who's been around business my whole life, I have tried to kind of reject anything that sounds like a true socialist model, but I've kind of come to the point where I don't nothing else has worked. I don't think that the system is working. It works fine for me. That's I'm taking care of it, but it's not working fine for the people who are using emergency rooms is their medical care. It's it, I hate, I hate inefficiency. If nothing else, if no one, if the only reason people listen to my podcast is to understand that they people who also hate inefficiency, then we're, then we're we have a common, a common goal there.

SPEAKER_01 28:45

Well, but universal health care doesn't have to be socialist.

SPEAKER_00 28:48

Well, and that's we don't have enough time for that. We are good to have you back. But I do want, we just got a couple, uh just about two minutes left. Is there anything we haven't talked about? And I want to thank you again for just being. I've loved this. I love the conversation. And by the way, I will be reaching out to Senator Tom Cotton's office. I have not yet, so that's on me, but I will. Is there anything we haven't talked about that you would like to conclude this week?

SPEAKER_01 29:13

Yes. I would like to talk about my commitments. Go ahead. The commitments I'm making to the people of Arkansas. So when I am U.S. Senator, I'm going to have the best constituent services program in the country. I'm going to open offices in Arkansas. I'm going to staff those offices from people from Arkansas, not just people from Arkansas, people from the region in which the office exists. Because it drives me absolutely nuts when someone calls a U.S. Senate office and then has to explain Arkansas before they can get to the meat of the conversation because that person's not from Arkansas, right? A senator gets $4 million a year to staff their offices. Tom Cotton has no constituent services program. What on earth is he doing with $4 million? Because we know he spends it. So what's he doing with it? I want to have Arkansas staff my DC office too. I want to make sure that when you call my office, you talk to somebody. If you send us an email, we answer your email with something other than a form letter. Because that's the job. The people of Arkansas elected you to be one of a hundred people. That's a lot of power in the federal government. One of a hundred people to help them, not just with legislation, but with everyday things like veterans' disability or a problem with your social security. That's the job. The second commitment I make is that everything I own, everything my husband owns, and everything my parents own, because I'll eventually inherit what they own, will go into a true blind trust. So until we do pass legislation that says that uh elected officials can't trade stocks, people will know that I will not be able to touch any of that. So they'll know what I hear in the halls of Congress will not enrich myself.

SPEAKER_00 30:53

Well, I want to conclude by saying that I believe you've got quite a command of the issues. You're able to talk about everything. I tried to at least throw some things at you. And I've had a wonderful time here. And I hope that my audience has learned something. This is uh, you know, it just politically speaking, uh, there's the Democrats seem to be on the rise in 2026. And I think there possibly could be states that have not traditionally been, you know, thought of as uh a Democrat winning that could surprise some people. And Arkansas, I know you you're already said you're gonna win. Maybe you got your victory speech written, but uh at a minimum, I think the competition is important, the battle for ideas is important, and you are you brought it strong here today in the last two episodes. Uh, folks, again, thank you for coming. Thank you. And this week, that's the POV of POB.