Where's our check in the mail?!

Here's a breakdown of the recent budget battle in SC that pitted Republicans against each other with Lowcountry House Rep. Matt Leber - powered by Disaster Plus

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
This is the Kelly Golden Show podcastpowered by Disaster Fluffs on a big failed
Friday. Breaking down the budget battlewas Representative Matt Lieber from here in the
low Country. Thirteen point two billion. The spending plan in this budget is
actually cheaper than last year's thirteen pointeight So I would think that's actually a

(00:21):
good thing and provides relief not onlyto tax relief with homeowners, but also
our tax rates. Yeah, wedid cut this year's budget from last year's.
It is down. I mean thenumber was two or three hundred million
dollars. So we are being acognitan of always having a balanced budget and
cutting spending where we can. Andyou know, just to compare, to

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try to compare Columbia, the DCis absurd. Those guys spend ten billion
dollars an hour and our entire budgetis thirteen billion, and it covers things
like the bridges and you know,trying to get better maintenance and these projects
started on our road, promotions forpolice teachers. There's all these pay raises

(01:04):
for those state employees. And Ithink that this thing is appropriately restrictive.
It is not access spending. Again, we have a two billion dollars budget
surplus. We're going to figure outhow we can spend some of that money,
send some of that money directly backto the tax payer. So I
just think it's absurd to try tocompare us to DC. So that comparison

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is coming from your Freedom Caucus representativesthere in Colombia. So the speech was
grand. I loved it. Iwas cheering, but you know it needs
to be directed at DC. They'respending is out of control. They haven't
balanced the budget since Nuke Gingrich forcedClinton to sign a balanced budget. That's
been a decade when we've got atwo B anddarsal. But some of the

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biggest problems that we're having in SouthCarolinas we're finding money. You know that
comptroller that I wrote the bill tohave him impeached because of poor accounting crisis.
We've recently found some money. That'sa good problem actually have. So
we've got a significant rainy day fun. You know, seven percent of the
voters actually voted for soy carolizing goodstanding. We balance our budget and run

(02:09):
a surplus. And you know,I know that the beast with the roads,
and I really think that our systemneeds to be audited as DOT needs
to be audited that you know,this is the whole thing is an overreaction
to the huge leatherman corruption in thepast. And we've given the states to
determine that when these projects get startedto the Infrastructure Bank, those guys are

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bureaucrap. When I first got elected, I was born. Do not you
know, complain about this certain roadand demand action right away because that's undue
use of office. Well, youknow what, you could hold me accountable
if I don't perform on the roads. I can't hold a bureaucrat. A
bureaucrat accountable, So that whole systemis flawed. So I'd like to look
at some reform in that area.Yeah, the State Infrastructure Bank Board has

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been notoriously chided by many fiscally conservativeRepublicans for quite some time, I know
on this show. I mean goesway back to Chip lime House and and
others, Bobby Harrell and the Senateyou know, led at the time by
President pro Tim Glen McConnell. Soyou mentioned that Comptroller general thing. Here
many people doing their taxes right now, Matt, and they're like, wait

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a second, what is going onin Columbia when we have all this surplus
money around and people are tripping andfinding cash. How does that happen?
Well, the money was in asort of the holding account to be dispersed
for whatever reason. I mean we'retalking about ten years ago, a decade
ago that this started, and itaccumulated there and it wasn't dispersed, so

(03:35):
they the money was on the book. Hey, this guy has to answered
for it. And when when weput together the impeachment paperwork and we and
we lowered his salary to a dollar. He resigned within a week and then
we sort of had a battle whowas going to be his replacement, and
the governor appointed the guy. ButI think there's going to be an election
on this, and you know,I know the Treasurer's office work is working

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close on, you know, soout this accounting problem. It wasn't that
the money was missing. It wasjust the books were just poorly maintained.
And you know, we're sorting thatout. But we do have a budget
surplus, and we spoke the leadershipand the speaker and they're sorting out what
would be best if we send arefund back to the taxpayers, which I
support, get some more speed onrepairing these roads and maintaining these roads.

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I mean, in the Low Countrywe have this constant battle with the upstate
guys because their roads, when theybuild a road, they last a lot
longer than our roads because of oursalt water, hurricane damages and all these
sort of things, and they don'tnecessarily grasp that idea. So I'm working
very hard with the other Charles andthat delegation members to insist that the Low

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Country gets more appropriations for our roadsand attentions for maintenance. Well, yeah,
because everybody their mother and brother aremoving here, our population alone.
Given tax dollars and what we contributeback to Colombia, I mean I read
two hundred million dollars to aging bridges. That is a drop in the bucket
and a thirteen billion dollar budget,right, and and we catch a little

(05:05):
grief on the on the Scout deal, but you know, every single General
Assembly member, all one hundred andseven he voted for that bill, save
eleven legislators. And most of themoney is going to building a railroad crossing
over I ninety five and twenty sixto open up that area. It's not
just Scout but to other industries.So uh, all of it was infrastructure

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or heart assets, and we don'tyou know, Volkswagen is not going to
leave. That's the number six largestcompany in the in the world. They
don't just you know, make dealsand collapse overnight. So even if they
did, we all the infrastructure inthe hearts, the assets, the buildings,
the roads, all that stuff stayswith South Carolina. So in all,
six of my mayors in my districtsupported that deal, and again only

(05:55):
eleven legislators voted against. It isa very complicated deal that's going to bring
thousands of thous jobs South Carolina.Bultimak instead, they're going to move their
audi operations from Tennessee and Phase twothat's still going to be even more jobs,
and it's going to be you know, with the service industries that are
accompany with it. It's an untoldamount of jobs. We're talking about folks
that are going to be have beenworking at seven to eleven and are now
going to have a forty thousand dollarsjob, no longer be on the doll

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or no longer be on the streetsdoing criminal activity. So all in all,
it's a great investment for South Carolina. It was surplus money and the
people of South Carolina wants to investit. Wisely, is there a push
at all Representative Lie Bird to getrid of our income tax like Florida.
Well, our taxes are so lownow, I mean we're going down a

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percent a year on average that mostfolks that are not even hit by it,
they don't even realize that they're payingthat sub client tax because it is
at a low number. But Iabsolutely want to go to a flat tax,
or a no income tax or consumertax. I want tax reform.
I love the Florida model, infact, the Tennessee models, even where

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there is no income tax at alland we have a consumer based tax.
I'm all for considering those sort ofthings this tax season, tax time,
and it's hard for us to hearas taxpayers not just getting squeezed, of
course you mentioned the federal government,but also in South Carolina getting squeezed when
our economy is just hurting us all. I mean, you know, we
all grocery shop, we all goand fillip gas, including you. I

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mean, so it's hard to hearthat we're finding money. We're sitting on
piles of cash. Okay, well, when's the chuck coming in the mail?
When am I going to see somekind of relief. Yeah. Well,
I'm definitely advocating for any surplus moneyto be returned to the taxpayers.
I think that just makes complete sense. I'm a Reagan Conservative, and I
think that's the way we should handleany sort of surpluses. And if we

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are running surpluses, we need tolower the tax rate even more because we're
collecting too much tax obviously, inmy opinion, even though we have probably
the lowest income tax rate other thanstate like Tennessee and Florida, which have
no income tax rates are and they'retrending lower and lower. We gave a
huge tax cut in this budget here, so I'm all for reform and lower

(08:07):
in the tax And what we're dealingwith is a lot of this inflation,
and that's the federal government printing allthis money, and so that's very difficult
for us at the state level toaffect that inflation. The best thing we
can do is make sure this suctline is open for business, and these
corporations and businesses will come in hereand pay a higher wage to allset that

(08:28):
growth inflation. Well, you've heardthe pushback. I mean it happened with
Boeing years back that they moved peoplehere from Washington State and that kills our
roads, it does all these otherthings, and it doesn't employ people in
South Carolina who don't have the skillsper se, that's not what we're seeing
in statistics. In fact, Bolkswagensaid that they wanted to come here because

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of the high skill our workers herehave, the education levels that our workers
here have, and the patriotism andthe love of state they have, and
just the energetic work ethic that thatdoesn't pay out for truth, I know
that's sort of an urban legend thatthat nobody in South Carolina got a job
at Boeing, but that's not necessarilyto In fact, my wife worked at

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Boeing and continues too. So uh, I think that the best thing we
can do is to continue to makesure that IBNE is open for business.
We are here to grow, anduh, you know, I think the
economy we have this one of thestrongest economies and one of the lowest unemployments
in the Southeast. So I'm prettyproud of the product that the that we've

(09:33):
got going here. Lastly, itis one of the strongest things South Carolina
just passes constitutional carry and I knowthere's what four million dollars in this budget,
and i'd liked it in the timelineof this budget getting past, you
think, I know, you don'thave a crystal ball, but it's in
the Senate now, and I imaginethey're going to be timely about it.
There's there's I don't think there's anythingin there that's that that that's a conflict

(09:56):
now with the Constitution will carry.I did not like some of the amendments
that the Senate and insisted on,the one of them being the training and
you know, I think there issome talk about making sure that the civilian
UH instructors that are already in thebusiness that they are they allowed to take
part in this. I did notlike that, you know, insisting on

(10:18):
these two training sessions per county andthen having to fund that. I did
not like the separate classes of gunowners with the cwp UH, meaning you
get a lesser sentence and if youaccidentally, you know, walk into a
restaurant that has a sign barring contilcary, I didn't like any of that.

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But I think that the courts aregoing to address those because they fall
under equal protection under the law.And you know, I think it's just
going to be cutting dry. Idon't know when that's going to happen.
Whenever a case develops or somebody sues, then I think they'll address that.
But we made sure that we putin the bill that if any part of
the bill is strict, that thebill continues to stand on his own,

(11:01):
and you can only sort of lineon and veto the problematic areas. And
so, you know, we'll seehow this training part goes. I think
some counties are not going to require, you know, two training sessions a
year a month, and maybe somemaybe need three, and we'll just see
how that goes. We can alwaysgo back to another buy of the apple.

(11:22):
But I was not going to letthem kill the bill just because of
these couple of silly amendments that theSenate insisted on. Well, on the
other would be the fact that eighteenyear olds can't buy a handgun because they
can't get the background check through thefederal government. Yeah, I sort of
had a premonition laying in bed thinkingabout that. The other day, I

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said, listen, everybody wants morebackground checks. So I'm drawing up a
resolution to insist that the federal governmentbegins it's background checks of eighteen year olds.
So currently they will only do someoneonce they turn twenty one. Therefore,
you can't legally go into a storeif you're eighteen to buy a gun.
You can't get the background check.But an eighteen year old can purchase
the gun from a relative, ora relative can purchase it for them.

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Well, we should be having backgroundchecks, and I think as soon as
they open up the background checks forthe eighteen year olds, and the eighteen
year old build will go into thePalmatostate armory and purchase the gun. If
they can get married and buy ahome and have children, they should be
able to buy whatever weapon they wantto defend that home. And so an
eighteen year old should be able toget a background check and purchase the weapon.

(12:28):
All right, State represent Matt Leeberanything else? Liber Percentate, I
need them all the help I canget. I'm going against a progressive Republican
who has a seventeen NRA ranking.Eight Democrats had a higher ranking than she
did. So if you want tocook constitutional conservatives, I am that conservative
auction in that rate. This bigfailed Friday edition of The Kelly Golden Show

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