October 14, 2024 • 33 mins
Woody & Greg Gory chat with US Congressman Mike Garcia – incumbent candidate for US House 27.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is money, all right, Welcome to a special edition.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
It's so intimate. It's like a more show podcast. Yeah right,
it's what.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
It's Greg Gory, Good morning, and we are being joined
by Congressman Mike Garcia, representing the twenty seventh District of
California and full disclosure, a personal friend of mine. And
it's kind of weird how we met each other. And
that's not really weird, but it's just very you're making
it sound weird already. I have a very I have
a very funny story about how I learned that you
(00:32):
were even a congressman. I had no idea, Like I
knew my before I knew he was a congressman. Right,
and so anyway, welcome, thank you for being here. This
is very different for us. You know, we don't we
don't do a lot of these things. So feel special.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
I feel special every day.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
But I don't know if I've ever met a congressman,
to be honest, really, I don't think so. Yeah, so
you'd like to call you congressman?
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Or sure? Should we call you mine? Just call me mine?
Oh that is actually it's still very weird to me. Really.
Anything besides Mike, Yeah, held a lot of names actually,
but oh I'm sure I imagine, but Mike is fine, yes, Okay.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
Anyway, so the story goes, you know, my wife and
I we hired Mike's wife, who's a decorator right in
tier decade. So like, you know, she came, you know,
highly recommended by some people that we like. And so
I mean we've done a ton of work with her
and uh and so we you know, we've been over
to their house. We've been uh looking at different you know,
(01:27):
the stuff that my wife needed to look at, fabrics
and finishes or whatever. So uh, anyway, so in these
conversations are just over the overtime, Like you know, Mike
and I have had a couple of conversations and just
chopping it up.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Former Navy fighter pilot with your rip.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
We start talking about cars, We start talking to guy stuff,
you know what I mean. Anyway, so I know him
as as Mike, you know. And so later on this
is now, god, a year and a half later or so,
my wife is sitting on the couch and she's scrolling
on Instagram and she goes, it's a really weird picture.
She goes, come take a look at this picture. Why
(02:01):
is Rebecca, who is Mike's wife. Why is Rebecca in
this picture with Nancy Pelosi? And like, A whatwe yeah, yeah,
So I look and I go, yeah, there's Rebecca. There's Mike, Mike,
Mike Garcia. That's Mike Garcia. Because her professional name is
Rebecca Rollins. I thought you were Mike Rowlins. So as
(02:24):
I knew you, I said, oh, yeah, what's what's Rebecca's
husband named Mike Rollins. And so then I found that's
how I'm like, wait a minute, Mike is Mike Garcia,
Mike the congressman, Mike Garcia. I'm like, and I remember
texting you go your goddamn congressman.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
That's the thing. I had no idea.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
So that's why I really feel like what I do
know about you, at least the person that you are
is pure. It's not driven by politics or anything else,
which I'm not a huge politics guy, per se. I
want to have a nice life and I want you know,
and I really feel like these local, you know, elections,
when it comes to your congressman, who's going to go
to yeah, who's going to go to the Senate, And
you know, who's going to be your district attorney? Things
(03:01):
like that mean so much more than as evidenced by
recent life correct locally correct especially level yep. So anyway,
I can vouch from a from a personal standpoint about
what a what a great guy Mike is and uh
you know his his wife is lovely and they've they've
got a great family and everything else. And uh so
now you're in this Uh, you're in this battle. I
(03:21):
think he called it a knife fight in a phone booth.
Speaker 2 (03:23):
Yeah, every every two years, and it's a it's a
close race. Right, I'm I am a registered Republican in
a district we only have twenty nine percent Republican registration. So, uh,
this is what you know they call the battleground districts.
It's only three to four maybe five nationwide that are
as tight as these and uh as my race, and
uh so it is it's a it's a it's a
(03:44):
it's a it's a fight, mister, struggle that's close every
time we run for two years basically, Yeah, which is crazy.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
It feel because it feels you're constantly campaigning. Even if
it's these races that are every four years, it feels
more constantly used to be oh that election cycles over
and there was at least a little bit of a break,
right because it is exhausted.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
It is exhausting.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
Yeah, I mean, I'm sure like just for the average person,
for the citizens exhausting. It's all the partisan nonsense, which
I hate, I hate, and I hate a lot of
you politicians by the way, just for I feel like
things never get done. I feel like it's just about
this infighting and who can get one over the other
person one hundred percent.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
And if I didn't know you personally, I probably just
by by you know, by default, hate your guts, you know,
and call you the good thing we know, but you
know what I mean, like, you know, because it's just
like our people reasonable to have that that that sort
of reaction to things. You see what's on TV, see
what's on in the in mainstream media as well social media.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
They are incentivized to divide us. And frankly, the two
party system is designed to divide us right now, and
I and I actually hate the two party system I
think right now, if that's my biggest complaint I can change,
it would be that we don't have parties that we
run as candidates. It forces people to really understand the
issues and the candidates. I wish every district was as
(04:55):
competitive as mine. We have four hundred and thirty five
seats in the House, and there's only five that are competitive.
What you get is are people who become lifelong politicians
that don't run hard, they don't get smart on the issues,
they're not challenged, there's no competition. Competition is good. I've
had thirty three opponents and you know, close to fifty
million dollars spend against me over five years, and they
spend twenty twenty five million in negative ads against me
(05:17):
this time. But it makes me work harder, makes me
smarter on the issues, makes me take more time with
the constituents. And I think we need weaker parties and
stronger leaders. And I think we've achieved the former, and
we're desperately in need of stronger leaders at this point.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Greg actually had an idea for many years. You've you've
proposed this.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
About the tax thing, what the paycheck thing? Well, no,
not that.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
But when you go to the polls and you go
to vote, you don't know who's who, like in other words,
that you know who the person is, like it would
say Mike Garcia, but it wouldn't say what party you
were registered with, like it would just have oh yes, yes, yes, yeah, because.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
The mayoral races, for example, they're supposed to not be partisan,
and now they've become complete everything's partisan.
Speaker 2 (05:54):
Yeah, you know. Yeah, it's when it's to their advantage,
they try to make it partisan. And when it's not
to your advantage, you know, you want to try to
strip that that anchor off your ankle, which is called
you know, in our case, a Republican.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
And I truly believe in my heart that if you
had somebody write down ten issues, ten things in life
that are important, you know, protecting the country, inflation, taxes, taxes,
I think most people would probably have about nine of
the same ten things. But they vote on party lines
because they think the other is wrong. It's super frustrating.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
It's maddening in some case, and both both parties are
guilty of it. Right in Red states, they do the
same thing. And so I'll simplify what you said even further, Greg,
which is if you boil it down to just one word,
and that one word is security, whether it's economic security,
neighborhood security, you know, school security, national security, border security,
(06:50):
election security, protecting social security. I can get ten people
in a room from from you know, far left to
far right, and they will all agree that security and
all the fronts are a good thing. And it's when
you start injecting names of politicians or names of legislation,
or you start injecting you know, feeds from social media
(07:11):
and mainstream media where you start to bifurcate. They start
to get divided over it because, you know, because of
these outside influences. So I agree, if we can get
through the party you know nonsense, recognize that we're all
part of one party, which is actually the coolest, you know,
proud party that we should be a part of, is
being that of the United States of America. Yeah, an
(07:31):
American is the best thing that we have going for us.
And for some reason we choose to be Democrats or
Republicans and pepsi versus Coke and even you know left
twigs as a you know, are you an iPhone android guy?
See another way to divice I I'm an old school iPhone.
I've got the button on mindset. But yeah, yeah, million
(07:51):
ways to divide us totally. That's the problem.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
And the thing is, like America will come together, but
it's always over something tragedy a tragedy, you know, it's
never just a we're you know, life and having a
good quality of life and neighborly kind of stuff.
Speaker 2 (08:05):
It's always because.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
We have to unite against the common enemy, and there's
just too many there's too many enemies created where it
doesn't need to be. And that's the part of some
politic thing. But I find you, when you know, I
hear you talk about stuff, or I read your positions
on stuff, I find you to be definitely way more
I definitely consider myself to be more central. Yeah, I'm
definitely Isn't that where most people are? I think the
(08:28):
majority of the country is in the middle. Yeah, yeah,
I mean to get the wackos who just like whatever
it is red or whatever it is blue, that's their position.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
We recently heard that stat where the people that make
the news, that are in the news, you're hearing from
the two percent on either side, correct, and then everybody
else is kind of somewhere in the middle.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
Is that an appropriate I think it's absolutely spotif I
think that's true. But for you, like you, consider myself
a pragmatic, you know, conservative, and you know, I'm not
a flamethrower. I say things directly. I say things as
they are. Not out there to try and get clicks
on social media, but I am out there to communicate
to my constituents in a very straightforward manner. The number
(09:04):
one feedback I get after my town halls. We've had
a few town halls that go for four hours, and
the feedback I get is you actually answered the question,
and you asked me a question. I'm going to answer
it first and then I'm going to tell you the
rationale behind it. And that's a very rare thing. While
on elected officials politicians, it's a weird strategy. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
it's a novel thing, right, so, but yeah, I mean,
(09:25):
it's not just the elected officials that you know, the
two percent far left, two percent far right. It's not
just you know, you're AOC and Marjorie Taylor Green and
that seems to define the parties and it's not the
reality of things. But it's also true among the constituents
and the citizens. You see the people out protesting and
rioting that you know, the whether they're pro Palestinian or
(09:45):
pro defund the police, it's a very vocal two percent.
What they are trying to do is get people who
are in positions like mine, elected officials or decision makers
to start behaving out of fear rather than behaving out
of principle. And I think when those people who we
have hired and we've voted for to represent us in
(10:05):
our security interests start changing their opinions out of fear,
then we're screwed.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
I was reading something about how different generations get their news.
You know, you get the Boomers who are just traditional
media nightly news newspapers, you know, if you can get one.
And then you get the Gen X, the millennials, and
they will, you know, get kind of a combination of
the old legacy media stuff and some of the stuff
on social media. When you get to Gen Z, and
(10:32):
this is going to be the next generation of people
who are voting on stuff or just talking about how
society operates in general, they will see a headline on
social It's all digital, so they'll see the headline. They
won't read any of it, not even the little brief
first paragraph synopsis. They go right to the comments and
they see what everybody else is saying about it, and
then that determines their opinion or their take or their
(10:53):
stance on whatever.
Speaker 2 (10:54):
It is that the articles about yeah, and a lot
of issues, a lot of issues and feeds are provided
to them rather than them seeking information. It's been it's
brain candy. It's a product of algorithms. Right, It's very dangerous.
So yeah, and this is this is why we've got
to be very careful with social media and and AI
overlaid on top of it. You can spread misinformation, disinformation,
(11:15):
fake news, and narratives. I'm completely wrong. We do it
every day. Yeah, I mean we try. That's your formula.
Oh yeah, we're like the most Yeah, I want.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
I wanted to share that other idea that which is
the one I thought you were talking about. And I
wish they could implement this federally where for either two
weeks or one month. I haven't figured out which one yet. Yeah,
he's still like he's in the drafting phase. I'm going
to say one month because it would be more like
a like a purge thing. Oh that sounds fun too,
but no, for one month, instead of having the taxes
(11:45):
taken out of your paycheck, they you get the gross amount,
but you have to write a check and send it
in instead of it being ond. Then people will realize
just how painful. It is because I have so many
friends who say, yeah, I don't mind if they raise
taxes because you know, we need better parks or whatever.
This is situation, and I think, do you not know
how many taxes we already pay? In their answer to this.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
I just don't look because they don't see it.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
It's the same. It's the same as spending cash. Cash
hurts more to spend than a card because the cards
just wipe. It's not real money, right, And then with
tag you don't see it. It's when you actually you're.
Speaker 2 (12:18):
Like and you know where this is actually already implemented.
This is the reality for small business owners actually have
to do this on a quarterly basis, cut a check
right to the government.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
And do you know anybody that owns a small business
and uh, you know, it's devastating to them and when
they see and it's not just having to write that check,
it's seeing that check go up every quarter.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
Every quarter.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
I'm saying, this regulation is your wife Rebecca bitch at
you because she's running a small business and she's like,
God damn it.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
And then yon at you. Wyone in everyone in California.
Speaker 3 (12:48):
And that's an addition to sales tax, income tax, property tax.
Owning two properties, I pay basically an entire salary in
property taxes. And that's why my stage in life. If
it's a ballot initiative, no, just a giant no. And
I'm sick and tired of the FEDS and the state.
Well we need a you know, we're going to raise
taxes by thirteen dollars for this parcel here, twelve dollars
(13:12):
if it's one penny, I'm voting no on it because
it's by a thousand paper cups. Yeah, And I want
to know what they're doing with the money they already
have when they say we need more money for let's
say schools. What are you doing with the hundreds of
billions you already have? It is so maddening.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
Well, let me ask you what that gas tax got
born and we just got higher gas prizes out of it. Yeah,
I mean, which is working out great. And the roads
are much better now right now there's no traffic.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
But you've been a proponent of lowering taxes, reducing regulations,
you know, but like what specific like tax reforms or
deregulatory efforts you know in your next term, Like what
would you prioritize, like, how can you make it so
Greg is not having a heart attack every five a month.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
Yeahs. At the federal level, we had what was called
the Top Tax Cut and Jobs Act of twenty eighteen,
and that actually lowered the taxes in every tax bracket.
It doubled the standard deduction for everyone married couple, single couple,
or singles as well. I did a lot of things
for small businesses, big businesses to allow them to invest.
But it had this little sort of middle finger to California,
(14:16):
which was called the salt cap. Right, a lot of
us in California, if you own a home and have
a job, capped at ten thousand dollars on what you
can deduct from your federal income tax would.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
Used to be what mortgage interest, property taxes.
Speaker 2 (14:30):
Orange interest property taxes. You know in some cases, mellow roos,
if you live in a certain neighborhood, income tax. In California,
we have some of the highest income tax That ten
thousand dollars cap used to be no cap at all,
and you can write off all of those taxes. Now
it's ten thousand dollars cap. That cap was the wrong
number in twenty eighteen, right, And so I have been
pushing for the last two years, especially to get this
(14:53):
cap removed. Okay, you see this is and this is
a top line. That's why I think it's fair because
like you are a Republican not popular in the Republican
Party on set, because that's where it came from. I mean, yes,
this was a Trump thing that came in and it
was seen as a way too few to Caul to
punish the hardcore blue states, the New York, the Illinois, California.
But even now if you see in the last couple
(15:13):
of weeks you live here, so you has come off
of that because what's happening is one, this is a
middle class problem. This isn't this isn't a white collar,
high end problem. If you own a home and have
a job, you're hitting ten thousand dollars to California in it. Now,
even red states like Texas that have higher property rates
than we do, which is which is crazy to think about,
but their property value taxes are actually higher than their
(15:34):
houses are way cheaper. They are cheaper, but they're hitting
that ten thousand dollars cap. So now it's not just
a blue state problem. It's it's it's actually becoming about
thirty states that are bumping into this cap. It's a
problem for middle income. So even Trump, to his credit,
and this is why we've got to fight these fights,
because you can shape these policies, and you can you know,
make sure that things at the federal level are being
(15:55):
shaped correctly. Even Trump a couple of weeks ago said
he's going to remove that salt cap when he's president.
So water over rocks sometimes it feels painful. This that
saltcap expires in twenty twenty five, and I'm committed to
fighting to make sure that it turns into a pumpkin
or it gets permanently.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
That me is a question. When you were a fighter
pilot in the Navy, did you ever get to eject?
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Get to eject? Yeah, I got to not eject. You
don't want to eject. You come out like two inches
shorter and broken bones. If you really Oh well, it's
a terminal experience. I mean, I know, Goose got a
bad top gun, but it was like, Goose will be
alive if I was flying. Yeah, yeah, the I.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
Got to fly with the Thunderbirds one time and it
was super cool and we had to go through They
do like a classroom training before they actually take you
up and everything, and there was a lot of stuff
about like what happens when it's time to eject.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
I go.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
Now, I got to tell you not that you want that,
Like I don't, you know, I don't want to be
in a situation where the slide on an aircraft is necessary,
like on an American Airlines flight. But I would love
to use the slide at some point. I've said that
a number of times. I think it'd be kind of
a cool experience, yeah, to eject, huh, you know, like
I wouldn't want it to be where like I'd just
been like halfway shot down or you know, something something
like that. Like my aircraft was in the you know,
(17:05):
dire straight like yeah, brown underwear.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
If you do, be ready for the shock at your life,
because it's gonna it's gonna be an emotional year. But
you never I never had, you know. I you know,
I flew a very reliable lettercraft, the F eighteen super Hornet,
and uh I flew onto aircraft carriers. So I had
a couple of nights where I was literally experiencing the
last thirty seconds of my life. But my god, I
never had to eject. I did lose eighteen friends. And
(17:30):
normally peacetime training missions where they you know, run into
each other, and so it's a very dangerous game. But
I know guys that have ejected.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
And I can't even learn how to land on an
aircraft carrier, like I thought about, like is it's one
of those things time trying.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
Yeah, the first time you go, well, you do simulators
for a long time, you do practice landings at the
field for weeks months, But the first time you go
to the ship, you're by yourself and you're looking at
what looks thousand foot long boat when you're sitting next
to it on the pier, it looks like the jet
star when you look at it from half a mile
(18:01):
in the middle of the hundreds of miles an hour, Yeah,
it looks like a postage stamp. Right. So the training
that we get is is is very good, and you
rely on your training and you literally have the rest
of your life to figure it out, so you do.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
I was I was talking to your wife and we're
talking about flying, because I've been wanting to take you know,
flying lessons and stuff like that. My wife's like, absolutely not.
And so your wife c blocked me on this too,
because she's like, nope, forget it. I'm like, wait, but
your your husband's a pilot and he flew fighter jets
and everything. And she goes, no, he's been trying. I
won't even fly with him. I go, is that right?
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Why? Zero interest in that? Why?
Speaker 1 (18:38):
And he and and he's like, She's like he he
uh tried to get me, like to talk me into
it or whatever. And then I guess you guys were
somewhere I forget where you were, and you were watching planes.
It was some kind of trip that you just the
two of you went on and you guys like watched
a plane crash. Yeah, I actually had. And she's like
and she was kind of coming around to it, and
she's like, nope.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
Yeah. I literally went to get my youngest son inspired
about aviation, and while we were walking out there to
watch a plane touch and go at Santa Paula Airport,
this guy crashed right in front of us. It was
not the motivational inspiration. I mean, do you ever fly.
I fly with friends once in a while. I got
a couple friends and have small planes, but like jets
are like, it's just it's yeah for me in this
(19:20):
airspace around here. It's not relaxing to fly around l A.
It's you know, it's driving on the freeways.
Speaker 1 (19:25):
And but I figure compared to being like a you know,
like a military application, it's yeah, compared to it's easy.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
It's just you know, do you want to subject yourself
to the to that again? And as a father of two,
and uh, with all this going on now, I like flying.
I still I'll get my private pilot sits. It's one
of these days.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
And yeah, just for whenever you're done with this at
some point or whatever, like you should you should be
like a corporate pilot.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
I think that would be really cool. Maybe. Yeah, the
problem is it depends on who you're working for. You got
Taylor Swift calling you too in the morning. He wants
to go to.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
That's true, all right, So let's let's get back to
the the topic at hand. So, Mike Garcia running in
to be your congressman for the twenty seventh district here
in California. So, and I think you're a very fair dude.
You said you're a straight shooter. Tell me give me
an example of something that you disagree with Donald Trump about.
You're a Republican. A lot of people just want to
(20:19):
toe the line. Yeah, you say, you tell like it is.
We talked about the solid issue. Sure, you said he's
come off of that. I think that's something that he's
still all on that you were all out.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
I think this this isolationism idea. This I think he's
been a little tepid when it comes to beating Russia.
I don't I don't think we should, we should have
any we should. We should either be hot or cold
when it comes to wanting to be Russia. We are
in a cold war right now. Putin's a thug, and
I think we need to be directly outspoken that we
(20:51):
want Russia to lose. Now where I disagree with guys
like Mitch McConnell, who's also a Republican rights I've heard
of him. It's not a blank check. This is the
problem that Biden has. He'll say things like we will
do whatever it takes to help Ukraine win, and the
simple fact is we won't do whatever it takes. We
won't give them a trillion dollars, we won't send American
troops there. So stop saying that, let's let's give them
(21:12):
the right weapons, let's make sure they're employing the right
strategy and and and make sure that we don't fund,
you know, another Vietnam basically. And I think that's what
President Trump is trying to convey, is that we shouldn't
be supporting a quagmire, an eternal quagmire here. We need
to get to a victory. And and you know, I
think he's also trying to say, all wars end at
(21:32):
a table, and you've got to bring people to a
table to negotiate a peace settlement.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
So, I mean, do you believe when he said that
he could end the war between Russia and Ukraine like
on day one?
Speaker 2 (21:45):
I think no. I think without having Putin to you know,
having a having a motivating factor to bring Putin to
the table, and having a motivator mating factor to bring
Zelenski to the table, neither one of them know what
their objectives are, right, so, and they certainly don't agree
on those objectives. So that's not something that happens on
day one. But that does happen after you start sanctioning Russia,
(22:07):
right after you start getting the right weapons to Ukraine. Uh,
and you put pressure not only on Putin but on
the oligarchs around him, and he starts realizing that as economy,
you know, we were still buying oil from Russia. Yeah,
we're still buying rare minerals from Russia. And we're still
buying grain, which is ninety five percent of their GDP.
Are those three.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
Things, which is crazy, Like p would have never thought
we're buying grain from another country.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
Me neither much less, you know, the evil Empire Russia. Right.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
Also oil and oil, right, I mean, is America or
like it's got to be number two or least number two,
like it's oil producing, we could be. And I'm saying,
but as far as like our potentially the amount of
oil that we could.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
Yeah, our state alone is probably the number five in
terms of potential. We have the reserves below us. So
I think what he's trying to convey.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
Is somehow Gays when we were in Texas a couple
of weeks ago, gas like two dollars and thirty five
cents gallon here magically it's just.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
But again no traffic and beautiful freeways everywhere. So right,
I think it's again, I think he's just trying to
convey that, you know, we can bring people to the
negotiation table, apply the pressure turn the needle and you know,
and the war. But I don't think it'll be day one. Yeah,
you know, I think it's a little hyperbole.
Speaker 1 (23:18):
But like how it uh, you know, we keep talking
about like voting for these you know local uh these
local races, and how that has a bigger impact on
people's life. So going back to housing or gas prices, taxes,
things like that, like crime, Yeah, the crime, but the
high the high cost of living. It's forcing a lot
of people or even just they get fed up and
they get sick of it. These California's just moving out
(23:40):
of state. They're moving to Texas, they're moving to Nevada
or any anywhere else besides here. But like from your
standpoint and your role in Congress, like what what is
your plan to make California more affordable? Like particularly like
you know, housing, you know, the rents are insane, energy costs, gas, right, So.
Speaker 2 (23:59):
That's the federal level. The cancer that's really eating everyone's
tail right now is inflation. We've realized it in California
about a thirty five percent cumulative inflation in the last
three and a half years.
Speaker 1 (24:10):
And most people don't even know like what inflation actually is.
All they know is everything's more expensed.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
But this is the why you have nine dollars bacon
instead of you know, five dollars bacon.
Speaker 3 (24:18):
Right, And when they use these terms of twelve percent,
I'm thinking I've noticed over the last couple of years.
I'm not even exaggerating, it seems like groceries are one
hundred percent more expensive.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
Well, it's cumulative. When we hear, oh, inflation was seven
percent this year or this quarter, that's just that time period,
but it's added to the previous years, the app you know,
the previous quarter. So what we have effectively seen in
California is in three and a half years, everything has
gone up on average thirty five percent more. And that
doesn't reverse. And that is a direct result of the
(24:49):
federal government, state government, local government's spending too much money,
putting too much cash into the system. And then when
we have supply chain problems, we have you know, material problem,
we don't have enough workforce to build stuff. You've got
too much money chasing too few goods, and that's what
leads to the inflation we have. It's all man made.
It's all because of the out of control tax and
(25:10):
spend mentality, both in Sacramento and at the federal level.
The crime thing is what I hear about most. Yeah,
and Gascone is like the penguin of Gotham City, douchebag. Yeah,
understatement of the world right there, right, Yeah, I like,
do you like Nathan Hawkman, He's a good guy. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
We did one of the this is the only other
one we did. Nathan Hawkman had him in here as
talking about a lot of this stuff, and he seems
to be a pretty.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
Latest pulse show him thirty percent.
Speaker 1 (25:33):
But he seems to be a pretty common sense approach, yeah,
to a lot of stuff and stuff that he could die. Said,
what can you do, like, you know, without having to
talk to anybody else or deal with anybody else or
get approved, Like what can you do like day one,
first week or whatever to start immediately turning things around?
And he had some really good common sense, uh you
know things that I like that guy.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
I'll know. The biggest opportunity to fix things, yeah, that
is at race and Nathan's going to do a good
job with it. Gascone is absolutely you know, DA stands
for district attorney and he's behaving as if he's the
defense attorney for these guys. True, and so what's wild
is the guy that I'm running against. We don't need
to say his name here, but this this dude gave
(26:12):
has funded Gascon's campaign. He's out there campaigning with Gascon,
and so he he is. Uh, these these type of
candidates and elected officials, and again that send that like
if somebody like me, it's in defensive you can't. Yeah,
there's there's there's no reason to defund the police. There's
no reason elect criminals.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Go Because we've asked this question on our show a
million times, like, can anybody out like, please if you
voted for George Gascal. I've never met one person who
says they voted for George Gaskon, not one. We asked
people to text in, not one. Well they did. They
probably didn't realize it. But it goes back to Greg's
point on the ballot. You know, party affiliation shows up.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
Commercials. They just they just blindly follow the lead. And
the Democrat machine localle is very powerful. This is why
they you know, they're running twenty five million dollars in
negative ads against me right now. It's very powerful, and uh,
you just can't believe it and blindly follow it so.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
On these on these ads, what what do you think
of all the things people? Of course there's a lot
of mud slinging and people embellishing or just straight up
lying misrepresenting. What like, what do you think is the
biggest mis misconception about you that has been it's out there,
it's maybe in these ads, or you know that people
(27:25):
are using the campaign against you, but they've they've tried everything.
Speaker 2 (27:27):
They're grasping at straws and you know in the state
that where straws are illegal. But they've hit me for
for having money, They've hit for being successful. They've hit
me for but you do have money. Literally, you are
you are successful? I have been successful. Yeah, I think
that's something we should be proud of. Right started with
nothing true? What's what's not the most frustrating thing? Well,
(27:48):
just just a couple of days ago with my opponent
apparently in a large settings that I have voted against
Obamacare and I wasn't even in office. Then, Uh, this
abortion issue, the abortion issue is probably the most emotional
one right now that people and these are what they're
running ads on the bottom line, what's your stance? So
my stances it's got nothing to do with my job.
This is a state's right issue. The Dobbs decision made
(28:09):
it a state's right issue. California voted in the last
cycle with Prop one to the people spoke. It's a
very emotional topic. Sure, the state is the lowest level
of representation where there's resources available to enforce these laws.
And Californians decided to have abortion basically be unrestricted through birth.
I don't personally agree with that. I believe in the
(28:29):
three exceptions, and I'm generally pro life, but I believe
in the Constitution, and I believe in the Supreme Court's
decision that it's a state's right issue, and in this case,
the people of California have decided. So are they just
painting you as like someone who's not for you?
Speaker 1 (28:44):
Know?
Speaker 2 (28:44):
Yeah, they're trying to circumstances like someone who wants to,
despite all of California's laws, go out and create a
national abortion ban. And I have zero interest in having
a national abortion ban. That that is literally contradictory to
what the Supreme Court old. It's not something that the
party wants. You just pointed out, it's not feasible. It's
(29:06):
literally unconstitutional at this point to do so so.
Speaker 1 (29:09):
But it's an emotional Like you said, it's emotional. That's
how the emotion of But that's how people vote. They
they vote on party, they vote on whatever strikes an emotion.
Speaker 2 (29:17):
That's right. Yeah, it's effective in some areas. And that's
why I think it's important for people to look at
people ask me what are the top three issues? And
the reality is, isn't a district like mine. It's it's
the question, is one of the top thirty issues? Because
they are so close. I've got it. You know, I'm
a big animal guy. I'm a big animal rights guy, right,
big support of the firefighters, big support of law enforcement.
There's there's so many facets on a daily basis, and
(29:39):
and politics is local in the end. And I just
want my voters to know that I've got no interest
in in in pursuing a national abortion ban. And the
opposition is is actually lying about this. They are flat
out lying about this, and and every you know, frankly,
every commercial they've run over the last five years has
been baseless and unsubstantiated. And why they lose. I speak
(30:02):
the truth. I don't change my vote voting behavior patterns
out of fear. I do everything out of principle? Does
that get you in trouble? And yeah, it makes my
job tougher.
Speaker 1 (30:10):
Something with other people in your party, because there's a
guy gotta imagine like those conversations in the hallways or whatever.
Speaker 2 (30:16):
Yeah, in Washington, there's people to the right of me,
there's people to the left of me, and you know,
sometimes you piss off everyone.
Speaker 1 (30:22):
And yeah, is there like any kind of pressure, like
has there been something where they come and go, no,
you need to you need to be with us on
this one. Or is it really kind of a negotiation
or is there some kind of Is there's not that
there's not that you've caved to it, But is there
some kind of strong arming where people, you know, are
pressured to do this or else?
Speaker 2 (30:40):
They they, to our party's credit, they don't ever require
you to vote a certain way. They don't ever threaten you.
Nancy Pelosi used to do this where they were She
would threaten her members with committee assignments or you know,
not supporting their campaigns if they didn't vote a certain way.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
It's like having to do dishes. You're gonna put you
on dishcret pretty much.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
Yeah, you're cleanup crew here, pal and and I'm alleyball.
I'll listen to I'll listen to the arguments, and if
I think the argument's valid, then you know, I'll go there.
But it's it's I think we've got to stay true.
It's my dad before he died, he said, you know,
just to call me miho, right, which is my son
in Spanish. He said, Meho, you're an umpire. You call
balls and strikes. That's it. And when you vote, you've
(31:17):
got a yes, and you've got to know that's it, right.
So the votes aren't hard, it's explaining to the constituents
sometimes the rationale behind them.
Speaker 1 (31:24):
Have you ever voted for something? I kind of later
realized that maybe I maybe I got that one wrong.
Speaker 2 (31:29):
Uh No, not really. No, there's something that lead to
longer conversations, you know, and you know it certainly would
have been easier to vote a certain way. But I
don't look back and say, hey, no I voted, I
voted wrong on this one.
Speaker 1 (31:42):
Well, I mean you've got my vote. That is that
is obvious, dull, you know, for many different reasons. But
you know, I just think Mike's a really I think
you're a great guy, and thank you. Straight shooter. I know,
you know, I think you You've got a great family.
And that's the other thing too, is like when you
actually know like somebody's family and like how their household,
you know, kind of operates and whatever, it's a deeper
(32:04):
insight and I I feel like I can share that
with U, with everybody with out. If you don't like me,
you're gonna go, well, this guy's a dick and I'm
never going to vote for him.
Speaker 2 (32:11):
But like I think, you.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
Know, if you know me and you kind of know
my my way of approaching things and looking at things
or whatever, I can just tell you that I think,
I think you're a great guy. I think you've done
a great job. I mean, good luck, man, and and
you know, hang in there. I know there's a lot
of crap going on. There's a lot of money on
the other side, and clearly people are saying things that
aren't necessarily true, and you know, but I think it's
(32:34):
one of the things. The more you're out there and
actually meeting people and talking to people, and you know,
I find it's a lot of the same way with
people on this show, Like you know, we get out
and we get in front of people, like people have
a completely different take. Yeah, when you humanize the Yeah,
when you humanize people, exactly right.
Speaker 2 (32:49):
But we need more of that. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:50):
Well, I think if you can have a great job
so far, and I hope you continue to be able
to to represent the twenty seventh district, they're in Congress,
and maybe you can give gregator of.
Speaker 2 (33:03):
Or show me where all the money is going. Yeah,
I can figure that out. Where is the money already happened, everybody,
Thank you, Thank you. What's your what's your website is, Mike.
It's Mike Garcia dot com. Elect Mike Garcia. Elect Mike Garcia.
Speaker 1 (33:20):
I have all this other stuff with these thoughts that
I wrote down and everything else I wanted to bring out.
I should have written this stupid website down. Elect Mike
Garcia dot com. Thanks man, appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (33:29):
Thank you guys,
This is money, all right, Welcome to a special edition.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
It's so intimate. It's like a more show podcast. Yeah right,
it's what.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
It's Greg Gory, Good morning, and we are being joined
by Congressman Mike Garcia, representing the twenty seventh District of
California and full disclosure, a personal friend of mine. And
it's kind of weird how we met each other. And
that's not really weird, but it's just very you're making
it sound weird already. I have a very I have
a very funny story about how I learned that you
(00:32):
were even a congressman. I had no idea, Like I
knew my before I knew he was a congressman. Right,
and so anyway, welcome, thank you for being here. This
is very different for us. You know, we don't we
don't do a lot of these things. So feel special.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
I feel special every day.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
But I don't know if I've ever met a congressman,
to be honest, really, I don't think so. Yeah, so
you'd like to call you congressman?
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Or sure? Should we call you mine? Just call me mine?
Oh that is actually it's still very weird to me. Really.
Anything besides Mike, Yeah, held a lot of names actually,
but oh I'm sure I imagine, but Mike is fine, yes, Okay.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
Anyway, so the story goes, you know, my wife and
I we hired Mike's wife, who's a decorator right in
tier decade. So like, you know, she came, you know,
highly recommended by some people that we like. And so
I mean we've done a ton of work with her
and uh and so we you know, we've been over
to their house. We've been uh looking at different you know,
(01:27):
the stuff that my wife needed to look at, fabrics
and finishes or whatever. So uh, anyway, so in these
conversations are just over the overtime, Like you know, Mike
and I have had a couple of conversations and just
chopping it up.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Former Navy fighter pilot with your rip.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
We start talking about cars, We start talking to guy stuff,
you know what I mean. Anyway, so I know him
as as Mike, you know. And so later on this
is now, god, a year and a half later or so,
my wife is sitting on the couch and she's scrolling
on Instagram and she goes, it's a really weird picture.
She goes, come take a look at this picture. Why
(02:01):
is Rebecca, who is Mike's wife. Why is Rebecca in
this picture with Nancy Pelosi? And like, A whatwe yeah, yeah,
So I look and I go, yeah, there's Rebecca. There's Mike, Mike,
Mike Garcia. That's Mike Garcia. Because her professional name is
Rebecca Rollins. I thought you were Mike Rowlins. So as
(02:24):
I knew you, I said, oh, yeah, what's what's Rebecca's
husband named Mike Rollins. And so then I found that's
how I'm like, wait a minute, Mike is Mike Garcia,
Mike the congressman, Mike Garcia. I'm like, and I remember
texting you go your goddamn congressman.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
That's the thing. I had no idea.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
So that's why I really feel like what I do
know about you, at least the person that you are
is pure. It's not driven by politics or anything else,
which I'm not a huge politics guy, per se. I
want to have a nice life and I want you know,
and I really feel like these local, you know, elections,
when it comes to your congressman, who's going to go
to yeah, who's going to go to the Senate, And
you know, who's going to be your district attorney? Things
(03:01):
like that mean so much more than as evidenced by
recent life correct locally correct especially level yep. So anyway,
I can vouch from a from a personal standpoint about
what a what a great guy Mike is and uh
you know his his wife is lovely and they've they've
got a great family and everything else. And uh so
now you're in this Uh, you're in this battle. I
(03:21):
think he called it a knife fight in a phone booth.
Speaker 2 (03:23):
Yeah, every every two years, and it's a it's a
close race. Right, I'm I am a registered Republican in
a district we only have twenty nine percent Republican registration. So, uh,
this is what you know they call the battleground districts.
It's only three to four maybe five nationwide that are
as tight as these and uh as my race, and
uh so it is it's a it's a it's a
(03:44):
it's a it's a fight, mister, struggle that's close every
time we run for two years basically, Yeah, which is crazy.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
It feel because it feels you're constantly campaigning. Even if
it's these races that are every four years, it feels
more constantly used to be oh that election cycles over
and there was at least a little bit of a break,
right because it is exhausted.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
It is exhausting.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
Yeah, I mean, I'm sure like just for the average person,
for the citizens exhausting. It's all the partisan nonsense, which
I hate, I hate, and I hate a lot of
you politicians by the way, just for I feel like
things never get done. I feel like it's just about
this infighting and who can get one over the other
person one hundred percent.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
And if I didn't know you personally, I probably just
by by you know, by default, hate your guts, you know,
and call you the good thing we know, but you
know what I mean, like, you know, because it's just
like our people reasonable to have that that that sort
of reaction to things. You see what's on TV, see
what's on in the in mainstream media as well social media.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
They are incentivized to divide us. And frankly, the two
party system is designed to divide us right now, and
I and I actually hate the two party system I
think right now, if that's my biggest complaint I can change,
it would be that we don't have parties that we
run as candidates. It forces people to really understand the
issues and the candidates. I wish every district was as
(04:55):
competitive as mine. We have four hundred and thirty five
seats in the House, and there's only five that are competitive.
What you get is are people who become lifelong politicians
that don't run hard, they don't get smart on the issues,
they're not challenged, there's no competition. Competition is good. I've
had thirty three opponents and you know, close to fifty
million dollars spend against me over five years, and they
spend twenty twenty five million in negative ads against me
(05:17):
this time. But it makes me work harder, makes me
smarter on the issues, makes me take more time with
the constituents. And I think we need weaker parties and
stronger leaders. And I think we've achieved the former, and
we're desperately in need of stronger leaders at this point.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Greg actually had an idea for many years. You've you've
proposed this.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
About the tax thing, what the paycheck thing? Well, no,
not that.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
But when you go to the polls and you go
to vote, you don't know who's who, like in other words,
that you know who the person is, like it would
say Mike Garcia, but it wouldn't say what party you
were registered with, like it would just have oh yes, yes, yes, yeah, because.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
The mayoral races, for example, they're supposed to not be partisan,
and now they've become complete everything's partisan.
Speaker 2 (05:54):
Yeah, you know. Yeah, it's when it's to their advantage,
they try to make it partisan. And when it's not
to your advantage, you know, you want to try to
strip that that anchor off your ankle, which is called
you know, in our case, a Republican.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
And I truly believe in my heart that if you
had somebody write down ten issues, ten things in life
that are important, you know, protecting the country, inflation, taxes, taxes,
I think most people would probably have about nine of
the same ten things. But they vote on party lines
because they think the other is wrong. It's super frustrating.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
It's maddening in some case, and both both parties are
guilty of it. Right in Red states, they do the
same thing. And so I'll simplify what you said even further, Greg,
which is if you boil it down to just one word,
and that one word is security, whether it's economic security,
neighborhood security, you know, school security, national security, border security,
(06:50):
election security, protecting social security. I can get ten people
in a room from from you know, far left to
far right, and they will all agree that security and
all the fronts are a good thing. And it's when
you start injecting names of politicians or names of legislation,
or you start injecting you know, feeds from social media
(07:11):
and mainstream media where you start to bifurcate. They start
to get divided over it because, you know, because of
these outside influences. So I agree, if we can get
through the party you know nonsense, recognize that we're all
part of one party, which is actually the coolest, you know,
proud party that we should be a part of, is
being that of the United States of America. Yeah, an
(07:31):
American is the best thing that we have going for us.
And for some reason we choose to be Democrats or
Republicans and pepsi versus Coke and even you know left
twigs as a you know, are you an iPhone android guy?
See another way to divice I I'm an old school iPhone.
I've got the button on mindset. But yeah, yeah, million
(07:51):
ways to divide us totally. That's the problem.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
And the thing is, like America will come together, but
it's always over something tragedy a tragedy, you know, it's
never just a we're you know, life and having a
good quality of life and neighborly kind of stuff.
Speaker 2 (08:05):
It's always because.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
We have to unite against the common enemy, and there's
just too many there's too many enemies created where it
doesn't need to be. And that's the part of some
politic thing. But I find you, when you know, I
hear you talk about stuff, or I read your positions
on stuff, I find you to be definitely way more
I definitely consider myself to be more central. Yeah, I'm
definitely Isn't that where most people are? I think the
(08:28):
majority of the country is in the middle. Yeah, yeah,
I mean to get the wackos who just like whatever
it is red or whatever it is blue, that's their position.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
We recently heard that stat where the people that make
the news, that are in the news, you're hearing from
the two percent on either side, correct, and then everybody
else is kind of somewhere in the middle.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
Is that an appropriate I think it's absolutely spotif I
think that's true. But for you, like you, consider myself
a pragmatic, you know, conservative, and you know, I'm not
a flamethrower. I say things directly. I say things as
they are. Not out there to try and get clicks
on social media, but I am out there to communicate
to my constituents in a very straightforward manner. The number
(09:04):
one feedback I get after my town halls. We've had
a few town halls that go for four hours, and
the feedback I get is you actually answered the question,
and you asked me a question. I'm going to answer
it first and then I'm going to tell you the
rationale behind it. And that's a very rare thing. While
on elected officials politicians, it's a weird strategy. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
it's a novel thing, right, so, but yeah, I mean,
(09:25):
it's not just the elected officials that you know, the
two percent far left, two percent far right. It's not
just you know, you're AOC and Marjorie Taylor Green and
that seems to define the parties and it's not the
reality of things. But it's also true among the constituents
and the citizens. You see the people out protesting and
rioting that you know, the whether they're pro Palestinian or
(09:45):
pro defund the police, it's a very vocal two percent.
What they are trying to do is get people who
are in positions like mine, elected officials or decision makers
to start behaving out of fear rather than behaving out
of principle. And I think when those people who we
have hired and we've voted for to represent us in
(10:05):
our security interests start changing their opinions out of fear,
then we're screwed.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
I was reading something about how different generations get their news.
You know, you get the Boomers who are just traditional
media nightly news newspapers, you know, if you can get one.
And then you get the Gen X, the millennials, and
they will, you know, get kind of a combination of
the old legacy media stuff and some of the stuff
on social media. When you get to Gen Z, and
(10:32):
this is going to be the next generation of people
who are voting on stuff or just talking about how
society operates in general, they will see a headline on
social It's all digital, so they'll see the headline. They
won't read any of it, not even the little brief
first paragraph synopsis. They go right to the comments and
they see what everybody else is saying about it, and
then that determines their opinion or their take or their
(10:53):
stance on whatever.
Speaker 2 (10:54):
It is that the articles about yeah, and a lot
of issues, a lot of issues and feeds are provided
to them rather than them seeking information. It's been it's
brain candy. It's a product of algorithms. Right, It's very dangerous.
So yeah, and this is this is why we've got
to be very careful with social media and and AI
overlaid on top of it. You can spread misinformation, disinformation,
(11:15):
fake news, and narratives. I'm completely wrong. We do it
every day. Yeah, I mean we try. That's your formula.
Oh yeah, we're like the most Yeah, I want.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
I wanted to share that other idea that which is
the one I thought you were talking about. And I
wish they could implement this federally where for either two
weeks or one month. I haven't figured out which one yet. Yeah,
he's still like he's in the drafting phase. I'm going
to say one month because it would be more like
a like a purge thing. Oh that sounds fun too,
but no, for one month, instead of having the taxes
(11:45):
taken out of your paycheck, they you get the gross amount,
but you have to write a check and send it
in instead of it being ond. Then people will realize
just how painful. It is because I have so many
friends who say, yeah, I don't mind if they raise
taxes because you know, we need better parks or whatever.
This is situation, and I think, do you not know
how many taxes we already pay? In their answer to this.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
I just don't look because they don't see it.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
It's the same. It's the same as spending cash. Cash
hurts more to spend than a card because the cards
just wipe. It's not real money, right, And then with
tag you don't see it. It's when you actually you're.
Speaker 2 (12:18):
Like and you know where this is actually already implemented.
This is the reality for small business owners actually have
to do this on a quarterly basis, cut a check
right to the government.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
And do you know anybody that owns a small business
and uh, you know, it's devastating to them and when
they see and it's not just having to write that check,
it's seeing that check go up every quarter.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
Every quarter.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
I'm saying, this regulation is your wife Rebecca bitch at
you because she's running a small business and she's like,
God damn it.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
And then yon at you. Wyone in everyone in California.
Speaker 3 (12:48):
And that's an addition to sales tax, income tax, property tax.
Owning two properties, I pay basically an entire salary in
property taxes. And that's why my stage in life. If
it's a ballot initiative, no, just a giant no. And
I'm sick and tired of the FEDS and the state.
Well we need a you know, we're going to raise
taxes by thirteen dollars for this parcel here, twelve dollars
(13:12):
if it's one penny, I'm voting no on it because
it's by a thousand paper cups. Yeah, And I want
to know what they're doing with the money they already
have when they say we need more money for let's
say schools. What are you doing with the hundreds of
billions you already have? It is so maddening.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
Well, let me ask you what that gas tax got
born and we just got higher gas prizes out of it. Yeah,
I mean, which is working out great. And the roads
are much better now right now there's no traffic.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
But you've been a proponent of lowering taxes, reducing regulations,
you know, but like what specific like tax reforms or
deregulatory efforts you know in your next term, Like what
would you prioritize, like, how can you make it so
Greg is not having a heart attack every five a month.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
Yeahs. At the federal level, we had what was called
the Top Tax Cut and Jobs Act of twenty eighteen,
and that actually lowered the taxes in every tax bracket.
It doubled the standard deduction for everyone married couple, single couple,
or singles as well. I did a lot of things
for small businesses, big businesses to allow them to invest.
But it had this little sort of middle finger to California,
(14:16):
which was called the salt cap. Right, a lot of
us in California, if you own a home and have
a job, capped at ten thousand dollars on what you
can deduct from your federal income tax would.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
Used to be what mortgage interest, property taxes.
Speaker 2 (14:30):
Orange interest property taxes. You know in some cases, mellow roos,
if you live in a certain neighborhood, income tax. In California,
we have some of the highest income tax That ten
thousand dollars cap used to be no cap at all,
and you can write off all of those taxes. Now
it's ten thousand dollars cap. That cap was the wrong
number in twenty eighteen, right, And so I have been
pushing for the last two years, especially to get this
(14:53):
cap removed. Okay, you see this is and this is
a top line. That's why I think it's fair because
like you are a Republican not popular in the Republican
Party on set, because that's where it came from. I mean, yes,
this was a Trump thing that came in and it
was seen as a way too few to Caul to
punish the hardcore blue states, the New York, the Illinois, California.
But even now if you see in the last couple
(15:13):
of weeks you live here, so you has come off
of that because what's happening is one, this is a
middle class problem. This isn't this isn't a white collar,
high end problem. If you own a home and have
a job, you're hitting ten thousand dollars to California in it. Now,
even red states like Texas that have higher property rates
than we do, which is which is crazy to think about,
but their property value taxes are actually higher than their
(15:34):
houses are way cheaper. They are cheaper, but they're hitting
that ten thousand dollars cap. So now it's not just
a blue state problem. It's it's it's actually becoming about
thirty states that are bumping into this cap. It's a
problem for middle income. So even Trump, to his credit,
and this is why we've got to fight these fights,
because you can shape these policies, and you can you know,
make sure that things at the federal level are being
(15:55):
shaped correctly. Even Trump a couple of weeks ago said
he's going to remove that salt cap when he's president.
So water over rocks sometimes it feels painful. This that
saltcap expires in twenty twenty five, and I'm committed to
fighting to make sure that it turns into a pumpkin
or it gets permanently.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
That me is a question. When you were a fighter
pilot in the Navy, did you ever get to eject?
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Get to eject? Yeah, I got to not eject. You
don't want to eject. You come out like two inches
shorter and broken bones. If you really Oh well, it's
a terminal experience. I mean, I know, Goose got a
bad top gun, but it was like, Goose will be
alive if I was flying. Yeah, yeah, the I.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
Got to fly with the Thunderbirds one time and it
was super cool and we had to go through They
do like a classroom training before they actually take you
up and everything, and there was a lot of stuff
about like what happens when it's time to eject.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
I go.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
Now, I got to tell you not that you want that,
Like I don't, you know, I don't want to be
in a situation where the slide on an aircraft is necessary,
like on an American Airlines flight. But I would love
to use the slide at some point. I've said that
a number of times. I think it'd be kind of
a cool experience, yeah, to eject, huh, you know, like
I wouldn't want it to be where like I'd just
been like halfway shot down or you know, something something
like that. Like my aircraft was in the you know,
(17:05):
dire straight like yeah, brown underwear.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
If you do, be ready for the shock at your life,
because it's gonna it's gonna be an emotional year. But
you never I never had, you know. I you know,
I flew a very reliable lettercraft, the F eighteen super Hornet,
and uh I flew onto aircraft carriers. So I had
a couple of nights where I was literally experiencing the
last thirty seconds of my life. But my god, I
never had to eject. I did lose eighteen friends. And
(17:30):
normally peacetime training missions where they you know, run into
each other, and so it's a very dangerous game. But
I know guys that have ejected.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
And I can't even learn how to land on an
aircraft carrier, like I thought about, like is it's one
of those things time trying.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
Yeah, the first time you go, well, you do simulators
for a long time, you do practice landings at the
field for weeks months, But the first time you go
to the ship, you're by yourself and you're looking at
what looks thousand foot long boat when you're sitting next
to it on the pier, it looks like the jet
star when you look at it from half a mile
(18:01):
in the middle of the hundreds of miles an hour, Yeah,
it looks like a postage stamp. Right. So the training
that we get is is is very good, and you
rely on your training and you literally have the rest
of your life to figure it out, so you do.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
I was I was talking to your wife and we're
talking about flying, because I've been wanting to take you know,
flying lessons and stuff like that. My wife's like, absolutely not.
And so your wife c blocked me on this too,
because she's like, nope, forget it. I'm like, wait, but
your your husband's a pilot and he flew fighter jets
and everything. And she goes, no, he's been trying. I
won't even fly with him. I go, is that right?
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Why? Zero interest in that? Why?
Speaker 1 (18:38):
And he and and he's like, She's like he he
uh tried to get me, like to talk me into
it or whatever. And then I guess you guys were
somewhere I forget where you were, and you were watching planes.
It was some kind of trip that you just the
two of you went on and you guys like watched
a plane crash. Yeah, I actually had. And she's like
and she was kind of coming around to it, and
she's like, nope.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
Yeah. I literally went to get my youngest son inspired
about aviation, and while we were walking out there to
watch a plane touch and go at Santa Paula Airport,
this guy crashed right in front of us. It was
not the motivational inspiration. I mean, do you ever fly.
I fly with friends once in a while. I got
a couple friends and have small planes, but like jets
are like, it's just it's yeah for me in this
(19:20):
airspace around here. It's not relaxing to fly around l A.
It's you know, it's driving on the freeways.
Speaker 1 (19:25):
And but I figure compared to being like a you know,
like a military application, it's yeah, compared to it's easy.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
It's just you know, do you want to subject yourself
to the to that again? And as a father of two,
and uh, with all this going on now, I like flying.
I still I'll get my private pilot sits. It's one
of these days.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
And yeah, just for whenever you're done with this at
some point or whatever, like you should you should be
like a corporate pilot.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
I think that would be really cool. Maybe. Yeah, the
problem is it depends on who you're working for. You got
Taylor Swift calling you too in the morning. He wants
to go to.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
That's true, all right, So let's let's get back to
the the topic at hand. So, Mike Garcia running in
to be your congressman for the twenty seventh district here
in California. So, and I think you're a very fair dude.
You said you're a straight shooter. Tell me give me
an example of something that you disagree with Donald Trump about.
You're a Republican. A lot of people just want to
(20:19):
toe the line. Yeah, you say, you tell like it is.
We talked about the solid issue. Sure, you said he's
come off of that. I think that's something that he's
still all on that you were all out.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
I think this this isolationism idea. This I think he's
been a little tepid when it comes to beating Russia.
I don't I don't think we should, we should have
any we should. We should either be hot or cold
when it comes to wanting to be Russia. We are
in a cold war right now. Putin's a thug, and
I think we need to be directly outspoken that we
(20:51):
want Russia to lose. Now where I disagree with guys
like Mitch McConnell, who's also a Republican rights I've heard
of him. It's not a blank check. This is the
problem that Biden has. He'll say things like we will
do whatever it takes to help Ukraine win, and the
simple fact is we won't do whatever it takes. We
won't give them a trillion dollars, we won't send American
troops there. So stop saying that, let's let's give them
(21:12):
the right weapons, let's make sure they're employing the right
strategy and and and make sure that we don't fund,
you know, another Vietnam basically. And I think that's what
President Trump is trying to convey, is that we shouldn't
be supporting a quagmire, an eternal quagmire here. We need
to get to a victory. And and you know, I
think he's also trying to say, all wars end at
(21:32):
a table, and you've got to bring people to a
table to negotiate a peace settlement.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
So, I mean, do you believe when he said that
he could end the war between Russia and Ukraine like
on day one?
Speaker 2 (21:45):
I think no. I think without having Putin to you know,
having a having a motivating factor to bring Putin to
the table, and having a motivator mating factor to bring
Zelenski to the table, neither one of them know what
their objectives are, right, so, and they certainly don't agree
on those objectives. So that's not something that happens on
day one. But that does happen after you start sanctioning Russia,
(22:07):
right after you start getting the right weapons to Ukraine. Uh,
and you put pressure not only on Putin but on
the oligarchs around him, and he starts realizing that as economy,
you know, we were still buying oil from Russia. Yeah,
we're still buying rare minerals from Russia. And we're still
buying grain, which is ninety five percent of their GDP.
Are those three.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
Things, which is crazy, Like p would have never thought
we're buying grain from another country.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
Me neither much less, you know, the evil Empire Russia. Right.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
Also oil and oil, right, I mean, is America or
like it's got to be number two or least number two,
like it's oil producing, we could be. And I'm saying,
but as far as like our potentially the amount of
oil that we could.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
Yeah, our state alone is probably the number five in
terms of potential. We have the reserves below us. So
I think what he's trying to convey.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
Is somehow Gays when we were in Texas a couple
of weeks ago, gas like two dollars and thirty five
cents gallon here magically it's just.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
But again no traffic and beautiful freeways everywhere. So right,
I think it's again, I think he's just trying to
convey that, you know, we can bring people to the
negotiation table, apply the pressure turn the needle and you know,
and the war. But I don't think it'll be day one. Yeah,
you know, I think it's a little hyperbole.
Speaker 1 (23:18):
But like how it uh, you know, we keep talking
about like voting for these you know local uh these
local races, and how that has a bigger impact on
people's life. So going back to housing or gas prices, taxes,
things like that, like crime, Yeah, the crime, but the
high the high cost of living. It's forcing a lot
of people or even just they get fed up and
they get sick of it. These California's just moving out
(23:40):
of state. They're moving to Texas, they're moving to Nevada
or any anywhere else besides here. But like from your
standpoint and your role in Congress, like what what is
your plan to make California more affordable? Like particularly like
you know, housing, you know, the rents are insane, energy costs, gas, right, So.
Speaker 2 (23:59):
That's the federal level. The cancer that's really eating everyone's
tail right now is inflation. We've realized it in California
about a thirty five percent cumulative inflation in the last
three and a half years.
Speaker 1 (24:10):
And most people don't even know like what inflation actually is.
All they know is everything's more expensed.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
But this is the why you have nine dollars bacon
instead of you know, five dollars bacon.
Speaker 3 (24:18):
Right, And when they use these terms of twelve percent,
I'm thinking I've noticed over the last couple of years.
I'm not even exaggerating, it seems like groceries are one
hundred percent more expensive.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
Well, it's cumulative. When we hear, oh, inflation was seven
percent this year or this quarter, that's just that time period,
but it's added to the previous years, the app you know,
the previous quarter. So what we have effectively seen in
California is in three and a half years, everything has
gone up on average thirty five percent more. And that
doesn't reverse. And that is a direct result of the
(24:49):
federal government, state government, local government's spending too much money,
putting too much cash into the system. And then when
we have supply chain problems, we have you know, material problem,
we don't have enough workforce to build stuff. You've got
too much money chasing too few goods, and that's what
leads to the inflation we have. It's all man made.
It's all because of the out of control tax and
(25:10):
spend mentality, both in Sacramento and at the federal level.
The crime thing is what I hear about most. Yeah,
and Gascone is like the penguin of Gotham City, douchebag. Yeah,
understatement of the world right there, right, Yeah, I like,
do you like Nathan Hawkman, He's a good guy. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
We did one of the this is the only other
one we did. Nathan Hawkman had him in here as
talking about a lot of this stuff, and he seems
to be a pretty.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
Latest pulse show him thirty percent.
Speaker 1 (25:33):
But he seems to be a pretty common sense approach, yeah,
to a lot of stuff and stuff that he could die. Said,
what can you do, like, you know, without having to
talk to anybody else or deal with anybody else or
get approved, Like what can you do like day one,
first week or whatever to start immediately turning things around?
And he had some really good common sense, uh you
know things that I like that guy.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
I'll know. The biggest opportunity to fix things, yeah, that
is at race and Nathan's going to do a good
job with it. Gascone is absolutely you know, DA stands
for district attorney and he's behaving as if he's the
defense attorney for these guys. True, and so what's wild
is the guy that I'm running against. We don't need
to say his name here, but this this dude gave
(26:12):
has funded Gascon's campaign. He's out there campaigning with Gascon,
and so he he is. Uh, these these type of
candidates and elected officials, and again that send that like
if somebody like me, it's in defensive you can't. Yeah,
there's there's there's no reason to defund the police. There's
no reason elect criminals.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Go Because we've asked this question on our show a
million times, like, can anybody out like, please if you
voted for George Gascal. I've never met one person who
says they voted for George Gaskon, not one. We asked
people to text in, not one. Well they did. They
probably didn't realize it. But it goes back to Greg's
point on the ballot. You know, party affiliation shows up.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
Commercials. They just they just blindly follow the lead. And
the Democrat machine localle is very powerful. This is why
they you know, they're running twenty five million dollars in
negative ads against me right now. It's very powerful, and uh,
you just can't believe it and blindly follow it so.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
On these on these ads, what what do you think
of all the things people? Of course there's a lot
of mud slinging and people embellishing or just straight up
lying misrepresenting. What like, what do you think is the
biggest mis misconception about you that has been it's out there,
it's maybe in these ads, or you know that people
(27:25):
are using the campaign against you, but they've they've tried everything.
Speaker 2 (27:27):
They're grasping at straws and you know in the state
that where straws are illegal. But they've hit me for
for having money, They've hit for being successful. They've hit
me for but you do have money. Literally, you are
you are successful? I have been successful. Yeah, I think
that's something we should be proud of. Right started with
nothing true? What's what's not the most frustrating thing? Well,
(27:48):
just just a couple of days ago with my opponent
apparently in a large settings that I have voted against
Obamacare and I wasn't even in office. Then, Uh, this
abortion issue, the abortion issue is probably the most emotional
one right now that people and these are what they're
running ads on the bottom line, what's your stance? So
my stances it's got nothing to do with my job.
This is a state's right issue. The Dobbs decision made
(28:09):
it a state's right issue. California voted in the last
cycle with Prop one to the people spoke. It's a
very emotional topic. Sure, the state is the lowest level
of representation where there's resources available to enforce these laws.
And Californians decided to have abortion basically be unrestricted through birth.
I don't personally agree with that. I believe in the
(28:29):
three exceptions, and I'm generally pro life, but I believe
in the Constitution, and I believe in the Supreme Court's
decision that it's a state's right issue, and in this case,
the people of California have decided. So are they just
painting you as like someone who's not for you?
Speaker 1 (28:44):
Know?
Speaker 2 (28:44):
Yeah, they're trying to circumstances like someone who wants to,
despite all of California's laws, go out and create a
national abortion ban. And I have zero interest in having
a national abortion ban. That that is literally contradictory to
what the Supreme Court old. It's not something that the
party wants. You just pointed out, it's not feasible. It's
(29:06):
literally unconstitutional at this point to do so so.
Speaker 1 (29:09):
But it's an emotional Like you said, it's emotional. That's
how the emotion of But that's how people vote. They
they vote on party, they vote on whatever strikes an emotion.
Speaker 2 (29:17):
That's right. Yeah, it's effective in some areas. And that's
why I think it's important for people to look at
people ask me what are the top three issues? And
the reality is, isn't a district like mine. It's it's
the question, is one of the top thirty issues? Because
they are so close. I've got it. You know, I'm
a big animal guy. I'm a big animal rights guy, right,
big support of the firefighters, big support of law enforcement.
There's there's so many facets on a daily basis, and
(29:39):
and politics is local in the end. And I just
want my voters to know that I've got no interest
in in in pursuing a national abortion ban. And the
opposition is is actually lying about this. They are flat
out lying about this, and and every you know, frankly,
every commercial they've run over the last five years has
been baseless and unsubstantiated. And why they lose. I speak
(30:02):
the truth. I don't change my vote voting behavior patterns
out of fear. I do everything out of principle? Does
that get you in trouble? And yeah, it makes my
job tougher.
Speaker 1 (30:10):
Something with other people in your party, because there's a
guy gotta imagine like those conversations in the hallways or whatever.
Speaker 2 (30:16):
Yeah, in Washington, there's people to the right of me,
there's people to the left of me, and you know,
sometimes you piss off everyone.
Speaker 1 (30:22):
And yeah, is there like any kind of pressure, like
has there been something where they come and go, no,
you need to you need to be with us on
this one. Or is it really kind of a negotiation
or is there some kind of Is there's not that
there's not that you've caved to it, But is there
some kind of strong arming where people, you know, are
pressured to do this or else?
Speaker 2 (30:40):
They they, to our party's credit, they don't ever require
you to vote a certain way. They don't ever threaten you.
Nancy Pelosi used to do this where they were She
would threaten her members with committee assignments or you know,
not supporting their campaigns if they didn't vote a certain way.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
It's like having to do dishes. You're gonna put you
on dishcret pretty much.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
Yeah, you're cleanup crew here, pal and and I'm alleyball.
I'll listen to I'll listen to the arguments, and if
I think the argument's valid, then you know, I'll go there.
But it's it's I think we've got to stay true.
It's my dad before he died, he said, you know,
just to call me miho, right, which is my son
in Spanish. He said, Meho, you're an umpire. You call
balls and strikes. That's it. And when you vote, you've
(31:17):
got a yes, and you've got to know that's it, right.
So the votes aren't hard, it's explaining to the constituents
sometimes the rationale behind them.
Speaker 1 (31:24):
Have you ever voted for something? I kind of later
realized that maybe I maybe I got that one wrong.
Speaker 2 (31:29):
Uh No, not really. No, there's something that lead to
longer conversations, you know, and you know it certainly would
have been easier to vote a certain way. But I
don't look back and say, hey, no I voted, I
voted wrong on this one.
Speaker 1 (31:42):
Well, I mean you've got my vote. That is that
is obvious, dull, you know, for many different reasons. But
you know, I just think Mike's a really I think
you're a great guy, and thank you. Straight shooter. I know,
you know, I think you You've got a great family.
And that's the other thing too, is like when you
actually know like somebody's family and like how their household,
you know, kind of operates and whatever, it's a deeper
(32:04):
insight and I I feel like I can share that
with U, with everybody with out. If you don't like me,
you're gonna go, well, this guy's a dick and I'm
never going to vote for him.
Speaker 2 (32:11):
But like I think, you.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
Know, if you know me and you kind of know
my my way of approaching things and looking at things
or whatever, I can just tell you that I think,
I think you're a great guy. I think you've done
a great job. I mean, good luck, man, and and
you know, hang in there. I know there's a lot
of crap going on. There's a lot of money on
the other side, and clearly people are saying things that
aren't necessarily true, and you know, but I think it's
(32:34):
one of the things. The more you're out there and
actually meeting people and talking to people, and you know,
I find it's a lot of the same way with
people on this show, Like you know, we get out
and we get in front of people, like people have
a completely different take. Yeah, when you humanize the Yeah,
when you humanize people, exactly right.
Speaker 2 (32:49):
But we need more of that. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:50):
Well, I think if you can have a great job
so far, and I hope you continue to be able
to to represent the twenty seventh district, they're in Congress,
and maybe you can give gregator of.
Speaker 2 (33:03):
Or show me where all the money is going. Yeah,
I can figure that out. Where is the money already happened, everybody,
Thank you, Thank you. What's your what's your website is, Mike.
It's Mike Garcia dot com. Elect Mike Garcia. Elect Mike Garcia.
Speaker 1 (33:20):
I have all this other stuff with these thoughts that
I wrote down and everything else I wanted to bring out.
I should have written this stupid website down. Elect Mike
Garcia dot com. Thanks man, appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (33:29):
Thank you guys,
The Woody Show News
Popular Podcasts
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.