Interview Only w/ Virginia Kase Solomon - Tackling Trump’s Rampant Corruption & Pay To Play Politics

Virginia Kase Solomon — president of Common Cause, one of the country's oldest and most respected pro-democracy organizations — joins the Chuck Toddcast to deliver a clear-eyed assessment of just how broken American self-government has become, and what it might actually take to fix it. Kase Solomon argues that Trump's corruption has gone so far beyond anything in modern history that it makes Watergate look quaint by comparison — she points to Trump stealing roughly $1.8 billion from American taxpayers as a single staggering example — but warns that the most dangerous development isn't the corruption itself, it's that young voters are growing up normalized to it, with no living memory of an administration where this kind of behavior carried consequences. She makes a striking comparison to Hungary, where it took genuinely staggering levels of corruption before Orbán could be toppled, and where the opposition only succeeded once it tied that corruption directly to degrading quality of life for ordinary people — a lesson she says American Democrats badly need to learn. They note that there are real bipartisan calls to address money in politics, that a congressional stock trading ban enjoys overwhelming public support, that Amy Klobuchar's Disclose Act keeps getting reintroduced and ignored, and that forced disclosure of large-dollar donors alone would significantly reduce political giving — but the country is on a runaway train, with big tech money flowing to whoever holds power and Trump openly running the country like a corporation.

The conversation broadens into Kase Solomon's structural diagnosis of why American democracy isn't working. She argues that the way the founders designed the country no longer functions in the modern era — but that the founders also gave us the tools to fix what's broken if we choose to use them. Congress is too small to genuinely represent the public, the Senate is horribly malapportioned, the Supreme Court has offered no real solution to the gerrymandering crisis, and we've completely lost the "statesmen" in Congress who once voted their conscience because there's no longer any incentive to compromise or work across the aisle. She is deeply concerned about the regulatory vacuum around AI — deepfakes have terrifying implications for elections and civil litigation is currently the only meaningful path to push back — and she warns that the election of judges has corrupted the rule of law in ways America needs a movement to address. Despite all of this, she  is genuinely hopeful: Common Cause is litigating against the corruption, organizing a million conversations between activists and ordinary Americans, and operating from the conviction that the public isn't stupid and still loves this country. Her closing argument is the most American one possible: the United States has always emerged from its darkest periods better than it went in — but only because people refused to accept the broken system as permanent, and that work has to start now.

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Timeline:

(Timestamps may vary based on advertisements)

00:00 Virginia Kase Solomon (Common Cause) joins the Chuck ToddCast

01:30 Common Cause works to hold the government accountable to the people

02:30 Corporate lobbies have disproportionate power compared to people

03:15 Many people threw their hands up after Citizen’s United

04:30 States are working to change campaign finance rules

06:15 States can ban companies in their state from making political donations

08:00 Rules changes but money always seems to find a way around them

10:00 Parties stopped becoming the epicenter of political donations

11:30 There are bipartisan calls to do something about money in politics

13:00 More GOP support for reform at the state level than national level

13:45 We’re on a runaway train for money in politics

14:30 Big tech money goes to whoever is in power

15:00 The country is being run like a corporation

15:45 Jamie Raskin has started an anti-corruption task force

16:15 A congressional stock trading ban has massive public support

17:15 Trump is obviously corrupt, but people fear him too much to act

18:30 Forced disclosure of large dollar donors would reduce donations

19:30 Amy Klobuchar has put forward the Disclose Act in almost every congress

22:00 The Trump administration’s corruption is beyon

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
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so use that code well. As many of you know,
trying to figure out how to reforming governments, bringing some

(01:46):
transparency and focus into maybe codifying norms and dealing with
the ethical breakdowns that I feel like politics has been
teeming with lately. I wanted to dive into some of
the the advocacy groups that are out there that have
been doing this for a while and trying to figure out,

(02:06):
you know, why does it seem to be harder to
get elected officials focused on government reform. So joining me
now is the tenth president of Common Cause. It's Virginia Solomon, Virginia.
It's nice to meet you.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
It's nice to meet you toactic. Thanks for having me.

Speaker 1 (02:25):
So I will confess. When I think of common Cause,
I think of Watergate. And I know that common Cause
technically started before Watergate, but in many ways, Fred Worthheimer
sort of the legendary figure at common Cause, not the founder,
but certainly put his stamp on it. And then some
over the years in the post Watergate era, common Cause

(02:48):
sort of the was the engine of producing you know,
what can we do to make government more transparent, more,
you know, a little less captured by special interest us
And you know, like any organization, it's had to evolve
over the years, and I know that you guys are evolving.
And so let me just start before we dive into

(03:09):
sort of today. How would you describe common Cause to
somebody who's perhaps listening to my podcast twenty six, twenty
seven years old, and maybe doesn't you know Watergate is
as relevant to them as teapot Dome is to me.

Speaker 2 (03:22):
Yeah, So we like to describe ourselves as the ones
who hold power accountable. We call ourselves the People's Lobby
because we recognize that special interests, big corporations, everybody has
their interests being represented in Washington, except for everyday people
who are impacted by a lot of the decisions that
are made, and so we're an army of over a

(03:44):
million members throughout the country. We're in every congressional district,
and these are everyday folks who are joining with us
to address issues both locally and in their states as
well as federally, and so being able to address corruption
because corruption doesn't happened in Washington, that's a misnomer. We
see this all over the country. We see it happening

(04:06):
in states. In every state house, there are lobbyists, There
are people who have undue influence in ways that is
so disproportionate to the everyday voter that we feel like
this is our mission, this is our purpose to make
sure that government is doing what it's doing should be doing,
and that we're holding power accountable.

Speaker 1 (04:26):
I will just say my bias when I think about
Common Cause has always been on the issue of campaign
finance reform. Yeah. Is that is that as much of
a focus today as you would argue it was maybe
in the early part of the late twentieth and early
twenty first century.

Speaker 2 (04:43):
I think yes and no. I think what we've seen though,
is that post Citizens United, there were a lot of
people who just kind of threw their hands up and said, well,
we can't really do anything about it now.

Speaker 1 (04:57):
So let's see if we I don't want to put
my hands up, Yeah, what do you do? What do
you do? I mean, you know, I have certainly stopped
believing that there is that limits on campaign finance reform work.

Speaker 2 (05:14):
Yeah, I mean, And so we have to look at
it through I think a twenty first century lens, right,
And I think what's happening right now is horrible as
it is when we see the amount of corporate influence
that's happening, particularly with this administration in Washington. But it's
not limited to that, right, Like, let's be very real.
Corporations have had influence for a very long time. It's

(05:36):
just gotten worse since citizens united and so thinking about
kind of new and innovative ways to change that. So,
for example, the CAP the Center for American Progress, they
have had this theory for some time that actually just
passed in Hawaii, one of our states that we're working with,
where secretaries of state actually get to dictate the rules

(06:01):
of corporations who are registered in that state, right, so
being able so they just little known thing people don't
even know. It's actually in the House in Montana right.

Speaker 1 (06:11):
Now, This done a lot of attention in Montana. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (06:15):
Yeah, changing the rules as to whether or not they
can make those political contributions. So when you see things
like that, this is an innovative solution, not something that
anybody had thought about. But yet here we are in
Hawaii the first one to try it out. Montana will
be number two to figure out how do we change
the rules.

Speaker 1 (06:36):
Articulate what the rule is, because I think I understand it,
which means you have to be incorporated in the state
if you want to be able to contribute. Is that
what it is?

Speaker 2 (06:44):
Well, no, no, this actually turns it all upside down.
So let's take the state like Delaware. I'll give it
because it's not happening in Delaware yet.

Speaker 1 (06:52):
Well, they've only got more companies registered there than any
other so that's an interesting to pick, So let's pick it.

Speaker 2 (06:57):
Yeah, it's like Delaware has more corporate entities than probably
any other state in the country. In order to be
incorporated in the state, you go through either the Secretary
of State or whatever their process is for becoming an
entity in that state. That is where you incorporate, That's
where you get all of your irs designation that is

(07:18):
where you get your licenses to operate in that state.
But you have to be incorporated in a state within
the United States of America. That is where your company exists,
and so they can be in all these other places.
You'll do your designations to be able to operate in
other states, but your home state is where your company,

(07:38):
your company is created. Instead of just going through and
thinking about I'm trying to think of the best way
to describe this. So you're registering in this state, that
they determine all the rules for how you get to
operate in that state. Okay, so that's all the rules.
Now what they can do is change the those rules

(08:00):
to say, in order to be incorporated in our state,
you can do all these things, but you can't give
political donations, or you can't contribute to political campaigns over
a certain amount of money, or whatever those rules are
that they want to determine. In the case of Hawaii,
they said, you're not going to be able to make
political donations in order. It's a risk for the state

(08:20):
in some ways because there is a fear for some
that companies will then go to another state. Right, they'll
just move. But at the end of the day. The
state is actually the one who determines how you get
to operate as a corporation in the state that you
are registered in. By taking their ability to do that,
they can no longer be registered in your state if

(08:41):
they're going to be making these contributions.

Speaker 1 (08:44):
So I get it, I think, but let me be
captain skeptic here, and it goes to I've always described
this about sort of my sort of evolution on this
over watching attempts to you just find gold is such
a great example of how this happened. There's this there's
this line in the movie Jurassic Park and it's the

(09:06):
Jeff Goldblum character and the old man is bragging about
how we've made it. These dinosaurs can't mate, don't know,
they're all the same gender. There's no way they're going
to procreate. And Jeff Gobloom says, life finds a way.
And the story of campaign money in my lifetime, going
back to every rough form that we came up with,

(09:31):
money has found a way, right like you you stop
it in one place, somebody come find something in the
tax code and we go to a you know, first
it was five twenty seven's because that was the number
in the tax code that they used, and it became
five oh ones, then five O three's and five O four's. Right,
it's all these little little entities in the tax code

(09:53):
that people have now overinterpreted of what you can do
with money like that, and you don't have to report
it right away and all the this stuff. Yeah, and
my fear of the system you've just designed. So company
X is fine, I'm not going to incorporate there. I'm
going to incorporate somebody else. I'm going to write this
check to some entity called Americans for America and Americans

(10:14):
for America. The super pac isn't going to report that
donation and they're going to go right back and be
able to spend that money in Hawaii. Why am I
tell me why I'm being too cynical?

Speaker 2 (10:24):
If you think you're not being too cynical, I mean,
the reality is, I think that we have to experiment
with as many ways or opportunities to figure out how
do we plug some of the holes in the dike,
you know, and how But it does feel at times
like we're playing whack a mole with.

Speaker 1 (10:44):
The money I mean you come up with. I mean, look,
there is now growing consensus among sort of whatever you
want to call people like me. I call myself a
political anthropologist these days, but sort of people that are
sort of watched this stuff for living and reported on
it that McCain Feinegel had more negative unintended consequences than positive. Right,

(11:08):
taking money out of the two parties turned out to
hide that big money. Right, there was a time where
we knew who was writing the checks. Then when we
told the two major parties they couldn't do this, it
moved elsewhere. And then it did something else that we
weren't fully appreciative of till so we say about the
last ten years, which is when parties no longer became

(11:30):
the epicenter of money. They also lost the ability to
vet candidates and decide who would make a good standing
Republican or Democrat and wouldn't right it sort of it
took And now some might say, well, that's good, the
party shouldn't have that control. And yet there's been arguments
that we've had some bad actors end up get elected

(11:50):
because political parties had no ability to sort of say, hey,
this person's not good for the country.

Speaker 2 (11:57):
Well, yes, and I mean and I think one of
the things that we have to really think about in
this moment is that we have to seek solutions and
we don't always know what the unintended consequences of those
solutions will be. But at the end of the day,
in a democracy, if we're saying that we want to

(12:18):
be able to have a healthy, thriving democracy, we know
that it can't be up to the person who has
the most money to determine what that democracy looks like.
And so at times I feel like we're trying different solutions.
They might not all work, but it's just like ranked

(12:39):
choice voting, for example. There are people who say ranked
choice voting is like the end all be all. I'm
not one of those people. I think ranked choice voting
is great in certain places, but is it a one
size fits all. And so I do think that the
more creative that we can be around thinking about or
stop to stop thinking about silver bullet solutions to everything.

Speaker 1 (13:00):
You know.

Speaker 2 (13:00):
I think that's part of the challenge that we have
in this country is that we're always looking for a
silver bullet and the reality is it's a whole bunch
of different things that we need to do.

Speaker 1 (13:08):
Well, here's the good news on this issue, and This
is another reason why I want to do on is
that I can't believe how many bipartisan calls I'm hearing
now to do something about money in politics, and it's
sort of refreshing, right, I'm you know, take my friend
the former governor of Ohio, John Kaisik, who fifteen years
ago would have never talked about campaign finance reform. Pat McCrory,

(13:31):
the former governor of North Carolina, who fifteen years ago
admits would never have thought about campaign finance reform, right,
sort of stuck to the talking point of Republicans of
that era. No, that isn't necessary and all this stuff,
And now they both It takes becoming a victim of dark,
big money for people to see the light sometimes. And
I say this, you know, look to be life is

(13:52):
about experiences, and if we're as long as you learn
from your experiences, then you're living a good life. Right.
So I do think there's a large agreement now, whether
it's elected officials or just rank and file on both
sides of the aisle, who have identified that money's got
too much power right now in politics. So that's step one. Right,

(14:16):
you can if you've got consensus that you have to
do something. Then you're there. Have you been able to
translate this yet? I mean, have you noticed this yourself
that suddenly hete there are more people from the right
side of the aisle, suddenly kind of interested in some
campaign solutions on this campaign finance front.

Speaker 2 (14:34):
Yes, at this state level. And I will say I'm trying.
I always try to figure out because I don't like
to paint a monolith of any group. I think it's
the Republicans who were kind of in the desert, wandering
the desert right now looking for their party.

Speaker 1 (14:53):
There's a little bit of that, and I certainly describe
two people that probably would not have gotten endorsements or
actually did not get endorsements from dear leader.

Speaker 2 (15:01):
So yes, So I think that, yes, there are people
who I think are people who are of good intent,
who have different political beliefs than myself, for example, but
who also believe in the promise of this country and
realize that we're on this runaway train and we have
to figure out a way to stop it or at

(15:23):
least pull the brakes. And so yes, I have seen that,
particularly at the state level. I think the ones that
we're not seeing are quite frankly the people who were
standing on the diet is behind President Trump when he
was on election.

Speaker 1 (15:38):
I mean, you know, I laugh about this. I've noticed
people say, oh, big tech is now republican. I said,
big tech was never democrat or republican. Big tech was
just going to give money whoever was in power. And
it was the mistake the left made about their relationship
with big tech at the time. And I think they've
learned a hard lesson. But I would tell my friends
on the right, guess what the many you're not in

(15:59):
power not going to be that interested in you either. No.

Speaker 2 (16:02):
I mean it's it's there's a politics of convenience, whatever
is going to help you and your business, especially when
that is what we live.

Speaker 1 (16:11):
Great phrase, by the way, politics of convenience.

Speaker 2 (16:14):
Yeah, I mean it really is a and so it's
what is convenient for me, What is going to be
the lowest threshold for me right now? I mean, if
you give a few million dollars to help build a ballroom,
which may or may not be happening because now the
taxpayers may be paying for that, but depending on what
you're able to do. It's just this constant quid pro

(16:35):
quo because we're running the country as if it's a
corporation in this moment. And they're not stupid people. The
people who run these companies, they know exactly what they're doing,
and it is politics of convenience. It is convenient for
me to be able to get what to give a
little bit of money away to get what I need.
They're they're not stupid. But the problem, I think is

(16:55):
that when those corporate interests and those people who are
you know, when capitalism has more of a voice in
this country than the people who are impacted every day
individuals who live here, there's a real problem there. And
I think going back to what the solutions are, I mean,

(17:16):
if we ever get a Congress again who is actually
serious about reform, I think there are some great things
that could be done. But in the meantime, we're going
to have you know, Jamie Raskin just started this anti
corruption task force and they're looking at what, you know,
corruption that's happening both within the administration and even on

(17:39):
on Capitol Hill. With the stock trading, for example, there's
been this We've been on a hope and a prayer
of getting a stock trading ban for really long time
now still has not happened.

Speaker 1 (17:51):
But you know, it's one of those depressing moments because
you know, this is an issue that's what seventy thirty
eighty twenty with the public right, it's not even there
is no This is one of those where I think
eighty percent of Republicans, eighty percent of Democrats are like, yeah, yeah,
members of Congress wouldn't be able to trade stocks like this.
That makes sense to me. It's amazing and why getting

(18:13):
the details on paper has been so difficult.

Speaker 2 (18:15):
And I think part of it is not that there
is a lack of will or interest. It is that
there is a leadership issue. You know, we're non part
as an organization, but I like to say we don't
endorse or support candidates or parties, but we're like the
umpire we called balls and strikes. And the reality is

(18:35):
that for us, as we see it, this is the
most corrupt administration. But it is also an administration that
has such strong authoritarian tendencies that there is a huge
fear among people that if you go against this president
and his wishes, you will lose your job. And so

(18:55):
there's also a lack of moral courage. I think that
we're seeing come out of here. It's just ego for
some who think, well, if I'm not here to do this,
then somebody else won't do a good job, like, you know,
as good a job as me. But the reality is
that people are fearful to even put certain pieces of
legislation forward because it'll upset the president. And that that's herey, please.

Speaker 1 (19:16):
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start with one that I'm an advocate of. When I

(21:09):
call the NASCAR approach instant disclosure forced. You know, when
I've been thinking about different ideas to sort of limit
money without a constitutional amendment. There are some things that
I think are are not easy, right. I mean, we
have the judicial we may not like how the judiciary
branch is interpreting the First Amendment when it comes to money.

(21:33):
And that's a twenty five year It's going to take
years in order to get that sort of change. So
in the meantime, you either fight for a constitutional amendment
or there might be a way to do things. And
so one thought I've always had is if you allowed
for unlimited donations, but once you give a certain amount

(21:57):
of money, once you take a certain amount of money
from somebody, you have to print their name, say their
name every time you communicate to the public, you know,
instead of the stand by your at it's you know,
I'm Chuck Todd, and I approved this message, which was
paid for by Jeff Bezos, Mark and Dreesen and Mark Zuckerberg.

(22:21):
And that at a minimum, let's say I made the
threshold ninety nine thousand dollars nine hundred and ninety nine, right,
anything one hundred thousand or more, you'd have to say
the name. I promise you Mark Zuckerberg would only hand
out checks of ninety nine hundred and ninety nine dollars, right,
what do you think of ideas like that? I'm sort
of being a little exaggeration where you open the door

(22:44):
its instant disclosure or an unlimited But if you want
to take unlimited, you've got to basically talk about your
donor the every time you communicate in your campaign.

Speaker 2 (22:56):
You know, it's funny because clob Senator Cloba Shier has
something called the disclosed Zac that she's put forward pretty
much every Congress. Yea, yeah, And I actually testified on
this a couple of years ago in the committee and
the opposition. Their basic pushback on this was, well, whatn't

(23:16):
the commercials have to be really long then if we were,
because they would have to name all of the people.
And I was thinking to myself, if you're worried about
how long a commercial or an ad is going to be,
like your priorities are completely messed up. But I think
this is the kind of thing when I was saying,
you know too earlier about having innovative solutions, we might
not be able to get everything that we want. We

(23:40):
know DC is slow, we know reform is slow. We
also know that constitutional amendments, I mean, how it took
seventy two years for women to have the right to vote.

Speaker 1 (23:48):
For the mast meaningful amendment we added was lowering the
voting age, and that was you know, before I was born.

Speaker 2 (23:55):
That was in the seventies and that was actually common
Cause who spearheaded that. So I'm just going to that
from ding ding dang. There you go, in addition to
sunshine laws. But I will say that it's these kinds
of solutions that you're talking about that it's a level
of we have to be more innovative here because while

(24:15):
we're trying to move the big pieces, we have to
think about even in a small way, just like that
kind of a disclosure. It gives more information to the people.
And at the end of the day, transparency is a
big part of this. If people don't know where it's
coming from. And we're not always on the same page
as our friends. Look, Anthony Romero from ACLU is a

(24:37):
good friend of mine and a mentor somebody a doore
ACLU is not on the same page as we are
around disclosure.

Speaker 1 (24:43):
Yeah, I've noticed that there's this argument, like the counter
on disclosure I always hear is, well, you know, some
people don't want to advertise their politics. Yeah, I'm like, Okay,
then don't give money. I mean, I don't like I
don't like that. Doesn't you know if you don't want
to advertise your politics, and why are you giving money?

(25:03):
You clearly you're you're you're deciding, you know, so you
want to anonymously you know. Look, you get to vote
just like everybody else, but you want an unfair advantage
to finance a campaign. But that's one of the arguments
I hear.

Speaker 2 (25:16):
Yeah, and that's one of I think, But that's the
bigger issue here. And so I think what we've seen,
I'm kind of grateful. And this might sound strange when
it comes to this administration, because what we've seen is
so egregious, right, what we've.

Speaker 1 (25:35):
Seen before, it's an MRI. I'm so glad you said
it that way. I believe this. I think fifty years
from now, we'll look back and think and basically say, well,
Donald Trump showed us where we had our vulnerabilities. He
was an MRI for our vulnerabilities.

Speaker 2 (25:51):
Maybe even a cat scan. I mean, like literally we
can see inside the intestines. But it's wild, right, And
so we sit here every day and I mean, just
like yesterday with the one point and I have to
say one point seven seven six billion, Yeah, symbolism before.

Speaker 1 (26:08):
I refuse to do it. It's one point eight. I'm rounding.
I'm not giving in that, but it's.

Speaker 2 (26:12):
Seventeen seventy six. The symbolism behind it, which is great,
you know, just wild. But you know what we've seen.
I think it makes Watergate look quaint.

Speaker 1 (26:23):
It was as I wrote I wrote in my substack earlier,
and this is going to air next week, so I'll say,
you know, late late last week, Nixon had enough shame
to hide this stuff.

Speaker 2 (26:34):
No, no, but Donald Trump isn't ashamed. This is exactly
who he said he was.

Speaker 1 (26:40):
Going to normalize. He's normalizing it. And my great fear
is that he's going to make people think well because
Trump basically says this, Yeah, all politics is corrupt. I'm
just honest about my corruption. Yeah, basically saying it.

Speaker 2 (26:53):
Think about It's really interesting because my staff we have
about one hundred and fifty staff members, and many of
our staff are younger gen z or you know, young millennials,
and you know they're coming in and it was wild
for me when we were asking folks in a recent

(27:13):
staff meeting, you know, what is your first memory of politics?
And none of them remember Barack Obama being president or
George Bush being president. So many of them young. So
one of the young folks they were in elementary school
when Donald Trump, or maybe middle school in high school
when Donald Trump became president. So their orientation and their

(27:37):
political awakening that was happening is this is all they've seen.
And for many who came before that were like, there
was actually a world before this where the biggest concern
that Republicans had was or the biggest job they could
could make towards Obama was wearing a tan suit. I mean,

(28:00):
there's a level of corruption here that I don't think
any of us have ever seen in our lifetimes. And
so I think there is going to be a backlash
at some point.

Speaker 1 (28:11):
People we all agree with that, right, we just don't
know when did we hit that. You know, I'm a
I'm Churchillian in this respect, Becaus Churchill once said, the
Americans always eventually get it right after they've exhausted every
other path, and so we'll figure it out.

Speaker 2 (28:24):
We'll figure it out. But the question is how much
damage is going to be done as a result. And
I think one of the things that is both concerning,
you know, just for us here as the American people,
but it's what our standing is in the world globally
and what this means for us because we see some

(28:47):
of the people that we have aligned ourselves with, or
the countries that we have aligned ourselves with, are also
not necessarily folks who have the best interest of the
United States at the end. And so you know this
there we are at this crossroads right now where not
only is it a moral decision that we need to
make for our country and whose interests are represent it,

(29:09):
but I think there's also something to be said about
our long term global standing, which has been severely damaged.

Speaker 1 (29:16):
So look, there's a lot that Common Cause could focus
on when it came to priorities, and you've talked about
some of these things, but you know, this is one
of those like how do you eat an elephant? And
it is you know, the cliche is one bye at
a time, But this is this this corruption issue, this
this sort of cat scan or MRI that that the
President has sort of handed us and we see, oh
my god, we've got to update this and this, and

(29:38):
you know, it's like find it's like getting your house
inspected and finding out, my god, there are termites everywhere.
Do I just bulldoze the place or where do I
start the repair? So walk me through what is your
priority this calendar year, this election season, and then what's
your priority for the next two years? And then what
are some issues that you'd love to tackle, but you know,

(29:59):
you got to do one and three first, and then
we'll let other groups focus on four and five.

Speaker 2 (30:04):
Yeah, So on the corruption piece. In the immediate we
have been trying to stop the bleeding, so to speak,
and so we've been heavily engaged in litigation. I mean,
we are filing lawsuits left and right. We just had
litigation that we filed against Trump and the irs last week.
We are we have been in this kind of I
refer to it as a rapid response phase because what

(30:26):
we're seeing is coming so fast. And then working at
local level reforms. I think one of the things that
a lot of people forget is that when you're able
to work at the state level, you're building momentum for
the federal government. You're building momentum towards large scale reform.
We're working also with people like Senator Warren's office we're working,

(30:49):
you know, both with members of the House and the
Senate to look at where we can again put our
fingers in the dike stop some of the purge. Are
there some immediate things? How are we bringing light We're
doing a lot of research, a lot of investigative research.
We work with partners, and so we have great groups
like Campaign, Legal Center and Demos and there are all

(31:12):
these great groups who were doing the work, and then
also groups like Protect Democracy, Ian Bassing who you know.
We just have this amazing group of partners who we
have created kind of a coalition of both thinkers and doers,
the thinkers and the practitioners. So as we think about
what reform looks like, we're also putting plans in place

(31:32):
to be able to figure out how do we test
some of these reforms at the state level. So that's
kind of the immediate The other thing is, though, the
organizing piece of this, and I think community organizing and
anti corruption is not something that naturally comes to people's minds,

(31:53):
but I will tell you we have something called our
Million Conversations Campaign, and we have a goal to have
a million conversationations with everyday people before the twenty eight election,
And we're talking to folks all throughout the country, whether
you are a farmer and rural in the breast.

Speaker 1 (32:10):
What are these canvassers? What's the what's the idea?

Speaker 2 (32:13):
These are organizers, and these are members of our organization.
I told you we have a million members already.

Speaker 1 (32:18):
People go door knock and com from Common Cause, They're
going to neighborhoods.

Speaker 2 (32:22):
What's we're having town halls, We're having what we call
kitchen table conversations. We're asking our members to each have
these conversations. At least twenty five individuals. Forty thousand of
our members have signed up to have twenty five conversations,
to talk and to record. What are the things that
are most pressing, What are the solutions that they see

(32:44):
that are most necessary? What do they want from their
elected leaders? And we're asking them to talk to other people,
and we're getting this information back and we're hearing because pulling,
you know, is as good as the sample that you have,
and you're asking these quick question.

Speaker 1 (33:01):
Pulling is good for what, it's not good for whys exactly?

Speaker 2 (33:04):
And when we're hearing from and I like that actually,
and what we're hearing from folks is that there is
a fatigue that people are feeling, not only because they're
seeing the amount of information, but people are struggling just
on an everyday basis. That affordability piece ties to the
anti corruption work in a way that I didn't even imagine,

(33:25):
because people are saying, I can't afford to pay my bills.
We don't have enough money for groceries. Farmers are saying,
we can't buy the fertilizer. But yet, you know, and
what's going to happen. We're going to have to charge
more for food later on down the line because it's
going to cost us more to yield these crops. And
they're saying, but I see all of this happening, and

(33:49):
I'm saying, the rich keep getting richer. You know, we
talk about it as a case shaped economy, but the
reality is that the people are on the downside of
that k they are feeling it much differently than the
people who are on the upsite, and they're angry. And
so this all does also come back to voting, and
voting ties in because people need to not only be angry,

(34:09):
but when we bring the conversation to everyday people, and
I'm talking about people from all walks of life, black brown,
Native American communities, rural farmers, people who live in the
inner city, suburban moms, they're all saying the same thing.
And people who are looking for a sense of agency,
a sense of something to belong to that isn't one

(34:30):
of the political parties, and by creating a home for them,
it gives people the opportunity to act. So organizing for
us is not just about putting policy being you know
this Washington group who is putting forward ideas to give
to politicians. No, we're saying to everyday folks, how can
you be part of the solution? Because John Gardner, our founder,

(34:52):
that is exactly where he started. We're bringing it back
to the basics until there's a real movement of everyday
folks who are demanding this. And I'm not talking about marchism,
telling people about people who are going to show up
to their town halls, people who are going to push
their local legislators. That's where I think real hardcore organizing
comes in and getting people to stand up and do something.

Speaker 1 (35:13):
You know, it's interesting as you were talking about that,
I was thinking about the election in Hungary because I
feel like and I want to learn more. I want
to keep learning more about his about his victory, but
it appears to me, what you know, Look, there was
political opposition to Orbon before they pointed out the corruption,
before it was widely known how corrupt things were. What

(35:37):
the moment, the reason the opposition one this time is
it seemed to connect with people's lives, right, they were
able to see that what you just described, I'm having trouble.
And wait a minute, government's not only not paying attention,
they're actually transacting over here. And you know, while they're
making money off of stock trades, I'm paying more or

(36:00):
for chicken, I'm paying more for gas and this. And
you know, I've always said, and it's I'm My greatest
fear is if we don't view this corruption as alarming,
and instead it's just seen as just as just the
way business is done. Because look, I'm watching this gerrymandering

(36:22):
business and when you start to one side says we're
going to do it, and the other side says, well,
we think it's a bad idea, but now we have
no choice to do it. Good people will do bad
things if they think the incentives are aligned the wrong way.
And I worry that if this corruption essentially gets normified,
gets sort of where the voters are essentially accept it

(36:45):
right because they don't punish it. That you'll see all
parties start to do this.

Speaker 2 (36:51):
But I think we've already gotten to that point, right.
I think it's just a different approach to it. So
when when President Trump reached out to Governor Abbott and said,
you know, we want you to redistrict the state mid
cycle redistricting, you know, redistricting in the middle is usually
only done because there's some core order, because a map

(37:14):
wasn't done like correctly, and the Voting Rights Act was
the main protection that we had. It's usually because because
you know, in our crucial v. Common Cause case that
was decided by the Supreme Court a few years ago,
they basically gave a green light on political gerrymandering. Excuse me,
it was the protections of the Voting Rights Act that

(37:37):
really prevented it from being completely out of control. And
we know, particularly in the South, Black people in the
South are the ones who are going to be most
harmed by these political gerrymanders. But in California, when when
Gavin Newsom said, hey, you know we're going to do
this here, We're going to fight back. One of the
things that we did was we put forth something called

(37:59):
fairness criteria. We knew that we weren't going to be
able to stop this, but at least we were trying
to say, you're not going to crack and pack districts
to do harm to people of color, specifically black people
Native Americans. With the recent Calai decision, all bets are off. Basically,
it was the death of the Voting Rights Act in

(38:22):
many ways, and so this is happening. It's going to happen.

Speaker 1 (38:28):
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my point is that like and there are people who
may have good intentions who are going to pursue essentially
what are undemocratic ideas, And that's my concern of this
sort of the whole fight fire with fire approach, you

(40:18):
know where, Look, if you believe what Texas is doing
is disenfranchising voters, the answer isn't to disenfranchised voters in
your state, right And I understand that's what you said
you were trying to do in California, and I get it.
But to me, this is my concern about this corruption
that we see pay to play, pay to play becomes
an accepted practice. Trust me, it isn't going to stay

(40:38):
in one party.

Speaker 2 (40:39):
But the difference was with California and for Virginia recently,
which also is not happening now, is that there was
a vote that was brought.

Speaker 1 (40:49):
To the people, so they did at least go to
the people. I will. I yes, it's better than not
going to the voters.

Speaker 2 (40:56):
It's better than not good to the people. But it's
all race to the bottom, right, and I think.

Speaker 1 (41:00):
Correctly, and there's nobody's going to win that race. There's
no winner.

Speaker 2 (41:03):
Supreme Court has not helped either in the sense that
they have not given any solutions. So first, you're not
going to determine how much political jerry mandering is too
much jerrymandering, and then you're basically saying that we're living
in a post racial society where we don't need this
protections anymore. I mean, it's it's kind of well, the.

Speaker 1 (41:20):
Problem with jerrymandering and this is where you know, so
I'm I'm one of these weird dorks that believes that
they answered all this is actually expanding the house. I
think if you if we if we right size the house,
founders intent right, They thought the house should grow with
the people, and we haven't let the house grown over

(41:40):
one hundred basically one hundred years. It makes jerry mandering
more effective. Sadly, where if you had more members of Congress,
I'm not saying you're not gonna have jerry mandering. And
by the way, we all now self sorted, so you
could if if your goal is to create competitive districts,
you might have to jerry mander in order to create
a competitive district the days, so there's all sorts of

(42:01):
I think challenges. Is it better to pursue the to
zag here instead of fighting over how we should determine maps?
Is it possible that we just don't have a big
enough Congress to properly represent this three democracy that's three
hundred and fifty million people.

Speaker 2 (42:20):
Oh absolutely, I mean you have four hundred and thirty
five members of the House and you have one hundred
people in the Senate. I mean the Senate is a
bigger issue for me in a lot of ways because malapportioned.

Speaker 1 (42:31):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (42:31):
Yeah, it's the apportionment issue, and it is a bigger
issue in the sense that it's you have two senators
in California and you have two senators from Delaware, for example. Well,
that's like completely different populations. How is that a fair
representation of the people, So.

Speaker 1 (42:51):
I thinks, and more importantly, you've also you know, the
reason that compromise happened was that the House was supposed
to at least be right sized on your population. So
California is not only underrepresented in the Senate, California is
also underrepresented in the House. I promise you. Virginia and Massachusetts,
which were the two states that everybody else was worried

(43:13):
was going to have too much power at the founding,
you know, they had right sized power in the House
based on their population. So California is hurt twice here,
not just once.

Speaker 2 (43:26):
Oh yeah, and so you know that is another thing
I need. I mean, at the end of the day,
you asked me something earlier about what the solutions are,
and me saying, you know, I'm kind of thankful in
a way that some of this stuff is happening, because
I think it's going to force us into or hope

(43:47):
it forces us to think about what this country and
what democracy should look like, you know. And what I
mean by that is we haven't changed that much over time.
You still have, you know, basically the same rules, the
same people, and the way that they were operating one

(44:09):
hundred and fifty years ago. You know, two hundred years ago,
we're coming up on the what is it the semi quincentennial.
I had to learn how to.

Speaker 1 (44:17):
Sign I don't know what right two hundred? Why can't
we just say two fifty. It's sort of like, you know,
there's certain things we come up with these nobody says
these words, except for when we're trying to come up
with a word for two fifty.

Speaker 2 (44:26):
But that's okay, right, But at the end of the day,
you know, we are not the same country we were
when we were founded, and the way that our system
of government was applied then is no longer working for us, and.

Speaker 1 (44:43):
So my fear, to their credit, they gave us tools
to update it. It's actually, you know, every historian I've
talked to, I said, how what would founders think if
they came back today? They were like, they wouldn't believe
there's only twenty seven amendments. They would they just assumed
we would be an active democracy.

Speaker 2 (45:00):
The tools, but not necessarily the will.

Speaker 1 (45:02):
Well, that's true.

Speaker 2 (45:03):
And and so you can have all the tools. You know,
you can lead a horse to water, but you can't
make it drink. Wasn't that the old saying? But a
lot of this does go back to the money and
the corruption and the self serving and the self dealing.
And I think that there is also a lack of
a sense of community that has that exists now in Washington.

(45:26):
I mean, I came to d C twenty five years ago,
and I'll never forget I was a young woman, you
know in Connecticut, Connecticut heart for Connecticut, and so you know,
I came and Barbara Kennelly was my representative when I
when I you know, back in the olden days and
so but when I first came I'll never forget. I

(45:49):
went to my first House Judiciary Committee meeting and John
Conyers and Henry Hyde were there and they were going
at it, and I was just, you know, clutching my girls, like,
oh my gosh, they're going out in this committee. And
then afterwards they said, Okay, come on, you're ready to
go get a drink. And I'm sitting there and I'm
thinking to myself, Oh, these guys are actually friends. They're

(46:12):
able to have compromise behind closed doors. And this also
happened back in the early twenty tens when we were
going through when we almost got immigration reform and Eric
Canter was up next to be Speaker of the House.
This is when he got primary.

Speaker 1 (46:28):
I lost and they all got spooked.

Speaker 2 (46:30):
And immigration reform did not happen. We came very close,
but there were relationships. You know, Gutierres and Eric Cancer
were able to have conversations or were able to get
to something different behind closed doors. And right now they

(46:51):
don't even speak to each other.

Speaker 1 (46:53):
I mean, you know, the word bipartisan is a bad
word to regular voters to these days. In fact, I've
been working with some groups that are trying really hard
to figure out to create new incentive structures for people
to break from their party, but not leave their party. Right,
There's plenty of people who would like to had to
have their own opinions. They want to stay a Democrat
or stay a Republican, but they don't agree with where

(47:16):
leadership is going on a specific issue. They'd like to
cross the aisle and work there. But if they do it,
particularly on one side of the aisle these days, they
could lose everything, right, rather than just sort of going, oh, yeah,
so and so it's seventy percent with us, but yeah,
thirty percent of the time they're over here. But you
know what, seventy percent is better than nothing, right, So

(47:36):
that's why they're a member of our caucus. Right, Whether
you know, I could be referring to Joe Mansion or
Lisa Murkowski, right, that's not you know, that's that's sort
of a real It is really hard. I want to
I don't want to violate confidence. But there was a
there was an individual member of Congress who broke from
their party and they explained what happened when they did it.

(47:59):
They got all these text messages from people that they
knew very well, or going what are you doing? Why
are you giving aid and comfort and all this stuff?
And it was like the person said they had no
problem on the issue, moving, you know, going in a
different direction. But the peer pressure was rough. Yeah, and
it was, and it made it gave me an empathy

(48:20):
for some of these elected officials that maybe I was lacking.
That there are and you just brought it up. There
are individual members who know we've got it, this isn't working,
but the incentive structure makes it that speaking out. You
mentioned it earlier, right, that they're afraid, and that's that's
something that I don't know how you reform an incentive structure.

Speaker 2 (48:43):
Well, you know, it's interesting we all remember this, right,
like if you know, you know the thumbs down moment
from John mcking there there aren't we've lost statesmen through
this process. You know, John McCain was a statesman. He cared,

(49:05):
I think deeply about the country. I didn't agree with
a lot of his policies. There were policies that I
did agree with, but he stood behind his values and
what he thought was right. He voted his conscience. And
there are very few people left in Congress who have
the ability to vote their conscience, who have the ability

(49:27):
to show up in a way because of the way
that the system has changed. It's in all or nothing.
This is a zero sum game. It's you know, we
describe people as good versus evil when we talk about
our country, and so I think, again, going back to
what needs to change, it's more than legislative policy. There

(49:50):
is in some ways many of many people have become
morally bankrupt in order to financially benefit and or because
they their goal is to be a politician. Their entire
lives being a politician and an elected leader used to

(50:11):
be about service. I don't know that it's about service anymore.
So I think there's a bigger examination that we have
to have for ourselves as a country when we think
about what the expectations of our leaders are, where we
are creating job descriptions for them. That's why when I
was talking about these million conversations. We're tired of having

(50:31):
leaders put forward a platform and we have no input
into what that should be. We want to be able
to have the American people actually have a say and
where they want this country to go. And I think,
you know, politics are always a dirty business, but at
this point, it's like we're basement level, you know, So

(50:54):
one of.

Speaker 1 (50:55):
The issues and I know you wanted to talk about this,
so I want to sort of lead you to it
a little bit, which has to do with what's happening
and how you campaign in America. Right, it's not just money.
But we've now got AI. We certainly there are we
don't have rules yet for how AI should be used,
which means we are going to see and we're already
seeing it, right, like the AI slop with some campaigns

(51:17):
that we're already seeing in certain places. And I don't
want to single out campaigns right now because then you
get down a rabbit hole about a specific campaign. But
there's some AI slop out there, and it's and one
side is doing more slop at the moment than the other.
But I know it's just a matter of everybody. Nobody
wants to ever have a disadvantage, right, So we know
it's coming, yet we have no rules around this. And

(51:39):
I you know, I'm now in my mid fifties and
I'll admit, like, I'll see stuff and someone will say, well,
that's obvious AI, and I'm like it is, you know,
And I'm like, I think my eyes are a little
bit older now. I'm worried, Like my kids figure it out.
But some of this stuff and it's like, I don't
know what are the you know what what is it?
A A Is there current laws in the books that

(52:01):
you think could govern against the use of aislot?

Speaker 2 (52:06):
No, this is the wild West. And that's what makes
it so scary. You know, there are some social media platforms,
for example, that self regulate content. So, for example, on TikTok,
they do require you to say this is an AI
generated content, and they do a pretty good job of
you know, whatever issues people might have with TikTok, they're

(52:28):
actually probably better than most. Meta does not provide those
same requirements, and so we see an X. I mean,
x's forget about it.

Speaker 1 (52:37):
The amount of area really is the wild West now?

Speaker 2 (52:40):
It is XES. I mean, I don't even know what
to say about that. But the amount of AI generated content,
and like you said, it's so good. It's not like
even you know, three years ago, where somebody would put
a picture and there might be like a sixth finger
or something on somebody's hand. No, it is so very
lifelike and realistic. And the part of the challenge, I

(53:00):
think is that Congress is always behind the eight ball
when it comes to knowing how to I mean, look,
we have an age issue in Congress as well that
ties to this because we have people a lot of
you know, we have a lot of.

Speaker 1 (53:17):
Other But in fairness, even if we had a younger Congress.
Government does not move fast, no, in general.

Speaker 2 (53:24):
But the understanding of it.

Speaker 1 (53:26):
And technology is moving so fast. I don't know what
the right way to regulate AI because the minute you
figure it out, it changes on you.

Speaker 2 (53:34):
And that is that in itself lies the issue. But
again going back to we might not be able to
regulate everything in this moment, but going back to that
idea around transparency and disclosure and being required especially with
political content, that you should there should be something in
place that requires political content to be labeled as AI

(53:58):
if it's AI.

Speaker 1 (53:59):
And like out loud, like it can't be. You know
how You'll see some prescription drug ads and it will
if you if you read carefully, they'll say this. The
portrayals are actors or they're paid actors or paid endorsers.
They don't say it. It is written that if you
squint right, or you have a big enough screen TV,
you might notice it. Like it the disclosure's got to

(54:22):
be this is AI material, like I want it to
be like louder than the actual commercial itself, you know.

Speaker 2 (54:29):
And and AI isn't completely harmful. Look, we use it
every day in our lives. You just have to do
a simple search and there's AI assist.

Speaker 1 (54:37):
That will can't avoid it. I know these people I
never use AI. Really, you're not on the internet like
trust me. Yeah, you're using as if you're doing search.
You're using AI whether you want to or not. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (54:48):
But the political content, the deep fake videos, which are
really concerning, and last election was one of the times
where I think we saw some of this in twenty
twenty I mean twenty twenty four in a real way.
But it was I think the first time where I realized, oh,
this is actually we had to litigate in twenty twenty

(55:10):
four over some of the deep deep bake content because
it was so disparaging to people.

Speaker 1 (55:16):
And so is that problem. I mean, it's funny you
bring up litigation. Sometimes civil litigation is the only way
we create some of these guardrails, you know. Basically, I
guess you make a bunch of AI defamation suits.

Speaker 2 (55:30):
Yeah, and that's part of the challenge though, is that
again going back to this idea of creativity, we're facing
things nobody has ever faced before. This is stuff that
we nobody knows what to do with it, and there
is the will. Like in Europe, there's a lot of
regulation that happens around AI content and I think they're
probably doing better. At least folks in the European Union

(55:54):
are doing a better job.

Speaker 1 (55:55):
Away was joke and if you care about privacy, help
the EU passes something.

Speaker 2 (55:58):
Yeah, But here we're not even like there is even
no real attempt at this point, and so civil litigation
really is the only way to go to bring these
things in the forefront and then figuring out where we
can draw legislative solutions or propose legislative solutions. But the complexity,
I mean, it's like, you know, asking big tech to

(56:21):
regulate themselves is I mean, it's not going to happen,
and so what do we And again there's there there
was a lot of ethical There was a much more
of an ethical approach to AI, I think just a
few years ago and the way that people spoke about it.
And now it's just a race or a competition to
see if we can beat China and that, and that's

(56:42):
really scary because when it's looked at as a competition
to see who can go further and faster, as opposed
to what is the impact of the people who will
be on the recipients of this technology, We've found ourselves
in a really dire place.

Speaker 1 (57:00):
Before I let you go, you brought up something. You know,
one of the founding successes for Common Cause was the
fight for sunshine laws. And I was I grew up
in Florida and we've had sunshine laws, and you know,
it's one of these It's ironic to me, the party
that now is trying to kill it was the party
that actually was the one who championed it because they

(57:21):
used to be in the minority and now they're in
the majority. And that happens quite a bit with political parties,
you know. They they they're pro something until they get
power and they're like, oh no, I don't know if
I want that anymore. But these sunshine laws have stock
and they certainly serve as a pretty good check on
what is I think kind of a weak legislature in Florida.

(57:42):
Ditto in Texas. Right if we didn't have the sunshine
laws in Texas, there'd be a lot more things we
didn't know. What's the status of sunshine laws around the country.
Who are some of the better states, and where are
you worried that there's going to be some rollbacks?

Speaker 2 (57:57):
You know, I think by and large, well Florida. Actually
it has been a stop gap in Florida, which is
really interesting, and in states around the country. I think,
you know, that's a hard question for me to answer
because I think in the states that have them, and
which is pretty much every state in the country had

(58:19):
them to very form of them. Yeah, yeah, it's a
varying degrees.

Speaker 1 (58:22):
But Florida. You go to Florida, like any individual, any citizen, like,
it's a little more some states are we're more responsive
to their sunshine laws is probably a better way to
put it.

Speaker 2 (58:31):
Yeah, I mean, I think there are states like Rhode Island,
who's doing a great job and they continue to expand
sunshine laws. I think that some of the states where
I am more concerned are states like North Carolina, for example.
North Carolina is an interesting state.

Speaker 1 (58:51):
Superpower legislative branch, super weak executive branch.

Speaker 2 (58:54):
Exactly, and so where you see that there is not
parody between the or the balance of power doesn't exist,
there becomes an opportunity. So when you see one of
the states, North Carolina is also a state that has
an elected Supreme Court, these this is a part isan court.
And so when you see jerrymandering combined with partisan elected

(59:17):
Supreme Court UH officers, and then you see a government
that is very much jerrymandered or the state is very
much cheerymandered, and then you see just how the balance
of power is off. Those are the states where I
see the biggest opportunity to roll back sunshine laws. And

(59:39):
so again this is just really about having a government
that is for and by the people, and that means
having some norms and having balance in place. And when
that balance gets off, you're a you're in a world
of trouble.

Speaker 1 (59:54):
Is there can we have a movement to get rid
of elected judges? You know Alexander Hamilton and Federalist seven,
when he was making his case for judiciary, was making
the case you know he doesn't He makes the case
against the election of Supreme Court judges and saying electing
judges is you know you got to have He's basically
making the case for umpires and is and is least

(01:00:15):
part at least factional. I think he calls it factions.
Back then we didn't have parties yet, that they're not
going to favor one faction or the other. Or you
try to find as neutral of an arbiter as you
can find. So the reason I always like to ground
this argument in the federalist papers is because anybody wants
to play originalism with me or any of that stuff,
It's like, this was founder's intent. And ultimately, you know,

(01:00:38):
and I do not understand these states that elect Supreme
Court justices and it's just I don't you know, it's
it's really seems so corruptible. You know, I'm not saying
every elected Supreme Court justice is corrupt, but it's a corrupt.
It's a more corruptible process than doing it through appointments now,

(01:00:59):
because some would argue, well, you know, an executive is
biased and this is you know, you can still have
these things. It's like, yeah, but the judge to actually
take the money themselves, right to know that they need donors,
you know, that's going to show up in their courtroom.
You know, it just it's inevitable.

Speaker 2 (01:01:16):
It is inevitable. And I think you're absolutely right. I
mean and look at the most recent Supreme Court case
in North Carolina with Alison Riggs. I mean, it was
millions and millions and millions of dollars the most expensive
court race because it wasn't just about the race itself,
which she won, it's that it was contested and so

(01:01:36):
there were just a ridiculous amount of money for it
to take months and months and months to say, oh,
actually she she did win. And so what happens is
when you have Supreme Court justices who have to spend
more of their time, a big large chunk of their
time fundraising prior to an election, the business of the

(01:01:58):
people is not happening. But again, and it comes into this.

Speaker 1 (01:02:02):
There's somebody you take a donation, you've potentially compromised yourself.

Speaker 2 (01:02:05):
Well exactly, and then you have to step back and say, well,
I mean, and this is if people.

Speaker 1 (01:02:11):
Step back right and everybody does it right.

Speaker 2 (01:02:13):
Not everybody is going to do that. And so it
is Look, I would love to leave with.

Speaker 1 (01:02:18):
Some hope and what I was going to get. Don't worry,
I was actually going to do that give And so
you're right, I'm look, because you know it's like a
you know, I joke I got a lot of you know,
every day is Festivus on the Check podcast with our
politics right now, I got a lot of problems with
you people. But look, what if you don't have optimism,
you're not going to get out of bed, right So

(01:02:40):
what what what gives you hope? I mean, I like
to call myself short term pessimistic, but long term optimistic.
So tell me why you're optimistic.

Speaker 2 (01:02:48):
I'm optimistic because the people in this country aren't stupid.
For as much as we see people trying, even the
people who are pushing back against what we see right now,
they are as much the patriot is the person who
stands outside every day waving a flag. People love this
country and people want to be able to live in
a country that loves them back. And I think sometimes

(01:03:12):
that means standing up and pushing back. And we've been
in this place before. We went through McCarthyism in the
nineteen fifties, during the same time where Jim Crow was happening,
during the same time in the nineteen sixties where we
saw the women's rights movement happening. So many things that happened,
and on the edge of that, after that that when
that next chapter was written, it was always so much better,

(01:03:36):
whether it was the Great Depression and then seeing the
big New Deal that came out of it, the Great
New Deal that came afterwards after the World War Two,
and we saw a very prosperous nation. This is a
dark time for our country, but we will get through it,
and we will be able to be better as a result.
And it's going to be the American people everyday, folks

(01:03:58):
who aren't connected to the wealthy and the powerful, standing
up and taking back their country and using their vote
and their voice. Who we're going to do it.

Speaker 1 (01:04:07):
Well. Look, a group like Common Cause has to have
some idealism in it, or we're not going to get
compromise solutions thater effective. That's what I always say. You
sort of have to aim for the aim for the
perfect in order to get people to sit down and
make things a little bit better.

Speaker 2 (01:04:22):
I couldn't have been doing this work for the past
thirty years if I, you know, wasn't hopefully optimistic all
the time. And the reality is that we're it's rough
right now, but we're going to be okay. But everybody
has to do their part. Being a citizen in this
country means you have to It's more than just go
into the ballot box. It's actually showing up at the
local level and then doing everything you can to help

(01:04:45):
your fellow neighbor while we're fighting this fight.

Speaker 1 (01:04:47):
It's well said, look that's we all need to realize
that citizenship is active. It's right, absolutely like what you see.
Get up off your took us anyway, Virginia. This was
a pleasure.

Speaker 2 (01:05:00):
Thank you so much, Chuck, really appreciate you having m
m m m m

Speaker 1 (01:05:08):
Hm