Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics, where we discussed the top political headlines with some of today's best minds. And in Trump's first one hundred days, the word Biden was his fifth most frequently used, According to a Time analysis of transcripts of Trump's public remarks, we have such a great show.
For you today.
As the world churns, host Andy Levy stops by to talk about Trump's meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Carney and Trump's complete inability to understand how trade works. Then we will talk to Kentucky Governor Andy Burscher about how to deliver to your constituents and help their lives.
But first the news Somali.
Some things in this world they're not for sale, and apparently one of them is Canada, because mister Mark Carney told that that Trump today and a lot of people were saying he may not have the Riz of Justin Trudeau to stand up to him, But I have to say I think he did a good job today.
Oh I'm glad you got Riz in there.
Listens, kids, Yes, my kids actually abanned me from saying the word rez. One of the ways in which we upset them is when my husband says, your mother has riz.
That gets them very upset.
How do they feel about you dressing chugi?
I don't know what chugi means. We'll talk about this. We're getting Is it fat? Is cheugy fat?
No doubt it's not.
I think you might want it. We've just come off the raist. Canada is not for sale. Let's just talk about this for a minute. So one of the things Trump invites the press in. He talks the press. He you know, talks back and forth. This was like the second time he's met Carney. Carney, he really did antagonize Trudeau. The whole fifty first day thing was meant to be kind of a way of antagonizing Trudeau. Now, Carney is like the dream politician for this moment. If I were Canada,
this would be my dream. He has managed Brexit, he was able to try to manage Brexit. He's a free trader, he's an economist, and he's been able to handle living over a crackhouse, which is what Canada is experiencing right now. We are the people who are smoking crack and our government. It's interesting to see him try to push back against Trump. So he starts off like a lot of European leaders
have with some success. You know, mister Trump, you're the biggest and tallest and most beautiful, real sort of pravda kind of North Korean, the kind of Mussolini esque praise that Trump needs. Then he says, you know, Canadian people who he represents. I mean, we've you know what's nice about Trump is he's completely forgotten about the whole elected for the people by the people. So Carney says, well, the Canadian people don't want to be a fifty first state.
They've pretty definitively said that that's not what they want,
you know. And then Trump's sort of what is interesting if there's something to be gleaned from this dysfunction, which is that you do see Trump he says, at one point, you know, it's not going to be as bad as it was when I was so mean, and I shouldn't be laughing to the President of Ukraine, because he did say in that meeting where you had the vice president being horrible to him, there was that he said, you know, this is not as combative as that.
I guess that's good. I don't know. I mean, Canada has.
Been our number one trading partner of Canada and Mexico. This is a completely self created crisis is that we're trying to manage. Now, completely self created crisis is because there are many that were trying to manage. But I felt for Carney and there was certainly a moment there when Trump was trying to explain he wants to stop buying Canadian cars, where it felt like he did not quite get what was going on and how any of this works.
So the Supreme Court has allowed mister Trump's administration to enforce the transgender military bin and uh, yeah, that's just lovely.
Yeah.
I mean again, this is like to sort of aside here. Main Governor Janet Mills told Trump World they could not take away federal funds because Trump was they were trying to sort of do this anti trans stuff with the schools, and she won in court. So a lot of times this stuff is pretty blatantly unconstitutional.
And now you have to remember we have this very.
Conservative court that has decided that discrimination is okay. Right, I mean that's really what we're saying here. Right, They're allowing Trump to enforce transgender military band.
They're doing that.
That's discrimination, right, You're discriminating against transgender people and the Supreme Court is allowing it. Look, ultimately, this Supreme Court may sort of be able to stop some of the really scary stuff that Trump's going to do.
But ideologically they are saying.
That discrimination is okay and that I think needs to I mean, you know, this is should not This is what this court is is very conservative court that he is very much in the tank for a lot of the stuff that we know is not okay.
Yeah. So when Mitch McConnell decided to step aside of being the Senate majority leader, many people wondered this, Tom tillis fella. I haven't heard much about him over the years. He's kind of had a low profile. How is he going to rule? And I think we got an interesting hint today.
So Tom tillis again, when you get brave right before you're up for election, that I think should be noted. That's not bravery, that's just like trying to survive trump Ism. For example, there were two high profile people who have decided not to run in twenty twenty six. They are New new in New Hampshire and Brian Kemp in Georgia.
And you could say they're doing it because they don't agree with trump Ism or their principal, but they're really doing it because they know that Trump's going to be a drag on the midterms, and they know it's not politically expedient. They've waited this long, They'll wait a little longer. And I think there's a similar motivation behind this. Till his nose he's up. He likes to be in the Senate, or maybe he's going to resign, but I think I
think he's going to try to run again. And North Carolina is not Alabama, right, it's a pretty purple state, and so you know he's going to vote against some of the really insane nominees Ed Martin, so he wants to be the new top prosecutor in DC.
He is. I just want to give you a few reasons.
Why he's completely I mean, he's just famous. Like go on his Twitter and you will be really freaked out.
This guy is not what you want.
He's not fit for office. So, in an interesting turn, many people were hoping that after Jerry Connelly unfortunately has stepped down as head of Oversight, that AOC would run, But she is going to stay on her position as the Energy and Commerce.
Committee yeah, she said, the dynamics have not changed. So Connolly is stepping down. Then there Eleanor Holmes Norton has put her hat in the ring. She is eight thousand years old. The Daily Caller was delighted to draw attention to that. But there are other people on that committee who are extremely good communicators, and they are Garcia Rocanna, Melanie Stansberry, who's freshman, Greg ciz Are, summer Lee, Maxwell Frost.
I mean, there are a lot of people on that committee who would be great to have on there as the ranking. This committee is such an insane I mean, and oversight is such an insane on the Republican side, I mean, you have just the craziest Marjorie Taylor, Green beaupert Ana, Paulina Luna, Nancy Mace, Andy Biggs, I mean, Paul Gosar, I mean, just craziness. But yeah, I mean, look, I think that this is a real opportunity here to elevate someone who's not ten thousand years old and no
one's ever heard of. We'll see what happens. I don't want to get my hopes up.
Get your hopes up that we don't have ten thousand.
Years years old.
Yeah, Andy Levy is the host of the new podcast As the World Churns, which you can find on your favorite podcast player, and he is the former host of the new Abnormal.
Here we Go, Andy Levy.
Molly john First.
Welcome back chart rated podcaster Andy Levy.
That's your Yeah, I know, I'm so bad.
It's self promotion.
Yeah, Molly is talking about the new podcast that Daniel Moody and I have launched this week, As the World Churns. You can find it anywhere you get your podcasts and also on YouTube.
So let's talk today. Donald Trump. You may have heard of him. He had a meeting with Mark Karney, the newly elected Prime Minister of Canada, and it was, I have to say, incredible they did, because Trump is good at getting people's attention, which is something Democrats could absolutely learn from.
He invited the.
Pool spray in and there he explained to that that he has no idea how trade works, and it was a pretty amazing moment in which he said yes, so Carney, who was like very smart and knows how to do stuff and was involved in the disaster that is Brexit, trying to keep Britain from ruining itself, which spoiler he was not able to do.
Said, well, you know, we have all.
These cars where they're made partially in Canada and partially in the United States, which is true. You know, you have these car parks that go back and forth to different factories. And the whole idea here is that you shouldn't tear if things multiple times, and Trump said, yeah, but we don't want to buy Canadian cars anymore. We only want to buy American cars. Are we all going to die?
I don't know that I've ever had.
This is the guy that supposed to be a businessman, like I keep being told that in this businessman billionaire mixed deals. This is a guy who I guess steals today said that we don't care about accessing foreign markets. Tatum, that's good to come. I think as a surprise to a lot of American companies. Maybe I'm wrong because I don't you know, look, I don't want to argue with
the business genius. It's entirely possible that I'm wrong. But my understanding of economics is that you want as many people as possible to buy your products, to buy your services, and that means you don't care really where they live in the world. So you know, Am I wrong, Molly?
Am I wrong?
I'm excited to tear off foreign films, the cash cow that is foreign films.
Yeah, but you have always and this is one thing, and you know, a lot of us we talk about this about you off air. You've always had a jingoistic streak always, it really does. It borders on the xenophobic, and you are apt to be muttering those damn foreigners a lot. I give you credit because you've managed to keep that. I guess until now you've got just keep that sort of private sort of you haven't done it on your podcasts or i'm MSNBC, but not yet. But the fact, but the fact of the matter is now
the world knows exactly what you are. So I guess I understand why you sort of agree with Trump here.
Yeah, I mean, certainly we don't need those foreigner Well, he is a genius. No, listen, Yeah, it is very stupid. This is very very stupid. But the good I think like we are careening into what seems like it is about to be an economic disaster completely of Trump's making. I feel like the one bright spot here is that it undermines the authoritarianism.
Well, it undermines the authoritarianism. By that, do you mean there are people in this country who might support Trump on the authoritarianism.
Yeah, there are quite a lot of people in this country. I think it's fair to say for whom attacking universities and disappearing grad students is not a disqualifier or a problem, right, you you know, it's it's not good. They don't even I don't think they even think it's particularly bad, right, They just are okay with it. But crashing the economy for no reason that actually does seem to have gotten even the people for whom you know, the rest of trump Ism is fine, pretty pissed. Yeah.
No, I think that's right. And I do think that, like, like you said, the people who either are gung ho about shutting down those damn elite universities and about cancer, yeah exactly, and kidnapping people and sending them to a foreign country because their skin is darker than ours. The people who are either gung ho for that, or they're okay with it, or they simply don't care. They are all going to care about, as you said, about if the economy crashes and they can't afford things, and they
look at their dolls. Well, that's the other thing. It's like, I'm older. Remember I was working at Fox News when Bernie Sanders said something about you know, it was about deodor it's and he was talking about how you go into a drug store and they are like, you know, thirty forty different brands of deodorant. He's like, that's crazy, we don't need that. And the outrage at Fox News when he said this, how dare he? How dare he
say we don't need all those choices? That's capitalism. And we've gone from that to of course, the same people who were saying that supporting the president who is out there saying, you know, you only need two dolls.
It's funny because on this podcast you're about to hear me interview Andy Beshore.
It's Andy Day, It's Andy Day on whatever his politics. And Andy said, it's not the difference between thirty five dollars and two dollars. It's the difference between two dollars and no dolls. And as someone who really has come from a lot of privilege, it didn't occur to me because as much as I, you know, understand that people who have less than I do, or who have been discriminated again, have a harder time. In some ways, it
didn't occur to me. I was as much guilty of the Trump affluent affluenza, you know, the way of thinking, as as anyone, because I thought there, you know, I thought, well, that's not a message anyone's going to like. But what Andy Bushers said is exactly right. It's it's not it's two dollars or no dolls, and and we're going to have and there's going to be a Christmas where because we already see the shipping, and we already see China and the toy manufacturing, and we just saw Mattel saying
toys are going to be more expensive. So this is not going to be a you know, they're a two dollars versus thirty five dollars Christmas. It's going to be people without toys.
Yeah, and our children, not.
People children, right, children or adults without toys.
Adult adults gonna have toys.
If you're an adult and you don't get anything for Christmas, it is not that you are not talking about in therapy twenty years later.
Wow, okay, Gritch, I just want to say that, you know, when we're talking about adults, we don't call them dollars. We call them action figures. That's very important.
PlayStation four five, thank you seven. It's going to be more expensive.
I know. I'm glad I have it already, and I've been talking to some other people about this, and I am like convincing myself to buy stuff now that I don't necessarily need, but like, you know, know that I kind of want because I'm like, it's it's only smart to buy it now before these tariffs really kick in. I'm saving myself money, is what I'm doing. I'm being smart by buying all these things.
Now.
If we're going into our own mental on this for a minute, I was saying, when are we not you and I together, we're just diving into mental in this here. But I was like, you know, I need more paper towels, like the tariffs are going to hit the paper.
House right Well, the tariffs may not, but the shelves may be bare.
I mean, so I was like, I'm going to need to buy seventy dollars worth of paper house right now.
Look, everything I've been reading is that. And as you alluded to the shipping earlier, that you know the ports are not as crowded as they were, and they're they're continuing the ports in America and they're continuing to become less and less crowded. And you know, I've seen people talking about how as early as later this month, we're going to really be noticing it at at the store, you know. So my I think my point here is that I may be stopping by Molly to get some paper.
Talks, and I may not be giving them. You know him, I think, no, no.
You.
During COVID too, You're like, I'm order surrounded. You made like a toilet paper roll for it.
And you.
The episode of CARB where they go into the closet and they realize that that once his name is in order, he's such a great guy, but he's actually he's got all the toilet paper. And it's incredible when you think about it, that we have made the stupidest person in America president and then we have made him the most powerful.
President in modern political history.
I've always felt that sometimes there are like the president can only do so much with the economy, and I feel like sometimes presidents get too much blame or too much credit for the state of the economy. But with what's happening now and what's gonna probably continue to happen. This is solely Donald Trump's fault. I mean, it's it's nobody else's fault, not counting to sycophants around him and in the Republican Congress. But this is this is like a self made recession which may turn into a self
made global depression, all because of this one guy. It's really I don't think it has a like there's no reference point for this in our lives. I don't think molly like, well, we could say this, oh, this is just like when this president did that. Like, there's really I can't think of one.
I mean, COVID a little bit, right, we saw it coming, but again it was in once in a lifetime pandemic, right, So that in a sense is a little bit different.
It's not the same at all.
But like the credit crisis, we were saved by a president who understood because that could have turned into I mean, obviously the way it was done, a lot of people didn't like bailing out the banks, and perhaps there would have been a way. I think what we saw, what Biden learned from it was that you should bail out everyone if you're going to bail out the banks, you got to bail out also small businesses. Now, the problem is when you start bailing out small businesses, you open
yourself to PPE fraud. By the way, so many people in Trump world got PPE loans, I mean incredible numbers. And then when you open the door to like paying out small businesses, why are you not paying out student loans? You know, you really do sort of open the door to moral re love. And see, there have been many times in sort of Trump's first term where I thought, oh, he's not going to do that. He's not going to do that, He's not going to do that, and that
he was sort of talked out of it. That's what we saw earlier this month with the public markets, that he was talked out of it. Eventually, the hope is that that will happen again. But when you listen to him talking to Mark Karney, it seems as if he still doesn't understand.
That he's wrong.
Yeah, Oh for sure, he absolutely doesn't understand that he's wrong. And when we talk about him being talked out of things, I don't think that's fully accurate because I think what ends up happening is like he names some outrageous figure like we're gonna put a one hundred percent tariff on this, and people are like, you know, the markets react to that badly. People are like, oh, this is a bad idea. And then he says, all right, we're only going to
do twenty percent, and still like, but that's still wrong. Yeah, Like that's still not good. It's just that we are being conditioned by you know, him going to this far extreme and then when he comes back a little, we're like, oh, okay, see he listens, but it's like, no, because he shouldn't. He shouldn't be doing these things at all. And and
you know, look, I don't know. I think at a certain point he is going to stop piling things back because, as you said, he is convinced that he is right and it doesn't matter how many people tell him he's wrong. I mean we saw that even with a lot of the tariffs that even Elon Musk was like, I don't want him to be doing this, and he didn't really care.
Is Elon Musk still running Doge? What is Doge doing? And why are we not hearing about it every die?
Yeah?
No, that's a good question. I guess they did have that little press conference with big balls. Yeah it's big balls, we know a couple days ago. But look, I think Musk is a little scared. I think he's a little scared of that move by the Tesla shareholders or the board to you know, maybe replace him if he doesn't dial it back. And I think that that is the sole reason that he hasn't been as public with the
Doge stuff. But also, I mean, look, they talked about dose as going to have all this transparency, and they launched that ridiculous website with the supposed dollars amazing, right, but that even on their own website, like that dollar figure is shrinking, like their supposed savings, and it's like, you know, I was going to say, we are learning, but we already knew this. But the people who didn't understand that Elon Musk just pedals absolute lies and nonsense
for a living. That's and I mean that for real, Like that's literally what he does talking about. I think it's been now fifteen years where he said we're going to be on Mars in five years.
Yeah, my favorite is what it would you like? Would you like to take nine minutes to get to Boston? Right?
So he makes these outrageous promises because he's a huckster, and he's a he's ultimately he's a grifter and and he sells these dreams.
The richest man in the world.
Yeah, because it's worked for him.
Because it's worked with the government. I mean, what kind of indictment does this our federal government, that this guy has gotten to be the richism in the world basically through government subsidies.
Yeah. I've been saying this for a long time, Like, this didn't start with Donald Trump.
Yeah, this was shut it down Democratic.
Yeah, this was Democratic administrations working with Elon Musk giving him these contracts. The oligarchy works for both parties.
Unfortunately, shut it down, Back it up, Andy Levy, you know what time it is, time to end, Time to end the podcast.
Okay, perhaps you'll come back.
Perhaps I will.
I would love to.
All Right, we'll see you soon.
Andy Burscher is the governor of Kentucky.
Welcome to Fast Politics. Governor Burshare, very excited to be here.
Thanks for the invitation.
There's this amazing moment of you building a house and talking about building.
The house in Kentucky.
So can you give me the context of why you're rebuilding or building in Kentucky.
What the story behind that was.
Kentucky, we have been hammered by natural disasters fourteen federally declared disasters since I'm a king governor, that's over five and a half years. We have the worst tornadoes in our history. Wiped out my dad's hometown of Dawson Springs, and we're rebuilding there. But in July of twenty twenty two, we had the worst flooding that we've ever seen. It killed forty five people, which I mean doesn't happen in floods,
and wiped out thousands upon thousands of homes. So we embarked on what is the I think the most challenging rebuild that we've seen in America. That's moving people from the valleys where it floods to the top of abandoned coal mines. We go in and we test them, we make sure that the ground is solid. And we have seven of these projects all across eastern Kentucky in the heart of Appalachia, where we are building homes on high
ground that will never ever flood. We'll address affordable housing at the same time, but most importantly, we're giving people who lost everything a forever home. I got to tell you, you see lots of great things as governor, but watching kids walk through for the first time a new home and pick out their rooms after being displaced for a couple of years is where I see God. You see this amazing joy and resiliency of these children, but just a new fresh start. It was very difficult to put together.
But wanting to actually solve a problem and not have to face this type of flooding again.
Part of what makes governors popular and what makes them perhaps even more set up for higher office is that you are able to solve logistical infrastructure problems.
So clearly you are a state that.
Has been battered by climate issues, right, what other kind of infrastructure problems are you addressing and how well?
A great thing about being a governor, and I think what differentiates us from just about any other office is we get things done and people see it. They can be a part of it. You know, you are so vested in your state every day on trying to make life better, and if you're doing it, you're trying to make life better for everyone. And investing in infrastructure helps democrats, republicans, independents.
It it just builds a better life for everyone. So right now we're engaged in three mega projects around our state, the most we've ever done at one time. We're building the Brent Spence Companion Bridge in northern Kentucky. President Biden came down to help make that announcement. That's one of the most traveled thoroughfares in the country, and the existing bridge isn't enough. We've got an I sixty nine project that's going to open up parts of Indiana and western Kentucky.
But then we have the Mountain Parkway, which is the first four lane highway into Appalachio, which is going to open up the possibility of manufacturing, which requires a four lane highway to ship in and out. And so this will be the first time in our history that this is possible with a workforce that is there. Workforce that help build America, but America left behind, and so we're
really excited about what that possibility means. The other infrastructure that's helping all of Kentucky but can make a huge difference in eastern Kentucky. It's high speed internet and that solves so many challenges, from educational opportunities to creating your own business. It has a chance when we finally get the bead money of being transformational across Kentucky and all of America, but especially rural America. As we build to
be more resilient after floods and tornadoes. We've got to rebuild the bridges stronger, capable of standing up to one hundred year flood every five or ten years. We've got to build our roads in a way to where they don't cave and wash away, especially our water and our
wastewater systems. Most people don't know that when it floods, the pressure of that comes through and it bursts all those pipes and it's millions upon millions of dollars of damage, and that makes the flooding worse because it can't take the water out and away. And so knowing that climate change is real, and I'm the first governor of Kentucky who said out loud that climate change is real, because
it is. Ask any farmer, us the US military. We know that the next probably ten years of ramifications are going to happen. Hopefully we can change the ten years after that, and so making sure we're building to protect our people from all of these challenges. But aside from infrastructure, there's a lot of human talent out there helping us and very worried about cuts from the Trump administration on what that means. The National Weather Service has saved so many lives.
I was gonna ask about that because you have people who are in rural areas where if they can't see what's coming, they could die.
Can you talk us through that?
Yeah, and in the urban areas too. The National Weather Service is an amazing group of people that are constantly watching for the next batch of bad weather. They gave us a heads up on our February flooding, which was massive. We saved one thousand people in the first twenty four hours because the National Weather Service told us when it would happen and where it would happen, and so we pre positioned all these swift water teams in their boats ready to go before the storm ever hit. That's what
the National Weather Service allows you to do. We only lost a couple people because of the direct flooding. We lost some more because they tried to drive through high water, which I wish people wouldn't ever try to do. But the National Weather Service saves lives by allowing you to prepare. And they not only talked to us they talked to all the meteorologists at all the stations, they talk to the radio stations, and so we're able to get this information out and people are able to prepare, to get
ready to go stay with relatives. But what we're seeing in our massive cuts and concerns that we wouldn't have twenty four seven three sixty five coverage in an area that has to have that everyday coverage.
You are a Democrat a red state as a governor. We've seen when Democratic governors are in red states they tend to do extremely well. This is not always true, but like I'm thinking about Cooper, there are just a
number of these blue governors in red states. But you've really had a lot of success in Kentucky, and you sort of talk us through why that is and how you have people who have voted for you who have never voted for Democrats, and just talk to me about how that works and how you are able to sort of let them know you're there for them despite if they are a Trumper or anything like that.
Being a successful governor is about being a governor for everyone, and I think that starts with the same type of focus. I'd like the entire Democratic Party, and for that matter, the Republican Party to adopt. And that's been an eighty percent of your time on the core concerns that people wake up thinking about and go to bed worried about. And that starts with your job, whether you make enough to support your family. We brought in a record amount
of private sector investment. We've created more jobs than under any other governor, the highest wages. We've broken our ex sports record, We've broken our tourism record. It shows you that Democrats can manage an economy and in fact help a state or a country thrive. I think the second piece that people worry about is their next doctor's appointment for themselves, or their parents or their kids. I've been able to expand Medicaid in ways where we have increased
access all over Kentucky. We just built our first hospital in Kentucky's largest African American community in one hundred and fifty years. First time people haven't had to take multiple buses or drive across town to see a specialist, much less their primary care doctor. I think people worry about
the roads and bridges they drive every day. They worry about the public school they drop their kids off at, and they worry about public safety in their communities, not just whether they are safe under the statistic, but whether they feel safe. And when you concentrate all those things, people feel better about their lives because you've worked to better their lives. And when you're doing that, I think
people will start giving you a second look. But I think there's two other things that you have to do at the same time. Number one is you've got to speak to people like a normal human being. We've seen all these sanitized terms that are out there where you lose your emotion and what it means. Kentucky has been racked with addiction that we just announced a thirty percent decrease in overdose deaths from last year. We've been waiting
for this moment for so long. But for every person I know that's gone through addiction, and I'm known a lot, they've never called it substance use disorder. They've called it addiction. Somebody who's hungry doesn't call it food insecurity, And I don't think that people push these words meaning to hurt dialogue. I think they meant it to reduce stigma. But I'm not sure changing words reduces stigma, changing arts reduce stigma, So focus talk to people like a real human being.
And the last piece that I think is so important is explaining your why. We talk a lot in the Democratic Party about the what, what's our position on this, what's her nuance on that, what's section A point three? But what we don't talk about is why. What drives us? And for me, that's my faith. And when I'm vetoed the nastiest ANTIOLOGBTQ bill that our state had ever seen in my election year, I explain why. I mean, I
believe that all children are children of God. And if I believe that, which I do in my court from my faith, it's my job to stand up for those kids when other people are picking on what happened after that, you know, to show people that politically, when you explain your why, they'll give you grace and space even if they disagree with you. I didn't lose a point. In fact, I have people coming up to me saying I might not agree with you, but I know you're doing what
you think is right. If you explain your why, people can disagree with the what, but ultimately still supports you.
So let's talk about the real talk thing.
Because I in a little bit of trouble this week because I was on with the Democratic Elected and she was very McKenzie and she was saying very mckenzy things. They're good ideas, right, I mean, there were a number of good ideas, but the way she was saying them was couched in a lot of very mackenzie kind of consultant d language. And when you talk like that, you really lose people, including me.
Sounds like you're talking down to people.
Yeah, And I also.
Just think people get very bored by it, and ultimately it's not effective.
So I liked that you talked about addiction.
I've been sober since I was nineteen, and I think a lot about how we treat addiction, and the problem of addiction is a huge problem in this country. One of the things that I think is really helpful when it comes to addiction is just I talk about it because I want to reduce stigma. And when you're talking about sort of religion, we also have weird stigma about religion in this country, and we shouldn't.
Talking about your faith can be why Joshapiro does it too. We're of different faiths, but we respect each other's. It can come from your values it can come from how you were raised. But if you or why deals with your faith, there are ways to talk about it without trying to press it on anyone. And the values that I typically talk about, which is loving your neighbor as yourself, the parable of the Good Samaritans, saying everybody as your neighbor. Those are found in all major religions or in all
major value systems. And I think there are things that people either directly relate to or they appreciate hearing because it helps them know how you're going to make decisions on the toughness of issues.
So let's talk about rural hospitals because you mentioned rural hospitals. Medicaid expansion is how you paid for a lot of these rural hospitals. TODK goes through medicaid expansion. Why you took it, why some red steak governors did not take it, and what it means now that Trump is targeting it.
Well, the guy who made medicaid expansion happen in Kentucky his named Steve Basher. He was my dad. Lost a governor's race in nineteen eighty seven, won a governor's race in two thousand and seven, and as a thirty year old lawyer starting in two thousand and seven.
I got to.
Watch him work go through the Great Recession. But expanding Medicaid was game changing, game changing in taking us from one of the top rates of uninsured or uncovered individuals to one of the lowest. There were over four hundred thousand Kentucky and so it got coverage for the first time. But it's also very humanizing when you see it. One of the reasons that I got into politics, other than my kids who deserved a better world than they were growing up in, was the time I'm standing on an
elevator with my dad while he's governor. The woman walks in and bursts into tears, and I didn't know what to do, and she looks at him and says, I'm alive today because of you. That she couldn't get coverage until Medicaid expanded, until we took the ACA and created the gold standard at that time, and she started getting coverage to deal with a very difficult and chronic issue. My goodness to see a person alive today because of that policy decision and thriving tells you that there is
real good that you can do in these jobs. But then fast forward, I become governor. In three months later, we get hit by the pandemic, and thank god we'd expanded Medicaid because Kentucky had rural hospitals with the extra beds that could take care of people at a time when we desperately needed it. We set up a field hospital, but didn't have to use it because our rural hospitals did an incredible job. They provided a higher level of
care than they were ever designed for. But they were there and the employees were there, and we have so many people alive today, both because of regular screenings you can get in your community, but also having that during the pandemic. But I think people now see Medicaid for what it is. Medicaid covers the people we love the most in the world, our parents and our kids. Half of Kentucky's kids are covered by Medicaid. Seventy percent of
our long term care call are covered by Medicaid. So major cuts to Medicaid are going to mean that people have to take in parents that need extra care. That's going to purt productivity in the economy. It's going to be tough on families. It also means our children are going to be less healthy, which is going to be a hit to both families and the economy. But then look at what happens with rural health care. I mean
it will devastate it. Most rural health care will shut down, and what that means is a huge loss of jobs. So in most counties that have a rural hospital, it's the second largest employer behind the public school system. But then think about the people that live in that county, because when that hospital shuts down, they're going to have to drive two hours to go to a doctor's appointment to see the sane doctor who lost their job in their hometown and had to move to a bigger city.
And that's whether you're on Medicaid or private insurance. It's going to hit everyone.
How will the tariffs effect Kentucky.
Harder than just about any other state? Already seeing it? You see major employers like UPS announcing twenty thousand layoffs. Not a ton of those are in Kentucky. But as we see major employers get hit, that'll hit every community. But then I see a lot of mid size or small businesses and they get parts from all over the world. Then getting parts from all over the world at the right cost allow them to employ a lot of Kentuckians, a lot of Americans, allow them to grow and add
more jobs. But as the costs are going up and they know they can't pass all that to the consumer because then it'd make it unaffordable, they're having to lay people off. And when a small business lays people off, it's somebody they may go to church with, their kids, may play on a baseball team together. It shows you how hard this is hitting the American people. And then
the way it'll tax our families. Now, if it hits our families at that forty six hundred dollars number that I think the Yale study had out there, that blows a hole in a budget you can't make up for. And so what that means is a president that was elected because the last group of voters thought he'd make paying the bills easier are going to be fully betrayed,
and it's going to be that much harder. And these comments that people could use less toys, I guess during Christmas coming out of a billionaire's mouth, thirty seven versus two. Most Americans can't afford thirty seven toys for their kids. It's the difference between a few and none.
Yeah, yeah, and I think that's important.
How do you talk to you know, you are the governor of the state where a lot of people voted for Trump.
How do you welcome those people back into the fold?
How do you say, like, I get the impulse because he offered to make things cheaper, but everything's getting more expensive.
Well, first thing I won't ever do is judge people by how they voted. I'll never talk down to people about how they voted. This is a democracy, it's their right, and I want people to go out and to vote. But what I can do is speak out about the policies, and you've got to do it with credibility. Now, there are a lot of questions going around about how should you engage with this administration. Well, the first thing is
if you're speaking out, you've got to have credibility. If the administration does something good, you've got to admit it. Their FEMA response in Kentucky has actually been very good, which is ironic wanting to dismantle parts of FEMA when it's actually operating on the ground better than I've seen it.
And I've seen a lot of FEMA operatings. But then you look at tariffs and their impact, the chaos that's caused in the market, the fact that the stock market, the bond market, the value of the dollar all going down, concerns about GDP and the rest of the economy. I mean, these are terrible policies that have hit the economy harder than any policy I've ever seen from a president in
my lifetime. And I've also never seen something that is so directly attributable to one person, because the president has owned these tariffs. He held up that board, which is I think a picture he's going to regret.
Thank you, Thank you, Governor Bushire.
Oh very much enjoyed it. Thanks for having me on.
No Moxec, Jesse Cannon, Mai junk Fast. We have been covering the subject. We've had Justice Riggs down in North Carolina on many a time on this podcast because we believe that this is truly gross what the Republicans have been doing, and unprecedented, but it looks like a happy ending maybe coming our way in America. Molly, what do you think of that concept.
I'm not going to feel better until she's sworn in, but it seems as if Justice Riggs this may finally be over right. The Republican lost and was like, no, I didn't lose, and so real classy stuff here by a Republicans. So the federal judge says results in North Carolina court race with Democrat ahead must be certified. So this justice says that it's.
Over, so we'll see what happens.
I hope that it's over and that she gets sworn in because she did win. And as much as it's fun for Republicans to feel that they can fight back when they don't win, this is really not how it's supposed to work.
That's it for.
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