August 26, 2025 • 34 mins
Leland Conway guest hosts for Tony and Dwight and talks about Cracker Barrel messing up in creative ways along with driver licenses being handed out to illegals.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Well, it's Leland Conways sitting in for the legendary Tony
and Dwight hanging out for you the next two three days.
Uh howdy, yeah, oh my word. You can follow along
on Twitter. It's at Leland's show. I gotta get into
this cracker barrel story right out of the gate. It's
driving me nuts. And a chance to talk about it too,
(00:21):
because the funny part is now, I'm doing a show
in San Diego, California. I am a missionary to the
West coast. So if you want to hear me regularly,
it's in the evenings by Eastern time on news radio
six hundred COGO. But I don't get to talk about
cracker barrel that much because California doesn't have very many
cracker barrels. To be honest with you, I think I
(00:42):
counted five in the whole state, and I'm like, I
grew up on this stuff and to see that though
that for whatever reason, the fact that there are still
corporations in America that don't get that woke is dead
is wild to me. And Cracker Bear, of all places,
cracker Barrel, I'm trying to I'm just trying to figure
(01:05):
out what is offensive about some old dude sitting on
a porch with his with his elbow up on a
barrel and an old country store. I mean, like, like,
what is so offensive about that that we have to
change it for gen Z? And I'll be honest with you,
(01:25):
I think the thing that is the worst about all
of this. And by the way, just to be clear,
there's only one person in America that can actually save
cracker Barrel right now, which is sad. There's only one
person in America that can save Cracker brow and it's
Sidney Sweeney. I'm just telling you, maybe kind of like
a Hooter's top but actually saying cracker barrel, Like, We're sorry,
We're bringing back the actual cracker barrel leg logo and
(01:48):
we're gonna have Sidney Sweeney in a tight like halter
top and that's gonna be the new ad campaign. Oops,
we messed up. Did anybody not learn a lesson from
bud Light? It is? It's wild, But I think the
worst part of this whole story is what they did
(02:11):
to the uh I don't know, I don't even know
what the thing's called, but the golf tea game, you
know what I'm talking about? The little try the little
triangle board game peg peg board. I mean it looked
like golf Tea's to me, but so so the peg
board game. Have you.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
I don't think anybody knows.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
Have you seen this?
Speaker 3 (02:26):
I I've heard this, but I don't. I couldn't believe
this was correct. I don't think most people know about this.
If they're mad about the logo, this will send them
into the streets.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
This is the worst part. So you used to go
in and play with that little try and Go peg
board and it would call you like if you got
all you know, if you were able to leave just one,
you got it, you were genius. If you left two,
I think it was you're pretty smarty, pretty smarty. If
you leave three, you're just playing dumb, and if you
(03:00):
leave four or more you're just playing egg egg nor
ray moose.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
That's correct.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
They have changed that now, Oh, because they don't want
anybody to be offended. Oh so now what it says is, uh,
leave one, you're a genius, leave two, rocking the chair,
but not the game three or more. Let's forget number four, right,
Let's just forget leaving four, three or more. No reason
(03:30):
to be embarrassed.
Speaker 4 (03:31):
Try again, They literally changed the peg board game because
because why because because twenty somethings can't be called an
ignoramus like it was just funny.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
This is uh. I saw this on a tweet. An
OutKick had the story as in Cracker Barrel's process of
rebranding from old timey to modern old timey and killing
their business, they woke afied the peg game to minimize
hurt feelings of those who don't do so well, what's
the best you ever did? Gus?
Speaker 3 (04:06):
I got it to one? I can get it to one. Man,
I am a genius.
Speaker 1 (04:11):
There's a lot of people listening right now that are like,
we go two.
Speaker 2 (04:14):
I'm sorry, what what is it?
Speaker 1 (04:16):
I am? Now?
Speaker 2 (04:17):
If I get one? What do they call it?
Speaker 1 (04:18):
What's you're It's a genius? That was that was that one? Yeah,
they didn't change that one. But but if you get
if you leave two, instead of being pretty smart, you're
now rocking the chair but not the game. And then
if you leave three, you're just playing dumb. Well, they
just have three or more, no reason to be embarrassed,
so they they've gone too far. They have this is it?
(04:42):
And and I'm just gonna say one thing right now.
If anybody starts messing with waffle House, I'm gonna be lit, Like,
for real, do not mess with waffle House. I look
this up too. There's zero waffle houses in California. There's
like forty seven in Arizona right next door, but there's
zero in californ Do you know how many I think
it was. I looked to see how many Kentucky had,
(05:03):
and I think it was like it was like forty seven.
There's like almost a waffle house in every town. But
let me go back to this thing, because this drives
me utterly insane. By the way, just let you know
at bottom of the hour, Representative Savanna Mattos is going
to join us. We're going to talk about driver's licenses
in Kentucky. I hadn't experienced the DMV the other day.
(05:25):
If anybody thinks that the government, if there's anybody out
there that still thinks the government can handle healthcare, just
go just go to a DMV or a government office.
But when I lived in Kentucky, which I moved out
of the state, I guess it's been seven years now
this December, and we still were able to go to
(05:46):
the county clerk's office to get our driver's license before
I left, and now with the whole real id thing,
Kentucky switched to kind of more of a DMV type style,
right instead of just going straight to the county clerk.
Well it's kind of interesting because they're now investigating this
big undercover thing where apparently some people were sliding illegal
(06:08):
immigrants a driver's license for a couple hundred bucks. And
now Savana Mattox is leading an effort to try to
get this back to you know, basically kind of a
county clerk or more of a local type of approach,
which I think would be better because trust me, when
you put everything in the hands of the state government,
like overall, it's gonna get worse. So she'll come and
(06:29):
talk to us at the bottom of the hour about
that anyway, So I gotta get back to the Cracker
Barrell thing. So this this drives me nuts because one
of the things that I love about Trump being elected
in twenty twenty four last year is that it was
finally I think people had had enough of the woke stuff.
It was always a very small minority of people who
were very good at bullying others who were leading the
(06:51):
charge on this and when you dig into the Cracker
barrel story. What's really interesting because when this one actually
caught me off guard, Like there's been a lot of
these leading up to twenty twenty four, but most of
what I've seen in corporate America is like actually going
the opposite direction. I mean, Sidney Sweeney is a perfect example, right,
Like American Eagle. I went by American Eagle in the
mall the other day, and I mean there was a
(07:12):
line outside the door, and then I looked at mainstream
media and they were like, uh, traffic, foot traffic is
down in the American Eagle. No, it's not. They made
like so much money and Cracker Ball I think they lost.
It was several hundred million dollars of market cap when
they did this, and initially they tried to cover it
up like, oh, this wasn't woke. It was just we're
trying to modernize it it it it looks Look I'm
(07:36):
not trying to offend Bob Evans, okay, but Bob Evans
is Ohio Bay, So I guess it's okay, Bob Evans.
That's what the new Cracker Barrel looks like. The inside
is all like white, which I find ironic. If you're
gonna go woke right, like that's a little funny. I mean,
this is it. I mean every we're like, oh, we're
trying to be more inclusive. Everything is just blanch white,
(07:57):
like what what are you doing? But no, it looks
like a Bob Evans. That's what it looks like. And
the thing I loved about cracker barrel was you go
in and it's kind of like a wood slat barn,
you know, barnwood on the side. It reminds you of
home in the South. I mean, that's what it is.
And you got all this good Southern food and you
got a big rock fireplace hearth, and you know, I
(08:21):
had to This is a total side note, but I
had the worst experience one time at a cracker barrel
though Gus, no way. Well, those that have listened to
me a long time, no, I have an issue with
people who take whiny little kids to restaurants and.
Speaker 3 (08:34):
Oh some of the things are coming back. I forgot
about this particular item. Yeah, we were lover of children,
ladies and gentlemen.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
Children were We were at a cracker barrel one time
and this kid is sitting like this guy has I
guess it's his grandkid or whatever. And they're sitting there
at the table and the kid is just screaming, and
so he hands them the like the peg game, right,
and the kid doesn't know what to do with it
because he's maybe four, and so he starts throwing the
(09:03):
golf tees around the restaurant, right, and one hits me
on the side of the head, and I'm like really,
and then the guy's like and then the kids starts
screaming again, and he starts slamming it down on the
table and so so then so he's like they're there,
they're there, you know, like that kind of approach to it.
And I'm like, dude, take the kid outside, whoop his ass,
bring him back in if he starts behaving otherwise, leave right.
(09:26):
So then they bring the food out and the kid's
like what it's screaming, it's screaming, grabs a biscuit, throws
it at Grandpa, hits him in the head, bounces off,
hits the guy behind him. I'm like, take the kid outside.
But I mean, it's a family joint, is the point.
And uh. And so I don't know where they're going
(09:46):
with this, but here's here's the funniest part of the
whole the whole story. When's the last time? Okay, if
you have gen z kids, Okay, you have twenty something kids,
you go go to the campus of U of l Okay,
go to the campus on UK. Go and see what
those kids are talking about. Do you ever hear them say, hey, guys,
(10:08):
it's Friday, let's go to Cracker Barrel? Does that ever happen? Now?
Of course not so. In other words, who are you
marketing to? Right?
Speaker 5 (10:19):
Like?
Speaker 1 (10:19):
Who are you trying to appease? It's not as though
all of the millennials are going to go, oh wow,
let's go try this new place, Cracker Barrel because it's
all white, like what do you oh? And the games
they play on the table are not offensive either, so
they're paying the price. I don't this is this is
(10:39):
my honest opinion. I don't know what you think us,
but I honestly believe this is the end of Cracker
Barrel because I don't know how they get out of it.
I mean, you tell me, I don't. I don't know
how they get out of this. Like you can't, you
can't backtrack? I mean I guess you could, but what
would that be like, because they spent My my understanding
is they spent two hundred million dollars on the re brand.
(11:02):
How do you even back out of that?
Speaker 3 (11:03):
I've I thought there was a few people upset about this.
Then over the weekend I started talking to a few
people and looking online. You sometimes online doesn't engage the
real world. And oh man, there's people that are just
absolutely flat. It's the logo that got them. Wait till
they see the PEG game. They don't Most people don't.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
Know about that. Okay, it like go ahead, No, No.
Speaker 3 (11:23):
I don't know how you I really don't know how
they get around it. Some people offered up some ways
to get around it. I think the first thing they
probably should do is just say, hey, we screwed up.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
Yes, this is like New Coke. We did New Coke.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
Hey, it was the best.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
We're bringing and Uncle Herschel.
Speaker 1 (11:37):
I didn't know this.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
The name of the guy on the sign is Uncle Herschel.
He's a real character. Yeah, bring him back. It's like
we're bringing him back. We screwed up, We're got bring
him back, and we're gonna fix the PEG game. Hey,
and we're gonna have specials or something. Maybe you do that,
but mine.
Speaker 1 (11:53):
You know, here's here's the thing kind of going along
with that. I you spend two hundred million dollars, which
is now so if you're an investor in Cracker Brow,
you gotta be like pissed, right. I mean the other
side of this is just how out of the blue.
It was, like, where did that even come from? And
I guess maybe they started this process prior to twenty
(12:14):
twenty four when this whole thing was like and maybe
they were maybe the CEO was like, well, we're too
far in it, so we have to try to maybe
find a way to spin it. I tried gus to
find a way to not be really pissed off about this.
Like I tried to be like, well, maybe this is
just a business rebranding and it's whatever. It's maybe it's
not woke that's driving it. But then I started like
(12:35):
reading about the background on it, and the background of
the CEO, and the background of some of the board members,
and the fact that apparently Blackrock owns like fifteen percent
of the stock and Blackrock wants everybody to be woke,
And I was like, oh, I know exactly where this
is coming from. I don't think it would be like
if if next time you went to Gatlinburg, you went
(12:57):
down there and all of a sudden, everything was like
Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills, right like it. Instead of
instead of being like, you know, Bob's Taffy Barn, it's
like get a Gucci purse or whatever like it would
it would it. It's not what it's supposed to be.
And so you have you have a niche audience. And
to your point about Coke is a great example of
(13:17):
this because I was actually reading some history of the
Coke thing the other day, and Coke was probably the
only company that could ever turn that around. But they
they did it through brand loyalty, and I remember they
kept new Coke around for a little while. You remember
that they kept it around like yess yeah, just kind
of on the down low, like it's still there if
you want it, and then eventually it just disappeared off
the shelves and then it was gone altogether. But that
(13:41):
was actually what caused that was the blind taste test
that Pepsi was doing, And they were doing these things
and people were showing that they liked the taste of
pepsi a little bit better and so they were trying
to find a way to react to it. And that's
the only time I've ever seen a major branding mishap
like this that literally they could do a U turn
(14:01):
and save their brand, which they did. I don't know
how Cracker Barrel gets out of this, because you have
you here's the problem in sales, okay, or marketing, marketing
one oh one. People buy stuff from you be based
on how you make them feel. Okay, So if you
(14:22):
ever make somebody that you're trying to sell something to
feel like they're less than you or like their identity
isn't important to you, you will lose the sale. And
that's kind of what this is a perfect example of
that Cracker Barrel has said to their core audience. Because remember,
the people that this new branding appeals to don't go
(14:43):
to Cracker Barrel. And they're not gonna go to Cracker
Barrel just because they painted the inside white and they
organize the tools on the wall in a more uh
function way pattern. Okay, that's not gonna make them go there.
They're still gonna go to the foe, or they're still
gonna go to the raw in place or wherever it
is that young people go, They're not gonna go to
cracker barrel. So you have taken the core group of people,
(15:07):
which is people who have a nostalgic feeling. My Mamma
and Papa sitting on the front porch and the porch
swing and on the rocking chair. That is a nostalgic
feeling for me being from Waddie, Kentucky. That's the ultimate
country town, you know what I mean, having an old
country store up the road. When I was a kid
in summertime, come in be at Mammal's house. It was
(15:29):
like the thing we did in the day was me
and my cousin would go down to the big thing
that filled up the water and the water tanks for
the farmers, and we would like put quarters in and
drench ourselves in the summertime underneath that and get in
trouble by the constable, and then we would go once
he kicked us out of there, we would go up
to the old country store and buy a coke. That's
what we did. This evokes that the old country store
evokes that sort of memorabilia, It evokes that sensibility, and
(15:53):
they take all of that away and they tell their
core customers Hey, you guys suck. We don't really like you.
We're gonna go over here to these people that have
never heard of us, don't care about us, don't want
to come to our store and try to make them
come in. It's not gonna work. And I guess out
short of a complete about face, they might as well
move to Canada. All right, we'll continue Leland Conway in
for for dwighten Tony on news Radio eight forty whas
(16:16):
Sony Dwight Show, Leland Conways sitting in news Radio eight
forty whas. Follow along on Twitter slash x. I still
can't call it Twitter. It's weird at Leland Show. I mean,
how do you do that? You'd be like I tweeted,
I xed, I XD some exes. How does that even work?
I don't even know how that works. Anyway, follow along,
It's cool if you can't remember at Leland Show. Just
look for Gavin Newsom's hair. I just like to be.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
What that is the name of your profile.
Speaker 1 (16:43):
It is on Instagram as well, Gavin Newsom's hair. I
just like to be a I did that. I did
that after he tried to make parody illegal in the
state of California, and I was like, oh yeah, meet
Mayor mcbike Lane. So anyway, we had some fun of that.
One other point, Gus, you you kind of brought this up.
We were talking about the cracker Barrel thing, and I've
(17:05):
got more to say on that, but we'll probably do
that later in a program. But two things. Number One,
if the way we know that this was a woke change,
like this was on purpose and a slap in the
face of their core business is is the peg board
is the pegboard game? If if a business says, you know,
it's time for an update, and frankly, I'll be honest
with you, Cracker Barrel probably could have used a little
(17:27):
bit of an update. There's nothing wrong with taking country
slightly modern, right, it's a lutely wrong with that. Totally cool.
But if that, if that's all they did, we'd be like, well,
you know, it's not the same Cracker Barrel, But if
the bean soup is still the same, then I'm good.
If the cornbread is still good, I'm good. But then
they changed the peg board, and that was the little
(17:49):
thing that a lot of people don't know about yet
that proves our point because that's the thing when you
when you when you don't want to call people an
ignorant ignoramus anymore, when you don't want to call people
just playing dumb in fun, which was clearly what that was,
then you clearly are trying to avoid hurting feelings. You
(18:10):
clearly have done this from a woke perspective. So I
will reiterate if anybody tries to touch waffle House, because
you are not an American by God, if you have
not been to waffle House at three o'clock in the morning,
in the morning trying to study for finals, there to
watch the fights, and if they do anything to mess
with that, I am done. I'm checking out, moving to Montana.
(18:31):
See you all right, we'll continue representatives, State representatives. Savanna
Mattox is going to join us. We'll talk driver's licenses,
illegal immigration on the dock at today. I got more
to say about Cracker Barrel and Councilman Anthony Pagentin. He's
gonna join us as well. Leland Conway is sitting in
for the legendary Tony and Dwight News Radio eight forty
whas it's crazy story. I've been watching this for a
(18:55):
while that there were some folks in the state government
that we're kind of sliding driver's licenses to legal immigrants
for a couple hundred bucks. And that adds to what
is an even bigger problem for Kentuckians, and that is
that when they had the real ID stuff, they went
to sort of more of a DMV model, if you will,
(19:17):
then being able to go down to the county clerk's
office and get your driver's license, which always seemed to
work pretty well. It is a little clunky when I
had to do it all the time, but at the
same time, it was like you had that local person
that you knew and that you voted for, and you
saw him around town. You saw him with the Kroger,
so you know, it was like there was some there
was some accountability to that. Joining us on the line
(19:37):
now is a representative Savannah attics. Savannah, good to talk
to you. How are you.
Speaker 5 (19:43):
I'm doing well? How are you?
Speaker 1 (19:45):
I couldn't be better. It's a great day. It's a
great day. So you've been all over this issue from
the beginning, So let's start with let's start with let's
start with the illegal immigration angle on this, and then
we'll kind of bring it back to the real ID
and then the real reason you've kind of started a
movement to try to get the driver's licensing back into
(20:05):
the hands of local authorities. But what was happening with
this was it temporary state employees that were kind of
like sliding these driver's licenses under the table to illegal
immigrants or what was taking place there.
Speaker 5 (20:20):
So the allegations that have come to the forefront in
the last couple of weeks that illegal immigrants were provided
these driver's license for the sum of two hundred dollars
under the table. That has been the tip point for you,
that has been fomenting for several years now, but it's
kind of been the tip of this sphere, so to speak,
(20:40):
for folks to realize, hey, this is a problem. And
you know, although I'm not certain that it has been
verified that the one thousand, nine hundred and eighty five
licenses that have been revoked were issued entirely to illegal immigrants,
I'm not sure where that stands. That aspect of it
is under investigation. We do know that one nine and
(21:03):
eighty five driver's license has been revoked by the state
because of fraud.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
That we do know that is that is a staggering
number Savannah. I mean, when you think about there are
two thousand people driving around Kentucky roads that I was
going to say shouldn't be, but there's a lot of
people driving that shouldn't be. I mean, just go on,
I seventy one for five minutes. But no, but I
mean they're mostly from Ohio, so it's okay, but no,
but that's a staggering number of people that shouldn't have
(21:31):
driver's licenses that are driving around Kentucky roads. I mean
that that's almost like a Russian roulette in a lot
of ways.
Speaker 5 (21:38):
How about really, And it's just it's another reason that
this should be administered at a local level like it
was done successfully for eighty eight years, because when your
circuit clerks are administering the driver's license program, those are
locally elected officials, right, and the people that they hire
to administer these license underneath of them that they are
(22:02):
held accountable not just to the circuit clerk, but to
the community, to the voters. And it provides an extra
level of oversight and security that we're not seeing these
temporary state workers.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
Yeah, wasn't the main reason though that they went to this.
The excuse behind it was, well, we got to do
this real ID thing, and coordinating one hundred and twenty
different county clerk's offices would be nearly impossible to be
able to do this in time. Was that their original excuse?
And what was your response to that?
Speaker 5 (22:35):
Yeah, so a lot of Kentuckians, not just in my
district but all across the commonwealth have been asking how
did we get in this situation? And yes, it's true
that we were at another real ID deadline. This was
back in twenty nineteen, twenty twenty. But really what led
to this is a decision that was made by the
Kentucky Circuit Clerks Association. They took a vote, and by
(22:58):
majority vote in twenty nineteen team they refused to not
only issue the real it, but to continue issuing the
standard driver's licenses. They did so on the basis that
they say that you know, in other states, it's not
the circuit clerks who do it, and that it should
be a transportation cabinet function. But and to be clear,
(23:20):
there was an attempted pilot project in Franklin and Woodford Counties.
They said that that because of the enhanced credentialing, they
weren't able to issue the real ID. But what we
know now in retrospect is that these real IDs driver's
licenses are not being printed at the regional office. All
these folks are doing is verifying documents and sending it
(23:43):
to a third party. Then your license comes into mail.
Our circuit clerks one hundred percent could do that, and
that's why I've been fighting to get it put back
in each individual county.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
Do they want to do it though? I mean, if
they voted before, they don't want to do it? Do
they not want that responsibility now?
Speaker 5 (24:01):
So I anticipate that the circuit clerks are going to
come back to the table as this legislation comes back again,
and the Kentuckians are very upset, so I anticipate that
they're going to have to come to the table. It's
important to note that their budget was never cuts, despite
their duties having decreased in terms of administering the license program.
(24:24):
That said, this would not be an unfunded mandate. It's
not going to be something that you know, by putting
this to local control that we're just leading them out
to pasture. There would be an appropriation to ensure that
our circuit clerks are equipped and enabled to administer this program.
But other legislation that has been discussed is putting it
with the county clerks, and they never did administer the program.
(24:47):
It has nothing to do with them, and their plates
are certainly full, so I do not support that. But again,
our circuit clerks, they successfully did this for eighty eight years.
I have confidence in their ability to do it.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
Ye, I mean that was always my experience, you know,
living in Kentucky, was was going down to the county
clerk's office and and it was relatively quick. I mean
I lived in Oldham County for eight years or yeah,
circuit clerk. I've always just hurt them as county clerks
whatever it's but I mean I knew the person. No,
it's all good. I mean I knew the person. And
(25:20):
you go into the office, you knew the people at
the front desk, and there wasn't like a huge long line.
It was just sit down, write your check, you know,
get your license or get your you know, get your
get your plates renewed or whatever. It was a relatively
smooth process for the most part. And I remember at
the time Savannah thinking that it was kind of clunky.
(25:40):
And then I moved to Colorado and d m vs
are horrifying. They're awful. I mean, I just had an
experience last week. My my plates were stolen off my
pickup truck and and so I had to I had
to call the sheriff because I don't want people running
around with my plates doing shenanigans. So I called sheriff
and then he gave me a police report and he's like, okay,
(26:02):
you got to take the police report down to the DMV.
I'm like, okay. I ended up having to pay for
new plates. Like I got my plate stolen, I had
to play for pay and I it was four hours
of my time just sitting there waiting while everybody else
was in the room. You know, it's so dumb. So,
I mean, I hope that you can find some way
that this would be smooth for Kentuckians to get this
(26:24):
stuff taken care of quickly and easy.
Speaker 5 (26:27):
Well, when we took a process that was once provided
in one hundred and twenty counties and bottlenecked it down
to just thirty four regional offices, it's no surprise that
Kentuckians are having to wait months to get an appointment,
drive hours away from home, stand there in line all day,
take off work to do so, and then wait several
more weeks for their license in the mail. That's the
(26:48):
part that's a mess, and we need to fix that.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
What is your I mean, clearly Kentuckians are upset about this.
Clearly this is an issue that's driving them mad, and
I think rightfully, So what is your assessment of, like
the popularity of your legislation? Clearly it's it's it's a
big zero for the circuit clerks, but for the people.
What are you hearing from your constituents about this?
Speaker 5 (27:15):
I have never had an issue that has had a
more robust coalition of supports, not just among citizens, but
you know, folks from all walks of life. Doesn't matter
if you're a Democrat or a Republican. This is a
top issue, but also among local elected officials and judge
executives and my colleagues in the House. Last session, the
bill had I think over ten co sponsors, and I anticipate,
(27:37):
you know, based on what I'm hearing during the interim,
that there's gonna be a whole lot more going into
this next session. So I think we're going to do
something legislatively. It's just a function of getting a good
clean bill and returning it where it belongs to each county,
to the circuit Clerk's office, not the caunt clerk.
Speaker 1 (27:55):
Yeah, so if your bill doesn't pass, what is Kentucky's plan? Now?
What is Governor dad Pants planning on doing if this
doesn't pass. Is he planning on creating an actual DMV
instead of the regional offices? Or what will be the
answer to this if it's not your bill.
Speaker 5 (28:18):
So I'm not intimately familiar with what it is that
the governor's planning to do. I would anticipate this if
anything right, Well, the Transportation Cabinet probably will ask for
additional funding because we're going into a budget cycle to
maybe hire more people or to make more regional offices.
I mean, it was kind of been back and forth
(28:39):
with this rodeo since twenty nineteen of you know, well,
we're just gonna build more. We're just going to do this,
and it's not working. I'm of the opinion you cannot
fix the regional office model. We need to go back
to one hundred and twenty counties. And you know, when
we talk about funding, let's take while we're spending on
that regional office model, give it to the circuit clerks,
(29:01):
let's get this thing done.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
Yeah yeah. Fascinating is when are you going to get
a chance to run this again? And what can people
do if they think this is a good idea.
Speaker 5 (29:13):
January sixth is the first day of session in twenty
twenty six, and I know that seems like a long
time away, but what citizens can be doing is contacting
their state representatives and their state senators and saying, we
want to go back to one hundred and twenty counties
to our circuit clerks locally to administer these Let's make
Kentucky licenses local again. They just need to be reaching
(29:35):
out and asking for that.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
Fascinating. Thanks for the thanks for taking the time to
join us at Savannah. We appreciate it. Hopefully something can
be worked out because you're right, I mean, people shouldn't
have to wait hours and hours and hours to deal
with this stuff, so it's nuts. Thanks for your time.
We appreciate it absolutely. Thank you all right, Representative Savannah Maddox,
I'm telling you right now, the last thing you want
(29:59):
is an actual like DMV. I mean, I was seriously,
I had my plates stolen and then I had to
pay for plates, and I sat there with screaming kids
in my ear, and I was like, and it was
so disorganized too. And the whole time I'm sitting there,
they had like it was my number was like five
(30:20):
ninety three, and when it got to five ninety two,
I was like, Okay, I'm next, and then they kept
calling the next number and it would be E seven
forty one. What what did that? B twenty seven? Like
what is that? Even? What is that? What is that?
There's no organization there? And then and then it was
just it was an absolute mess. And I remember thinking
(30:41):
the whole time, there's actually people in America who want
government run healthcare, and this is they can't even do
here's your license plates after they got stolen. It was wild.
So hopefully they come up with some kind of solution
to that, uh somewhere sometime. All right, we'll continue coming
up next hour. By the way, Mayor Greenberg backing off
sanctuary city status, Yes for Louisville. We'll talk about that.
(31:01):
News Radio eight forty whas Leland Conway in for Tony
and Dwight. The Babylon B is an American treasure. I
was just looking at Twitter slash x and they've got
a post up with a picture of Elizabeth Warren and
it says Harvard to pay Elizabeth Warren four hundred thousand
dollars to teach class on why college is so expensive. Perfect.
(31:25):
That's so perfect, all right, Gus, I gotta tell you
a story. So we were talking about DMV and all that stuff.
So my stolen plates. This is wild because folks that
know me know that I'm like a little sensitive about
government surveillance. I don't like it.
Speaker 2 (31:38):
I hadn't heard that before.
Speaker 1 (31:39):
I hadn't heard that before. I'm a bit of a libertarian.
And so I'm up in Montana on business a couple
of weeks ago, and I'm on my way back and
I get home and I park my truck and I
unload it and I go inside for a while and
then I come back out. And as I come back out,
in Colorado have to have front plates and back plates,
(32:02):
so they overdo everything because they got cameras everywhere. And
I come out and my front plate's just gone, and
I was like, where did that go? And I've lost
a plate before to wind and other stuff like that,
but this wasn't the case. And I looked down at
the brace and I was like, oh, those are stripped out.
Somebody grabbed that and ripped it off, and so I
go I call the sheriff's office because I like went online.
(32:23):
I was like, what do you do if you have
your plates are stolen? And I don't know if I
have time to finish this story because it's pretty fascinating,
but it's one of those situations where the cameras actually
helped me, but then I got creeped out by how
much they helped me. Right, So I talked to a
sheriff's deputy. I tell him what happened. He goes, where
do you think this happens? I don't know. I was
(32:44):
driving between Montana and Colorado. I have no idea. Just
got home. They're gone. They were there when I left
the hotel in Montana, they're gone now. And so he's like, okay, cool,
So he hangs up. About twenty minutes later, he calls
back and he goes, hey, did you stay at a
hotel in Johnstown, Colorado? Last night? And I was like, yeah,
(33:04):
I did. Actually, on my way back, I was teaching
a firearms class and so I stayed there right by
the range, and then came on home today and He's
like okay, and he's like, is this the address of
the hotel? And I was like, yeah, it is. I
was like, how do you know? And he's like, well,
the last time we picked up your plate on the
camera was eleven PM, which is the time I got
back from dinner eleven PM at this address, and the
(33:27):
next time we saw it was eight am this morning,
and then the next camera was gone. So they were
like they basically they tracked down that my plates were
stolen at the hotel by cameras of when they saw
it and when they did it. And I was like, okay,
that's wild. But it obviously it helped me because it
(33:48):
backed up my story, right.
Speaker 2 (33:49):
But they knew where you were at just by being
on the interstate.
Speaker 1 (33:53):
Yes, with cameras, they knew the hotel that I stayed
at because it was it was like they saw it.
They saw the backplate at eight o'clock in the morning,
but the front plate didn't register when I left the hotel,
but they saw the both plates the night before at
eleven pm, so they knew the hotel that I stayed at.
Speaker 3 (34:11):
That's that that Well, now the Leland Conway surveillance has.
Speaker 2 (34:16):
Got me back now creepy. That's very creepy. I mean,
he did me give them any information to tell you, oh, because.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
I didn't even tell him I stayed at a hotel
because I couldn't remember, Like I'm just telling this, I'm
like somewhere between here and here. And then he calls
back and he's like, yeah, did you stay at the
Courtyard by Marriott and Johnstown like, yeah, that's where your
plates were stolen. Holy crap. Okay, So anyway, all right,
coming up next hour, speaking of driver's licenses for illegal immigrants,
(34:44):
let's talk about that issue. Mayor Greenberg saying Louisville is
no longer a sanctuary city. It's interesting the reasoning behind it.
We'll talk about all that coming up. Leland Conway and
for Tony and Dwight News Radio eight forty WAJS
Well, it's Leland Conways sitting in for the legendary Tony
and Dwight hanging out for you the next two three days.
Uh howdy, yeah, oh my word. You can follow along
on Twitter. It's at Leland's show. I gotta get into
this cracker barrel story right out of the gate. It's
driving me nuts. And a chance to talk about it too,
(00:21):
because the funny part is now, I'm doing a show
in San Diego, California. I am a missionary to the
West coast. So if you want to hear me regularly,
it's in the evenings by Eastern time on news radio
six hundred COGO. But I don't get to talk about
cracker barrel that much because California doesn't have very many
cracker barrels. To be honest with you, I think I
(00:42):
counted five in the whole state, and I'm like, I
grew up on this stuff and to see that though
that for whatever reason, the fact that there are still
corporations in America that don't get that woke is dead
is wild to me. And Cracker Bear, of all places,
cracker Barrel, I'm trying to I'm just trying to figure
(01:05):
out what is offensive about some old dude sitting on
a porch with his with his elbow up on a
barrel and an old country store. I mean, like, like,
what is so offensive about that that we have to
change it for gen Z? And I'll be honest with you,
(01:25):
I think the thing that is the worst about all
of this. And by the way, just to be clear,
there's only one person in America that can actually save
cracker Barrel right now, which is sad. There's only one
person in America that can save Cracker brow and it's
Sidney Sweeney. I'm just telling you, maybe kind of like
a Hooter's top but actually saying cracker barrel, Like, We're sorry,
We're bringing back the actual cracker barrel leg logo and
(01:48):
we're gonna have Sidney Sweeney in a tight like halter
top and that's gonna be the new ad campaign. Oops,
we messed up. Did anybody not learn a lesson from
bud Light? It is? It's wild, But I think the
worst part of this whole story is what they did
(02:11):
to the uh I don't know, I don't even know
what the thing's called, but the golf tea game, you
know what I'm talking about? The little try the little
triangle board game peg peg board. I mean it looked
like golf Tea's to me, but so so the peg
board game. Have you.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
I don't think anybody knows.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
Have you seen this?
Speaker 3 (02:26):
I I've heard this, but I don't. I couldn't believe
this was correct. I don't think most people know about this.
If they're mad about the logo, this will send them
into the streets.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
This is the worst part. So you used to go
in and play with that little try and Go peg
board and it would call you like if you got
all you know, if you were able to leave just one,
you got it, you were genius. If you left two,
I think it was you're pretty smarty, pretty smarty. If
you leave three, you're just playing dumb, and if you
(03:00):
leave four or more you're just playing egg egg nor
ray moose.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
That's correct.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
They have changed that now, Oh, because they don't want
anybody to be offended. Oh so now what it says is, uh,
leave one, you're a genius, leave two, rocking the chair,
but not the game three or more. Let's forget number four, right,
Let's just forget leaving four, three or more. No reason
(03:30):
to be embarrassed.
Speaker 4 (03:31):
Try again, They literally changed the peg board game because
because why because because twenty somethings can't be called an
ignoramus like it was just funny.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
This is uh. I saw this on a tweet. An
OutKick had the story as in Cracker Barrel's process of
rebranding from old timey to modern old timey and killing
their business, they woke afied the peg game to minimize
hurt feelings of those who don't do so well, what's
the best you ever did? Gus?
Speaker 3 (04:06):
I got it to one? I can get it to one. Man,
I am a genius.
Speaker 1 (04:11):
There's a lot of people listening right now that are like,
we go two.
Speaker 2 (04:14):
I'm sorry, what what is it?
Speaker 1 (04:16):
I am? Now?
Speaker 2 (04:17):
If I get one? What do they call it?
Speaker 1 (04:18):
What's you're It's a genius? That was that was that one? Yeah,
they didn't change that one. But but if you get
if you leave two, instead of being pretty smart, you're
now rocking the chair but not the game. And then
if you leave three, you're just playing dumb. Well, they
just have three or more, no reason to be embarrassed,
so they they've gone too far. They have this is it?
(04:42):
And and I'm just gonna say one thing right now.
If anybody starts messing with waffle House, I'm gonna be lit, Like,
for real, do not mess with waffle House. I look
this up too. There's zero waffle houses in California. There's
like forty seven in Arizona right next door, but there's
zero in californ Do you know how many I think
it was. I looked to see how many Kentucky had,
(05:03):
and I think it was like it was like forty seven.
There's like almost a waffle house in every town. But
let me go back to this thing, because this drives
me utterly insane. By the way, just let you know
at bottom of the hour, Representative Savanna Mattos is going
to join us. We're going to talk about driver's licenses
in Kentucky. I hadn't experienced the DMV the other day.
(05:25):
If anybody thinks that the government, if there's anybody out
there that still thinks the government can handle healthcare, just
go just go to a DMV or a government office.
But when I lived in Kentucky, which I moved out
of the state, I guess it's been seven years now
this December, and we still were able to go to
(05:46):
the county clerk's office to get our driver's license before
I left, and now with the whole real id thing,
Kentucky switched to kind of more of a DMV type style,
right instead of just going straight to the county clerk.
Well it's kind of interesting because they're now investigating this
big undercover thing where apparently some people were sliding illegal
(06:08):
immigrants a driver's license for a couple hundred bucks. And
now Savana Mattox is leading an effort to try to
get this back to you know, basically kind of a
county clerk or more of a local type of approach,
which I think would be better because trust me, when
you put everything in the hands of the state government,
like overall, it's gonna get worse. So she'll come and
(06:29):
talk to us at the bottom of the hour about
that anyway, So I gotta get back to the Cracker
Barrell thing. So this this drives me nuts because one
of the things that I love about Trump being elected
in twenty twenty four last year is that it was
finally I think people had had enough of the woke stuff.
It was always a very small minority of people who
were very good at bullying others who were leading the
(06:51):
charge on this and when you dig into the Cracker
barrel story. What's really interesting because when this one actually
caught me off guard, Like there's been a lot of
these leading up to twenty twenty four, but most of
what I've seen in corporate America is like actually going
the opposite direction. I mean, Sidney Sweeney is a perfect example, right,
Like American Eagle. I went by American Eagle in the
mall the other day, and I mean there was a
(07:12):
line outside the door, and then I looked at mainstream
media and they were like, uh, traffic, foot traffic is
down in the American Eagle. No, it's not. They made
like so much money and Cracker Ball I think they lost.
It was several hundred million dollars of market cap when
they did this, and initially they tried to cover it
up like, oh, this wasn't woke. It was just we're
trying to modernize it it it it looks Look I'm
(07:36):
not trying to offend Bob Evans, okay, but Bob Evans
is Ohio Bay, So I guess it's okay, Bob Evans.
That's what the new Cracker Barrel looks like. The inside
is all like white, which I find ironic. If you're
gonna go woke right, like that's a little funny. I mean,
this is it. I mean every we're like, oh, we're
trying to be more inclusive. Everything is just blanch white,
(07:57):
like what what are you doing? But no, it looks
like a Bob Evans. That's what it looks like. And
the thing I loved about cracker barrel was you go
in and it's kind of like a wood slat barn,
you know, barnwood on the side. It reminds you of
home in the South. I mean, that's what it is.
And you got all this good Southern food and you
got a big rock fireplace hearth, and you know, I
(08:21):
had to This is a total side note, but I
had the worst experience one time at a cracker barrel
though Gus, no way. Well, those that have listened to
me a long time, no, I have an issue with
people who take whiny little kids to restaurants and.
Speaker 3 (08:34):
Oh some of the things are coming back. I forgot
about this particular item. Yeah, we were lover of children,
ladies and gentlemen.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
Children were We were at a cracker barrel one time
and this kid is sitting like this guy has I
guess it's his grandkid or whatever. And they're sitting there
at the table and the kid is just screaming, and
so he hands them the like the peg game, right,
and the kid doesn't know what to do with it
because he's maybe four, and so he starts throwing the
(09:03):
golf tees around the restaurant, right, and one hits me
on the side of the head, and I'm like really,
and then the guy's like and then the kids starts
screaming again, and he starts slamming it down on the
table and so so then so he's like they're there,
they're there, you know, like that kind of approach to it.
And I'm like, dude, take the kid outside, whoop his ass,
bring him back in if he starts behaving otherwise, leave right.
(09:26):
So then they bring the food out and the kid's
like what it's screaming, it's screaming, grabs a biscuit, throws
it at Grandpa, hits him in the head, bounces off,
hits the guy behind him. I'm like, take the kid outside.
But I mean, it's a family joint, is the point.
And uh. And so I don't know where they're going
(09:46):
with this, but here's here's the funniest part of the
whole the whole story. When's the last time? Okay, if
you have gen z kids, Okay, you have twenty something kids,
you go go to the campus of U of l Okay,
go to the campus on UK. Go and see what
those kids are talking about. Do you ever hear them say, hey, guys,
(10:08):
it's Friday, let's go to Cracker Barrel? Does that ever happen? Now?
Of course not so. In other words, who are you
marketing to? Right?
Speaker 5 (10:19):
Like?
Speaker 1 (10:19):
Who are you trying to appease? It's not as though
all of the millennials are going to go, oh wow,
let's go try this new place, Cracker Barrel because it's
all white, like what do you oh? And the games
they play on the table are not offensive either, so
they're paying the price. I don't this is this is
(10:39):
my honest opinion. I don't know what you think us,
but I honestly believe this is the end of Cracker
Barrel because I don't know how they get out of it.
I mean, you tell me, I don't. I don't know
how they get out of this. Like you can't, you
can't backtrack? I mean I guess you could, but what
would that be like, because they spent My my understanding
is they spent two hundred million dollars on the re brand.
(11:02):
How do you even back out of that?
Speaker 3 (11:03):
I've I thought there was a few people upset about this.
Then over the weekend I started talking to a few
people and looking online. You sometimes online doesn't engage the
real world. And oh man, there's people that are just
absolutely flat. It's the logo that got them. Wait till
they see the PEG game. They don't Most people don't.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
Know about that. Okay, it like go ahead, No, No.
Speaker 3 (11:23):
I don't know how you I really don't know how
they get around it. Some people offered up some ways
to get around it. I think the first thing they
probably should do is just say, hey, we screwed up.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
Yes, this is like New Coke. We did New Coke.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
Hey, it was the best.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
We're bringing and Uncle Herschel.
Speaker 1 (11:37):
I didn't know this.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
The name of the guy on the sign is Uncle Herschel.
He's a real character. Yeah, bring him back. It's like
we're bringing him back. We screwed up, We're got bring
him back, and we're gonna fix the PEG game. Hey,
and we're gonna have specials or something. Maybe you do that,
but mine.
Speaker 1 (11:53):
You know, here's here's the thing kind of going along
with that. I you spend two hundred million dollars, which
is now so if you're an investor in Cracker Brow,
you gotta be like pissed, right. I mean the other
side of this is just how out of the blue.
It was, like, where did that even come from? And
I guess maybe they started this process prior to twenty
(12:14):
twenty four when this whole thing was like and maybe
they were maybe the CEO was like, well, we're too
far in it, so we have to try to maybe
find a way to spin it. I tried gus to
find a way to not be really pissed off about this.
Like I tried to be like, well, maybe this is
just a business rebranding and it's whatever. It's maybe it's
not woke that's driving it. But then I started like
(12:35):
reading about the background on it, and the background of
the CEO, and the background of some of the board members,
and the fact that apparently Blackrock owns like fifteen percent
of the stock and Blackrock wants everybody to be woke,
And I was like, oh, I know exactly where this
is coming from. I don't think it would be like
if if next time you went to Gatlinburg, you went
(12:57):
down there and all of a sudden, everything was like
Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills, right like it. Instead of
instead of being like, you know, Bob's Taffy Barn, it's
like get a Gucci purse or whatever like it would
it would it. It's not what it's supposed to be.
And so you have you have a niche audience. And
to your point about Coke is a great example of
(13:17):
this because I was actually reading some history of the
Coke thing the other day, and Coke was probably the
only company that could ever turn that around. But they
they did it through brand loyalty, and I remember they
kept new Coke around for a little while. You remember
that they kept it around like yess yeah, just kind
of on the down low, like it's still there if
you want it, and then eventually it just disappeared off
the shelves and then it was gone altogether. But that
(13:41):
was actually what caused that was the blind taste test
that Pepsi was doing, And they were doing these things
and people were showing that they liked the taste of
pepsi a little bit better and so they were trying
to find a way to react to it. And that's
the only time I've ever seen a major branding mishap
like this that literally they could do a U turn
(14:01):
and save their brand, which they did. I don't know
how Cracker Barrel gets out of this, because you have
you here's the problem in sales, okay, or marketing, marketing
one oh one. People buy stuff from you be based
on how you make them feel. Okay, So if you
(14:22):
ever make somebody that you're trying to sell something to
feel like they're less than you or like their identity
isn't important to you, you will lose the sale. And
that's kind of what this is a perfect example of
that Cracker Barrel has said to their core audience. Because remember,
the people that this new branding appeals to don't go
(14:43):
to Cracker Barrel. And they're not gonna go to Cracker
Barrel just because they painted the inside white and they
organize the tools on the wall in a more uh
function way pattern. Okay, that's not gonna make them go there.
They're still gonna go to the foe, or they're still
gonna go to the raw in place or wherever it
is that young people go, They're not gonna go to
cracker barrel. So you have taken the core group of people,
(15:07):
which is people who have a nostalgic feeling. My Mamma
and Papa sitting on the front porch and the porch
swing and on the rocking chair. That is a nostalgic
feeling for me being from Waddie, Kentucky. That's the ultimate
country town, you know what I mean, having an old
country store up the road. When I was a kid
in summertime, come in be at Mammal's house. It was
(15:29):
like the thing we did in the day was me
and my cousin would go down to the big thing
that filled up the water and the water tanks for
the farmers, and we would like put quarters in and
drench ourselves in the summertime underneath that and get in
trouble by the constable, and then we would go once
he kicked us out of there, we would go up
to the old country store and buy a coke. That's
what we did. This evokes that the old country store
evokes that sort of memorabilia, It evokes that sensibility, and
(15:53):
they take all of that away and they tell their
core customers Hey, you guys suck. We don't really like you.
We're gonna go over here to these people that have
never heard of us, don't care about us, don't want
to come to our store and try to make them
come in. It's not gonna work. And I guess out
short of a complete about face, they might as well
move to Canada. All right, we'll continue Leland Conway in
for for dwighten Tony on news Radio eight forty whas
(16:16):
Sony Dwight Show, Leland Conways sitting in news Radio eight
forty whas. Follow along on Twitter slash x. I still
can't call it Twitter. It's weird at Leland Show. I mean,
how do you do that? You'd be like I tweeted,
I xed, I XD some exes. How does that even work?
I don't even know how that works. Anyway, follow along,
It's cool if you can't remember at Leland Show. Just
look for Gavin Newsom's hair. I just like to be.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
What that is the name of your profile.
Speaker 1 (16:43):
It is on Instagram as well, Gavin Newsom's hair. I
just like to be a I did that. I did
that after he tried to make parody illegal in the
state of California, and I was like, oh yeah, meet
Mayor mcbike Lane. So anyway, we had some fun of that.
One other point, Gus, you you kind of brought this up.
We were talking about the cracker Barrel thing, and I've
(17:05):
got more to say on that, but we'll probably do
that later in a program. But two things. Number One,
if the way we know that this was a woke change,
like this was on purpose and a slap in the
face of their core business is is the peg board
is the pegboard game? If if a business says, you know,
it's time for an update, and frankly, I'll be honest
with you, Cracker Barrel probably could have used a little
(17:27):
bit of an update. There's nothing wrong with taking country
slightly modern, right, it's a lutely wrong with that. Totally cool.
But if that, if that's all they did, we'd be like, well,
you know, it's not the same Cracker Barrel, But if
the bean soup is still the same, then I'm good.
If the cornbread is still good, I'm good. But then
they changed the peg board, and that was the little
(17:49):
thing that a lot of people don't know about yet
that proves our point because that's the thing when you
when you when you don't want to call people an
ignorant ignoramus anymore, when you don't want to call people
just playing dumb in fun, which was clearly what that was,
then you clearly are trying to avoid hurting feelings. You
(18:10):
clearly have done this from a woke perspective. So I
will reiterate if anybody tries to touch waffle House, because
you are not an American by God, if you have
not been to waffle House at three o'clock in the morning,
in the morning trying to study for finals, there to
watch the fights, and if they do anything to mess
with that, I am done. I'm checking out, moving to Montana.
(18:31):
See you all right, we'll continue representatives, State representatives. Savanna
Mattox is going to join us. We'll talk driver's licenses,
illegal immigration on the dock at today. I got more
to say about Cracker Barrel and Councilman Anthony Pagentin. He's
gonna join us as well. Leland Conway is sitting in
for the legendary Tony and Dwight News Radio eight forty
whas it's crazy story. I've been watching this for a
(18:55):
while that there were some folks in the state government
that we're kind of sliding driver's licenses to legal immigrants
for a couple hundred bucks. And that adds to what
is an even bigger problem for Kentuckians, and that is
that when they had the real ID stuff, they went
to sort of more of a DMV model, if you will,
(19:17):
then being able to go down to the county clerk's
office and get your driver's license, which always seemed to
work pretty well. It is a little clunky when I
had to do it all the time, but at the
same time, it was like you had that local person
that you knew and that you voted for, and you
saw him around town. You saw him with the Kroger,
so you know, it was like there was some there
was some accountability to that. Joining us on the line
(19:37):
now is a representative Savannah attics. Savannah, good to talk
to you. How are you.
Speaker 5 (19:43):
I'm doing well? How are you?
Speaker 1 (19:45):
I couldn't be better. It's a great day. It's a
great day. So you've been all over this issue from
the beginning, So let's start with let's start with let's
start with the illegal immigration angle on this, and then
we'll kind of bring it back to the real ID
and then the real reason you've kind of started a
movement to try to get the driver's licensing back into
(20:05):
the hands of local authorities. But what was happening with
this was it temporary state employees that were kind of
like sliding these driver's licenses under the table to illegal
immigrants or what was taking place there.
Speaker 5 (20:20):
So the allegations that have come to the forefront in
the last couple of weeks that illegal immigrants were provided
these driver's license for the sum of two hundred dollars
under the table. That has been the tip point for you,
that has been fomenting for several years now, but it's
kind of been the tip of this sphere, so to speak,
(20:40):
for folks to realize, hey, this is a problem. And
you know, although I'm not certain that it has been
verified that the one thousand, nine hundred and eighty five
licenses that have been revoked were issued entirely to illegal immigrants,
I'm not sure where that stands. That aspect of it
is under investigation. We do know that one nine and
(21:03):
eighty five driver's license has been revoked by the state
because of fraud.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
That we do know that is that is a staggering
number Savannah. I mean, when you think about there are
two thousand people driving around Kentucky roads that I was
going to say shouldn't be, but there's a lot of
people driving that shouldn't be. I mean, just go on,
I seventy one for five minutes. But no, but I
mean they're mostly from Ohio, so it's okay, but no,
but that's a staggering number of people that shouldn't have
(21:31):
driver's licenses that are driving around Kentucky roads. I mean
that that's almost like a Russian roulette in a lot
of ways.
Speaker 5 (21:38):
How about really, And it's just it's another reason that
this should be administered at a local level like it
was done successfully for eighty eight years, because when your
circuit clerks are administering the driver's license program, those are
locally elected officials, right, and the people that they hire
to administer these license underneath of them that they are
(22:02):
held accountable not just to the circuit clerk, but to
the community, to the voters. And it provides an extra
level of oversight and security that we're not seeing these
temporary state workers.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
Yeah, wasn't the main reason though that they went to this.
The excuse behind it was, well, we got to do
this real ID thing, and coordinating one hundred and twenty
different county clerk's offices would be nearly impossible to be
able to do this in time. Was that their original excuse?
And what was your response to that?
Speaker 5 (22:35):
Yeah, so a lot of Kentuckians, not just in my
district but all across the commonwealth have been asking how
did we get in this situation? And yes, it's true
that we were at another real ID deadline. This was
back in twenty nineteen, twenty twenty. But really what led
to this is a decision that was made by the
Kentucky Circuit Clerks Association. They took a vote, and by
(22:58):
majority vote in twenty nineteen team they refused to not
only issue the real it, but to continue issuing the
standard driver's licenses. They did so on the basis that
they say that you know, in other states, it's not
the circuit clerks who do it, and that it should
be a transportation cabinet function. But and to be clear,
(23:20):
there was an attempted pilot project in Franklin and Woodford Counties.
They said that that because of the enhanced credentialing, they
weren't able to issue the real ID. But what we
know now in retrospect is that these real IDs driver's
licenses are not being printed at the regional office. All
these folks are doing is verifying documents and sending it
(23:43):
to a third party. Then your license comes into mail.
Our circuit clerks one hundred percent could do that, and
that's why I've been fighting to get it put back
in each individual county.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
Do they want to do it though? I mean, if
they voted before, they don't want to do it? Do
they not want that responsibility now?
Speaker 5 (24:01):
So I anticipate that the circuit clerks are going to
come back to the table as this legislation comes back again,
and the Kentuckians are very upset, so I anticipate that
they're going to have to come to the table. It's
important to note that their budget was never cuts, despite
their duties having decreased in terms of administering the license program.
(24:24):
That said, this would not be an unfunded mandate. It's
not going to be something that you know, by putting
this to local control that we're just leading them out
to pasture. There would be an appropriation to ensure that
our circuit clerks are equipped and enabled to administer this program.
But other legislation that has been discussed is putting it
with the county clerks, and they never did administer the program.
(24:47):
It has nothing to do with them, and their plates
are certainly full, so I do not support that. But again,
our circuit clerks, they successfully did this for eighty eight years.
I have confidence in their ability to do it.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
Ye, I mean that was always my experience, you know,
living in Kentucky, was was going down to the county
clerk's office and and it was relatively quick. I mean
I lived in Oldham County for eight years or yeah,
circuit clerk. I've always just hurt them as county clerks
whatever it's but I mean I knew the person. No,
it's all good. I mean I knew the person. And
(25:20):
you go into the office, you knew the people at
the front desk, and there wasn't like a huge long line.
It was just sit down, write your check, you know,
get your license or get your you know, get your
get your plates renewed or whatever. It was a relatively
smooth process for the most part. And I remember at
the time Savannah thinking that it was kind of clunky.
(25:40):
And then I moved to Colorado and d m vs
are horrifying. They're awful. I mean, I just had an
experience last week. My my plates were stolen off my
pickup truck and and so I had to I had
to call the sheriff because I don't want people running
around with my plates doing shenanigans. So I called sheriff
and then he gave me a police report and he's like, okay,
(26:02):
you got to take the police report down to the DMV.
I'm like, okay. I ended up having to pay for
new plates. Like I got my plate stolen, I had
to play for pay and I it was four hours
of my time just sitting there waiting while everybody else
was in the room. You know, it's so dumb. So,
I mean, I hope that you can find some way
that this would be smooth for Kentuckians to get this
(26:24):
stuff taken care of quickly and easy.
Speaker 5 (26:27):
Well, when we took a process that was once provided
in one hundred and twenty counties and bottlenecked it down
to just thirty four regional offices, it's no surprise that
Kentuckians are having to wait months to get an appointment,
drive hours away from home, stand there in line all day,
take off work to do so, and then wait several
more weeks for their license in the mail. That's the
(26:48):
part that's a mess, and we need to fix that.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
What is your I mean, clearly Kentuckians are upset about this.
Clearly this is an issue that's driving them mad, and
I think rightfully, So what is your assessment of, like
the popularity of your legislation? Clearly it's it's it's a
big zero for the circuit clerks, but for the people.
What are you hearing from your constituents about this?
Speaker 5 (27:15):
I have never had an issue that has had a
more robust coalition of supports, not just among citizens, but
you know, folks from all walks of life. Doesn't matter
if you're a Democrat or a Republican. This is a
top issue, but also among local elected officials and judge
executives and my colleagues in the House. Last session, the
bill had I think over ten co sponsors, and I anticipate,
(27:37):
you know, based on what I'm hearing during the interim,
that there's gonna be a whole lot more going into
this next session. So I think we're going to do
something legislatively. It's just a function of getting a good
clean bill and returning it where it belongs to each county,
to the circuit Clerk's office, not the caunt clerk.
Speaker 1 (27:55):
Yeah, so if your bill doesn't pass, what is Kentucky's plan? Now?
What is Governor dad Pants planning on doing if this
doesn't pass. Is he planning on creating an actual DMV
instead of the regional offices? Or what will be the
answer to this if it's not your bill.
Speaker 5 (28:18):
So I'm not intimately familiar with what it is that
the governor's planning to do. I would anticipate this if
anything right, Well, the Transportation Cabinet probably will ask for
additional funding because we're going into a budget cycle to
maybe hire more people or to make more regional offices.
I mean, it was kind of been back and forth
(28:39):
with this rodeo since twenty nineteen of you know, well,
we're just gonna build more. We're just going to do this,
and it's not working. I'm of the opinion you cannot
fix the regional office model. We need to go back
to one hundred and twenty counties. And you know, when
we talk about funding, let's take while we're spending on
that regional office model, give it to the circuit clerks,
(29:01):
let's get this thing done.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
Yeah yeah. Fascinating is when are you going to get
a chance to run this again? And what can people
do if they think this is a good idea.
Speaker 5 (29:13):
January sixth is the first day of session in twenty
twenty six, and I know that seems like a long
time away, but what citizens can be doing is contacting
their state representatives and their state senators and saying, we
want to go back to one hundred and twenty counties
to our circuit clerks locally to administer these Let's make
Kentucky licenses local again. They just need to be reaching
(29:35):
out and asking for that.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
Fascinating. Thanks for the thanks for taking the time to
join us at Savannah. We appreciate it. Hopefully something can
be worked out because you're right, I mean, people shouldn't
have to wait hours and hours and hours to deal
with this stuff, so it's nuts. Thanks for your time.
We appreciate it absolutely. Thank you all right, Representative Savannah Maddox,
I'm telling you right now, the last thing you want
(29:59):
is an actual like DMV. I mean, I was seriously,
I had my plates stolen and then I had to
pay for plates, and I sat there with screaming kids
in my ear, and I was like, and it was
so disorganized too. And the whole time I'm sitting there,
they had like it was my number was like five
(30:20):
ninety three, and when it got to five ninety two,
I was like, Okay, I'm next, and then they kept
calling the next number and it would be E seven
forty one. What what did that? B twenty seven? Like
what is that? Even? What is that? What is that?
There's no organization there? And then and then it was
just it was an absolute mess. And I remember thinking
(30:41):
the whole time, there's actually people in America who want
government run healthcare, and this is they can't even do
here's your license plates after they got stolen. It was wild.
So hopefully they come up with some kind of solution
to that, uh somewhere sometime. All right, we'll continue coming
up next hour. By the way, Mayor Greenberg backing off
sanctuary city status, Yes for Louisville. We'll talk about that.
(31:01):
News Radio eight forty whas Leland Conway in for Tony
and Dwight. The Babylon B is an American treasure. I
was just looking at Twitter slash x and they've got
a post up with a picture of Elizabeth Warren and
it says Harvard to pay Elizabeth Warren four hundred thousand
dollars to teach class on why college is so expensive. Perfect.
(31:25):
That's so perfect, all right, Gus, I gotta tell you
a story. So we were talking about DMV and all that stuff.
So my stolen plates. This is wild because folks that
know me know that I'm like a little sensitive about
government surveillance. I don't like it.
Speaker 2 (31:38):
I hadn't heard that before.
Speaker 1 (31:39):
I hadn't heard that before. I'm a bit of a libertarian.
And so I'm up in Montana on business a couple
of weeks ago, and I'm on my way back and
I get home and I park my truck and I
unload it and I go inside for a while and
then I come back out. And as I come back out,
in Colorado have to have front plates and back plates,
(32:02):
so they overdo everything because they got cameras everywhere. And
I come out and my front plate's just gone, and
I was like, where did that go? And I've lost
a plate before to wind and other stuff like that,
but this wasn't the case. And I looked down at
the brace and I was like, oh, those are stripped out.
Somebody grabbed that and ripped it off, and so I
go I call the sheriff's office because I like went online.
(32:23):
I was like, what do you do if you have
your plates are stolen? And I don't know if I
have time to finish this story because it's pretty fascinating,
but it's one of those situations where the cameras actually
helped me, but then I got creeped out by how
much they helped me. Right, So I talked to a
sheriff's deputy. I tell him what happened. He goes, where
do you think this happens? I don't know. I was
(32:44):
driving between Montana and Colorado. I have no idea. Just
got home. They're gone. They were there when I left
the hotel in Montana, they're gone now. And so he's like, okay, cool,
So he hangs up. About twenty minutes later, he calls
back and he goes, hey, did you stay at a
hotel in Johnstown, Colorado? Last night? And I was like, yeah,
(33:04):
I did. Actually, on my way back, I was teaching
a firearms class and so I stayed there right by
the range, and then came on home today and He's
like okay, and he's like, is this the address of
the hotel? And I was like, yeah, it is. I
was like, how do you know? And he's like, well,
the last time we picked up your plate on the
camera was eleven PM, which is the time I got
back from dinner eleven PM at this address, and the
(33:27):
next time we saw it was eight am this morning,
and then the next camera was gone. So they were
like they basically they tracked down that my plates were
stolen at the hotel by cameras of when they saw
it and when they did it. And I was like, okay,
that's wild. But it obviously it helped me because it
(33:48):
backed up my story, right.
Speaker 2 (33:49):
But they knew where you were at just by being
on the interstate.
Speaker 1 (33:53):
Yes, with cameras, they knew the hotel that I stayed
at because it was it was like they saw it.
They saw the backplate at eight o'clock in the morning,
but the front plate didn't register when I left the hotel,
but they saw the both plates the night before at
eleven pm, so they knew the hotel that I stayed at.
Speaker 3 (34:11):
That's that that Well, now the Leland Conway surveillance has.
Speaker 2 (34:16):
Got me back now creepy. That's very creepy. I mean,
he did me give them any information to tell you, oh, because.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
I didn't even tell him I stayed at a hotel
because I couldn't remember, Like I'm just telling this, I'm
like somewhere between here and here. And then he calls
back and he's like, yeah, did you stay at the
Courtyard by Marriott and Johnstown like, yeah, that's where your
plates were stolen. Holy crap. Okay, So anyway, all right,
coming up next hour, speaking of driver's licenses for illegal immigrants,
(34:44):
let's talk about that issue. Mayor Greenberg saying Louisville is
no longer a sanctuary city. It's interesting the reasoning behind it.
We'll talk about all that coming up. Leland Conway and
for Tony and Dwight News Radio eight forty WAJS
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