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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Utility companies are bracing for a future affected by climate change and evolving energy markets. Marisa and Scott are joined by Patti Poppe, the CEO of PG&E. Poppe has been trying to navigate these challenges and more since her tenure started in 2021, after the company emerged from bankruptcy for the second time in two decades. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey there, everyone. From KQED Public Radio, this is Political Breakdown. I’m Marisa Lagos.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m Scott Shafer. Today on the Breakdown, our guest took the helm of Pacific Gas and Electric Company three years ago, just after the nation’s largest utility emerged from bankruptcy. And as it continues to face existential questions about its future at a time of climate change and evolving energy markets.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Patti Poppe is here. She’s now stearing PG&E through multiple challenges, including recent rate hikes, the continuing threat of wildfires and distrust of the company among many of its 16 million customers. We’re going to ask her about all that. And I got you to say existential in the lead, which was fun.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I know. I was I was afraid of mispronouncing that, but I think I got it right.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But before we bring Patti Poppe in, Scott, we do have to talk about some news this week, which is that Bakersfield Republican Congressman Kevin McCarthy is stepping down. He announced this in a bit of a surreal Wall Street Journal editorial today saying he will not finish his term. He’s going to leave at the end of the year. This comes two months, of course, after he was ousted as speaker by the far right faction in the House. And he says he did what, as I said, surreal. He says he did what he set out to accomplish. No matter the odds or personal cost. We did the right thing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, of course. You know, there are a lot of things that, you know, history will judge. Like January 6th, for example, where, of course, there was the Trump inspired mob stormed the Capitol. And it’s interesting because, you know, McCarthy was never really trusted by the far right part of his party. Right.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Even though he really aligned himself with them more than the moderates, honestly.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, in many ways, certainly increasingly, as time went by, and, you know, that changed from the time he was in Sacramento. But, you know, he was too willing to talk to Democrats, to willing to keep the government open, not willing to sort of force a crisis when it came to government spending or government funding as well. So, you know, I think we all remember when he came to the House floor on January 6th and really went after Trump blaming him for what happened. And then like a few weeks later was down at Mar a Lago.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kissing the ring, basically. I mean, it really was a remarkable especially when we heard later on some of the things he was saying behind the scenes. But, you know, I do think to your point, you know, McCarthy came up in Sacramento as a lawmaker here in California and was very well-liked across the aisle, was seen as a pretty centrist Republican, kind of a back slapper, always been fundraising. And yeah, but not somebody with like huge policy chops. And I think, you know, in some ways that kind of came back to bite him because there was so little trust of him among these wings of the party because he hadn’t ever been, you know, you may disagree with him or agree with him, but like someone like Mike Johnson, the current speaker, is clearly coming from a very specific point of view.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He is although, you know, he did some of the same things that McCarthy did and was deposed over like, you know, a government funding bill. And so I think, you know, it’s one thing to be a Matt Gaetz from Florida where you’re throwing bombs all the time. It’s another thing — and Nancy Pelosi talked with us about this many times — to be in charge of the caucus. You know, you have to get things done. You have to round up the votes. You have to count the votes.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And you have to make people believe that they can trust you even if they you don’t do what they ultimately want. And I think that that is lacking in general in this Republican caucus. But certainly he he had challenges.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He did, and I think even Democrats didn’t trust him. You know, at the end when the vote came to…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Especially Democrats. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer. \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well but I think there were some people, you know, Hakeem Jeffries, I think they considered maybe cutting some kind of a deal on a power sharing arrangement with him. But in the end, the caucus just didn’t trust him. They felt, you know, whether it was the going after the impeachment inquiry of Biden or Hunter Biden, all those things, you know, and just were backtracking on promises that they just didn’t want to keep him there.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right. I mean, it is interesting. You know, the thing that he was very good at was fundraising. He raised hundreds of millions of dollars for Republicans. I mean, just his ousting, I think, sounded some alarms within, you know, the campaign wings of the Republican caucus. And it’s going to be fascinating to see A, what he does next. He says he is he still wants to be involved, whatever that means. So we’ll see if he’s still involved in Republican politics. But what it’ll do to some of these competitive House races here in California, you know, he really has help folks like David Valadao in the Central Valley. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Protected him from Trump…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah Young Kim down in Orange County keep their seats at times.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah and you know very different in so many ways from Nancy Pelosi both you know, the role they played as speaker. But Nancy Pelosi, also a prolific fundraiser for her party, she stepped away. Now she’s the speaker emerita and is continuing. She’s running for reelection. That’s not make everybody happy in that. But she’s yeah, but she is continuing to raise money for the party. Something that it’ll be I don’t think McCarthy is going to necessarily want to do I mean his leaving, you know, before the end of the term and you know, with the eviction of George Santos, get throwing him out of the house, I mean, there are majorities down to like 2 or 3 votes right now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right. And I think that’s something that’s going to be fascinating also as we see a potential special election happen in his district, which is a safe red seat, we should say. This is not going to change the makeup of the California delegation per se. It does open up a rare opportunity to run for Congress on the safe seat.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But it’s a huge loss of power for all of you and part of a trend as well with Feinstein’s death and Pelosi stepping.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, and we’re seeing long time, you know, veterans like Anna Eshoo in the South Bay decided to step down. So it is definitely a moment of transition here. But I mean, in some of those cases, these are people have served for decades, are in their seventies or beyond. He is not. And so this really, I think, is indicative of this moment, you know, in American politics. Quickly, before we break, any thoughts on who might run for that seat?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, you know, you have to look, first of all, at which Senate and assembly seats are nested within that district. Shannon Grove, state senator, she’s been down there for quite a while. Vince Fong is in the assembly. He may run as well. I’m sure they’re all looking at it, doing polling, checking their fundraising. And there is also, we should say already even before he stepped down, there is a kind of a MAGA Republican running who is getting some help from Roger Stone, who is kind of conciliatory to Donald Trump so that he will probably stay in the race and then we’ll see if, you know, some better known Republicans jump in as well. And probably a Democrat or two. But it won’t really matter. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, we’ll keep an eye on it. And that means more elections for folks in that district because there will probably be two next year. Okay. We are going to take a short break. When we come back, we will be joined by PG&E CEO Patti Poppe. You’re listening to Political Breakdown from KQED Public Radio. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Welcome back to Political Breakdown. I’m Marisa Lagos here with Scott Shafer. And we are thrilled to welcome PG&E CEO Patty Poppe. She took over the largest investor owned utility in California as it was emerging from bankruptcy and the second time in 20 years. Must have been quite a job interview. Patti Poppe, welcome to the breakdown.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thank you for having me. Great to be with you.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, before we talk about your current role, I do want to go back. You grew up in Michigan. I think your mom was a school principal and teacher. Your dad was a nuclear engineer. And I mean, this is a very big job in an area that hadn’t does not has not historically always had women leaders. I’m curious, like, how your parents jobs and your upbringing informed your career path?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, well, that’s a great question. You know, I always would I always say my dad taught me how to be an engineer and my mom taught me how to be a leader. She was a great school principal. We all know that schools are such important places in the lives of so many people. And she was a great principal and a great leader for her teachers. So I got to see her do that. And that was always inspiring to me.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, and as Marisa said, you were, probably found yourself being the only woman or one of the few women in rooms, whether it was in the corporate suites or even in some of the undergrad and business school and post-grad classes you took. You took some really male, male-oriented kinds of.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Industrial engineering? Is that your…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Industrial engineering, I mean, GM. What was that like? What did you learn from that? What difference did it make to have you in the room at those times?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, since I had six sisters at home, I probably had plenty of women in my life telling me what to do. I was the baby, so I got lots of instruction, let’s just say. But I think growing up in automotive as an operator, as an engineer, you know, my dad really wanted me to be an engineer. He inspired and encouraged me to do so. None of my other sisters had been engineers, so I was sort of his last, last ditch effort to get one out of the bunch. And so I’m in this great pride and joy that way. But, you know, growing up in automotive, it was an interesting era at General Motors, there actually were more women than you might expect. Mary Barra’s the CEO at General Motors. She and I were contemporaries. She was a little bit ahead of me, but we had a lot of other really amazing women in operations. And so I grew up not actually thinking it was that strange. In fact, I felt like it was very well-received. And and maybe in some ways it was an advantage because people wanted to have more diverse leadership. And so maybe I got tested a little more early and pushed further and faster and, you know, was able to deliver when called. And so I feel good about what General Motors prepared me for professionally.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">How did you make the leap into energy? You went to DTE Energy and then CMS. I think they’re both also investor in utilities in Michigan?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s right. That’s right. My well, my dad actually worked for Consumers Energy, CMS Energy. So he retired from CMS Energy. Had done built nuclear power plants around the country. And so I was familiar with energy, but I had been in automotive and really at General Motors, we had to move around a lot. And I have young children and that’s one of the advantages of working for an energy company or a utility. We don’t have to move. And so my husband and I made a, you know, a family decision to settle in Michigan with our family and and raise our daughters. And so we we really made a personal decision that ended up being a really exciting professional move in the long run. Had I known, I had no idea at the time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So you ended up transitioning to PG&E. You were hired roughly 2020. And, you know, that was a time when the company was still, you know, in bankruptcy, emerging from bankruptcy, dealing with the aftermath of some devastating fires. What made you think that’s the job I want?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right. Super easy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Well, you know, I think I was compelled watching from afar, having been CEO at CMS Energy for at that time, five years. That was in my hometown. It was a very well-run company. We’d had our own transformation. And so I was able to observe and learn through that transformation at CMS and then to lead it myself. I did feel like I could help. I watched from afar what was happening here in California and specifically for PG&E, such an iconic company. After everything the company had been through and the the customers and our communities had been through. I felt like PG&E really needed an operating oriented leader. And I got a lot of calls. A lot of people called and asked me to consider taking the job. And the first several calls, I was like, No, no, no. You know, I’m I’m in a great place in my hometown. I lived next door to my sister and next door to my dad. There was no reason for me to move. But then, as I really considered the seriousness of what was happening here, I truly felt compelled to come and make a difference.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So it sounds like you wanted the challenge, because one of the things like prepping for this, I’m counting them up. I mean, before you arrive, the company had pled guilty or been found guilty of 90 felony counts and faced more. Like that feels like a bit of a red flag. I mean, what what was your thought in terms of like what you could bring to the table that might be different?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Well, I knew what it meant to run a very strong ethical and safe company, and I knew it was possible for PG&E too. And what I know is that the people who work for PG&E are not criminals. These are not bad people who set out to do harm. The people, the kind of people who are attracted to a utility and the kind of people who are attracted to PG&E are your neighbors, your friends, your family that set out to have a career at a company where they know they can make a difference in their hometown. And I wanted those people to feel valued and respected again.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Can I push back though? I mean, yes, the line folks, I think, are all members of our community. But I mean, this is a company we were both there on the scene when San Bruno blew up. Right. This natural gas explosion. And that was just the first of many investigations that found shoddy record keeping, lying to regulators, covering up things in order to maximize profits. Like can you say that everybody really had the community’s best interest in line historically?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. So maybe I’m I’m talking generally there’s always the risk of bad apples for sure. And I guess maybe what I’m saying is that I knew that a company like this could be run well and that could be trustworthy. And that with the right kind of leadership and the right kind of focus on what is happening on the ground every day, not distracted by, you know, what’s new and interesting in the globe, but really focused on what’s happening here today. This company could be really important for the clean energy transition, for the ambitions of the state and the ambitions of the globe to thwart the effects of climate change. This company is essential to California’s ambition and the world’s forecast.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean we have no choice. We have to pay you guys no matter what as people who live in this region.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> You said a moment ago that you thought that PG&E could be an ethical ethically run company, suggests that there were things that happened before you got there that weren’t so ethical. What what were you thinking?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, you know, I don’t I wasn’t here. And so it’s very hard for me to. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well you must have looked at that pattern, right, before you took the job.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean, I saw the results of a lot of things that contributed to the outcomes that were so devastating to so many. And I knew that that did not have to be our future and that did not have to be the reality for the citizens of California who are served by PG&E, and that we could be a force for good. And so that that is really what I have been relentlessly focused on since the day I got here. My focus is on making sure that we are trustworthy, that we are honest and ethical and safe, and that we are doing what is necessary every single day to make it safer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Can I ask about the very structure of investor owned utilities? As somebody who did not come from a business or energy world? As I have covered and I’ve covered PG&E and a lot of these tragedies for the last 20 years. Why should a public utility be publicly traded? Like, why should something that we all rely on be subject to the whims of Wall Street, the desire to, you know, make shareholders…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Quarterly earnings reports?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. And isn’t that in itself a conflict?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, that is a great question. And I will tell you, when I left automotive and went to the energy industry and I was I was running power plants, I had the same thought. I thought, wowwee why is it where we need to make a profit here? Shouldn’t we be doing, like, our public good? And then the more I learned and the more I understood, particularly the business model, where we have to attract huge sums of capital to invest in the infrastructure because customers don’t pay for that every they don’t pay for it real time. Customers make a mortgage payment, if you will, on all of the assets. But we have to get the money from the capital markets. And so what I learned is that investor owned utilities actually do have to compete. We have to compete for capital. And when we compete for capital, we are benchmarked like crazy. Wall Street actually is a very important leg of the stool to make sure that we do good work. And when we don’t do good work, Wall Street exits. And so the fact that we have to attract capital actually helps create some real tension around our performance relative to our peers. And I can tell you, they rack and stack us and PG&E was at the bottom of the list. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When you say performance though, does that mean financial performance or…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think you might be surprised. Our investors recognize that there’s a virtuous cycle. It starts with serving customers. When you serve customers well and you keep the system safe, then regulators are more apt to be able to approve the things that you need to invest in that that’s when the investor gives their return. But they know if you lose trust with your regulator, you lose trust with your customers. You’re not going to get easy yeses and follow through and support for your ambitions.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, the company, of course, went into bankruptcy, which is a way of restructuring debt. And, you know, a lot of people see that as a way of escaping responsibility with rate payers. In fact, many in Wall Street on Wall Street made kind of a killing. Some of the hedge funds and others, you know, how do you respond to that criticism? You know, that the only real winner of all that was was the company and the shareholders? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And the company did come out very similar. Right? I mean, it’s structured the same at least.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, it is structured the same. And the state did have an option. I mean, the state had a choice to split up PG&E or, or municipalize PG&E at that moment. But I think when they looked at all the calculus, the idea of breaking up the company actually was not in the best interest of the people that we serve. And I will say that the company was not absolved of the of the debts in many ways. We’re still at a sub-investment grade. We still have to work very hard to attract capital from the capital markets. So there’s no doubt. And a lot of investors lost it all. And I want to just clarify one thing. When we talk about shareholders, it’s kind of interesting to me because a shareholder at a utility, I want to tell you who we’re talking about. We are not talking about the hedge funds. We’re not talking about the big fat cats on Wall Street. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well we were for a small period. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When we were in bankruptcy because they know how to come in and make their move. But a good utility, a utility like PG&E, our shareholders are moms and pops. Heck, you guys, probably our shareholders, you might not know it, Right. But in your retirement funds, in your 401Ks, in the firefighters funds, in the police funds, in the teachers, they’re invested in utilities and they are invested in PG&E. And so shareholders at PG&E, are moms and pops and I want to keep my promise to them too. They’ve entrusted their life savings to a mutual fund or something and asking for a little return to come back. That’s what PG&E delivers. When we deliver profits, we deliver profits for those moms and pops who are funding the infrastructure that keeps people safe in California.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you’re just joining us, you’re listening to a Political Breakdown from KQED Public Radio. I’m Marisa Lagos. Here is Scott Shafer. Our guest today, PG&E CEO Patti Poppe. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I want to ask about corporate culture. We’ve been told that your motto is “leading with love.” And. We mentioned earlier, you know, these decimating fires and natural gas explosion in San Bruno, felony charges, bankruptcy. Like what was the morale like when you got there and how do you change that and potentially the culture of a company if that’s needed?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, culture change at PG&E is the number one priority because it’s through our people that we deliver what we do. And there is no doubt that people had were shaken about their role in the past, their role in the future. How do they make it right? It’s a big entity. What is PG&E? And “leading with love” is a fundamental tenet that I felt needed to interrupt business status quo. To come in and say, Hello, I’m your new CEO and I lead with love. I got a lot of, like, reaction…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Like oh yeah, she’s from the Midwest. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, she’s from Michigan. Yeah no, the Midwest for sure. And they they, you know, in fact, I had people say, you know what? You can’t say that you’re losing credibility. I said, Oh my friends get used to it because I think love is essential ingredient. You know, you look at professional athletes, for example, I’m a huge Golden State Warriors fan and have been for a long time, long before I moved here. Maybe that’s why I migrated.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Draymond is from Michigan. Michigan State.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, that’s true. But you know, the athletes very the and the winning teams, of course, they always talk about how they love their teammates. They love their coach, they love the players. Why is that full expression of joy of the game constrained to only professional athletes? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I don’t know, we love each other. We like to talk about that at KQED.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s nice!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> You know, but in addition to the joy or maybe, you know, it adds to the joy, are the salaries and the bonuses that a lot of the executives get. It’s a lot of money. I think you’re you make 51 million, I think, per year.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">No, no, no, no. That was that was a one time make hole. I had already earned that money at my previous company. And the only way I wasn’t going to leave that on the table to take the job, so they paid me what I had made.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In 2021, yeah.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But there was also on the table, I think, $188 million in raises and bonuses for executives at a time when, you know, so many terrible things were happening. And I think a lot of people on the outside look and say, where is the accountability? Why do people working for companies that are either, you know, financially not doing well or doing bad things, you know, in out in the world as with the wildfires and so on? Why are why are people getting rewarded?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, I will say this. To attract talent, there are market rates for leadership. And people can work a lot of places. When I joined PG&E, the entire executive team was vacant, so there was no one there making money off what had happened. They had all been fired or had quit. I had to hire an entirely new team. I searched the entire world and the country for the best and brightest leaders, and I have to pay them to come. And they left good jobs. They did not need to come and they did. And so there’s there’s a market rate for talent, just like there’s a market rate for athletes, just like there’s a market rate for great radio broadcasters.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s not the same as athletes, let me tell you that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Nor is mine. But, you know, I think that that this idea that that to invest in leadership is essential to turning the company around. And so to invest in leadership, there darn better be a return on investment for customers and for our coworkers to have the right leaders in place.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, I want to talk about customers. We just saw approval of PG&E rates to go up for everyone in January. The average is going to be about $30 a month, which adds up over the course of a year to hundreds of dollars. Why is this happening? And especially given everything we’ve talked about, you know, you haven’t been CEO forever, but the customers have been paying for, you know, for a long time. And there’s been a lot in the past of evidence of not necessarily investing that money wisely or doing all the things that were promised under previous rates. So what’s the case to to to and you already made it to the regulators, but to the rate payers that this is justified?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Well, first of all, I when I first got here, I heard a lot of people say to me, oh my gosh, PG&E chose profits over safety. You didn’t invest in the infrastructure. Well, I will tell you, the leadership team at the helm of PG&E is very focused on delivering the safe infrastructure that will stand the test of time. That does cost something. The the good news is that rate increase that we requested and it’s a four year rate increase. We hadn’t had one in a couple of years. We did put in for this rate increase. There is some catch up for investments we’ve made in hardening the system and making the system safe to wildfire. We’ve had significant improvement in that area, which I’ll talk about. But the idea that over that four years, 2023, 2024, 2025 and 2026, the average the compound average rate increase for each of those four years is going to be around 3%. It just so happens the first year is the biggest bump and then actually it will come down next year and come down again the next year. There’s some catch up between 23 and 2024 that is embedded in that increase that will get spread back out over time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And that is largely to underground a lot of the wires?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That the undergrounding is a small piece. It’s a lot 85% of it is safety and infrastructure, though, investments all over the system. And the undergrounding was a small piece of that increase that the regulators really wanted to see us do more, could we do more and didn’t want to write a blank check and yes, tell us to go collect those dollars before we proved we could do it. I’m happy to report that this year we will have underground 350 miles of line that we have never done that before, almost double what we’ve ever done before.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And for years we heard that was way too expensive. And so is that is the technology changed? Is it just we’re at a point where that just needs to happen?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Two things. One, the comparison to building overhead conductor, which has been the standard to what we’re doing today, takes into account all of the vegetation management that we’re doing today that we were not doing before. PG&E spends 1.5 to 1.8 billion dollars a year taking down trees. That’s a problem. California, we need to save the trees and we need to instead of investing over a billion dollars a year, invest that same amount in a capital investment, you actually can invest in that undergrounding for less. It is lower cost than what we are doing today or before. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So were they just wrong before? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Before we weren’t doing as much vegetation management, so it wasn’t as much of a trade. But today we have to or we’re\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And then the executives say they were doing it and a lot of it wasn’t getting done.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I, I can’t actually I don’t know that. I don’t know that to be true.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Another question, though, how much of this the problem with wildfires and you know lines trees falling lines getting you know sparking and so on, how much of that can be resolved, do you think, from undergrounding versus new technology or hardening the system, adding resiliency?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It is all of the above. And I will say on undergrounding and we talk about our 10,000 mile plan and I sometimes wish I had called it the 9,442 mile plan because they’re very specific miles. These aren’t it isn’t an arbitrary 10,000. These are very specific high risk miles in the places where the trees are coming in contact with the lines and trees that look healthy on the outside that have some issue in the in the routes. We can now protect customers with those specific miles being underground.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That is PG&E CEO Patti Poppe. Thank you for coming in. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks a lot. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Wish we had more time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, I do, too. I’ll come back any time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That is going to do it for this edition of Political Breakdown. We’re a production of KQED Public Radio.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Our engineer today is Christopher Beale. Our producer is Izzy Bloom. I’m Scott Shafer. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m Marisa Lagos. We’ll see you next time. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-content post-body\">\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey there, everyone. From KQED Public Radio, this is Political Breakdown. I’m Marisa Lagos.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m Scott Shafer. Today on the Breakdown, our guest took the helm of Pacific Gas and Electric Company three years ago, just after the nation’s largest utility emerged from bankruptcy. And as it continues to face existential questions about its future at a time of climate change and evolving energy markets.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Patti Poppe is here. She’s now stearing PG&E through multiple challenges, including recent rate hikes, the continuing threat of wildfires and distrust of the company among many of its 16 million customers. We’re going to ask her about all that. And I got you to say existential in the lead, which was fun.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I know. I was I was afraid of mispronouncing that, but I think I got it right.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But before we bring Patti Poppe in, Scott, we do have to talk about some news this week, which is that Bakersfield Republican Congressman Kevin McCarthy is stepping down. He announced this in a bit of a surreal Wall Street Journal editorial today saying he will not finish his term. He’s going to leave at the end of the year. This comes two months, of course, after he was ousted as speaker by the far right faction in the House. And he says he did what, as I said, surreal. He says he did what he set out to accomplish. No matter the odds or personal cost. We did the right thing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, of course. You know, there are a lot of things that, you know, history will judge. Like January 6th, for example, where, of course, there was the Trump inspired mob stormed the Capitol. And it’s interesting because, you know, McCarthy was never really trusted by the far right part of his party. Right.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Even though he really aligned himself with them more than the moderates, honestly.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, in many ways, certainly increasingly, as time went by, and, you know, that changed from the time he was in Sacramento. But, you know, he was too willing to talk to Democrats, to willing to keep the government open, not willing to sort of force a crisis when it came to government spending or government funding as well. So, you know, I think we all remember when he came to the House floor on January 6th and really went after Trump blaming him for what happened. And then like a few weeks later was down at Mar a Lago.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kissing the ring, basically. I mean, it really was a remarkable especially when we heard later on some of the things he was saying behind the scenes. But, you know, I do think to your point, you know, McCarthy came up in Sacramento as a lawmaker here in California and was very well-liked across the aisle, was seen as a pretty centrist Republican, kind of a back slapper, always been fundraising. And yeah, but not somebody with like huge policy chops. And I think, you know, in some ways that kind of came back to bite him because there was so little trust of him among these wings of the party because he hadn’t ever been, you know, you may disagree with him or agree with him, but like someone like Mike Johnson, the current speaker, is clearly coming from a very specific point of view.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He is although, you know, he did some of the same things that McCarthy did and was deposed over like, you know, a government funding bill. And so I think, you know, it’s one thing to be a Matt Gaetz from Florida where you’re throwing bombs all the time. It’s another thing — and Nancy Pelosi talked with us about this many times — to be in charge of the caucus. You know, you have to get things done. You have to round up the votes. You have to count the votes.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And you have to make people believe that they can trust you even if they you don’t do what they ultimately want. And I think that that is lacking in general in this Republican caucus. But certainly he he had challenges.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He did, and I think even Democrats didn’t trust him. You know, at the end when the vote came to…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Especially Democrats. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer. \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well but I think there were some people, you know, Hakeem Jeffries, I think they considered maybe cutting some kind of a deal on a power sharing arrangement with him. But in the end, the caucus just didn’t trust him. They felt, you know, whether it was the going after the impeachment inquiry of Biden or Hunter Biden, all those things, you know, and just were backtracking on promises that they just didn’t want to keep him there.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right. I mean, it is interesting. You know, the thing that he was very good at was fundraising. He raised hundreds of millions of dollars for Republicans. I mean, just his ousting, I think, sounded some alarms within, you know, the campaign wings of the Republican caucus. And it’s going to be fascinating to see A, what he does next. He says he is he still wants to be involved, whatever that means. So we’ll see if he’s still involved in Republican politics. But what it’ll do to some of these competitive House races here in California, you know, he really has help folks like David Valadao in the Central Valley. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Protected him from Trump…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah Young Kim down in Orange County keep their seats at times.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah and you know very different in so many ways from Nancy Pelosi both you know, the role they played as speaker. But Nancy Pelosi, also a prolific fundraiser for her party, she stepped away. Now she’s the speaker emerita and is continuing. She’s running for reelection. That’s not make everybody happy in that. But she’s yeah, but she is continuing to raise money for the party. Something that it’ll be I don’t think McCarthy is going to necessarily want to do I mean his leaving, you know, before the end of the term and you know, with the eviction of George Santos, get throwing him out of the house, I mean, there are majorities down to like 2 or 3 votes right now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right. And I think that’s something that’s going to be fascinating also as we see a potential special election happen in his district, which is a safe red seat, we should say. This is not going to change the makeup of the California delegation per se. It does open up a rare opportunity to run for Congress on the safe seat.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But it’s a huge loss of power for all of you and part of a trend as well with Feinstein’s death and Pelosi stepping.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, and we’re seeing long time, you know, veterans like Anna Eshoo in the South Bay decided to step down. So it is definitely a moment of transition here. But I mean, in some of those cases, these are people have served for decades, are in their seventies or beyond. He is not. And so this really, I think, is indicative of this moment, you know, in American politics. Quickly, before we break, any thoughts on who might run for that seat?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, you know, you have to look, first of all, at which Senate and assembly seats are nested within that district. Shannon Grove, state senator, she’s been down there for quite a while. Vince Fong is in the assembly. He may run as well. I’m sure they’re all looking at it, doing polling, checking their fundraising. And there is also, we should say already even before he stepped down, there is a kind of a MAGA Republican running who is getting some help from Roger Stone, who is kind of conciliatory to Donald Trump so that he will probably stay in the race and then we’ll see if, you know, some better known Republicans jump in as well. And probably a Democrat or two. But it won’t really matter. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, we’ll keep an eye on it. And that means more elections for folks in that district because there will probably be two next year. Okay. We are going to take a short break. When we come back, we will be joined by PG&E CEO Patti Poppe. You’re listening to Political Breakdown from KQED Public Radio. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Welcome back to Political Breakdown. I’m Marisa Lagos here with Scott Shafer. And we are thrilled to welcome PG&E CEO Patty Poppe. She took over the largest investor owned utility in California as it was emerging from bankruptcy and the second time in 20 years. Must have been quite a job interview. Patti Poppe, welcome to the breakdown.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thank you for having me. Great to be with you.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, before we talk about your current role, I do want to go back. You grew up in Michigan. I think your mom was a school principal and teacher. Your dad was a nuclear engineer. And I mean, this is a very big job in an area that hadn’t does not has not historically always had women leaders. I’m curious, like, how your parents jobs and your upbringing informed your career path?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, well, that’s a great question. You know, I always would I always say my dad taught me how to be an engineer and my mom taught me how to be a leader. She was a great school principal. We all know that schools are such important places in the lives of so many people. And she was a great principal and a great leader for her teachers. So I got to see her do that. And that was always inspiring to me.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, and as Marisa said, you were, probably found yourself being the only woman or one of the few women in rooms, whether it was in the corporate suites or even in some of the undergrad and business school and post-grad classes you took. You took some really male, male-oriented kinds of.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Industrial engineering? Is that your…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Industrial engineering, I mean, GM. What was that like? What did you learn from that? What difference did it make to have you in the room at those times?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, since I had six sisters at home, I probably had plenty of women in my life telling me what to do. I was the baby, so I got lots of instruction, let’s just say. But I think growing up in automotive as an operator, as an engineer, you know, my dad really wanted me to be an engineer. He inspired and encouraged me to do so. None of my other sisters had been engineers, so I was sort of his last, last ditch effort to get one out of the bunch. And so I’m in this great pride and joy that way. But, you know, growing up in automotive, it was an interesting era at General Motors, there actually were more women than you might expect. Mary Barra’s the CEO at General Motors. She and I were contemporaries. She was a little bit ahead of me, but we had a lot of other really amazing women in operations. And so I grew up not actually thinking it was that strange. In fact, I felt like it was very well-received. And and maybe in some ways it was an advantage because people wanted to have more diverse leadership. And so maybe I got tested a little more early and pushed further and faster and, you know, was able to deliver when called. And so I feel good about what General Motors prepared me for professionally.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">How did you make the leap into energy? You went to DTE Energy and then CMS. I think they’re both also investor in utilities in Michigan?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s right. That’s right. My well, my dad actually worked for Consumers Energy, CMS Energy. So he retired from CMS Energy. Had done built nuclear power plants around the country. And so I was familiar with energy, but I had been in automotive and really at General Motors, we had to move around a lot. And I have young children and that’s one of the advantages of working for an energy company or a utility. We don’t have to move. And so my husband and I made a, you know, a family decision to settle in Michigan with our family and and raise our daughters. And so we we really made a personal decision that ended up being a really exciting professional move in the long run. Had I known, I had no idea at the time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So you ended up transitioning to PG&E. You were hired roughly 2020. And, you know, that was a time when the company was still, you know, in bankruptcy, emerging from bankruptcy, dealing with the aftermath of some devastating fires. What made you think that’s the job I want?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right. Super easy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Well, you know, I think I was compelled watching from afar, having been CEO at CMS Energy for at that time, five years. That was in my hometown. It was a very well-run company. We’d had our own transformation. And so I was able to observe and learn through that transformation at CMS and then to lead it myself. I did feel like I could help. I watched from afar what was happening here in California and specifically for PG&E, such an iconic company. After everything the company had been through and the the customers and our communities had been through. I felt like PG&E really needed an operating oriented leader. And I got a lot of calls. A lot of people called and asked me to consider taking the job. And the first several calls, I was like, No, no, no. You know, I’m I’m in a great place in my hometown. I lived next door to my sister and next door to my dad. There was no reason for me to move. But then, as I really considered the seriousness of what was happening here, I truly felt compelled to come and make a difference.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So it sounds like you wanted the challenge, because one of the things like prepping for this, I’m counting them up. I mean, before you arrive, the company had pled guilty or been found guilty of 90 felony counts and faced more. Like that feels like a bit of a red flag. I mean, what what was your thought in terms of like what you could bring to the table that might be different?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Well, I knew what it meant to run a very strong ethical and safe company, and I knew it was possible for PG&E too. And what I know is that the people who work for PG&E are not criminals. These are not bad people who set out to do harm. The people, the kind of people who are attracted to a utility and the kind of people who are attracted to PG&E are your neighbors, your friends, your family that set out to have a career at a company where they know they can make a difference in their hometown. And I wanted those people to feel valued and respected again.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Can I push back though? I mean, yes, the line folks, I think, are all members of our community. But I mean, this is a company we were both there on the scene when San Bruno blew up. Right. This natural gas explosion. And that was just the first of many investigations that found shoddy record keeping, lying to regulators, covering up things in order to maximize profits. Like can you say that everybody really had the community’s best interest in line historically?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. So maybe I’m I’m talking generally there’s always the risk of bad apples for sure. And I guess maybe what I’m saying is that I knew that a company like this could be run well and that could be trustworthy. And that with the right kind of leadership and the right kind of focus on what is happening on the ground every day, not distracted by, you know, what’s new and interesting in the globe, but really focused on what’s happening here today. This company could be really important for the clean energy transition, for the ambitions of the state and the ambitions of the globe to thwart the effects of climate change. This company is essential to California’s ambition and the world’s forecast.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean we have no choice. We have to pay you guys no matter what as people who live in this region.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> You said a moment ago that you thought that PG&E could be an ethical ethically run company, suggests that there were things that happened before you got there that weren’t so ethical. What what were you thinking?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, you know, I don’t I wasn’t here. And so it’s very hard for me to. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well you must have looked at that pattern, right, before you took the job.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean, I saw the results of a lot of things that contributed to the outcomes that were so devastating to so many. And I knew that that did not have to be our future and that did not have to be the reality for the citizens of California who are served by PG&E, and that we could be a force for good. And so that that is really what I have been relentlessly focused on since the day I got here. My focus is on making sure that we are trustworthy, that we are honest and ethical and safe, and that we are doing what is necessary every single day to make it safer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Can I ask about the very structure of investor owned utilities? As somebody who did not come from a business or energy world? As I have covered and I’ve covered PG&E and a lot of these tragedies for the last 20 years. Why should a public utility be publicly traded? Like, why should something that we all rely on be subject to the whims of Wall Street, the desire to, you know, make shareholders…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Quarterly earnings reports?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. And isn’t that in itself a conflict?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, that is a great question. And I will tell you, when I left automotive and went to the energy industry and I was I was running power plants, I had the same thought. I thought, wowwee why is it where we need to make a profit here? Shouldn’t we be doing, like, our public good? And then the more I learned and the more I understood, particularly the business model, where we have to attract huge sums of capital to invest in the infrastructure because customers don’t pay for that every they don’t pay for it real time. Customers make a mortgage payment, if you will, on all of the assets. But we have to get the money from the capital markets. And so what I learned is that investor owned utilities actually do have to compete. We have to compete for capital. And when we compete for capital, we are benchmarked like crazy. Wall Street actually is a very important leg of the stool to make sure that we do good work. And when we don’t do good work, Wall Street exits. And so the fact that we have to attract capital actually helps create some real tension around our performance relative to our peers. And I can tell you, they rack and stack us and PG&E was at the bottom of the list. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When you say performance though, does that mean financial performance or…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think you might be surprised. Our investors recognize that there’s a virtuous cycle. It starts with serving customers. When you serve customers well and you keep the system safe, then regulators are more apt to be able to approve the things that you need to invest in that that’s when the investor gives their return. But they know if you lose trust with your regulator, you lose trust with your customers. You’re not going to get easy yeses and follow through and support for your ambitions.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, the company, of course, went into bankruptcy, which is a way of restructuring debt. And, you know, a lot of people see that as a way of escaping responsibility with rate payers. In fact, many in Wall Street on Wall Street made kind of a killing. Some of the hedge funds and others, you know, how do you respond to that criticism? You know, that the only real winner of all that was was the company and the shareholders? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And the company did come out very similar. Right? I mean, it’s structured the same at least.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, it is structured the same. And the state did have an option. I mean, the state had a choice to split up PG&E or, or municipalize PG&E at that moment. But I think when they looked at all the calculus, the idea of breaking up the company actually was not in the best interest of the people that we serve. And I will say that the company was not absolved of the of the debts in many ways. We’re still at a sub-investment grade. We still have to work very hard to attract capital from the capital markets. So there’s no doubt. And a lot of investors lost it all. And I want to just clarify one thing. When we talk about shareholders, it’s kind of interesting to me because a shareholder at a utility, I want to tell you who we’re talking about. We are not talking about the hedge funds. We’re not talking about the big fat cats on Wall Street. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well we were for a small period. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When we were in bankruptcy because they know how to come in and make their move. But a good utility, a utility like PG&E, our shareholders are moms and pops. Heck, you guys, probably our shareholders, you might not know it, Right. But in your retirement funds, in your 401Ks, in the firefighters funds, in the police funds, in the teachers, they’re invested in utilities and they are invested in PG&E. And so shareholders at PG&E, are moms and pops and I want to keep my promise to them too. They’ve entrusted their life savings to a mutual fund or something and asking for a little return to come back. That’s what PG&E delivers. When we deliver profits, we deliver profits for those moms and pops who are funding the infrastructure that keeps people safe in California.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you’re just joining us, you’re listening to a Political Breakdown from KQED Public Radio. I’m Marisa Lagos. Here is Scott Shafer. Our guest today, PG&E CEO Patti Poppe. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I want to ask about corporate culture. We’ve been told that your motto is “leading with love.” And. We mentioned earlier, you know, these decimating fires and natural gas explosion in San Bruno, felony charges, bankruptcy. Like what was the morale like when you got there and how do you change that and potentially the culture of a company if that’s needed?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, culture change at PG&E is the number one priority because it’s through our people that we deliver what we do. And there is no doubt that people had were shaken about their role in the past, their role in the future. How do they make it right? It’s a big entity. What is PG&E? And “leading with love” is a fundamental tenet that I felt needed to interrupt business status quo. To come in and say, Hello, I’m your new CEO and I lead with love. I got a lot of, like, reaction…\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Like oh yeah, she’s from the Midwest. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, she’s from Michigan. Yeah no, the Midwest for sure. And they they, you know, in fact, I had people say, you know what? You can’t say that you’re losing credibility. I said, Oh my friends get used to it because I think love is essential ingredient. You know, you look at professional athletes, for example, I’m a huge Golden State Warriors fan and have been for a long time, long before I moved here. Maybe that’s why I migrated.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Draymond is from Michigan. Michigan State.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, that’s true. But you know, the athletes very the and the winning teams, of course, they always talk about how they love their teammates. They love their coach, they love the players. Why is that full expression of joy of the game constrained to only professional athletes? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I don’t know, we love each other. We like to talk about that at KQED.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s nice!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> You know, but in addition to the joy or maybe, you know, it adds to the joy, are the salaries and the bonuses that a lot of the executives get. It’s a lot of money. I think you’re you make 51 million, I think, per year.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">No, no, no, no. That was that was a one time make hole. I had already earned that money at my previous company. And the only way I wasn’t going to leave that on the table to take the job, so they paid me what I had made.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In 2021, yeah.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But there was also on the table, I think, $188 million in raises and bonuses for executives at a time when, you know, so many terrible things were happening. And I think a lot of people on the outside look and say, where is the accountability? Why do people working for companies that are either, you know, financially not doing well or doing bad things, you know, in out in the world as with the wildfires and so on? Why are why are people getting rewarded?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, I will say this. To attract talent, there are market rates for leadership. And people can work a lot of places. When I joined PG&E, the entire executive team was vacant, so there was no one there making money off what had happened. They had all been fired or had quit. I had to hire an entirely new team. I searched the entire world and the country for the best and brightest leaders, and I have to pay them to come. And they left good jobs. They did not need to come and they did. And so there’s there’s a market rate for talent, just like there’s a market rate for athletes, just like there’s a market rate for great radio broadcasters.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s not the same as athletes, let me tell you that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Nor is mine. But, you know, I think that that this idea that that to invest in leadership is essential to turning the company around. And so to invest in leadership, there darn better be a return on investment for customers and for our coworkers to have the right leaders in place.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, I want to talk about customers. We just saw approval of PG&E rates to go up for everyone in January. The average is going to be about $30 a month, which adds up over the course of a year to hundreds of dollars. Why is this happening? And especially given everything we’ve talked about, you know, you haven’t been CEO forever, but the customers have been paying for, you know, for a long time. And there’s been a lot in the past of evidence of not necessarily investing that money wisely or doing all the things that were promised under previous rates. So what’s the case to to to and you already made it to the regulators, but to the rate payers that this is justified?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Well, first of all, I when I first got here, I heard a lot of people say to me, oh my gosh, PG&E chose profits over safety. You didn’t invest in the infrastructure. Well, I will tell you, the leadership team at the helm of PG&E is very focused on delivering the safe infrastructure that will stand the test of time. That does cost something. The the good news is that rate increase that we requested and it’s a four year rate increase. We hadn’t had one in a couple of years. We did put in for this rate increase. There is some catch up for investments we’ve made in hardening the system and making the system safe to wildfire. We’ve had significant improvement in that area, which I’ll talk about. But the idea that over that four years, 2023, 2024, 2025 and 2026, the average the compound average rate increase for each of those four years is going to be around 3%. It just so happens the first year is the biggest bump and then actually it will come down next year and come down again the next year. There’s some catch up between 23 and 2024 that is embedded in that increase that will get spread back out over time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And that is largely to underground a lot of the wires?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That the undergrounding is a small piece. It’s a lot 85% of it is safety and infrastructure, though, investments all over the system. And the undergrounding was a small piece of that increase that the regulators really wanted to see us do more, could we do more and didn’t want to write a blank check and yes, tell us to go collect those dollars before we proved we could do it. I’m happy to report that this year we will have underground 350 miles of line that we have never done that before, almost double what we’ve ever done before.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And for years we heard that was way too expensive. And so is that is the technology changed? Is it just we’re at a point where that just needs to happen?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Two things. One, the comparison to building overhead conductor, which has been the standard to what we’re doing today, takes into account all of the vegetation management that we’re doing today that we were not doing before. PG&E spends 1.5 to 1.8 billion dollars a year taking down trees. That’s a problem. California, we need to save the trees and we need to instead of investing over a billion dollars a year, invest that same amount in a capital investment, you actually can invest in that undergrounding for less. It is lower cost than what we are doing today or before. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So were they just wrong before? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Before we weren’t doing as much vegetation management, so it wasn’t as much of a trade. But today we have to or we’re\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And then the executives say they were doing it and a lot of it wasn’t getting done.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I, I can’t actually I don’t know that. I don’t know that to be true.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Another question, though, how much of this the problem with wildfires and you know lines trees falling lines getting you know sparking and so on, how much of that can be resolved, do you think, from undergrounding versus new technology or hardening the system, adding resiliency?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It is all of the above. And I will say on undergrounding and we talk about our 10,000 mile plan and I sometimes wish I had called it the 9,442 mile plan because they’re very specific miles. These aren’t it isn’t an arbitrary 10,000. These are very specific high risk miles in the places where the trees are coming in contact with the lines and trees that look healthy on the outside that have some issue in the in the routes. We can now protect customers with those specific miles being underground.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That is PG&E CEO Patti Poppe. Thank you for coming in. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks a lot. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Wish we had more time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Patti Poppe: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, I do, too. I’ll come back any time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That is going to do it for this edition of Political Breakdown. We’re a production of KQED Public Radio.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Our engineer today is Christopher Beale. Our producer is Izzy Bloom. I’m Scott Shafer. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m Marisa Lagos. We’ll see you next time. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>"
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"content": "\u003cp>What’s up with Governor Gavin Newsom debating a presidential candidate? Marisa and Scott break down Newsom’s motivations for going head-to-head with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis tonight. Then, KQED science reporter Danielle Venton joins to dig into the home insurance crisis in California, brought on by a changing climate and the resulting natural disasters.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey there, everyone, from KQED Public Radio. This is Political Breakdown. I’m Marisa Largo.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m Scott Shafer. Today on the Breakdown, we dig into the home insurance crisis in California and beyond, brought on by a changing climate and the resulting natural disasters.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">KQED is own Danielle Venton and will be here to discuss her reporting, which is featured on a new season of the podcast Sold Out. But first, Scott, a big night tonight for our own California governor. For some reason, he’s in Georgia debating Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Follow the bouncing ball.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So what are they running for?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, exactly. Well, of course, DeSantis is trying to run for president. He’s have been struggling. Newsom insists he’s not running for president and he’s not.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Insists insists insists insists\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, he has subzero interest in that. But, he of course, has been raising his national profile, international profile, really with a trip to China and Israel. And so, yeah, he’s he’s been egging on, he’s been trolling DeSantis, along with Texas Governor Greg Abbott for months now. And they finally agreed to debate tonight on Fox with Sean Hannity, who apparently is buddies with Gavin Newsom now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Bromance, I believe, is the correct \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Bromance\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Bromance, frenemies? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah it’s a lot of testosterone I think in the room. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey I went back and found the tweet where Newsom originally challenged Santos to this debate. It includes lines like, “clearly you’re struggling, distracted and busy playing politics with people’s lives. I’ll bring my hair gel. You bring your hairspray.” So can we expect to that level of intellectualism do you think at this debate? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I hope not. I mean, there are some very substantive differences between these guys and between California and Florida. You did a lot of reporting, Marisa, on Covid policy and how differently California and Florida dealt with it. Now, there’s also things that Newsom’s going to have to defend, like all the homeless in San, homelessness in California.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Although there’s homelessness in Florida, too. Nobody talks about it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, there there is for sure. But like all these things, it’s like they’re each going to come armed with their data. And we know that Governor Newsom loves data. He loves studies and statistics. And you can kind of get lost in that. It’s not necessarily the kind of thing that wins over an audience. And I think ultimately it’s really going to be what impression do people take away from these, you know, this confrontation? I don’t think anybody’s going to remember this, the substance of their the details of what they talked about. But it’s like, you know, DeSantis has not been the most likable on the campaign trail. A lot of people don’t like Gavin Newsom. But nonetheless, you know, he beat back a recall. And, you know, this isn’t really his audience. It’s Fox News. It’s not his base.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But he loves that because he watches Fox News all the time, as we said. I mean, he’s been on with Hannity several times. They like to spar. He showed up at the GOP presidential debate to be in the spin room. I think it’s going to be fascinating to see. Hannity is promised to sort of like not do a lot, just kind of let them go at it. So we’ll see how that works out. That could be bad if they’re just like crosstalk over each other. But yeah, I think to your point, I mean, one of the analysts I spoke with about this is Selena Zito. She writes for The Washington Examiner and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. And she was like, you know, this is a rare debate where they could actually both kind of win in the sense that, like, they’re not talking to the same audiences. So I think as long as it doesn’t feel like a routing on either side, I think they both might sort of be able to sort of claim victory. And, you know, in Newsome’s case, as someone else pointed out to me, he gets to talk to an audience that he doesn’t always and that in itself is a win for him because he is trying to spread the good word of Gavin Newsom far and wide. For whenever he runs.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think he gets points as Pete Buttigieg does when he goes on Fox just for being there, because it is known as a kind of a very hostile to Democrats kind of environment. And so, you know, we’ll see how that goes. And, you know, Marissa, you and I saw him up close debating Brian Dahle in the gubernatorial election last year.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Saw? We moderated it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We moderated it. Yeah, we did. And, you know, we remember, I think, how aggressive Newsom was in that debate\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Better than I expected, honestly.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Better and more aggressive than I thought he would be. I’m using that hand thing that he does and Bill Clinton does. Sorry. But yeah, so I think we’ll expect I would expect to see more of that tonight. And what I hope is that it’s not just a bunch of screaming over each other that people actually get to hear what they’re saying.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, like makes a case. Why is your six week abortion ban better than California’s very, you know, liberal, so to speak, abortion, like, let’s get into it. Why the Don’t Say Gay versus like the way that we’ve handled LGBT rights here? I mean, these are serious issues that impact people’s lives. And, you know, this is an opportunity. We’ll have to see. All right. Before we go to a break, Scott, big news dropped just before the Thanksgiving holiday. The assembly speaker, Robert Rivas, who just took over, is has named a bunch of new committee assignments. This is the game of musical chairs, kingmaker himself. What do we know?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, well, you know, as the expression goes, to the winner go the spoils. And so he’s getting to reward some of his big allies and some of the bigger moves that he made. Assemblymember Cecilia Aguiar-Curry from Davis is going to be replacing Isaac Bryan, who was sort of Rivas’s top lieutenant in that contentious, you know, very long battle, very contentious battle that split the caucus to who would who was going to replace Anthony Rendon as the speaker. Bryan now takes over natural resources. And then Buffy Wicks here in the Bay Area gets a really plum assignment. She’ll be chair of a proposed appropriations. And, you know, both that and the Budget Committee, which is now going to be chaired by Jesse Gabriel, taking over from Phil Ting. Those are the real two, the real juice committees. And then just real quick, another change. You know, public safety, fentanyl has become a big issue and there’s going to be a change in the chair of that public safety committee, Reggie Jones Sawyer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">No surprise there. I mean, he is running in L.A. for a local office. He had gotten a lot of flak. I mean, I don’t I think he had told me that he was he knew he would be replaced, essentially. And he and he was happy about it because he’s going to be running for this local office.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Although, he’s being replaced by a guy running for mayor of Sacramento. Kevin McCarty. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right so it’s not like you can’t walk and chew gum. I mean, look, all of these are pretty progressive Democrats. Still. There are going to be some differences. I think there’s some cheering of the NIMBY sort that this idea that the sort of further strengthens, because I, I don’t think you can say that there a bunch of NIMBYs in charge before. To your point, Buffy Wicks, one of Rivas’s sort of top lieutenants in the speaker battle, getting that plum position although you know that also means you’re going to have to be the bad guy when it or bad lady when it comes time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She’s up for that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Yeah, I think she is. And I think that it I mean, it’s just I think these are the kinds of things that you’re like, okay, noted. You know, I think Isaac Bryan and him had kind of clashed because he had some, you know, designs on the leadership post as well. Yeah. But a lot of this is going to we’re going to have to wait and see what it actually means, you know?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. And I think the one one thing that is being noticed is that with Isaac Bryan leaving as sort of that inner circle for the speaker, there are now no Black members of the assembly who are really going to be among the top lieutenants for the new speaker. And there’s some consternation about that, although, you know, if you look at all the committee chairs, you know, it is a diverse group of folks.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it is interesting, I mean, because we’re also this is the first time in a very long time we don’t have a speaker from either L.A. or kind of Central Bay Area. Yeah. Rivas from Salinas is a much more sort of rural, different, just different vibe. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think it’s yeah, I think those are parts of California that never really feel represented in Sacramento, whether it’s the Central Valley or the Central Coast. So yeah, I think it’ll be very interesting and he seems to be uniting the caucus in a way that it certainly wasn’t, you know, by the end of last summer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’ll see.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, you will see.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">All right. We’re going to take a short break. When we come back, KQED science reporter Danielle Venton will join us to talk about her deep dive into the troubled home insurance market in California. You’re listening to Political Breakdown from KQED Public Radio. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Welcome back to Political Breakdown. I’m Marisa Lagos here with Scott Shafer. We are thrilled to have on the show today Danielle Venton. She is a science reporter here at KQED and was part of the team who just put out a new season of the podcast, Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America. This season is a six part look at the intersection of housing and climate change crises. Danielle, thanks for being here.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks so much for having me.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">All right. Well, we want to get into the politics on what’s happening here, but I thought we’d start with the way you open your episode of the show, which is the story of a Santa Rosa man, Jason Majors. Tell us a little bit about what happened to him and kind of why you used him as a central character in this whole narrative.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, I mean, I thought he typified the insurance crisis in sort of an unexpected way. So he until recently lived in northwest Santa Rosa in a very fire prone area, steep canyons, thick forests, lots of lots of overgrown brush, and survived about half a dozen fires in about the last seven years. He survived the Tubbs, the Kincade, the Walbridge, the Hennessy and the Glass fires and his home —\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And his home’s standing? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And his home is still standing. But he’s had his insurance canceled about as many times. When I spoke to him this summer, he still had insurance, but he was trying to sell his home because unfortunately, he’s getting a divorce and that’s part of the deal.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Just so we understand, like did he survive all those fires by dumb luck or did he do things to make it more defensible?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He’s worked on his property a lot.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He takes it real seriously.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Yeah. He spends days clearing brush. He has a, you know, a roof that is ready for fires that has mesh over the vents. I mean, he he does all the things he can to be prepared for fires. But he had a terrible, terribly hard time trying to sell his property. He had to drop the price four times before he found a buyer. And one of the things his agent told him was that prospective buyers liked the house. They liked the area, but they couldn’t get insurance, at least insurance that they were happy with. And so it really it was eroding into his personal wealth and, you know, the money that he’d have to use to start this new phase of life.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So this is, I mean, people I’m not going to lie Danielle, sometimes people get a little bored talking about insurance. Right. So, I mean, can you just kind of explain to us like what is the state of play here in California? When we talk about the insurance market, who are the key players when it comes to regulators, advocates? Like, how does the process work? I mean, obviously, we know as consumers, you buy a house, you got to get an insured. If you have a mortgage, you want to get it insured anyway because you don’t want something to happen. But like, how is what I pay regulated by the state? How does that all play out? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Absolutely. I mean, I think people think that insurance is boring. But I think it’s fascinating because it is our first line of defense against climate change for for most of us.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it’s basically betting. I mean, right? It’s gambling.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, totally. And it’s the it’s the thing that guarantees that, you know, if something bad happens to you, it doesn’t ruin your future life. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, at the same time, it’s like one of the few things you buy that you hope you never use.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">True. Yeah. Yeah. You know, and the less often you have to use it, the healthier the whole market is. And people are using insurance too often right now. And that’s the source of the big problem. So, you know, what’s what’s the who are the players here? You have insurance companies who are, you know, placing bets basically with with their consumers about, you know, how risky their property is. You have the insurance commissioner, Ricardo Lara, who regulates the industry in the state. And then you have different consumer advocate groups who are trying to trying to look out for customers.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So let’s dig into one of those, and that’s the insurance commissioner. That position was created by the voters in 1988, Proposition 103. And at that time, the big issue was auto insurance. Obviously, a lot has changed since then. So, you know, as we’re talking now about home insurance, but what else is on his plate and how much power does he, Ricardo Lara, have to address this problem?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, Prop 103 in 1988 made that an elected position. It had been appointed by the governor prior to that. So it affected car insurance, italso affected home insurance, business insurance. And he has a lot of power to determine how companies can do business, do business in the state. People have different interpretations of how well he’s using that power, whether whether he is, you know, whether Prop 103 has been, whether the rules have been kind of written to strictly, you know, above and beyond the letter of the law.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Can you tell us, like, what were the basics of 103? Like, what was besides creating this elected, you know, position? Like what what does it say?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I would assume the idea of that was to insulate that person from what, politics? To make them independent, which is kind of ironic because they’re elected now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, and now you could argue that it’s more subjected to populist winds because it is an elected position. So in the late ‘80s, car insurance in California was just increasing hand over fist. I mean, it was it was absurd. And so Prop 103 to start with, told insurance companies that they had to decrease their rates by 20%. But also that they couldn’t predict into the future how bad they thought risk was going to be. They had to use historical data to price risk. And that they couldn’t increase rates to much above about 7% without getting together all these documents, all this data going to the state and saying, hey, we want to raise our rates, you know, more than 7%. This is why you should let us. And the state would then take a look at that and say, yes you can, or no you can’t.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So created similar regulation to what we have in the electricity market, for example. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, right. And then it also created a opportunity for the public to get involved and challenge those rate increases. And if if members of the public wanted to do that, they could apply for the costs of doing that to be to be reimbursed. And some consumer advocates like Consumer Watchdog have made about $10 Million over the last decade not made, but they have been reimbursed millions of dollars for their work in challenging rate increases.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, it’s hard to understand how auto insurance could suddenly be going up, up, up, up. Like people are becoming worse drivers. But in the case of\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean maybe they were.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, maybe they were. But like not to justify those kind of rate increases that trigger this, but with, in this case, climate change and wildfires are, in fact making it more expensive for insurance companies and homeowners to survive. And so they have a better case to make, don’t they, that maybe their rates should be based on something else that’s really reflects the conditions.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Because things are changing, right? To your point about projections versus reflections, yeah. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think everyone who’s lived through the last seven years in this state realized that realizes that the risk that we thought existed ten years ago is not the risk that we have today. If you grant that, then I think it’s reasonable to, you know, to accept that maybe we need to pay more for that risk to be insured. Insurance companies want to be able to look into the future. And so they’re called catastrophic models, catastrophe modeling. Which would, which incorporate climate change models and local conditions into kind of predicting how much a place is at risk of fire or floods.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. So I guess, like what do you see as the politics here? Because it strikes me that an insurance commissioner, Ricardo Lara, needs to tackle this, but there’s also not a lot of like people like you don’t want to be the person overseeing huge increases in the market. Like, how do you see this kind of right now? It seems like nobody has really wanted to tackle it head on from the governor on down to the legislature and insurance commissioner. Do you think that’s fair?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think that’s fair. I think tackling it is not going to be popular, and that’s —\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Because rates will go up.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Because rates will go up. Now, let me let me say, you know, the devil’s advocate side of this. People’s rates going up maybe 20, 30% kind of across the state would mean paying a couple hundred dollars more a year for insurance. I don’t want to pay more. Like, I like having my insurance. You know, pretty reasonable. We should say, insurance in California cost quite a bit less than in other states with similar climate liabilities. I don’t want to pay more for insurance, but I also want to be able to sell my house.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right or buy a house. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s not the end of the world necessarily to pay a little bit more for insurance. It’s the end of the world if the insurance market continues to weaken and someday collapses. And the the path that we’re on right now, well I mean we are headed towards that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">How much could the governor do with an executive order or Ricardo Lara as insurance commissioner due unilaterally? I mean, to what extent can they address the problem on their own.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Through executive order, I don’t think the governor can do much. In September, he did issue an executive order asking for Ricardo Lara to take quick action on trying to stabilize the market. And two hours later, Ricardo Lara \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Almost as if they orchestrated the whole thing together!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Announced these big sets of changes. And some of these some of the things that he said would be considered are stuff that the insurance industry definitely wants. Like they want to be able to use catastrophic models, not just historical modeling. He said that they’d hire more staff to consider rate increases faster. But the big, you know, a big concession that he got from the insurance industry, which which shouldn’t be overlooked is that the insurance companies guaranteed that they would write, that they would cover 85% of homeowners in wildfire prone areas. These are the areas that insurance companies have been have been leaving kind of they’re sort of cherry picking who they want to insure so that they don’t have too much risk. And and that would be, you know, if 85% of homeowners can get good, fair market coverage in wildfire prone areas, that would take some of the risk off the public, sort of the public option. And, you know, that could be very good for stabilizing the market.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you’re just joining us, you’re listening to Political Breakdown from KQED Public Radio. I’m Marisa Lagos, here with Scott Shafer. We are talking with KQED science reporter Danielle Venton. We’re talking climate change, housing and insurance. All right. So the insurance commissioner is going down this regulatory route, not with a change in the law. Right? They’re trying to sort of restructure within the confines of Prop 103\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Basically rewrite the rules of 103.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The interpretation of 103. Which is controversial. Let’s talk about the pushback they’ve received. I know consumer watchdog you mentioned at the top is one of the biggest interveners. They’re one of the biggest groups in the state. They have reacted pretty angrily, I would say, to some of this. You know, we also saw a lot of pushback when there was an attempt in the legislature this summer to do some of this legislatively. And we’ve seen a bunch of members of Congress come out against it. What are they objecting to?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean, the if I just to say it bluntly, I think they want the past to still be the present. You know, they they there is a huge concern about rates going up. But it seems hard to figure out how you really fix this problem without rates going up. You can’t. You can’t wildfire safety your way out of the crisis we’re in right now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So in other words, you’re saying it’s going to take some political courage. We’ve got an insurance commissioner who just got reelected. And I don’t know if there are term limits for insurance commissioner, but, you know, he’s not going to face the voters in any case until 2026. You’d think that would maybe help him get a stronger spine. Newsom can’t run for governor again, but he’s\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And we should say Lara’s been on the show. We’ve asked him about this. He’s gotten a lot of heat since he got elected in 2018 for essentially reneging on a campaign promise. He said he would take no money from insurance companies. Public campaign filings show that he has. He also got some heat for hanging out with insurance lobbyists and things like that. So, I mean, there’s some distrust here, right, with the consumer advocates and other folks.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And some justification for that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, absolutely. But I have spoken with consumer advocates and in fact, John Garamendi, the congressman who penned the letter that was signed by by many, you know, a large portion of the congressional California congressional delegation.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Former insurance commissioner himself.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. And I was and he wrote this letter to Lara that said, you know, we we’re concerned with the steps that you’re taking and think that you should use your powers to to to take a closer look at basically the books of individual insurance companies. And I, I spoke with him yesterday. I really tried to push on, how do you think that more data is going to help him better regulate these companies? Don’t these companies kind of know their own bottom line and they’re deciding to leave? Seven of the top 12 insurance companies have left or are pulling back from the state. And I could not get a clear answer. It was a little bit bewildering. And unfortunately, he got pretty frustrated with me. I don’t understand. They don’t seem to make a concession that that interest the insurance industry regulation structure actually needs to change.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, we’re right in this moment where Newsom, the legislature, is very much in a yimby phase. You know, let’s build more housing. And I’m wondering, how does this problem of people not being able to get insurance in some parts of the state, how does that bump up against those priorities?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, my goodness. This is an enormous problem. You know, developers, people who are going to build homes, they’re one of the people who want to buy insurance. If they can’t get insurance, they’re not going to build those homes. And that really threatens everything the state is trying to do to become more affordable, more equitable. I mean, housing is a problem that affects all other areas of of the state.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What do we know about, you know, to Garamendi’s concerns and those of some of the consumer groups, like what do we know about insurance companies’ bottom lines? Like what do they have to tell us, you know, how much they make or tell Wall Street or whatever year after year?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean, we do get to we could do good indications of that. Insurance companies say that the catastrophic fires you fire years of 2017 and 2018 wiped out the previous 20 years of profits. I also spoke with an insurance industry analyst from the R Street Institute, and he says, you know, he his name is his last name is Theodorou. And he, you know, gives congressional testimony all the time and and is, you know, kind of a go to expert. People often ask him, hey, is the insurance industry just super greedy? And he went back and looked over a number of decades and found that while the S&P 500 over the last couple decades has gone up an average of 14% a year, insurance company profits, insurance companies make about 4% a year. You know, so. So they’re not making money hand over fist, like.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They could still be greedy, but that’s, that’s a judgment call.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">How much is enough? Yeah. But, you know, other states, of course, face similar climate change problems. Florida hurricanes, tornadoes, floods. You know, why are insurance companies not fleeing those states? Is it that the rate structure is just completely different and more beneficial to them?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, I mean, one thing to say is that people do pay more in other states like Louisiana, Texas, Florida that have big climate risks. Insurance companies are leaving Florida. Florida has enormous problems. They have really \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Them for the debate tonight. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, exactly. You know, they’re their version of sort of the what California has is a fair plan is like the insurer of last resort. Florida has a citizens insurance and it has its really undercapitalized, very shaky, enormous problems. So, you know, overall, there are some unique problems to California. But climate change is really upending the whole insurance industry model as we know it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So we have, on the one hand, the insurance commissioner rewriting these regulations. They will become public. There will be feedback. We will all hear the outcry, whatever they are. On the other hand, as I mentioned, the legislature tried and failed to get something over the finish line in the last few minutes. Like do you expect that to come back legislatively next year? And what what would they be tackling? Because as we know, a ballot measure has got to go back to the voters if you want to change them significantly.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, I think what’s on the table right now are just tweaks within the realm of, you know, Prop 103 and the idea of voters approving something that opponents can say, hey, this is going to make your rates skyrocket. I mean, it just seems like a just like\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Far cry? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, we started off this segment talking about Jason Majors, the man you met up in Santa Rosa, having a hard time selling his house because they can’t get insurance. I’m wondering, you know, to what extent, you know, can this be addressed by like communities deciding. Because there’s a line in your podcast about, you know, any home is only as safe as the least safe neighbor. So to what extent like do would it be helpful to have like a policy within a county or a neighborhood? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right something the government can help\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. To enforce and say, hey, you’ve got to make this less fire prone.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It would be enormously helpful. One of the most promising solutions I learned about in reporting from my podcast was spearheaded by the by the climate officer of Sonoma County, and she was trying to hammer out this plan where a neighborhood where people are having a lot of trouble getting insurance would all meet a certain level of fire safety, and in exchange they would basically be guaranteed from insurance companies reliable, affordable insurance if certain standards were maintained. I think that’s a that’s a potentially promising model. It was getting off the ground. And then, you know, Allstate and State Farm all began leaving and it just put the whole thing on ice. There’s other ideas, too, of, you know, looking at kind of landscape level safety with bringing in insurance companies, fire authorities. That really kind of needs to be in addition to some increase of rates. Community level safety really needs to be the way of the future. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Danielle Venton, she contributed to the podcast Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America. You can find it wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you so much for coming in.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks Danielle.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thank you.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s going to do it for this edition of Political Breakdown. We’re a production of KQED Public Radio.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Our engineer today is Christopher Beale. Our producer is Izzy Bloom. I’m Scott Shafer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m Marisa Lagos. You can also find this podcast wherever you find your podcasts. We’ll see you next time. Hope insurance is sexy now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\n",
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"description": "What’s up with Governor Gavin Newsom debating a presidential candidate? Marisa and Scott break down Newsom’s motivations for going head-to-head with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis tonight. Then, KQED science reporter Danielle Venton joins to dig into the home insurance crisis in California, brought on by a changing climate and the resulting natural disasters. Episode Transcript",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>What’s up with Governor Gavin Newsom debating a presidential candidate? Marisa and Scott break down Newsom’s motivations for going head-to-head with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis tonight. Then, KQED science reporter Danielle Venton joins to dig into the home insurance crisis in California, brought on by a changing climate and the resulting natural disasters.\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-content post-body\">\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey there, everyone, from KQED Public Radio. This is Political Breakdown. I’m Marisa Largo.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m Scott Shafer. Today on the Breakdown, we dig into the home insurance crisis in California and beyond, brought on by a changing climate and the resulting natural disasters.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">KQED is own Danielle Venton and will be here to discuss her reporting, which is featured on a new season of the podcast Sold Out. But first, Scott, a big night tonight for our own California governor. For some reason, he’s in Georgia debating Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Follow the bouncing ball.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So what are they running for?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, exactly. Well, of course, DeSantis is trying to run for president. He’s have been struggling. Newsom insists he’s not running for president and he’s not.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Insists insists insists insists\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, he has subzero interest in that. But, he of course, has been raising his national profile, international profile, really with a trip to China and Israel. And so, yeah, he’s he’s been egging on, he’s been trolling DeSantis, along with Texas Governor Greg Abbott for months now. And they finally agreed to debate tonight on Fox with Sean Hannity, who apparently is buddies with Gavin Newsom now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Bromance, I believe, is the correct \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Bromance\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Bromance, frenemies? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah it’s a lot of testosterone I think in the room. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey I went back and found the tweet where Newsom originally challenged Santos to this debate. It includes lines like, “clearly you’re struggling, distracted and busy playing politics with people’s lives. I’ll bring my hair gel. You bring your hairspray.” So can we expect to that level of intellectualism do you think at this debate? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I hope not. I mean, there are some very substantive differences between these guys and between California and Florida. You did a lot of reporting, Marisa, on Covid policy and how differently California and Florida dealt with it. Now, there’s also things that Newsom’s going to have to defend, like all the homeless in San, homelessness in California.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Although there’s homelessness in Florida, too. Nobody talks about it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, there there is for sure. But like all these things, it’s like they’re each going to come armed with their data. And we know that Governor Newsom loves data. He loves studies and statistics. And you can kind of get lost in that. It’s not necessarily the kind of thing that wins over an audience. And I think ultimately it’s really going to be what impression do people take away from these, you know, this confrontation? I don’t think anybody’s going to remember this, the substance of their the details of what they talked about. But it’s like, you know, DeSantis has not been the most likable on the campaign trail. A lot of people don’t like Gavin Newsom. But nonetheless, you know, he beat back a recall. And, you know, this isn’t really his audience. It’s Fox News. It’s not his base.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But he loves that because he watches Fox News all the time, as we said. I mean, he’s been on with Hannity several times. They like to spar. He showed up at the GOP presidential debate to be in the spin room. I think it’s going to be fascinating to see. Hannity is promised to sort of like not do a lot, just kind of let them go at it. So we’ll see how that works out. That could be bad if they’re just like crosstalk over each other. But yeah, I think to your point, I mean, one of the analysts I spoke with about this is Selena Zito. She writes for The Washington Examiner and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. And she was like, you know, this is a rare debate where they could actually both kind of win in the sense that, like, they’re not talking to the same audiences. So I think as long as it doesn’t feel like a routing on either side, I think they both might sort of be able to sort of claim victory. And, you know, in Newsome’s case, as someone else pointed out to me, he gets to talk to an audience that he doesn’t always and that in itself is a win for him because he is trying to spread the good word of Gavin Newsom far and wide. For whenever he runs.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think he gets points as Pete Buttigieg does when he goes on Fox just for being there, because it is known as a kind of a very hostile to Democrats kind of environment. And so, you know, we’ll see how that goes. And, you know, Marissa, you and I saw him up close debating Brian Dahle in the gubernatorial election last year.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Saw? We moderated it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We moderated it. Yeah, we did. And, you know, we remember, I think, how aggressive Newsom was in that debate\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Better than I expected, honestly.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Better and more aggressive than I thought he would be. I’m using that hand thing that he does and Bill Clinton does. Sorry. But yeah, so I think we’ll expect I would expect to see more of that tonight. And what I hope is that it’s not just a bunch of screaming over each other that people actually get to hear what they’re saying.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, like makes a case. Why is your six week abortion ban better than California’s very, you know, liberal, so to speak, abortion, like, let’s get into it. Why the Don’t Say Gay versus like the way that we’ve handled LGBT rights here? I mean, these are serious issues that impact people’s lives. And, you know, this is an opportunity. We’ll have to see. All right. Before we go to a break, Scott, big news dropped just before the Thanksgiving holiday. The assembly speaker, Robert Rivas, who just took over, is has named a bunch of new committee assignments. This is the game of musical chairs, kingmaker himself. What do we know?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, well, you know, as the expression goes, to the winner go the spoils. And so he’s getting to reward some of his big allies and some of the bigger moves that he made. Assemblymember Cecilia Aguiar-Curry from Davis is going to be replacing Isaac Bryan, who was sort of Rivas’s top lieutenant in that contentious, you know, very long battle, very contentious battle that split the caucus to who would who was going to replace Anthony Rendon as the speaker. Bryan now takes over natural resources. And then Buffy Wicks here in the Bay Area gets a really plum assignment. She’ll be chair of a proposed appropriations. And, you know, both that and the Budget Committee, which is now going to be chaired by Jesse Gabriel, taking over from Phil Ting. Those are the real two, the real juice committees. And then just real quick, another change. You know, public safety, fentanyl has become a big issue and there’s going to be a change in the chair of that public safety committee, Reggie Jones Sawyer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">No surprise there. I mean, he is running in L.A. for a local office. He had gotten a lot of flak. I mean, I don’t I think he had told me that he was he knew he would be replaced, essentially. And he and he was happy about it because he’s going to be running for this local office.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Although, he’s being replaced by a guy running for mayor of Sacramento. Kevin McCarty. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right so it’s not like you can’t walk and chew gum. I mean, look, all of these are pretty progressive Democrats. Still. There are going to be some differences. I think there’s some cheering of the NIMBY sort that this idea that the sort of further strengthens, because I, I don’t think you can say that there a bunch of NIMBYs in charge before. To your point, Buffy Wicks, one of Rivas’s sort of top lieutenants in the speaker battle, getting that plum position although you know that also means you’re going to have to be the bad guy when it or bad lady when it comes time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She’s up for that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Yeah, I think she is. And I think that it I mean, it’s just I think these are the kinds of things that you’re like, okay, noted. You know, I think Isaac Bryan and him had kind of clashed because he had some, you know, designs on the leadership post as well. Yeah. But a lot of this is going to we’re going to have to wait and see what it actually means, you know?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. And I think the one one thing that is being noticed is that with Isaac Bryan leaving as sort of that inner circle for the speaker, there are now no Black members of the assembly who are really going to be among the top lieutenants for the new speaker. And there’s some consternation about that, although, you know, if you look at all the committee chairs, you know, it is a diverse group of folks.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it is interesting, I mean, because we’re also this is the first time in a very long time we don’t have a speaker from either L.A. or kind of Central Bay Area. Yeah. Rivas from Salinas is a much more sort of rural, different, just different vibe. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think it’s yeah, I think those are parts of California that never really feel represented in Sacramento, whether it’s the Central Valley or the Central Coast. So yeah, I think it’ll be very interesting and he seems to be uniting the caucus in a way that it certainly wasn’t, you know, by the end of last summer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’ll see.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, you will see.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">All right. We’re going to take a short break. When we come back, KQED science reporter Danielle Venton will join us to talk about her deep dive into the troubled home insurance market in California. You’re listening to Political Breakdown from KQED Public Radio. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Welcome back to Political Breakdown. I’m Marisa Lagos here with Scott Shafer. We are thrilled to have on the show today Danielle Venton. She is a science reporter here at KQED and was part of the team who just put out a new season of the podcast, Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America. This season is a six part look at the intersection of housing and climate change crises. Danielle, thanks for being here.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks so much for having me.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">All right. Well, we want to get into the politics on what’s happening here, but I thought we’d start with the way you open your episode of the show, which is the story of a Santa Rosa man, Jason Majors. Tell us a little bit about what happened to him and kind of why you used him as a central character in this whole narrative.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, I mean, I thought he typified the insurance crisis in sort of an unexpected way. So he until recently lived in northwest Santa Rosa in a very fire prone area, steep canyons, thick forests, lots of lots of overgrown brush, and survived about half a dozen fires in about the last seven years. He survived the Tubbs, the Kincade, the Walbridge, the Hennessy and the Glass fires and his home —\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And his home’s standing? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And his home is still standing. But he’s had his insurance canceled about as many times. When I spoke to him this summer, he still had insurance, but he was trying to sell his home because unfortunately, he’s getting a divorce and that’s part of the deal.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Just so we understand, like did he survive all those fires by dumb luck or did he do things to make it more defensible?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He’s worked on his property a lot.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He takes it real seriously.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Yeah. He spends days clearing brush. He has a, you know, a roof that is ready for fires that has mesh over the vents. I mean, he he does all the things he can to be prepared for fires. But he had a terrible, terribly hard time trying to sell his property. He had to drop the price four times before he found a buyer. And one of the things his agent told him was that prospective buyers liked the house. They liked the area, but they couldn’t get insurance, at least insurance that they were happy with. And so it really it was eroding into his personal wealth and, you know, the money that he’d have to use to start this new phase of life.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So this is, I mean, people I’m not going to lie Danielle, sometimes people get a little bored talking about insurance. Right. So, I mean, can you just kind of explain to us like what is the state of play here in California? When we talk about the insurance market, who are the key players when it comes to regulators, advocates? Like, how does the process work? I mean, obviously, we know as consumers, you buy a house, you got to get an insured. If you have a mortgage, you want to get it insured anyway because you don’t want something to happen. But like, how is what I pay regulated by the state? How does that all play out? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Absolutely. I mean, I think people think that insurance is boring. But I think it’s fascinating because it is our first line of defense against climate change for for most of us.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it’s basically betting. I mean, right? It’s gambling.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, totally. And it’s the it’s the thing that guarantees that, you know, if something bad happens to you, it doesn’t ruin your future life. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, at the same time, it’s like one of the few things you buy that you hope you never use.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">True. Yeah. Yeah. You know, and the less often you have to use it, the healthier the whole market is. And people are using insurance too often right now. And that’s the source of the big problem. So, you know, what’s what’s the who are the players here? You have insurance companies who are, you know, placing bets basically with with their consumers about, you know, how risky their property is. You have the insurance commissioner, Ricardo Lara, who regulates the industry in the state. And then you have different consumer advocate groups who are trying to trying to look out for customers.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So let’s dig into one of those, and that’s the insurance commissioner. That position was created by the voters in 1988, Proposition 103. And at that time, the big issue was auto insurance. Obviously, a lot has changed since then. So, you know, as we’re talking now about home insurance, but what else is on his plate and how much power does he, Ricardo Lara, have to address this problem?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, Prop 103 in 1988 made that an elected position. It had been appointed by the governor prior to that. So it affected car insurance, italso affected home insurance, business insurance. And he has a lot of power to determine how companies can do business, do business in the state. People have different interpretations of how well he’s using that power, whether whether he is, you know, whether Prop 103 has been, whether the rules have been kind of written to strictly, you know, above and beyond the letter of the law.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Can you tell us, like, what were the basics of 103? Like, what was besides creating this elected, you know, position? Like what what does it say?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I would assume the idea of that was to insulate that person from what, politics? To make them independent, which is kind of ironic because they’re elected now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, and now you could argue that it’s more subjected to populist winds because it is an elected position. So in the late ‘80s, car insurance in California was just increasing hand over fist. I mean, it was it was absurd. And so Prop 103 to start with, told insurance companies that they had to decrease their rates by 20%. But also that they couldn’t predict into the future how bad they thought risk was going to be. They had to use historical data to price risk. And that they couldn’t increase rates to much above about 7% without getting together all these documents, all this data going to the state and saying, hey, we want to raise our rates, you know, more than 7%. This is why you should let us. And the state would then take a look at that and say, yes you can, or no you can’t.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So created similar regulation to what we have in the electricity market, for example. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, right. And then it also created a opportunity for the public to get involved and challenge those rate increases. And if if members of the public wanted to do that, they could apply for the costs of doing that to be to be reimbursed. And some consumer advocates like Consumer Watchdog have made about $10 Million over the last decade not made, but they have been reimbursed millions of dollars for their work in challenging rate increases.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, it’s hard to understand how auto insurance could suddenly be going up, up, up, up. Like people are becoming worse drivers. But in the case of\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean maybe they were.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, maybe they were. But like not to justify those kind of rate increases that trigger this, but with, in this case, climate change and wildfires are, in fact making it more expensive for insurance companies and homeowners to survive. And so they have a better case to make, don’t they, that maybe their rates should be based on something else that’s really reflects the conditions.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Because things are changing, right? To your point about projections versus reflections, yeah. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think everyone who’s lived through the last seven years in this state realized that realizes that the risk that we thought existed ten years ago is not the risk that we have today. If you grant that, then I think it’s reasonable to, you know, to accept that maybe we need to pay more for that risk to be insured. Insurance companies want to be able to look into the future. And so they’re called catastrophic models, catastrophe modeling. Which would, which incorporate climate change models and local conditions into kind of predicting how much a place is at risk of fire or floods.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. So I guess, like what do you see as the politics here? Because it strikes me that an insurance commissioner, Ricardo Lara, needs to tackle this, but there’s also not a lot of like people like you don’t want to be the person overseeing huge increases in the market. Like, how do you see this kind of right now? It seems like nobody has really wanted to tackle it head on from the governor on down to the legislature and insurance commissioner. Do you think that’s fair?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think that’s fair. I think tackling it is not going to be popular, and that’s —\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Because rates will go up.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Because rates will go up. Now, let me let me say, you know, the devil’s advocate side of this. People’s rates going up maybe 20, 30% kind of across the state would mean paying a couple hundred dollars more a year for insurance. I don’t want to pay more. Like, I like having my insurance. You know, pretty reasonable. We should say, insurance in California cost quite a bit less than in other states with similar climate liabilities. I don’t want to pay more for insurance, but I also want to be able to sell my house.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right or buy a house. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s not the end of the world necessarily to pay a little bit more for insurance. It’s the end of the world if the insurance market continues to weaken and someday collapses. And the the path that we’re on right now, well I mean we are headed towards that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">How much could the governor do with an executive order or Ricardo Lara as insurance commissioner due unilaterally? I mean, to what extent can they address the problem on their own.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Through executive order, I don’t think the governor can do much. In September, he did issue an executive order asking for Ricardo Lara to take quick action on trying to stabilize the market. And two hours later, Ricardo Lara \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Almost as if they orchestrated the whole thing together!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Announced these big sets of changes. And some of these some of the things that he said would be considered are stuff that the insurance industry definitely wants. Like they want to be able to use catastrophic models, not just historical modeling. He said that they’d hire more staff to consider rate increases faster. But the big, you know, a big concession that he got from the insurance industry, which which shouldn’t be overlooked is that the insurance companies guaranteed that they would write, that they would cover 85% of homeowners in wildfire prone areas. These are the areas that insurance companies have been have been leaving kind of they’re sort of cherry picking who they want to insure so that they don’t have too much risk. And and that would be, you know, if 85% of homeowners can get good, fair market coverage in wildfire prone areas, that would take some of the risk off the public, sort of the public option. And, you know, that could be very good for stabilizing the market.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you’re just joining us, you’re listening to Political Breakdown from KQED Public Radio. I’m Marisa Lagos, here with Scott Shafer. We are talking with KQED science reporter Danielle Venton. We’re talking climate change, housing and insurance. All right. So the insurance commissioner is going down this regulatory route, not with a change in the law. Right? They’re trying to sort of restructure within the confines of Prop 103\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Basically rewrite the rules of 103.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The interpretation of 103. Which is controversial. Let’s talk about the pushback they’ve received. I know consumer watchdog you mentioned at the top is one of the biggest interveners. They’re one of the biggest groups in the state. They have reacted pretty angrily, I would say, to some of this. You know, we also saw a lot of pushback when there was an attempt in the legislature this summer to do some of this legislatively. And we’ve seen a bunch of members of Congress come out against it. What are they objecting to?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean, the if I just to say it bluntly, I think they want the past to still be the present. You know, they they there is a huge concern about rates going up. But it seems hard to figure out how you really fix this problem without rates going up. You can’t. You can’t wildfire safety your way out of the crisis we’re in right now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So in other words, you’re saying it’s going to take some political courage. We’ve got an insurance commissioner who just got reelected. And I don’t know if there are term limits for insurance commissioner, but, you know, he’s not going to face the voters in any case until 2026. You’d think that would maybe help him get a stronger spine. Newsom can’t run for governor again, but he’s\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And we should say Lara’s been on the show. We’ve asked him about this. He’s gotten a lot of heat since he got elected in 2018 for essentially reneging on a campaign promise. He said he would take no money from insurance companies. Public campaign filings show that he has. He also got some heat for hanging out with insurance lobbyists and things like that. So, I mean, there’s some distrust here, right, with the consumer advocates and other folks.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And some justification for that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, absolutely. But I have spoken with consumer advocates and in fact, John Garamendi, the congressman who penned the letter that was signed by by many, you know, a large portion of the congressional California congressional delegation.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Former insurance commissioner himself.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. And I was and he wrote this letter to Lara that said, you know, we we’re concerned with the steps that you’re taking and think that you should use your powers to to to take a closer look at basically the books of individual insurance companies. And I, I spoke with him yesterday. I really tried to push on, how do you think that more data is going to help him better regulate these companies? Don’t these companies kind of know their own bottom line and they’re deciding to leave? Seven of the top 12 insurance companies have left or are pulling back from the state. And I could not get a clear answer. It was a little bit bewildering. And unfortunately, he got pretty frustrated with me. I don’t understand. They don’t seem to make a concession that that interest the insurance industry regulation structure actually needs to change.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, we’re right in this moment where Newsom, the legislature, is very much in a yimby phase. You know, let’s build more housing. And I’m wondering, how does this problem of people not being able to get insurance in some parts of the state, how does that bump up against those priorities?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, my goodness. This is an enormous problem. You know, developers, people who are going to build homes, they’re one of the people who want to buy insurance. If they can’t get insurance, they’re not going to build those homes. And that really threatens everything the state is trying to do to become more affordable, more equitable. I mean, housing is a problem that affects all other areas of of the state.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What do we know about, you know, to Garamendi’s concerns and those of some of the consumer groups, like what do we know about insurance companies’ bottom lines? Like what do they have to tell us, you know, how much they make or tell Wall Street or whatever year after year?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean, we do get to we could do good indications of that. Insurance companies say that the catastrophic fires you fire years of 2017 and 2018 wiped out the previous 20 years of profits. I also spoke with an insurance industry analyst from the R Street Institute, and he says, you know, he his name is his last name is Theodorou. And he, you know, gives congressional testimony all the time and and is, you know, kind of a go to expert. People often ask him, hey, is the insurance industry just super greedy? And he went back and looked over a number of decades and found that while the S&P 500 over the last couple decades has gone up an average of 14% a year, insurance company profits, insurance companies make about 4% a year. You know, so. So they’re not making money hand over fist, like.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They could still be greedy, but that’s, that’s a judgment call.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">How much is enough? Yeah. But, you know, other states, of course, face similar climate change problems. Florida hurricanes, tornadoes, floods. You know, why are insurance companies not fleeing those states? Is it that the rate structure is just completely different and more beneficial to them?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, I mean, one thing to say is that people do pay more in other states like Louisiana, Texas, Florida that have big climate risks. Insurance companies are leaving Florida. Florida has enormous problems. They have really \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Them for the debate tonight. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, exactly. You know, they’re their version of sort of the what California has is a fair plan is like the insurer of last resort. Florida has a citizens insurance and it has its really undercapitalized, very shaky, enormous problems. So, you know, overall, there are some unique problems to California. But climate change is really upending the whole insurance industry model as we know it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So we have, on the one hand, the insurance commissioner rewriting these regulations. They will become public. There will be feedback. We will all hear the outcry, whatever they are. On the other hand, as I mentioned, the legislature tried and failed to get something over the finish line in the last few minutes. Like do you expect that to come back legislatively next year? And what what would they be tackling? Because as we know, a ballot measure has got to go back to the voters if you want to change them significantly.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, I think what’s on the table right now are just tweaks within the realm of, you know, Prop 103 and the idea of voters approving something that opponents can say, hey, this is going to make your rates skyrocket. I mean, it just seems like a just like\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Far cry? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, we started off this segment talking about Jason Majors, the man you met up in Santa Rosa, having a hard time selling his house because they can’t get insurance. I’m wondering, you know, to what extent, you know, can this be addressed by like communities deciding. Because there’s a line in your podcast about, you know, any home is only as safe as the least safe neighbor. So to what extent like do would it be helpful to have like a policy within a county or a neighborhood? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right something the government can help\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. To enforce and say, hey, you’ve got to make this less fire prone.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It would be enormously helpful. One of the most promising solutions I learned about in reporting from my podcast was spearheaded by the by the climate officer of Sonoma County, and she was trying to hammer out this plan where a neighborhood where people are having a lot of trouble getting insurance would all meet a certain level of fire safety, and in exchange they would basically be guaranteed from insurance companies reliable, affordable insurance if certain standards were maintained. I think that’s a that’s a potentially promising model. It was getting off the ground. And then, you know, Allstate and State Farm all began leaving and it just put the whole thing on ice. There’s other ideas, too, of, you know, looking at kind of landscape level safety with bringing in insurance companies, fire authorities. That really kind of needs to be in addition to some increase of rates. Community level safety really needs to be the way of the future. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Danielle Venton, she contributed to the podcast Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America. You can find it wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you so much for coming in.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks Danielle.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Danielle Venton: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thank you.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s going to do it for this edition of Political Breakdown. We’re a production of KQED Public Radio.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Our engineer today is Christopher Beale. Our producer is Izzy Bloom. I’m Scott Shafer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m Marisa Lagos. You can also find this podcast wherever you find your podcasts. We’ll see you next time. Hope insurance is sexy now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>"
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"title": "David DePape Found Guilty In Paul Pelosi Attack",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Scott and Marisa are joined by KQED’s Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez to talk about the trial and verdict in the case of David DePape, who is accused of attacking Paul Pelosi with the hammer. Then, KQED politics and government correspondent Guy Marzorati joins to talk about protestors shutting down the Bay Bridge, Biden’s successful meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping and Guy’s weekend plans: covering the state Democratic Convention in Sacramento.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey, everyone. From KQED Public Radio, this is Political Breakdown. And I’m Marisa Largo.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m Scott Shafer. Today on The Breakdown, a guilty verdict in the case of the man who attacked Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul, after breaking into their San Francisco home last year.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Our very own Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez is here to update us on the conviction of David DePape and fill us in on the details of that trial, which he’s been in court for for the past couple of weeks. We will also chat with Guy Marzorati about his exciting weekend plans. He’s heading up to Sacramento for the state Democratic Convention. Thanks, Guy. But first, Joe, welcome back. Thank you for being here.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks for having me. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey Joe. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So under the wire, made it back in time for this taping. And, you know, we should say this guilty verdict came out today very shortly after the prosecutors had rested their case. Explain what he’s been convicted of exactly.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, sure. So it’s not as straightforward as you would expect as an attack with a hammer would be. These specific federal charges rely on Pelosi as a federal officer. It’s attacking the family member of a federal officer — assault, I should say — and attempted kidnapping of a federal officer in retaliation for her duties. So that makes this a lot different than what folks might expect.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And we saw DePape did take the stand in his own defense earlier in the week. I mean, did he talk about his intent? I mean, it was kind of surprising to some that that he actually, you know, was there to sort of help himself, but he didn’t really say anything that would seem to help him.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, I you know, it’s it’s an interesting choice because it really isn’t common to see the accused up there on the witness stand, right? But again, it has to do with these very specific charges. What the defense really was trying to get at is, why did he target Pelosi? What was his reason for going after Pelosi? In the defense’s arguments, they essentially were trying to say, well, if it was not because of her federal duties, like because she took a vote that they didn’t, that he didn’t like, or because she took funding away from a program that he didn’t like, if it wasn’t related to that and it was something outside of that, then actually this federal statute, this very particular and unique federal statute should not apply. So they got him up there and he’s telling way more details than we had heard before. He had an inflatable unicorn costume that he wanted to wear on video while breaking the speaker’s kneecaps and then potentially wheeling her out in the Congress. How he gets from her home to Congress, I can’t tell you. But what I will tell you is that was part of his plan. And then to lure someone that the court called Target One, who is an academic in queer theory to Pelosi’s home. That was the fascinating part. Pelosi wasn’t even his main target. His main target was this academic who he accused, quite erroneously, completely ridiculous of being a pedophile.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m still stuck on inflatable unicorn. Yeah.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They held it up in court. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, he had it. He had it in his possession?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They had it on his backpack in his person. Had it on his back in his purse. No, no. Not one, two. You have to have a backup.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And those things aren’t cheap. I know. I bought my kids them for Thanksgiving or for Halloween, rather. So I do want to back up, though, Joe, because a lot of the things you’re talking about sound pretty crazy, I think, to your average citizen. And but they do track, I think when you think about it with some of the conspiracy theories we’ve heard particularly Q Anon, when you talk about, you know, targeting someone like Pelosi, part of the whole Q Anon belief system is that Democrats are pedophiles and there’s a lot of sort of obsession with, I think, the queer community and LGBT rights. So what, I mean, can you just explain a little bit more about what the defense said, what he said about his own thinking? Because I think, you know, one thing I hope we can do is, I don’t know, maybe take some lessons from all of this about the kind of moment we live in. And is there anything that we heard that could push back against a lot of those conspiracies?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So DePape had a very, I would say, a sad and and hopeful and then sad again tale. He was a homeless man for a long while. But then when, you know, he started hatching his plan against Pelosi, he had found a home. Someone had let him live in their garage. He didn’t have a bathroom. He didn’t have a shower. He didn’t have a bed. He had a futon. We saw pictures of his futon that was slid up against the wall. A neighbor let him shower at her house. But, you know, there wasn’t other support for him. And here he was alone in this garage playing video games all day. And he described on the stand how he became radicalized. He would listen to right wing YouTubers and podcasters spewing all of this hate for hours. He would listen to it all weekend from start to finish, from when he woke up until he went to sleep and that radicalized him. And to the things you’re talking about, the pedophiles, the ideas that Democrats are helping pedophiles or that academics who study sex theory are pushing for molestation, all these crazy ideas. And that’s where he descended. There are groups doing this work. I talked to some folks at a group called Peril, which studies extremists, and there are ways to help people and deprogram them. But they are not easy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, you know, we call them crazy ideas. And, you know, Marisa, you alluded to sort of this moment we’re in in our politics. I mean, just the other day, Donald Trump was in New Hampshire, he called Nancy Pelosi a crazed lunatic. And then he says, what the hell was going on with her husband? Let’s not ask. I mean, this guy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, he said similar things when I saw him speak in Anaheim.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. So he’s like, fueling this stuff. And I have to say, it’s not quite related to the trial, but it’s beyond me. How folks can think that is the kind of mindset you want in the White House.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Honestly, it’s very related to the trial because, and I’ll tell you, because on the witness stand to have talked about how he wanted Nancy Pelosi to admit the lies she had told about Trump with Russiagate — this is the accusation about pornographic tapes with Trump in Russia, and he wanted her to confess to her lies about it. He had her YouTube videos that said that she lied about it. The YouTube videos told him that Trump was innocent and the left wing media was making up lies about Trump. And that is what radicalized — he went into tears was crying on the stand when he thought about the times when he was against Trump until he saw the light.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Wow. Well, I’m curious how prosecutors responded to like this sort of novel legal defense that, yes, he did this horrific act, but it was not directly related to Pelosi’s official duties. What how did the you know, federal prosecutors kind of counter that in the courtroom and just talk about the vibe to like during all of this. What was the audience thinking? What were the court officials, you know, what were their faces looking like?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: T\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">lking about vibe? The most shocking moment in this whole trial, I think, and we saw some pretty horrific stuff was when the defense first gave their argument. Because when the defense first gave their argument, they started out by straight up listing DePape’s crazy conspiracy theories with no qualifiers that the Jodi Linker, the federal public defender for the northern district, she starts by saying, Tom Hanks has raped a young girl and such and such a person is a pedophile. They start listing off these crazy things to the point where I think everyone in the room thought, Wow, do you believe this? Did DePape get you to say this? What’s happening here? And then she pivoted and says, Well, these are the crazy things DePape believes. You think they’re crazy. I think they’re crazy. But this case is not a whodunit. It’s a why done it. But the prosecutors, as you noted, as you’re asking about, prosecutors don’t really address that at all. 80% of the case, they never poked a hole in it. They never really went to it. Instead, they hammered home. So sorry, poor choice of words. They really pushed hard on the idea that he planned this meticulously for weeks, that he planned it through paying and purchasing for online services to find the addresses for his targets. And he had a long target list and that he meticulously purchased things that he knew would get him into the home and studied the home to get in. And that must have found purchase with the jury because they eventually came to the verdict they did.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. And they deliberated, I think, about 8 hours. And I don’t know, you know, it was a fairly short trial, so I don’t know if that seems like a lot of time or a little time. But it would have been shocking, though, wouldn’t it, given that all of this was on tape, you know, the hammer attack and him lying in a pool of blood, even though the federal charges kind of you know, as you say, they required intent, proving intent. But it must have been hard for the jurors, I would think, to separate out, you know, what he did versus why.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think this is a testament to how strong the defense’s case was, how strong they presented their case, I should say, because going into it, the experts I talked to said this should be a really open and shut thing. This should be really easy. And those are the ones where prosecutors sometimes fail. Right, Because it seems so easy. The defense really came out with all guns blazing. And I got to tell you, just as a layperson sitting in the gallery, like the prosecutors didn’t seem, it didn’t seem as immediately compelling, you had to think more about it. You had to think a lot more about really worked through the logic of what they were saying. Whereas if you just went off of how you felt in that moment, the defense really was very convincing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What was Paul Pelosi’s testimony like? He did take the stand. And I mean, I don’t know if all of our listeners have watched that horrible video, but he’s been through quite a bit. And it sounds like he, I don’t know, you characterize what it was like.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So he came in and I have to say there was a kind of a hush over the courtroom because we had been hearing all about the horrific things that happened to him. We had seen it from multiple angles. We had seen video that hadn’t been released to the public of him laying in a pool of his own blood and his what they call agonal breathing, which is like the death rattle when you’re trying to get more oxygen to your brain to save your brain. And it was absolutely horrific and frightening. And then here he is finally in person. And he described fear. You know, DePape burst into the room, surprising him as he was asleep on the third floor of his home. He described DePape repeatedly as like a bigger man. And DePape is quite tall, especially compared to Paul Pelosi. And how he had tried to escape. First, he tried to escape to the elevator, which is there’s an elevator door across from their bedroom and he couldn’t make it to kind of shut him off. And then he described how he hatched the plan to call 911 and kind of signal to them surreptitiously that he was in trouble without angering DePape.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And he’s very lucky. But it’s really extra showed extraordinary composure on his part to be able to the fact that he’s alive.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, my God. Talk about composure. He was so composed and he was so diplomatic with DePape, that DePape on the stand said, I had a good rapport with Paul Pelosi. I think we were getting along. Then the interesting thing about DePape is he’s the kind of person who, if you talk to him for five minutes about something completely innocuous, you would never know that he had a unfortunately twisted mind.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And he did apologize, right. To to Paul Pelosi.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He did. He did. He said, you know, Paul Pelosi was never my intended target. He only got in my way of pursuing evil, is what he said.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So former Speaker Nancy Pelosi was not in court. I know one of her daughters, Christine Pelosi, was there supporting her father.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Every day. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What has been the reaction from the Pelosi family and what was it like, you know, having them in court, do you think, for all the various players in this?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, the family really focused on Paul. They they you know, they called him Pop in their statement and said that he had incredible composure both that night in order to get himself safe, and on the stand. Which, you know, is very true. You heard him on the stand talk about how he lost his hair and wasn’t able to grow it back for nine months. You saw him on the stand while we looked at a photograph of his skull, depressed in the front from the hammer blow. And and you see all that and you’re watching all that while you know Christine is just behind you in the back row and thinking about what their family must be thinking. It’s quite a harrowing thing for all of them to go through. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Of course, this was a federal trial with federal charges. There are also pending charges from D.A. San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins. Any sense of where that’s going to go now that we have a guilty verdict?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Absolutely. Jenkins released a statement right away saying, hey, we’re pursuing those charges. We’ve got a pretrial hearing on the 29th of this month where they’re going to set a trial date. And he faces again up to life in prison for these state charges as well.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I guess I’m just curious before we let you go, Joe, like what’s your takeaway from this in terms of, like I mentioned earlier, just the bigger politics here, This was clearly, you know, a horrific event for the Pelosi family, for the city of San Francisco. I don’t know. Do you have any any hope that we can we can have better a better sort of dialog moving forward?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean, it’s not lost on me that, you know, a big central part of the case was the radicalization of David DePape, the kind of conspiracy theories around Nancy Pelosi that led to this. And those have not stopped. She she continues to hear them every day.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, well, not only her. And, you know, you wonder what impact that there’s been a lot of convictions in the January 6th cases as well. Same kind of radicalization happening. And you don’t, you know, you would hope that it would send a signal to people like, hey, maybe this isn’t the best, you know, route to go. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, and, you know, as they talked about on the stand of Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley was talking a lot about this statute that was tried under the one about federal duty, specifically, this was used in the January 6th insurrection. This was used the same statute for the insurrectionists, and it may need some updating. There’s a lot of debate about the intent of the statute, and it seemed there were some loopholes that may have been possible for the defense to drive through. I mean, we saw a day’s worth of deliberation.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">All right. Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez, KQED politics reporter, thank you so much for your time on this.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thank you both. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks, Joe.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">All right. We’re going to take a short break. When we come back, Guy Marzorati is going to join us to talk about all the other news this week. You might have heard there was a conference here in San Francisco. You are listening to Political Breakdown from KQED Public Radio. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Welcome back to Political Breakdown. I’m Marisa Lagos here with Scott Shafer. And Guy Marzorati, our trifecta of politics. Guy, welcome back. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey there. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Welcome to the other side of the glass.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Good to be here.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So it was a bit of a raucous we here in the Bay Area, ya’ll. We’re taping this Thursday afternoon. Thursday morning, protesters fully shut down the Bay Bridge for hours. Some of them allegedly threw their keys into the bay to, you know, to prevent their cars from moving. We saw a protest most days. President Biden was down at this beautiful estate south of San Francisco, meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Governor was here, vice president. I don’t know. Broad takeaways, guys, what do you think?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well you know, I think it’s not quite over yet, but it seems from San Francisco’s perspective, they got a lot out of it. You know, it looked good on TV.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Even the protests. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Even the protests and the protests were, you know, they didn’t get out of hand. This wasn’t like the Democrats convention in Chicago. You know, in 1968, it was you know, they got a chance to make their point. The police seemed to\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It did seem a little on the edge yesterday.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It was on the edge, yeah, it was on the edge. But I think, you know, in some ways and people will talk about the summit with, you know, Biden and Xi Jinping. But I think in some ways, you know, when you have events like this, what the long term takeaway is more the connections that are made between people, you know, from different parts of the world, whether they’re talking about climate change or trade or whatever, immigration, whatever it might be. And I think those are that’s really the value of conventions generally, those those connections you make.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean, going into this, I think given the stakes of the US-China relationship, it seem like there is no way that Biden’s meeting with Xi could be overshadowed by anything. But it almost was. I mean, I think the takeaway for a lot of people living in the Bay Area who may not have been involved in APEC might be the Bay Bridge shutdown and the and the protests over Gaza that were happening there. And even Biden’s press conference yesterday, I think, you know, there was so much focus on on his description of Israeli Israel’s attack on the hospital in Gaza that I think almost that news and that issue itself in some ways overwhelmed what the real purpose of of this convention was and certainly the summit between those two leaders.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Although you could argue maybe that’s not the worst thing diplomatically. I think that, you know, the relationship between China and the U.S. was so bad going into this. I mean, our military is haven’t even been talking in the last few years. And, you know, I think Biden went in with very clear goals. He wasn’t going to make best friends with Xi. Right. He was going to try to reestablish those relationships, make sure that when something goes wrong, that they can, you know, pick up the phone, you know, and and it was funny, though, I say that they’re not best friends, but he I think he said they met for 68 hours at one point when they were both vice presidents or \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They spent a lot of time together. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So they do know each other. But yeah, I mean, I do think that obviously in general, what is going on in Israel, in Gaza is the sort of biggest news right now. And that is a huge part of this. And to your point, I mean, we heard him, I think very forcefully sort of restate his support for Israel this week, but and allude to this idea that, I mean, he kind of hinted that he thinks they’re making progress on the hostages and he definitely backed up Israeli defense and intelligence over this question of whether there is Hamas operating out of this hospital.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And kind of a split screen moment with Biden’s comments and then the protests we see on the Bay Bridge on something that you’ve been looking into, which is how local congressional delegation here in the Bay Area is responding to this. And it’s an issue in which you do see daylight between our congressional delegation, all kind of all Democrats in this region, daylight between them and the kind of activist wing of the Democratic Party.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And even their staff in some cases. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You talked to Ro Khanna this week.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I did. So I’ll just tease. I have an episode dropping tomorrow on our podcast, The Bay here at KQED. So I looked pretty deeply at where all roughly ten members of the Bay Area delegation, you can, you know, grab some and takes them out depending on where you sort of put that. But nine out of ten of them are not calling for a cease fire, which is exactly what the protesters on the Bay Bridge were asking for. Barbara Lee is the only one who has called for that. And yeah, I had a phone call with Ro Khanna, who had a staff member depart pretty publicly over his refusal to call for a cease fire. And, you know, Khanna was very blunt about the fact that he just doesn’t feel like that that is the right diplomatic move right now. But he also was very, you know, sort of strong on his feeling that there’s no justification, you know, that killing one Hamas fighter cannot justify killing 500 civilians. And he had very kind words actually, for his former staff staffer. He said it was a very civil conversation. It sounds like they both left it respecting each other. This young man just didn’t feel like he could work for Khanna over this issue.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, and I think that these protesters and world leaders, too, who have been talking about this. The U.N., for that matter, they’re making their point. They’re being heard. I mean, there’s no question that the president and secretary of State, Blinken, they’re pivoting, they’re recalibrating their position on this. They’re talking more about Palestinians and a two state solution that must happen. The fact that Israel cannot occupy Gaza after this is all over, Israel has yet to come up with the solid evidence that there was, in fact, a military base under that, you know, hospital. So, you know, I think, you know, to your point about the press conference, Guy, with Xi and Biden, I mean, there are really more questions about Israel and Hamas than there were about the talks that had just happened with the two leaders. And I think in some ways, you know, if you’re the White House, if you’re the presidential campaign, that’s not such a bad thing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s what I’m saying. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, and and I think, too, they’re probably just grateful there were no huge gaffes. You know, and it’s funny because when you when you watch the president, you know, you’re just waiting. He doesn’t have that command that you would hope a president would have. You know, he didn’t make any mistakes. But, you know, you kind of you’re kind of waiting.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is funny because I think we all blame that on Joe Biden’s age. But let’s face it, like that’s been Joe Biden for a long time. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Joe Biden brand.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But I agree. I think that in some ways, in these diplomatic, very tense talks, like no news is good news in a weird way, like, no, you know, nothing upsetting the applecart, so to speak.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And also, you know, the kind of news cycles we have now, the two big breakthroughs on fentanyl and reconstituting the military communication between the two countries. Like that came out like a day before, you know so it’s all kind of like old by the time the press conference happened for sure.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But I do think I mean the fentanyl thing I think is worth mentioning, given where we’re sitting, that that is a huge issue for the U.S. And I think that, you know, it’s not going to solve it. But but China has a lot of power here to disrupt the flow of these precursor chemicals. And I think that, you know, any opening in that is something that is good from a public health perspective and potentially is going to be good for politically for for Biden. Okay. Before we wrap this show, let’s talk about your exciting weekend ahead, Guy. Heading down to Sacto. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Heading to the Democratic convention, the organizing and endorsing convention of the state Democratic Party. So these are all the, you know, the party faithful, the delegates from all corners of California descending on Sacramento. I kind of, so the big highlight, I think we’ll be hearing from the Democratic Senate candidates who are going to have to address delegates now that there’s not, you know, an imminent government shutdown. This feels like Barbara Lee’s moment. This or to put it another way, this kind of feels like Barbara Lee’s last stand. Right. You know, the issue environment that exists with what’s happening in Gaza, she is is this kind of seems tailor made for really her career and kind of the moral authority that she’s held on on foreign policy issues dating back to her historic vote, being the only member of Congress to vote against the authorization of force for Afghanistan. It kind of feels like, you know, she needs to draw the contrast, certainly with Adam Schiff, also with Katie Porter to some extent, and really make herself the candidate for, you know, the people that are in the streets protesting right now, you know, pushing for a cease fire, which, as you said, she’s been the only member of Congress here in the Bay Area.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But she\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">hasn’t been out there pushing\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She hasn’t been out there. And, you know, even, you know, the super PAC that’s supporting her, they put out a million dollar ad buy. I think they’re feeling that pressure right now, like we need to, you know, really up her in the polls before it gets too late. And even that it relied a lot on her really incredible life story, but it didn’t draw that really sharp contrast that I think she needs to be drawn at this moment.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think the most important thing that any of the Senate candidates could get would be an endorsement from the party. But that seems completely out of reach. You need a 60% vote. So Barbara Lee is not going to get that, even though this, you know, this party is to the left, even of the, you know, the base of the Democratic Party in a lot of ways in California, we’ve said before they didn’t endorse Dianne Feinstein, you know, six years ago or five years ago when she was running against Kevin de Leon. But what else is happening, Guy? Because, you know, there will be an endorsement, but there’s also some talk about Rusty Hicks, the party chair, and what’s going to happen with him. He may run for the state assembly.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right. He’s now moved up to the north coast. So he’s in this second assembly district that Jim Wood, who is, you know, held for a number of years, says he’s not going to be running again in 2024. So that’s created a lot of speculation. Well, maybe Rusty Hicks is going to leave the party chair and run for this assembly seat. There’s going to be a lot of, you know, endorsement fights, I think, happening in districts even here in the Bay Area, state Senate districts in which we have multiple Democrats running. Again, this endorsement thing, basically there’s a pre-convention process that happens if you get within a certain threshold that then goes to the convention. So you’re going to see some districts where literally the party endorsement is at stake this weekend. And I think it means a lot in a thing in an assembly race or in the Senate race, especially with the timeline that we’re talking about here before the March primary. Voters just aren’t going to have a lot of information to work with. Voting starts at the beginning of February. We are, you know, literally getting within months of that. And so for in a lot of these races that Democratic Party endorsement means a lot. And that’s why it’s going to be, you know, a lot of fighting happening on the floor in Sacramento this weekend.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m interested to hear afterward like how much some of these looming ballot measure fights could also play here. I know I have already talked to some consultants who are working against big oil to defend the setbacks that the legislature passed, you know, requiring oil and gas operations to be a certain distance from schools and homes and things like that. There’s this huge fight looming over this business roundtable measure we’ve talked about before that would essentially cut off local governments and the state government at the knees around tax increases.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Or even an issue like rent control that divided the Democratic Party in each of the last few times it’s been on the state ballot. Again, as Scott alluded to, this base of delegates is to the left of the electorate, the Democratic electorate. And so you have seen the party support these efforts for rent control in the past, even when leading Democrats in the state, like the governor have not backed it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But that one’s more complicated anyway because of who’s sponsoring it, the AID’s health care foundation, there’s a big take out today in the L.A. Times looking at the that organization and Michael Weinstein, who leads it and the sort of horrific conditions at some of their low income housing and the evictions that they have undertaken. So that ones like that, there’s a lot going on with that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, well, and coming back to the Middle East, too, I mean, Palestine, Hamas, Israel, I mean, I’m imagining that’s going to be a big topic. Protests and, you know, topic of conversation. You know, depending on what Rusty Hicks does, there could also be a fight for party chair. We’ve seen that be pretty heated in the past between him and Kimberly Ellis a few years ago. Any sense of you know, that? I mean, let’s just face it, we care about that and maybe five other people.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s not a big —\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The timing would be would be interesting, though, right, to to make this move for the assembly now —\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As we head into 2024.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As we head right into this election in 2024, when really like the organizing of the party does need to be on point, especially in these kind of swing districts where you need that kind of grassroots structure, infrastructure.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, you wonder if people might just want him to stay there.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay. Less than a minute left, guys. But we got to mention the fact that Kevin McCarthy got accused of — \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kidney punch\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kidney punching another member of Congress\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">An NPR reporter was there and witnessed it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> We had the Draymond head lock. We had the Kevin McCarthy elbow. People need to — \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">My kids are wrestling\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He didn’t get suspended, though. Unlike Draymond\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It feels like things are going a little off the rails in Congress, ya’ll.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, absolutely. And there was also kind of also a confrontation in the Senate between two Republican senators you know this \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And a Republican senator threatening a union boss, both of them saying they’re going to fight. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Calm down, deep breath. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Back to the top of the show, yeah, everybody deep breath, it’s politics not MMA. All right, we’ll keep an eye on that. You know, McCarthy, there’s a thought he may not run again, so we’ll have to see.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Gotta right wing challenger. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">All right. Thanks, Guy. Thanks so much for coming in. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">My pleasure. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Have fun in Sacramento weekend.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That is going to do it for this edition of Political Breakdown. We are a production of KQED Public Radio.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Our engineer today is Jim Bennett, our producers Guy Marzorati and Izzy Bloom. I’m Scott Shafer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m Marisa Lagos. Happy Thanksgiving. We will have a show on Thanksgiving. So hope to see you then. If not, have a great week.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Bye bye.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Scott and Marisa are joined by KQED’s Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez to talk about the trial and verdict in the case of David DePape, who is accused of attacking Paul Pelosi with the hammer. Then, KQED politics and government correspondent Guy Marzorati joins to talk about protestors shutting down the Bay Bridge, Biden’s successful meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping and Guy’s weekend plans: covering the state Democratic Convention in Sacramento.\u003c/span>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-content post-body\">\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey, everyone. From KQED Public Radio, this is Political Breakdown. And I’m Marisa Largo.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m Scott Shafer. Today on The Breakdown, a guilty verdict in the case of the man who attacked Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul, after breaking into their San Francisco home last year.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Our very own Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez is here to update us on the conviction of David DePape and fill us in on the details of that trial, which he’s been in court for for the past couple of weeks. We will also chat with Guy Marzorati about his exciting weekend plans. He’s heading up to Sacramento for the state Democratic Convention. Thanks, Guy. But first, Joe, welcome back. Thank you for being here.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks for having me. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey Joe. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So under the wire, made it back in time for this taping. And, you know, we should say this guilty verdict came out today very shortly after the prosecutors had rested their case. Explain what he’s been convicted of exactly.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, sure. So it’s not as straightforward as you would expect as an attack with a hammer would be. These specific federal charges rely on Pelosi as a federal officer. It’s attacking the family member of a federal officer — assault, I should say — and attempted kidnapping of a federal officer in retaliation for her duties. So that makes this a lot different than what folks might expect.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And we saw DePape did take the stand in his own defense earlier in the week. I mean, did he talk about his intent? I mean, it was kind of surprising to some that that he actually, you know, was there to sort of help himself, but he didn’t really say anything that would seem to help him.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, I you know, it’s it’s an interesting choice because it really isn’t common to see the accused up there on the witness stand, right? But again, it has to do with these very specific charges. What the defense really was trying to get at is, why did he target Pelosi? What was his reason for going after Pelosi? In the defense’s arguments, they essentially were trying to say, well, if it was not because of her federal duties, like because she took a vote that they didn’t, that he didn’t like, or because she took funding away from a program that he didn’t like, if it wasn’t related to that and it was something outside of that, then actually this federal statute, this very particular and unique federal statute should not apply. So they got him up there and he’s telling way more details than we had heard before. He had an inflatable unicorn costume that he wanted to wear on video while breaking the speaker’s kneecaps and then potentially wheeling her out in the Congress. How he gets from her home to Congress, I can’t tell you. But what I will tell you is that was part of his plan. And then to lure someone that the court called Target One, who is an academic in queer theory to Pelosi’s home. That was the fascinating part. Pelosi wasn’t even his main target. His main target was this academic who he accused, quite erroneously, completely ridiculous of being a pedophile.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m still stuck on inflatable unicorn. Yeah.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They held it up in court. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, he had it. He had it in his possession?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They had it on his backpack in his person. Had it on his back in his purse. No, no. Not one, two. You have to have a backup.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And those things aren’t cheap. I know. I bought my kids them for Thanksgiving or for Halloween, rather. So I do want to back up, though, Joe, because a lot of the things you’re talking about sound pretty crazy, I think, to your average citizen. And but they do track, I think when you think about it with some of the conspiracy theories we’ve heard particularly Q Anon, when you talk about, you know, targeting someone like Pelosi, part of the whole Q Anon belief system is that Democrats are pedophiles and there’s a lot of sort of obsession with, I think, the queer community and LGBT rights. So what, I mean, can you just explain a little bit more about what the defense said, what he said about his own thinking? Because I think, you know, one thing I hope we can do is, I don’t know, maybe take some lessons from all of this about the kind of moment we live in. And is there anything that we heard that could push back against a lot of those conspiracies?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So DePape had a very, I would say, a sad and and hopeful and then sad again tale. He was a homeless man for a long while. But then when, you know, he started hatching his plan against Pelosi, he had found a home. Someone had let him live in their garage. He didn’t have a bathroom. He didn’t have a shower. He didn’t have a bed. He had a futon. We saw pictures of his futon that was slid up against the wall. A neighbor let him shower at her house. But, you know, there wasn’t other support for him. And here he was alone in this garage playing video games all day. And he described on the stand how he became radicalized. He would listen to right wing YouTubers and podcasters spewing all of this hate for hours. He would listen to it all weekend from start to finish, from when he woke up until he went to sleep and that radicalized him. And to the things you’re talking about, the pedophiles, the ideas that Democrats are helping pedophiles or that academics who study sex theory are pushing for molestation, all these crazy ideas. And that’s where he descended. There are groups doing this work. I talked to some folks at a group called Peril, which studies extremists, and there are ways to help people and deprogram them. But they are not easy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, you know, we call them crazy ideas. And, you know, Marisa, you alluded to sort of this moment we’re in in our politics. I mean, just the other day, Donald Trump was in New Hampshire, he called Nancy Pelosi a crazed lunatic. And then he says, what the hell was going on with her husband? Let’s not ask. I mean, this guy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, he said similar things when I saw him speak in Anaheim.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. So he’s like, fueling this stuff. And I have to say, it’s not quite related to the trial, but it’s beyond me. How folks can think that is the kind of mindset you want in the White House.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Honestly, it’s very related to the trial because, and I’ll tell you, because on the witness stand to have talked about how he wanted Nancy Pelosi to admit the lies she had told about Trump with Russiagate — this is the accusation about pornographic tapes with Trump in Russia, and he wanted her to confess to her lies about it. He had her YouTube videos that said that she lied about it. The YouTube videos told him that Trump was innocent and the left wing media was making up lies about Trump. And that is what radicalized — he went into tears was crying on the stand when he thought about the times when he was against Trump until he saw the light.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Wow. Well, I’m curious how prosecutors responded to like this sort of novel legal defense that, yes, he did this horrific act, but it was not directly related to Pelosi’s official duties. What how did the you know, federal prosecutors kind of counter that in the courtroom and just talk about the vibe to like during all of this. What was the audience thinking? What were the court officials, you know, what were their faces looking like?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: T\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">lking about vibe? The most shocking moment in this whole trial, I think, and we saw some pretty horrific stuff was when the defense first gave their argument. Because when the defense first gave their argument, they started out by straight up listing DePape’s crazy conspiracy theories with no qualifiers that the Jodi Linker, the federal public defender for the northern district, she starts by saying, Tom Hanks has raped a young girl and such and such a person is a pedophile. They start listing off these crazy things to the point where I think everyone in the room thought, Wow, do you believe this? Did DePape get you to say this? What’s happening here? And then she pivoted and says, Well, these are the crazy things DePape believes. You think they’re crazy. I think they’re crazy. But this case is not a whodunit. It’s a why done it. But the prosecutors, as you noted, as you’re asking about, prosecutors don’t really address that at all. 80% of the case, they never poked a hole in it. They never really went to it. Instead, they hammered home. So sorry, poor choice of words. They really pushed hard on the idea that he planned this meticulously for weeks, that he planned it through paying and purchasing for online services to find the addresses for his targets. And he had a long target list and that he meticulously purchased things that he knew would get him into the home and studied the home to get in. And that must have found purchase with the jury because they eventually came to the verdict they did.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. And they deliberated, I think, about 8 hours. And I don’t know, you know, it was a fairly short trial, so I don’t know if that seems like a lot of time or a little time. But it would have been shocking, though, wouldn’t it, given that all of this was on tape, you know, the hammer attack and him lying in a pool of blood, even though the federal charges kind of you know, as you say, they required intent, proving intent. But it must have been hard for the jurors, I would think, to separate out, you know, what he did versus why.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think this is a testament to how strong the defense’s case was, how strong they presented their case, I should say, because going into it, the experts I talked to said this should be a really open and shut thing. This should be really easy. And those are the ones where prosecutors sometimes fail. Right, Because it seems so easy. The defense really came out with all guns blazing. And I got to tell you, just as a layperson sitting in the gallery, like the prosecutors didn’t seem, it didn’t seem as immediately compelling, you had to think more about it. You had to think a lot more about really worked through the logic of what they were saying. Whereas if you just went off of how you felt in that moment, the defense really was very convincing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What was Paul Pelosi’s testimony like? He did take the stand. And I mean, I don’t know if all of our listeners have watched that horrible video, but he’s been through quite a bit. And it sounds like he, I don’t know, you characterize what it was like.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So he came in and I have to say there was a kind of a hush over the courtroom because we had been hearing all about the horrific things that happened to him. We had seen it from multiple angles. We had seen video that hadn’t been released to the public of him laying in a pool of his own blood and his what they call agonal breathing, which is like the death rattle when you’re trying to get more oxygen to your brain to save your brain. And it was absolutely horrific and frightening. And then here he is finally in person. And he described fear. You know, DePape burst into the room, surprising him as he was asleep on the third floor of his home. He described DePape repeatedly as like a bigger man. And DePape is quite tall, especially compared to Paul Pelosi. And how he had tried to escape. First, he tried to escape to the elevator, which is there’s an elevator door across from their bedroom and he couldn’t make it to kind of shut him off. And then he described how he hatched the plan to call 911 and kind of signal to them surreptitiously that he was in trouble without angering DePape.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And he’s very lucky. But it’s really extra showed extraordinary composure on his part to be able to the fact that he’s alive.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, my God. Talk about composure. He was so composed and he was so diplomatic with DePape, that DePape on the stand said, I had a good rapport with Paul Pelosi. I think we were getting along. Then the interesting thing about DePape is he’s the kind of person who, if you talk to him for five minutes about something completely innocuous, you would never know that he had a unfortunately twisted mind.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And he did apologize, right. To to Paul Pelosi.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He did. He did. He said, you know, Paul Pelosi was never my intended target. He only got in my way of pursuing evil, is what he said.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So former Speaker Nancy Pelosi was not in court. I know one of her daughters, Christine Pelosi, was there supporting her father.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Every day. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What has been the reaction from the Pelosi family and what was it like, you know, having them in court, do you think, for all the various players in this?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, the family really focused on Paul. They they you know, they called him Pop in their statement and said that he had incredible composure both that night in order to get himself safe, and on the stand. Which, you know, is very true. You heard him on the stand talk about how he lost his hair and wasn’t able to grow it back for nine months. You saw him on the stand while we looked at a photograph of his skull, depressed in the front from the hammer blow. And and you see all that and you’re watching all that while you know Christine is just behind you in the back row and thinking about what their family must be thinking. It’s quite a harrowing thing for all of them to go through. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah. Of course, this was a federal trial with federal charges. There are also pending charges from D.A. San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins. Any sense of where that’s going to go now that we have a guilty verdict?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Absolutely. Jenkins released a statement right away saying, hey, we’re pursuing those charges. We’ve got a pretrial hearing on the 29th of this month where they’re going to set a trial date. And he faces again up to life in prison for these state charges as well.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I guess I’m just curious before we let you go, Joe, like what’s your takeaway from this in terms of, like I mentioned earlier, just the bigger politics here, This was clearly, you know, a horrific event for the Pelosi family, for the city of San Francisco. I don’t know. Do you have any any hope that we can we can have better a better sort of dialog moving forward?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean, it’s not lost on me that, you know, a big central part of the case was the radicalization of David DePape, the kind of conspiracy theories around Nancy Pelosi that led to this. And those have not stopped. She she continues to hear them every day.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, well, not only her. And, you know, you wonder what impact that there’s been a lot of convictions in the January 6th cases as well. Same kind of radicalization happening. And you don’t, you know, you would hope that it would send a signal to people like, hey, maybe this isn’t the best, you know, route to go. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, and, you know, as they talked about on the stand of Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley was talking a lot about this statute that was tried under the one about federal duty, specifically, this was used in the January 6th insurrection. This was used the same statute for the insurrectionists, and it may need some updating. There’s a lot of debate about the intent of the statute, and it seemed there were some loopholes that may have been possible for the defense to drive through. I mean, we saw a day’s worth of deliberation.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">All right. Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez, KQED politics reporter, thank you so much for your time on this.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thank you both. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks, Joe.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">All right. We’re going to take a short break. When we come back, Guy Marzorati is going to join us to talk about all the other news this week. You might have heard there was a conference here in San Francisco. You are listening to Political Breakdown from KQED Public Radio. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Welcome back to Political Breakdown. I’m Marisa Lagos here with Scott Shafer. And Guy Marzorati, our trifecta of politics. Guy, welcome back. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hey there. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Welcome to the other side of the glass.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Good to be here.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So it was a bit of a raucous we here in the Bay Area, ya’ll. We’re taping this Thursday afternoon. Thursday morning, protesters fully shut down the Bay Bridge for hours. Some of them allegedly threw their keys into the bay to, you know, to prevent their cars from moving. We saw a protest most days. President Biden was down at this beautiful estate south of San Francisco, meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Governor was here, vice president. I don’t know. Broad takeaways, guys, what do you think?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well you know, I think it’s not quite over yet, but it seems from San Francisco’s perspective, they got a lot out of it. You know, it looked good on TV.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Even the protests. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Even the protests and the protests were, you know, they didn’t get out of hand. This wasn’t like the Democrats convention in Chicago. You know, in 1968, it was you know, they got a chance to make their point. The police seemed to\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It did seem a little on the edge yesterday.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It was on the edge, yeah, it was on the edge. But I think, you know, in some ways and people will talk about the summit with, you know, Biden and Xi Jinping. But I think in some ways, you know, when you have events like this, what the long term takeaway is more the connections that are made between people, you know, from different parts of the world, whether they’re talking about climate change or trade or whatever, immigration, whatever it might be. And I think those are that’s really the value of conventions generally, those those connections you make.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I mean, going into this, I think given the stakes of the US-China relationship, it seem like there is no way that Biden’s meeting with Xi could be overshadowed by anything. But it almost was. I mean, I think the takeaway for a lot of people living in the Bay Area who may not have been involved in APEC might be the Bay Bridge shutdown and the and the protests over Gaza that were happening there. And even Biden’s press conference yesterday, I think, you know, there was so much focus on on his description of Israeli Israel’s attack on the hospital in Gaza that I think almost that news and that issue itself in some ways overwhelmed what the real purpose of of this convention was and certainly the summit between those two leaders.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Although you could argue maybe that’s not the worst thing diplomatically. I think that, you know, the relationship between China and the U.S. was so bad going into this. I mean, our military is haven’t even been talking in the last few years. And, you know, I think Biden went in with very clear goals. He wasn’t going to make best friends with Xi. Right. He was going to try to reestablish those relationships, make sure that when something goes wrong, that they can, you know, pick up the phone, you know, and and it was funny, though, I say that they’re not best friends, but he I think he said they met for 68 hours at one point when they were both vice presidents or \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They spent a lot of time together. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So they do know each other. But yeah, I mean, I do think that obviously in general, what is going on in Israel, in Gaza is the sort of biggest news right now. And that is a huge part of this. And to your point, I mean, we heard him, I think very forcefully sort of restate his support for Israel this week, but and allude to this idea that, I mean, he kind of hinted that he thinks they’re making progress on the hostages and he definitely backed up Israeli defense and intelligence over this question of whether there is Hamas operating out of this hospital.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And kind of a split screen moment with Biden’s comments and then the protests we see on the Bay Bridge on something that you’ve been looking into, which is how local congressional delegation here in the Bay Area is responding to this. And it’s an issue in which you do see daylight between our congressional delegation, all kind of all Democrats in this region, daylight between them and the kind of activist wing of the Democratic Party.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And even their staff in some cases. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You talked to Ro Khanna this week.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I did. So I’ll just tease. I have an episode dropping tomorrow on our podcast, The Bay here at KQED. So I looked pretty deeply at where all roughly ten members of the Bay Area delegation, you can, you know, grab some and takes them out depending on where you sort of put that. But nine out of ten of them are not calling for a cease fire, which is exactly what the protesters on the Bay Bridge were asking for. Barbara Lee is the only one who has called for that. And yeah, I had a phone call with Ro Khanna, who had a staff member depart pretty publicly over his refusal to call for a cease fire. And, you know, Khanna was very blunt about the fact that he just doesn’t feel like that that is the right diplomatic move right now. But he also was very, you know, sort of strong on his feeling that there’s no justification, you know, that killing one Hamas fighter cannot justify killing 500 civilians. And he had very kind words actually, for his former staff staffer. He said it was a very civil conversation. It sounds like they both left it respecting each other. This young man just didn’t feel like he could work for Khanna over this issue.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, and I think that these protesters and world leaders, too, who have been talking about this. The U.N., for that matter, they’re making their point. They’re being heard. I mean, there’s no question that the president and secretary of State, Blinken, they’re pivoting, they’re recalibrating their position on this. They’re talking more about Palestinians and a two state solution that must happen. The fact that Israel cannot occupy Gaza after this is all over, Israel has yet to come up with the solid evidence that there was, in fact, a military base under that, you know, hospital. So, you know, I think, you know, to your point about the press conference, Guy, with Xi and Biden, I mean, there are really more questions about Israel and Hamas than there were about the talks that had just happened with the two leaders. And I think in some ways, you know, if you’re the White House, if you’re the presidential campaign, that’s not such a bad thing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s what I’m saying. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, and and I think, too, they’re probably just grateful there were no huge gaffes. You know, and it’s funny because when you when you watch the president, you know, you’re just waiting. He doesn’t have that command that you would hope a president would have. You know, he didn’t make any mistakes. But, you know, you kind of you’re kind of waiting.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is funny because I think we all blame that on Joe Biden’s age. But let’s face it, like that’s been Joe Biden for a long time. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Joe Biden brand.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But I agree. I think that in some ways, in these diplomatic, very tense talks, like no news is good news in a weird way, like, no, you know, nothing upsetting the applecart, so to speak.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And also, you know, the kind of news cycles we have now, the two big breakthroughs on fentanyl and reconstituting the military communication between the two countries. Like that came out like a day before, you know so it’s all kind of like old by the time the press conference happened for sure.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But I do think I mean the fentanyl thing I think is worth mentioning, given where we’re sitting, that that is a huge issue for the U.S. And I think that, you know, it’s not going to solve it. But but China has a lot of power here to disrupt the flow of these precursor chemicals. And I think that, you know, any opening in that is something that is good from a public health perspective and potentially is going to be good for politically for for Biden. Okay. Before we wrap this show, let’s talk about your exciting weekend ahead, Guy. Heading down to Sacto. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Heading to the Democratic convention, the organizing and endorsing convention of the state Democratic Party. So these are all the, you know, the party faithful, the delegates from all corners of California descending on Sacramento. I kind of, so the big highlight, I think we’ll be hearing from the Democratic Senate candidates who are going to have to address delegates now that there’s not, you know, an imminent government shutdown. This feels like Barbara Lee’s moment. This or to put it another way, this kind of feels like Barbara Lee’s last stand. Right. You know, the issue environment that exists with what’s happening in Gaza, she is is this kind of seems tailor made for really her career and kind of the moral authority that she’s held on on foreign policy issues dating back to her historic vote, being the only member of Congress to vote against the authorization of force for Afghanistan. It kind of feels like, you know, she needs to draw the contrast, certainly with Adam Schiff, also with Katie Porter to some extent, and really make herself the candidate for, you know, the people that are in the streets protesting right now, you know, pushing for a cease fire, which, as you said, she’s been the only member of Congress here in the Bay Area.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But she\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">hasn’t been out there pushing\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She hasn’t been out there. And, you know, even, you know, the super PAC that’s supporting her, they put out a million dollar ad buy. I think they’re feeling that pressure right now, like we need to, you know, really up her in the polls before it gets too late. And even that it relied a lot on her really incredible life story, but it didn’t draw that really sharp contrast that I think she needs to be drawn at this moment.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think the most important thing that any of the Senate candidates could get would be an endorsement from the party. But that seems completely out of reach. You need a 60% vote. So Barbara Lee is not going to get that, even though this, you know, this party is to the left, even of the, you know, the base of the Democratic Party in a lot of ways in California, we’ve said before they didn’t endorse Dianne Feinstein, you know, six years ago or five years ago when she was running against Kevin de Leon. But what else is happening, Guy? Because, you know, there will be an endorsement, but there’s also some talk about Rusty Hicks, the party chair, and what’s going to happen with him. He may run for the state assembly.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Right. He’s now moved up to the north coast. So he’s in this second assembly district that Jim Wood, who is, you know, held for a number of years, says he’s not going to be running again in 2024. So that’s created a lot of speculation. Well, maybe Rusty Hicks is going to leave the party chair and run for this assembly seat. There’s going to be a lot of, you know, endorsement fights, I think, happening in districts even here in the Bay Area, state Senate districts in which we have multiple Democrats running. Again, this endorsement thing, basically there’s a pre-convention process that happens if you get within a certain threshold that then goes to the convention. So you’re going to see some districts where literally the party endorsement is at stake this weekend. And I think it means a lot in a thing in an assembly race or in the Senate race, especially with the timeline that we’re talking about here before the March primary. Voters just aren’t going to have a lot of information to work with. Voting starts at the beginning of February. We are, you know, literally getting within months of that. And so for in a lot of these races that Democratic Party endorsement means a lot. And that’s why it’s going to be, you know, a lot of fighting happening on the floor in Sacramento this weekend.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m interested to hear afterward like how much some of these looming ballot measure fights could also play here. I know I have already talked to some consultants who are working against big oil to defend the setbacks that the legislature passed, you know, requiring oil and gas operations to be a certain distance from schools and homes and things like that. There’s this huge fight looming over this business roundtable measure we’ve talked about before that would essentially cut off local governments and the state government at the knees around tax increases.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Or even an issue like rent control that divided the Democratic Party in each of the last few times it’s been on the state ballot. Again, as Scott alluded to, this base of delegates is to the left of the electorate, the Democratic electorate. And so you have seen the party support these efforts for rent control in the past, even when leading Democrats in the state, like the governor have not backed it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But that one’s more complicated anyway because of who’s sponsoring it, the AID’s health care foundation, there’s a big take out today in the L.A. Times looking at the that organization and Michael Weinstein, who leads it and the sort of horrific conditions at some of their low income housing and the evictions that they have undertaken. So that ones like that, there’s a lot going on with that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, well, and coming back to the Middle East, too, I mean, Palestine, Hamas, Israel, I mean, I’m imagining that’s going to be a big topic. Protests and, you know, topic of conversation. You know, depending on what Rusty Hicks does, there could also be a fight for party chair. We’ve seen that be pretty heated in the past between him and Kimberly Ellis a few years ago. Any sense of you know, that? I mean, let’s just face it, we care about that and maybe five other people.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s not a big —\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The timing would be would be interesting, though, right, to to make this move for the assembly now —\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As we head into 2024.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As we head right into this election in 2024, when really like the organizing of the party does need to be on point, especially in these kind of swing districts where you need that kind of grassroots structure, infrastructure.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, you wonder if people might just want him to stay there.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay. Less than a minute left, guys. But we got to mention the fact that Kevin McCarthy got accused of — \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kidney punch\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kidney punching another member of Congress\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">An NPR reporter was there and witnessed it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati:\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> We had the Draymond head lock. We had the Kevin McCarthy elbow. People need to — \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">My kids are wrestling\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He didn’t get suspended, though. Unlike Draymond\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It feels like things are going a little off the rails in Congress, ya’ll.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, absolutely. And there was also kind of also a confrontation in the Senate between two Republican senators you know this \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And a Republican senator threatening a union boss, both of them saying they’re going to fight. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Calm down, deep breath. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Back to the top of the show, yeah, everybody deep breath, it’s politics not MMA. All right, we’ll keep an eye on that. You know, McCarthy, there’s a thought he may not run again, so we’ll have to see.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Gotta right wing challenger. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">All right. Thanks, Guy. Thanks so much for coming in. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guy Marzorati: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">My pleasure. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Have fun in Sacramento weekend.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That is going to do it for this edition of Political Breakdown. We are a production of KQED Public Radio.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Our engineer today is Jim Bennett, our producers Guy Marzorati and Izzy Bloom. I’m Scott Shafer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Marisa Lagos: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m Marisa Lagos. Happy Thanksgiving. We will have a show on Thanksgiving. So hope to see you then. If not, have a great week.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Scott Shafer: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Bye bye.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>"
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003cem>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Scott and Marisa analyze Governor Gavin Newsom’s trips to Israel and China and discuss a state review of San Francisco’s housing approval process. Then, Tia Orr, executive director of SEIU California, joins to talk about her rise in the labor movement, wins for labor in this year’s legislative session and the ballot measure fight she’s focused on in 2024.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Hey everybody, from KQED Public Radio it’s Political Breakdown, I’m Scott Shafer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And I’m Marisa Lagos. On today’s show if you or someone in your family works in the fast food or health care industries needs to use sick time, chances are they have benefited from the work done by SEIU, the state’s largest union.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Our guest today, Tia Orr, runs the show at SEIU, and she’s here to talk about the hot labor summer, organized labor’s banner year up in Sacramento and where they parted ways on occasion with Governor Gavin Newsom and his veto pen. We’ll talk about all that, Marisa. But speaking of Gavin Newsom, he’s been globetrotting. He’s done vetoing and signing bills. And so he’s been out of the country. He’s made a stop in Israel, brief stop and has been in China for the last few days. Two very big hotspots in the world. A little bit of controversy in that he didn’t meet with any Palestinians when he was in Israel. But in China, he got some nice pictures, went to the Great Wall, drove a hybrid car, talked about fentanyl, met with Xi Jinping. So, you know, I think you wonder, like, what’s he doing there?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I do wonder what’s doing there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> What are they getting out of it? Why are we spending money on that?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I mean, to be fair, you and I have covered the last few governors as well. They both made these similar treks to China. Obviously, it’s a huge economic powerhouse globally, but especially for California, a lot of close ties. However, this is not the moment that we were in when Jerry Brown went there or Arnold Schwarzenegger. And I do think it’s been interesting.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer\u003c/strong>: Do you mean just in terms of controversy?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Just politically. Yeah, like where China sits on the world stage, what our relationship is with them. I think a lot of the human rights abuses that obviously folks would like Newsom to be bringing up with President Xi, he did not. He said he brought them up some of the governors. I just think that this is a much different moment than it was for, you know, when Jerry Brown went there. Obviously, there’s always been tensions and it just does raise questions about sort of does, obviously, this helps burnish his sort of credentials and it makes him look more like a diplomat and a national figure. But I think it could come with some blowback as well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> We’ll see. I mean, I think obviously, you know, we were talking about this earlier before with the show that, you know, the Biden administration has signed off on all of this stuff. We do kind of wonder what they’re saying behind the scenes, like is he a shadow president, what is he doing over there or let him step into the minefields and see what happens? You know, I think in terms of like this not being the moment, you know, these things do get planned a certain number of weeks, months in advance. And it’s hard to predict exactly what’s going to.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I mean more the broader moment, not October of 2023\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Yeah, but I would argue, though, you know, this is also a time when the Biden administration is trying to lower the temperature, you know, and find some common ground. And I think sometimes having a governor who maybe doesn’t have a history of animosity and bad back and forth rhetoric maybe can help.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And the responsibilities, right? That that a president does. I mean, we should note this was not paid for by us, the taxpayer. This is paid for by the California State Protocol Foundation, which basically means that Newsom and his allies, you know, went and asked for donations from private donors to fund this, which is generally how these trips are funded.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Yeah exactly and of course the media kind of got strong-armed out when President Xi Jinping met with the governor. They weren’t too happy about that. But, you know, that’s when you go to a communist country, you know, you don’t have a lot of rights. And, you know, if they tell you not to go in, you’re probably not going to go in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Yeah, I mean, interestingly, state media was allowed in, American media were not, The Chronicle had a headline that they were physically blocked from going into the room. So, again, I think I guess my questions would just more be, what does this do for Newsom long term and when he comes home? Because a lot of what the Chinese government stands for and a lot of the things he was not able to bring up directly are, you know, priorities for him at home. Right. And so it’s an interesting kind of juxtaposition.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> It is and it’s also a huge Asian population here in California. I’m sure a lot of, although that’s going to be a mixed bag, too, depending on where you’re from.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> That’s what I mean, that’s what a lot of the human rights groups are bringing up are there are people here who cannot go back to, say, Hong Kong because of the CCP? And it does kind of, you know, a head of APEC, we should mention this huge international summit coming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Xi Jinping may be coming to that. I’m sure the governor will be there as well. We’ll we’ll talk about that on another show. But another sort of ripple effect from the governor here locally in San Francisco is this big housing investigation into how slow California, or San Francisco is in permitting and approving housing. It’s dead last in terms of the amount of time that it takes. Marisa, you did reporting on that report that came out this week and it didn’t look good for for San Francisco to tell us, like, what are some of the big impediments? Why does it take so long?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I mean, I feel like anyone who’s been paying attention will not be surprised at what the state found, which is that we have some of or we do have the longest timelines to approve housing, a process that allows for appeals even after something has already been entitled and you know very clearly that the head of housing and community development for the state, Gustavo Velasquez, says this is why housing is so expensive and native San Franciscans are being priced out. And so they’re really demanding a list of 18 fixes, including some changes to the city charter that are really going to sort of fundamentally change the way San Francisco permits housing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Doesn’t that require voter approval?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Some of them may, and they’ve given them longer timelines. But I did find it very interesting that there is really a list of demands from the state. And they’re saying if if we do not, you know, comply with these, they the state, you know, could take away funding, could sue San Francisco, and that we could essentially lose all control over planning decisions. So I think this is something that city hall and and neighborhood groups and others who have historically blocked a lot of development are going to have to take seriously.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> I don’t know, maybe but, you know, if you really oppose, if you like, stopping things for one reason or another, I mean, are you how compelled are you going to be by a threat from Sacramento? I mean, maybe you will be, but I mean, some of the things these things can be done sort of at a policy level.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Absolutely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Like they don’t require voter approval, and because that, you know, we’re talking could be months, year, years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Yeah I think it will be interesting if some of this goes before voters. I think there’s been a real sea change on housing. And I do think that you really see bills and policy is being passed at the state level and even embraced at the local level. That would have been a third rail even a decade ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Yeah, absolutely. And of course —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And they say they may take this on the road coming to your city in June if you’re not building housing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Yeah, well and interesting because the state did sue Huntington Beach in Orange County and so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> They’ve gone after Berkeley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> They went after Berkeley. So they’re trying to, you know, balance the conservative more red counties —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Well I think they’re going after the counties that aren’t building. I mean, if you look at the statistics, I mean, one of the things I heard this week is that there’s actually a lot of similarities between the way Huntington and Berkeley operate. San Francisco, we’re on an island of our own. We have a process like nobody could even believe at the state level.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Yeah, well, and being a city and county probably, you know, makes that a little tougher in some ways as well. All right. We’re going to take a short break. And when we return, we’re going to be joined by Tia Orr, or she’s the head of SEIU. It’s one of the most powerful labor unions in California. And she’s the head of it. You’re listening to Political Breakdown from KQED Public Radio.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Welcome back to Political Breakdown. I’m Scott Shafer here with Marisa Lagos. And, you know, by any measure, organized labor had not just a good but a really great, some might say historic year. In Sacramento, the governor signed several important bills that were high on labor’s priority list, including pay raises for fast food workers and health care workers, more paid sick time. And our guest today gets a lot of credit for that or blame, depending on your point of view for what happened up there. Tia Orr is executive director of SEIU, it’s the largest union in California with 700,000 members. Tia Orr, welcome to Political Breakdown.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Thank you for having me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Good to have you here. Well, SEIU is short for Service Employees International Union. Give us a sense of who you represent. What kinds of workers?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Well, we represent 700,000 workers across the state of California and growing. Our workers range from county workers, state workers, janitors across the board, child care workers who we recently organized into the union. County workers, as I stated. Health care workers, of course. And we’re working to bring fast food workers into the union as well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I mean, that’s a big range of people with different interest employers. I’m wondering, you know, how you kind of came to this work. I know your mom was a state worker. Was politics in your blood as a kid?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> No, I think fighting for the underdog always was something that was, you know, in me as as my fire and motivation. You know, look, I have my own story. I had my son at 19 years old. Pretty difficult having a kid at that young age. And I found myself, ironically, doing jobs similar to the jobs of the workers that I represent today. So ironic, but powerful in its own right. Security officers. I was a security officer while going to college with my young son, who is now 26 years old and working in the legislative space himself. I was a home care worker. We represent, obviously 380,000, of our 700,000 members are homecare workers. I found myself doing that job as a college worker as well. And so I, I have a deep connection to the work that they do and understand the struggles and trying to stay above water.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Tell us a little bit about your hometown. Where did you grow up? What was high school, middle school like for you?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Yes, Sacramento is where I grew up, born and raised. I have hundreds of family members, a big, gigantic family with cousins everywhere. I went to Christian Brothers High School in Sacramento with a lot of family members who went to school with us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> What percentage of your family or union members would you say?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Oh, God. A large portion of them. Because a lot of us are low wage workers and state workers. And Sacramento, is a big —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Industry town.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Industry town for state workers. So I think back to my aunts and my uncles, my mom, you know, state workers, county workers across the board.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> You know, you are one of a line of recent sort of very powerful, politically savvy women of color who have come up in the labor ranks. But that was not always the case. I wonder, you know, thinking about one of your predecessors, Laphonza Butler, who we’ve had on the show now, Senator Butler. I mean, what difference does it make having somebody like yourself, you’re black your Latina, at you, as you say, grew up with this family, watching these people? Like how does that impact the way you do your work?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Oh, I think I lead an end with it. Right. And I think if you think about Senator Butler and who she is and what I’ve learned from her, a woman that walks into the room that leads and ends with her values is someone that I look up to and admire in that regard. But you’re right. Still to this day, there’s not enough women of color that are leading in this space that can come with the stories that I just told you about my own life that can add that to the conversation on strategy and how to mobilize workers to be able to relate to them. I would say it’s imperative for us to create a broader table where there’s more people that look like us and Senator Butler and others so that we can have those conversations and get real work done.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> We’ll talk more about the Senate race. But were you disappointed in that regard that she didn’t run?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> You know, look, I trust her immensely and she is a deeply thoughtful person. So when she decides to do something or not to do something, I know that it was intentional and it was for good reason. And trust me, we have not seen the end of Senator Butler. She is a young woman who has a lot of fire in her and I think has a passion for workers in our communities that’s going to continue even after her 14 months serving as U.S. senator.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Yeah, well, we’ll all be watching what she decides to do next. I want to ask, after Butler left SEIU and before you came in as the head, there was a scandal. Alma Hernandez, former executive director, was charged with tax fraud, embezzlement, perjury. The charges were not actually related to her work at SEIU. They were related to a previous campaign. But what was it like coming in on the heels of that? Did you have, you know, mending to do image-wise or otherwise with the union?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Yeah, of course. You always want to make sure that the members trust that the work that we’re doing with their limited resources. Remember, we’re representing janitors and home care workers who are giving us a portion of their small paycheck to be able to represent them. And so, of course, you want to assure them that their resources are protected. But Alma Hernandez was a leader in this movement that did amazing things that I don’t want to get taken away from the conversations that you just mentioned. Her leadership inspired me. It continues to do that, and I think we had to do some instilling in our membership that their resources were being protected even through her leadership, and that we were going to continue to push forward and hold their resources very, very accountable and protected.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> When that story broke and as it unfolded, were you kind of like, you know, what were the first things that went through your mind? And, you know, apart from what you just said about her doing a lot of good things in terms of the organization, SEIU and its image, reputation and potential downfall?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Yeah, I mean, you certainly want to make sure that you bring the organization back and focus on the work that we have in front of us. At the time we were pursuing the fast food measure, the first round of it in 257. At the time we were dealing with the blow up of the COVID pandemic and workers being in fear of their work and losing work in a lot of regards. So the goal for us was this to bring everything back in, continue to project strength and show strength and assure our members again that their resources were being spent to advance their values and their principles. And we were going to stay on track to continue to do the work that we did at SEIU. I just want to say that SEIU, even with the victories we had this year, these victories, don’t come from one person. Our failures don’t come from one person. Our movement is about 700,000 workers in SEIU in particular that are our bosses and that guide us and lead us on strategy. And we wanted to make sure that we continue to own that space and let them lead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Well, let’s talk about some of those victories. You did have a big year. Why do you think this session was so productive? Like you mentioned, sort of the shoulders that you’re building on, You know, but it does seem like this was a remarkably prolific year for the labor movement in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Yeah, you know, I thought about this as I was driving over, you know, the lesson, if I walk away from this legislative session to learn is never underestimate the power of workers that are united. And I think that we’ve seen across the nation, I think stemming from the pandemic, workers feeling unprotected, workers feeling unsafe, workers feeling and realizing how underpaid they are in comparison to the CEOs that are their employers every single day. That force and that collective action came together to demand the legislature across the nation, especially in California, to respond to their needs and try to influence some reshaping of their economic reality so they can provide for their families. So I give this year and the victories of this year, to many years of investment. But workers who really stepped out were resilient, I would say risky in that regard, to step on the front lines and make those demands\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Aside from the unified workforce and workers letting their voices be heard. What about some of the structural changes in Sacramento, like having a new speaker in Robert Rivas?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> I think that’s a good question. I mean, look, none of these wins are possible if you don’t have a legislature that shares the values of the workers who stand on the front lines. And so all of this work that we’re doing starts with electing people that look and share the values of their communities. So Robert Rivas, of course, being one of them as speaker, but his caucus and the Democratic Party and making sure that we have people that are Black and brown and LGBTQ+ that come from the communities and have stories like me, they can they can lend to their decisions on policy making. We’re going to have a big challenge in this coming election with a number of open seats to hold on to that legislative body that is similar and shares the values of those workers. We see it as an opportunity to grow that base, but I know we’re going to have to fight with everything we have to continue that and grow it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> So, the governor. Let’s talk about Gavin Newsom. It was a mixed bag for you all this year. You know, he signed some very high profile bills, vetoed others, including one that would have paid striking workers after two weeks, another that would have offered workplace protections to domestic workers. How would you sum up kind of his record with labor this year and your relationship with him?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Look, I think I can say unequivocally that the governor listens to workers, and I honestly believe that he shares the values of workers and what their needs are. Like everything in the legislature, it takes a long time. And for example, if you think about fast food, we worked on that since 2012. It was a group of workers in New York that decided to walk out and demand $15 an hour that many folks, when they heard it, that was just insanely crazy. And ten years later, now we have the passage of 1228, a council for these fast food workers in California and $20 an hour. Were we disappointed by those vetoes? Of course. Right. Striking workers need attention. Domestic workers need to be valued. But we have work to do. And the one thing that I trust about these workers because I know them, I believe well, is they are resilient and they don’t give up. So I imagine these things are going to be coming back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> If you’re just joining us, you’re listening to Political Breakdown from KQED. I’m Scott Shafer here with Marissa Largo’s. We’re talking with Tia Orr she runs SEIU, it’s the largest union in California, which, by the way, had a very good year up in Sacramento. And back to the governor for a moment. You know, there’s a lot of speculation always when a governor signs or vetoes, but especially vetoes a bill that a Democratic legislature has sent to him. What’s your take on why he vetoed some of the things he did? I mean, there’s a lot of speculation that he’s looking ahead to 2028.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Yeah I wish I could get into his mind and dictate or predict what his next step is going to be. But look, he’s a thoughtful, thoughtful governor. He has amazing staff. And it does require us, and I had to do this both with $25 for health care as well as fast food to roll up your sleeves and dig in and make some concessions sometimes and decide if it does any harm to the workforce. And look, we didn’t get there this year on those two vehicles or three vehicles that you mentioned. But again, I hope and expecting those come back next year and conversations with the governor will continue to hopefully get us into a place where he can sign them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Is there a particular bill that you see as the biggest win? I mean, there were bills to raise pay in the fast food industry, as we mentioned, for health care workers like janitors and security guards, even hospital gift shop workers, to $25 an hour increasing paid sick days like is one of those personally closer to you or more hard fought or, I don’t know, just like a bigger win?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> You know, I you know, I want to lean towards all of them are big wins. I don’t want to pick one over the other. I think when you’re talking about —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> They’re all your babies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> They’re all my babies. When you’re talking about fast food and health care, though, if you put those together, we’re talking about over a million workers that are going to see substantial raises. I would couch them as one of the greatest blows to poverty in generations. So those two are ones that I would say stand out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> On the fast food industry, this was part of a kind of more complicated deal to take a referendum off the ballot that would have rolled back protections. We don’t have to get into all of the nitty gritty, but I’m curious why you think the industry engaged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Look, I think that the industry realizes just what I said to you, the resiliency of the workforce and that the battle and the fight wasn’t going to stop. And so we came into the legislature this year with a multifaceted strategy, one to change the referendum process, to be more fair to voters. Another one to bring back joint liability, which is an issue we negotiated out of the original bill, of fast food. And the third one was to create the Industrial Welfare Commission, where, regardless of what happened on the referendum, workers would have a voice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> One of the bills that have been a priority of Lorena Gonzalez for many years is to allow legislative staff to organize, and that got stalled for many years. It got through to the governor, he signed it. What impact do you think that could have on the way things work up there?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> You know, look, I was a legislative staffer, and so I can speak to some of the benefits they don’t get and the needs that they have as staff. I think you’re going to create longevity in the workforce. I think you’re going to have more committed workforce. It’s a very young staff. People transition in and out a lot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Does it change the power dynamic?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Or the politics?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Yeah, I think it changes. You know, I think people are going to stay true to where their politics are, but it’s going to create staff that have more knowledge, even with term limits and education and the history of what’s happening and hopefully a happier group of people that have power to sit at the table and decide on their working conditions. It was an exciting win that Lorena Gonzalez has led for some time and another one that took many years to get across the finish line, speaking to the veto that happened earlier this year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I think people underestimate that how often these bills have been coming and coming. We’ve seen this around criminal justice as well. I want to ask you, kind of looking ahead to 2024, business interests are running a ballot measure that would essentially retroactively invalidate many taxes and fees that both local and state jurisdictions, you know, rely on. It would also make it way harder to increase revenues in the future. There’s been this whole move by Democrats and SEIU to put another ballot measure on that would sort of change the Constitution so that this measure would need two thirds as well. Talk about just like the politics here, how big of a priority is this in 2024 and what are what is the case you all will be making to the electorate?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> I mean, it is the priority. There is nothing more that we’re focused on than the Business Roundtable proposal and the threat that it proposes to all of our communities. You know, look, I think how would —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> How would you describe it?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Yeah, tell us, it’s really complicated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> I mean, really, the intent of this is to really strap local government and state government and the executive branch from raising any revenue. And we’re talking about revenue that speaks to homelessness that you guys talked about at the start of the show that speaks about emergencies if there’s an earthquake or another pandemic. You know, these, they’re calling it the Taxpayer Protection Act. I would argue that it actually does the opposite. It doesn’t protect constituents. It leaves us pretty vulnerable without the ability to create solutions for how to get out of a lot of the situations that we know all too well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Is that an opening, though? Because it strikes me that a local supervisor or a city council member in a red county also wants to be able to pay for fire and trash and streets. Like, what conversations are you having maybe on the other side of the aisle about that?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> We’re having conversations with everybody because I think everyone is speaking to the Board of Supervisors, as you mentioned, on both sides of the aisle can see some impact. And it’s probably why you’ve seen the governor and the legislature file a petition with the Supreme Court trying to get this measure off of the ballot in November because of its threat. And I do think it speaks to folks across the aisle because it ties their hands on their ability to improve the conditions of their communities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Looking at the Senate race, you know, one of the bills, as we said that the governor vetoed was pay for striking workers after a couple of weeks on the picket line. Now, Adam Schiff, who’s running for the Senate, says he’s going to introduce a bill to make that federal legislation. I think we all know how likely that is to make it through the House of Representatives or the Senate, for that matter. But what are your thoughts about that kind of a move on his part?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> You know, I think the good news about that is that the conversation is happening at the national level, and it’s a conversation that certainly needs to happen at a national level for two reasons. One, I think you see strikes that are happening across the nation. It’s not just California. And two, and I think one of the reasons a governor cited about the veto is our unemployment insurance fund is in deficit. And we do need support from the federal government to get that fund in in a in a base where we can provide these benefits to striking workers who I agree need it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Speaking of years long problems, the unemployment fund, that is not a new issue. I want to ask you about a little a little labor dustup. Politico had a story today about the Cal Labor federation. This is run by former Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> That’s the third time we’ve mentioned her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> She is a friend of our pod. She’s been on here many times. She hired one of her former consultants, Richie Ross, to consult for the labor Fed. That’s resulted in a dust up because he has run some campaigns against labor. And she has actually called in the past for a blacklist of consultants who did that. I mean, what’s your take on all of this?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> I mean, it’s two separate issues, right? One, as I spoke about resources earlier, you know, our union and I’m sure many others want to be sure that members’ resources are spent on folks that are going to advance our values and certainly not spent on consultants that go against us in a number of races. And Richie Ross has been one of those consultants. And the second question we have, and I believe we’re going to have these conversations in our labor family and figure this out is when you hire those individuals who likely should be on the black list, but are also being paid by union membership dues to be able to do the work. And that does create some unsettling and I think some conversations within the labor family for us to be able to mitigate it. And I’m I’m confident that we’ll be able to do that with our brothers and sisters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I mean, he’s known for being pretty effective, though. Is there an argument —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> He’s effective.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Is there an argument that you neuter the other side by hiring someone like that?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Well and he’s also got deep roots with the farm workers and Dolores Huerta.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> He does. You can’t take that away from him but there is Prop 15, for example, in bail reform, for example, many electoral races we’re literally on opposing sides. And so, look, I congratulate him on the success that he has and wish him the best. But the resources of SEIU, I think our leaders would be concerned that they would be spent on a consultant who is working against us and in many cases, and were the definition of what I think, you know, Lorena Gonzalez put out, as is, who should qualify for the blacklist.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> You in your job must be in many meetings with corporate leaders and lobbyists, you know, going back and forth on issues, trying to maybe come up with common ground. I’m just wondering, is there a moment that comes to mind where, you know, they made a point that you hadn’t thought of or they made it convincingly that made you rethink your position?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr: \u003c/strong>I think everything that we do, we have a tendency to sit down at the table and hear from the other side. If you don’t listen to the other side, you can’t get to a solution. And I think those are the differences within all honesty of how we’re able to get things signed and maybe things not getting signed. So we’re always open to that. And there’s always things that I think are moving that will hear from the other side that then we take back and figure out ways if we can solve it. Some things I you know, I don’t buy, I walk away, you know, knowing that that’s not probably a reality, but some things are true.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> What about the argument that, hey, you give workers a raise, there’s going to they’re going to hand it down to the consumers. They’re going to raise prices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Yeah, I don’t buy that as much because I think handing down increases in prices to consumers has happened without raises.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> All right. We always like to end on a fun now. So you have a big job representing a lot of people. You’re in the room on these tough negotiations. What do you do for fun?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> What do I do for fun?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Remember fun?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> What would your son say if we asked him?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> You know, like spending time with my kids is probably what I do for the most fun. They all play sports, and we’re all very active in the Sac State college events and football games, and I’m really just trying to get some downtime with family and watching movies and just hanging out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Did you play sports?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> I did, I played softball in college, my brother played football at Cal Berkeley, he’s the athletic director at Sac State now, so we’re still involved in all the sports and again, a huge family. So we’re at sport events every weekend somewhere in Sacramento.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> What was your best softball move?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> My best move? I was a second baseman, so I dove a lot. I stopped balls from going in the outfield and I remember some big, big game winning hits I had that I still remember those like, I’m still in high in college and I’m still young, but it still fires me up a little bit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> There’s probably some metaphors there for Sacramento. Balls and strikes and fly balls.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> I often compare some of this to sports, not by minimizing the work that we do but it is pretty competitive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Alright, Tia Orr from SEIU California, thank you so much for coming in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Thanks so much for having me.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"headline": "Tia Orr on Labor's Big Year in California",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003cem>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Scott and Marisa analyze Governor Gavin Newsom’s trips to Israel and China and discuss a state review of San Francisco’s housing approval process. Then, Tia Orr, executive director of SEIU California, joins to talk about her rise in the labor movement, wins for labor in this year’s legislative session and the ballot measure fight she’s focused on in 2024.\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-content post-body\">\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Hey everybody, from KQED Public Radio it’s Political Breakdown, I’m Scott Shafer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And I’m Marisa Lagos. On today’s show if you or someone in your family works in the fast food or health care industries needs to use sick time, chances are they have benefited from the work done by SEIU, the state’s largest union.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Our guest today, Tia Orr, runs the show at SEIU, and she’s here to talk about the hot labor summer, organized labor’s banner year up in Sacramento and where they parted ways on occasion with Governor Gavin Newsom and his veto pen. We’ll talk about all that, Marisa. But speaking of Gavin Newsom, he’s been globetrotting. He’s done vetoing and signing bills. And so he’s been out of the country. He’s made a stop in Israel, brief stop and has been in China for the last few days. Two very big hotspots in the world. A little bit of controversy in that he didn’t meet with any Palestinians when he was in Israel. But in China, he got some nice pictures, went to the Great Wall, drove a hybrid car, talked about fentanyl, met with Xi Jinping. So, you know, I think you wonder, like, what’s he doing there?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I do wonder what’s doing there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> What are they getting out of it? Why are we spending money on that?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I mean, to be fair, you and I have covered the last few governors as well. They both made these similar treks to China. Obviously, it’s a huge economic powerhouse globally, but especially for California, a lot of close ties. However, this is not the moment that we were in when Jerry Brown went there or Arnold Schwarzenegger. And I do think it’s been interesting.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer\u003c/strong>: Do you mean just in terms of controversy?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Just politically. Yeah, like where China sits on the world stage, what our relationship is with them. I think a lot of the human rights abuses that obviously folks would like Newsom to be bringing up with President Xi, he did not. He said he brought them up some of the governors. I just think that this is a much different moment than it was for, you know, when Jerry Brown went there. Obviously, there’s always been tensions and it just does raise questions about sort of does, obviously, this helps burnish his sort of credentials and it makes him look more like a diplomat and a national figure. But I think it could come with some blowback as well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> We’ll see. I mean, I think obviously, you know, we were talking about this earlier before with the show that, you know, the Biden administration has signed off on all of this stuff. We do kind of wonder what they’re saying behind the scenes, like is he a shadow president, what is he doing over there or let him step into the minefields and see what happens? You know, I think in terms of like this not being the moment, you know, these things do get planned a certain number of weeks, months in advance. And it’s hard to predict exactly what’s going to.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I mean more the broader moment, not October of 2023\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Yeah, but I would argue, though, you know, this is also a time when the Biden administration is trying to lower the temperature, you know, and find some common ground. And I think sometimes having a governor who maybe doesn’t have a history of animosity and bad back and forth rhetoric maybe can help.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And the responsibilities, right? That that a president does. I mean, we should note this was not paid for by us, the taxpayer. This is paid for by the California State Protocol Foundation, which basically means that Newsom and his allies, you know, went and asked for donations from private donors to fund this, which is generally how these trips are funded.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Yeah exactly and of course the media kind of got strong-armed out when President Xi Jinping met with the governor. They weren’t too happy about that. But, you know, that’s when you go to a communist country, you know, you don’t have a lot of rights. And, you know, if they tell you not to go in, you’re probably not going to go in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Yeah, I mean, interestingly, state media was allowed in, American media were not, The Chronicle had a headline that they were physically blocked from going into the room. So, again, I think I guess my questions would just more be, what does this do for Newsom long term and when he comes home? Because a lot of what the Chinese government stands for and a lot of the things he was not able to bring up directly are, you know, priorities for him at home. Right. And so it’s an interesting kind of juxtaposition.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> It is and it’s also a huge Asian population here in California. I’m sure a lot of, although that’s going to be a mixed bag, too, depending on where you’re from.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> That’s what I mean, that’s what a lot of the human rights groups are bringing up are there are people here who cannot go back to, say, Hong Kong because of the CCP? And it does kind of, you know, a head of APEC, we should mention this huge international summit coming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Xi Jinping may be coming to that. I’m sure the governor will be there as well. We’ll we’ll talk about that on another show. But another sort of ripple effect from the governor here locally in San Francisco is this big housing investigation into how slow California, or San Francisco is in permitting and approving housing. It’s dead last in terms of the amount of time that it takes. Marisa, you did reporting on that report that came out this week and it didn’t look good for for San Francisco to tell us, like, what are some of the big impediments? Why does it take so long?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I mean, I feel like anyone who’s been paying attention will not be surprised at what the state found, which is that we have some of or we do have the longest timelines to approve housing, a process that allows for appeals even after something has already been entitled and you know very clearly that the head of housing and community development for the state, Gustavo Velasquez, says this is why housing is so expensive and native San Franciscans are being priced out. And so they’re really demanding a list of 18 fixes, including some changes to the city charter that are really going to sort of fundamentally change the way San Francisco permits housing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Doesn’t that require voter approval?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Some of them may, and they’ve given them longer timelines. But I did find it very interesting that there is really a list of demands from the state. And they’re saying if if we do not, you know, comply with these, they the state, you know, could take away funding, could sue San Francisco, and that we could essentially lose all control over planning decisions. So I think this is something that city hall and and neighborhood groups and others who have historically blocked a lot of development are going to have to take seriously.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> I don’t know, maybe but, you know, if you really oppose, if you like, stopping things for one reason or another, I mean, are you how compelled are you going to be by a threat from Sacramento? I mean, maybe you will be, but I mean, some of the things these things can be done sort of at a policy level.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Absolutely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Like they don’t require voter approval, and because that, you know, we’re talking could be months, year, years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Yeah I think it will be interesting if some of this goes before voters. I think there’s been a real sea change on housing. And I do think that you really see bills and policy is being passed at the state level and even embraced at the local level. That would have been a third rail even a decade ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Yeah, absolutely. And of course —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And they say they may take this on the road coming to your city in June if you’re not building housing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Yeah, well and interesting because the state did sue Huntington Beach in Orange County and so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> They’ve gone after Berkeley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> They went after Berkeley. So they’re trying to, you know, balance the conservative more red counties —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Well I think they’re going after the counties that aren’t building. I mean, if you look at the statistics, I mean, one of the things I heard this week is that there’s actually a lot of similarities between the way Huntington and Berkeley operate. San Francisco, we’re on an island of our own. We have a process like nobody could even believe at the state level.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Yeah, well, and being a city and county probably, you know, makes that a little tougher in some ways as well. All right. We’re going to take a short break. And when we return, we’re going to be joined by Tia Orr, or she’s the head of SEIU. It’s one of the most powerful labor unions in California. And she’s the head of it. You’re listening to Political Breakdown from KQED Public Radio.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Welcome back to Political Breakdown. I’m Scott Shafer here with Marisa Lagos. And, you know, by any measure, organized labor had not just a good but a really great, some might say historic year. In Sacramento, the governor signed several important bills that were high on labor’s priority list, including pay raises for fast food workers and health care workers, more paid sick time. And our guest today gets a lot of credit for that or blame, depending on your point of view for what happened up there. Tia Orr is executive director of SEIU, it’s the largest union in California with 700,000 members. Tia Orr, welcome to Political Breakdown.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Thank you for having me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Good to have you here. Well, SEIU is short for Service Employees International Union. Give us a sense of who you represent. What kinds of workers?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Well, we represent 700,000 workers across the state of California and growing. Our workers range from county workers, state workers, janitors across the board, child care workers who we recently organized into the union. County workers, as I stated. Health care workers, of course. And we’re working to bring fast food workers into the union as well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I mean, that’s a big range of people with different interest employers. I’m wondering, you know, how you kind of came to this work. I know your mom was a state worker. Was politics in your blood as a kid?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> No, I think fighting for the underdog always was something that was, you know, in me as as my fire and motivation. You know, look, I have my own story. I had my son at 19 years old. Pretty difficult having a kid at that young age. And I found myself, ironically, doing jobs similar to the jobs of the workers that I represent today. So ironic, but powerful in its own right. Security officers. I was a security officer while going to college with my young son, who is now 26 years old and working in the legislative space himself. I was a home care worker. We represent, obviously 380,000, of our 700,000 members are homecare workers. I found myself doing that job as a college worker as well. And so I, I have a deep connection to the work that they do and understand the struggles and trying to stay above water.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Tell us a little bit about your hometown. Where did you grow up? What was high school, middle school like for you?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Yes, Sacramento is where I grew up, born and raised. I have hundreds of family members, a big, gigantic family with cousins everywhere. I went to Christian Brothers High School in Sacramento with a lot of family members who went to school with us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> What percentage of your family or union members would you say?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Oh, God. A large portion of them. Because a lot of us are low wage workers and state workers. And Sacramento, is a big —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Industry town.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Industry town for state workers. So I think back to my aunts and my uncles, my mom, you know, state workers, county workers across the board.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> You know, you are one of a line of recent sort of very powerful, politically savvy women of color who have come up in the labor ranks. But that was not always the case. I wonder, you know, thinking about one of your predecessors, Laphonza Butler, who we’ve had on the show now, Senator Butler. I mean, what difference does it make having somebody like yourself, you’re black your Latina, at you, as you say, grew up with this family, watching these people? Like how does that impact the way you do your work?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Oh, I think I lead an end with it. Right. And I think if you think about Senator Butler and who she is and what I’ve learned from her, a woman that walks into the room that leads and ends with her values is someone that I look up to and admire in that regard. But you’re right. Still to this day, there’s not enough women of color that are leading in this space that can come with the stories that I just told you about my own life that can add that to the conversation on strategy and how to mobilize workers to be able to relate to them. I would say it’s imperative for us to create a broader table where there’s more people that look like us and Senator Butler and others so that we can have those conversations and get real work done.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> We’ll talk more about the Senate race. But were you disappointed in that regard that she didn’t run?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> You know, look, I trust her immensely and she is a deeply thoughtful person. So when she decides to do something or not to do something, I know that it was intentional and it was for good reason. And trust me, we have not seen the end of Senator Butler. She is a young woman who has a lot of fire in her and I think has a passion for workers in our communities that’s going to continue even after her 14 months serving as U.S. senator.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Yeah, well, we’ll all be watching what she decides to do next. I want to ask, after Butler left SEIU and before you came in as the head, there was a scandal. Alma Hernandez, former executive director, was charged with tax fraud, embezzlement, perjury. The charges were not actually related to her work at SEIU. They were related to a previous campaign. But what was it like coming in on the heels of that? Did you have, you know, mending to do image-wise or otherwise with the union?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Yeah, of course. You always want to make sure that the members trust that the work that we’re doing with their limited resources. Remember, we’re representing janitors and home care workers who are giving us a portion of their small paycheck to be able to represent them. And so, of course, you want to assure them that their resources are protected. But Alma Hernandez was a leader in this movement that did amazing things that I don’t want to get taken away from the conversations that you just mentioned. Her leadership inspired me. It continues to do that, and I think we had to do some instilling in our membership that their resources were being protected even through her leadership, and that we were going to continue to push forward and hold their resources very, very accountable and protected.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> When that story broke and as it unfolded, were you kind of like, you know, what were the first things that went through your mind? And, you know, apart from what you just said about her doing a lot of good things in terms of the organization, SEIU and its image, reputation and potential downfall?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Yeah, I mean, you certainly want to make sure that you bring the organization back and focus on the work that we have in front of us. At the time we were pursuing the fast food measure, the first round of it in 257. At the time we were dealing with the blow up of the COVID pandemic and workers being in fear of their work and losing work in a lot of regards. So the goal for us was this to bring everything back in, continue to project strength and show strength and assure our members again that their resources were being spent to advance their values and their principles. And we were going to stay on track to continue to do the work that we did at SEIU. I just want to say that SEIU, even with the victories we had this year, these victories, don’t come from one person. Our failures don’t come from one person. Our movement is about 700,000 workers in SEIU in particular that are our bosses and that guide us and lead us on strategy. And we wanted to make sure that we continue to own that space and let them lead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Well, let’s talk about some of those victories. You did have a big year. Why do you think this session was so productive? Like you mentioned, sort of the shoulders that you’re building on, You know, but it does seem like this was a remarkably prolific year for the labor movement in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Yeah, you know, I thought about this as I was driving over, you know, the lesson, if I walk away from this legislative session to learn is never underestimate the power of workers that are united. And I think that we’ve seen across the nation, I think stemming from the pandemic, workers feeling unprotected, workers feeling unsafe, workers feeling and realizing how underpaid they are in comparison to the CEOs that are their employers every single day. That force and that collective action came together to demand the legislature across the nation, especially in California, to respond to their needs and try to influence some reshaping of their economic reality so they can provide for their families. So I give this year and the victories of this year, to many years of investment. But workers who really stepped out were resilient, I would say risky in that regard, to step on the front lines and make those demands\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Aside from the unified workforce and workers letting their voices be heard. What about some of the structural changes in Sacramento, like having a new speaker in Robert Rivas?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> I think that’s a good question. I mean, look, none of these wins are possible if you don’t have a legislature that shares the values of the workers who stand on the front lines. And so all of this work that we’re doing starts with electing people that look and share the values of their communities. So Robert Rivas, of course, being one of them as speaker, but his caucus and the Democratic Party and making sure that we have people that are Black and brown and LGBTQ+ that come from the communities and have stories like me, they can they can lend to their decisions on policy making. We’re going to have a big challenge in this coming election with a number of open seats to hold on to that legislative body that is similar and shares the values of those workers. We see it as an opportunity to grow that base, but I know we’re going to have to fight with everything we have to continue that and grow it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> So, the governor. Let’s talk about Gavin Newsom. It was a mixed bag for you all this year. You know, he signed some very high profile bills, vetoed others, including one that would have paid striking workers after two weeks, another that would have offered workplace protections to domestic workers. How would you sum up kind of his record with labor this year and your relationship with him?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Look, I think I can say unequivocally that the governor listens to workers, and I honestly believe that he shares the values of workers and what their needs are. Like everything in the legislature, it takes a long time. And for example, if you think about fast food, we worked on that since 2012. It was a group of workers in New York that decided to walk out and demand $15 an hour that many folks, when they heard it, that was just insanely crazy. And ten years later, now we have the passage of 1228, a council for these fast food workers in California and $20 an hour. Were we disappointed by those vetoes? Of course. Right. Striking workers need attention. Domestic workers need to be valued. But we have work to do. And the one thing that I trust about these workers because I know them, I believe well, is they are resilient and they don’t give up. So I imagine these things are going to be coming back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> If you’re just joining us, you’re listening to Political Breakdown from KQED. I’m Scott Shafer here with Marissa Largo’s. We’re talking with Tia Orr she runs SEIU, it’s the largest union in California, which, by the way, had a very good year up in Sacramento. And back to the governor for a moment. You know, there’s a lot of speculation always when a governor signs or vetoes, but especially vetoes a bill that a Democratic legislature has sent to him. What’s your take on why he vetoed some of the things he did? I mean, there’s a lot of speculation that he’s looking ahead to 2028.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Yeah I wish I could get into his mind and dictate or predict what his next step is going to be. But look, he’s a thoughtful, thoughtful governor. He has amazing staff. And it does require us, and I had to do this both with $25 for health care as well as fast food to roll up your sleeves and dig in and make some concessions sometimes and decide if it does any harm to the workforce. And look, we didn’t get there this year on those two vehicles or three vehicles that you mentioned. But again, I hope and expecting those come back next year and conversations with the governor will continue to hopefully get us into a place where he can sign them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Is there a particular bill that you see as the biggest win? I mean, there were bills to raise pay in the fast food industry, as we mentioned, for health care workers like janitors and security guards, even hospital gift shop workers, to $25 an hour increasing paid sick days like is one of those personally closer to you or more hard fought or, I don’t know, just like a bigger win?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> You know, I you know, I want to lean towards all of them are big wins. I don’t want to pick one over the other. I think when you’re talking about —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> They’re all your babies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> They’re all my babies. When you’re talking about fast food and health care, though, if you put those together, we’re talking about over a million workers that are going to see substantial raises. I would couch them as one of the greatest blows to poverty in generations. So those two are ones that I would say stand out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> On the fast food industry, this was part of a kind of more complicated deal to take a referendum off the ballot that would have rolled back protections. We don’t have to get into all of the nitty gritty, but I’m curious why you think the industry engaged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Look, I think that the industry realizes just what I said to you, the resiliency of the workforce and that the battle and the fight wasn’t going to stop. And so we came into the legislature this year with a multifaceted strategy, one to change the referendum process, to be more fair to voters. Another one to bring back joint liability, which is an issue we negotiated out of the original bill, of fast food. And the third one was to create the Industrial Welfare Commission, where, regardless of what happened on the referendum, workers would have a voice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> One of the bills that have been a priority of Lorena Gonzalez for many years is to allow legislative staff to organize, and that got stalled for many years. It got through to the governor, he signed it. What impact do you think that could have on the way things work up there?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> You know, look, I was a legislative staffer, and so I can speak to some of the benefits they don’t get and the needs that they have as staff. I think you’re going to create longevity in the workforce. I think you’re going to have more committed workforce. It’s a very young staff. People transition in and out a lot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Does it change the power dynamic?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Or the politics?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Yeah, I think it changes. You know, I think people are going to stay true to where their politics are, but it’s going to create staff that have more knowledge, even with term limits and education and the history of what’s happening and hopefully a happier group of people that have power to sit at the table and decide on their working conditions. It was an exciting win that Lorena Gonzalez has led for some time and another one that took many years to get across the finish line, speaking to the veto that happened earlier this year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I think people underestimate that how often these bills have been coming and coming. We’ve seen this around criminal justice as well. I want to ask you, kind of looking ahead to 2024, business interests are running a ballot measure that would essentially retroactively invalidate many taxes and fees that both local and state jurisdictions, you know, rely on. It would also make it way harder to increase revenues in the future. There’s been this whole move by Democrats and SEIU to put another ballot measure on that would sort of change the Constitution so that this measure would need two thirds as well. Talk about just like the politics here, how big of a priority is this in 2024 and what are what is the case you all will be making to the electorate?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> I mean, it is the priority. There is nothing more that we’re focused on than the Business Roundtable proposal and the threat that it proposes to all of our communities. You know, look, I think how would —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> How would you describe it?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Yeah, tell us, it’s really complicated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> I mean, really, the intent of this is to really strap local government and state government and the executive branch from raising any revenue. And we’re talking about revenue that speaks to homelessness that you guys talked about at the start of the show that speaks about emergencies if there’s an earthquake or another pandemic. You know, these, they’re calling it the Taxpayer Protection Act. I would argue that it actually does the opposite. It doesn’t protect constituents. It leaves us pretty vulnerable without the ability to create solutions for how to get out of a lot of the situations that we know all too well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Is that an opening, though? Because it strikes me that a local supervisor or a city council member in a red county also wants to be able to pay for fire and trash and streets. Like, what conversations are you having maybe on the other side of the aisle about that?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> We’re having conversations with everybody because I think everyone is speaking to the Board of Supervisors, as you mentioned, on both sides of the aisle can see some impact. And it’s probably why you’ve seen the governor and the legislature file a petition with the Supreme Court trying to get this measure off of the ballot in November because of its threat. And I do think it speaks to folks across the aisle because it ties their hands on their ability to improve the conditions of their communities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Looking at the Senate race, you know, one of the bills, as we said that the governor vetoed was pay for striking workers after a couple of weeks on the picket line. Now, Adam Schiff, who’s running for the Senate, says he’s going to introduce a bill to make that federal legislation. I think we all know how likely that is to make it through the House of Representatives or the Senate, for that matter. But what are your thoughts about that kind of a move on his part?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> You know, I think the good news about that is that the conversation is happening at the national level, and it’s a conversation that certainly needs to happen at a national level for two reasons. One, I think you see strikes that are happening across the nation. It’s not just California. And two, and I think one of the reasons a governor cited about the veto is our unemployment insurance fund is in deficit. And we do need support from the federal government to get that fund in in a in a base where we can provide these benefits to striking workers who I agree need it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Speaking of years long problems, the unemployment fund, that is not a new issue. I want to ask you about a little a little labor dustup. Politico had a story today about the Cal Labor federation. This is run by former Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> That’s the third time we’ve mentioned her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> She is a friend of our pod. She’s been on here many times. She hired one of her former consultants, Richie Ross, to consult for the labor Fed. That’s resulted in a dust up because he has run some campaigns against labor. And she has actually called in the past for a blacklist of consultants who did that. I mean, what’s your take on all of this?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> I mean, it’s two separate issues, right? One, as I spoke about resources earlier, you know, our union and I’m sure many others want to be sure that members’ resources are spent on folks that are going to advance our values and certainly not spent on consultants that go against us in a number of races. And Richie Ross has been one of those consultants. And the second question we have, and I believe we’re going to have these conversations in our labor family and figure this out is when you hire those individuals who likely should be on the black list, but are also being paid by union membership dues to be able to do the work. And that does create some unsettling and I think some conversations within the labor family for us to be able to mitigate it. And I’m I’m confident that we’ll be able to do that with our brothers and sisters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I mean, he’s known for being pretty effective, though. Is there an argument —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> He’s effective.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Is there an argument that you neuter the other side by hiring someone like that?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Well and he’s also got deep roots with the farm workers and Dolores Huerta.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> He does. You can’t take that away from him but there is Prop 15, for example, in bail reform, for example, many electoral races we’re literally on opposing sides. And so, look, I congratulate him on the success that he has and wish him the best. But the resources of SEIU, I think our leaders would be concerned that they would be spent on a consultant who is working against us and in many cases, and were the definition of what I think, you know, Lorena Gonzalez put out, as is, who should qualify for the blacklist.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> You in your job must be in many meetings with corporate leaders and lobbyists, you know, going back and forth on issues, trying to maybe come up with common ground. I’m just wondering, is there a moment that comes to mind where, you know, they made a point that you hadn’t thought of or they made it convincingly that made you rethink your position?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr: \u003c/strong>I think everything that we do, we have a tendency to sit down at the table and hear from the other side. If you don’t listen to the other side, you can’t get to a solution. And I think those are the differences within all honesty of how we’re able to get things signed and maybe things not getting signed. So we’re always open to that. And there’s always things that I think are moving that will hear from the other side that then we take back and figure out ways if we can solve it. Some things I you know, I don’t buy, I walk away, you know, knowing that that’s not probably a reality, but some things are true.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> What about the argument that, hey, you give workers a raise, there’s going to they’re going to hand it down to the consumers. They’re going to raise prices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Yeah, I don’t buy that as much because I think handing down increases in prices to consumers has happened without raises.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> All right. We always like to end on a fun now. So you have a big job representing a lot of people. You’re in the room on these tough negotiations. What do you do for fun?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> What do I do for fun?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Remember fun?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> What would your son say if we asked him?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> You know, like spending time with my kids is probably what I do for the most fun. They all play sports, and we’re all very active in the Sac State college events and football games, and I’m really just trying to get some downtime with family and watching movies and just hanging out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Did you play sports?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> I did, I played softball in college, my brother played football at Cal Berkeley, he’s the athletic director at Sac State now, so we’re still involved in all the sports and again, a huge family. So we’re at sport events every weekend somewhere in Sacramento.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> What was your best softball move?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> My best move? I was a second baseman, so I dove a lot. I stopped balls from going in the outfield and I remember some big, big game winning hits I had that I still remember those like, I’m still in high in college and I’m still young, but it still fires me up a little bit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> There’s probably some metaphors there for Sacramento. Balls and strikes and fly balls.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> I often compare some of this to sports, not by minimizing the work that we do but it is pretty competitive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Alright, Tia Orr from SEIU California, thank you so much for coming in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Tia Orr:\u003c/strong> Thanks so much for having me.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>"
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"title": "Laphonza Butler's Decision and Nancy Pelosi on Paul Pelosi, San Francisco and the Grateful Dead",
"headTitle": "Laphonza Butler’s Decision and Nancy Pelosi on Paul Pelosi, San Francisco and the Grateful Dead | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">View the full episode transcript.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Senator Laphonza Butler announces she won’t run for a full term 2024. Scott and Marisa discuss the surprise announcement as well as Governor Gavin Newsom’s trip to Israel and what the ongoing dysfunction in the House of Representatives means for vulnerable California Republicans. Then, in the second part of their conversation at KQED Live, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi talks to Marisa and Scott about her husband Paul’s recovery, her decision to run for re-election, homelessness in San Francisco and the Grateful Dead.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Hey there, everyone. From KQED Public Radio, this is Political Breakdown. I’m Marisa Lagos.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> And I’m Scott Shafer. Today on The Breakdown, we continue our conversation with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. This week, she’ll get into why at age 83, she’s running for another two years in Congress. And we’ll talk 2024 electoral politics too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> All that’s from our recent on-stage conversation with the San Francisco congresswoman. If you want to watch the entire hour, you can tune in tomorrow night to KQED TV. That’s channel nine. That’s Friday night. We’ll be airing the unedited conversation at 8 p.m.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But first, Scott, a big news week sort of culminating, or maybe, this afternoon with an announcement from Laphonza Butler, the woman named by Gavin Newsom to fill Dianne Feinstein Senate seat. She says she will not run, putting out a statement saying that she has spent the last several weeks since the appointment pursuing her clarity, thinking about what kind of life she wants to have, what kind of service she wants to offer, and that she’s decided not to run. “Knowing you can win a campaign doesn’t always mean you should run a campaign.” And we have actually the senator in her own voice talking on Fox 11 in Los Angeles to Elex Michaelson. And he, you know, asked her about this question. And she talked a lot about the work she’s done getting particularly women of color elected to office, but had this to say.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laphonza Butler:\u003c/strong> The divisive nature and of the harassment that is happening both online and in real life. My mother is 70 years old. She didn’t sign up for this. My daughter is nine. She didn’t sign up for for this. And so I’m thinking about my family, my family’s safety. I’ve already gotten my first piece of hate mail and a stranger has shown up at my door.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> That is certainly a legitimate reason not to run. You know, and especially since she has never run before and so suddenly she’s thrown into this cauldron in D.C. where it’s I mean, right now it’s just red hot for all kinds of reasons. And so it’s you know, it’s not surprising if you come up through the political world and you’ve run for office, you kind of gotten used to being yelled at by your constituents. I could see where this would be, you know, kind of a shock. On the other hand, I think there’s there is a question, was this a real decision? You know, was did she really think about running or as some thought when she was appointed, that she really or she really never intending to run, which is what some people were hoping Newsom would do. But I don’t know.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I kind of believe her that this has been an iterative process because it does sound like she didn’t have a lot of sort of warning before the governor called. And I do think you have to consider I mean, she’s not just a woman, she’s a black woman. She’s a black female lesbian. She has a young daughter, as she mentioned. You know, outside of that interview, I have heard from people who know her that the yeah, reaction, the hate was very swift. And I do think that that is a real thing. And, you know, if you look at the statement, it’s interesting. I mean, pursuing my clarity, I think, you know, a question of I mean, this doesn’t mean she’ll never run for anything.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> I think, in fact, she’s gotten a great launch. You know, she is she was it was a brilliant appointment in a lot of ways. It got Newsom out from under a rough spot, promising to appoint a Black woman, but not wanting to appoint somebody who was going to run. I think she was very well received in Washington. And, you know, I don’t know what her name ID exactly is in California, but it’s a lot higher than it was a few weeks ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Well, you know who’s happy today?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Barbara Lee, I’m sure is quite happy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And I’m sure Adam Schiff and Katie Porter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> And Nancy Pelosi who we’ll be hearing from in a little bit. But so, yeah, I think, you know, it is rare, as she said, to have that kind of power and to give it up, you know. Because it looked to many who saw her that she was running. She was looking and sounding like a candidate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And she still has a year to do that job and to build that name I.D. I’m like, we are not done hearing from Laphonza Butler. The woman is 43 years old. She was a rising star in the party before all of this. I think this just gives her a little time. And I’m sure there might have been. Yeah, some family conversations. It’s not, as we’ve talked about here in relation to Dianne Feinstein death. Your entire family makes a sacrifice when you go into it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Absolutely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Alright well other news we need to get to before we go to the former speaker. Gavin Newsom goes to Israel. He follows President Biden. He is arriving there on Friday, just spending a few hours, it sounds like, meeting with with folks. They haven’t really said who\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Victims of the violence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Is he running for president?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> He certainly seems to be running for shadow president. I mean, this is quite something. I mean, he addressed the U.N. last month talking about climate change. He’s going to be debating Governor Ron DeSantis, who is running for president at the end of November. So he certainly is looking and sounding like a candidate, and I’m sure he’s keeping the powder dry, if, in fact, that were to open up an opportunity. But it’s also, you know, going to Israel right now, it is a bit of a, you know, minefield, so to speak, to be it is very much inflamed passions on all sides. And, you know, also if when you parachute into a city. Situation like that, it can be very disruptive to everything else that’s going on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Probably not more disruptive than the president of the United States. But you know.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Who has a good reason to be going? I’m not sure he has a good reason to be going.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> We’ll see. Well, and we will be watching. He has then to China on Monday, where he’ll be doing a bunch of meetings with government and business leaders. And so we’ll be watching his latest foray into the world stage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Yeah, not the only governor, we should say, too Kathy Hochul from New York was there a few days ago and might still be there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Yeah, and a lot I think a lot of at home politics for them to deal with, wrestle with over that situation. Finally, Scott, and this could change honestly in the next few hours. But the House speaker chaos continues that we saw today. First, Jim Jordan saying, you know what, I’ll throw my sort of support behind a caretaker position for the current speaker and or the\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Patrick McHenry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I don’t know what they call him. And then coming out a few hours later saying, no, never mind, maybe I can convince some people. I think what’s interesting here in California is that essentially all of the Republican members who are in purple districts, swing districts where they know they will have tough elections against Democrats, voted to support Jim Jordan. I think it’s important to note that this is not just I mean, Kevin McCarthy is associated with Trump, but Jim Jordan asked Trump for a pardon because according to a lot of reporting, because he thought he might have followed the law over the January six stop the steal a whole thing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Absolutely. I mean, he is part of the chaos caucus in the Republican Party in the House right now. And, you know, there’s I’m sure at least some of them are quite happy to see the house grind to a halt. They’re not big on government generally. And although it’s not a good look for the reasons you just stated in terms of bad politics, when you’re running for reelection, just to be part of a party that seems to be dysfunctional and unable to govern. On the other hand, you know, people have voters have a way of kind of forgetting certain things.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> It’s a long road —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Although not so long until March.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Yeah. And I do think, though, that this is it really does whatever you think about, if voters will remember or care about Jim Jordan, if he lives or dies in the speakership fight, I think it does play into the narrative that Democrats have leaned into about Republicans as a party of chaos, of extremism, of sort of kowtowing to former President Trump. And, you know, I’m not saying that someone like Orange County Congresswoman Michele Steele isn’t still an excellent candidate for her district, but there’s already billboards going up there tying her to Trump and Jordan. And I do think that it is a little and someone like David Valadao, who voted to impeach Trump and is now voting for Jim Jordan, who helped with that attempt to overthrow the government.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> And these are all self-inflicted wounds. You know, this is not like somebody imposed this on them, although I suppose they would say the Democrats did by not voting to support McCarthy. But, you know, in the end, as she has said, it’s their speaker. They have to elect the speaker. No one ever no Republicans ever helped her become speaker. And but it will be interesting, Marissa, I think, to see just how far will Democrats stay on the sidelines here and allow this chaos to develop. There are some big issues coming up, including the funding of the government, which that is going to be in front of them by November. And we’ll see if Hakeem Jeffries.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Well, not to mention aid to Israel and Ukraine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Exactly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And I mean, you know, with a war going on, I do think I mean, you even see in just the tenor of Jordan’s comments, it’s a lot easier to stand on the outside and throw bombs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Yes, exactly. And I think that’s, you know, is it really I think they have to decide, are they going to be a governing party or an outside throwing rocks party?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> All right. We’re going to take a short break. When we come back, we’ll return to our recent conversation with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. You’re listening to Political Breakdown from KQED Public Radio.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Welcome back to Political Breakdown. Marisa Lagos here with Scott Shafer. We are about to bring you more of our conversation with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. This is from our sit down with her earlier this month at KQED Live. And if you missed part one last week, make sure to subscribe to the Political Breakdown podcast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Last year, as you may recall, Pelosi’s husband, Paul, was attacked at their home by an assailant who was looking for the former House speaker. We asked Nancy Pelosi how he’s doing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Thank you for asking. Paul is making rapid progress, probably about 80% back, but he’s doing what he needs to do in terms of therapy and the rest. But it’ll take a few more months and hopefully by Christmas or New Year, he’ll be okay. Thank you, though, for asking. Everybody ask about. All over the world, we get so much, so many prayers and so many thoughts and and goodwill for him. And you know what is so funny? Cause he’s not even political. He’s not even political. And that person came looking for me, and Paul paid the price. Such a sweet person. But Christine and Nancy Corinne are here they are. We take great pride in him and take good care of him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> You went when this horrible incident happened. You were asked on CNN, I think it was like, is this going to affect your decision to run for reelection? He said, yes, it definitely will. And I think our initial take was, oh, she’s not going to run. Obviously, you’re running. And I’m wondering, did it have that impact on you? ‘I’m not going to let this guy determine whether or not I run for reelection.’\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Well, it a lot of it would depend on how well Paul was improving, that’s for sure. But here’s the thing. For 20, it was more than 35 years I’ve been in contact with 20 of those years, I was speaker or leader eight years speaker, which meant that everything that was happening in the Capitol and the House of Representatives, I had major responsibility for and as leader in the Democratic Party. When that came was coming to an end, the city of San Francisco had given me so much latitude to do that. To take that responsibility, not to the neglect of my city, but nonetheless an additional responsibility in my service In Congress. I visit 87 countries, sometimes once, sometimes five times, sometimes closer to double digit if it were a theater of war like Afghanistan or Iraq.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But, for me when I saw that San Francisco had certain needs right now ad what I could do about that in the Congress. I thought, they’ve given me all this latitude. I’m not walking away when the glory days in terms of speakership are over. I’m here, as I always have been, for the people of San Francisco. So it was more about San Francisco. It was also about the fact that our democracy is at stake. And that to me was we do we take the oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, which is at risk is at risk in what we see among some people, one of them, you know who I mean. And that was part of my it was about San Francisco and it was about our democracy. And what it means to individuals in terms of their freedom, what it means for our country, and what it means to the world, that America’s democracy is a strong model to the world of democracy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Will you commit, there will be an election, your election, and the lot of those questions will be settled when you’re when you’re up for reelection, will you commit to serving two full years?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> What do you mean two full years?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Another full term in the House.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Yeah that’s what my plan is to do, of course.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I do want to ask, it’s thought that your daughter, Christine Pelosi, who’s here, might want to run for your seat in the future. Would you want her to do that?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> We’ve never had that conversation. Shall we have it here?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Sure, yeah, we’d love to.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> You’re telling me that there’s somebody who wants my job?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong>\u003cem> [laughs]\u003c/em> But you know public service is a huge sacrifice, and yeah, I’m just curious.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> It is. And that’s why I respect my colleagues on the other side, have respected my colleagues on the other side of the aisle and the people who send them to the Congress. Public service is service and it is a blessing if you have the privilege to be engaged in it. And I always say to people, because I get asked all the time by young women wh want to be involved, and I say, here’s what I say to them. I say, “know your why.” Know why you want to do this. Is it about children? For me, my why was about children. One in five children in America went to sleep hungry at night, one in five children in America lived in poverty and went to sleep hungry at night. That got me out of the kitchen to the Congress. Housewife, House speaker. The children, for the children and that’s why.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So know what you’re talking about. Get the job. Figure out how you can strategically attract people to your point of view. Care, show what’s in your heart. And I say that to young people and say know how important your participation is. In the history of the world, there’s never been anyone like you. So know your power. Know the difference that you can make. And know your why. Because this is hard, it comes at you — I don’t care. But nonetheless, other people do. You get in a ring. You know, beautiful Republican President Teddy Roosevelt, he talked about being in the arena and how you’re not a spectator anymore. You’re a fighter. So I say to them you are in the arena. You know your power, know your why, and know that you’re going to have to take a punch. Sometimes you’re going to have to throw a punch for the children, for the children.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But my favorite my favorite line of this is Sister Joyce down in Los Angeles. I just saw the other day she sent me this thing. It was a Bishop in Africa, nailed this to the wall in a hospital and it said, “One day when I die and I happily go to meet my maker. Our creator, he will say to me, Show me your wounds. And if I have no wounds, he will say, was nothing worth fighting for? I’m proud of my wounds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> So after Senator Feinstein passed away, the governor had to make an appointment there’s a lot of reporting that among the things that the governor had to consider was you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Oh no, why would I want to be a Senator, I’ve been Speaker of the House.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Did you have any conversations with the governor about the appointment?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> No, no, none.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Not one?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> No. Maybe jokingly, I may have said, no I don’t even think jokingly. I don’t think we ever had a conversation about it. But I’m very proud of the governor. We’re very proud that he was mayor of San Francisco. He is knowledgeable, articulate, and out there in the fray to hold to fight for our democracy as we go into this in this campaign. So. No, no, no. I never did have a conversation with him. It was up to him. He had a lot of appointments. He appointed a Senator Alex Padilla, wonderful. An attorney general. Then. Well, no, Jerry Brown did the first appointment of Xavier Becerra and then he put in Bonta, and then the secretary of state and then another senator. That’s a lot of appointments for one person for a governor. He handled it very with excellent people all throughout.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> You know, you speak in very glowing terms of President Biden. And obviously it will be alongside him campaigning next year for the Democrats. I’m just curious, like you talked about the economy. I mean, so important. We hear a lot these days about immigration on the border. What do you think success looks like on some of these issues in terms of communicating some of the wins you laid out to the electorate? Because it doesn’t seem by the poll numbers that people are feeling some of those good that that good news. And there’s a lot of fear about what’s happening on the southern border.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Well, the border, we have a responsibility to secure our border. There’s no question about that. And we want to do so in a way that honors our values. I’ve worked with the with the evangelicals, for example, and when what’s his name tried to do a ban on Muslims and the rest, we had a big come together and they said, the U.S. refugee resettlement program is the crown jewel of American humanitarianism. That’s the evangelicals. So we have again, we have to to honor our values as we protect our border.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But let me just say this. I’m not a big believer in the polls in the last election, say around now. Did you ever hear that we’re going to lose 30 or 40 seats? It was going to be a red wave. This red wave was coming. And I said, you know what, that’s just ain’t the case because we had our elections. We knew we said to people in the district, in one district at a time, your person voted against democracy, voted against gun violence protection, voted against saving the environment, voted against a woman’s right to choose, and they all lost. We won every seat except New York. We lost five seats and we’ll win those in the next election. But the polls said we were going to lose 30 to 40. We lost five.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And it’s a year out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> So as far as that’s concerned, I think that we have to improve the, we have to give the people the message the way they receive it. And when they’re ready to receive it. And I feel very confident that the president will succeed. I didn’t tell you this, remember I told you about food out of their mouths. Heating oil for seniors and all that. Would you believe that the Republicans want to take almost 80% of the funding for Title One, education for the poorest children in America. They want to take almost all of it away. Why I say that is because education is part of our democracy. An informed electorate is the crown jewel of a democracy. And they want. If you live in the suburbs and you have high tax areas where they can go to school and have a wonderful education, God bless them for that. But why would you take 80% of the money from the poorest kids in America? It’s just, it’s wrong, but it’s also un-democratic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So when we again go out there and make the case where people are ready to receive it, who give a damn about justice and fairness and liberty and justice for all. What good is it to say to a country if you’re poor, we don’t want you to even have an education because you know what? You’re depriving America of some of the best talent, some of the freshest thinking that you don’t even know about, not to even mention them reaching their self-fulfillment, but for America making America strong. So when you see how we are, you know, in the fight. Throwing the punch, as Diane said ‘Why do you have to be the one always making the charge?’ It’s because of the oath we take to protect and defend the Constitution. The pledge we take for liberty and justice for all. That the flag is still there. And that’s what you will see. And that’s why we do this. That’s why we do this. And that is what is at stake in this election. The children.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> You’ve children you’ve mentioned San Francisco a number of times. Obviously, you care deeply about your city. And San Francisco’s had its moment in the barrel. You know, we’re constantly being attacked by Fox News. There are serious problems on the streets with fentanyl, homelessness, public safety, you know, car break ins. Homelessness is at the root of a lot of that. And I’m wondering, you know, we talk about the city. What can the city do? What can the state do? But why isn’t the federal government doing more? Do you feel like, because under Republican and Democratic presidents, it seems like, for example, HUD funding has been going down.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Well let me just say that I don’t agree with how you describe San Francisco. That’s how The New York Times might describe San Francisco. And yes, we have fentanyl on the street. Homelessness has been largely addressed, except if you’re talking about —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Encampments.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Drug use and fentanyl and the rest of that. And the federal government has done a lot of things under President Obama and under President Biden to recognize the beautiful diversity of communities like ours in terms of of how the laws are written to provide as much affordable, we get low income, affordable housing and then market rate. Most for low income and affordable housing. So a lot of what’s on the street now is not necessarily about homelessness as it is related to drug use. And that’s one of the things I’m working very hard on. And I think the city has done a good job. The mayor has done a good job in getting people off the street. But if they don’t want to leave, then we just have to address the fentanyl issue. This, see this thing here. Just the base, not the flap where just the flowers, not the base. Less than that of fentanyl would kill the whole city of San Francisco. This chair. 25% of the people on the Earth. Fentanyl, it’s so deadly. And yet chemicals from China processed in Mexico, brought into the United States, some of it sold in San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So I’ve called on the federal government to do a what is called a well, an initiative where there is violence and drug use, they can come in and help get that off the street. And that’s what they are working on. And we’ll be making some announcements about that. But it’s a decision and the community has to recognize that there has to be more law enforcement. You know, we want everybody’s rights protected and the rest. But there has to be more law enforcement because this is deadly. But San Francisco is so great and we’re resilient. We are resilient. We are a great place. We have great values. The song of Saint Francis and our anthem make me an instrument of thy peace. Such greatness, beautiful diversity of people, of opinion, of religion, of politics, just different from each other, but respectful of everyone. So I couldn’t be prouder than to speak for the people of San Francisco on the floor of the House.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> We are short on time, but we did learn last month that you are a Deadhead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> That’s quite a pivot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And I know, but we had to get this question. And so what’s your usual concert attire? We usually see you dressed for the House of Representatives and events like this. And what’s your favorite song?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Well, here’s the thing. I love the Grateful Dead. And they had this article that I love, the Grateful Dead, which I do and have for years. And they’ve done a lot of political things for us and this or that and this last.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> The last concert. Final, final, final.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Final of the Grateful Dead, I was there. And then I went to say hi to them during intermission and they said, no, you have to stay on stage for it. So. So they were there. And I was right here. It was fabulous. It was great. And then they gave me something “vote.” Now you go out there and hold a sign that says voters and no, I’m not going out there and have that song. We want people to vote. We don’t want them to take it out on a politician who shows up at a rock and roll concert. I love them. I love you U2. U2 they just did a beautiful thing about Israel. I love so many. The one that I regret that I never saw. I’ve seen almost everybody. The one I never saw was Queen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Are you in heels at the concerts?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> I think I had boots. It was a little chilly that night and chilly that night. I don’t even remember what I had.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I had to ask because you’re famous for the heels.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Yeah, usually I do. But I don’t remember what I had that night because it was cold. In fact, I said to Bobby Weir, you’ve got to put on —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Bob Weir?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> I said you’ve got to put on socks, it’s cold. He said oh no I’m fine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> How do you know them so well?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Oh, they. When I became whip, which was the big moment, you know, in other words, who became whip was going to do that. And they came and did a show for me in Washington, DC. It was quite remarkable. Nobody ever saw anything like that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> All right. Well, Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi, thanks so much.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Thank you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Thank you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> That’s a wrap for tonight’s edition of Political Breakdown, a production of KQED Public Radio.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> We want to say thanks to our KQED Live crew, including executive director Ryan Davis and producer Lance Gardner. Our radio engineer is Jim Bennett. And I’m Marisa Lagos, thanks for coming tonight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> And let’s thank Scott and Marisa for their wonderful questioning and orchestrating all of this tonight. And thank all of you.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">View the full episode transcript.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Senator Laphonza Butler announces she won’t run for a full term 2024. Scott and Marisa discuss the surprise announcement as well as Governor Gavin Newsom’s trip to Israel and what the ongoing dysfunction in the House of Representatives means for vulnerable California Republicans. Then, in the second part of their conversation at KQED Live, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi talks to Marisa and Scott about her husband Paul’s recovery, her decision to run for re-election, homelessness in San Francisco and the Grateful Dead.\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-content post-body\">\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Hey there, everyone. From KQED Public Radio, this is Political Breakdown. I’m Marisa Lagos.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> And I’m Scott Shafer. Today on The Breakdown, we continue our conversation with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. This week, she’ll get into why at age 83, she’s running for another two years in Congress. And we’ll talk 2024 electoral politics too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> All that’s from our recent on-stage conversation with the San Francisco congresswoman. If you want to watch the entire hour, you can tune in tomorrow night to KQED TV. That’s channel nine. That’s Friday night. We’ll be airing the unedited conversation at 8 p.m.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But first, Scott, a big news week sort of culminating, or maybe, this afternoon with an announcement from Laphonza Butler, the woman named by Gavin Newsom to fill Dianne Feinstein Senate seat. She says she will not run, putting out a statement saying that she has spent the last several weeks since the appointment pursuing her clarity, thinking about what kind of life she wants to have, what kind of service she wants to offer, and that she’s decided not to run. “Knowing you can win a campaign doesn’t always mean you should run a campaign.” And we have actually the senator in her own voice talking on Fox 11 in Los Angeles to Elex Michaelson. And he, you know, asked her about this question. And she talked a lot about the work she’s done getting particularly women of color elected to office, but had this to say.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Laphonza Butler:\u003c/strong> The divisive nature and of the harassment that is happening both online and in real life. My mother is 70 years old. She didn’t sign up for this. My daughter is nine. She didn’t sign up for for this. And so I’m thinking about my family, my family’s safety. I’ve already gotten my first piece of hate mail and a stranger has shown up at my door.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> That is certainly a legitimate reason not to run. You know, and especially since she has never run before and so suddenly she’s thrown into this cauldron in D.C. where it’s I mean, right now it’s just red hot for all kinds of reasons. And so it’s you know, it’s not surprising if you come up through the political world and you’ve run for office, you kind of gotten used to being yelled at by your constituents. I could see where this would be, you know, kind of a shock. On the other hand, I think there’s there is a question, was this a real decision? You know, was did she really think about running or as some thought when she was appointed, that she really or she really never intending to run, which is what some people were hoping Newsom would do. But I don’t know.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I kind of believe her that this has been an iterative process because it does sound like she didn’t have a lot of sort of warning before the governor called. And I do think you have to consider I mean, she’s not just a woman, she’s a black woman. She’s a black female lesbian. She has a young daughter, as she mentioned. You know, outside of that interview, I have heard from people who know her that the yeah, reaction, the hate was very swift. And I do think that that is a real thing. And, you know, if you look at the statement, it’s interesting. I mean, pursuing my clarity, I think, you know, a question of I mean, this doesn’t mean she’ll never run for anything.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> I think, in fact, she’s gotten a great launch. You know, she is she was it was a brilliant appointment in a lot of ways. It got Newsom out from under a rough spot, promising to appoint a Black woman, but not wanting to appoint somebody who was going to run. I think she was very well received in Washington. And, you know, I don’t know what her name ID exactly is in California, but it’s a lot higher than it was a few weeks ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Well, you know who’s happy today?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Barbara Lee, I’m sure is quite happy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And I’m sure Adam Schiff and Katie Porter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> And Nancy Pelosi who we’ll be hearing from in a little bit. But so, yeah, I think, you know, it is rare, as she said, to have that kind of power and to give it up, you know. Because it looked to many who saw her that she was running. She was looking and sounding like a candidate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And she still has a year to do that job and to build that name I.D. I’m like, we are not done hearing from Laphonza Butler. The woman is 43 years old. She was a rising star in the party before all of this. I think this just gives her a little time. And I’m sure there might have been. Yeah, some family conversations. It’s not, as we’ve talked about here in relation to Dianne Feinstein death. Your entire family makes a sacrifice when you go into it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Absolutely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Alright well other news we need to get to before we go to the former speaker. Gavin Newsom goes to Israel. He follows President Biden. He is arriving there on Friday, just spending a few hours, it sounds like, meeting with with folks. They haven’t really said who\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Victims of the violence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Is he running for president?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> He certainly seems to be running for shadow president. I mean, this is quite something. I mean, he addressed the U.N. last month talking about climate change. He’s going to be debating Governor Ron DeSantis, who is running for president at the end of November. So he certainly is looking and sounding like a candidate, and I’m sure he’s keeping the powder dry, if, in fact, that were to open up an opportunity. But it’s also, you know, going to Israel right now, it is a bit of a, you know, minefield, so to speak, to be it is very much inflamed passions on all sides. And, you know, also if when you parachute into a city. Situation like that, it can be very disruptive to everything else that’s going on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Probably not more disruptive than the president of the United States. But you know.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Who has a good reason to be going? I’m not sure he has a good reason to be going.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> We’ll see. Well, and we will be watching. He has then to China on Monday, where he’ll be doing a bunch of meetings with government and business leaders. And so we’ll be watching his latest foray into the world stage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Yeah, not the only governor, we should say, too Kathy Hochul from New York was there a few days ago and might still be there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Yeah, and a lot I think a lot of at home politics for them to deal with, wrestle with over that situation. Finally, Scott, and this could change honestly in the next few hours. But the House speaker chaos continues that we saw today. First, Jim Jordan saying, you know what, I’ll throw my sort of support behind a caretaker position for the current speaker and or the\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Patrick McHenry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I don’t know what they call him. And then coming out a few hours later saying, no, never mind, maybe I can convince some people. I think what’s interesting here in California is that essentially all of the Republican members who are in purple districts, swing districts where they know they will have tough elections against Democrats, voted to support Jim Jordan. I think it’s important to note that this is not just I mean, Kevin McCarthy is associated with Trump, but Jim Jordan asked Trump for a pardon because according to a lot of reporting, because he thought he might have followed the law over the January six stop the steal a whole thing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Absolutely. I mean, he is part of the chaos caucus in the Republican Party in the House right now. And, you know, there’s I’m sure at least some of them are quite happy to see the house grind to a halt. They’re not big on government generally. And although it’s not a good look for the reasons you just stated in terms of bad politics, when you’re running for reelection, just to be part of a party that seems to be dysfunctional and unable to govern. On the other hand, you know, people have voters have a way of kind of forgetting certain things.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> It’s a long road —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Although not so long until March.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Yeah. And I do think, though, that this is it really does whatever you think about, if voters will remember or care about Jim Jordan, if he lives or dies in the speakership fight, I think it does play into the narrative that Democrats have leaned into about Republicans as a party of chaos, of extremism, of sort of kowtowing to former President Trump. And, you know, I’m not saying that someone like Orange County Congresswoman Michele Steele isn’t still an excellent candidate for her district, but there’s already billboards going up there tying her to Trump and Jordan. And I do think that it is a little and someone like David Valadao, who voted to impeach Trump and is now voting for Jim Jordan, who helped with that attempt to overthrow the government.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> And these are all self-inflicted wounds. You know, this is not like somebody imposed this on them, although I suppose they would say the Democrats did by not voting to support McCarthy. But, you know, in the end, as she has said, it’s their speaker. They have to elect the speaker. No one ever no Republicans ever helped her become speaker. And but it will be interesting, Marissa, I think, to see just how far will Democrats stay on the sidelines here and allow this chaos to develop. There are some big issues coming up, including the funding of the government, which that is going to be in front of them by November. And we’ll see if Hakeem Jeffries.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Well, not to mention aid to Israel and Ukraine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Exactly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And I mean, you know, with a war going on, I do think I mean, you even see in just the tenor of Jordan’s comments, it’s a lot easier to stand on the outside and throw bombs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Yes, exactly. And I think that’s, you know, is it really I think they have to decide, are they going to be a governing party or an outside throwing rocks party?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> All right. We’re going to take a short break. When we come back, we’ll return to our recent conversation with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. You’re listening to Political Breakdown from KQED Public Radio.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Welcome back to Political Breakdown. Marisa Lagos here with Scott Shafer. We are about to bring you more of our conversation with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. This is from our sit down with her earlier this month at KQED Live. And if you missed part one last week, make sure to subscribe to the Political Breakdown podcast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Last year, as you may recall, Pelosi’s husband, Paul, was attacked at their home by an assailant who was looking for the former House speaker. We asked Nancy Pelosi how he’s doing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Thank you for asking. Paul is making rapid progress, probably about 80% back, but he’s doing what he needs to do in terms of therapy and the rest. But it’ll take a few more months and hopefully by Christmas or New Year, he’ll be okay. Thank you, though, for asking. Everybody ask about. All over the world, we get so much, so many prayers and so many thoughts and and goodwill for him. And you know what is so funny? Cause he’s not even political. He’s not even political. And that person came looking for me, and Paul paid the price. Such a sweet person. But Christine and Nancy Corinne are here they are. We take great pride in him and take good care of him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> You went when this horrible incident happened. You were asked on CNN, I think it was like, is this going to affect your decision to run for reelection? He said, yes, it definitely will. And I think our initial take was, oh, she’s not going to run. Obviously, you’re running. And I’m wondering, did it have that impact on you? ‘I’m not going to let this guy determine whether or not I run for reelection.’\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Well, it a lot of it would depend on how well Paul was improving, that’s for sure. But here’s the thing. For 20, it was more than 35 years I’ve been in contact with 20 of those years, I was speaker or leader eight years speaker, which meant that everything that was happening in the Capitol and the House of Representatives, I had major responsibility for and as leader in the Democratic Party. When that came was coming to an end, the city of San Francisco had given me so much latitude to do that. To take that responsibility, not to the neglect of my city, but nonetheless an additional responsibility in my service In Congress. I visit 87 countries, sometimes once, sometimes five times, sometimes closer to double digit if it were a theater of war like Afghanistan or Iraq.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But, for me when I saw that San Francisco had certain needs right now ad what I could do about that in the Congress. I thought, they’ve given me all this latitude. I’m not walking away when the glory days in terms of speakership are over. I’m here, as I always have been, for the people of San Francisco. So it was more about San Francisco. It was also about the fact that our democracy is at stake. And that to me was we do we take the oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, which is at risk is at risk in what we see among some people, one of them, you know who I mean. And that was part of my it was about San Francisco and it was about our democracy. And what it means to individuals in terms of their freedom, what it means for our country, and what it means to the world, that America’s democracy is a strong model to the world of democracy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Will you commit, there will be an election, your election, and the lot of those questions will be settled when you’re when you’re up for reelection, will you commit to serving two full years?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> What do you mean two full years?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Another full term in the House.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Yeah that’s what my plan is to do, of course.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I do want to ask, it’s thought that your daughter, Christine Pelosi, who’s here, might want to run for your seat in the future. Would you want her to do that?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> We’ve never had that conversation. Shall we have it here?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Sure, yeah, we’d love to.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> You’re telling me that there’s somebody who wants my job?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong>\u003cem> [laughs]\u003c/em> But you know public service is a huge sacrifice, and yeah, I’m just curious.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> It is. And that’s why I respect my colleagues on the other side, have respected my colleagues on the other side of the aisle and the people who send them to the Congress. Public service is service and it is a blessing if you have the privilege to be engaged in it. And I always say to people, because I get asked all the time by young women wh want to be involved, and I say, here’s what I say to them. I say, “know your why.” Know why you want to do this. Is it about children? For me, my why was about children. One in five children in America went to sleep hungry at night, one in five children in America lived in poverty and went to sleep hungry at night. That got me out of the kitchen to the Congress. Housewife, House speaker. The children, for the children and that’s why.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So know what you’re talking about. Get the job. Figure out how you can strategically attract people to your point of view. Care, show what’s in your heart. And I say that to young people and say know how important your participation is. In the history of the world, there’s never been anyone like you. So know your power. Know the difference that you can make. And know your why. Because this is hard, it comes at you — I don’t care. But nonetheless, other people do. You get in a ring. You know, beautiful Republican President Teddy Roosevelt, he talked about being in the arena and how you’re not a spectator anymore. You’re a fighter. So I say to them you are in the arena. You know your power, know your why, and know that you’re going to have to take a punch. Sometimes you’re going to have to throw a punch for the children, for the children.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But my favorite my favorite line of this is Sister Joyce down in Los Angeles. I just saw the other day she sent me this thing. It was a Bishop in Africa, nailed this to the wall in a hospital and it said, “One day when I die and I happily go to meet my maker. Our creator, he will say to me, Show me your wounds. And if I have no wounds, he will say, was nothing worth fighting for? I’m proud of my wounds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> So after Senator Feinstein passed away, the governor had to make an appointment there’s a lot of reporting that among the things that the governor had to consider was you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Oh no, why would I want to be a Senator, I’ve been Speaker of the House.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Did you have any conversations with the governor about the appointment?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> No, no, none.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Not one?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> No. Maybe jokingly, I may have said, no I don’t even think jokingly. I don’t think we ever had a conversation about it. But I’m very proud of the governor. We’re very proud that he was mayor of San Francisco. He is knowledgeable, articulate, and out there in the fray to hold to fight for our democracy as we go into this in this campaign. So. No, no, no. I never did have a conversation with him. It was up to him. He had a lot of appointments. He appointed a Senator Alex Padilla, wonderful. An attorney general. Then. Well, no, Jerry Brown did the first appointment of Xavier Becerra and then he put in Bonta, and then the secretary of state and then another senator. That’s a lot of appointments for one person for a governor. He handled it very with excellent people all throughout.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> You know, you speak in very glowing terms of President Biden. And obviously it will be alongside him campaigning next year for the Democrats. I’m just curious, like you talked about the economy. I mean, so important. We hear a lot these days about immigration on the border. What do you think success looks like on some of these issues in terms of communicating some of the wins you laid out to the electorate? Because it doesn’t seem by the poll numbers that people are feeling some of those good that that good news. And there’s a lot of fear about what’s happening on the southern border.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Well, the border, we have a responsibility to secure our border. There’s no question about that. And we want to do so in a way that honors our values. I’ve worked with the with the evangelicals, for example, and when what’s his name tried to do a ban on Muslims and the rest, we had a big come together and they said, the U.S. refugee resettlement program is the crown jewel of American humanitarianism. That’s the evangelicals. So we have again, we have to to honor our values as we protect our border.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But let me just say this. I’m not a big believer in the polls in the last election, say around now. Did you ever hear that we’re going to lose 30 or 40 seats? It was going to be a red wave. This red wave was coming. And I said, you know what, that’s just ain’t the case because we had our elections. We knew we said to people in the district, in one district at a time, your person voted against democracy, voted against gun violence protection, voted against saving the environment, voted against a woman’s right to choose, and they all lost. We won every seat except New York. We lost five seats and we’ll win those in the next election. But the polls said we were going to lose 30 to 40. We lost five.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And it’s a year out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> So as far as that’s concerned, I think that we have to improve the, we have to give the people the message the way they receive it. And when they’re ready to receive it. And I feel very confident that the president will succeed. I didn’t tell you this, remember I told you about food out of their mouths. Heating oil for seniors and all that. Would you believe that the Republicans want to take almost 80% of the funding for Title One, education for the poorest children in America. They want to take almost all of it away. Why I say that is because education is part of our democracy. An informed electorate is the crown jewel of a democracy. And they want. If you live in the suburbs and you have high tax areas where they can go to school and have a wonderful education, God bless them for that. But why would you take 80% of the money from the poorest kids in America? It’s just, it’s wrong, but it’s also un-democratic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So when we again go out there and make the case where people are ready to receive it, who give a damn about justice and fairness and liberty and justice for all. What good is it to say to a country if you’re poor, we don’t want you to even have an education because you know what? You’re depriving America of some of the best talent, some of the freshest thinking that you don’t even know about, not to even mention them reaching their self-fulfillment, but for America making America strong. So when you see how we are, you know, in the fight. Throwing the punch, as Diane said ‘Why do you have to be the one always making the charge?’ It’s because of the oath we take to protect and defend the Constitution. The pledge we take for liberty and justice for all. That the flag is still there. And that’s what you will see. And that’s why we do this. That’s why we do this. And that is what is at stake in this election. The children.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> You’ve children you’ve mentioned San Francisco a number of times. Obviously, you care deeply about your city. And San Francisco’s had its moment in the barrel. You know, we’re constantly being attacked by Fox News. There are serious problems on the streets with fentanyl, homelessness, public safety, you know, car break ins. Homelessness is at the root of a lot of that. And I’m wondering, you know, we talk about the city. What can the city do? What can the state do? But why isn’t the federal government doing more? Do you feel like, because under Republican and Democratic presidents, it seems like, for example, HUD funding has been going down.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Well let me just say that I don’t agree with how you describe San Francisco. That’s how The New York Times might describe San Francisco. And yes, we have fentanyl on the street. Homelessness has been largely addressed, except if you’re talking about —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Encampments.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Drug use and fentanyl and the rest of that. And the federal government has done a lot of things under President Obama and under President Biden to recognize the beautiful diversity of communities like ours in terms of of how the laws are written to provide as much affordable, we get low income, affordable housing and then market rate. Most for low income and affordable housing. So a lot of what’s on the street now is not necessarily about homelessness as it is related to drug use. And that’s one of the things I’m working very hard on. And I think the city has done a good job. The mayor has done a good job in getting people off the street. But if they don’t want to leave, then we just have to address the fentanyl issue. This, see this thing here. Just the base, not the flap where just the flowers, not the base. Less than that of fentanyl would kill the whole city of San Francisco. This chair. 25% of the people on the Earth. Fentanyl, it’s so deadly. And yet chemicals from China processed in Mexico, brought into the United States, some of it sold in San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So I’ve called on the federal government to do a what is called a well, an initiative where there is violence and drug use, they can come in and help get that off the street. And that’s what they are working on. And we’ll be making some announcements about that. But it’s a decision and the community has to recognize that there has to be more law enforcement. You know, we want everybody’s rights protected and the rest. But there has to be more law enforcement because this is deadly. But San Francisco is so great and we’re resilient. We are resilient. We are a great place. We have great values. The song of Saint Francis and our anthem make me an instrument of thy peace. Such greatness, beautiful diversity of people, of opinion, of religion, of politics, just different from each other, but respectful of everyone. So I couldn’t be prouder than to speak for the people of San Francisco on the floor of the House.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> We are short on time, but we did learn last month that you are a Deadhead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> That’s quite a pivot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> And I know, but we had to get this question. And so what’s your usual concert attire? We usually see you dressed for the House of Representatives and events like this. And what’s your favorite song?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Well, here’s the thing. I love the Grateful Dead. And they had this article that I love, the Grateful Dead, which I do and have for years. And they’ve done a lot of political things for us and this or that and this last.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> The last concert. Final, final, final.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Final of the Grateful Dead, I was there. And then I went to say hi to them during intermission and they said, no, you have to stay on stage for it. So. So they were there. And I was right here. It was fabulous. It was great. And then they gave me something “vote.” Now you go out there and hold a sign that says voters and no, I’m not going out there and have that song. We want people to vote. We don’t want them to take it out on a politician who shows up at a rock and roll concert. I love them. I love you U2. U2 they just did a beautiful thing about Israel. I love so many. The one that I regret that I never saw. I’ve seen almost everybody. The one I never saw was Queen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Are you in heels at the concerts?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> I think I had boots. It was a little chilly that night and chilly that night. I don’t even remember what I had.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> I had to ask because you’re famous for the heels.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Yeah, usually I do. But I don’t remember what I had that night because it was cold. In fact, I said to Bobby Weir, you’ve got to put on —\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> Bob Weir?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> I said you’ve got to put on socks, it’s cold. He said oh no I’m fine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> How do you know them so well?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Oh, they. When I became whip, which was the big moment, you know, in other words, who became whip was going to do that. And they came and did a show for me in Washington, DC. It was quite remarkable. Nobody ever saw anything like that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> All right. Well, Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi, thanks so much.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> Thank you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> Thank you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Scott Shafer:\u003c/strong> That’s a wrap for tonight’s edition of Political Breakdown, a production of KQED Public Radio.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Marisa Lagos:\u003c/strong> We want to say thanks to our KQED Live crew, including executive director Ryan Davis and producer Lance Gardner. Our radio engineer is Jim Bennett. And I’m Marisa Lagos, thanks for coming tonight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nancy Pelosi:\u003c/strong> And let’s thank Scott and Marisa for their wonderful questioning and orchestrating all of this tonight. And thank all of you.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>"
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"info": "Gentrification is changing cities across America, forcing people from neighborhoods they have long called home. Call them the displaced. Now those priced out of the Bay Area are looking for a better life in an unlikely place. American Suburb follows this migration to one California town along the Delta, 45 miles from San Francisco. But is this once sleepy suburb ready for them?",
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},
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"id": "baycurious",
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"tagline": "Exploring the Bay Area, one question at a time",
"info": "KQED’s new podcast, Bay Curious, gets to the bottom of the mysteries — both profound and peculiar — that give the Bay Area its unique identity. And we’ll do it with your help! You ask the questions. You decide what Bay Curious investigates. And you join us on the journey to find the answers.",
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},
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},
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"info": "KQED’s statewide radio news program providing daily coverage of issues, trends and public policy decisions.",
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"order": 8
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"tagline": "Your state, your stories",
"info": "Every week, The California Report Magazine takes you on a road trip for the ears: to visit the places and meet the people who make California unique. The in-depth storytelling podcast from the California Report.",
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"airtime": "SUN 1pm-2pm, TUE 10pm, WED 1am",
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"source": "City Arts & Lectures"
},
"link": "https://www.cityarts.net",
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"order": 1
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"title": "Code Switch / Life Kit",
"info": "\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em>, which listeners will hear in the first part of the hour, has fearless and much-needed conversations about race. Hosted by journalists of color, the show tackles the subject of race head-on, exploring how it impacts every part of society — from politics and pop culture to history, sports and more.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em>, which will be in the second part of the hour, guides you through spaces and feelings no one prepares you for — from finances to mental health, from workplace microaggressions to imposter syndrome, from relationships to parenting. The show features experts with real world experience and shares their knowledge. Because everyone needs a little help being human.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510312/codeswitch\">\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/lifekit\">\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />",
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"id": "commonwealth-club",
"title": "Commonwealth Club of California Podcast",
"info": "The Commonwealth Club of California is the nation's oldest and largest public affairs forum. As a non-partisan forum, The Club brings to the public airwaves diverse viewpoints on important topics. The Club's weekly radio broadcast - the oldest in the U.S., dating back to 1924 - is carried across the nation on public radio stations and is now podcasting. Our website archive features audio of our recent programs, as well as selected speeches from our long and distinguished history. This podcast feed is usually updated twice a week and is always un-edited.",
"airtime": "THU 10pm, FRI 1am",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Commonwealth-Club-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
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"source": "Commonwealth Club of California"
},
"link": "/radio/program/commonwealth-club",
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"title": "Forum",
"tagline": "The conversation starts here",
"info": "KQED’s live call-in program discussing local, state, national and international issues, as well as in-depth interviews.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 9am-11am, 10pm-11pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Forum-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
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"order": 9
},
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"meta": {
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"source": "WNYC"
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"info": "A live production of NPR and WBUR Boston, in collaboration with stations across the country, Here & Now reflects the fluid world of news as it's happening in the middle of the day, with timely, in-depth news, interviews and conversation. Hosted by Robin Young, Jeremy Hobson and Tonya Mosley.",
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"hidden-brain": {
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"info": "Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships.",
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"airtime": "SUN 7pm-8pm",
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"source": "NPR"
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"how-i-built-this": {
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"title": "How I Built This with Guy Raz",
"info": "Guy Raz dives into the stories behind some of the world's best known companies. How I Built This weaves a narrative journey about innovators, entrepreneurs and idealists—and the movements they built.",
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"airtime": "SUN 7:30pm-8pm",
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"hyphenacion": {
"id": "hyphenacion",
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"tagline": "Where conversation and cultura meet",
"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
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"jerrybrown": {
"id": "jerrybrown",
"title": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown",
"tagline": "Lessons from a lifetime in politics",
"info": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown brings listeners the wisdom of the former Governor, Mayor, and presidential candidate. Scott Shafer interviewed Brown for more than 40 hours, covering the former governor's life and half-century in the political game – and Brown has some lessons he'd like to share. ",
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"order": 18
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},
"latino-usa": {
"id": "latino-usa",
"title": "Latino USA",
"airtime": "MON 1am-2am, SUN 6pm-7pm",
"info": "Latino USA, the radio journal of news and culture, is the only national, English-language radio program produced from a Latino perspective.",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/latinoUsa.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "http://latinousa.org/",
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},
"link": "/radio/program/latino-usa",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?s=143441&mt=2&id=79681317&at=11l79Y&ct=nprdirectory",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510016/podcast.xml"
}
},
"marketplace": {
"id": "marketplace",
"title": "Marketplace",
"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 4pm-4:30pm, MON-WED 6:30pm-7pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Marketplace-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.marketplace.org/",
"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "American Public Media"
},
"link": "/radio/program/marketplace",
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"rss": "https://feeds.publicradio.org/public_feeds/marketplace-pm/rss/rss"
}
},
"masters-of-scale": {
"id": "masters-of-scale",
"title": "Masters of Scale",
"info": "Masters of Scale is an original podcast in which LinkedIn co-founder and Greylock Partner Reid Hoffman sets out to describe and prove theories that explain how great entrepreneurs take their companies from zero to a gazillion in ingenious fashion.",
"airtime": "Every other Wednesday June 12 through October 16 at 8pm (repeats Thursdays at 2am)",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "https://mastersofscale.com/",
"meta": {
"site": "radio",
"source": "WaitWhat"
},
"link": "/radio/program/masters-of-scale",
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"rss": "https://rss.art19.com/masters-of-scale"
}
},
"mindshift": {
"id": "mindshift",
"title": "MindShift",
"tagline": "A podcast about the future of learning and how we raise our kids",
"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Mindshift-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED MindShift: How We Will Learn",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/mindshift/",
"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 12
},
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