Steve Hilton breaks down his plan for California.

Steve Hilton shares his vision for California 🇺🇸

From economic reform to rebuilding opportunity, he lays out what he’d change if elected.

Big ideas. Big ambitions.

What do you think? 👇

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

California after these whatever 16 years of one party rule. It's so expensive, it's so difficult to do anything, to run a business or anything. Our gas prices are the highest in the nation. We have the highest housing costs in the country. The number one reason people are leaving the state, you'll never own your own home. Republican Steve Hilton, a former Fox News host.

SPEAKER_00 0:19

President Donald Trump throwing his weight behind Republican Steve Hilton for governor. California has, quote, gone to hell, and that Steve Hilton can quote turn it around before it is too late.

SPEAKER_02 0:31

Apart from all the other things I'm fighting for, I'm fighting to make sure that this state that I love does not turn into the country.

SPEAKER_04 0:41

I mean Florida's winning, the real estate agency must be having a grand all time. It's a great migration. What's our deficit?

SPEAKER_02 0:48

Well, it's projected next year 18 billion. Two trillion dollars of wealth have left the state just because of the threat of this billionaire's tax. Well, the unions run this place. What? You are an elected member of the legislature. And you're sitting there without any kind of embarrassment saying the unions run this place. It definitely shifted something that made me think, why would anyone vote for more of this?

SPEAKER_04 1:14

What would be your first thing that you do in office? Day one thing, I'll just Oh, you don't have a shot, you're a Republican. But if all the Republicans in California actually came out to vote, you'd win, and it wouldn't be. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 1:25

It shows you that it's possible. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_04 1:27

Hi everybody. Welcome to the Highly Jewish Podcast Association with Joyce. Uh, just wanted to say I am so honored and privileged to have Steve Hilton. All right, come on. Um, this is amazing to see him in this light and just be able to have a calm and cool conversation. For those that don't know, he used to be an advisor to the UK Prime Minister David Cameron. Then he became an incredible media personality. And now he's running for governor of California, thank God, because he definitely has my endorsement, and I certainly hope that he wins. And I just hope that we can, you know, in this time get to know you a little better. I love it. Let's go. Yeah, and just chat. So, um, well, first I really want to ask, how has campaigning been for you? Because this, I have now seen you out of multiple fundraisers, and it's been months and months, and you must be exhausted.

SPEAKER_02 2:17

No, it's really interesting. It's a I I I don't know how to put it. And this may sound weird. Other but look at that cool building. I love this is what I love about this job, by the way. Is you see all these cool bits of California. I love the architecture, that sort of mid-century. Yeah, we're in Orange County. We're in the city of Orange. I just did a video for social media, which has been a bit of a joke. Um, I know, but I couldn't resist it. So we actually came here to do a part of a college tour. Oh, wow. Chat because we had an event with students this morning. And then I love oranges. Okay. I really love orange. I've always loved orange. That's your favourite fruit? It almost my favourite thing.

unknown 2:52

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 2:52

Oh, wow. And I literally, as anyone on the team will testify, I literally every day at least one orange, sometimes. Oh my god. The other week we were in the Central Valley. I actually went to a citrus farm, picked some oranges, which I'm still finishing up. Anyway, I just we were driving to Chapman and we just were in the city of Orange. Yeah. In Orange County. And we just drove past Orange Street. I thought, I come on, I gotta do it.

SPEAKER_01 3:18

So I literally just made a little video of me eating an orange on Orange Street. Oh my god. In the city of Orange, in Orange County. No, and look had to be done. You're right. Now I'm seeing just street signs, orange everywhere.

SPEAKER_04 3:30

The color oh wow, you're not joking. Exactly. Wow, okay. Well this place is I I hope you I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 3:35

I hope everybody welcomes you with open arms.

SPEAKER_02 3:37

But to your question about being it's it's um it's tiring, but I'm not tired. It's a weird thing. So I'm very it very much is hard work. But I want to put in the work because I feel like, as I've said all along, the reason I'm doing this because I think I can win. I really believe that, but it's going to be very difficult. It's not easy. I'm not kind of running around saying, oh, everything's so and it's true, you know, it's such a disaster in California after these whatever 16 years of one party rule, everything. I don't want to get all political too early, but it's a disaster. Oh yeah, everything it's so expensive, it's so difficult to do anything, to run a business or anything. And so, on the one hand, you could say, yeah, obviously they're gonna get kicked out. Who why would anyone vote for more of this? But actually, it's not you know, it's not as easy as that. And so I think you've got to put the work in. And I launched the campaign actually here in Orange County in Huntington Beach. Wow. When was it, last April, end of April? And I've been on the road constantly, and people say no one's ever done it like this before. But I think, okay, we've got to do something different. I mean, I've literally been everywhere, um, almost every county out of 58. There's a couple more we're gonna do in the next few weeks. And as you said, and now it's really picked up the pace this year because obviously we're getting towards the election, and so it's you know, like the fund we've got to raise money, the town halls, it's uh doing things, you know, highlighting issues, press conference, Cal Doge we've launched this year, so we're highlighting fraud and finding examples of fraud. So there's a lot going on. And it is true that it's it's crazy, you know, it's a big state and you're driving a lot and flying around a lot, and often, you know, we arrive at the whichever Hampton Inn we're staying in at like 1 a.m. and you're up at six to do a TV interview, and then you're on the road. You know, so yes, it's definitely really hard work, but I do not feel at all tired. You feel like there's like a purpose to a driven. Completely energized by it, truly. I'm not just making it up, I really do. I do want to say though that of course the really tough thing about it is um for my family. Yeah. And that's people say that, and I really see that now. Like my wife is incredible. We got two teenage sons at home, she's got a full-time job. It's really tough. You know, we used to split things pretty equally. Yeah, it takes a it takes a village. That that's you know, and it's a real massive thing. I mean, it's not just oh, that's inconvenient, it's like hugely disruptive.

SPEAKER_01 6:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:02

Um, and you know, she's right behind it, and we've talked about it, and she's very involved, and I talked to her about every aspect of it. But um it's very, very tough. Yeah, from that point of view. I mean, it's all very well for me to be you know, running around. It actually a lot of it is real fun. You know, you see this amazing state, it's beautiful, meet incredible people, meet amazing businesses. That's one of the things I love. The thing that you're the one thing I just want to um say that's very kind of true about me, most although you mentioned you're right, I worked in the government in the UK, and um more recently people know me here from from Fox News and whatever. Most of my career has actually been in business. So I've worked in business all over the world. I started companies back in the UK Street in particular. Well, one we we had a consulting firm, um, which did very well, and then we started a couple of restaurants. Oh wow, my business are a very tough nightmare, business. Yeah. Um, you know, it was fun and we learned a lot from it, but really difficult. And then here, after we moved to 2012, I taught at Stanford for a couple of years, but nobody. So we're based in the Bay Area, right there in the card tech world. And I started a company there as well. So that's been most of my career.

SPEAKER_03 7:11

So you know what it's like to have to deal with the state to get anything.

SPEAKER_02 7:14

Yeah. I mean, there is a and and actually that's going to be on the on the ballot. That's what it that's my ballot designation as a business owner. So a small business owner, yeah. Yeah. Because that most of my career's been in business. So um I exactly, I really anyone trying to run a business in this state.

SPEAKER_04 7:31

It's not so when did you know that you started campaigning last April? Or when did you know you were going to? Like when were you like, all right, I need to sit my wife down and have this conversation?

SPEAKER_02 7:40

Yeah, I mean, I actually can't remember. We could probably figure it out because um I saw I was a Fox News host. I hosted this show on Sunday nights with the Hex Revolution, which I loved. It was an amazing opportunity, totally out of the blue, never expected to do. I'd never done anything in media before. Oh wow. Um it was amazing. So how'd you land there? Well, that's a whole that's a whole idea. But I truly what happened was um as I was doing that, I did it for what, seven years, something like that. And it was great. What an incredible honour, actually, to have a you know to just, you know, and then you get a very free hand of fox. Like you're the you you you're the editor, you decide what topics you cover, you that's amazing. You write everything, you know, like it's all very you you so it's an amazing honor and privilege to be able to do that, speak to the whole country every Sunday night for an hour, um, and put together a show exactly how you you wanna you wanna put it together. Um however, af you know, you're just talking. Right. So it just had this hand crank to sort of get back to doing things. Yeah. And at first, I guess my first impulse was I love California. I'd become an American citizen by then, this is our home, this is where, you know. And um I just wanted to I could see everything going so badly wrong. I thought, well, I've got a background in policy and government for part of my career. Maybe, you know, let's try and do something. And so I started a very so I say policy organization, it really was just me and and one brilliant guy who helped with me and a website. So it was a black some big organization, but but the I got I started thinking about the policy, diving into these policy things, meeting people. I I had been invited over the years to go speak at Republican things and whatever, and I'd always not done that. And now I did, and I started getting into things in California. And the first big issue that we really looked at was housing and the housing crisis. And actually, the more that I looked into that, it felt like the the a really big thing that could that would be useful would could really only be accomplished with a ballot initiative because the interests in Sacramento was would be so opposed to it.

SPEAKER_03 9:57

The housing crisis is, I feel like, especially worse in northern California.

SPEAKER_02 10:01

It's just a desert. Well, everywhere is deserved, but you're I mean, we have the highest housing costs in the country, the lowest home ownership. It's the number one reason people are leaving the state. And it's so heartbreaking you see young people, they're just a chapman to date. Like, no expectation at all of anything. Of even staying in California. Wow. Because it's just impossible here. You'll never own your own home. We can't make a life. Why would you raise Fab? You know, yeah, we're going to Nashville or Florida or wherever. Yeah, Texas. You know, it's just, or even next door, you know, Nevada, Arizona. And so uh I worked on that, and I don't want to get all in the policy weeds, but basically there were two components of this ballot. One was capping what is what's known as impact fees, which no one's ever heard of, but they're basically a tax on how it refers to the the concept is when you build housing, there's an impact on the local community, and you try you pay some fees to mitigate that, maybe for some environmental remediation or a plague ground or whatever. What if it's a good And by the way, we already have property tax, you know, there's all these other taxes. Anyway, for years that that was, you know, pretty, you know, a couple of grand here where it's now massively escalated to the point where impact fees, they call developer impact fees or developer fees, whatever you want to call it, can be, according to the book, the Turner Centre in Berkeley, the sort of real experts on housing in California, up to 20% of the cost of the new house. It's huge, right? So that's that's a hidden tax on housing that no one's aware of. So the first part of our thing was um capping impact fees, much lower than they are now. The second part was even more is even more complicated and and unknown. I'll tell you the thing, and then I'll ex- this does get back to your question of why I'm doing this. The second part was the actual proposal was eliminating the private right of action under CICRA. So what does that mean? CECWA, CE, the acronym C E Q A, California Environmental Quality Act. It was passed in 1970, been around for ages, originally intended for, you know, stopping pollution from big factories, kind of things that we would all support. Over the years, it's got extended and applied to everything. So it's just a nightmare. It gets in the way of, you know, you're a build a shed in your gut or whatever. It's just build mice to complain about it. You know, it's just you had some solar panel thing you're just trying to do, and this got in the way of that, I think. So it's a nightmare, complicated, massive regulatory mess. And on top of the actual regulations, which are bad enough, there's this thing called the private right of action. What that means is that anybody can file a lawsuit to kind of prosecute infringements of the act, which is, you know, not normal. Like we can't prosecute someone for breaking the law. We're not law enforcement. Right. With CEQA, anyone can file a lawsuit. It's called the private right of action. And so that's what happens. They have all these lawsuits. It's one of the reasons that really it's really a big reason why everything's a housing so expensive, because endless lawsuits are filed that delay the process, are at to cost. Sometimes projects don't have a 70% of lawsuits under CICRA are filed to block housing. Of those lawsuits, nearly all of them, actually maybe not nearly, but a majority are filed, nothing to do with the environment, filed by unions, to negotiate with the developer what they call project labor agreements, where they it's basically extortional. So they file a lawsuit, they say, if you give us this, this, and this, we'll drop the lawsuit. That's what that's what happens.

SPEAKER_03 13:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:44

It's all hidden from view. No one knows at you of this, right? Xbox Rosh. Exactly. And so the components usually are what they call prevailing wage, which sounds very nice, but usually it's like wage rates that are at least double, sometimes treble what the market rate would be. That increases the cost of housing. And um what they call skilled and trained workforce, which again sounds very nice. Who doesn't want that? Sure. What it actually means is union members only. And that means for a lot of projects, you have to ship in workers from other places because you don't have union members, though, you have to put them up in hotels. And it's just insane.

SPEAKER_04 14:17

And the thing is, though, if you ever have a position against the union, the people think you're a bad person, but you don't realize that there's so much that's like written, exactly that little letters that totally change the way that the laws are actually going to be enacted.

SPEAKER_02 14:30

So is this so that's the background. We didn't get the ballot initiative off of the ground, couldn't raise the money to have them. So then I thought, okay, maybe we can try it in the legislature. Why not try? So I go to them, so you know, people start introducing me to people in Sacramento. I start going there, having meetings. And there's one person that said, You've got to talk to this legislator. They are really good on housing. Okay. Have a meeting. Um, and um we're talking about all this, and my two points here, they supposed to say, Oh, that'd be transformational. I said, fantastic. Let's work on it together. You're a Democrat, I'm Republican. Very nice, let's do it together. Yeah. We see I to I. Um, oh, I couldn't support you public. Why not? The unions would hate it. I said, I know, but you've just told me it would be transformational, so what? They did this that we were up in the office that you could see the state capital down below. Oh at the window. And they went with this, like with their arm, like this. Well, the unions run this place. Literally worked for the unions run, and I just thought, what? You are an elected member of the legislature. And you're sitting there without any kind of embarrassment, saying the unions run this place. Well, that's why I felt so angry about it. I just thought that's ridiculous. Yeah. And like, no. No. And be done about it. And I don't I'm not saying I literally that night went home and said, I'm running for cultural, but it definitely shifted something. Shifted something exactly. That's a good phrase for it. Shifted something that made me think, I don't know. Yeah.

unknown 16:01

Fuck it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 16:02

Let's do it, you know. Yeah, absolutely. Well, thank you for for doing it because it looks like I think what started off really early on, people like, oh, you don't have a shot, you're a Republican. But I think there's also enough of us over here that are very exhausted with how things have been based and want something to really shift. And I think that, oops, it's gonna draw. Um, and I think that that's you know, you're a breath of fresh air in that way. And I think that you also speak so well to to people on issues that matter to everyone, regardless of a party you're affiliated with. And I think that that's like a great, a great thing. And I, you know, so I'm grateful for that too, you know, just as, you know, the citizen here.

SPEAKER_02 16:42

You know, well, I think that and a resident here. No, I appreciate that. And I really appreciate all the love and energy, and and that's one of the reasons why I don't feel tired by because that I just feel the support. And actually, you actually get a sense of, I don't want to be too pompous about it, but their sense of obligation and responsibility because I really feel it's very interesting the kind of things that people say to you. Like, well, you know, when I would be doing before I was a candidate or whatever, and you'd go around, or sometimes people follow you in the grocery store or whatever, and it'd be very similar what they'd say. How'd it say I love your show? Like the main thing people would say. Those words almost every single I love for a show. And now the most common phrase is you have to win. Yeah. And it's this intensity about it that's very interesting. It's not honestly how we support you, you have my vote, you know, these are the things we say, but very often it's you have to win. Yeah, because there's a sort of sense of urgency, yes, desperation.

SPEAKER_04 17:46

Because it does go beyond you. You know, like you were just something that represents so many of the people that feel completely left out of the conversation in this state. You know, like it seems like if you're not one way, then you're no way and you're not counted and you don't matter. And that's, you know, if we haven't learned anything as a whole, you know, like at least here in LA, you would think that, you know, being a Republican is in the minority. And I guess that's the case here in the state. But if you look at this nationally, you know, two million more people voted for Trump. Like, if that's not enough to make people understand that we are far from the minority, I don't know what more there is to like convey. And I, in it, and I, as someone who like, I'm running for city council in West Hollywood, it's a nonpartisan seat, but I'm a Republican. And so, of course, you know, the everyone's like, oh, come on. I don't know how you're gonna get in there, but it's the same thing. You have to win because people are starved for just common sense. Like nothing that you stand on is radical.

SPEAKER_02 18:41

Nothing that you stand on you know, exactly. I say that the whole time, which is that I'm asked, you know, a few times in the interviews, uh, where I, you know, what's your political, whatever. I say, you know, on how do you define yourself politically? The word I always start with, I'm just a sort of a pragmatist, pragmatic. It's not just practical, like problem-solving business mindset. It's not ideological. I think we've had so much ideology with all this stuff that is just not regardless of the results or the real-world outcomes, we've got to keep going with the ideology because this is what we believe. And it's just ridiculous. And that's why you end up with these insane policies like shutting down our oil and gas industry in California and but but yet, you know, not using any less, just instead importing it from halfway around the world on giant super tankers, which means our gas prices are the highest in the nation and is really hurting working class Californians the most who drive their cars and trucks out of the day, not the climate warriors who are pushing this laws. And so none of it literally doesn't make sense. It doesn't even make sense on its own terms, but they just want to look like they're conforming to the ideology. Yeah? And we've just got to get away from that, just practical things. I totally agree. And you know, that whole there's there's something I it's very funny when you when you when you look at the coverage, the media coverage of the race, particularly in the Sacramento kind of media. There's this and and definitely from the Democrats, the way they speak and and all these kind of you know lobbying, you know, the swamp, you know, the the establishment, the sister kind of people, especially in Sacramento. There's an an unbelievable arrogance about it. Oh yeah. Like, oh yeah, we're gonna Republicans are not gonna win, of course I might believe. No. Let's see which of sometimes they even I've noticed this, it's like sometimes when they cover polls, they totally shouldn't lubricate it. Well, or they they l I've seen this multiple times. They they only they they literally don't even report my number or the other Republicans' number, and they just talk about the Democrats. And actually, in every case, they do that. We are higher than all the Democrats. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 20:52

Well, because they don't even report it. Because the thing is, they're they're banking on us not coming out to vote. You know, like if if we think, okay, like my vote's not going to count, why am I going to spend my time during the day, you know, to go and and vote for something that I'm not going to, it's not count. And so they're using it just a strategy, and they're so great at that. When it comes to that, they're effective in California, yes, making the Republicans not want to come out. If all the Republicans in California actually came out to vote, you'd win and it wouldn't even complicate.

SPEAKER_02 21:21

Exactly right. It's a really important what you've just said. And that's actually a really big part of the reason that I am being so energetic and running around doing all these things. Because actually, it's about that. Yeah. It's about mobilizing us and making us feel we can do it. And actually, just to put some numbers on what you just said, it's a very important point. So when people say, oh, there aren't enough Republicans to win, I just want to go through the numbers. I think, you know, this is like really the the foundation of the case for optimism. Is that if you look at um people look at the percentages of the sheriff and they look at, I don't know, voter registration, we got two to one Democrat, or you look at vote share in elections, which has been pretty steadily 60%, 40% for the last twenty years, actually. But if you look at the actual number of votes in this is a midterm election, 2026. So if you take for comparison the last two, 2018, 2022, and you take the average the total votes to try and project roughly what is a reasonable assumption of what the votes will be this year. The number you get, just averaging out the last two is 11.7 million total votes in California. So to win, you you know, just over 50% of that is roughly 5.9 million votes. Trump in California in 2024, without campaigning here really, you know, and it wasn't target state, they weren't going for it. Got 6.1 million votes in California. Trump. So it's it's literally what you just said. It's a it's just if every person, if every person voted for Trump in 2024, votes for me in 26, as I sometimes say with a flourish, I'll be the governor with 200,000 votes to spare. Now that's it's not easy to get and actually for you know you're not going to get 100% of a presidential year turnout. Sure, but start that's the starting point. Yeah. And actually it shows you that it's possible.

SPEAKER_04 23:22

Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean I'm really hoping that your, you know, the other one pulling you down just leaves already. Because he's just hurting us as a party I think at this point. We should all rally behind you. I think that well I know you agree with that. So I'm hoping in that same sense of like you need to win I'm one of those people that would be saying that to you. So I hope that we all do that out here soon. What what would be your first thing that you do in office? Like let's say you get it, you know, or we're manifesting here, right? So you can hopefully well this would be the first thing.

SPEAKER_02 23:55

There's some big things I'll get to in a second but there's something which is big but it's sort of limited and pr and can you know um concise in one sense which is something we do on day one and I've talked about this. Like you just mentioned gas prices we're driving we're out. Yeah it's like everything they can do to screw people with cars they want to do they just hate people drive it's ridiculous. And one of the virtual examples of that is uh vehicle registration which is in most states it's like under a hundred bucks to register your your vehicle California 600 700 many people over a thousand I've heard people say 2000 2500 just insane amounts of money and it's all so fiddly and complicated 800 actually you're 800 okay yeah so that's a tibula yeah um well if you look at the bill it's got all these ridiculous line items there's a basic registration fee for most people is$71 and then and then you they add on all this other stuff um including things what made me laugh was transportation improvement fund. What's that? You know how are they improving any cover they're literally another example of how badly we're doing the worst roads of the country 50th out of 50 states rated for road road quality and so a day one thing I'll just get rid of all of that. Very simple we've got a DMV$71 flat fee registry per person perfect. The bigger more kind of you know longer term thing but it will start on day one are two things. Number one sending a budget to the legislature because the budget is really the main policy making vehicle for the governor and for the state. And so I'll have it written, I'll have it ready and it'll be basically implementing the the plans that I've run three dollar gas, cut your electric bills in half, your first hundred grand tax free, no more free healthcare for illegal immigrants so we can lower healthcare costs for you, a home you can afford to buy. Now behind each one of those is it is a reform plan, policy plan. And that's what will be in the first budget. And now behind that things like to cut taxes you've got to cut spending so there'll be spending reductions getting rid of fraud and weight no all of that. But that first budget will be the kind of vehicle to enact the policy platform that I ran on. Which really is summed up in one word I mean we're doing these town walls up and down the state I'm calling it the the calaffordable tool basic one word calaffordable that's the and so you send the budget to the legislature then it's a process you negotiate. I mean that's gonna be but my starting assumption will be when I'm when I take office next January having been elected as the first Republican governor 20 years. That's a revolution in California and I I would especially after the Democrats all these years of lecturing about our democracy how much they care about our democracy. Yeah so much. Well if you just care about destruction it's like the wrong they pick the wrong D word is I know well everybody fine let's just give them that okay you'd care about democracy. Right well the people just voted for this change. So work with me to implement here. But then the other part of it assuming that that doesn't go so well with them is you can make a lot of change happen if you know what you're doing through the executive branch. Through you yeah there's hundreds of agencies that are really driving so much of this cost and hassle, the burden of regulation and taxation all coming out of these agencies. And sometimes there's fees and hidden charges and permits and sweat all this nonsense. And and um I mean I don't want to get into it anyway the the the plan there is that I'll be ready on day one with the people that I'm gonna be putting into these agencies to run them and and and the executive orders to redirect their work in a common sense direction and the legal opinions to back that all up. And that they'll be ready on day one so we can start those changes immediately.

SPEAKER_04 28:14

Amazing we definitely need that I mean right now what's our deficit stitch.

SPEAKER_02 28:19

Well it's projected next year 18 Villier but that's always variable because they uh You know these the the estimates of the whole budget making process are ridiculous. So now they didn't make an estimate this year for a budget that begins halfway through next year starts the fiscal year starting mid 2027. So it's all crazy guesswork. And and the and the revenues are very impossible to predict because we've got such a ridiculous tax base because it's so skewed. I mean all the people saying the rich must pay their fair share. They do already like they do a lot like nearly half the revenue comes from the top 1%.

SPEAKER_04 28:56

Yeah and especially if that's leaving now I don't know what takes oh we're gonna be doing out here when all of the rich people disappear.

SPEAKER_02 29:02

Right. Well that's the I mean Chamath and those guys on the All In podcast have estimated that already two trillion dollars of wealth has left the state because of the threat of this billionaire's tax. And so that has already cost us billions of dollars of revenue without even it happening.

SPEAKER_01 29:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 29:24

I mean that's why sometimes like I I feel like I sound like conspiracy theorist and I promise I'm not but like sometimes I feel like like there was an alternative force that came into the Democratic Party and like ruined the ruined it. Like think about New York and how everyone is leaving New York and going to Florida. I mean Florida's winning the real estate agents there must be having a grand old time because every rich person in full in New York and in California are all like it's a great migration and it's it's very it's very scary that like that's literally happening in real time and I feel like it's been the like the writing has been on the wall and the fact that nothing in the Democratic party has shifted I mean I was once a Democrat. Like when did you what what was your sort of journey there? Um October 7th and okay and watching what was happening on campuses I mean the the Biden administration should have nipped it in the bud immediately, pulled funding immediately, you know, called in the guards have them come in in storm like it it this should have it should have been like done the next day. The fact that it went on the way that it did and then the way that we were you know the administration was treating Israel I mean like I don't even have to get into that it's so obviously apparent that it's like anti-American. And so I'm so relieved that Trump is president and and that's what shifted for me because I was like you know if the Democrats care so much about social justice then Jews should be inclusive of that. Is there an brilliantly simple way of putting it so it's like let's just be so like forget even like if you care about Israel as a Jew that makes sense. But let's say you're not a Jew. You should care about your allies and if you have an ally that's actually a democracy in a p in a sea um surrounded by things that are not only not democracies but things that pledge to kill America then as an American I should care about protecting my own self-interest.

SPEAKER_02 31:13

And in here at home, I mean in LA, I mean one one of the most you know I spent an afternoon at Hil Hill in um UCLA. Mm-hmm. And it was really eye-opening because obviously you know you read and you talk and I'd hear heard stories about what's been happening and a lot of it's reported in the media but what I hadn't appreciated was just how far down it goes and how widespread it is in the sense that you've got high school kids who are frightened to reveal that they're Jewish. Oh high school won't wear things just don't want anyone to know you've got um you know like the just routine that you the the Jewish people for whatever kind of event and everything have to pay for your own extra security. Oh my God totally routine.

SPEAKER_01 32:02

No we have Maganam is an organization I love them I blessed it's like it's America excuse me what you should not none of none of that is acceptable.

SPEAKER_02 32:11

It doesn't matter whether it's Jewish or Muslim it doesn't matter you shouldn't it's not acceptable.

SPEAKER_04 32:16

Right and it's become acceptable you know and that's and I'm grateful that you know my Jewish people make sure to have great security. I mean we saw what just happened here. And so I'm I'm so grateful that our security like is the way that it is but it uh to your point it shouldn't have to be this way. And the fact that the Democratic Party has always always sat on this scenario that they care so much about people. And yet here you have a group of people that have more hate crimes committed against us than any other religious group and you're not going to protect it. You're going to create DEI initiatives that don't include us. You're going to chain and then on top of that you're going to be okay with people chanting death to America and death to Zionists. I mean it's so like and it's one thing to just chant, okay? Like I love freedom of speech. I don't might not agree with you but I want you to be able to say what you want to say but the second you start blocking me from entering a class that's what it's no longer free speech. But by the way, it's illegal.

SPEAKER_02 33:14

Right illegal right the First Amendment allows you to stand on the sidewalk with a sign or a channel or whatever creative means you want. Cool. Yeah but it does not allow you actually you're not protected if you're blocking the street if you're blocking traffic yeah if you're blocking entry to a lawful that's an illegal yeah um and the they should enforce the law.

SPEAKER_04 33:38

But not I guess not when you're on campus and it means blocking Jews or blocking teachers that even have key cards and deactivating them. I mean it's it's crazy what was happening in Colombia and it's funny now I had someone say yeah but look now you know so many of these schools now have Jewish presidents and I'm like and why is that that's because Trump pulled funding and the schools are now terrified and have to clean house if that never had happened where would we be today? I I I think that we would be personally I I feel like the nuclear bomb would be like right here if we didn't have Trump as president.

SPEAKER_02 34:13

So I'm a big fan and I'm grateful, you know, and I'm also very grateful for what's I'm just interested in that because I can see what why that issue would have you know had that powerful effect. But did you then have a process where you had to you know come to terms with other policy issues? Oh my God everything or or did you like or was that actually kind of easy because you kind of already agreed what what how was that?

SPEAKER_04 34:32

Well for me I always felt like look I felt like I've been a 90s Democrat like just a sensible a sensible person.

SPEAKER_02 34:38

Okay so it seems to me that that the whole when you talk you look at the rhetoric around immigration immigration reform ICE Nazis Gestapo all this kind of stuff it's the same I they haven't changed that position. Yeah I don't really see that they've changed I mean obviously it was a disaster for Carmel Harris in the presidential campaign big part of why they lost but they seem to have not learned no lessons from that.

SPEAKER_01 35:03

Really and you feel that way but do you think they've changed on the on immigration? In terms of the Democrats?

SPEAKER_04 35:08

Yeah oh no Democrats just keep pushing harder to the left for every time I mean they're actually thinking um I I I mean are they really actually seriously considering Kamala and AOC? Is that real for a president well she it's possibly so is that actually gonna I mean that's a great that's great for us.

SPEAKER_02 35:24

There's no way there's no question it seems to me that um they are both they are cut serious about it Kamala and you know they they certainly but why else would AOC have done that the moment I think that was very revealing was that she goes to the Munich Security Conference and starts going on about foreign policy not in a particularly impressive way. Of course that's like okay so maybe I mean I thought it was a joke you know but like she obviously doesn't think that's it and Colmo Harris definitely is going for it. This whole in sort of never-ending book tour um that we're paying for a lot of it with paying for her security which is absolutely outrageous the arrogance and entitlement of that by the way oh just not even a second thought so basically that that book tour the idea really reveals something which is that we taxpayers should fund her basically her presidential campaign. She's that's what this is the book tour. So why should we pay for it the her security and they say oh she has security that's fine of course I don't want people to be at risk great but then you pay for it or your donors pay for it or your publisher pay for it.

SPEAKER_04 36:30

Or there's plenty of money she raised 80 million overnight when she decided to to run for president.

SPEAKER_02 36:36

Yeah it's just outrageous the arrogance of these people just like desperate to stay in the spotlight and we have to make it all possible for them.

SPEAKER_04 36:44

I mean I also I guess I just don't get like at what point you know someone I asked someone you know why so many people have a hard time just admitting you know that like okay hey maybe the Democrats want the best side of things and he said to me that it was like because then they would have to admit they were wrong. And for a lot of people that's a really hard pillow to swallow and I get it because look for 20 years I mean I wasn't just a Democrat. I worked for Hillary's campaign in Iowa I moved to Iowa to be a campaign or organizer for her campaign. And I was the person that was writing on my status says I'm gonna leave the country if Trump plans. That was me. Okay. And then I left the country I married a woman divorced a woman nothing's changed for me and now we're here. So I was I was that person. And so I I I know what it was like to wake up from my you know delusion. And it wasn't easy to be like oh my God. And for the last 20 years I'm sitting here championing for a side that actually just doesn't care. And that was really difficult and I lost friendships and that wasn't like so I get that that's difficult but like at some point like are that many people afraid to be wrong must be miserable being in a relationship with these people. They're like never gonna say I'm sorry. Like how do you not like accept like I made a mistake or like wow this really isn't working and I I maybe we need to change and you know Fettermen I why can't the Democratic Party be like the Fettermans? If it if they if they were like Fetterman then I would say wow there might actually be a shot for them the next time and that and that there's no one following his league.

SPEAKER_02 38:13

It's interesting that that's like one of the things that I'm doing differently in this race you've ever seen it before from any candidate for government in California is I'm actually it's r running with a team. And of course the elections in California it's individual. It's not like for president where the president chooses a running mate and it's a ticket every everything is elected you we have eight statewide offices in California directly elected. But I have I it it makes sense to me that we run put together a team because actually when we get to Sacramento you're you know everything is I'd in I'd learn that in business and anyway like it's not one person it's a team. And so I've chosen as my running mate she's now running with me for lieutenant governor someone called Gloria Romero. Gloria was the leader of the state Senate for the Democrats many years ago like about 20 years ago and she's exactly like this and she walked away from the Democrats and it's a very powerful story. She was always somewhat when she was there she would would if she were here she would say you know I worked across the aisle she was always a believer in school choice and parent power that that teacher unions hated that and so wow I've never seen this I've never been up here beautiful right I wish you did wonder if that camera gets to see anything but yeah it is she not wow looking up yeah we are this is Alicia Parkway so we are your mission view it's stunning over here so um anyway so she she will and she was very much as I said school choice parent power the teachings hated it she left the Senate and then she's got you know get more and more just like that more and more disillusion with the extremism on that she walked away I first met her when she was working with Rick Romel on a ballot initiative for school choice. And um we became friends we worked together on policy things she's running with me for uh she's gonna be my running mate Hilton Romero that's the plan. But she tells that story as well of walking away and actually there are some powerful examples of that if you think about it. And Trump 2024 had a lot of that you know Bobby Kennedy was a Democrat. Tulsi Gabbard was a Democrat. Leo Tyrrell who's now in the Justice Department Trump actually Reagan when you think it's interesting to think to Ronald Reagan was once a Democrat. Yeah and so there's actually a really long history of that.

SPEAKER_04 40:43

Yeah people just like woke up and realized wow you know like actually the the the party that cares a little bit more about you is actually the Republican side. Yeah you know and I people really need to I I'll give it to the Democrats for having a really good narrative for a very long time.

SPEAKER_02 41:00

Yeah um that they're the party that cares because they're definitely not and it's interesting how they've been able to maintain that even in California when you just look at the results you know this sort of absolute scandal of the homelessness crisis that they've let festive so not I think how can anyone compassionate just preside over that and still be considered compassionate I think they're doing in California at least what I noticed is they're like oh but there's just so many people here you can't you can't expect it to to be great.

SPEAKER_04 41:30

I think they just assume that statistically because it's such a big place you've got it that homelessness is inevitable and that there's nothing you can do about it. And it's like such a uh like I'll I'll never forget one of the times and I really knew that the Democrats have lost it was I was walking out in near Studio City and Studio City is is a pretty neighborhood rent is pretty high um but there's a lot of homelessness and right outside of one of their camps was a sign for Trump. And I laughed because I was like if the poorest people are the ones that want Trump to win then you have clearly clearly like done something well on the side that's supposed to claim to care about people that don't have much. And it's just um so yeah so that's the part that's really I just I felt like the Democratic Party has now become anti-American. And that's that's that's when you start getting into really scary tourist you know territory. That's when countries like really lose it and that and I yeah I that's what's scary for me and I I don't I think I see that very strongly because I it seems to me that's what's happening in Europe, particularly in England.

SPEAKER_02 42:40

Oh my God. It's absolutely unbelievable what's going on there. And I mean I've Do you go back often no we go back um once a year basically for Christmas to see family and friends. And uh the thing is that when I so I became a citizen in 2021 we moved here 2012 so that was nine years. When you when you become a citizen you do the ceremony you you swear the oath of allegiance and there you you you swear I renounce my allegiance to all other places. And I had this sort of funny thing which was the first time we went back after I got was as as an American and my US passport and I still had my British passport um and we and you arrive at Ether Airport in London and you go they have those electronic gates but I put in the passport my UK although why I'm here in the UK I'll bet it I should use that one. It didn't work and I and you know what it's like this hassle you've got stuff people behind you can come on get on with it. And like it's all I tried a few times it didn't work I thought I'll just try the US one well assuming it wouldn't anyway I put it in work straight away. So I really thought that oh have they cancelled it you know I didn't I didn't know right you know maybe that's that's it. But then someone asked me later about um are you a dual citizen? And I thought well actually I don't think so but anyway I checked and you have to go through this actual process of renouncing In your UK. Anyway, I've done that now. So I have officially renounced. My citizenship to do this form. They charge you 482 pounds of cost. But when I think about that now, in all seriousness, you look at England, I mean it's lost.

unknown 44:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 44:14

No, and it's disastring that. And I just I feel very and one of the things I say I feel very strongly about, you know, you you look at everything. I mean, you've got the anti-Semitism, the Muslim thing, the the Sharia law, um, uh the the inability to control the border, even though that was the whole point of Brexit. Yeah, etc. The disastrous economy, socialism, like crazily bad. And free of speech. Yeah, they're interested now for saying things. I think it's like 30,000 a year or something. Yeah, it's crazy. And so I have this line which I feel very strongly about, which is apart from all the other things I'm fighting for in this race, I'm fighting to make sure that this state that I love does not turn into the country I left. I love that. Thank you. It's a really that's where it's headed. If we can really is. And I've seen it, and and that's why I feel so strongly Patashed.

SPEAKER_04 45:04

Well, I'm I you have my vote. And over there, I mean, let's like you better win for our sake. I love it. It's so much great to be with everything. I appreciate it. All right.