July 8, 2026 • 33 mins
As artificial intelligence expands at a historic pace, massive data centers are appearing across America — but what impact are they having on our communities, resources, and way of life?
In this episode of The Tudor Dixon Podcast, Tudor sits down with Benji Backer, founder of Nature Is Nonpartisan and United by Nature, to discuss the growing concerns surrounding AI data centers, Big Tech’s influence, energy demand, water usage, and the future of conservation in America.
Benji explains why the debate over the environment should not be divided by politics, why communities deserve a voice before major technology projects move in, and how America can balance innovation, national security, economic growth, and protecting natural resources.
Tudor and Benji also dive into the deeper questions surrounding AI, online privacy, social media addiction, America’s relationship with technology, and why reconnecting with family, community, and nature may be more important than ever.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the Tutor Dixon Podcast. We are going to
talk data centers today from the perspective of maybe some
of the stuff you don't necessarily know about data centers,
and from the conservation view and the environmental view, I
would argue oftentimes you hear that Republicans are not the
party of the environmentalist or the conservationists, and I have
(00:24):
to say, really, you have to ask yourself, well, who
is standing up for the environment these days, because we've
seen in my state Democrats who have brought in companies
and had no environmental testing done. They were going to
put chemicals into our water. It was just like to
get the big factory into the state. They were willing
(00:46):
to do anything. So I say that saying I don't
think that this is necessarily a partisan issue, that one
side is better than the other. But I think it
is a nonpartisan issue and every side it has to
get involved. I believe that the person that we have
on today would probably agree with that. His name is
Benji Backer. He is the founder and CEO of Nature
(01:10):
is Nonpartisan and United by Nature, one of the leading
environmental voices in the country. Benji, thank you so much
for coming on to talk about this today.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
It's great to be here.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Couldn't agree more that we should all be at the
table and that neither side is better than the others.
So it's great to great to have an allied voice.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
Well, I love what United by Nature says. It's like,
we're not here. You guys have this quote. We're not
here to convince you to care. We're here to remind
you that you already do. I think that's fascinating because
I think we do. Life is very complicated in the
fact that it's like, oh, we care until we see
something that we feel like book, but we need this,
(01:50):
but we need this, and that I think is the
politics coming into play. It's something that I love that
you're out there fighting against it. This is a new fight,
I think with data centers as we see this. And
before we got on, I was telling you that we've
talked about the wind farms before, and the solar farms
that are going out and taking a big chunk of land.
(02:11):
We've talked about the ocean, the wind farms that are
out in the ocean and how they're affecting animals. And
when we talked about this, it was a few years
ago and they were saying we're not getting a lot
of response from the administration. I'll say a few weeks ago,
I saw the President. He had Secretary Bergham behind him.
(02:33):
Somebody asked about wind farms and how they were affecting
the marine life, and they said, we're meeting with people.
Do you get the impression that the administration is starting
to say, Okay, we need to look at this, we
need to be a little bit more realistic about how
this is affecting the environment, rather than just say this
is the next best thing, we got to jump into it.
Speaker 3 (02:54):
I'm a little bit skeptical, honestly, that the administration is
understanding the massive backlash that there is around data centers
and AI in general, because they're also trying to balance
the economic growth argument and the national security argument. And
it is, honestly a really hard conversation because data centers
are inherently not good for communities right now. That could
(03:18):
change that, you know, they could get better, they could
improve technology can get better. But as I've talked about,
there's only thirty jobs associated full time, long term with
the data center. It does increase the temperature around those
places where the data centers are built. The noise and
light pollution is substantial, and there's also the water and
(03:41):
energy usage component, so it doesn't provide a lot of jobs,
and it also harms the community in a lot of ways.
So when I think about nature, I don't think about
just the mountains out west, or you know, global climate
change or any things that people kind of this hyper
political term that's come with the word nature. I think
of the stream in people's neighborhoods. I think of the
(04:04):
trees in people's neighborhoods. I think of the birds in
people's backyards, and the water that people drink and the
energy that we use because we're relying on the resources
which is nature to survive, and data centers do pose
an mediate threat to that. Now, we also need to
compete with China, and we also need to compete with
other countries, and that's the tough balance the administration has
(04:26):
to take. But I do think that they're airing too
much on the side of tech and data centers versus communities,
and I think it's going to be something that does
hurt them in the midterms.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
There has not been a great explanation as to what
happens at the data centers Obviously, we know there's a
lot of processing that happens with AI, and we're hearing
it's the AI race. But I think there's also a
lot of mistrust when it comes to big tech, and
some people are saying, Man, we see all these cameras
going up, We've got all these data centers, this is
(04:58):
all this information is being process Are these really to
win that race? Could there be something else nefarious around it?
There has not been any discussion as to why they
are so critical other than AI, and I feel like
that's a conversation that needs to actually be had, but
there's not really people pushing back on that either.
Speaker 3 (05:18):
Yeah, I agree. I mean big tech does not have
our best interests in mind. If they did, they wouldn't
have the addictive algorithms and the AI that is hurting
a lot of people. I mean, I know personally people
who have been hurt by AI chats and being told
to do things that they shouldn't do. Like tech companies
(05:40):
are trying to make us divided, and they're trying to
pit us against one another. They're trying to get us
to hate liberals or hate conservatives, depending on what side
you're on, and they're genuinely tearing this country apart in
a lot of ways. Now, I also am not you know, naive.
I know that there's benefits, right, it's nice to be
able to ask AI, you know, what the what to
(06:01):
do in a city when you're gonna go visit, or
you know, there's certain things that are beneficial or some
efficiencies from a business standpoint. But tech companies in general
have their profits and their uh, you know, their their
power ultimately in mind. And so one of the one
of the problems with the data centers right now is
that they're being railroaded through without community support, without community
(06:26):
buy in. And that's partially because it's such a new
technology that they can say, well, if we don't do
it here, you know, China is gonna beat us. And
so they kind of are able to supersede anybody's individual feeling.
And I don't think that that's okay. And I also
think that this is sort of a bubble that we're in.
Is AI going away? Absolutely not, Should we you know,
(06:48):
be against everything that's AI related, No, but we do
need to be honest that there are negative ramifications that
the tech companies do not care, they do not have
our best interests in mind, and we need to step
up and say that they need to do better.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
There's so much stuff that I want to say about
what you just said, so I have to remember everything
that you just said, because this is really a deep
dive into this that we have not we have not
explored this. But you talked about people being upset that
they're just coming into their communities, and that to me
is the political connection here, because in politics, there's always
(07:25):
this desire to bring business to your state, to show
that you've been effective to like the results are the
press releases, right, it's hey, we've got this big, this
big data center coming in. It's bringing this much money
to the community. And in many cases they are bringing
some investment to the community. And in many cases the
compromise that is done in a government not in the community. Again,
(07:49):
the community members don't necessarily get to chime in. In Michigan,
we know we don't have local control, so we don't
get to chime in. But the behind the scenes is
oftentimes you're going to build a certain amount of power
stations here that will then give a discount to the people,
and there's a financial benefit, and then the press release
(08:10):
also comes out and says this is going to bring
twenty five hundred jobs to this community while they're building,
And you have to really read the fine print there
because it's all the people that come in to build
the data center. They're there for three six months, part
of me temporary job. Yeah, exactly, you're exactly right, yes,
(08:30):
the temporary jobs. But then you know, the data center
is a massive facility of computers that are holding data. Ultimately,
there's a lot of questions about, well, what is the
water doing. We in Michigan, we're very protective of our
water because we have some of the largest natural resources
of water in the entire world. But data centers are
(08:52):
looking here because they want to bring in water. Well,
then we hear they're not going to use water anymore.
They're going to have a different cooling system. To your point, like,
how is that raising the temperature, how is that taking
the energy?
Speaker 2 (09:04):
What is that?
Speaker 1 (09:06):
What is that method? We don't talk about it. We
just hear, oh, it's not going to use water, So
actually we feel better about it. The idea, the fact
that we don't know what's going into our own community
is very disturbing.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
Yeah, And honestly, the water thing is really interesting because
so energy wise, we all know that data centers aren't
going to use a lot of energy. You know, even
the data center companies talk about that. So that's that's
its own issue that is one hundred percent real. Then
there's the water issue, which people say is not real
or they say it's the biggest thing. Ever, here's the truth.
(09:41):
Some of the new technology does cool the water and
is able to reuse the water on site so that
people and companies don't have to use as much. The
challenge is that technology uses even more energy than the
energy production before for that technology is invented. And here's
(10:03):
here's the issue. Most energy sources use a ton of
water to power the energy. Coal, nuclear, natural gas uses
a ton of water to fuel our lives. So it's
just shifting the water to a different source. And then
the data center companies can say, well, we're not using it.
(10:23):
The energy companies are using it. Either way, the water
is an issue, So it doesn't matter if it's because
the energy sources are using it now versus the data
centers on site itself. So I don't know if that
makes sense, but that's the that's the roundabout way that
they're trying to defend the water usage argument, and unless
(10:44):
you don't dive a little bit deeper, you might say, oh,
they've they've figured it out, But in reality, they are
still threatening our water supply in a massive way. And
I live in Arizona where we don't actually have very
much water. If you aren't paying attention, I mean, the
Colorado River issue is massive. The Southwest is running out
of water, and it's not a hyperbole, it's one hundred
(11:05):
percent true. And data centers should not be built there
at the level that they are. And you're right, it's
not a red or blue thing. I mean, like the
governor of Arizona is a Democrat and they're rail roading
it through there, and in states where those Republicans they're
rail roading it through. And at the very least, we
need to be having an honest conversation about how damaging
(11:27):
this can be. And I don't think that the tech
companies want us to.
Speaker 1 (11:31):
No, absolutely not. The other thing that I find interesting is, again,
what is going through these data centers? How does this
actually impact our lives. My daughter said something to me
the other day that I had never heard, and I
thought this was actually pretty interesting. She's a writer. She
(11:52):
loves to write poems, she loves to write short stories.
She obviously writes for school. She wants to This is
what she wants to be. Ultimately, writing is her life goal. Right,
She said to me the other day, Yeah, I was
reading and it said, don't ever write anything that you
might want to publish one day in a Google Doc
(12:12):
because all of the Google docs are being consumed by AI,
and anything you write in a Google Doc is then
being spit out by AI. So someone could say, write
a story like this and it will just take your
piece and hand it to them. Well, well, I don't
even think about that when it comes to business. And
when you talk about business and business people saying AI
(12:35):
is so critical, do we even know how dangerous AI is?
Because what's stopping the Chinese from taking all of our stuff?
Speaker 3 (12:43):
Well, I think that that's privacy is dead on the Internet.
I think we just need to accept that anything we
say or do in the Internet, even if it's on
a private browser, even if it's on a private tab,
it is going to be shared or being tracked NonStop.
As I run an on profit and nature's non partisan,
and it's really scary when we talk to companies about ads,
(13:06):
how much they admit the fact that they know everything
about everyone all the time, that they can they can
target you based on what you ate for lunch yesterday.
I mean that just it's crazy, how creepy it is.
So we have to accept that privacy is dead on
the Internet, but how much.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
More so once this once these factories, data factories, I
mean this is literally factory stuff.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
Yes, they have all our stuff.
Speaker 3 (13:33):
So I actually think in a roundabout way, this is
going to be an important moment for humanity to decide
what we want, and it's going to be up to
our personal behavior in a way. Are we going to
stand up to the addiction and the tech kind of
incentive to make us addicted to their products? And are
(13:53):
we going to actually lean closer into our communities? And
that's what I actually hope. There's basically two we can
go down. We can go down this path of giving
our data to these companies and potentially China, but even
our own government. We just don't want to have all
this data in other people's hands about ourselves, and we
can become more and more screen addicted, more and more
tech addicted, or we can get closer to each other again,
(14:17):
closer to our families, closer to our communities, and start
to build something that's more substantive again, because we all
know that social media, even Google docs, right, they don't
provide us a lot of happiness or value. What provides
us happiness and value is human connection and you know,
families and close close relationships. That is not what's happening
(14:41):
with AIA, data centers or social media. So I think
if we move away from that, there's going to be
a little bit of a splintering. And that's why I
do believe that the AI thing is sort of a
bubble because there's a lot of people getting off social media,
there's a lot of people who are sick of AI.
There's a lot of people who don't want these things
to be built, and they're not even using AI or
they're using it very sparingly. And I think that there
(15:02):
is going to be a moment of choosing that a
lot of us are going to have to do individually
and if we want that future, the AI future, the
AI only future, or do we want a future that's
you know, creating more human relationships than we currently have.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
You bring up an interesting thing because, as I've watched
my kids grow up in this technology age, which is
much different than the way I grew up, and I
watch them get kind of connected to people they don't know,
and they're like, oh, I followed this channel, and you
know they did this today or they did that today.
They have slowly decided this is not real and stepped
(15:38):
away from it on their own. So it's been fascinating
to watch them go, Wow, this is actually as I
get older and I see people performing for the camera
that's not their real life and they're sort of turned
off by it. So kind of interested to see if
society does say, how much more are we going to
elevate people who just do crazy stuff for a camera,
(16:02):
but aren't there's no community there, They don't actually have
a sense of who their audience is. I mean, I
think one of the families that we just saw who
made the decision to abort their child on their channel,
got a lot of backlash. And we're seeing we're just
seeing this like there's a really ugly side to how
(16:25):
people react to you when they think they know you
but they don't actually know you. And and the kids that
are watching this today, I feel like as they watch this,
they go. Maybe I don't want that because I remember
when they were little, they were my girls. I admit
they were like, I'd love to be a YouTube star
when I grow up. I'm like, oh, my goodness, that's
not what you want out of life. But as they've
(16:47):
watched how that, how destructive that can be, maybe they
do step away from technology to a certain extent.
Speaker 3 (16:54):
Yeah, And there's so many I mean, social media makes
people miserable, even though I know so many social media
influencers into YouTube show hosts and people like that, and
they're not happy, Like technology does not make people happy.
Technology helps is supposed to help solve problems, but it's
not like, you know, it's helpful in curing cancer or
the fact that we can talk to each other right
(17:15):
now is very cool, but it's not meant to do
what it's doing right now. It's not meant to pit
people against one another, to get people so addicted that
they can't stop looking. And I think just people are
sort of fed up with it because at the end
of the day, it's like, well, how much outrage can
we sell, how many crazy ideas can we sell, how
many things can how many crazy things can we do
on camera? Before it's just not fun anymore. And I
(17:41):
do think we're getting this to the point where things
have to get crazier and crazier and crazier.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
You have to do.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
You have to import kids on camera, right like, no
matter if your pro choice or pro life, most people
would think that's sick. So I haven't seen that, but
that's that's disgusting. So it's like most ninety percent of
people would watch that, even people on the left, and
they'd say that's not okay, especially to do in public
like this. And I think we're getting to this point
where ninety percent of people are hating what's on the
(18:07):
internet more and more, and I do think that it's
it's gonna be an interesting chasm. But I also think
there's an opportunity for us to reconnect to nature in
a really unique way. Like we spend less time outside
right now, kids do than prison inmates.
Speaker 2 (18:25):
And we have to change that.
Speaker 3 (18:28):
We have to change that, because if you don't know
your own community and you can't look up in wonder
at the stars or add a tree or like I
don't know if you guysn't seen the movie's soul, but
like even just the little parts of trees that fall
off when you're looking up at them, like can be
so magical, like falling in love with just the simplicity
and the beauty of life. Like that's what we need
(18:51):
our next generation to do. We need to create a
next generation of people who are connected to the real
world rather than the virtual world. And I think that's
up to all all of us, just try to instill
in people.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
You were recently in a documentary weren't.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
You Yes, called the Conservatives? Yeah, so what.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
Do people see if they go there? And that came
out in March, right.
Speaker 3 (19:15):
Yeah, So that is going to be out publicly later
this year. It's doing some screenings right now all over
the country and then they're going to release it on
I think Apple and Amazon. But it's really about the
fight that people are having, mostly on the right to
get back involved in the environmental discourse. And this issue
used to be something that both sides worked on together,
(19:37):
and it used to be sort of one of those
few unifying issues. Eighty two percent of Americans self identified
as environmentalists in nineteen ninety. So I know that term
now is so negative, but it didn't used to be
and it doesn't have to be we are all environmentalists.
If you care about the air that you breathe, if
you care about the water that you drink, if you
care about the trees not burning down and causing air
(19:59):
pollution every summer, if you care about ocean health and
not having plastic pollution everywhere and microplastics in your water,
that is making you an environmentalist because you're advocating for
something that you care about. It's just that the environmentalists,
as we think about them, have not done it in
the right way. And the movie is kind of about
(20:21):
that fight, but that's really what we're trying to solve.
Speaker 2 (20:23):
In general.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
We're building the next generation of American conservation and our
goal is to build the biggest environmental movement in the country,
kind of redo it in a way that actually makes
Americans want to be a part of it. And it
is not a left or right thing that it's an
American thing, and that's what we're building.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
There's always any topic like this. I think there if
there's an opportunity to pit people against each other politically,
that is exploited. And I think that I really look
at from the nineties to today. I when I got out
of college, I went and worked for my dad. He
owned a steel foundry, and the steel got a lot
of flack for being you know, here you are melting
(21:03):
metal and you're using chemicals in these sand molds, and
that's a problem. And I saw the kind of transformation
in American manufacturing in the nine in the nineties, in
the two thousands, where it was like there was constant
innovation as to how to make it cleaner, how to
protect the air quality, how to make sure you're testing
(21:25):
everything outside of the foundry. But my dad would say
all the time, He's like, really, we get a lot
of flak for this, but we're probably some of the
American factories are the cleanest factories in the world. And
he was like, and we're the ultimate recyclers, you know,
we're taking all the scrap metal and we're melting it
down and we're making a new product. You do. It
is hard, though, when you're doing something something like that
(21:48):
to convince people we're always going to be making We're
always going to be manufacturing as humans, that's just what
we we We have gotten used to cars and equipment,
mining equipment, you know, that's the lifestyle. We want to
do it as clean as we can and the manufacturers
who are out there in the United States. I've met
(22:09):
a lot of these people, and they are certainly not
people that are just like I don't care. We're going
to do whatever we will, whatever we want. How do
we get that message across though, that we as a
country can be the cleanest country in the world. We
can do the things in a different and a better
way than we're seeing, say in China, where you see
some of the highest pollution in the entire on the
(22:31):
entire globe.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
Yeah, we have to.
Speaker 3 (22:34):
The right needs to accept the fact that the environmental
issues are one of the issues that they need to
care the most about because it's about It's about more
than just you know, polar bears and ice caps. It's
about our own communities. And the left needs to accept
the fact that we have to have manufacturing and energy
(22:54):
production and that if we're going to do it, there's
going to be trade off, so we might as well
mitigate those trade offs by doing it in the United States.
We need both of them. We need the right to
be more pro nature and more involved in the nature conversation.
We need the left to accept the fact that we
have balanced energy and resource needs that we have to accept.
(23:15):
And both sides, in my opinion, have gotten that wrong
because they want to be so against the other side,
like the rights seen as the anti environment party, because
right now it sort of is because they're because they're
going against everything the left's four. But that's not good
enough like that, that's not a strong position. You can't
just be against what the other side's for. And the
left is so pro environment that they can't even accept
(23:37):
the fact that we need to have energy built in
communities and we have. So the future of environmentalism, in
the future of this country, honestly, will be built by
kind of the seventy to eighty percent of Americans who
know that we need to have energy and resources, but
also know that we need to protect the few wild
spaces and the you know, the nature in our own communities.
Speaker 2 (23:58):
And who ever accepts that.
Speaker 3 (24:01):
From a political standpoint is going to be very successful
because it's a very compelling message and it's something that
most people can rally around.
Speaker 1 (24:09):
I only laugh when you say that because it has
become I do think that in the past politicians could
reach across the aisle and say I can agree with
you here, I don't agree with you there, and that
has changed so much in the last I would say
fifteen years where it's like I am not like you
(24:30):
in any way possible. It's so damaging to our future.
And I do think I think that people like you
are bringing that back together. I do think there is
an opportunity to say, Okay, so we disagree on certain
things as a country where a capitalist country that loves people,
(24:52):
that is welcoming, but also has limits to what we're
willing to do. We don't want to fundamentally change what
this country is. We have to s somehow come together
on the issues that we can agree on. Just to
get back to the data center thing really quick before
I let you go. I do think this is starting
to come to a head in a way where organizations
(25:14):
like yours are critical because you know, we see you
talked about this not being a choice in your community
and how this is affecting your community. The Nashville Zoo
is fighting a data center right now, and they're talking
about it in a way that I heard the people
talking about the wind farms. It's they're saying, exposure to
(25:35):
unabated tonal noise and infrasound coming from this data center
is going to have detrimental impacts on the well being
of the animals in the zoo. And they talk about
this testimony from this rancher in Texas who says that
since this data center went in next to their farm,
they have not seen a single live birth from cattle
(25:57):
ever since they had a data center. So they're saying, like,
you have to uner stand. It may not be that
you're getting radiation or you have something that is immediately
causing cancer. You are causing a form of cancer from
this constant vibration, this constant noise. We've seen near some
farms where they had wind farms, where the calves are
(26:19):
coming out with curved hubs and they can't walk straight.
There's something happening next to these massive data centers and
alternative energy sources. Because of the constant vibration and the
constant noise that is affecting animals, Why wouldn't it also
be affecting children.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Yeah, and that's exactly right.
Speaker 3 (26:44):
We don't also have enough data, in a really funny
way about in research about the impacts of these things,
and it wasn't really done. And it's one of the
biggest issues is that we don't even know what's going
out next to us. We're so we're putting in billions
of dollars to these things. It's kind of like the
vaccines in a way where it's like it's being pushed
(27:06):
on us in a way that we all know hasn't
been fully tested yet.
Speaker 2 (27:12):
And if people.
Speaker 3 (27:13):
Want that in their community or they want to get vaccinated,
like let them, you know, like absolutely, But if you
make it something where you're shoving it down people's throats
when it's such a new thing, you're going to have
skepticism around it.
Speaker 2 (27:26):
And I think that that's healthy.
Speaker 3 (27:29):
It's you know, it's not healthy to talk in falsehoods
and to put false information out there. But most of
these questions that people are asking are really fair, and
we need to get answers. And we also need to
realize that you can't lose a country's health and community
(27:49):
just for the sake of national security. That's not a
fair argument. You don't have to choose between national security
and the health of America. In fact, I'd rather lose
out an ai race then to China, which we already
are losing, then completely give up what communities want, And that's.
Speaker 1 (28:11):
Also a form of losing national security, and I think
that's where we have to understand. If everybody gets sick,
or you don't have enough farmland or you can't produce
enough food, you have a national security issue. So they're
not mutually exclusive. It's not like you can look at
one and not the other. And I think that's something
that seems to be creeping into the political world a
(28:32):
little bit. I know we had the Make America Beautiful
Again Act, but it does seem like there needs to
be followed through. There needs to be someone who is
actually coordinating this. Do you feel like there needs to
be like does this go through the Department of the
Interior or how does this work that we can actually
(28:54):
make sure we're protecting our most valuable resources here, which
is not just nature but also humans.
Speaker 3 (29:00):
Yes, humans and nature are also the same thing because
we all rely on each other. It's kind of like
third grade science class.
Speaker 2 (29:07):
But it's true.
Speaker 3 (29:09):
We need a twenty first century investment in our environment.
And I'm not talking about putting up energy sources everywhere
that we don't want or whatever. I'm talking about investment
in our rivers, our streams, our communities, our farms, our forests,
the places that people live, recreate, and rely on to survive.
We need a twenty first century massive investment in that,
(29:31):
and if we don't have that, we will lose our communities.
We all live in places where we are surrounded by
dire environmental challenges. Whether that's the Southwest drying up with
water with the Flint, Michigan water crisis, or the forest
fires that are happening every summer. Every community is dealing
with some of these growing challenges, microplastics in people's water,
(29:54):
like there's a massive need to address this, and it's
not just the federal government. We need our governors to
do it, we need local governments to do it, we
need companies to do better.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
But the federal government has to play a role in this.
Speaker 3 (30:07):
It did when it was cleaning up the ozone and
the smog in cities and rivers that were on fire,
and we're getting dangerously close to the need for something
like that again and to address some of these major
major challenges. So yes, the Trump administration has to take
a stronger stance on this. Otherwise people will look back
and see a really missed opportunity to unite people, but
(30:28):
be just being on the wrong side of it, and
you don't want to be on the wrong side.
Speaker 1 (30:32):
Of this well. And that's something that we haven't been
willing to discuss, is what we do to proactively protect
the environment if we and if it's not working. I mean,
I do think that we discovered that there isn't going
to be enough energy coming from wind farms and solar farms,
and there are some negative impacts if they go into
certain areas. And yet because there is this back and
(30:55):
forth of like this is our solution, your solution doesn't work,
or there is not a good solution on your side,
So we're going to stick to our solution. We have
to be able to admit when there are certain things
that are wrong. But I love your idea of investing
in our environment too, because we just kind of think
of it as being there. And when I traveled Michigan
and went to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan when I
(31:16):
was running for office, the number one thing I heard
there was we have to make sure that our trails
are preserved, that people can go out and experience nature,
that people can go out and fish and hunt, and
those are important. People don't realize those are important activities
to preserving the environment as well. And they were feeling
really left behind by the governor saying we're not getting
(31:36):
that attention and we're not getting that investment.
Speaker 3 (31:39):
Yeah, we have to also represent the important role that
hunters and anglers play in conservation and the you know,
the Upper Peninsula relies on that for its survival, and
especially the tourism side in a lot of ways. I mean,
I went up there when I was younger all the time,
and you know a lot of these towns, especially the
(32:02):
ones that haven't had manufacturing there in a long time,
rely on people coming and experiencing the nature. So we
are not different than nature. We are part of it,
and the best way to support it is to be
in it. But it also needs more than just us
being in it. We have to have the federal government
play a role. But it's not just the federal government.
And I do think we've moved from we need to
(32:25):
move from climate to environment, if that makes sense. We
climate became the new environmentalism, and we need just restoring habitats,
restoring wild places, taking care of our trails, taking care
of wildlife populations. We need that to be the future
of environmentalism. And I think most Americans can rally behind
that right or left.
Speaker 1 (32:45):
Yeah, I agree, and it is so refreshing to see
someone young and involved and you've done so much. I
expect to see a lot more from you, Benji Backer.
Thank you so much for being on the podcast today.
Speaker 3 (32:57):
It's great to be here, great conversation, and thank you
so much.
Speaker 1 (33:00):
Yeah, I've really enjoyed it, and thank you all for listening.
And make sure you share so that we can get
this message out. You know where you can get the podcast,
the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast. You can watch the video
on Rumble or YouTube at Tutor Dixon. Make sure you
share it, but make sure you go out outside touch grass,
have fun, and have a blessed day.
Welcome to the Tutor Dixon Podcast. We are going to
talk data centers today from the perspective of maybe some
of the stuff you don't necessarily know about data centers,
and from the conservation view and the environmental view, I
would argue oftentimes you hear that Republicans are not the
party of the environmentalist or the conservationists, and I have
(00:24):
to say, really, you have to ask yourself, well, who
is standing up for the environment these days, because we've
seen in my state Democrats who have brought in companies
and had no environmental testing done. They were going to
put chemicals into our water. It was just like to
get the big factory into the state. They were willing
(00:46):
to do anything. So I say that saying I don't
think that this is necessarily a partisan issue, that one
side is better than the other. But I think it
is a nonpartisan issue and every side it has to
get involved. I believe that the person that we have
on today would probably agree with that. His name is
Benji Backer. He is the founder and CEO of Nature
(01:10):
is Nonpartisan and United by Nature, one of the leading
environmental voices in the country. Benji, thank you so much
for coming on to talk about this today.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
It's great to be here.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Couldn't agree more that we should all be at the
table and that neither side is better than the others.
So it's great to great to have an allied voice.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
Well, I love what United by Nature says. It's like,
we're not here. You guys have this quote. We're not
here to convince you to care. We're here to remind
you that you already do. I think that's fascinating because
I think we do. Life is very complicated in the
fact that it's like, oh, we care until we see
something that we feel like book, but we need this,
(01:50):
but we need this, and that I think is the
politics coming into play. It's something that I love that
you're out there fighting against it. This is a new fight,
I think with data centers as we see this. And
before we got on, I was telling you that we've
talked about the wind farms before, and the solar farms
that are going out and taking a big chunk of land.
(02:11):
We've talked about the ocean, the wind farms that are
out in the ocean and how they're affecting animals. And
when we talked about this, it was a few years
ago and they were saying we're not getting a lot
of response from the administration. I'll say a few weeks ago,
I saw the President. He had Secretary Bergham behind him.
(02:33):
Somebody asked about wind farms and how they were affecting
the marine life, and they said, we're meeting with people.
Do you get the impression that the administration is starting
to say, Okay, we need to look at this, we
need to be a little bit more realistic about how
this is affecting the environment, rather than just say this
is the next best thing, we got to jump into it.
Speaker 3 (02:54):
I'm a little bit skeptical, honestly, that the administration is
understanding the massive backlash that there is around data centers
and AI in general, because they're also trying to balance
the economic growth argument and the national security argument. And
it is, honestly a really hard conversation because data centers
are inherently not good for communities right now. That could
(03:18):
change that, you know, they could get better, they could
improve technology can get better. But as I've talked about,
there's only thirty jobs associated full time, long term with
the data center. It does increase the temperature around those
places where the data centers are built. The noise and
light pollution is substantial, and there's also the water and
(03:41):
energy usage component, so it doesn't provide a lot of jobs,
and it also harms the community in a lot of ways.
So when I think about nature, I don't think about
just the mountains out west, or you know, global climate
change or any things that people kind of this hyper
political term that's come with the word nature. I think
of the stream in people's neighborhoods. I think of the
(04:04):
trees in people's neighborhoods. I think of the birds in
people's backyards, and the water that people drink and the
energy that we use because we're relying on the resources
which is nature to survive, and data centers do pose
an mediate threat to that. Now, we also need to
compete with China, and we also need to compete with
other countries, and that's the tough balance the administration has
(04:26):
to take. But I do think that they're airing too
much on the side of tech and data centers versus communities,
and I think it's going to be something that does
hurt them in the midterms.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
There has not been a great explanation as to what
happens at the data centers Obviously, we know there's a
lot of processing that happens with AI, and we're hearing
it's the AI race. But I think there's also a
lot of mistrust when it comes to big tech, and
some people are saying, Man, we see all these cameras
going up, We've got all these data centers, this is
(04:58):
all this information is being process Are these really to
win that race? Could there be something else nefarious around it?
There has not been any discussion as to why they
are so critical other than AI, and I feel like
that's a conversation that needs to actually be had, but
there's not really people pushing back on that either.
Speaker 3 (05:18):
Yeah, I agree. I mean big tech does not have
our best interests in mind. If they did, they wouldn't
have the addictive algorithms and the AI that is hurting
a lot of people. I mean, I know personally people
who have been hurt by AI chats and being told
to do things that they shouldn't do. Like tech companies
(05:40):
are trying to make us divided, and they're trying to
pit us against one another. They're trying to get us
to hate liberals or hate conservatives, depending on what side
you're on, and they're genuinely tearing this country apart in
a lot of ways. Now, I also am not you know, naive.
I know that there's benefits, right, it's nice to be
able to ask AI, you know, what the what to
(06:01):
do in a city when you're gonna go visit, or
you know, there's certain things that are beneficial or some
efficiencies from a business standpoint. But tech companies in general
have their profits and their uh, you know, their their
power ultimately in mind. And so one of the one
of the problems with the data centers right now is
that they're being railroaded through without community support, without community
(06:26):
buy in. And that's partially because it's such a new
technology that they can say, well, if we don't do
it here, you know, China is gonna beat us. And
so they kind of are able to supersede anybody's individual feeling.
And I don't think that that's okay. And I also
think that this is sort of a bubble that we're in.
Is AI going away? Absolutely not, Should we you know,
(06:48):
be against everything that's AI related, No, but we do
need to be honest that there are negative ramifications that
the tech companies do not care, they do not have
our best interests in mind, and we need to step
up and say that they need to do better.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
There's so much stuff that I want to say about
what you just said, so I have to remember everything
that you just said, because this is really a deep
dive into this that we have not we have not
explored this. But you talked about people being upset that
they're just coming into their communities, and that to me
is the political connection here, because in politics, there's always
(07:25):
this desire to bring business to your state, to show
that you've been effective to like the results are the
press releases, right, it's hey, we've got this big, this
big data center coming in. It's bringing this much money
to the community. And in many cases they are bringing
some investment to the community. And in many cases the
compromise that is done in a government not in the community. Again,
(07:49):
the community members don't necessarily get to chime in. In Michigan,
we know we don't have local control, so we don't
get to chime in. But the behind the scenes is
oftentimes you're going to build a certain amount of power
stations here that will then give a discount to the people,
and there's a financial benefit, and then the press release
(08:10):
also comes out and says this is going to bring
twenty five hundred jobs to this community while they're building,
And you have to really read the fine print there
because it's all the people that come in to build
the data center. They're there for three six months, part
of me temporary job. Yeah, exactly, you're exactly right, yes,
(08:30):
the temporary jobs. But then you know, the data center
is a massive facility of computers that are holding data. Ultimately,
there's a lot of questions about, well, what is the
water doing. We in Michigan, we're very protective of our
water because we have some of the largest natural resources
of water in the entire world. But data centers are
(08:52):
looking here because they want to bring in water. Well,
then we hear they're not going to use water anymore.
They're going to have a different cooling system. To your point, like,
how is that raising the temperature, how is that taking
the energy?
Speaker 2 (09:04):
What is that?
Speaker 1 (09:06):
What is that method? We don't talk about it. We
just hear, oh, it's not going to use water, So
actually we feel better about it. The idea, the fact
that we don't know what's going into our own community
is very disturbing.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
Yeah, And honestly, the water thing is really interesting because
so energy wise, we all know that data centers aren't
going to use a lot of energy. You know, even
the data center companies talk about that. So that's that's
its own issue that is one hundred percent real. Then
there's the water issue, which people say is not real
or they say it's the biggest thing. Ever, here's the truth.
(09:41):
Some of the new technology does cool the water and
is able to reuse the water on site so that
people and companies don't have to use as much. The
challenge is that technology uses even more energy than the
energy production before for that technology is invented. And here's
(10:03):
here's the issue. Most energy sources use a ton of
water to power the energy. Coal, nuclear, natural gas uses
a ton of water to fuel our lives. So it's
just shifting the water to a different source. And then
the data center companies can say, well, we're not using it.
(10:23):
The energy companies are using it. Either way, the water
is an issue, So it doesn't matter if it's because
the energy sources are using it now versus the data
centers on site itself. So I don't know if that
makes sense, but that's the that's the roundabout way that
they're trying to defend the water usage argument, and unless
(10:44):
you don't dive a little bit deeper, you might say, oh,
they've they've figured it out, But in reality, they are
still threatening our water supply in a massive way. And
I live in Arizona where we don't actually have very
much water. If you aren't paying attention, I mean, the
Colorado River issue is massive. The Southwest is running out
of water, and it's not a hyperbole, it's one hundred
(11:05):
percent true. And data centers should not be built there
at the level that they are. And you're right, it's
not a red or blue thing. I mean, like the
governor of Arizona is a Democrat and they're rail roading
it through there, and in states where those Republicans they're
rail roading it through. And at the very least, we
need to be having an honest conversation about how damaging
(11:27):
this can be. And I don't think that the tech
companies want us to.
Speaker 1 (11:31):
No, absolutely not. The other thing that I find interesting is, again,
what is going through these data centers? How does this
actually impact our lives. My daughter said something to me
the other day that I had never heard, and I
thought this was actually pretty interesting. She's a writer. She
(11:52):
loves to write poems, she loves to write short stories.
She obviously writes for school. She wants to This is
what she wants to be. Ultimately, writing is her life goal. Right,
She said to me the other day, Yeah, I was
reading and it said, don't ever write anything that you
might want to publish one day in a Google Doc
(12:12):
because all of the Google docs are being consumed by AI,
and anything you write in a Google Doc is then
being spit out by AI. So someone could say, write
a story like this and it will just take your
piece and hand it to them. Well, well, I don't
even think about that when it comes to business. And
when you talk about business and business people saying AI
(12:35):
is so critical, do we even know how dangerous AI is?
Because what's stopping the Chinese from taking all of our stuff?
Speaker 3 (12:43):
Well, I think that that's privacy is dead on the Internet.
I think we just need to accept that anything we
say or do in the Internet, even if it's on
a private browser, even if it's on a private tab,
it is going to be shared or being tracked NonStop.
As I run an on profit and nature's non partisan,
and it's really scary when we talk to companies about ads,
(13:06):
how much they admit the fact that they know everything
about everyone all the time, that they can they can
target you based on what you ate for lunch yesterday.
I mean that just it's crazy, how creepy it is.
So we have to accept that privacy is dead on
the Internet, but how much.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
More so once this once these factories, data factories, I
mean this is literally factory stuff.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
Yes, they have all our stuff.
Speaker 3 (13:33):
So I actually think in a roundabout way, this is
going to be an important moment for humanity to decide
what we want, and it's going to be up to
our personal behavior in a way. Are we going to
stand up to the addiction and the tech kind of
incentive to make us addicted to their products? And are
(13:53):
we going to actually lean closer into our communities? And
that's what I actually hope. There's basically two we can
go down. We can go down this path of giving
our data to these companies and potentially China, but even
our own government. We just don't want to have all
this data in other people's hands about ourselves, and we
can become more and more screen addicted, more and more
tech addicted, or we can get closer to each other again,
(14:17):
closer to our families, closer to our communities, and start
to build something that's more substantive again, because we all
know that social media, even Google docs, right, they don't
provide us a lot of happiness or value. What provides
us happiness and value is human connection and you know,
families and close close relationships. That is not what's happening
(14:41):
with AIA, data centers or social media. So I think
if we move away from that, there's going to be
a little bit of a splintering. And that's why I
do believe that the AI thing is sort of a
bubble because there's a lot of people getting off social media,
there's a lot of people who are sick of AI.
There's a lot of people who don't want these things
to be built, and they're not even using AI or
they're using it very sparingly. And I think that there
(15:02):
is going to be a moment of choosing that a
lot of us are going to have to do individually
and if we want that future, the AI future, the
AI only future, or do we want a future that's
you know, creating more human relationships than we currently have.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
You bring up an interesting thing because, as I've watched
my kids grow up in this technology age, which is
much different than the way I grew up, and I
watch them get kind of connected to people they don't know,
and they're like, oh, I followed this channel, and you
know they did this today or they did that today.
They have slowly decided this is not real and stepped
(15:38):
away from it on their own. So it's been fascinating
to watch them go, Wow, this is actually as I
get older and I see people performing for the camera
that's not their real life and they're sort of turned
off by it. So kind of interested to see if
society does say, how much more are we going to
elevate people who just do crazy stuff for a camera,
(16:02):
but aren't there's no community there, They don't actually have
a sense of who their audience is. I mean, I
think one of the families that we just saw who
made the decision to abort their child on their channel,
got a lot of backlash. And we're seeing we're just
seeing this like there's a really ugly side to how
(16:25):
people react to you when they think they know you
but they don't actually know you. And and the kids that
are watching this today, I feel like as they watch this,
they go. Maybe I don't want that because I remember
when they were little, they were my girls. I admit
they were like, I'd love to be a YouTube star
when I grow up. I'm like, oh, my goodness, that's
not what you want out of life. But as they've
(16:47):
watched how that, how destructive that can be, maybe they
do step away from technology to a certain extent.
Speaker 3 (16:54):
Yeah, And there's so many I mean, social media makes
people miserable, even though I know so many social media
influencers into YouTube show hosts and people like that, and
they're not happy, Like technology does not make people happy.
Technology helps is supposed to help solve problems, but it's
not like, you know, it's helpful in curing cancer or
the fact that we can talk to each other right
(17:15):
now is very cool, but it's not meant to do
what it's doing right now. It's not meant to pit
people against one another, to get people so addicted that
they can't stop looking. And I think just people are
sort of fed up with it because at the end
of the day, it's like, well, how much outrage can
we sell, how many crazy ideas can we sell, how
many things can how many crazy things can we do
on camera? Before it's just not fun anymore. And I
(17:41):
do think we're getting this to the point where things
have to get crazier and crazier and crazier.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
You have to do.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
You have to import kids on camera, right like, no
matter if your pro choice or pro life, most people
would think that's sick. So I haven't seen that, but
that's that's disgusting. So it's like most ninety percent of
people would watch that, even people on the left, and
they'd say that's not okay, especially to do in public
like this. And I think we're getting to this point
where ninety percent of people are hating what's on the
(18:07):
internet more and more, and I do think that it's
it's gonna be an interesting chasm. But I also think
there's an opportunity for us to reconnect to nature in
a really unique way. Like we spend less time outside
right now, kids do than prison inmates.
Speaker 2 (18:25):
And we have to change that.
Speaker 3 (18:28):
We have to change that, because if you don't know
your own community and you can't look up in wonder
at the stars or add a tree or like I
don't know if you guysn't seen the movie's soul, but
like even just the little parts of trees that fall
off when you're looking up at them, like can be
so magical, like falling in love with just the simplicity
and the beauty of life. Like that's what we need
(18:51):
our next generation to do. We need to create a
next generation of people who are connected to the real
world rather than the virtual world. And I think that's
up to all all of us, just try to instill
in people.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
You were recently in a documentary weren't.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
You Yes, called the Conservatives? Yeah, so what.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
Do people see if they go there? And that came
out in March, right.
Speaker 3 (19:15):
Yeah, So that is going to be out publicly later
this year. It's doing some screenings right now all over
the country and then they're going to release it on
I think Apple and Amazon. But it's really about the
fight that people are having, mostly on the right to
get back involved in the environmental discourse. And this issue
used to be something that both sides worked on together,
(19:37):
and it used to be sort of one of those
few unifying issues. Eighty two percent of Americans self identified
as environmentalists in nineteen ninety. So I know that term
now is so negative, but it didn't used to be
and it doesn't have to be we are all environmentalists.
If you care about the air that you breathe, if
you care about the water that you drink, if you
care about the trees not burning down and causing air
(19:59):
pollution every summer, if you care about ocean health and
not having plastic pollution everywhere and microplastics in your water,
that is making you an environmentalist because you're advocating for
something that you care about. It's just that the environmentalists,
as we think about them, have not done it in
the right way. And the movie is kind of about
(20:21):
that fight, but that's really what we're trying to solve.
Speaker 2 (20:23):
In general.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
We're building the next generation of American conservation and our
goal is to build the biggest environmental movement in the country,
kind of redo it in a way that actually makes
Americans want to be a part of it. And it
is not a left or right thing that it's an
American thing, and that's what we're building.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
There's always any topic like this. I think there if
there's an opportunity to pit people against each other politically,
that is exploited. And I think that I really look
at from the nineties to today. I when I got out
of college, I went and worked for my dad. He
owned a steel foundry, and the steel got a lot
of flack for being you know, here you are melting
(21:03):
metal and you're using chemicals in these sand molds, and
that's a problem. And I saw the kind of transformation
in American manufacturing in the nine in the nineties, in
the two thousands, where it was like there was constant
innovation as to how to make it cleaner, how to
protect the air quality, how to make sure you're testing
(21:25):
everything outside of the foundry. But my dad would say
all the time, He's like, really, we get a lot
of flak for this, but we're probably some of the
American factories are the cleanest factories in the world. And
he was like, and we're the ultimate recyclers, you know,
we're taking all the scrap metal and we're melting it
down and we're making a new product. You do. It
is hard, though, when you're doing something something like that
(21:48):
to convince people we're always going to be making We're
always going to be manufacturing as humans, that's just what
we we We have gotten used to cars and equipment,
mining equipment, you know, that's the lifestyle. We want to
do it as clean as we can and the manufacturers
who are out there in the United States. I've met
(22:09):
a lot of these people, and they are certainly not
people that are just like I don't care. We're going
to do whatever we will, whatever we want. How do
we get that message across though, that we as a
country can be the cleanest country in the world. We
can do the things in a different and a better
way than we're seeing, say in China, where you see
some of the highest pollution in the entire on the
(22:31):
entire globe.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
Yeah, we have to.
Speaker 3 (22:34):
The right needs to accept the fact that the environmental
issues are one of the issues that they need to
care the most about because it's about It's about more
than just you know, polar bears and ice caps. It's
about our own communities. And the left needs to accept
the fact that we have to have manufacturing and energy
(22:54):
production and that if we're going to do it, there's
going to be trade off, so we might as well
mitigate those trade offs by doing it in the United States.
We need both of them. We need the right to
be more pro nature and more involved in the nature conversation.
We need the left to accept the fact that we
have balanced energy and resource needs that we have to accept.
(23:15):
And both sides, in my opinion, have gotten that wrong
because they want to be so against the other side,
like the rights seen as the anti environment party, because
right now it sort of is because they're because they're
going against everything the left's four. But that's not good
enough like that, that's not a strong position. You can't
just be against what the other side's for. And the
left is so pro environment that they can't even accept
(23:37):
the fact that we need to have energy built in
communities and we have. So the future of environmentalism, in
the future of this country, honestly, will be built by
kind of the seventy to eighty percent of Americans who
know that we need to have energy and resources, but
also know that we need to protect the few wild
spaces and the you know, the nature in our own communities.
Speaker 2 (23:58):
And who ever accepts that.
Speaker 3 (24:01):
From a political standpoint is going to be very successful
because it's a very compelling message and it's something that
most people can rally around.
Speaker 1 (24:09):
I only laugh when you say that because it has
become I do think that in the past politicians could
reach across the aisle and say I can agree with
you here, I don't agree with you there, and that
has changed so much in the last I would say
fifteen years where it's like I am not like you
(24:30):
in any way possible. It's so damaging to our future.
And I do think I think that people like you
are bringing that back together. I do think there is
an opportunity to say, Okay, so we disagree on certain
things as a country where a capitalist country that loves people,
(24:52):
that is welcoming, but also has limits to what we're
willing to do. We don't want to fundamentally change what
this country is. We have to s somehow come together
on the issues that we can agree on. Just to
get back to the data center thing really quick before
I let you go. I do think this is starting
to come to a head in a way where organizations
(25:14):
like yours are critical because you know, we see you
talked about this not being a choice in your community
and how this is affecting your community. The Nashville Zoo
is fighting a data center right now, and they're talking
about it in a way that I heard the people
talking about the wind farms. It's they're saying, exposure to
(25:35):
unabated tonal noise and infrasound coming from this data center
is going to have detrimental impacts on the well being
of the animals in the zoo. And they talk about
this testimony from this rancher in Texas who says that
since this data center went in next to their farm,
they have not seen a single live birth from cattle
(25:57):
ever since they had a data center. So they're saying, like,
you have to uner stand. It may not be that
you're getting radiation or you have something that is immediately
causing cancer. You are causing a form of cancer from
this constant vibration, this constant noise. We've seen near some
farms where they had wind farms, where the calves are
(26:19):
coming out with curved hubs and they can't walk straight.
There's something happening next to these massive data centers and
alternative energy sources. Because of the constant vibration and the
constant noise that is affecting animals, Why wouldn't it also
be affecting children.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Yeah, and that's exactly right.
Speaker 3 (26:44):
We don't also have enough data, in a really funny
way about in research about the impacts of these things,
and it wasn't really done. And it's one of the
biggest issues is that we don't even know what's going
out next to us. We're so we're putting in billions
of dollars to these things. It's kind of like the
vaccines in a way where it's like it's being pushed
(27:06):
on us in a way that we all know hasn't
been fully tested yet.
Speaker 2 (27:12):
And if people.
Speaker 3 (27:13):
Want that in their community or they want to get vaccinated,
like let them, you know, like absolutely, But if you
make it something where you're shoving it down people's throats
when it's such a new thing, you're going to have
skepticism around it.
Speaker 2 (27:26):
And I think that that's healthy.
Speaker 3 (27:29):
It's you know, it's not healthy to talk in falsehoods
and to put false information out there. But most of
these questions that people are asking are really fair, and
we need to get answers. And we also need to
realize that you can't lose a country's health and community
(27:49):
just for the sake of national security. That's not a
fair argument. You don't have to choose between national security
and the health of America. In fact, I'd rather lose
out an ai race then to China, which we already
are losing, then completely give up what communities want, And that's.
Speaker 1 (28:11):
Also a form of losing national security, and I think
that's where we have to understand. If everybody gets sick,
or you don't have enough farmland or you can't produce
enough food, you have a national security issue. So they're
not mutually exclusive. It's not like you can look at
one and not the other. And I think that's something
that seems to be creeping into the political world a
(28:32):
little bit. I know we had the Make America Beautiful
Again Act, but it does seem like there needs to
be followed through. There needs to be someone who is
actually coordinating this. Do you feel like there needs to
be like does this go through the Department of the
Interior or how does this work that we can actually
(28:54):
make sure we're protecting our most valuable resources here, which
is not just nature but also humans.
Speaker 3 (29:00):
Yes, humans and nature are also the same thing because
we all rely on each other. It's kind of like
third grade science class.
Speaker 2 (29:07):
But it's true.
Speaker 3 (29:09):
We need a twenty first century investment in our environment.
And I'm not talking about putting up energy sources everywhere
that we don't want or whatever. I'm talking about investment
in our rivers, our streams, our communities, our farms, our forests,
the places that people live, recreate, and rely on to survive.
We need a twenty first century massive investment in that,
(29:31):
and if we don't have that, we will lose our communities.
We all live in places where we are surrounded by
dire environmental challenges. Whether that's the Southwest drying up with
water with the Flint, Michigan water crisis, or the forest
fires that are happening every summer. Every community is dealing
with some of these growing challenges, microplastics in people's water,
(29:54):
like there's a massive need to address this, and it's
not just the federal government. We need our governors to
do it, we need local governments to do it, we
need companies to do better.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
But the federal government has to play a role in this.
Speaker 3 (30:07):
It did when it was cleaning up the ozone and
the smog in cities and rivers that were on fire,
and we're getting dangerously close to the need for something
like that again and to address some of these major
major challenges. So yes, the Trump administration has to take
a stronger stance on this. Otherwise people will look back
and see a really missed opportunity to unite people, but
(30:28):
be just being on the wrong side of it, and
you don't want to be on the wrong side.
Speaker 1 (30:32):
Of this well. And that's something that we haven't been
willing to discuss, is what we do to proactively protect
the environment if we and if it's not working. I mean,
I do think that we discovered that there isn't going
to be enough energy coming from wind farms and solar farms,
and there are some negative impacts if they go into
certain areas. And yet because there is this back and
(30:55):
forth of like this is our solution, your solution doesn't work,
or there is not a good solution on your side,
So we're going to stick to our solution. We have
to be able to admit when there are certain things
that are wrong. But I love your idea of investing
in our environment too, because we just kind of think
of it as being there. And when I traveled Michigan
and went to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan when I
(31:16):
was running for office, the number one thing I heard
there was we have to make sure that our trails
are preserved, that people can go out and experience nature,
that people can go out and fish and hunt, and
those are important. People don't realize those are important activities
to preserving the environment as well. And they were feeling
really left behind by the governor saying we're not getting
(31:36):
that attention and we're not getting that investment.
Speaker 3 (31:39):
Yeah, we have to also represent the important role that
hunters and anglers play in conservation and the you know,
the Upper Peninsula relies on that for its survival, and
especially the tourism side in a lot of ways. I mean,
I went up there when I was younger all the time,
and you know a lot of these towns, especially the
(32:02):
ones that haven't had manufacturing there in a long time,
rely on people coming and experiencing the nature. So we
are not different than nature. We are part of it,
and the best way to support it is to be
in it. But it also needs more than just us
being in it. We have to have the federal government
play a role. But it's not just the federal government.
And I do think we've moved from we need to
(32:25):
move from climate to environment, if that makes sense. We
climate became the new environmentalism, and we need just restoring habitats,
restoring wild places, taking care of our trails, taking care
of wildlife populations. We need that to be the future
of environmentalism. And I think most Americans can rally behind
that right or left.
Speaker 1 (32:45):
Yeah, I agree, and it is so refreshing to see
someone young and involved and you've done so much. I
expect to see a lot more from you, Benji Backer.
Thank you so much for being on the podcast today.
Speaker 3 (32:57):
It's great to be here, great conversation, and thank you
so much.
Speaker 1 (33:00):
Yeah, I've really enjoyed it, and thank you all for listening.
And make sure you share so that we can get
this message out. You know where you can get the podcast,
the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast. You can watch the video
on Rumble or YouTube at Tutor Dixon. Make sure you
share it, but make sure you go out outside touch grass,
have fun, and have a blessed day.
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