March 27, 2026 • 40 mins
Congressman Bacon has served as the U.S. representative for Nebraska's 2nd congressional district since 2017. As a retired military officer he provides context about the conflict in Iran.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Today, I have a great guest, and we have lots
and lots to talk about. Congressman Don Bacon is with
us today from a congressional district too, And Congressman Bacon,
welcome to the show.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Hey, it's always good to be at k and it's
great to talk to you.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Thank you. Are you in DC? Are you traveling?
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Got back last night?
Speaker 1 (00:20):
You got back last night? So you're back in Nebraska. Boy,
you go back and forth a lot, don't you.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
The funny thing is I set you a text asking
you to pick me up. I meant to send that
to someone else.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
Darn it, I guess I missed it. Otherwise, you know
what I've been there, what at two in the morning
or something like that. Well, we have lots to talk
about today. I really wanted to start out and talk
a bit about Operation Epic Fury and US being in
the Middle East. And you know, we sat down about
a week ago, you and I had breakfast together, and
(00:52):
I think we talked for two hours as you were
telling me your opinion of things going on and why
it's so important. And I think that's what I wanted
to start out with today. Why is it so important?
You've been to the Middle East, you understand what's going on, Why,
in your opinion, is it so important that we are
over there. And then one thing I want you to
cover too is I hear from the Democrats in Congress
(01:15):
a lot we demand to know when we are going
to pull out, demanding that intend to get that information
right now. And I always think we're going to pull
out when the job is done. So I kind of
want to hear what you have to say about what's
going on in the Middle East.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Well, first, you know, anytime you're in war, it's a
high risk, it's unpredictable, and that's why we should be
very reluctant to go to war. And you know, lives
are put on the line, and you lose people, even
not in combat, like having those two tankers colliding in
mid air over Iraq, and you know the Kwaiti's acidentally
(01:51):
shut down three of our fIF fifty five teams as
they're getting ready to land. Yes, and so there's a
fog and frictional war, and we should be very careful
the use of military force. That said, Iran has been
a war with US since nineteen seventy nine. They have
killed approximately one thousand Americans in terrorist attacks. Now, the
(02:12):
worst one was two hundred and forty one Americans in
Beirut when they bombed our barracks with the Marines. And
then we had nineteen ninety six Iranian terrorists blew up
a dormitory in Saudi Arabia with Air Force people in it.
I lost to one of my friends in that attack.
His name was Captain Tim Hahn and he got killed
(02:34):
in that explosion. But I was in Iraq. The proxy
groups that worked for Iran attacked us every day, and
my part of Baghdad, on a good day, we would
have three rockets or mortars hit our area from these
proxy groups that I RAN controlled. On bad days would
be like thirty mortars and rackets. And it's estimated that
(02:56):
we lost six hundred and nine Americans from the the
proxy groups that I RAN controlled, And they were the
ones who sent the most deadly roadside bombs that could
go through our tanks, and they made them in Iran
and put them in Iraq for the terrorists to use.
And though recently we know Iran was trying to they've
(03:16):
been trying to build a nuclear weapon. They had deep
underground bunkers. We've destroyed those bunkers, you know, like six
months ago. However, they still had processed fuel that can
make nuclear weapons, about ton of them we estimate, and
so that fuel wasn't destroyed, but the ability to make
more fuel that was destroyed. And do we want Iran
(03:39):
to be able to have ten nuclear weapons? And the
answers obviously know their leaders talk about destroying Israel. They
have a very apocalyptic mindset of bringing in the end times,
and it's scary. This is the very top leadership of Iran.
So they're the world's biggest terrorist exporter. We paid, we've
(04:00):
hurt by it. Done with a nuclear weapon is unthinkable.
I think the final straw was to kill at least
thirty thousand Iranians since January in these protests, just shooting
him in the hospitals. They just you know, they just
executed their top wrestler, a nineteen year old who protested.
(04:20):
They did that yesterday. The over thirty thousand Iranians were killed.
And at some point when does humanity say this is unacceptable.
That's why I support the operation. And I don't know
when it will be done. I think it will be
done in a couple of weeks, months, maybe we'll have
a little bit of presence there still, but we don't
know when the war will end. It's not a science
(04:41):
in that way. You know that the enemy has a vote.
So I think I'm with you. We end up when
it's done and demanding.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
To know when it's done. I have to think to myself, when,
when ever has Eisenhower MacArthur our patent been asked? I
want to know exactly when this is done. And it's
done when the job is done, correct.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Right, I mean it was done when we got it
when we entered Berlin, essentially, right, and so we But
I think when you look at the battle right now,
Iran has no air force, no navy, really no air
defenses anymore. But they do have these speedboats and some
ability to target these tankers right off their coast. And
(05:24):
that's a problem, and we're gonna have to work hard
to open up the straits of horror moves.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
And you talked about it already, but I've had plenty
of people that I know say, well, wait a minute,
didn't we already bomb them? I believe it was in
last summer July and take out all of their ability
to make nuclear weapons. But what you are saying we did,
but they still have the ability to make more. It's
an issue with uranium too. Correct.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
Correct that we really destroyed their underground production and their infrastructure,
but they'd already made process fuel to make nuclear weapons
with and we weren't able to eliminate at storage and
that supply, and we estimated there's enough fuel to make
ten like Hiroshima type bombs. You know that that's what
(06:14):
they had, that ability, and that was really some of
the intelligence driving this, you know, the current operations.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
And another thing we discussed that you have been over there,
and you've been over there present when those missiles are
being fired at you, and you told me what it
was like. You mentioned that on a bad day that
you could have say thirty or so on a good day.
I think you just said, you know, just a few,
but just describe what it's like when you get the
alert that those missiles are coming in. How long do
(06:43):
you have to actually take cover and what do you
do to take cover when you're over there?
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Well, I was in bad Dad. You know, they were
being launched about ten or twenty miles away and you
would normally get about a five second warning, which wasn't
a lot of time to get into a bunker. So
normally just you know, you got on the ground and
tried to get behind a wall something like that. And
when I first got to back dad, I knew it
(07:09):
would be a lucky shot to get hit. It's just
sort of random, and I was sort of care free
about it. I didn't I just sort of it didn't
bother me. But then I almost got hit twice, right,
and then that that woke you up, right, Well, I did.
One time was I had a key wall we call
it a smell wall between a trailer, and then right outside
(07:29):
of my trailer was a tea wall with sandbags and
a rocket hit on the other side of that tea wall.
Enough could have been a drug hit on the trailer,
I would have got killed. But on the other side
of the tea wall, you know, the blast went into
that tea wall with the sandbags. It was so close.
My lights came out of the ceiling and it was
very jarring, and I was like, okay, that would have hurt. Yeah, right,
it changed by suddenly I got I paid a lot
(07:51):
more attention to warnings.
Speaker 1 (07:52):
So what do you I mean, what do you have
about a minute when you know that they're they're coming.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
It's a minute. It's a minute right now because they're
being fired. For my ran, wow, and the range is
a lot farther. For me, it was about five seconds.
I get about five second warning, unbelievable because they were
shooting about ten miles away right. But however, the forces
in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE, they're getting about a minute
(08:19):
warning and so I guess enough time maybe to get
to a bunker. And Israel's getting a little longer warning
because that the range is a lot farther. But can
you imagine having to get up two or three times
a night and watch through a bunker. No, it'd be
very you know, Okay, do it for a night or
two is one thing. To do it for a month,
it gets very hard. That's what you know. The Israelis
(08:40):
are going through right now.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
And it says so much for the brave men and
women that are in our military that are over there,
and then what is going on with the citizens over
there too, what they're having to deal with over and
over twenty four to seven. So we hope this comes
to an end soon. But let me ask you this,
do you think that there is the chance that we
will have stability or even peace in the Middle East.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
I know the Bible sort of says there, this is
an area that we'll never have peace. But I gotta
I have to work with. Well, we don't have a
threat an enemy Iran, that those the shield leaders, the Malas,
they hate us, the great Satan, Israel, the little Satan.
And when someone kills over a thousand Americans over a
(09:25):
period of time, you know that's we should we should
see the truth of it. I got to think we're
going to be better off with getting this government out.
And what we're trying to do is collapse the government.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
And we have to get rid of the right.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
Right, we're trying to make the regime collapse itself, and
we've done a pretty good job of it. We're taken
we've taken out the top two or three layers of
the government between US and Israel. We've taken out a
lot of their command of control, a lot of the
all the top senior leaderships have been killed already, and
it's very hard for the the next guy's in the
line to take over, and when they do, they get killed.
(10:04):
And so we're trying to put enough pressure that the
government collapses, and we know the people want to have
a more representative government, and we have I don't know
how we do the polling there, but we have polling.
And Iran they're the most pro American people in the
Middle East. It's amazing. They want their freedom back. But
(10:25):
I think I could tell you it's very hard to
get there. I just know, are we better off with
this government or without it? And I know without it
it's the right answer. These guys would kill any of
us at our heartbeat they could.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
And lastly, clarify this for us. Did the President have
the authority to do what he did without Congress approving?
Speaker 2 (10:49):
Yes, becaues see, he's the commander in chief and just
practically if he comes to Congresses, I want to go
to war with Iran. Well, now we just gave away
all the surprise. We got to have surprise and so
and that's what he was saying, you know yesterday with
the Japanese Prime minister. And there's truth there. So he
has the ability command in chief to do what he did. However,
(11:10):
if the operations go beyond sixty days, he has to
have approval from Congress or he has to stop them.
Speaker 1 (11:17):
Okay, and that's what's important that for people to know.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
And we could vote right now to say we don't
want it if we wanted it, right, So the Congress
has the ability to vote and say we're going to
withdraw funding, but the majority of us thinking this is needed.
And so when this came up for a vote, when
the Delocrats wanted to have a vote it, we debated
it and the majority in the House voted against stopping
the President from doing it. So in a sense, Congress
(11:43):
has given us a cent or its consent to do
this because we voted against the War Powers resolution. But
we always have the ability to bring it back. And
if he doesn't have approval within sixty days, that that
would limit his ability to go forward.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
Right. And I thought when he was with the Japanese
Prime Minister it was a little bit funnier, I would say,
tongue in cheek like Trump can be, but so true
when he said to the Japanese Prime minister, well, I
would have liked had a lot of warning about Pearl
Harbor too, And I thought, what a great comeback that
he had on that one. Well, while we have it's true,
(12:18):
it's true, I have a few more things I want
to talk about, well we still have you travel for instance,
give us your opinion on what's going on with TSA
or not showing up. I heard in Houston yesterday there
was about fifty percent of the TSA that didn't show up.
Tempers are flaring at the airport. How close are we
(12:39):
in Congress to coming to an agreement that those TSA
will be paid so that we don't have this problem,
especially right now coming into spring break?
Speaker 2 (12:48):
Right now it's a disaster. I mean some airports are
having a three hour wait to go through TSA. Now,
thankfully Omaha has been better. In DC yesterday it was
not bad at all, But so the AIRPORT'SA and Texas
are terrible. And you know, I want to stay right
up front. The House is past full funding, right so
the House has passed full funding of every agency. It's
(13:11):
the effect that in the Senate that they have to
get sixty votes, and the Democrats by and large have
voted against funding, so they can't get sixty votes. So
we do. Our position in the House is whatever the
Senate can get sixty votes on, well we'll vote on
it whether we'd improve it, but they're going to have
to get sixty votes somehow, and it may be full funding,
or it may be funding for everything but one or
(13:34):
two things. But whatever they can get sixty votes on,
we need to do it. But I do think the
pressure is growing on Chuck Schumer. It's unacceptable to not
pay TSA, the Coastguard, FEMA absolute secret service. But they're
they're trying to they're trying to really defund the whole
land Security headquarters. They would like to defund ICE and
(13:54):
Border Patrol. But that this is what most people don't understand.
Those two agencies are already funded right Ice and Border
patrol are funded for three years right now. But the
Chuck Humer wants to go on to defund a lot
of that on ice boarder patrol. And they're holding FEMA
Secret Service, TSA, Coast Guard, Willius hostage. And I think
(14:18):
that they've come back and said, well, well fund those
but we're not going to fund hold Security headquarters. But
we've got a defund Ice and border patrols. That's that's
their goal.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
It's untenable, and.
Speaker 2 (14:30):
We need border patrol, we need ICE. And I was
you know, people say, well they didn't like their behavior
in Minnesota. Yeah, the Secretary got fired over this, right,
and the number two person there got fired. So the
President has responded to what he thought was an overreach
in Minneapolis by removing the leadership, and he's putting new
leadership in and you can already see the tax tactics
(14:51):
have changed. So I would suggest to the Democrats, or
particularly Chuck Schumer, the President and the administration has already,
you know, did a course correction on board patrol on
ice and how they and how they were their tactics
and how they were you know, rounding people up. So
I think in some ways the success is already is
already there.
Speaker 1 (15:12):
And I think people know that that government employees, they
eventually will get paid. You have to pay somebody for
the work that you do. But when Because the TSA
members are TSA employees, they don't get paid a wopping
big salary. They're what around forty thousand a year, and
they've got to live day today too, so well, so
(15:32):
many of them are leaving, not showing up for work,
to take on another job just to get by.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
Well, most people in these situations are living paycheck to paycheck,
and it is unacceptable what is happening. There is no
excuse it's an embarrassment to Congress, but I just want
people to know the House has funded it. Just we're
just trying to get sixty votes in the Senate. And
I think the chuck humor is long on this. But
(16:00):
I would rather sit down with them and try to
find an answer to get this fused, because it's not
here to the people that aren't getting paid.
Speaker 1 (16:06):
We got to have solutions now. While we still have
a few minutes left, I want to ask you about
the Save Act and why you think the Senate won't
pass that. I've heard anywhere from seventy to eighty percent
of Americans support the Save Act. It's just common sense.
It's to secure our elections, voter ID, proof of citizenship
(16:27):
to register to vote. Why do you think that it's
not going to pass in the Senate. I know you
supported it, and we.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
Vote important place in the House in it's passed and
it's a voter ID, which that is the part that
I mean seventy percent of African Americans supported, eighty percent
of Americans overall support voter ID. That should be a
no brainer. What the Democrats have been focused on, honus
the proof of citizenship that it's made too hard to prove,
(16:56):
and so the House has worked on it to try
to simplify it, make it easier, because we don't want
to make it too if we don't want to make
it that hard to prove your citizen. But we do
think citizens should be the only ones voting in federal elections,
and we know that some states have a very low bar.
We'd like to have him do better. But I think
(17:16):
that if I think if it was voter ID only
we could get sixty votes on the Senate, it would
come back to the House. I think there's a lot
of pushback on the citizen proof of citizenship, and they'll
focus on are we making it too hard to prove
here a citizen? But I think we've made it easier
in the second version of this bill, and that the
President also said he wants to make mail and balloting harder,
(17:41):
and I think there's some pushback on that, even even
a lot of Republicans say, you know, like we do
this in Nebraska. I think we do it pretty well.
So I think the way the process should work. If
we can get sixty votes on voter ID, let's take
take that and we can work on the rest later.
Because of the alternatives, We're not going to get anything
passed out of the out of the Senate, so I
think we should what we get sixty votes on, and
(18:02):
then you know, Franklin proof assistance should we should campaign
on it because most Americans want citizens only to vote, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (18:09):
And it's so important for the state to keep the
voter rolls clean. You know, those that have moved, those
that are illegal, those of who have died, and that's
those are still people that are on the voter rolls
in places. So I think that, you know, we really,
we really got to secure our elections. And I certainly
supported as I said, most Americans do too, So we
hope that that can move forward and something can get
(18:32):
done about it, because you know what, there is voter fraud.
It does happen. It happens in every election. It's usually
not enough to swing the election, but it does happen.
I remembered the first time I ran in two thousand
and six for the legislature, and if you recall, I
was declared the winner and then on the ninth day,
when provisional ballots were counted, my race flipped and I
(18:54):
was behind by fourteen votes. We went through every one
of those provisional ballots, and there were some that the
addresses were parking lots, abandoned buildings. But you know, usually
it's just not enough to swing the whole election, but
it is there and it is present.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
Right, Well, I totally agree, and I think I think
Nebraska does a good job of it. But you're right,
even if it's a micro percentage, these people should be prosecuted,
held accountable. And you're right. People want to know that
it's one vote per person and that their vote counts.
Speaker 1 (19:25):
And for every vote that isn't legal, it cancels your
vote out. And that's the one thing to keep on remembering.
Excuse me, Congress from making thanks for being with us today.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
All right, Peyton and I are here today and we're
going to be taking your calls, but we you know, Peyton,
I was listening to you yesterday and Chris Baker yesterday afternoon,
and I heard the funniest thing I think I've ever
heard on the radio. In fact, I almost wrecked my car.
Oh and not good. And that was you and Chris
Baker talking about pregnancy and minstrel periods. Uh uh huh,
(20:05):
I heard it.
Speaker 3 (20:05):
You can't deny it. Oh no, looking at him here
right now. But here's the thing, what do you think
about that?
Speaker 1 (20:11):
Okay, well, let me say, and I'm sure there's not
one woman that is listening to us now that would
not agree with me, that we are certainly fortunate that
men can't get pregnant. That's what I'm gonna say. But
how you know, what, how much time do we have here?
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (20:29):
We got some time, okay, so you know, for punishment
for what you and Chris were saying. Oh, you are
going to have to listen to my pregnancy story right now,
and I'll get this. I'll get this done in two minutes.
Let's hear it. But okay, I have two kids, right
My daughter Elizabeth was born in eighty five, so she's
forty right now. I was living well in another state
(20:51):
and we and my husband at the time, who has
passed away, we moved down to Galveston, Texas, and I
was seven months pregnant, all right, So here I didn't
know anybody, didn't know the doctor had a new doctor.
And so that was in August. In October is when
she was due. I remembered one day I started having
these cramps and things like that. But I didn't want
(21:13):
to be that girl. I didn't want to be the
new doctor's wife coming into the hospital and I'm going
over gosh sake, let's send her home, you know. So
I didn't want to do that. So I went through
the whole day, made tacos for dinner. Hurricane jan was
in the Gulf. We were in Galveston, which is an
island in the Gulf, and so we waited till. I
waited till probably midnight, and I'm thinking to myself, my goodness,
(21:36):
this is uncomfortable. And when I really go into labor,
I'm probably not going to do too well because this
is really uncomfortable. Now, I said, maybe we should go
and get checked. We're driving down the seawall. Waves are
coming over the sea wall, splashing into the car, and
I know, I told my husband at the time, I said,
let's turn around and go back. This is ridiculous. No,
we better go in and get you checked. So we
(21:56):
go in in a dlly dally around for like an hour,
and then when they first checked me, they go, oh,
you're having a baby. Boom. We went in the delivery
room and I had her, so lucky. I went no anesthesia,
no epidural. Nothing. She just popped right out as healthy
as she can be. Second kid, two years later, This
is Andrew. So I thought, I'm not going to go
(22:18):
in late on this one. Andrew's thirty eight right now,
and so we went in a week before he was due.
Went to the doctor and he goes feel, They feel
your belly, and he goes, this kid's really big. So
we come in on your due date. If you haven't
had him, we're going to induce you. So I went
in on his due date and they go, you're in
labor already, and I said, okay, so I didn't have
to get induced. But long story short, that one went
(22:41):
real easy too. Andrew weighed eleven pounds and he was
twenty four inches long. He was two feet long, and
to get eleven pounds, he was like a toddler. And
everybody was saying, holy cow, is this really an infant?
If they were even kidding me, they didn't want to
put him in the newborn nursery because you look like
a He was probably sitting up in his little bassin,
(23:02):
walking walking in as he gets delivered, and he's still
a big The kid is is six foot five. But
the kid came out screaming, and and Andrew's screamed for
the next nine months. But he's a good kid.
Speaker 3 (23:13):
So just to clarify, we were talking that in plenty
of other countries around the world, South Korea, Kenya, Indonesia, Spain,
they give women two days off per month for their
menstrual cycles.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
Really is that? Is that not a good thing? I
I I really wouldn't think that that would be something
that I would campaign on or that I would think
would be really important. I just don't. I mean, this
is this is just something that's part of life, and
you just, I mean, deal with it. For christ I hear,
(23:50):
I hear you. Well that's that. You remember I had
an eleven pound baby. So, yeah, you're you're a tough cookie,
aren't you. Yeah, and I was, yeah, I guess I
was like back out on the fields later on that day,
you know, first day of spring. Yes, it is, thank goodness.
But you know what I just read this morning that
this was the second mildest winter in history. Oh, I'll
(24:13):
take it. It kind of felt like it. It was
very very mild. You know, we had a couple snowfalls,
but but no big deal this year. And so but
you know what I am. I am solar powered. I
don't know about you. I love warm weather. I love
the sunshine. I love it when we change the clocks
so that it stays light later and later and later.
I bet you do too, because you're probably out there
(24:34):
kicking a soccer ball around. I love it. I know
I do. I really like this. So I'm so glad
it's the first day of spring. Now watch, we'll have
some big blizzard next weak and it'll it'll be ten below.
Speaker 3 (24:45):
Yes, So we're gonna get into affordable housing here, Yes, Okay.
I'm gonna play a quick talkback mic from Ken just
to get a listener's perspective of how things are going,
and then you can break it down for us. Okay, sure,
radio talkback mic on the new iHeartRadio app. Good morning.
Speaker 4 (25:01):
I'll tell you another consequence intended or not. Many years ago,
I was up and coming out of the military, and
I lived in an apartment complex in Omaha. I was
paying nine hundred a month. Neighbor next to me fifteen dollars.
Other neighbor next to me seven point fifty. There's no
steak in the game when you talk about affordable housing.
(25:22):
There is no stake in the game, they don't have
to keep it up. The place was run down inside
of five years. If you don't have any stake in
the game, you don't care.
Speaker 1 (25:30):
You know, I really understand what he is saying, and
I think it's important to I explained it the other day,
but I'm going to explain it again because affordable housing
is so misunderstood. It is true that affordable housing is
different in New York and Los Angeles as it is
in Omaha, Nebraska. The definition of affordable is based on
(25:55):
the area median income, or we call it the AMI.
But the so it's different in New York the average
income as it is in Omaha. But the AMI also
depends on the size of the household. So basically, you
should not be paying any more than thirty percent of
your income on housing including utilities. And it doesn't make
(26:19):
any difference if you make fifty thousand a year or
five hundred thousand a year. It's the same base calculation.
And so the AMI, like I said, it depends on
the size of the household. The AMI is not only
looking at the average median income, but it's different if
you are a one person household or a four person household,
(26:42):
and so you almost need a table to define what
affordable means. So, for instance, Omaha's single person AMI, the
average median income in Omaha, Nebraska is about seventy nine
thousand dollars a year, and for a four person household
it's about one hundred thirteen seven hundred thousand a year.
(27:03):
So affordable for a single person is twenty three thousand,
eight hundred eighty dollars a year or one thousand, nine
hundred and ninety dollars a month. That's what is considered
affordable in Omaha, Nebraska. Affordable for a four person household
is approximately thirty four thousand a year, are two thousand,
(27:25):
eight hundred and forty three a month. So you got
to see that there are different levels of affordability, and
like I said, it is it is very difficult to understand.
Generally speaking, the terms are eighty percent to one hundred percent.
AMI is for affordable workforce housing is like fifty to
eighty percent, Low income housing is thirty to fifty percent,
(27:48):
and very low income is below thirty percent. That's or
that would be extremely low income. So there's a lot
of definition that goes with that, and it's very confusing.
But what I found when I was mayor is when
we would announce that, according to the regulations that there
are here is a housing project. Let's look at the duo,
(28:10):
which are the twin Towers Central Park Plaza, Downtown, seven
hundred and seven apartments. There's a percentage of those, a
certain percentage are affordable. But immediately people would say, well,
what is the rent for a one bedroom or a studio,
And when the developer would say this is what it is, well,
that's not affordable for me, you know, but it's affordable
(28:31):
according to the definition. And HUD basically defines what affordable means.
I said this the other day, but I'm going to
repeat it. HUD defines what affordable is. And if you
look at their I'll say their chart, start at the bottom.
It comes to low income, and then it would be
up a level subsidized, then it would be affordable, then
(28:51):
it would be workforce, then it would be market rate,
and then it would be luxury. That's kind of how
the different levels go. But to basically, and I'm not
sure that that's the right word to use, you have
to have this certain income in the area that you
are in, so it is very very confusing about that.
But there are a lot of people that just want
(29:13):
to think that affordable housing is cheap housing, and it
is not. It's not at all.
Speaker 3 (29:18):
Well, Gene, you know here, I am looking for apartments
with my fiance before we move in together, and you
said nineteen hundred could be considered affordable.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
Well, our budget's lower than that. What does that mean
for us?
Speaker 2 (29:30):
Oh?
Speaker 1 (29:30):
There and there, you know, there there are some that
and I'm just going through the numbers off of the
chart right here. But the thing of it is the
average is is that to qualify, you should not be
paying any more than thirty percent of your monthly income
including utilities on housing. And you know a lot of
times some of these studios are say eight nine hundred
(29:53):
a month, that's all they are. That's considered affordable. But
I will have people say not affordable for me. So
you really got to shop around, you know. I think
the I think the average in Omaha for a one
bedroom might be twelve to fourteen hundred for a market rate,
and then you go up from there. And so yeah,
(30:15):
it's it's it's it's a challenge because people need to
get something they need to get in good housing, that's
for sure. We want them to do that. We don't
want them all in low income subsidized housing, and you know,
we don't promote low income housing anymore either. It should
be mixed income, because you don't want to create an
area a big, a big bunch of apartments that are
(30:35):
all low income, because then you recreate the projects and
that's not what you want. So it's really you're really
looking for good mixed income and good affordable housing and
then to have our stock of affordable housing available. But
we have to work on some incentives to get developers
to build those things because they again they have to
(30:58):
get their return on investment, so forcing them forcing developers
to build more affordable housing is not a way that
I would support.
Speaker 3 (31:07):
So good conversation on affordable I want to shift our
attention a little bit to this State of the City. Yeah,
and I don't have a direct question for you to
get you kicked off here, but I just kind of
want to hear your thoughts. Mayor John Ewing has his
State of the City this afternoon at two o'clock.
Speaker 1 (31:23):
Do those start on time? That's exactly what I did.
I did. I did twelve of those. I started at
two o'clock in the afternoon. Yes, they do start on time,
and you should be able to go to the City
of Omaha to their website. You should go to City
Council and it should be playing live so you could
listen to it. I will say that the two most
(31:44):
important speeches a year a mayor gives, and I've given
plenty of speeches in my twelve years a mayor are
the budget speech, which you've given the summer, and then
the State of the City speech. Those are the two
most important speeches you give, and you talk about the
mayor and with the budget as well as the state
of the city, we'll talk about what your priorities are
(32:05):
and what your priority and your successes that you've had,
and then you talk about where you're going in the future. Now,
I did say because it is true that when Maror
Ewing did his first budget speech, it was verbatim the
last budget speech that I gave was because it was
so good. Well, I want to tell myself that, but
(32:25):
I mean Kerrie Murphy, who is my communication director, and
I wrote that speech, and we recognize that speech. When
Maror Ewing gave it, so hopefully I thought it was
a really good speech and just change a lot of
numbers and change some things, but a lot of it
was my speech, so I will be really interested in
seeing what the state of the city is. It is
the longest speech I gave. It could get up to
(32:47):
twenty minutes. You know, I usually didn't want to give
a speech over fifteen because you certainly did start losing
your audience. People start looking at their cell phones, sleeping whatever,
And you know you want it. You might want to
make it interesting and you want to make it going.
But I want to hear it. I want to hear
what Mary Ewing's priorities are where he's going. Keep in mind,
(33:07):
there were a lot of campaign promises that were made.
I stood right next to him and I heard every
one of them. So let's see if he's going to
address those things and he is going to move forward
with the things that he has promised. It's a very
important speech and I want people to listen to it,
and then you be the judge. You know, I shouldn't
(33:27):
be the judge, but I know what it's like. I
know what it's like being mayor, and I know how
important this speech is to let people know what's going
on and where you're going in the future.
Speaker 3 (33:38):
This is the kfa B comment line with your host
Jean Stothard. My name is Peyton Highlocked, producer of the show.
A little bit of a fun question here. If Omaha
residents won a second trash container, they fill out a
form listing all the people in the home and the
form has to be notarized. This seems to be very unnecessary.
Councilman brinker Harding stated that the notary is misused to
obtain an extra trash container. Why the notary, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (34:03):
Why the rotary To tell you the truth? And you know,
I have to stop and refresh my memory because I
negotiated this new contract for our new trash collection system
we have with the ninety six gallon cards. Honestly, I
have an extra bin and I applied for it myself,
and I don't remember having it notarized. But you know,
(34:27):
I guess my husband and I is just me and him.
I guess we create a lot of trash. I don't know.
Do you recycle? I recycle like crazy. What about composting?
I you know, I don't do a lot of composting,
but every bit of glass if you recall, we don't
recycle glass curbside in Omaha. It's considered a contaminant and
if you put it in with your regular recycling and
(34:50):
one breaks, the whole thing has to be put in
the landfill. So we have those big purple bins all
over Omaha, and once a week I take all of
my glass, I say, and I go and I throw
it in the purple bins. But yes, I do recycle.
But you can get this extra cart that I'm talking about.
It's a different color. It's blue, so they know it's
your extra cart. But I have one, and I pay
(35:13):
ninety dollars a year for it. Now somebody may say, well,
I have a lot of I have six kids, and
I don't want to pay that ninety dollars. But really,
ninety dollars a year is not a lot to have
the ability to have that extra ninety six gallon cart.
Some weeks, I don't put it out. In some weeks
when I'm purging and doing things like that, I do
(35:34):
put that extra card out. Remember, with our old system,
I mean, people could put their sofa and their barbecue
grill out on the curb and the city would pick
it up. Can't do that anymore, it has to fit
in that cart, so that extra one is quite handy.
Speaker 3 (35:47):
That makes a lot of work for the for the
workers coming around to collect those things.
Speaker 1 (35:50):
But remember now it's all automated and they have those
big arms that come down and will lift the carts,
and you could put bricks in those carts. Really there's
not a lot of weight limit with them anymore. But
it's so much safer for those that are working on
those trucks too, So it's a good system. It took
some time to get used to it. I know people
(36:11):
hated it at first. I remember that we did a
pilot for about six months. We picked one neighborhood and
the one thing that they said in the beginning is
I hate that ninety six gallon cart. And when the
pilot was over, they said, don't take away my ninety
six gallon card because I love it. So it just
takes them getting used to and Gene.
Speaker 3 (36:28):
It looks and sounds like people were not super satisfied
with your answer. They love the definition of affordable, but
what does it mean.
Speaker 1 (36:36):
It's confusing it, I mean, it's very confusing, and it
is confusing to try to define it too. But like
I said, it's based on your average median income of
the area live in. And the base definition is you
should not be spending more than thirty percent of your
(36:56):
income on housing, including you utilities. And it doesn't make
any difference if you're fifty thousand dollars a year salary
or your five hundred thousand dollars a year. And so
affordable again based on the average median income. Where I
is probably can excuse me confusing is when I said,
(37:17):
so a single person's ami in Omaha is about seventy
nine thousand a year, where a four person household is
around one hundred and thirteen thousand dollars a year. And
so I said affordable for a single person is that
you would be paying twenty three thousand, about twenty three
thousand a year on housing or nineteen hundred a month.
(37:40):
Now that includes homes. We're not just talking apartments here.
So you got to think if you go out and
buy a home, you got to think of the mortgage
to on that. And so it's different for a single person,
and it's different for what is affordable. But I believe
you're an average affordable housing studio or single single bed,
(38:02):
single bed apartment in Omaha now is maybe seven eight
hundred a month, and some people will say that's not
affordable for me, but that's according to what the definition is.
So it is confusing, but it's it's worth spending time
on it, because when we keep on saying we need
more affordable housing units, what does that mean? And it
(38:25):
does not mean that you're gonna get, you know, a
luxury apartment for four hundred dollars a month.
Speaker 3 (38:31):
I mean, it's just not going to happen. This is
a little bit of a lighter question here to wrap
up the day. Okay, this comes from Angie this morning.
This morning, when I was laying in bed, unable to
go back to sleep, I had a pressing question come
to mind. Gean, while you were mayor in now do
or did you have security stay around your house overnight?
Did you have security following you during the day. Inquiring
(38:51):
minds want to know.
Speaker 1 (38:52):
Oh, I bet you they do. No, I never had
them at my home. I didn't. I didn't want that.
I didn't think it was necessary to have a cruiser
out in front of my home. I did have security
drive me around, and I will tell you when I
became mayor, I told Todd Schmoter, I don't need this,
I don't want this. I'm going to drive my own
personal car and I'm going to drive myself around until
(39:14):
a couple incidents happened with me and Todd had to say,
I told you so, and so then I said, okay,
I will have security drive me around, but I will
drive my own car. And we did that for four years,
and so I think it's important to do that. A
lot of times you're running around during the day. You
got to get to one place to another to another,
(39:34):
and it helps the security is with you. But I
never had them travel with me, and I never had
them parking a cruiser around my house at night time.
Speaker 3 (39:44):
Thirty seconds left in the show Geane ninety degrees Tomorrow,
Beautiful Day Today.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
Anything going on this weekend? You know? I Well, first
of all, Tomorrow night we're going to go see my
husband and I, Kevin and I are going to go
see Bob Dylan at the Orpheum. Well, that's going to
be a great show. And he's playing golf tomorrow. I mean,
you go, you go your south. Their city courses are open,
the private courses are being open, So enjoy your weekend.
Thanks for listening, and thanks for being with us today.
Today, I have a great guest, and we have lots
and lots to talk about. Congressman Don Bacon is with
us today from a congressional district too, And Congressman Bacon,
welcome to the show.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Hey, it's always good to be at k and it's
great to talk to you.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Thank you. Are you in DC? Are you traveling?
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Got back last night?
Speaker 1 (00:20):
You got back last night? So you're back in Nebraska. Boy,
you go back and forth a lot, don't you.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
The funny thing is I set you a text asking
you to pick me up. I meant to send that
to someone else.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
Darn it, I guess I missed it. Otherwise, you know
what I've been there, what at two in the morning
or something like that. Well, we have lots to talk
about today. I really wanted to start out and talk
a bit about Operation Epic Fury and US being in
the Middle East. And you know, we sat down about
a week ago, you and I had breakfast together, and
(00:52):
I think we talked for two hours as you were
telling me your opinion of things going on and why
it's so important. And I think that's what I wanted
to start out with today. Why is it so important?
You've been to the Middle East, you understand what's going on, Why,
in your opinion, is it so important that we are
over there. And then one thing I want you to
cover too is I hear from the Democrats in Congress
(01:15):
a lot we demand to know when we are going
to pull out, demanding that intend to get that information
right now. And I always think we're going to pull
out when the job is done. So I kind of
want to hear what you have to say about what's
going on in the Middle East.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Well, first, you know, anytime you're in war, it's a
high risk, it's unpredictable, and that's why we should be
very reluctant to go to war. And you know, lives
are put on the line, and you lose people, even
not in combat, like having those two tankers colliding in
mid air over Iraq, and you know the Kwaiti's acidentally
(01:51):
shut down three of our fIF fifty five teams as
they're getting ready to land. Yes, and so there's a
fog and frictional war, and we should be very careful
the use of military force. That said, Iran has been
a war with US since nineteen seventy nine. They have
killed approximately one thousand Americans in terrorist attacks. Now, the
(02:12):
worst one was two hundred and forty one Americans in
Beirut when they bombed our barracks with the Marines. And
then we had nineteen ninety six Iranian terrorists blew up
a dormitory in Saudi Arabia with Air Force people in it.
I lost to one of my friends in that attack.
His name was Captain Tim Hahn and he got killed
(02:34):
in that explosion. But I was in Iraq. The proxy
groups that worked for Iran attacked us every day, and
my part of Baghdad, on a good day, we would
have three rockets or mortars hit our area from these
proxy groups that I RAN controlled. On bad days would
be like thirty mortars and rackets. And it's estimated that
(02:56):
we lost six hundred and nine Americans from the the
proxy groups that I RAN controlled, And they were the
ones who sent the most deadly roadside bombs that could
go through our tanks, and they made them in Iran
and put them in Iraq for the terrorists to use.
And though recently we know Iran was trying to they've
(03:16):
been trying to build a nuclear weapon. They had deep
underground bunkers. We've destroyed those bunkers, you know, like six
months ago. However, they still had processed fuel that can
make nuclear weapons, about ton of them we estimate, and
so that fuel wasn't destroyed, but the ability to make
more fuel that was destroyed. And do we want Iran
(03:39):
to be able to have ten nuclear weapons? And the
answers obviously know their leaders talk about destroying Israel. They
have a very apocalyptic mindset of bringing in the end times,
and it's scary. This is the very top leadership of Iran.
So they're the world's biggest terrorist exporter. We paid, we've
(04:00):
hurt by it. Done with a nuclear weapon is unthinkable.
I think the final straw was to kill at least
thirty thousand Iranians since January in these protests, just shooting
him in the hospitals. They just you know, they just
executed their top wrestler, a nineteen year old who protested.
(04:20):
They did that yesterday. The over thirty thousand Iranians were killed.
And at some point when does humanity say this is unacceptable.
That's why I support the operation. And I don't know
when it will be done. I think it will be
done in a couple of weeks, months, maybe we'll have
a little bit of presence there still, but we don't
know when the war will end. It's not a science
(04:41):
in that way. You know that the enemy has a vote.
So I think I'm with you. We end up when
it's done and demanding.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
To know when it's done. I have to think to myself, when,
when ever has Eisenhower MacArthur our patent been asked? I
want to know exactly when this is done. And it's
done when the job is done, correct.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Right, I mean it was done when we got it
when we entered Berlin, essentially, right, and so we But
I think when you look at the battle right now,
Iran has no air force, no navy, really no air
defenses anymore. But they do have these speedboats and some
ability to target these tankers right off their coast. And
(05:24):
that's a problem, and we're gonna have to work hard
to open up the straits of horror moves.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
And you talked about it already, but I've had plenty
of people that I know say, well, wait a minute,
didn't we already bomb them? I believe it was in
last summer July and take out all of their ability
to make nuclear weapons. But what you are saying we did,
but they still have the ability to make more. It's
an issue with uranium too. Correct.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
Correct that we really destroyed their underground production and their infrastructure,
but they'd already made process fuel to make nuclear weapons
with and we weren't able to eliminate at storage and
that supply, and we estimated there's enough fuel to make
ten like Hiroshima type bombs. You know that that's what
(06:14):
they had, that ability, and that was really some of
the intelligence driving this, you know, the current operations.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
And another thing we discussed that you have been over there,
and you've been over there present when those missiles are
being fired at you, and you told me what it
was like. You mentioned that on a bad day that
you could have say thirty or so on a good day.
I think you just said, you know, just a few,
but just describe what it's like when you get the
alert that those missiles are coming in. How long do
(06:43):
you have to actually take cover and what do you
do to take cover when you're over there?
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Well, I was in bad Dad. You know, they were
being launched about ten or twenty miles away and you
would normally get about a five second warning, which wasn't
a lot of time to get into a bunker. So
normally just you know, you got on the ground and
tried to get behind a wall something like that. And
when I first got to back dad, I knew it
(07:09):
would be a lucky shot to get hit. It's just
sort of random, and I was sort of care free
about it. I didn't I just sort of it didn't
bother me. But then I almost got hit twice, right,
and then that that woke you up, right, Well, I did.
One time was I had a key wall we call
it a smell wall between a trailer, and then right outside
(07:29):
of my trailer was a tea wall with sandbags and
a rocket hit on the other side of that tea wall.
Enough could have been a drug hit on the trailer,
I would have got killed. But on the other side
of the tea wall, you know, the blast went into
that tea wall with the sandbags. It was so close.
My lights came out of the ceiling and it was
very jarring, and I was like, okay, that would have hurt. Yeah, right,
it changed by suddenly I got I paid a lot
(07:51):
more attention to warnings.
Speaker 1 (07:52):
So what do you I mean, what do you have
about a minute when you know that they're they're coming.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
It's a minute. It's a minute right now because they're
being fired. For my ran, wow, and the range is
a lot farther. For me, it was about five seconds.
I get about five second warning, unbelievable because they were
shooting about ten miles away right. But however, the forces
in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE, they're getting about a minute
(08:19):
warning and so I guess enough time maybe to get
to a bunker. And Israel's getting a little longer warning
because that the range is a lot farther. But can
you imagine having to get up two or three times
a night and watch through a bunker. No, it'd be
very you know, Okay, do it for a night or
two is one thing. To do it for a month,
it gets very hard. That's what you know. The Israelis
(08:40):
are going through right now.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
And it says so much for the brave men and
women that are in our military that are over there,
and then what is going on with the citizens over
there too, what they're having to deal with over and
over twenty four to seven. So we hope this comes
to an end soon. But let me ask you this,
do you think that there is the chance that we
will have stability or even peace in the Middle East.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
I know the Bible sort of says there, this is
an area that we'll never have peace. But I gotta
I have to work with. Well, we don't have a
threat an enemy Iran, that those the shield leaders, the Malas,
they hate us, the great Satan, Israel, the little Satan.
And when someone kills over a thousand Americans over a
(09:25):
period of time, you know that's we should we should
see the truth of it. I got to think we're
going to be better off with getting this government out.
And what we're trying to do is collapse the government.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
And we have to get rid of the right.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
Right, we're trying to make the regime collapse itself, and
we've done a pretty good job of it. We're taken
we've taken out the top two or three layers of
the government between US and Israel. We've taken out a
lot of their command of control, a lot of the
all the top senior leaderships have been killed already, and
it's very hard for the the next guy's in the
line to take over, and when they do, they get killed.
(10:04):
And so we're trying to put enough pressure that the
government collapses, and we know the people want to have
a more representative government, and we have I don't know
how we do the polling there, but we have polling.
And Iran they're the most pro American people in the
Middle East. It's amazing. They want their freedom back. But
(10:25):
I think I could tell you it's very hard to
get there. I just know, are we better off with
this government or without it? And I know without it
it's the right answer. These guys would kill any of
us at our heartbeat they could.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
And lastly, clarify this for us. Did the President have
the authority to do what he did without Congress approving?
Speaker 2 (10:49):
Yes, becaues see, he's the commander in chief and just
practically if he comes to Congresses, I want to go
to war with Iran. Well, now we just gave away
all the surprise. We got to have surprise and so
and that's what he was saying, you know yesterday with
the Japanese Prime minister. And there's truth there. So he
has the ability command in chief to do what he did. However,
(11:10):
if the operations go beyond sixty days, he has to
have approval from Congress or he has to stop them.
Speaker 1 (11:17):
Okay, and that's what's important that for people to know.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
And we could vote right now to say we don't
want it if we wanted it, right, So the Congress
has the ability to vote and say we're going to
withdraw funding, but the majority of us thinking this is needed.
And so when this came up for a vote, when
the Delocrats wanted to have a vote it, we debated
it and the majority in the House voted against stopping
the President from doing it. So in a sense, Congress
(11:43):
has given us a cent or its consent to do
this because we voted against the War Powers resolution. But
we always have the ability to bring it back. And
if he doesn't have approval within sixty days, that that
would limit his ability to go forward.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
Right. And I thought when he was with the Japanese
Prime Minister it was a little bit funnier, I would say,
tongue in cheek like Trump can be, but so true
when he said to the Japanese Prime minister, well, I
would have liked had a lot of warning about Pearl
Harbor too, And I thought, what a great comeback that
he had on that one. Well, while we have it's true,
(12:18):
it's true, I have a few more things I want
to talk about, well we still have you travel for instance,
give us your opinion on what's going on with TSA
or not showing up. I heard in Houston yesterday there
was about fifty percent of the TSA that didn't show up.
Tempers are flaring at the airport. How close are we
(12:39):
in Congress to coming to an agreement that those TSA
will be paid so that we don't have this problem,
especially right now coming into spring break?
Speaker 2 (12:48):
Right now it's a disaster. I mean some airports are
having a three hour wait to go through TSA. Now,
thankfully Omaha has been better. In DC yesterday it was
not bad at all, But so the AIRPORT'SA and Texas
are terrible. And you know, I want to stay right
up front. The House is past full funding, right so
the House has passed full funding of every agency. It's
(13:11):
the effect that in the Senate that they have to
get sixty votes, and the Democrats by and large have
voted against funding, so they can't get sixty votes. So
we do. Our position in the House is whatever the
Senate can get sixty votes on, well we'll vote on
it whether we'd improve it, but they're going to have
to get sixty votes somehow, and it may be full funding,
or it may be funding for everything but one or
(13:34):
two things. But whatever they can get sixty votes on,
we need to do it. But I do think the
pressure is growing on Chuck Schumer. It's unacceptable to not
pay TSA, the Coastguard, FEMA absolute secret service. But they're
they're trying to they're trying to really defund the whole
land Security headquarters. They would like to defund ICE and
(13:54):
Border Patrol. But that this is what most people don't understand.
Those two agencies are already funded right Ice and Border
patrol are funded for three years right now. But the
Chuck Humer wants to go on to defund a lot
of that on ice boarder patrol. And they're holding FEMA
Secret Service, TSA, Coast Guard, Willius hostage. And I think
(14:18):
that they've come back and said, well, well fund those
but we're not going to fund hold Security headquarters. But
we've got a defund Ice and border patrols. That's that's
their goal.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
It's untenable, and.
Speaker 2 (14:30):
We need border patrol, we need ICE. And I was
you know, people say, well they didn't like their behavior
in Minnesota. Yeah, the Secretary got fired over this, right,
and the number two person there got fired. So the
President has responded to what he thought was an overreach
in Minneapolis by removing the leadership, and he's putting new
leadership in and you can already see the tax tactics
(14:51):
have changed. So I would suggest to the Democrats, or
particularly Chuck Schumer, the President and the administration has already,
you know, did a course correction on board patrol on
ice and how they and how they were their tactics
and how they were you know, rounding people up. So
I think in some ways the success is already is
already there.
Speaker 1 (15:12):
And I think people know that that government employees, they
eventually will get paid. You have to pay somebody for
the work that you do. But when Because the TSA
members are TSA employees, they don't get paid a wopping
big salary. They're what around forty thousand a year, and
they've got to live day today too, so well, so
(15:32):
many of them are leaving, not showing up for work,
to take on another job just to get by.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
Well, most people in these situations are living paycheck to paycheck,
and it is unacceptable what is happening. There is no
excuse it's an embarrassment to Congress, but I just want
people to know the House has funded it. Just we're
just trying to get sixty votes in the Senate. And
I think the chuck humor is long on this. But
(16:00):
I would rather sit down with them and try to
find an answer to get this fused, because it's not
here to the people that aren't getting paid.
Speaker 1 (16:06):
We got to have solutions now. While we still have
a few minutes left, I want to ask you about
the Save Act and why you think the Senate won't
pass that. I've heard anywhere from seventy to eighty percent
of Americans support the Save Act. It's just common sense.
It's to secure our elections, voter ID, proof of citizenship
(16:27):
to register to vote. Why do you think that it's
not going to pass in the Senate. I know you
supported it, and we.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
Vote important place in the House in it's passed and
it's a voter ID, which that is the part that
I mean seventy percent of African Americans supported, eighty percent
of Americans overall support voter ID. That should be a
no brainer. What the Democrats have been focused on, honus
the proof of citizenship that it's made too hard to prove,
(16:56):
and so the House has worked on it to try
to simplify it, make it easier, because we don't want
to make it too if we don't want to make
it that hard to prove your citizen. But we do
think citizens should be the only ones voting in federal elections,
and we know that some states have a very low bar.
We'd like to have him do better. But I think
(17:16):
that if I think if it was voter ID only
we could get sixty votes on the Senate, it would
come back to the House. I think there's a lot
of pushback on the citizen proof of citizenship, and they'll
focus on are we making it too hard to prove
here a citizen? But I think we've made it easier
in the second version of this bill, and that the
President also said he wants to make mail and balloting harder,
(17:41):
and I think there's some pushback on that, even even
a lot of Republicans say, you know, like we do
this in Nebraska. I think we do it pretty well.
So I think the way the process should work. If
we can get sixty votes on voter ID, let's take
take that and we can work on the rest later.
Because of the alternatives, We're not going to get anything
passed out of the out of the Senate, so I
think we should what we get sixty votes on, and
(18:02):
then you know, Franklin proof assistance should we should campaign
on it because most Americans want citizens only to vote, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (18:09):
And it's so important for the state to keep the
voter rolls clean. You know, those that have moved, those
that are illegal, those of who have died, and that's
those are still people that are on the voter rolls
in places. So I think that, you know, we really,
we really got to secure our elections. And I certainly
supported as I said, most Americans do too, So we
hope that that can move forward and something can get
(18:32):
done about it, because you know what, there is voter fraud.
It does happen. It happens in every election. It's usually
not enough to swing the election, but it does happen.
I remembered the first time I ran in two thousand
and six for the legislature, and if you recall, I
was declared the winner and then on the ninth day,
when provisional ballots were counted, my race flipped and I
(18:54):
was behind by fourteen votes. We went through every one
of those provisional ballots, and there were some that the
addresses were parking lots, abandoned buildings. But you know, usually
it's just not enough to swing the whole election, but
it is there and it is present.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
Right, Well, I totally agree, and I think I think
Nebraska does a good job of it. But you're right,
even if it's a micro percentage, these people should be prosecuted,
held accountable. And you're right. People want to know that
it's one vote per person and that their vote counts.
Speaker 1 (19:25):
And for every vote that isn't legal, it cancels your
vote out. And that's the one thing to keep on remembering.
Excuse me, Congress from making thanks for being with us today.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
All right, Peyton and I are here today and we're
going to be taking your calls, but we you know, Peyton,
I was listening to you yesterday and Chris Baker yesterday afternoon,
and I heard the funniest thing I think I've ever
heard on the radio. In fact, I almost wrecked my car.
Oh and not good. And that was you and Chris
Baker talking about pregnancy and minstrel periods. Uh uh huh,
(20:05):
I heard it.
Speaker 3 (20:05):
You can't deny it. Oh no, looking at him here
right now. But here's the thing, what do you think
about that?
Speaker 1 (20:11):
Okay, well, let me say, and I'm sure there's not
one woman that is listening to us now that would
not agree with me, that we are certainly fortunate that
men can't get pregnant. That's what I'm gonna say. But
how you know, what, how much time do we have here?
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (20:29):
We got some time, okay, so you know, for punishment
for what you and Chris were saying. Oh, you are
going to have to listen to my pregnancy story right now,
and I'll get this. I'll get this done in two minutes.
Let's hear it. But okay, I have two kids, right
My daughter Elizabeth was born in eighty five, so she's
forty right now. I was living well in another state
(20:51):
and we and my husband at the time, who has
passed away, we moved down to Galveston, Texas, and I
was seven months pregnant, all right, So here I didn't
know anybody, didn't know the doctor had a new doctor.
And so that was in August. In October is when
she was due. I remembered one day I started having
these cramps and things like that. But I didn't want
(21:13):
to be that girl. I didn't want to be the
new doctor's wife coming into the hospital and I'm going
over gosh sake, let's send her home, you know. So
I didn't want to do that. So I went through
the whole day, made tacos for dinner. Hurricane jan was
in the Gulf. We were in Galveston, which is an
island in the Gulf, and so we waited till. I
waited till probably midnight, and I'm thinking to myself, my goodness,
(21:36):
this is uncomfortable. And when I really go into labor,
I'm probably not going to do too well because this
is really uncomfortable. Now, I said, maybe we should go
and get checked. We're driving down the seawall. Waves are
coming over the sea wall, splashing into the car, and
I know, I told my husband at the time, I said,
let's turn around and go back. This is ridiculous. No,
we better go in and get you checked. So we
(21:56):
go in in a dlly dally around for like an hour,
and then when they first checked me, they go, oh,
you're having a baby. Boom. We went in the delivery
room and I had her, so lucky. I went no anesthesia,
no epidural. Nothing. She just popped right out as healthy
as she can be. Second kid, two years later, This
is Andrew. So I thought, I'm not going to go
(22:18):
in late on this one. Andrew's thirty eight right now,
and so we went in a week before he was due.
Went to the doctor and he goes feel, They feel
your belly, and he goes, this kid's really big. So
we come in on your due date. If you haven't
had him, we're going to induce you. So I went
in on his due date and they go, you're in
labor already, and I said, okay, so I didn't have
to get induced. But long story short, that one went
(22:41):
real easy too. Andrew weighed eleven pounds and he was
twenty four inches long. He was two feet long, and
to get eleven pounds, he was like a toddler. And
everybody was saying, holy cow, is this really an infant?
If they were even kidding me, they didn't want to
put him in the newborn nursery because you look like
a He was probably sitting up in his little bassin,
(23:02):
walking walking in as he gets delivered, and he's still
a big The kid is is six foot five. But
the kid came out screaming, and and Andrew's screamed for
the next nine months. But he's a good kid.
Speaker 3 (23:13):
So just to clarify, we were talking that in plenty
of other countries around the world, South Korea, Kenya, Indonesia, Spain,
they give women two days off per month for their
menstrual cycles.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
Really is that? Is that not a good thing? I
I I really wouldn't think that that would be something
that I would campaign on or that I would think
would be really important. I just don't. I mean, this
is this is just something that's part of life, and
you just, I mean, deal with it. For christ I hear,
(23:50):
I hear you. Well that's that. You remember I had
an eleven pound baby. So, yeah, you're you're a tough cookie,
aren't you. Yeah, and I was, yeah, I guess I
was like back out on the fields later on that day,
you know, first day of spring. Yes, it is, thank goodness.
But you know what I just read this morning that
this was the second mildest winter in history. Oh, I'll
(24:13):
take it. It kind of felt like it. It was
very very mild. You know, we had a couple snowfalls,
but but no big deal this year. And so but
you know what I am. I am solar powered. I
don't know about you. I love warm weather. I love
the sunshine. I love it when we change the clocks
so that it stays light later and later and later.
I bet you do too, because you're probably out there
(24:34):
kicking a soccer ball around. I love it. I know
I do. I really like this. So I'm so glad
it's the first day of spring. Now watch, we'll have
some big blizzard next weak and it'll it'll be ten below.
Speaker 3 (24:45):
Yes, So we're gonna get into affordable housing here, Yes, Okay.
I'm gonna play a quick talkback mic from Ken just
to get a listener's perspective of how things are going,
and then you can break it down for us. Okay, sure,
radio talkback mic on the new iHeartRadio app. Good morning.
Speaker 4 (25:01):
I'll tell you another consequence intended or not. Many years ago,
I was up and coming out of the military, and
I lived in an apartment complex in Omaha. I was
paying nine hundred a month. Neighbor next to me fifteen dollars.
Other neighbor next to me seven point fifty. There's no
steak in the game when you talk about affordable housing.
(25:22):
There is no stake in the game, they don't have
to keep it up. The place was run down inside
of five years. If you don't have any stake in
the game, you don't care.
Speaker 1 (25:30):
You know, I really understand what he is saying, and
I think it's important to I explained it the other day,
but I'm going to explain it again because affordable housing
is so misunderstood. It is true that affordable housing is
different in New York and Los Angeles as it is
in Omaha, Nebraska. The definition of affordable is based on
(25:55):
the area median income, or we call it the AMI.
But the so it's different in New York the average
income as it is in Omaha. But the AMI also
depends on the size of the household. So basically, you
should not be paying any more than thirty percent of
your income on housing including utilities. And it doesn't make
(26:19):
any difference if you make fifty thousand a year or
five hundred thousand a year. It's the same base calculation.
And so the AMI, like I said, it depends on
the size of the household. The AMI is not only
looking at the average median income, but it's different if
you are a one person household or a four person household,
(26:42):
and so you almost need a table to define what
affordable means. So, for instance, Omaha's single person AMI, the
average median income in Omaha, Nebraska is about seventy nine
thousand dollars a year, and for a four person household
it's about one hundred thirteen seven hundred thousand a year.
(27:03):
So affordable for a single person is twenty three thousand,
eight hundred eighty dollars a year or one thousand, nine
hundred and ninety dollars a month. That's what is considered
affordable in Omaha, Nebraska. Affordable for a four person household
is approximately thirty four thousand a year, are two thousand,
(27:25):
eight hundred and forty three a month. So you got
to see that there are different levels of affordability, and
like I said, it is it is very difficult to understand.
Generally speaking, the terms are eighty percent to one hundred percent.
AMI is for affordable workforce housing is like fifty to
eighty percent, Low income housing is thirty to fifty percent,
(27:48):
and very low income is below thirty percent. That's or
that would be extremely low income. So there's a lot
of definition that goes with that, and it's very confusing.
But what I found when I was mayor is when
we would announce that, according to the regulations that there
are here is a housing project. Let's look at the duo,
(28:10):
which are the twin Towers Central Park Plaza, Downtown, seven
hundred and seven apartments. There's a percentage of those, a
certain percentage are affordable. But immediately people would say, well,
what is the rent for a one bedroom or a studio,
And when the developer would say this is what it is, well,
that's not affordable for me, you know, but it's affordable
(28:31):
according to the definition. And HUD basically defines what affordable means.
I said this the other day, but I'm going to
repeat it. HUD defines what affordable is. And if you
look at their I'll say their chart, start at the bottom.
It comes to low income, and then it would be
up a level subsidized, then it would be affordable, then
(28:51):
it would be workforce, then it would be market rate,
and then it would be luxury. That's kind of how
the different levels go. But to basically, and I'm not
sure that that's the right word to use, you have
to have this certain income in the area that you
are in, so it is very very confusing about that.
But there are a lot of people that just want
(29:13):
to think that affordable housing is cheap housing, and it
is not. It's not at all.
Speaker 3 (29:18):
Well, Gene, you know here, I am looking for apartments
with my fiance before we move in together, and you
said nineteen hundred could be considered affordable.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
Well, our budget's lower than that. What does that mean
for us?
Speaker 2 (29:30):
Oh?
Speaker 1 (29:30):
There and there, you know, there there are some that
and I'm just going through the numbers off of the
chart right here. But the thing of it is the
average is is that to qualify, you should not be
paying any more than thirty percent of your monthly income
including utilities on housing. And you know a lot of
times some of these studios are say eight nine hundred
(29:53):
a month, that's all they are. That's considered affordable. But
I will have people say not affordable for me. So
you really got to shop around, you know. I think
the I think the average in Omaha for a one
bedroom might be twelve to fourteen hundred for a market rate,
and then you go up from there. And so yeah,
(30:15):
it's it's it's it's a challenge because people need to
get something they need to get in good housing, that's
for sure. We want them to do that. We don't
want them all in low income subsidized housing, and you know,
we don't promote low income housing anymore either. It should
be mixed income, because you don't want to create an
area a big, a big bunch of apartments that are
(30:35):
all low income, because then you recreate the projects and
that's not what you want. So it's really you're really
looking for good mixed income and good affordable housing and
then to have our stock of affordable housing available. But
we have to work on some incentives to get developers
to build those things because they again they have to
(30:58):
get their return on investment, so forcing them forcing developers
to build more affordable housing is not a way that
I would support.
Speaker 3 (31:07):
So good conversation on affordable I want to shift our
attention a little bit to this State of the City. Yeah,
and I don't have a direct question for you to
get you kicked off here, but I just kind of
want to hear your thoughts. Mayor John Ewing has his
State of the City this afternoon at two o'clock.
Speaker 1 (31:23):
Do those start on time? That's exactly what I did.
I did. I did twelve of those. I started at
two o'clock in the afternoon. Yes, they do start on time,
and you should be able to go to the City
of Omaha to their website. You should go to City
Council and it should be playing live so you could
listen to it. I will say that the two most
(31:44):
important speeches a year a mayor gives, and I've given
plenty of speeches in my twelve years a mayor are
the budget speech, which you've given the summer, and then
the State of the City speech. Those are the two
most important speeches you give, and you talk about the
mayor and with the budget as well as the state
of the city, we'll talk about what your priorities are
(32:05):
and what your priority and your successes that you've had,
and then you talk about where you're going in the future. Now,
I did say because it is true that when Maror
Ewing did his first budget speech, it was verbatim the
last budget speech that I gave was because it was
so good. Well, I want to tell myself that, but
(32:25):
I mean Kerrie Murphy, who is my communication director, and
I wrote that speech, and we recognize that speech. When
Maror Ewing gave it, so hopefully I thought it was
a really good speech and just change a lot of
numbers and change some things, but a lot of it
was my speech, so I will be really interested in
seeing what the state of the city is. It is
the longest speech I gave. It could get up to
(32:47):
twenty minutes. You know, I usually didn't want to give
a speech over fifteen because you certainly did start losing
your audience. People start looking at their cell phones, sleeping whatever,
And you know you want it. You might want to
make it interesting and you want to make it going.
But I want to hear it. I want to hear
what Mary Ewing's priorities are where he's going. Keep in mind,
(33:07):
there were a lot of campaign promises that were made.
I stood right next to him and I heard every
one of them. So let's see if he's going to
address those things and he is going to move forward
with the things that he has promised. It's a very
important speech and I want people to listen to it,
and then you be the judge. You know, I shouldn't
(33:27):
be the judge, but I know what it's like. I
know what it's like being mayor, and I know how
important this speech is to let people know what's going
on and where you're going in the future.
Speaker 3 (33:38):
This is the kfa B comment line with your host
Jean Stothard. My name is Peyton Highlocked, producer of the show.
A little bit of a fun question here. If Omaha
residents won a second trash container, they fill out a
form listing all the people in the home and the
form has to be notarized. This seems to be very unnecessary.
Councilman brinker Harding stated that the notary is misused to
obtain an extra trash container. Why the notary, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (34:03):
Why the rotary To tell you the truth? And you know,
I have to stop and refresh my memory because I
negotiated this new contract for our new trash collection system
we have with the ninety six gallon cards. Honestly, I
have an extra bin and I applied for it myself,
and I don't remember having it notarized. But you know,
(34:27):
I guess my husband and I is just me and him.
I guess we create a lot of trash. I don't know.
Do you recycle? I recycle like crazy. What about composting?
I you know, I don't do a lot of composting,
but every bit of glass if you recall, we don't
recycle glass curbside in Omaha. It's considered a contaminant and
if you put it in with your regular recycling and
(34:50):
one breaks, the whole thing has to be put in
the landfill. So we have those big purple bins all
over Omaha, and once a week I take all of
my glass, I say, and I go and I throw
it in the purple bins. But yes, I do recycle.
But you can get this extra cart that I'm talking about.
It's a different color. It's blue, so they know it's
your extra cart. But I have one, and I pay
(35:13):
ninety dollars a year for it. Now somebody may say, well,
I have a lot of I have six kids, and
I don't want to pay that ninety dollars. But really,
ninety dollars a year is not a lot to have
the ability to have that extra ninety six gallon cart.
Some weeks, I don't put it out. In some weeks
when I'm purging and doing things like that, I do
(35:34):
put that extra card out. Remember, with our old system,
I mean, people could put their sofa and their barbecue
grill out on the curb and the city would pick
it up. Can't do that anymore, it has to fit
in that cart, so that extra one is quite handy.
Speaker 3 (35:47):
That makes a lot of work for the for the
workers coming around to collect those things.
Speaker 1 (35:50):
But remember now it's all automated and they have those
big arms that come down and will lift the carts,
and you could put bricks in those carts. Really there's
not a lot of weight limit with them anymore. But
it's so much safer for those that are working on
those trucks too, So it's a good system. It took
some time to get used to it. I know people
(36:11):
hated it at first. I remember that we did a
pilot for about six months. We picked one neighborhood and
the one thing that they said in the beginning is
I hate that ninety six gallon cart. And when the
pilot was over, they said, don't take away my ninety
six gallon card because I love it. So it just
takes them getting used to and Gene.
Speaker 3 (36:28):
It looks and sounds like people were not super satisfied
with your answer. They love the definition of affordable, but
what does it mean.
Speaker 1 (36:36):
It's confusing it, I mean, it's very confusing, and it
is confusing to try to define it too. But like
I said, it's based on your average median income of
the area live in. And the base definition is you
should not be spending more than thirty percent of your
(36:56):
income on housing, including you utilities. And it doesn't make
any difference if you're fifty thousand dollars a year salary
or your five hundred thousand dollars a year. And so
affordable again based on the average median income. Where I
is probably can excuse me confusing is when I said,
(37:17):
so a single person's ami in Omaha is about seventy
nine thousand a year, where a four person household is
around one hundred and thirteen thousand dollars a year. And
so I said affordable for a single person is that
you would be paying twenty three thousand, about twenty three
thousand a year on housing or nineteen hundred a month.
(37:40):
Now that includes homes. We're not just talking apartments here.
So you got to think if you go out and
buy a home, you got to think of the mortgage
to on that. And so it's different for a single person,
and it's different for what is affordable. But I believe
you're an average affordable housing studio or single single bed,
(38:02):
single bed apartment in Omaha now is maybe seven eight
hundred a month, and some people will say that's not
affordable for me, but that's according to what the definition is.
So it is confusing, but it's it's worth spending time
on it, because when we keep on saying we need
more affordable housing units, what does that mean? And it
(38:25):
does not mean that you're gonna get, you know, a
luxury apartment for four hundred dollars a month.
Speaker 3 (38:31):
I mean, it's just not going to happen. This is
a little bit of a lighter question here to wrap
up the day. Okay, this comes from Angie this morning.
This morning, when I was laying in bed, unable to
go back to sleep, I had a pressing question come
to mind. Gean, while you were mayor in now do
or did you have security stay around your house overnight?
Did you have security following you during the day. Inquiring
(38:51):
minds want to know.
Speaker 1 (38:52):
Oh, I bet you they do. No, I never had
them at my home. I didn't. I didn't want that.
I didn't think it was necessary to have a cruiser
out in front of my home. I did have security
drive me around, and I will tell you when I
became mayor, I told Todd Schmoter, I don't need this,
I don't want this. I'm going to drive my own
personal car and I'm going to drive myself around until
(39:14):
a couple incidents happened with me and Todd had to say,
I told you so, and so then I said, okay,
I will have security drive me around, but I will
drive my own car. And we did that for four years,
and so I think it's important to do that. A
lot of times you're running around during the day. You
got to get to one place to another to another,
(39:34):
and it helps the security is with you. But I
never had them travel with me, and I never had
them parking a cruiser around my house at night time.
Speaker 3 (39:44):
Thirty seconds left in the show Geane ninety degrees Tomorrow,
Beautiful Day Today.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
Anything going on this weekend? You know? I Well, first
of all, Tomorrow night we're going to go see my
husband and I, Kevin and I are going to go
see Bob Dylan at the Orpheum. Well, that's going to
be a great show. And he's playing golf tomorrow. I mean,
you go, you go your south. Their city courses are open,
the private courses are being open, So enjoy your weekend.
Thanks for listening, and thanks for being with us today.
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