Sen. JD Vance | This Past Weekend w/ Theo Von #540

we have some upcoming tour dates there in Colorado Springs in Colorado Casper Wyoming Billings Montana and Missoula Montana Bloomington Indiana Columbus Ohio Champagne Illinois over there in a fighting align eye area Grand Rapids Michigan Lafayette Louisiana and bont Texas you can get all your tickets at theo. comom are and thank you so much for the support I want to start by saying that uh we have reached out to uh Governor walls and vice president Harris and we would love to uh have them uh in studio as well uh today's guest is a senator from the

state of Ohio he's currently on the Republican ticket for vice president uh he's a Yale graduate he's a Marine uh he's an author uh he wrote with the book hillbilly elegy uh I've read about half of it and uh I'm really grateful to spend time with him today to discuss some issues and get to know him today's guest is Mr JD Vance and I will find a song I will sing [Applause] but then it starts to become more interesting like the last woman we had on Like Trains cats around the country really with a traveling

cat circus yeah so that's who you're following up you know just so that's way more interesting than a politician man it's just so you know where you are you know Mr Vance in the in the call me please call me JD please yeah just so you know where you are JD and the existence of things um JD Vance thanks for coming in today man yeah man it's good to be here I really appre appreciate it I just went to uh oh I just went to Lambo field the other day you ever been there uh I

don't think I ever have been to Lambo field but I think I'm going to Lambo field tomorrow nuh-uh yeah yeah um I'm pretty sure I mean running for vice president you never know where you are dayto day but um I'm pretty sure we're going to the Packers game tomorrow wow dude it was so did you have fun it's amazing yeah um we we just went I had a show there the night uh on a Saturday night last Saturday so we just got to go do a tour okay but um it's just so wild you drive

into this you know it's a small City yeah and you're like wait there's an NFL team here it doesn't Mak sense really yeah like the NFL team in some ways right I mean the Packers are so popular but no I'm looking forward to going I mean it's it's kind of like a political right of passage because like I have a guy serving with the Senate Ron Johnson really good dude he's a senator he's a senator fromc from Wisconsin and he's just talking about like you know you go to a you do the tail G thing

at Lambo field if you're running for office in Wisconsin and Wisconsin's like a big Battleground state so I'm going to go and check it out uh we're bringing our kids with us actually which I don't know what we're going to do with our kids cuz they're 74 and two I don't think they're going to be that into a tailgate filling with cheese dude you know I'm saying so maybe yeah maybe my wife will take him somewhere and I'll go like have fun at the tailgate but I'm I'm looking forward to it cuz I'm a pretty

big football fan Lambo field is like you know oh yeah when we saw ital oh I didn't know what to do when we saw it I didn't know yeah like and there was some kids were crying and stuff and the parents were like kind of wiping their cheeks with cheese or whatever but it was like um yeah it was really interesting but wait were they were crying because they were so excited to be at Lambo field they were crying man I I so are you are you a big football guy yeah okay so I'm a

big college football guy yeah I'm I'm more of a college football guy but I I like both um so I'm an Ohio State guy went to Ohio State you know born and raised in Ohio um but you know there there's like the Ohio State Michigan rivalry is one of the big big rivalries and this happens of course after um after the election so I'm hoping to go to the game but you talk about like a kid crying at a football field this is this reminds me of a story is like one of my my dear

friends and he's like otherwise a nice guy but Ohio State Michigan just turns into a he turns into a total animal so this is 2006 who is he the senator you're talking about no no no it's a totally different guy this a buddy I've known since I was like 5 years old okay just a guy back home we go to the Ohio State Michigan game game uh we're number one they're number two I think we win that game like 4239 it was very very tight game I don't remember the exact score and we're leaving and

there's this family and this kid is like you know there it's a family of Michigan fans and this kid is crying and you know my buddy goes up to him and he you I'm like oh you know Bill's going to be like sweet to this family like welcome to Ohio glad you guys come to the game sorry it didn't work out and and my buddy goes I'm oh are you are you sad that Michigan lost and little boy goes yeah and he says well maybe next time you won't Ro for a team that sucks and

walks and I was like oh Bill uh we should trying to be nicer to the newcomers but then like you realize that's is not a coner no no but that's why Ohio State and Michigan hate each other right CU that kid was probably 9 years old so this is 2006 I mean he's I don't know close to you 25 now he probably still remembers that from Ohio State when he was crying after a game and like that's what makes the Rival Tom Brady yeah exactly that's how it gets something oh dude I remember the craziest

thing I ever saw was there was a a Mexican Father and Son balling crying when The Rock came back one night at WWE yeah standing there together same height that's a b balling crying dude and it was they both had belts on and it was like yeah yeah I mean those are it's like the little rituals that that actually make life worth it man but but definitely I mean like like like my son he's seven now but I took him to the Ohio State Michigan game I think the last no I took I took him

to the game last year but then we you know we watch it even when he's like four years old and uh Michigan has beat Ohio State the last three years and so it's just like you know the first time I ever saw my kid cry over sports event was last year at the Ohio State Michigan game when they beat him when when when Michigan beat Ohio State yeah oh when you cry when your team wins that means something is probably you have parenting issues in your home I feel like you know that's right that's definitely

right that's definitely right but I mean it it's it's like I mean Ohio State just lost to orgon a couple you know like a week ago I guess and you sort of realize like I get so much joy out of watching sports and like taking my son to the Ohio State mission games like one of the coolest Moments Of My Life as a father but then it almost always ends in heartbreak yeah right because only one team actually wins the championship and I I I sometimes wonder like why do we put ourselves through this it's

so true that such that it is yeah at a certain point you're the odds are you're going to face not feeling great yeah Absol that it's going to end right yeah I mean like I I guess the one team in my lifetime like the Bulls in the 90s Chicago Bulls in the 90s and the Patriots when they had the Brady bichi run like most of the time you're actually happy if you're a fan of that team but I mean like I'm a Bengals fan um in in Pro Sports and like they made the Super Bowl

a few years ago and it was so cool yeah I remember that against 49ers uh was it against the 49ers it's funny I don't even remember who they were playing against but I remember they lost at the very end it was a very close game we almost put it off but then it's like all the joy turned into complete sadness like I'm I'm a grown man on the verge of tears because a sports team that I rooted for lost to game wake you know wake up man I think I I wonder what it is maybe

it's just like sorry I have to not say the f word or no it's okay make sure people still vote for me if I too many F bombs I'm going to lose too many votes so I'll try to tone it down okay yeah if you say more than seven or eight I'll tap you on the shoulder thank you appreciate it dude oh I well actually my ribs dude I've been on a um like almost like just on bed rest the past like eight days because I I was at the Vanderbilt game when they beat Alabama

um two weeks ago that was a big one and some guy I don't even know him I got a little bit of a look at him and he squeezed me so hard he kept squeezing me and I was like don't squeeze me anymore and then he squeezed me even more was was a happy squeeze or you could hear my ribs like dude they really like the oxygen leaving your lungs yeah please don't go that's on bit I love you ribs that had never been away from me like they were leaving home for the first time

wait but was he squeezing you cuz he was happy he was happy okay so this wasn't like a so I was smiling dude my smile hit I mean the more he squeezed my the edges of my smile you could hear him ding against my ear loses yeah he squeezed me as much as somebody could be squeezed his wife is not doing well if that guy has a wife I'll tell you that because that anyway my ribs I've been having to ice him dude it's been really like actually cracked a rib I mean it's so it

sucks but it was awesome but it's like yeah the you go through to be associated with it you know I mean look my my so um like I I've only been to the game in ant Arbor once and uh you know Ohio State fans again oh is it we going up in that territory people throwing beer bottles at us sometimes full beer cans at us I had some kid run up he was like a 19-year-old kid run up from behind me and it had been raining a lot that day and he had like M like

he' taken a chunk of mud out of the ground and shoved it in my mouth I mean this again this is like what these Sports rivalries are built around is is moments like this but uh we we we had I guess won four years in a row reforestation isn't it that's right but man we we'd won four years in a row and uh this this girl she's like you know 22 years old she gets in my buddy's face and she said this is my senior year you ruined my college career because you guys beat us

four years in a row and then she takes a swing at us and a cop tackles this 22-year-old girl down the bleachers and I'm just you know like man again yeah people can injured people get injured at sporting events it's crazy oh yeah I thought for a second I thought you were describing a wedding in Appalachia dude that's what I thought for a second we've had we've had we've had we've had some of those too yeah I'm just joking I'm just joking um we had Billy strings in he's a guy who does a lot of

uh picking he does like a lot of guitar picking and stuff he talked a lot about um his environment where he grew up he grew up in like his area had a lot of addiction in it and stuff like that what part of West Virginia is he from um oh who's this guy he's from laning but he grew up he grew up in Kentucky I'm ruining well but a lot of people this is like the story of my life but a lot of people from Michigan Ohio Pennsylvania their families are all from West Virginia East

Kentucky East Tennessee and then they moved up for the factory jobs oh yeah like there's a really cool song by Dwight Yoko called a reading right in Route 23 and it's like in some ways it's like the story of my family because he came from like two counties over he moved to Central Ohio instead of Southern Ohio but um I mean it's like millions of people was a massive massive thing so I wouldn't be surprised even that guy's from Michigan if he's got like West Virginia family I don't know that guy though yeah Billy strings

he's great he's and he's a guy too and he'll take you fishing if you want to go but he um he uh just has a fascinating story of just like growing up and what his life was like um and playing music through it all and learning music and um how that kind of kept him going and kept him um gave him something to do really um yeah why was that migration why did people migrate from there to um yeah it was it was I mean at least the the biggest thing is you think about it

so World War II ends right America's the biggest industrial power in the world and a lot of these factories are coming online close to where they had you know access to waterways cuz you got to ship iron ore and coal and all that stuff so a lot of stuffff around the Great Lakes that's Michigan Ohio um you a lot of coal in Pennsylvania and so you had all these steel mills and you know textile factories and you know like automobile plants of course in Michigan and all the stuff is getting built and then it's actually

what's interesting about it is you had a lot of black people come from the deep south and then a lot of primarily white people coming from Appalachia and they sort of M migrated together to all these factories and like you know there are books written in Detroit about you know the you've got like basically the hillbillies from Appalachia the black people from the deep south and they're just kind of like tossed in to Detroit and like a lot of what we think of as sort of modern Detroit culture is like the fusion of those two

groups of people who just dropped in in massive massive numbers and uh you it's like one of the stories of like why is Chicago such a big Blues Town cuz all the black folks from the Deep South were moving in and they were you know bringing their music with them that's why Chicago became such a capital for blues is it's not really like it's because all those folks who came from the Delta um so it's it's it's but basically jobs man I mean there wasn't my my m talked about this that's when I called my

grandmother she talked a lot about how you know if you were growing up in Eastern Kentucky in the 30s and 40s it was like basically you could go work in the mines or get out like that was all there was at that time wow and so my grandfather went and worked at the steel mill you know built a built a pretty good life was a union welder for 40 years and then uh oh yeah we just had a union president on oh yeah I listen to that one I like that guy Sean he's wild yeah

he is wild he's I mean it's funny man you can tell he's from Boston he's got that thick Boston accent but he's a he's a he's a cool dude um I actually I've talked to Sean a couple times and you know it's like normally and you know it's like normally Democrats are considered sort of the pro-union and then you know 30 years ago Republicans were the anti-union and you know one of the things I've been I've been talking a lot about people like Sean is you know a lot of union members are coming over to

the Republican side and I think the Republican party we got to do you know frankly a better job at kind of welcoming people but um I think Trump is doing a really good job at making Union voters feel at home in our Coalition which is like an interesting part of what you know what we're all about I mean I think you so Sean's the head of the teamsters I think yeah and there was some poll they did just of teamsters members where it's like 65% of teamsters in Pennsylvania are going to vote for Trump that's

a crazy turnaround from even 15 years ago yeah they couldn't endorse usually they there's only been two times where they haven't endorsed a candidate in the past 30 years I think or maybe past 50 years yeah but um but this would be one of those times they said I think because it's just it's too split yeah um so do you have to ask Trump places you can go to promote or to um campaign what does that relation how does that work yeah no it's it's it's actually mostly driven at like the staff level right and

so a strategy kind of yeah it's like strategy so so okay there are seven big Battleground States it's uh the three in the midwest or Michigan Wisconsin Pennsylvania and then Georgia Arizona Nevada and North Carolina and so it's like you look at a little bit it's driven by polling a little bit driven on just like where do you think this guy is going to do the best and I've spent a ton of my time like I think I did like six or five five or six events just in Pennsylvania the past week and a half

wow so I've spent a lot of time Pennsylvania a lot of time Michigan a lot of time in uh in Wisconsin I'm actually trying to get Kid Rock to go with me to Michigan in a couple days cuz he's a Michigan guy oh he'll go yeah he probably will yeah he'll go dude he he's he yeah he he texted me last night I mean you know you can't see but my my cousin for those of you who are watching my cousin's here she's more like my big sister um but like we're we're hanging out I

went to a wedding last night oh nice and my my my little cousin got married and um Kid Rock sends me a text message he's like hey if you're in Nashville because I think he I guess he knew I was doing this podcast well some people were going over there buddy of M I was texting he's like hey we're going over to Bob's and I was like I gotta prepare for this podcast tomorrow Vance is coming on yeah maybe that's how he knew cuz he texted me and I was like oh man I want to

fly to Nashville right now just so I can party with Kid Rock right I mean like that's a that's a that's an experience of a lifetime um so so now I'm trying to get him to go to go to Michigan with me but oh I'm sure he probably would man oh yeah dude he's if uh he he's one of a kind man yeah but anyway answer your question it's basically you go where the campaign needs you to go right and and like yeah I could say no but I'm like running for vice president so I

try to do as much as I can just to be helpful and do y'all have do you go with Donald Trump do you guys go separately a lot of times do you guys have like strategy talks in the mornings and stuff like is it what is it like yeah it's it's more inform is like doubles tennis kind of it's more divide and conquer right so it's like you got two people and you can be in two places so you might as well do it but if we got like a really big event like you know

the president got shot in in Bucks County or sorry which time are you talking about the first time okay the first time they really um he got shot in um in in Pennsylvania and so we went out to Pennsylvania together to do a big rally and then Elon El there in but Butler PA yes in Butler Pennsylvania um and then you know like I was in Bucks County Pennsylvania like a week earlier but that was just me right right so you sort of go you know some places you go together but most of the time

we're sort of dividing and conquering how um with the attempts that they've had on Trump's on Trump's life and safety how much of a concern has that been for you like it's like because if I'm standing next to a guy and they're shooting at him I'm next to him yeah you know yeah I know what you mean I mean I try not to think about it man cuz really yeah it's it's just it's of these things you can't control and if you're going to do this job like you got to go out and talk to

a lot of people and you got to tr go try to win right I mean like I fundamentally believe that we're trying to win to help the country so either you you know you either do it or you don't do it and if you do it you just kind of kind of accept it I mean I I don't think there's I don't know maybe I'm just this is just me rationalizing it I don't feel like there's that big of a Target on my back but who the hell knows well you're tall you might are you

a little taller than him or not I think we're about the same height okay yeah which is funny man the weird people say about you on the internet like the thing there was a long time maybe even still today if you Google how tall is JD Vance it would say 5'7 and I oh it says 62 now somebody updated it yeah somebody updated it yeah um okay the first headline is JD Vance is tall but Americans are getting shorter what the hell is the internet's a weird ass It also says Joe Biden is 6 foot

sleep I don't know if that's a height well see this is a thing though how tall is JD Vance we found there was like a conspiracy on the internet that I was a really short guy guy but yeah no I'm I'm about 6'2 I think yeah once you get better people helping you get you hype you get you get you're pretty tall you're I'm six feet tall yeah I'm six feet tall if this rib gets back in place I'm six foot and a half inch brother I'll tell you that um so there's did you have

to ask your wife about that like say hey like did she have to weigh in because that's a little because I'm trying to think of other jobs where you get shot at really military um domestic VI vience I guess and then politician politician I mean normally politicians don't get shot at that much but apparently apparently it's coming back man that's not that's not like a good thing to come back to you know what I mean yeah but I also I mean it's it's I definitely grew up um like and I grew up in Ohio but

I spent a lot of time in E Kentucky yeah and if you go to like there's a courthouse in bre County Kentucky I mean beautiful part of the country like kind of in the mountains and there's like a plaque like a historical plaque that's basically like you know on this site multiple people were killed in the breath it County blood feuds of the early you know the early 20th century so I don't know you just kind of kind of accept it um as as as bad as it is I mean I want us to get

away from it right as a country but as a individual candidate I think you just have to kind of accept it I mean I'll tell you um but I guess if you're going into battle you're going into battle that's right that's right you just got to do what you got to do yeah um but again you know like I'm I'm a I'm a person of faith I don't talk about it that that much I don't wear it on my sleeve I always sort of mistrust people who wear it too much on their sleeve but feel

like you know if God wants me to beew be vice president I'll be vice president if if not then I won't yeah you know you just got to work your ass off and let the chips fall where they may yeah I saw I saw where you had your mom was out and you congratulated her on she almost has 10 years of sobriety you said that's right yeah she's uh in January January of 2025 she will be 10 years clean and sober and that's really funny cuz you know she's standing next to there uh That's Mike

Johnson the speaker of the house oh yeah and like my family is not very political so they bring her up to this booth and like two chairs over is Donald Trump of course she knows who that is but she shakes Mike Johnson's hand and uh he's like you know lovely to meet you and she says lovely to meet you too who are you do you work in politics like Mom that's the speaker of the house okay she's like well I'll take a uh I'll take a McDouble um a Diet Coke with witht eyes what was

uh yeah I know your mom's your Mom struggle with alcoholism right um add Mo mostly yeah mostly non-alcohol drugs I never saw her you know drink that much but I mean you know pills opioids heroin um what's it been like to watch her get sober what's that been like it's amazing man it's it's amazing I know you're you're what what are you your your recovery I'm recovery yeah a lot of my family's in it too so I think yeah I can I can relate a lot to your story to be honest with you yeah but

I mean mean look I mean there was a time like I always you know always wanted to grow up and have a family and I I remember when I was a teenager thinking to myself there's no way Mom's going to be around to meet like if I have kids there's no way my mom's ever going to meet him and um you know she's now like she's now a great grandmother to to the three grandkids but I don't know man it's it's just if if you've known anybody in this circumstance it sounds like you know very

well what it's like is there's like this there's two feelings that you have or at least always two feelings I had when mom was going through it is like on the one hand yeah she's so smart she's so funny and you're just like kind of rooting for her because you just want her to get better then on the other hand you're just pissed off it's like you know because you don't quite understand it I think if you're not in recovery yourself it's hard to fully understand and um you know see that you'd be frustrated with

her one moment and then just desperate for her to get better the next moment you're constantly bouncing back and forth but man it's it's amazing it really is I mean she you know she was at the wedding we were at last night and uh just having a good time and being her like funny quirky self she has a good sense of humor she's a very good sense of humor um I mean you know like the the bride and groom this really cool tradition where they had like at each table a wine bottle with a number

on it and then like at the table one they'd open the that bottle of wine their first anniversary and table two the second anniversary and so forth and they had people write stuff in Sharpies on the wine bottle I'd never seen that I thought it was a pretty cool uh little thing um and my mom I forget what table she was in but you know like 10 years down the road and she just she writes something on on the her bottle like like hey I love you hopefully I'm still alive when you're drinking this she's

just got like again like a kind of a morbid quirky sense of humor um but yeah man it's it's it's really amazing because I again I I just never I never thought she'd be alive when I was 40 years old yeah and she is and she's got a good relationship with her family and her grandparents or her grand kids and that's just a very cool thing yeah it's a blessing man that's awesome to see it was really cool to see that um did you ever go to meetings with her did she go to you have

been before yeah I've been to a lot of NA meetings um when you were growing up did you ever go or no yeah I went when I was a kid um I went I went when I was a teenager I mean I've been to a lot actually just in the past few years cuz she you now that she's like you know she feels like she's really on the other side of it she does a lot with her local La I think she's the treasurer the Secretary of her local La chapter and um I don't do

you ever go to meetings or anything oh yeah I went to one I went to one I was at one last sign at eight okay I mean there there's a there's actually a really special Community around it which I really like and it almost kind of reminds me of church right% where you you know you say you say these prayers and and you talk about what's going on and there's like this sense of fellowship and community that I think is is really is really awesome and you know it's it's it's like one of these things

where you see just human nature nature and all of its good sides and its bad sides right cuz sometimes you have people who come in and they're getting their 24-hour Medallion yeah right which is like this is the first real period of sobriety I've had in a very long time and then sometimes you have people are you know celebrating 15 20 25 years and uh it's it's just amazing to see but I don't know if you noticed this but something I noticed and it's you know it's not to get too political here but you know

like five six seven years ago you know you start noticing this and then it really started picking up a few years ago where you you have somebody who's been say 6 months or nine months sober and then they don't come to a couple meetings and then they're just dead and you realize like when people relapsed when Mom was in the worst of it yeah there was some dangerous out there but it wasn't nearly as deadly as the stuff that's out there today oh yeah and I I really worry about that right cuz you know think

about the second chance I got with my mom and I really worry that the the poison that we've got in the streets now is so dangerous that a lot of people would have that second chance but you know you fall off the wagon once 15 years ago it's like oh that sucks I'm going to climb back on today you fall off that wagon it might it might kill you yeah and I really worry about that cuz I think a lot of a lot of good people you know like Mom it didn't happen like once right

it's not like she got clean and sober and that was it right it's a process fall off a few times yeah you get back on it's a process man yeah I've had relapses over the years and had to get back on and it's it's tough and one of the tougher things to do is to get back on but it's funny because I think if I if I don't know if I'd be sober if the stuff weren't killing people to be honest with you I know that's sad to say but that keeps me out of the

risk of it you know it just makes it too makes it a little scarier yeah that's the thing it makes it scarier but it's also sad that somebody I mean this is ridiculous to say probably that somebody can't you know you can't even do cocaine in this country anymore you know and that seems like a crazy thing to say and don't say that don't say that I but I said it but but yeah but don't say that anymore I'm gonna steal that line after the election though and I no no we got to win first

it's unfortunate to be clear to those watching I've never done cocaine before yeah and nobody made many mistakes but not that one nobody saying yeah but it's just it's unfortunate that's that it's un I don't even know where to I know you it's it's unfortunate that like look like everybody makes mistakes right everybody makes mistakes right and like I I I know there a buddy of mine told me about this um this is hell this has got have been three years ago um it's been a while but B basically what happened is his daughter was

like a bridesmaid in a wedding and they were going to this wedding and like the wedding got cancelled because a couple of the groomsmen like had terrible overdoses the night before at the bachelor party because they took some I mean like you know you can judge and say oh they shouldn't have been taken something but everybody takes something at some point in their lives like we don't want it to kill people we don't want stupid mistakes to kill people that's that's sort of like live and learn live and learn from stupid mistakes right you used

to be able to live and learn yes now it becomes a death sentence and that's what's really I think changed about from now now to when my uh my mom was struggling with addiction why why is it so bad like what do you know a lot about the fentanyl crisis I mean I know a fair amount about it you know I've I've I've worried about it uh for a long time I've I've you know worked on bills related to it I mean there there are two basic issues right and it's it's like you know any

business there's a manufacturer there's a wholesaler and then there's the retail right and you know with with Fint andol it's it's not you can't like make Fint in a trailer in somebody's basement or that's like it's not like meth it it takes a really complicated pretty sophisticated pharmaceutical process so we know that a lot of it maybe even most of it the Chinese are making meaning Chinese companies not like necessarily the Chinese government but they sure as hell know about it and then they bring it in primarily through the southern border and the Mexican drug

cartels are like the wholesalers right of the Chinese Pharm farmas the manufacturer the drug cartels are bringing in whol sale style and then it makes it in the street level wow and um I mean it's really crazy man like I I was talking to a DA agent about this a couple years ago and I think this was in this was in 2022 he was he was like look a few years ago the cartels were making less than a billion dollars a year and he's like in 2223 we think they'll make $14 billion a year so

like an explosion of drug trafficking in this country and yeah you you hear about stories and I don't think it happens that much thank God but somebody smokes a joint it's lace with fentol they go into a coma yeah I mean I have seven friends that that um I have seven friends and not even just like estranged people you know like but not all best friends sure but I have seven friends at um that overdose and died from uh fentanyl yeah yeah that's me right and it yeah and it H with harder stuff it happens

a lot like I think with you know you hear about it being laced in marijuana but like not that much but I mean you you're point about cocaine pills like you have to be careful seriously it's a huge thing an unbelievable crisis and it's like yeah you'd think that we'd I I don't know how you fight something like that maybe we need to have like a like a head of like the DEA or something on maybe he would be able to help or or she would be able to help us figure that out a little

bit more I think it'd be that'd be a very interesting conversation but I think I think you've got a I think you got to go go to it at the heart and something you know Trump did towards the end of his administration doesn't get a a lot of headlines obviously I'm biased I think it should get headlines is he was using economic leverage to try to convince the Chinese to crack down on fentol manufacturing because if you get it at the source right that's I think really the way to address it oh there's fol and

half the bookshelves they make over there dude you put a couple you put a half a set of dictionaries and that will give that will give way seen I mean I I absolutely believe that bad oh man that's what's in the furniture here we we okay yeah I think we're good this episode is sponsored by prize pick baby prize picks if you like firing on Sports like I do occasionally then prize picks is the best daily fantasy sports app for you you can sign up today and get $50 instantly when you play $5 you don't

even need to win to receive the $50 Bon it's guaranteed NBA is finally back and prize picks is celebrating with an Anthony Edwards free Square that's right Anthony Edwards only needs one point to win at his projection of more than 0.5 points to your lineup and boost the multiplier that's what I love about prize picks it's not choosing teams it's choosing individual players each player has a set projection and you choose either more or less than that set projection if you're smart with sports and you know what players are going to perform on what nights

in the NBA NFL UFC and many more Sports than prize pick is the best app for you firsttime users download the prize picks app and use code Theo and prize picks will instantly give you 50 bucks on your your first lineup of $5 or more no strings attached put in $5 and instantly get a free $50 you can do it prize picks needless to say it's about that time it's what we've all been waiting for I'll say it you can feel it you can feel it vibrating through the cable wires and it's almost here Sunday

November 10th it's the Epic return of Yellowstone and it's only on Paramount Network what will become of the Dutton family can they save the Yellowstone Ranch how far will Beth and rip go to protect the family Legacy generations of blood have led to this nothing will prepare you for the mustsee premere event don't miss the Epic return of Yellowstone on Sunday November 10th at 87 Central on Paramount Network that's right Paramount Network Sunday November 10th Yellowstone returns you know I've been wearing these recently because they're more relaxed and they're Tommy Johns that's what they are

they're more a lot of um kind of nighttime men's uh under garments or whatever under pants they're too tight on me they tight and they make me they scrunch me and they push me and they hold me too much that's why I like Tommy John it's it's more comfortable it doesn't have that tight waistband that makes it so I just got to go and uh do pee peeing all night Tommy John it's so comfortable you'll like it it's great for travel summer vacation silky soft cool breathable I would go to say that may be the

most comfortable underwear I've ever worn you can shop Tommy John right now for huge summer savings get 25% off your first order at Tommy john.com Theo that's right save 25% at Tommy john.com tho see site for details uh but you you I mean you do that you go out after the drug cartels the other thing people don't realize about the cartels man is is one we're talking about some very dark and dangerous people like this is not some guy who's like dealing you know selling joints on a college campus these are like they're doing sex

trafficking they're they're they're they're they're getting 11 10-year-old girls involved in the sex trade very evil people dictator type of like oh just absolutely vile and it's it's like why why are we making it easier for these this like massive Criminal um organizations to get richer and richer and richer like we should be trying to make them poor and I mean you know help help people actually need it well it's also it's obviously one of the biggest enemies that's right it's like if there were an enemy that we killing if somebody if there were somebody

shooting in your country every day and killing people yeah at a certain point you go over there or you send your military there or do something to say hey you're not going to be we're not going to let do this anymore that's basically what's happening that's right I mean can you can you imagine if if if Mexico sent gunmen across the border and killed 70,000 Americans a year because that's about what dies from fit andol we would be in a major war right you know we we just absolutely would be the case so the other

thing that's crazy about this is so these cartels and you see this graphic UPS pretty pretty interesting there but the cartels are going to start to destabilize the country of Mexico like do do you know um do you know name Pablo Escobar yeah I do okay so like the the the Colombian cartels in the 70s were as powerful as like the Colombian government right it was it was a narco State you don't want that to happen at like right at the American southern border where the drug cartels have more power than the Mexican Government that's

just going to be chaotic it's going to be basically a warlike atmosphere on our Southern border that's bad news well it's bad news but it'd be great to figure out a way that to to shut it down I mean it just feels like yeah if that many people are dying each year if if it were actual people shooting at these people we would send people there in a heartbeat right I mean and I and I think that's what we have to I think not that we have to send people to to Mexico but I think

that we actually have to have a military response at the southern border 100% because these are such vicious people and I think local law enforcement they're telling us they're overwhelmed by some of these guys and we've got to be willing to send our our best people our best fighters to get control of the Southern border I think that's the most important issue confronting the country because look I mean how do you even measure the human cost of 70,000 people many of them in the prime of their life and the ripple effect of it too in

their families the orphans the parents that are heartbroken I mean how many kids are like this my story right that's why my grandmother raised me is because my mom struggled with addiction luckily my mom got clean you've got hundreds of thousands of children who are being raised by their grandparents or their aunts and uncles like that is an unspeakable human tragedy man when we we could do so much better and we're failing right now and uh that's you know one one of the reasons why I'm here one of the reasons why I'm running yeah um

what what what was it like growing up like with an alcoholic mother like and no judgment against your mother this is just to look at it right I sure I appreciate that yeah what um what is that like like is it hard to make a connection with your mom like what are some of the side effects of that uh on a child yeah I mean I definitely think there's a um you get very careful about who you lie yourself to get close to right that's that's one big part of it you're never quite sure whether

you can trust the particular situation that you're in right so am I still going to be living in this house 3 months from now if I have somebody if I give somebody my address because this is back in the 90s right people still wrote letters postcards things like that at least a lot more than they do today if I give somebody my address are they going to send me a letter and I'm not even to live in this place anymore because we you we moved around a fair amount right but I I I think I

I I think that you know the the thing that it I took away from it is I very even as a young kid I sort of very neatly divided the world into like three categories of people right there were the helpless people the victims the people who needed to be helped there were the bad guys who were praying on the victims and then there were the the strong people who sort of stood up uh for for everybody else and stood up to the bad guys that's like you know that's overly simplistic um but definitely you

know I I saw my mom growing up very much as this person who was who was kind of a victim and was being prayed on by by bad people right and then the person who was sort of looking up for us and standing up for me especially was my grandmother and uh I think that that that attitude of you know some people are just not as strong as we wish them to be and bad people are going to pray on them but it's kind of up to you know try to make yourself the person who

can look out for people who can protect people and that's always what I wanted to be that's one thing I I think I took from it um were you able to be that for your mom did you feel like you know not always certainly I mean when I was a it's a lot of responsibility for a kid I was when I was a teenager man I I was definitely very very selfish I think I got pretty resentful just the situations like oh other people have more money than I do other people have more stability than

I do you know other people you know they they've got nice cars we don't have that so there's there's definitely like there's definitely like a resentment that comes from I think but um you know I left High School enlisted in the Marine Corps uh spent four years in the Marine Corps and I think that what you know that really did for me was just like gave me a cool perspective and I probably went into the Marine cor I was pretty whiny pretty resentful kid was pissed off at my mom was pissed off at all these

other people cuz I didn't have the things that I thought I should have and then eventually yeah there's me when I was much much skinnier much better looking oh yeah the Marines dud that was the original o that's that's right that's bro zic D that is good that is good Marine's the original zic I'm going to steal that one um but but man yeah I I know I say this all the time dude if I went back to boot camp for two months boot Camp's three months if I went back to boot camp for two

months I'd come out with a six-pack yeah um but but you know I've anyway so Seer fat dude sorry that was stupid and I don't even know if I if you can even joke simy and I'm no offense to any Marines not at all no I'm I'm sure no Marines took offense to yeah I've been we've done a lot of shows on military bases and stuff and yeah yeah it's usually the arm is just waiting for the Marines to get there to tell them what to do usually right that's right I know the chain of

command man but yeah anyway so we we uh we we had a we yeah I I think that the way that I noticed it I mean not to get you know too personal but like when I so I met my wife in law school and it was like you know I dated girls in the past but for her it was like oh my God this is I'm in love with this girl right like I known her for a week and I was like I want to marry this girl yeah and um there was definitely just

an element of like it took a long time for me to get to a place where I was like oh I can actually trust this person I actually rely on this person because that's not really the experience that I had grown up is the people you trusted on trusted the people you relied on they would just kind of disappear sometimes through no fault of their own but sometimes they would just disappear and so you know I don't know you say have attachment issues and that's that's something that definitely I think comes from growing up in

a pretty tough pretty chaotic environment but you know the other thing the flip side of it is again this is this is why I talk about the Marine Corps is you after four years of the Marine Corps you know like like one of the best Marines maybe the best Marine that I served with is this kid who grew up he was a Puerto Rican guy from the Bronx was a drug dealer was did he wear jewelry um I mean not with uniform right cuz that's yeah maybe he did but by the time he you know

by the time I met him as a marine he did but but he was like he had had a much harder life than I had and there was no there was no complaining no whining he was just doing his job and he was a good dude and you meet a lot of people like that and you start to realize like in some ways you know not having everything handed to you is actually a blessing right and and and growing up in a tough circumstance and being able to understand and that not everybody's always had it

easy I used to be annoyed by that kind of complaining about it now I sort of see it as like a good thing right cuz I I think I have a different perspective than than a lot of people I spend my life around where you know they they they they were born to a rich family they went to a private school then they you know everything was kind of laid out for them it's kind of good to not have everything laid out for you because you have to work for it a little bit more yeah

that was going to be my next my my followup question that was just like yeah what are the what are the positives like and also so we don't get stuck in like you know um just in like a Debbie Downer spiral kind of you know cuz it's okay to talk about stuff but sometimes you know it's like things can get kind of like where you're just looking at the negative things but there's usually something positive in everything exactly right and um yeah that's what I was thinking what were some of the positives of um of

having a childhood like that and of being um yeah and I guess it would be some self-reliance I think I think it's definitely some self-reliance um awareness probably which is probably a curse when you're young cuz it feels like you have to be kind of scared of stuff but or but when you get older being having awareness can be pretty helpful sometimes yeah I've got my head on a swivel right I'm always looking around corners I'm always you know kind of worried that things that aren't exactly what they seem but I think that's made me

a little less comfortable which is a good thing especially in the in the political life that I live these days yeah it's good to have your head on a swivel hey now you know what I'm saying you're like yeah everybody has everybody in politics has device that's much worse than alcoholism is is the way that I put it um but we we um release the list seriously we need to release the F scene list that that is an important thing um we can go down that that rabbit hole but anyway I I I guess the

other thing that I I gain from it is you know I I think that I'm just much I see people as people and one thing I've picked up up on like I went to law school at Yale and and a lot of them a lot of my classmates are good people but you're a lawyer also yeah but I sort of as soon as I went went from law school I went to the business world so I never really practiced law I was mostly a business guy um but like a lot of my friends they they

look at people as like where did you go to school what do your parents do you know what job do you have what credential do you have I've never had that right and so when people like talk about politics or policy and be like oh well this person has a PhD I don't give a that may they may be smart but I don't care about is only three doesn't even spell anything yeah exactly I don't even but I don't care about the letters um but I but like I meet somebody and oh they don't have

a fancy degree or they don't have a fancy job I I still just naturally care about what they think because the way that I grew up I just sort of see people as people and I think that's a that's just a very it's a perspective that I'm glad that I have I think it's very much a product of how I grew up yeah I like people that have their own thing I I I have like I don't like I don't I don't dislike somebody if they inherited everything yeah but I li I gravitate more towards

people that that haven't had that experience I think because um yeah I don't know there's just something a little bit more admirable about it I don't like it when PE things were handed to people I guess maybe real the truth is I got upset when other people had stuff that was handed to them which probably was just normal stuff to be handed to a kid or to a to you know but that made me like oh screw that you know I'll figure this out you know what I'm saying them or whatever you know what I'm

saying I'll you know I have that exact attitude when I was like 13 14 yeah yeah and some of that is it's just that Rebellion at that age um what would you say and we have a lot of uh audience members that uh have struggled with addiction or who or and these days everybody's you can't even like who doesn't have somebody that's in their family or something that struggle with addiction but what what suggestion or like just advice or thoughts would you give to um a young person who has a parent who's uh who has

alcoholism as to how to navigate that because I even get messages a lot from people um that are like hey my dad is struggling or this what do I do I don't know what to do here you know um do you have any thoughts on that and it's not like you're a specialist yeah yeah I'm not I'm not a specialist um I mean here here's here's what I try to do I mean take this for you know for what it's worth but number one is you you got to if you're a kid in your environment

where there's a lot of addiction you got to make sure that you're taken care of right like don't don't get yourself in such a situation where it's not just your parent that is struggling but it becomes you that's struggling too right because you can't help them out you can't help them out unless you're able to take care of yourself first right right that's that's number one I think number two is as hard as it is man and I know this very well cuz there were times when I had some very angry moments with my mom

don't get resentful and try to keep your heart as open as possible right you got to compartmentalize a little bit right there's yeah there's the addict version but then there's the version that you know that read you a book when you were a kid or there's the version that took you to you know your favorite movie or you try try to hold on to the memories that are completely divorced from the addiction because I think if you allow yourself to become totally resentful then it doesn't just affect them it starts to affect you too right

um don't don't allow your parents addiction to become something that destroys your life too in other words is is youve got to kind of you got to kind of keep your soul intact here um I mean I ju Just practically go to those NA meetings I I learned more about Mom and her addiction going to those NA meetings and I didn't always you know it's not like it was like some Eureka moment oh there's you know I'm not pissed off at you anymore right but you at least understand it a little bit more and you

gain some appreciation for what's going on in their life because that's a that's a big part of it yeah and you also thing about na meanings is is just again it is human nature and all of its Splendor its virtue and its Vice man it's some a boat the last one I went to some dude selling a boat at one of them exactly like you can't dud we're trying to get off of drugs dude and yeah and some guy started bidding on the boat I'm like and they had made him take it outside yeah because

it's outside issues or whatever but it was like what is even happening here dude I was in Ana meeting some guy had a fish hook stuck in his freaking cheek dude really yeah wow wow man he but he had two weeks clean yeah he'd either had a really bad night or really good night both Jesus yeah what happen God dang it's just like all right dude Catch and Release brother Catch and Release he probably tried to come across the border oh we and I only say that cuz we had a couple border patrol agents on

here and so we've learned a good bit about it over the years no I had man I had a border patrol agent who's he's clearly before you go but I just that that that statement about trying not to be resentful against your parent because yeah once you that resentment is seed that can lead you down some of this or activate some of the same behaviors in you it's not and I'm not preaching that but it can activate a lot of uh resentment is just it's an evil seed no that's right so so many bad things

can happen there because it's just that's an important message I never thought of that or heard it before well and and what you said earlier about not getting into a negative spiral I think is is really important just just psychologically I me look man I know you had a a tough life in a lot of ways um there are certainly some moments in my life that were pretty tough but I've never again I'm not an expert I've you know I've read some books on this stuff this is not JD Vance's expert opinion this is just

a guy talking is I really worry that a lot of the mental health stuff in 2024 is about like focusing so much on what's bad in your life that you end up wallowing in it and it becomes a sort of self-reinforcing spiral like there's only so much can I mean if bad has happened to you there's only so much you can do to think about it and process it and you know sometimes bad happens because it just happens right there's no like rationalizing there's no like thinking through it and and and you know what I

what I've always found like is is most helpful is getting outside and going for a walk like that made me feel way better than trying to understand why did Mom do this thing when she was 13 or when I was 13 years old and she was you know I guess 39 uh 30 36 she would have been when I was 13 but like why why right still harping on it yeah I got to go for some walks then I mean I go for them but still sometimes you got some ghosts man but and I got

ghosts too man but but the longer you sit there and look for ghosts all you it's still ghost still a ghost it's almost like you find more ghosts and you keep on finding them and then it's like all right man I just I need to go like hang out with my buddies go for a walk and have a drink well you know not if you're uh dealing with addiction but um like have a drink of coffee just like go you know go hang out because I really worry that like the constant wallowing is bad for

us yeah we've gotten into this definitely into a constant into a heavy self-help type of vibe you know like every book is a self-help book because self-help is great but also you're saying the the other side of that is you're saying that something's wrong with me right um and so if you're always looking for ways to improve yourself which it can be positive to do that yeah I've noticed in my own life it's also a way where you're also kind of saying there's always something wrong with you that's interesting so I'm in the same way

that I'm oh I'm always trying to get better it's like I'm there I've obviously created then I'm I'm I'm there's something unachievable yeah because I'm always trying to get better it's I've set this impossible course so really I'm part of me is telling me Oh there's something wrong with you so it becomes a little bit more about finding ways to accept myself you know yeah you got to balance it right you got to balance like obviously there's all things we can work on but you know it can become a self-defeating cycle if people love it

and I try to I try to just balance it I mean you know like I I um like about about two years ago uh at the end of my Senate campaign I was just like I had gotten very overweight and it's like I mean campaign is hard on the body you eat you know Chick-fil-A for breakfast you eat Windy's for lunch you eat you know waffle house for dinner right after a while that starts to catch up with you and um you know like I I I think the what did you get at w house

just so we know it oh man I'm an all America special sub uh grits for home fries or hash browns yeah that's god I didn't even know they had home fries well they have they have hash browns sorry they have hash browns not home fries they have homeless Fries over there dude dude bro that that okay that the second photo from the top that is the All America special but again I'm not a grits guy so if you swap out the grits for hash browns they don't charge you anything look dude dude that is a

that that is a meal of Champions right there your arteries are paying a high tariff that's yes they are yes they are but anyway the point do you get raisin toast or stick with that regular toast I get regular toast yeah I just put a lot of jam on it I'm not a big raisin guy yeah you like raisins I like I mean cuz I like grapes that have been through something you know it's just who I am you know but uh so yeah I guess I do like it you know I guess I like

my I like my grapes you know nice and nice and and clean and oh I like grapes of rat you know which are basically raisins those are basically raisins but anyway there I I I bring that up because it's like you can get into a spiral where it's like oh I'm I'm unhealthy and you beat beat up on yourself about it but like there's a good balance where you recognize you got to you know go for a run every now and then and and take care of yourself and that's what I've tried to do is

you know just balance the good and the bad yeah yeah life balance man it's a good point yeah things aren't going to be exactly yeah things aren't going to be perfect you know I always was like I always yeah I created when I was a kid like I have to be perfect in to be like accepted or whatever you know that was like a that was like a way that I created in my life I think like I well what did that look so give me like what would you try to be perfect at like

school or work or or just like you know getting in shape or like what like what what like what's your if you're trying to get perfect what are you trying to get perfect well that's the crazy part is it was almost this blind thing I never even asked the question hey what am I trying to be perfect at it was just this like you like the only way you're going to be seen you have to do everything perfect you know yeah and then you'll get the you'll I don't know it just this missing thing inside

of myself I want I wanted to be seen so it was like you have to do it perfect yeah right if you cuz if you do it perfect then there would be no way it wouldn't mathematic makes sense that you wouldn't be seen then because that would have to be seen right nobody would not see something that was done perfectly but but Perfection was is impossible and so it was always I'd always set myself up for this like you'd always come up short no matter what it was and it could be in anything something I

was presenting at school the way I was the way I looked while you were talking to me it just everything had to be like this so it was this constant like I just never let my breath go you know and um and and then I was always falling short and so then that can be a tough way to live man yeah oh it was horrible and it fulfilled this prophecy in my head oh we fell short you're not enough which which is what you thought in the beginning anyway right and I'm not saying that now

like now I have different thoughts and feelings but those were things that I now I'm able to look back and see oh that that's how I was operating Y and just how even when I talk about it it sounds impossibly stressful yeah it does I mean yeah did you ever go to Aca meetings or anything like that ACA meetings like adult children of Alcoholics did you ever go to no no I I guess it's interesting no I never did um yeah some people don't need it yeah I mean I I think frankly it probably would

have helped me um would have been useful to go to we did sometimes like there there was one very long-term treatment facility that mom went to and I I guess it was kind of like that because part of that was that we would go to meetings every couple of weeks with all the kids of the people who were in that may have been an AA meeting I just didn't know the name of it but uh that that was definitely interesting and again it's like you go to the meetings with some of these kids and you

think your life is tough and you realize man there's always somebody who's got it much worse than you do yeah and that's a again I think that's a good attitude to have because then you feel grateful for what you have that's another thing man like the feeling of gratitude is so empowering like if you're just grateful for what you have you know I'm like yeah you know you and your wife have an argument but if you're just grateful for her for her existence that's such a better attitude your kid does something that's annoying to you

but I'm just so grateful that I have this beautiful little baby that I get to take care of I don't know the the feeling of gratitude I think is a very powerful thing yeah I mean people say that a lot um did was being a parent scary for you were you scared like absolutely yeah terrifying to me yeah man I um yeah just I was taught by my childhood that most people really screw GRE up parenting and you know it's it's not just like you make a mistake you get a bad grade or you know

your boss is pissed off at you it's you make a mistake and you're like screwing up you get a bad that has to go stay that stays alive stays alive damn C+ is having a tough week C+ is having a really tough week and um you know like do you have kids so so I mean you just you just love your kids so much right I me you really think this The Sun Shines out their ass you know that's that's kind of how you see children Bears or whatever that's right like a Care Bear but

a living breathing Care Bear yeah that you have to take care of and so I was just really terrif because you know this has certainly gotten a lot better but you know when I was 27 28 I had like a pretty bad temper you know like if somebody cut me off I'd be really pissed off now I don't drive anymore cuz I have a secret service detail which is probably a good thing but um but I but I you know like I I I just think to myself oh my God is my kid going to

do something bad and I'm going to you know fly off the handle like you know oh yeah I worry about that right and yeah I mean look certainly kids can be frustrating from time to time but for whatever reason I think it's part because my wife's so patient it's in part just cuz I'm older and a little wiser is uh you know it's it's it's really worked out and I've you know I've screwed up and I've made mistakes as a parent and certainly there are days where you're like oh man I can't believe that I

did this or that but um you know one kids are much more resilient than people give them credit for and and uh two it's just it's a it's a learning process man and it's it's amazing I mean kids are so so crazy like the the difference between our 2-year-old and our seven-year-old just in personality and what they say and you know kids have no filter yeah right so like one of the things that we call on our our side of the aisle is that we'll like you know we'll call the news journalists the corporate media

I call them fake news right you got to be careful about that my kids's getting on the plane with me my four-year-old to come to an event and um and somebody gets on the're on the loud speaker they're saying where to said or whatever and he's like no no we see he sees all these people taking photos of us and videos because I I get photographed in video you know I'm constantly being photographed wherever I go and he sees these people with camera he goes taddy is that the fake news and you you know you

you realize you got to be a little bit more careful about what you say but like no that's grandma now smile okay that's just Grandma's getting a picture of us uh but yeah I mean it's it's it's the most rewarding thing that I've ever done uh it's it's definitely changed my perspective so it surprised you as to as to it surprised you against your fears kind of it did it did I mean one it's just not as it's not as hard I guess as I thought it would be yeah CU I wor that's what I

just yeah I guess yeah I don't know if I think about it being hard I don't know it just feels like it would be so scary that's the word that comes into my head man it is it is scary but it's like one of those things where you just you know you just deal with it right and it's kind of good to confront that fear and then you realize it's not as bad I mean you know mo most people will tell you like the first kid gets completely babied right yeah and you know you oh

you've got to put hand sanitizer on before you touch touch the baby when they come home from the hospital and by the third kid you're like I don't you know oh you just played in the mud fine come come over here and and and you realize that kids are again they're they're much more resilient than people give them credit for but you also you just learn a lot about yourself and like the coolest right think about my mom I didn't think my mom would be alive when I was 40 years old and now I see

her play Pokémon with my little seven-year-old and build a relationship with these little kids and it's just a really it's a really really rewarding thing I mean does it feel like a gift that you were able to give your mom almost a like not you were able to give it to her but that like you know God gave you this series of events in your life where you get to see your mom play with this kid and you're like man that almost could have been me but it it does get to be me like in

a weird way like yeah that's that's exactly right I feel like it's a gift that God gave to us where we get to have this second chance with Mom yeah and you know we get to wouldn't necessarily relied on mom when I was 12 or 13 cuz she was still you know still caught up in addiction but now like we'll leave our kids with Mom and like being able to rely on her is just a very it's a very cool thing you know my my um my wife I remember when our our kids were first

born or or was born in 2017 and at that point mom had been clean sober for about a year and a half I guess and like I remember talking with my wife and she's saying like I love your mom I hope that she stays clean and sober but like we're never letting her babysit yeah it's lur right little early early but now like we trust her with all three of them wow it's amazing thing man oh yeah and now with three kids you'll give them to anybody to watch you know saying if you guys three

kids bro that's true anybody can watch him that's right no we we but no that's I think that's really cool I could have just imagine I could imagine like you getting to see like your kids be with your mom and this it just like like um completing the eight or whatever you know I'm saying like that symbol or whatever you know infinity symbol or whatever you know see that it's pretty powerful yeah it's important that's the power of like things you see through recovery and stuff too you know it's like that people get to um

just have a different life you know it's like you witness it all the time in the in the meetings and stuff I do anyway yeah there's something there's something very Redemptive about it man yeah if you want to hear a miracle or something you want to see a miracle go to a meeting yeah you know what I'm saying you get I mean um and it very much is like church it's like sometimes people like you don't go to church sometimes I'm like dude I go to four I go to church four times a week at

least yeah right I go I go for it's like it that's those meetings it really is it's like you get everything you could get out of um I mean you witness God's work just through other people you know I mean much less outside of uh possibly in your own life yeah and there the testimonials you hear at meetings the it takes somebody who's been clean for 2 days to walk in ACH of strangers and bid on a yeah or to sell a boat hey hey I've got no I'm joking I I didn't mean to interrupt

you there I I got rid of my cocaine and now I've got a boat you want to buy it oh man is your business growing our um our online merch store has grown over the past few years we started off a buddy of mine and I was slanging him out of his basement helping us get it done but it evolved and we needed more help thankfully ship station was there for us ship station helps you achieve exceptional shipping efficiency with a robust allinone order fulfillment system that integrates with over 180 of the most popular e-commerce

platforms marketplaces and carriers ship station is the fastest most affordable way to ship products to your customers with discounts of up to 89% off UPS DHL Express and USPS rates scale your e-commerce business with the shipping software that delivers switch to shipstation today go to shipstation.com and use code Theo to sign up for your free 60-day trial that's shipstation.com code Theo have you heard that the flavored air category is quickly becoming the leading alternative to vaping and smoking it's a whole new movement indeed towards better habits led by the sponsors of today's episode fume fume

is an awardwinning flavored air device flavored air isn't like vaping if if Vapor was compared to Sticky soda fume cores are closer to herbal teas fume has lots of delicious flavors to choose from like crisp mint orange vanilla and the new peach blush with flavored air you can satisfy your oral fixation through a passive diffusion system that utilizes no electronics Vapor or combustion fume has over 300,000 customers including me and you can be the next success story for a limited time use my code Theo to get a free gift with your journey pack head to

Tri fume that's t r y f m.com and use code Theo to get a free gift with your order today trif nume.com code Theo to every elected official and politician in America the people stand United desperate for you to listen if you're not advocating for prices and transparency in Healthcare you are compromising every single American across this country because when we can't see prices hospitals insurance and their middlemen charges whatever they want our very own Health Care system is robbing all of us we just need the prices that's how our economy works if you want

to do right by workers employers and unions then you got to do right by the people they represent and the families who depend upon them and we got to hear it pric is now power to the [Music] patience oh dude did you ever listen to Jelly Roll it's funny um I I met jelly roll at the United States Senate cuz I'm on the Banking Committee he came and gave what was he trying to get pardoned for something no no I don't think so at least but he was uh he did a um like he was

a witness at a hearing in the Senate Banking Committee oh I think I saw that on cpan or something and that was a joke jelly he knows it was he was he was really good I talked to him briefly I'm sure he doesn't remember um do but I but I thought he I thought he gave like some very interesting you know testimony he talked about the fitall issue a little bit I want to say he maybe talked about homelessness a little bit but I remember him talking about fentol and um yeah he's got an amazing

life I mean talk about a guy who had a much tougher life than I did that's jelly roll yeah that's a great Point yeah yeah he's a magic man when you and when you talk to him it's just like watching pure um it's just genuine yeah that's what it is it's like a it's like um clean water it's like what we used to have in a lot of our Rivers it's like um that's what he is yeah he's just genuine I mean a genuine human being oh he'll tear up at anything it's just cuz it's

just what's in him is just real yeah you know um he's a genuine guy that actually leads me pretty good um into this next part I want to talk about some stuff I wrote down okay because I wanted to be clear and this is important yeah go man so you're from a region that was uh firsthand devastated by the money lizard Sackler family right um which like uh you know which Purdue farman and everything that happened with oxyon like over 500,000 people um died at the hands of them yeah and um big big problem yeah

unbelievable right and it compromised like you know they used loopholes all types of stuff to uh to be able to keep that company going right and really to keep killing people I mean it seemed undeniable at a certain point that they were murderers it was legalized drug dealing as what it was on an industrial scale I mean made billions and Bill billions of dollars like a slap on the like they got a financial slap on the wrist right very tiny but why why can't we shouldn't they be kicked out of our country it feels like

like if we can let in 20 million people in our country right that shouldn't be here or that are not like vetted properly to be don't have a legal right to be here I I agree I would say they shouldn't be here but why can't we put those on a boat and send them back to wherever the they came from uh that's a good question man uh look I I think that frankly I don't mean that angrily at you but it's like no man I I'm I'm pissed off about it too like at what point

do people lose the opportunity to be here it seemed like if you killed 500,000 people you wouldn't be able to hang out anymore or maybe at least you should have a criminal investigation yeah right cuz that that's the thing that's always I've always I mean like the Sackler family clearly got rich off of an extraordinary amount of human misery and death okay where are they from bring It Up up real quick I want to say they're from New York maybe or they're from the Northeast I'm pretty sure the Sackler family origin from galasa and Poland

and their ancestors were Jewish immigrants Isaac Sackler Brooklyn New York oh and then they lived in Brooklyn New York that's why I thought they were from New York Connecticut um I mean look the the thing that I've never understood about them is they did get fined but the fine was such a tiny amount comp what they but they made tens and tens and billions of dollars I mean these guys were absolutely rolling in the dough but they like why isn't there a criminal investigation into this right like if if if I sold drugs on the

street and some person has an overdose and died like I you can get felony prosecuted for that or at least investigated for it and there was never a criminal at least as I understand it never a criminal investigation into what was known yeah I think breached a plea deal of some sort okay as the nation continues to Grapple with the uh the Sackler family had agreed to pay 6 billion to families and States as part of an agreement to wind down Purdue Pharma the maker of oxy continent exchange of sacri family would be immunized from

future civil liability claims unreal cuz here's here's my understanding about it and I by the way I I think that like you you always got to be worried about the stuff when you're the child of addiction is like are there whether it's drugs alcohol whatever you got to be you kind of you're worried about making sure you do yourself don't get hooked on anything right like I had a minor surgery once and like a very minor surgery and I was prescribed boxy cotton and I took it for like you know 12 hours got any left

sorry no cuz of my wife cuz of what I'm about to tell you okay and um my my wife who was like giving me my meds she was like hey you ready for your next dose and I was like yeah you know the Pain's not really that bad anymore I don't really want to take one um but yeah just give me one cuz I feel really good when I take it and then she and I both have this like moment of realization like oh right that is that is where this whole thing starts she you

know took it to wherever some disposal site and got we got rid of it now was it but the the problem with oxycotton as I understand it at least is that it's supposed to be delayed release oxycodone but you know the problem that is is people figured out if you just crush it up yeah then you can just get it all at once all released right now all released right now and then the Sackler families I understand it knew about it right Purdue farman knew this was going on and they should have been like oh

no no okay we're going to stop this because people were getting Ked killed by overdosing all this stuff cuz they're taking too high of a dose and they didn't do anything yeah like that that is my understanding fundamentally of what happened is is they didn't want to stop it cuz they were getting rich from it it's man it's it's really gross I just couldn't imagine that imagine people dying and you're making money but they're people are dying family the ripple effect of that in this country is still it's still haunting people know absolutely and that's

where the heroin epidemic which is now a fol epidemic came from it started as a pill epidemic and it actually was like I always used to think it was okay kind of like me like oh you have a surgery and you get too many drugs and then eventually you get hooked what it actually was is they were overprescribing it so much that it was just everywhere right and so like oh you know your nephew comes over and he's 17 and he takes some to his buddies and now they're all hied on hooked on oxy and

that's like that that's what actually happened and there was just so much of this drug everywhere that it started the epidemic we have now yeah and the outside it was like candy coat it was like you just had to slurp off the outside a little bit and then you could party oh I didn't realize that yeah I think you just had to slur I heard about people crushing I didn't know if you you just had to slurp off the outside yeah I think you did and um yeah um yeah and yeah and one of the

worst things about it was that like medicine used to be a term that was like it was for help right yes it was like and it was in our brains I think as as humans and C citizens in our society and culture medicine was help right and that that whole thing with them kind of tripped that word where it made it it made people question the value of medicine absolutely it may be made people um just question then who's prescribing them medicine it made Health it made um like your doctors seem un uh trustworthy it

just it ruins so much um trust that's absolutely right ruined a lot of social trust and I I agree I think they they they deserve a ton of blame for that and it's it's interesting though that was maybe the first point the the oxy epidemic was sort of the first point where I started to question like the mainstream big farmer narrative a little bit and I always asked myself and I think this is something you know like I'm Republican I'm conservative but one of the things that I think the old left was pretty smart about

is like recognizing that um you know when when money gets involved when the profit motive gets involved in health that that can lead to good things right can lead to people trying to cure cancer because they know they're going to make a lot of money if they cure cancer I'm fine with that right but people making money if they cure cancer that's a great thing but then also sometimes it can lead to manipulation of the health system that doesn't actually benefit People's Health but does get people hooked on a lot of drugs that they they

wouldn't otherwise need and this was something again the old left understood this that like well you got to be careful like are we prescribing this medication because it's good for people cuz that's good or are we prescribing it because some big pharmaceutical company is getting rich if we do and they're putting pressure on the government or somebody else to encourage us to prescribe this medication yeah and I think there are a whole host of ways in which you know frankly the old left was right about that and you know I've tried to persuade you know

modern conservatives that we should be more concerned about that issue it's like you Bobby Kennedy makes this point all the time right like good some Pharmaceuticals are good for us but some actually it's not totally clear whether we're taking them just because it makes people money and this is like let me give you a concrete example right so you know that this there's obviously this big like debate about transgender issues and you don't have to wait into that but what really worries me is when you've got pharmaceutical companies that are making billions of dollars on

hormonal therapies for kids and are we really like are we really being smart about whether this is good for the kids about whether it causes long-term con consquences and why is nobody saying well wait a second the people who are lobbying us to give these drugs to kids are also getting rich off of it right and I I just I worry about that I mean I you you to follow the money motive it definitely of course they would want that because it's just another way it's like well how do we split the atom here again

to make even more money off of somebody well why not your gender you know what I'm saying you're not using it y you know you're like what do you mean I'm not using my gender like I'm trying I'm trying to I'm still developing it yeah you know I'm saying and you're going to like but I agree it's like a couple of my buddies secretly low-key date trans people right and I don't care if any somebody's trans or neopolitan or whatever I don't I don't care you know what I'm saying hell if I had a vagina

I would probably wouldn't go looking for women you know so there's probably some up some up to it but um what I'm talking about is uh I don't know what I'm talking look man if if you're an adult but look where the money like look follow the Mone talk kids follow the money think about what's going on like are the people pushing this what is their real or do they have some other motive you have to think about that you know well that's why I mean like you mentioned OIC earlier um which you know I've

know a couple friends who taken it I've never taken OIC or you know any weight loss kind of drug oh it got it ended up having a black market there was somebody selling it outside of a Vineyard Vines illegally or something over there outside of Charlottesville outside of Vineyard Vines that's that's the most that's the perfect encapsu it breaks my heart yeah vard fine she was a capid Delta somebody said she was a capid Delta I know she was but it's just that kind of stuff shakes me to my JD oh that's really that's dark

man that's dark that's that's darker than a lot of what goes on in politics a c Delta selling a zic black market off outside of Vineyard findes I'm going have nightmares they call it fmic but I I I you know I like worry okay so America has a terrible obesity problem okay and I'm not look I'm not a doctor I'm not telling if your doctor tells you to take OIC follow your doctor's advice not you know what you're hearing from me on a podcast thck I don't mind it a little you [Music] know what I

worry about is okay you know you create a problem and then you medicate to solve the problem instead of like maybe solving the underlying problem right like why don't we try to understand why it is that we have a terrible OB obesity epidemic rather than just giving people another pill to pop well it's also we get used to that then after a while and then it's hard to put the toothpaste back in the tube exactly right that's one of theough one and that's more of like a kind of a bigger look at that like um

yeah it's like how much personal responsibility it's like that's something I struggle with sometimes my brother and I talk about this sometimes like you know people have problems and um specifically even like thinking about the oxycon thing like they created a medicine that was so strong that even your ability your god-given ability to be able to battle against it like you'd be in AA rooms and you'd see people that came in from opioid and it was something different than alcoholism exactly right it wasn't alcohol it wasn't it was addiction but it was something different it

was like that's right these PE that's zombied these people it's like it's like they created this um this skip card in Uno or something it was like so at that point like um what were we talking about I had a good idea talking about opioids the effect it has on people's brains pharmaceutical companies making money from we talking about OIC putting the toothpaste back in the tube right right personal responsibility yeah yeah yes okay you were almost there sorry you helped me you laid all the breadcrumbs dude that's good man um so uh but I'm

here I'm here to help man it's your next vice president I'll live to serve however I can you just help me right there but yeah it's like um but then they created something that was so powerful kind of exceeded our ability our natural ability to be able to fight against it right so at that point um personal responsibility kind of isn't it's it's still there but it's not exactly Fair because you're allowing a company to create something that you can't naturally compete against it it turns you into a zombie man I mean really sorry that

took so long my brain isad no man no it's it's I know exactly what you mean and it's it's it's it's like one thing to sort of take a pill so your pain goes away or you take a pill cuz you know you got a lung infection the lung infection goes away or like whatever when something can so fundamentally transform your personality and your sense of you know ambition and reward like what are you what are you going after it's it's yeah it's not a medicine it's very it's very very weird um like that's the

thing it's not a medicine that is a drug yeah and I I mean my my mom like to her great credit man I don't know how she does this because like look there are some things where you really do need a strong pain medication right and I forget something happened a couple years ago where they were like you know she maybe she had some infection but they they really wanted to give her oxy and she was just like no I refuse to take it so she for a couple days I mean she was in agonizing

pain but she just took Advil took Tylenol and she was fine yeah and she and she and she persevered through it but man you're right the stuff it it just yeah it's like it changes not just your personality but it changes whether you can take care of yourself and other people right like for most normal people there's this thing where it's like oh oh crap I'm not taking care of my kids my kids need me I got to change something right but if you're on opioids it's like it flips a switch off where yeah I'm

not taking care of my kids but maybe I don't give a because the drugs have so affected my brain yeah I think that's it man um and with that so staying in the health in like medical and healthc Care thoughts yeah um one of the major and I wrote this down so I could say it clearly and just save everybody time who's listening um one of the major bipartisan issues that's plaguing Americans is the Health Care system which has become um outrageously expensive right it's uh it's unaffordable it's inaccessible by millions of Americans um we're

overpaying hospitals and insurance companies that hide their prices yes and they charge us whatever they want yeah patients overpay workers overpay uh companies overpay the taxpayers overpay um on this podcast Bernie Sanders came on and he stressed the need for healthcare price transparency um Donald Trump did the same thing he had an executive order yeah I think it's still in place that demands price transparency uh Mark Cuban uh stressed the need for healthcare price transparency how do we not have real prices and transparency and healthc Care knowing that it's exactly what America needs so that

our Health Care system will be honest and affordable and accessible well you're right that we should have it and um the reason that we don't is unfortunately because there are a lot of powerful people who get rich off of keeping these things secret and so they don't want transparency they don't want sunshine you can say Chuck Schumer if you want I won't say well I mean look you're right though like obviously Bernie and I are't on the same team politically but there are some healthcare things like price transparency where actually I think he and president

Trump are both right that there's nothing that you I mean you go to Starbucks right you buy coffee you know how much getting you know how much it's it's costing you you know I remember when my my wife I think it was her second baby where you know you get like pain medications when you're delivering a baby at least most people do cuz it's like a very painful experience yeah and there was some weird thing where the the the doctor that she chose was out of network and she didn't real I mean you know you're

not checking whether the doctor's in network at the time right you're just sort of choosing a doctor and we come home and we have like a $115,000 unexpected bill because she chose the wrong doctor an hour before she delivers a baby and it's like this is totally crazy and I'm you know we're in a situation where that that was not a big deal for us we were able to afford it but think about like a a normal middle class family goes and has a baby and comes home to a medical bill that's like a fifth

of their entire take-home pay that year right that's crazy oh the number one cause of bankruptcy in America is uh medical debt yeah it's it's it's a huge huge problem and I think the price transparency is a big part of it but you ask like why hasn't it happened because every time that we try to force Tri price transparency um the Serv the service providers the insurance companies or the pharmaceutical companies don't actually want that transparency here's one of the reason why the pharmaceutical companies don't want transparency it's because if Americans if we realized how

much more we were paying for pharmaceuticals over the Europeans there would be a revolution in this country we pay a lot more than them we pay way more than them and again like I my attitude is I am fine with people you know if you invent a life-saving cancer drug I'm fine with people earning a great profit for doing something amazing like that you want to you want to motivate people to do it in the first place right and and a lot of people are obviously motivated by that profit motive but if if you take

certain drugs that are you know they cost $100 in the United States of America and they're way way cheaper in Europe or some of these really expensive multi cancer bring something up for me yeah these really expensive like next Generation cancer Therapeutics they cost way less in Europe okay and this says in 2022 us prices across all drugs Brands and generics were nearly 2.78 times as high as prices in In the comparison countries us prices for brand drugs were at least 3.22 times as high as prices in the comparison countries even after adjustments for estimated

us re debates wow does it show those countries is there a chart with that or no I love a chart it's it's oecd countries which is mainly Europe those are like the advanced economies basically the the rich countries basically o and and what so First World countries probably basically yeah so Canada uh probably Israel's in there a lot of the a lot of the European countries I think are all in OCD okay United States Germany Canada Japan um Switzerland Switzerland I can't see that heard of that comparable County average you're screwing with me Austria well

I think they misspelled it dude there's not that many zits in it uh Australia United Kingdom and Sweden wow so we pay per capita spending on prescription drugs in 2019 900 and what does per capita mean just per okay per person $93 per person whereas in Sweden $270 United Kingdom $273 dude yeah that's crazy right yeah that's not fair dude they colonize everybody and they're paying cheaper for dope it's exactly right but again but again the reason we don't really know what we're paying here is because you know because they hide it they hide it

they hide it and they don't want to let people know because if you let people know then they would demand to pay less something president Trump proposed for example I think is a very good idea is that he proposed reimporting drugs from Europe basically if they're selling it in Sweden or wherever for $270 per person and we're paying [Music] I mean I I I I of course have no idea no inside knowledge into into what drove the motives of the Assassins oh yeah I'm just joking but I wouldn't be shocked money man I wouldn't be

shocked if there's some really dark stuff out there cuz look two separate people have tried to take a swing at this guy in about three months yeah like well you know they didn't like Donald Trump right because they wouldn't have tried to shoot him if they if they liked him um but I I wouldn't be the first guy who who went after Trump I hate to put on the tinf how here but we we've not been able to get unable to get into his phone we know that he had all these like foreign encrypted apps

on his cell phone it is crazy to me that we don't know the guy's motive yeah it's nuts he almost killed the president yeah and we don't know why he did it we don't know anything about the guy yeah yeah they're like he had a lunch box or something it's like the vaguest information they keep putting out about the guy you know he'd been using a library car like who gives a exactly yeah his mom's name was Sharon it's like great thank you dude yeah dude yeah they're like oh he yeah they're like oh he

was a Colts fan you're like who gives a who gives a yeah that's exactly us information guy you know so how do we stop that do you get do you get approached by lobbyists and stuff like that like all the time do you really and what does that look like who are they what are they wearing uh they're they're so lobbyists here's how you spot them okay um they're always wearing poorly fitted suits MH with extremely ugly ties so if you go out and you see a guy with a poorly fitting suit and extremely ugly

tie he's definitely a lobbyist okay okay it's like it's like in Happy Gilmore he's a lobbyist for big fabric huh it sounds like it's like in Happy Gilmore where the guys like uh uh you know the the the coach is trying to get Happy Gilmore to play golf and and Happy's like you know you know what you need to play golf is uh goofy goofy pants in effect ass that's what you need to be a lobbyist is Goofy pants and and that but why can't we if everybody knows by way I like golf want to

be clear I like golf do you like golf I I I I I I'm not that good at it okay I'll play when I get a little bit older I don't want to slow people down okay right now Fair Point you know but anyway yeah so so okay the way I like Brooks kka yeah I do too um he's cool yeah he seems like a cool dude and I like that girl that smokes that plays dude Puffer aav whatever I have eyes only for one woman Theo I've got I've only my wife yeah no I

like her you don't have to know I'm talking about no comment no com no comment from Senator I know who you're talking about the hot John daily so John Daly doesn't really do it for you he's a good he's a good dude though oh no I like John man I definitely oh if you need a ride in an ambulance hang out with John you'll get one in RP and I just I'm just Jing I I think it was also it's true I've been at two places where John's been taking one time they came in looking

for him he went out there and was sitting in the shotgun that is awesome and they're like where is oh my God he tried to help you guys out oh that is so funny he's a legend he's got to come on here soon but how do we stop that if all the senators in congress People Know It Like Bernie CER said there's three times as many lobbyists um in DC as there are um congressmen and Senators then why don't we get that out like yeah okay here here's why doesn't it stop like if all you

guys know it and everybody's supposed to be working for the people then why doesn't it stop so I actually think that we're getting a little bit better compared to maybe 10 years ago people have no idea how much Washington was just completely run by lobbyists and you know you think about like guy on the left like Bernie Sanders but most importantly a guy on the right like Donald Trump completely blows the existing system up and this is by the way like what I realized cuz I was wasn't a trump guy back in 2016 and obviously

I'm his running mate now so uh I really like him what people don't realize is back in 2016 how much lobbyist money and influence there was that wanted to destroy Donald Trump they hated the guy because he didn't owe anything to them right he didn't come from the existing political process and if you look at some of the younger guys who have come in you know we're we're much more just open about the fact that lobbyist influence is out there right you can't be in DC without running into these people but you got to be

honest with people like I'm not g to let this person write a piece of legislation for me I'm not gonna let this person dictate how I vote and yeah I've gotten some definitely some criticisms from the lobbyist groups in DC some of them will say well you know we don't know if we can trust this guy and that's fine with me I'm I'm okay lob can't trust you fuing good you're doing your job that's exactly right that's that's my exact attitude towards it they don't know if he can trust you who gives a exactly that's

exactly right um so but but that that is how the town works is that if you come in and you don't always take their meetings you don't always do what they want you to then they'll start whispering about you and then they can get articles written about you they can have people say bad about you this is why people call it the corporate media is if you pick up a story in the Washington Post and you read it and you know here's this anonymous source said this this anonymous source said that there is a 98%

chance that the person who's attacking Donald Trump is on the take somehow for sure whether it's a lobbyist or whether it's a political consultant it's all Dison Hest money laundering that's all DC ultimately is is people who get paid to offer an opinion instead of having a real opinion here's the thing that I think we need to fix structurally about this so let me give you an example you know my Senate staff has probably 40 or so people and um you know all extremely good people my staff tends to be a little bit younger because

I'm one of the youngest I'm the second youngest US senator right now and um you know like if I wanted to pay my chief of staff $30,000 more year than what I pay him right now I'm not allowed by law so even though I'm a senator and I was elected to represent the people of Ohio I'm not allowed to control who I pay and how I pay them it's all sort of set by law and here's the bigger issue is that if you think about it you know a lot of this a lot of these

big important laws are very complicated right they've got 800 Pages 900 pages and I think the laws should be simpler but if you've got a 900 page law and you've got a bunch of junior staff who don't know the town very well and they don't make a whole lot of money then the people who are writing the laws are not going to be your Junior staffers it's going to be lobbyists right and we've seen this multiple times with legislation that I've drafted where the lobbyist will actually ask to get into like the draft of the

law and make changes for you and say well yeah we'll justify no no no no no I want my staff that works for me to write the laws that I'm drafting but we I I actually think that we need to empower senators and congressmen to hire who they want to make a bigger staff if they want because if you think about it the amount of staff a congressman has a congresswoman has is a fraction of the federal budget I mean we're talking about like a percent of a percent of a penny on the federal budget

and so um we we we could actually give people the staff that they need to to be able to actually write the laws and to make sure the lobbyists don't have much influence and and you ask like who are the lobbyists okay okay the lobbyists are the people who are really good staffers and then the staffers want to buy a nicer house and they want to you know start a family and they can't you know DC is a very expensive town I mean you know a one-bedroom apartment in DC will easily run you $44,000 a

month right now right it's just a very expensive town so then those people go and become lobbyists they trade in their public service for a fat check and I think that we got to fix something about that thing that happened with um with oxy and they got the people that were working with the FDA to come and work for them that's exactly right that that is exactly right so it happens at our Congress it happens with our B big bureaucratic agencies and I think we have to fix something about that like we want the people

in our government to be public spirited and focus on doing the public good I don't think that this system that we have works very well where you know you do public service for a little bit and then you jump and go make a million dollars a year as a lobbyist right no no no no no no you got I think you got to separate those functions much better than you have right now yeah because then then you're then like being a public servant is just a junior college for being becoming a lobbyist it seems like

that is a big a big worry that I have especially with my staff I mean these are really smart really good guys and a big part of what I think about a big part of what I think about is how am I going to keep these guys as they get more senior as they become better at their job as they become better at figuring out when a lobbyist is trying to sell them a bill of goods right that's a skill right and acquire that skill over time when they can just spend whatever they want when

they're the Yankees that's exactly right yeah damn dude we're all going to be addicted no we're not man I'm telling you we're going I'm telling you we're actually going in the right direction this is what people don't and and I recognize you play have of your millions of listeners some people love Trump and some people hate him but but the thing that Trump really changed about DC is that he was not beholden to the moneyed interests oh well that's one thing that I also like about Bobby Kennedy that I mean I've known Bobby for years

Bobby's been a friend of mine for for years I knew him before I thought aie was going to be do politics or he's a good dude man I like Bobby he used to hold meetings at his house on Tuesdays and we would go to him yeah in his backyard dude and one of his dogs always was slobbering stuff on me it was a huge dog it might not even have been a dog cuz he has a lot of animals what would it have been then I don't know dude but he's had a lot of animals

over the years Bob he can afford probably baby dog that was all over Theo but he doesn't need anything else he's got a great name he's got a cool wife he's got he doesn't he's always cared about just making people healthy if is he wrong sometimes on things sure he probably is just like anybody else I'd I'd rather have somebody just raise their hand and ask questions like absolutely that's one thing that I just love about him that he's not beholding to any of these people you know the thing that I hate about politics and

just media culture in this country right now man is people are so afraid of saying anything that's unconventional they're they're afraid of thinking thoughts that you're not allowed to think like the biggest ideas come from people who just follow the truth right and yeah sometimes they're going to be wrong sometimes they're not going to get everything right but we've got to stop punishing people like Bobby Kennedy for saying well maybe this doesn't work yeah hey what about that exactly like that hey what about that is something we have to preserve and I do feel like

we're trying to we're kind of destroying it this this is so I'm going to sound like an old man but this is what I think is really jacked up about social media is okay we're all social animals right we're all influenced by people around us oh yeah but look 30 years ago an opinion it would take it many many days before an opinion became the accepted conventional wisdom you know you'd have to be repeated in one newspaper and then repeated in another newspaper and people would talk about it now you can have something happen on

social media it's viral and 10 minutes later you've got like the social media Feeding Frenzy that says well here's this thing that I came up with 10 minutes ago and if you don't agree with that thing I came up with 10 minutes ago then there's going to be a Feeding Frenzy attacking you attacking your family finding out where you worked and attack it trying to attack your employer for keeping you in a job like that is a really jacked up thing to take the the normal human social impulse to want to be liked and to

you know want to make friends and to put it all on the internet where it operates at like the speed of light I think there's something very deranged about that yeah yeah well and it's also it's like we do you are you a repeater or are you a thinker like that's the thing it's like we get so preoccupied now and so occupied so quickly that we don't even put it through our own filter that's exactly right and it's like and then our filter starts to not even be a filter anymore because it's like well nobody's

using me I'll just I'm just a pathway now and how we all to become desensi to and we just become repeaters right that's exactly what social media does is it just turns us all into repeaters I like that Bobby Kennedy is sort of willing to say no no no no I'm actually going to think for myself on this topic I mean it is crazy why why do we have such a terrible obesity problem why do we have all these like you know certain types of diabetes or on the rise among children today it's like okay

we're the richest country in the history of the world and you know children are getting diseases that they didn't get 30 40 years ago like somebody should be saying what the hell is going on or like yeah somebody should and it should be our leaders but there it feels like there's so much compromisation in there I mean dude dude do you know okay um this is a a paper by a Nobel yeah yeah we're we're yeah we'll take a few more minutes yeah um now we're just having fun um but there's a paper by a

Nobel prizewinning Economist um that talks about the return to education in years of life and do you know how much take a person who's got a four-year degree versus a person who never went to college do you know how much longer the person with a four-year degree lives in the United States of America right now 7 years seven years longer yeah so going to college you get rewarded with seven years of additional life if that doesn't tell you something is seriously up in our country then nothing will right that is not okay and and it's

part of it's it's Health part of it's that you know people um are working more dangerous jobs if they don't have a college degree but part of it's just that we have have I think made it so hard to get by in our country if you don't have a four-year degree that people are you know they're not making enough money to support their families and they get stressed out then they turn to addiction of course addiction happens to everybody but it's much more common among those without a college degree so I I just this to

me is like what what is this campaign about like what is Trump being president about is fixing the big problems not like the fake problems that the media gets us to focus on not the slogans but why are people dying 7 years earlier if they don't have a college degree why do we have this historic obesity epidemic in the richest country in the world why do we have like Wars breaking out like crazy all over the world why do pharmaceutical companies get rich by forcing Therapeutics that aren't even always good for us right like these

are like big big big issues that frankly I think absent Trump we wouldn't even be talking about this stuff well I mean I definitely think that one of the things that certainly excited me about Trump uh when he first was running was wow this guy is Rogue and you know what is and this whole thing is so messed up now that that's what you I would I I hated politics so much I just I hated that I was like I would hire a I would hire a muppet to go in there with a hammer that's

right I would hire a muppet with a hammer if I could vote for a muppet with a hammer and that's how most people feel it's like it doesn't even feel like it's working for us anymore so what does it even matter yeah um yeah but so that's why I think Bobby that's one thing that I did that's one thing that I thought was pretty amazing about bringing Bobby Kennedy um into you guys' campaign is that um he's a sheriff for that kind of he really is you know for caring I think for just for genuinely

caring about people because I know I know he cares about people it's like I have friends that don't care about me they're still my friends some of them but he's a friend that is a caring guy yeah yeah that's absolutely right so that is I think why I've uh vouged for him a lot yeah um I had one more thing Let me see um oh the polls and stuff okay yeah yeah I've been looking at the polls recently um and especially at KI is a place where I look at them okay this the betting Market

stuff yeah they're a website and an app where people can bet money on regular happenings like in society like not just political stuff anything from like politics to entertainment um and I think it's a good tracker in a capitalistic Society because it's people putting their money down right it's like right so it's people saying this is what I think right with my money as opposed to just other polls um what what's the latest on there what does it say oh it say Trump is 57 comml is 43 Trump 57% um that's pretty good yeah that's

pretty good does it say the total amount of money that people have bet or not yet oh it says 32 m91 17,000 has been put out there on this it's just yeah so that's why I like to follow their stuff just because it's actually people putting their money down sure are there what do you think of polls that are out there these days uh do you guys follow these polls Is that real stuff to you like I know that like they had the Clinton Trump poll years ago and they had Clinton who was neck and

neck or something and then it wasn't when it came out do you guys follow any of that or is that really part of the daily routine not really man I mean I I I can I can get you in the weeds a little bit but I'll try to I'll try to I live and breathe this stuff so I try not to make it make it too intense I trust a lot of media so it's like here yeah here here's basically the way you shouldn't trust polls whether they're good for us or bad for us and

here's the reason you shouldn't trust polls is about 10 years ago every 10th person you called to do a poll would answer now it's about 1 in 30 people okay and another important thing is that if you're a Democrat especially if you're a higher education level Democrat you're much more willing to answer pollster questions where if you're excuse me if you're like my family if somebody called them a stranger and said who are you going to vote for they would say F you and hang up the phone oh yeah right so what what the reason

the polls have gotten so bad is because Trump voters are less likely to answer pollster questions and kamla Harris voters are much more likely to answer pollster questions so it's very hard to get an accurate sample uh to give you any any sense of what's going on but do you just believe that or you just saying that I actually believe that yeah no I I believe that um and I've seen it in my own race for example you know I ran for Senate there were all these public polls that say you know the race was

tied or maybe we'd even lose by a few points and the pollster that I had who just polled for my campaign he's actually Trump's pollster too and very smart guy and he said look the reason these polls are wrong is because they're not reaching voters who don't like to answer polls and those voters are going heavily for you so I said okay well how much are we going to win by and he said you're going to win by six points and we won by seven points right so he was much more accurate than the public

pollers now you ask why is he more accurate because most of the public polls they cost 10 $20,000 like if you see a poll published in a newspaper article $10 to $20,000 to get an accurate sample these guys need to really it's it's $60 $70,000 because they've got to call thousands and thousands of people to get a representative sample of the American people so honest like sitting here honestly yeah I think that chart's about right I think that we've probably got about a 60% chance of winning I think the polls would have to be wrong

but they'd have to be wrong in a proa direction where normally they're wrong in a pro Trump direction and you know we've got 18 days 17 days man and we're just going to like do everything that we can to win this race but you shouldn't believe the polls basically yeah and I and and I say this right now because the polls are all saying we'd win that's why that's why it's 5743 don't buy the polls because here's the thing okay it could keep people from voting also it could keep people from voting but let's say

for example that some something happened I don't know what happened but let's say something happen yeah where the people who don't want to answer pollster questions are now comma voters right so you just you can't trust this stuff you got to assume that you just got to work your ass off that's what we're trying to do you know president Trump and I doing multiple events a day at this point and um if you if you want in my view if you want to secure the Border have common sense Economic Policy then Donald Trump is is

your man and I I got to say man something about KL Harris and I like I know a little bit about you and I've read about some of your political views and we've invited W to come on we yeah I'm sure I'm sure you would um but but like they will but like sha O'Brien who's you know the head of the teamers like one of the things that President Trump has sort of been known for is bringing more workingclass people into the Republican Coalition right it's I think one of the reasons why he's been very

successful politically um if you look at like where kamla is on the big Pharma stuff or you look at where she is on the foreign conflict stuff she she's like very Pro warar or if you look at where she is on things like how do we how do we put tariffs on Goods that are imported from China so that you don't have the Chinese undercutting the wages of American workers right like the illegal immigration thing like yeah it's about fentol and drug trafficking but when you bring in millions upon millions of illegal immigrants who are

willing to work under the table that undercuts the wages of American workers right so our own people get poorer and I don't have anything against the illegal immigrants themselves I have something against kamla Harris who lets these people come in but I want our people to be able you know black white brown whatever I just want our people to be able to work for a solid wage that doesn't work when you have people coming in like this well some of it is we have to have personal responsibility too as as um people running companies to

not hire I agree those people as well and so you have to enforce that side of it as well I agree you got to do both sides of it I think we got to make it harder to hire illegal labor we also to make it harder for illegal labor to come into the country in the first place I I agree both sides of it have got a matter but I think that's actually why we're doing so much better among working people is because they recognize like I open borders is not good for me right all

my commun is not good for me like this this this stuff with Farm is not good for me and so they have become more open to Donald Trump um and I think it's a very good thing because I think look man between Bobby Kennedy me obviously the president at the top of the ticket I think we're going to have such a cool Administration that's going to try to tackle the big things and not just govern along these slogans anymore so look I hope that ends up being true cuz I think we'll do a lot of

good if we win if you um no matter what happens in this election would do you think you would run again in the future I don't know man um it's so hard to even imagine running for anything after this because I'm so obsessed with winning right now and you know like I probably you certainly probably would do another term in the Senate but that doesn't come up for four more years cuz Senate terms are six years it's like what I ever run National again I don't know man that's a big that's a big thing it's

a big big thing to put your family through yeah I can imagine and I've only I've I've seen it for two months three months now that I've been the VP nominee to to run for that for two years my attitude is let's get Donald Trump elected and let's fix as much as we can because then then then I think the country will be in a much better spot like I I don't mean to sound like a Doomer and again I just really haven't thought about I I haven't really thought about what I would do in

in 2028 no matter what but man if kamla Harris is the president for the next four years we have four more years of open borders four more years of not putting tariffs on Chinese Imports four more years of the the crazy foreign policy that's proar all over the world I really do worry that the country is in a very very bad spot so I don't think too much about future politics I want to win this race how many times do politicians say stuff that's just on the trail and then when it comes time to actually

get in office and do stuff it seems like that person disappears um me hopefully not at all some politicians definitely say one thing and then and then don't govern that way in in in the private in the privacy of of their actual office I mean some of it's negotiation right like some of it is okay so let's say you have a tax plan where you want 10 things to happen happen but then to get the Democrats to vote for it you have to take out two of those 10 things like that's just the the give

and take of governance but I don't think that's what you're talking about I mean what what you do see sometimes is people who say something on the campaign Trail even though they affirmatively do not believe that thing at all and that's just that's not dishonesty it's certainly not me it's certainly not Donald Trump they say what you will about Donald Trump but he just says what he thinks and I think that's actually one of the reasons why people like him a lot of people are going to vote for him I think also because it's just

the funny who he's the funniest dude they've ever had in there uh he is incredibly funny the he says is absolutely wild he's got he's got a great sense of humor can I tell you one story yeah and then you have go I know I know I have to go soon um I've got you know my my person over here no I I I know I'm going to have dinner with my kids tonight so it's a big deal Skyline Chili in in not in Cincinnati we're doing Skyline Chili in Middletown even if you have other

chilling you just say that dud I won't tell any that's one thing I don't care if you lie about D Man Skyline is good have you ever had Skyline uh Skyline goes straight to the basement I know that brother I'll tell you that dude I have had it I respect it okay I've had it at a wedding I've had I've had at a wedding in Covington Kentucky I've had Skyline Chile that's that's a that's a good wedding man those must have been good friends um anyway yeah so so the the first time not that the

had met ever met my wife but the first time president Trump spent any like real time with my wife did he flirt with her or not he didn't flirt with her he was very sweet to her you know gave her a big hug told her she was beautiful I he's you know he's a very engaging guy right something the media doesn't tell people about him that he's he's a very engaging guy very easy to talk to but it's so funny like my wife is super diplomatic and so he asks her he's like Usha you know

what do you think about your your husband being involved in politics and she's oh you know it's nice I I like you know supporting him he really cares about public service loves the people of Ohio just gives a very diplomatic answer and then he kind of Chuckles and says yeah my wife hates it too and it just like broke the ice perfectly and then she could actually have a conversation with him cuz she wasn't trying to like talk to the president then she was just talking to a guy at that point yeah and uh he's

he's just he's he's got a very a very good way about him and he breaks down funny stuff dud that alith dinner the other night that was good if Tony henchcliffe helped him write that or not I don't know it's a good question but he's I'm telling you a lot of the stuff he just comes up with himself I mean the the line where he was talking about you know white dudes for comma oh yeah he was and he was like he was like I forget exactly what he said but something the effect of well

they they their wives their wives boyfriends are all voting for Trump that was pretty crazy dude and like all good jokes there's like an element of truth to it oh my best he rubbed unlucky Chuck Schumer right there squeeze a couple bucks out of the insurance companies right there um do you think our voting poll do you think that our uh voting is fair do you think I do I do I mean system I I think we had some problems in 2020 I think the biggest problem in 2020 is that big Tech interfered in the

election like I I I really think it's I can't believe that Facebook and Twitter when it was owned then they they they admitted to like um leaving certain things off and stuff and not and not faced in any charges they admitted to censoring American citizens weeks for an election right we'll have to talk about that another time we got to get into that um I I yeah if you'll have me back I'll come back after we win and have a good conversation but you're always welcome in Cincinnati even despite your views on Skyline hey man

I respect that uh we'll be cheering your mom on um you get a 10-e chip it's in January it's in January awesome man um Mr Vance thank you so much for spending time with us today thanks man good to see you now I'm just floating on the breeze and I feel I'm falling like these leaves must be Cornerstone oh but when I reach that ground I'll share this piece of my life found I can feel it in my bones but it's going to