Latest / Coconut Justice / CJP #78: Tennessee Contingency
Transcript
- Carlos: Hey guys, like I said in the intro, we got ⁓ Victoria Broderick from Tennessee Four. Victoria Broderick: Hi guys, I'm Victoria Broderick. ⁓ Carlos: Hi, Victoria Broderick. We also welcome back Joshua Sales, 7. ⁓ it's been a minute since we've talked and we haven't talked ⁓ as a group. ⁓ I wanted to check in with you guys to see how your campaigns are going, see if you have any new ⁓ tips. ⁓ Joshua Sales TN7: Hey guys. Glad to be here. Carlos: Hey, what's good? Victoria Broderick is a mom that works in the tech industry and now is running to represent Tennessee's 4th district. Joshua Sales is a history teacher that has written 12 bills by himself. And he is now running to represent Tennessee's 7th district. I wanted to check in with my Tennessee friends to see what's going on out there in Tennessee. Before we get into it, remember to go to Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. I just gotta call up my district. Joshua Sales TN7: Now they're just called the Proud Boys. Carlos: No. Victoria Broderick: I mean that's not my district anymore, so. Carlos: The reason Yeah. are they doing the goofy things with your districts, moving them around, shaking them around, picking their voters? Coconutjustice.com to get you some clothes that I think would look good on you. Let's go. Victoria Broderick: Yeah. Josh, do you want to talk about it? Joshua Sales TN7: Yeah. ⁓ sure. so yeah, Carlos, you're talking about the fact that just about a month and a half ago, Tennessee state legislator voted to redistrict the entire state, right? They the very second the Supreme Court gutted the ⁓ part two of the Voter Rights Act, Marsha Plackburn, our senator, got with Donald Trump, who then reached out to Cameron Sexton, our state legislative lead, ⁓ and basically, you know, arranged, redistricting the state, that even though 35 to 40 percent of Tennesseans vote Democratic, they're aiming to make it a zero nine representation state and effectively wipe out the voice of countless Democrats, primarily attacking the black voices of Memphis by splintering that city. the ⁓ county of Shelby into three different districts and silencing the voice of those people. Carlos: Hmm. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I mean, t a lot of ⁓ I think the unique part about Tennessee is we were already a supermajority. We have the unique ⁓ you've Carlos and I, we've talked about this, is we have the supermajority in our Tennessee state legislature, as well as we have all but one of our federal seats were held by Republicans and we have a Republican governor. The point of this was to disenfranchise black voters in Memphis, but also disenfranchise the entire state because if they re If they redistricted and grab more power, which is what they're hoping for in the 2026 midterms, then they get we have they've there's no stopping the Republican testing ground, which is Tennessee. Tennessee is a testing ground for Republican policy. ⁓ but this could backfire on them. And that's where I want to give the hope to the voters. It made my district more competitive, ⁓ you know, as a candidate to be running for two years. Two and a half years in this district. Now I do have four primary opponents. but I've been running consistently in this district for two years. and it's made it more competitive and it's made the district actually smaller and the majority of my district actually stayed the same, unlike the rest of the districts. I don't know, Josh, if yours stayed the same or not. ⁓ but I know that mine stayed core the same because I lost six counties total. Joshua Sales TN7: We lost about in Tennessee seven, we lost about seven counties and picked up three more. ⁓ to piggyback off of like Victoria's Point here. Tennessee has been the testing ground, right? We know our our own state legislator has named that they got most of their marching orders from Steven Miller. We know that Tennessee is trying to push all these projects, whether it's vouchers, whether it's disenfranchisement, whether it's voter ID laws, what have you to really? Create a dystopian state where there's very little a person can do to get ahead. And so there's a question, right? What can we do at the state level? What can we do at the federal level? To really talk about like what Victoria said about like a lot of these places became more competitive, right? Tennessee 7 went from an R plus 22 to an R plus 10.5. Afton Bain in the special election last year gained 13 points. If the candidate in seven can do the exact same thing, TN7 actually goes to the Democrats. In fact, six out of the nine districts are now considered R plus 12 or below, which means if any of the candidates there can capitalize. On that blue wave and can push the same sound ground game that Afton Bain ran, there are good chances that this completely backfires in Republicans' faces. But what us candidates need is for the people to get out and help us. Victoria and I can only make so many phone calls, can only knock on so many doors ourselves. We need people willing to get out there and fight for democracy. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Victoria Broderick: Yeah. And I mean to just like add to that as well, I think that it it goes to tell people like when we the only thing that Republicans are more afraid of than the Epstein files is voter turnout. That is the that is the move. They are because it's the one thing they and they can't control it. They can't control voter turnout. That's what Carlos: That's historically true. Yeah. Victoria Broderick: Like I tell people all the time, I speak to my constituents about this all the time, and I say this on panels everywhere, whenever I'm traveling, whatnot. We voter turnout's the one thing they can't control. So that's why they make it harder and harder. They want you to feel like your vote doesn't matter. It's why they have done this. If you look at Tennessee, we used to be a blue state. We weren't always red. And we've been, you know, even when we were blue state, we never pushed for more supermajority like type policy, which we could have at the time. My district used to be blue. ⁓ so we've always been more purple. And I think that the idea that like this election cycle, your vote doesn't matter, is don't don't discredit that. We can flip these seats. You know, I got 28% of the vote as a first-time no-name candidate in five months in 2024. If I can pull in those numbers when people with more money than I had, more name recognition, ⁓ more time. can only get 33 to 35% of the vote. That says that Tennessee voters are looking for, they're looking for something to believe in. And we're giving them that. And I don't know if Josh, I don't know if your district's like this just to bring it all home is whoever wins the primary. We have to support and move the team forward. Because the only way we fix this is at a federal level, but it has to go all the way down ballot. You cannot stop at at the federal level. You have to go all the way down to dog catcher. If you will. Joshua Sales TN7: Yeah. Yeah. I mean you have so August sixth will be the primary for the federal election here in Tennessee, but it's also the local general election. ⁓ we have people in my county running for school board, which is massively important, right? I I think school board is one of the races that often gets overlooked. where what they do Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: Affects the next 10 to 20 to 30 years down the line, right? We're talking the fact that, like, we have in so many counties across Tennessee moms for liberty types, right? The ones who want to ban books because they're afraid your kids will learn to think for themselves by reading them. And they want to incorporate readings of the Bible. And I say that with no disdain towards Christianity. I'm Carlos: Yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: I'm actually as a teacher looking forward to that passing because I'm like, listen, we can go over how many times Jesus flipped the tables and how Jesus said, it's easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get into heaven. We can talk about how Jesus hated capitalism. I let's bring it on, y'all. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. You think you're about you think you're scared about voter turnout. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: Yeah. and so yeah, we're seeing this this push to disenfranchise voters, whether it is literally through law or whether it is through a rhetoric of your vote doesn't matter. I think that's one of the number one things we see in Tennessee is this voter apathy. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Carlos: And and a question that's asked quite a bit is why should I vote? Does my vote even matter? And the folks that are running for office or are trying to hold on to office, they all say if it wasn't that important, why are they working so hard to take it away from you? And it's it's that simple. Go ahead, Victoria. Victoria Broderick: And I put it as I put it as a so this is the analogy I use for it. You can either be the TERF that politicians walk on or you can be a player on the field. I'm a politician. If you want to be turf, I don't want that for you because I want change. I don't need you to score the goals. I don't need you to punch, you know, punch up or whatever. I just need you on the field because we're all a part of a community and we want our community to move forward. And If you don't want a choice, there's it's not a it's not a spectator sport. You're literally going to be the turf that politicians walk on. The spectators are the rest of the world watching you give up your right, your superpower to be a player on the field, to be a bootlicker for people who don't care about your well-being. And that's why I'm I want every single person to be on the field with me because we're better together. And Accountability starts with your activism and you being on the field. Joshua Sales TN7: And there's a historical precedence for this, right? When America was first founded 250 years ago, only about 6% of the population actually had a right to vote. You didn't even, that 6% didn't even vote for president, right? They didn't vote for their senators. And throughout American history, we have watched an expansion of those rights. We have watched after the Civil War, ⁓ Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: African American males gained the right to vote during the suffragette movement in the early 1900s. Women gained the right to vote. And we've seen backlash, right? We've seen this. We take two steps forward, one step back, two steps forward, one step back with the Reconstruction era, with what we're seeing right now. And it's something that I want to remind people that we consistently move forward when we all work together. And to your credit, Carlos, like you named, right, they wouldn't be going after our votes if the votes didn't have some sort of Carlos: Mm-hmm. Imagine jumping in an Uber. And the Uber can take you wherever the hell the Uber driver wants. Isn't that wouldn't that feel a little strange? Like if you jump in an Uber, wouldn't you want to tell the Uber driver where you would at least like to go? Victoria Broderick: Exactly. See woman here, I'm hopping out and doing a body roll. I'm gone. I'm out. No, no. ⁓ I use that. as like this is one of the things that I I think I said it to you, Carlos. Like when we did our our interview a while back. ⁓ it's vote voting is public transportation. You don't need to buy a house with a white picket fence. You just need to get on the bus going in the direction you want to go. Every two years, you get the option to get off the bus. Carlos: Ha ha. Joshua Sales TN7: That's Carlos: And I don't blame you. I don't blame you. Victoria Broderick: And that's what you should treat. We're not anything special. I am no different than your barista that hands you a latte. The only difference is I hand you legislation and both can ruin your day if they're not done right. I like alliteration. Carlos: And please pay and please and please pay attention to the very first words of the Constitution. It says we the people. It doesn't say I'm the man and I'm gonna take you to where we need to be. It doesn't say shit about building a useless arch. It doesn't say anything about a ⁓ messing up the reflection pool. It doesn't say anything about that. Victoria Broderick: I do. Joshua Sales TN7: But it does talk about promoting the general welfare, right? And I think that is a clause within the pre. And listen, y'all, it we are talking just the preamble, right? We're talking the very first paragraph of our constitution, the bedrock of our entire country. And it names in it that our government is there to promote the general welfare. And that to me is where the discussions begin. Carlos: Yes. Joshua Sales TN7: Right? What does it mean to promote the general welfare? And when we look at a tax system that from 1975 to 2023, according to a RAND study, transferred $79.8 trillion worth of wealth from the bottom 90% to the top 1% via trickle-down economics, that is not a system that promotes the general welfare. And we need to be honest with ourselves and we need to start moving towards politicians who Carlos: Yes. Joshua Sales TN7: actually care to do what's going to help you, the people, no matter what the cost, right? Carlos, you and I have talked about so many times. Money, we're told the money's not there until it comes time to bomb a school, a girls' school in Iran. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Or for drones that fly over New Jersey, you know. Victoria Broderick: Exactly. Joshua Sales TN7: Right. And and the truth is Victoria Broderick: Or to give some billionaire another government handout. Joshua Sales TN7: And that's the scary part, right, Victoria? Like we are looking at we are looking at so many alarm bells going off at the same time. NOAA has had to readjust their graph for the El Nino. It used to historically it used to top out at four degrees Celsius above normal. This year they've had to go in and raise it to five degrees Celsius because they knew it was going to go off the chart. We know the international banking community has been screaming about the fact. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: That AI companies are doing what's called shadow borrowing, right? This whole thing, if you go to a bank and you say, I want to take on a loan to build an expansion on my house, the bank says, Okay, well, let's see your assets. What's happening with these loans is that the AI companies are hiding those loans on their records so that the banks don't see them. And so they are over-leveraged. Carlos: Yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: And we're being told that this is twice the level of what the housing market was in 08. And so we know that we're facing again a bubble within the stock market that when it bursts, if anything like 08 happens, it's going to be the American people, the working class, who are going to pay for it. Victoria Broderick: And I think that you like if someone if someone's watching this and they want to see how it's already affecting, how the economy is playing. And I say the economy because everyone thinks Wall Street, but like this is your community. This is not just your milk and grocery prices. Look at your shelters, your animal shelters in your area. If you're seeing an uptick in more animals just being dropped and your shelters screaming for help. Carlos: Mm. Victoria Broderick: That is normally the first sign that something is going wrong. It's not the first sign, but like I'd like to point to this because it's a big complaint in my community, a huge complaint. And as someone who loves animals, I'm like, I remember this in 2007, 2008 when I moved to Tennessee. It was rampant and out of control. Every week there was a new dog dropped off. And we had at the time a kill shelter. So like if they got take taken in, it's gone. Carlos: Yeah. Victoria Broderick: And it's taken years to get past that. And even with TNR programs, etc., this decimates not only our the ecosystem for our communities, but it decimates what happens to these family pets. These are your these are your things. Like if you're looking at your cost and you're doing that, you're thinking about a gallon of milk, how if you're gonna buy a gallon of milk or if you're going to have that subscription to Netflix, those That shouldn't be something you have to think about. These are necessities now. They're not just things that you're like, ⁓ that's an extra thing. No, no. A lot of us are staying home now. A lot of us aren't going out to eat and get drinks and do the thing. And if you don't have enough money to to live your life, then you're a slave to the system, for lack of a better word. And Carlos: Yeah. Victoria Broderick: That's not acceptable. And they want it to be that hard because the more they take away your community, the more they make it hard, the less likely you are to stand up. The less likely you are when it the the sh really hits the fan, you're less likely. I mean, we watch this happen. There's historical precedent for it. And everything that we, you know, history doesn't repeat itself, but it rhymes. And we're watching it happen and we're watching it happen in real time. And somebody's getting rich. And we know who that is. Follow the money. Like if your candidates are taking corporate money, if your if they're only taking money from rich people, that's a red flag. That means that they're already bought. They're bought and paid for. And we have to address it. Carlos: And think of and think about and think about this. If you have been in Congress, this these are gonna be shots fired. If you have been in Congress as much as a lot of our Congress people have been, where they've been there for fifteen years, twenty years and all this stuff, and I understand you to keep things Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Carlos: moving you want to a lot of times you want to keep someone in office just because they know where the pencils are and that's a shortcut, you know, dumb shit like that. But at what point are we gonna say, okay, we've been doing it like this for 20 years. The shit doesn't work. We need more people. We need fresh eyes on the paper so we can move the so we can move the ball forward. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: I think right. It's a great question, Carlos. And I think the question isn't when do we? It's when do the DNC, right? When does the GOP, when do the people who actually have like controls of these apparatuses start waking up? Right. ⁓ there was a poll I read just the other day that said Carlos: But I don't think it's I don't I don't think it's their responsibility though, because they're getting rich. They're doing what they're set out to do. I want citizens, the people that live in Josh's neighborhood and the people that live in Victoria's neighborhood, I want you guys to get well and the people that live in Carlos's neighborhood. I want you guys to be well informed. And I want you guys to get a good feel for these other alternatives because More people are turning independent than ever before because they're tired of the left and they're tired of the right. But but the responsibility, ⁓ at least in California, they make it so easy to vote. They just mail you your ballot, you fill it out, you sign it on the outside, and you put it in the mailbox. You don't have to buy a stamp that they make it so easy, and to make it even easier. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. So woke. Carlos: This year I went onto Chat GPT and I said, Chat GPT, I'm filling out my ballot. Ask me whatever questions, ⁓ you know, ask me ten questions that's going to help me understand better who I should vote for. And it asked me the 10 questions and I answered them wholeheartedly with honesty, you know. I'm trying to fit I'm trying to make the the right decision here. And so I educated myself. Instead of using Chat GPT to do other creative shit that I don't have to pay an artist to do, I'm actually using it to learn, to see that maybe the incumbent, for as comfortable as everyone is with the incumbent, I actually voted for one of the new guys because this whole corporate pack money thing is a big thing for me. And it's bigger than APAC. I don't want GE to tell me. I don't want, you know, ⁓ the the booze folks to tell me who who's the best person or I don't want their v their vote to out vote my vote, if that makes sense. Joshua Sales TN7: And I think right, it goes back to us talking about the down ballot as well. Right. It goes my mind goes straight back to how important it is for us to get good people into county commission, good people into the school board, good people into the county mayor, because these are the people who help decide what we teach our children to the point that like i if you're using chat GPT as a tool, Carlos, okay. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: I want people to be so educated that they instinctively know to ask themselves these questions. They don't need Chat GBT to write them for them. They can just go, hey, okay, let me go in, let me look at who is giving money to these people. And that's public record. You can go into the FEC and look at who has donated to who, who has, like one of my opponents in the primary, started with a hundred and twenty-five thousand dollar loan from their own pocketbook, right? That tells you like, okay, they're they're literally self-funding themselves, right? I Carlos: Yeah. Victoria Broderick: I know I think I know who that is. Joshua Sales TN7: Yeah, there's there is an individual that I'm running against who jumped into the race after the redistricting. He's worth on paper, this is per his own filing with the FEC, over fifty million dollars. And I'm like, how can you literally as part of the one percent say that you are going to represent people the same way I am when I'm fighting the one percent? Carlos: Woo Right. I heard that teachers in Tennessee make a killing though. Victoria Broderick: Okay. And I think t before Josh throws hands. Joshua Sales TN7: Let me but but also like there does need to be there does need to be something said about like besides for when I was managing restaurants, right? I'm thinking about back when I was a ⁓ server, back when I was, you know, a cook. Like I am making more as a teacher than I was then, but I'm still struggling, right? And it's a it becomes this thing where I think so many people are like tired of hearing, ⁓ teachers need to be paid more. They do, but so do everyone else. Carlos: Right. Right. Victoria Broderick: And I think to like to like kind of round out like this topic of conversation, like how I got started was because I wanted to educate down ballot voters and I wanted to share my experience and knowledge. ⁓ because you could take political spectrum tests. Every four years there is a political test that comes out for president, and you can literally rate you literally do it. It's all on policy, and it can be as as surface level or as integrated as you would like it. And it will tell you who your presidential candidate is. And would you not believe it or not, every election, like the last election cycle when I did it in 20 in 2020, I share this result on my TikTok page. I would I vote like I a green party was my the green party was the highest on my like vote. But I don't vote for cicadas like Jill Stein. So like That was a no for me. We don't we're in a two-party system and I don't vote for cicadas. So like I went down the list and it was Joe Biden and he had a 93% rating based on policy, based on the things that I cared about. And I was like, cool, I can vote for him. And I had other candidates. Trump was like down there at the very bottom, like one percent. I mean like that is like the percentage it gives you for every single party on their platform what their policy is built up. And I shared this because I want people to understand the political spectrum because it is a spectrum. It is not just Democrat, Republican, socialism, communism, fascism. It is literally there's so many pieces to it. And it's very integrated and it depends on where you fall and what your pro I always ask people what's your policy? What the th what are the things that are policy? Not Your fee fees policy. And I think the more that we educate like voters, it means they come onto the field, it means they understand why they should be paying teachers more and why the other people in the economy deserve equal pay. Because in Tennessee, you need $90,000 as a single income family to feel like you're afloat. You need $250,000. Carlos: Jesus. Victoria Broderick: If you're look as a family of five, that's two, two adults, three children, to feel like you're afloat. The average income in Tennessee is like sixty thousand dollars. Make it make the math make sense. Joshua Sales TN7: The the the household median income is eighty-five thousand, right? So the median household, so half of the households in Tennessee make below that, doesn't even hit that first number victorious at the ninety thousand. ⁓ and so yeah, it becomes yeah. Victoria Broderick: Exactly. And that is your bills paid. Your bills paid. You have like five dollars left for that one coffee you're gonna treat yourself to. And we all know you do it, so don't judge anyone. Carlos: Yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: Well, you shouldn't have to judge anyone, right? Because let's be real, that $5 coffee means ideally you're you're if you know this is where I get on my soapbox, you're not buying it from Starbucks, you're buying it from a local coffee shop. But that's sustaining the local economy, right? If I'm only making so much money that all I can buy are my groceries and pay my bills, what economy do we actually have? Carlos: Exactly. That's why I try to remind especially normal poor folks. And by normal po poor folks I mean probably everyone hearing my voice. Victoria Broderick: Yes. If you're listening to this podcast, you're probably a poor. Carlos: Yeah. When they talk about the economy, they're not talking about you. They're talking about how much rich people are spending. Victoria Broderick: Mm-mm. No. Joshua Sales TN7: And this is the whole thing behind the new Trump Kids accounts, right? They want to get your kid invested into the stock market so that they fall for these things more and more. It's the same reason why we saw retirement shift from being paid by the employers to being an individual 401k. It's this design to constantly make the worker. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: more ingrained into the system that they don't benefit. Victoria Broderick: It's like with your your doc like your medical vision and dental being tied to your employer. If it's tied to your employer, you have less choice. You have less freedom also your employer to speak to the capitalism in the chat because we all know that someone's gonna be like, well, it it it it's better. No, no, it actually benefits companies more if they're not worried about your health care. They actually not only do they have to pay you more, because you're Carlos: Yeah. Companies don't wanna pay companies don't wanna pay for your health insurance. They don't wanna contribute to your health insurance. They don't wanna do that shit. Victoria Broderick: They don't want to. And it it makes it more competitive for them, but it also makes it more competitive for you because if you're not a what my mom quote unquote called a benefit slave, where you're having to rely on that you know that health care, it's why I still work full time running for Congress. I literally have like three full time jobs. I work full time, I'm running for Congress, and I have two tiny humans, and then I have a husband. I don't know if that counts as another full time job, but we'll Carlos: And she's recording this podcast right before bedtime. Victoria Broderick: Yes, like he's literally on Mr Victoria for Congress is doing it he's doing the best, guys. He's he's well taken care of. He is a kept man. Carlos: Thank you, Mr. Victoria for Congress. Thank you for your service. Victoria Broderick: but this is this it makes it more competitive and it ⁓ means that more it means more, but they don't want that. They don't want you to buy from a local coffee shop. They don't want you to buy, have choices and start your own businesses because that means that they don't get a cog in the cycle and in the system. Carlos: Right. Exactly. They want everything to be a strip mall. Joshua Sales TN7: little and there's even another dynamic there. Yeah. There's another dynamic there that we're missing, right? When we separate health insurance from your workplace, which studies have shown one in six Americans are afraid to quit their job because of healthcare being tied to it. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: This actually benefits small businesses. Universal healthcare is beneficial, it's a net positive to small businesses. Small businesses don't get the same rates that big companies do. So they're having to pay more just to give you the same health care to be competitive. We want to see our rural areas, our small towns, get built up. Universal healthcare has so many downstream positives between Carlos: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: Small businesses not having to pay that anymore between the extra ⁓ income in your own pocket that you get to keep instead of sending it off to a healthcare insurance CEO, that turns into not one five dollar coffee a week, three or four. And it turns into going out to dinner, it turns into buying your kid that Christmas present that they want that you weren't sure how to fit into the budget. It allows you. Carlos: Those on pr entreprene the entrepreneurial types, all that money can go into your own business so you can start a business. Or if you have one partner that has to stay home to watch the kids or whatever it is, at least you might have the money that that person who's staying home who maybe wants to start a in-home business, whatever, whatever, at least you have that flexibility. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Carlos: You have that breathing room. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. It also allows for healthier people, which leads to a better economy in general, because people aren't going to the emergency room for health care. They aren't they aren't ignoring bills or potential issues that could cost them millions of dollars. They're not going bankrupt anymore. And it it creates this thing where if you're healthier, if you have the you're like there's less stress. That leads to happier individuals, which leads to a better economy because you're going to make decisions like maybe you know, yeah, you're gonna buy that kid the the thing that he wants for Christmas, but also maybe you're gonna do a part-time job and have like a little you do some side like some side sort of side passion that you've wanted to do for decades, but because of needing the income and needing the health care or whatever, you're doing it and we can't These are policies that we can put in place day one in like getting elected in Congress. Like, this is not something that's like down the road. If literally I tell people all the time, this is a policy that we can put in place day one that immediately alleviates pressure for so many people who are struggling. And they don't want that, which is why they don't want you to vote to circle it all back. Joshua Sales TN7: Which Carlos, that is the second of my 12 bills, is a universal healthcare bill in which the median household in America making $85,000 a year would only pay $50 a month. That's premium deductible copay. That is doctor visits, that is dental, vision, and mental health. $50 a month for the median household in America. Talk about freeing up how much extra money in your paycheck you would actually be seeing. Carlos: Yeah. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: And that's the thing, right? We constantly have Republicans screaming, This is socialism. Who cares? Right? Carlos: No no no no. Not even not even who cares. If that's socialism, then why isn't it socialism when you're hitting up the government so we can flip rockets into goddamn the into the ocean? Why isn't it socialism Joshua Sales TN7: Yeah. A ⁓ Victoria Broderick: Why isn't it socialism when we give Elon Elon Musk a loan or a grant? Carlos: Right. Why is it social why isn't it socialism when in two thousand and eight all these fucking idiots went and crashed the world's economy and no one went to jail? Why is it why wasn't it socialism when we save saved all the banks? All the car companies? Victoria Broderick: Yeah. And we already like socialism. Like that's the thing. If like what we're talking about is progressivism. It's it progress. Do you like your eight-hour workdays? Yes. Carlos: And it's not gonna hurt. And it's not gonna hurt the country. You know why? You know why? There's nothing but proof out there that it works. We know that universal a ⁓ basic income works because Dubai has it and all those people are wonderful. Everyone eats, everyone looks great. We know that fixing homelessness, ⁓ they're in I think it's Norway, they all but fixed it because they took homeless people off the street, put them in housing, and gave them Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Carlos: ⁓ social workers. And we know that it's affordable and we know that it can work because the the United States is currently paying for all these wonderful programs for Israel to have. So we know we can afford it. We know that it works. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. And we also know that like when it this is this is how we progress as a society. Progressivism isn't scary. If you like your eight hour work eight hour workdays, that's progressivism. If you like your weekends, that's progressivism. Joshua Sales TN7: Yeah. Carlos: Correct. If you like your child not to have to go to the factory, that's progressivism. Victoria Broderick: Yep, exactly. Like, I don't know what this obsession with going back to the Gilded Age is and what people why people want to organ trail themselves out of here. But like you do, you boo-boo. Just do it. It's fine. You want to yeah, that's your right. I don't want to be a part of that. I've played the organ trail game. I'm good. But if you want to do that. Carlos: Yeah. Nobody wants dysentery. Joshua Sales TN7: Nobody wants dysentery. Victoria Broderick: Nobody, nobody wants dysentery. Play that game too much. We've seen this movie. I'm good. Joshua Sales TN7: That was most of third grade for me, was just playing organ trail on the computer. Victoria Broderick: Same as like millennials. Joshua Sales TN7: You're done with the work packet, go play organ trail, it's fine. ⁓ Victoria Broderick: G ⁓ it was my favorite game to play. I was like I was like, let me just buy up all the alcohol because I'm gonna be cleaning wounds and snake bites and stuff and like I'll just hoping like it'll be fine. Six barrels of gin later. Carlos: Dare I say Tennessee whiskey? Joshua Sales TN7: So Carlos, I think, yeah, I think this all circles, right, that the need for voter education, right? Which I constantly like, I like to jokingly say, like, which is why you should send a teacher to Congress. But it's so true, right? We need to have these conversations that we're not having. And that doesn't mean between you, Victoria, and myself, right? Victoria Broderick: Brown all. Carlos: Right. Right. Joshua Sales TN7: We are people who have educated ourselves. We're people who have already talked with other people and not just talk to people who agree with us, but people who disagree with us so that we can learn from them and sharpen ourselves. But these are conversations that 90% of Americans you start to bring up and it's, ⁓ I don't do politics. I don't, I don't talk politics. I don't want to get into that fight. And it's like whether you want to or not is a privilege. Carlos: Ha ha ha. Joshua Sales TN7: Because the truth is everything is politics. And if you don't want to be involved, back to Victoria's analogy earlier, you become the turf. You become what everyone is stepping on. And I don't want that for you. It's part of why I'm a teacher, right? I'm trying to make sure that kids are educated and know how to question. I teach English rhetoric and like I tell my students, I'm like, the number one thing I want you to learn from me is asking the question why? Right. The thing that so many adults try and stamp out of kids, stop asking me why. Never stop asking why. Never stop questioning. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: Because the second you do is the second people can start pulling one over. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Carlos: And they're just waiting. They're just waiting. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: They're waiting. They're opportunistic. And I mean, and this is like, you know, circling back to our experiences, Josh is a teacher. I worked in international domestic logistics prior to the Trump administrations, because they Trump in his term destroyed international domestic logistics. Like he did he wreaked havoc on it. And I paid the price twice for it. First with my international job, and then second with my domestic job. Because of the way he mishandles. He doesn't know what he's doing. He doesn't understand. And then, you know, now I'm in a different field because that job went away and I had to find employment. I work in technology. I work with some of Fortune 500 companies in SAS based products. I'm watching AI and thinking, Whew, guys, we gotta get this under control. Because it should be a tool. It should not be a replacement. It should only be a tool. And the amount of data it's gathering is insane. Like Carlos, your example with Chat GPT, I want you to ask your chat GPT to talk like you. That that's gonna be your homework after this because I bet you your chat GPT can talk like you. Carlos: Insane. Joshua Sales TN7: Time out. I am the teacher, I give the homework, okay. Carlos: Ha. Victoria Broderick: I'm just momming it up in here. Joshua Sales TN7: Fair. Well Mom takes Mom takes top of the rank, so we'll give it to you. Carlos: I know, you saw you saw how quick I picked up my pen? Victoria Broderick: Look, look, we need more teachers in Congress. We need moms. We need working people in Congress who understand what the average Tennessean, average American is going through day in, day out. It's not radical to want you to be able to afford your groceries and have some money put back. It's not radical for you to need those safety nets and to have commun safe communities, you know. I say this like, you know, I'm running on safety, affordability, freedom, and equity. Make it safe. I want your safety nets in place. I want your community set in place, safe and in place because those things benefit you. I want it affordable because when it's affordable, you do more. And like when it comes to freedom, what good is freedom if you cannot afford it? What good is it? If you're not free is the answer. Carlos: Yeah, or if you don't have the if you don't have the tools to enjoy it. Victoria Broderick: It's not free. If you don't can't get the health care you need, if you can't make the life love who you love, get the you know medical care you need, then you're not free. And if you cannot afford it, you're not free. And it's equitable to say this is not a left versus right fight. This is a bottom versus top fight. This is a grassroots versus donor class. And you as the voter need to be asking those questions, the hard questions. Carlos: You're not. Victoria Broderick: Does your candidate take corporate PAC money? Yes or no? Who are the majority of their donors? Do they take APAC money? Because when you have a political opponent that's raised $700,000, it begs the question where's that money coming from? Because the average American is struggling right now. My average donation is $22.47. That's coming from working people who are giving up if they're working minimum wage. Four hours of work. If you've raised seven hundred thousand dollars, that begs the question. And that is that is facts. That's one of my primary opponents. Carlos: Yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: That's it, I think that as a newcomer to politics has been the most eye-opening thing, right? How much money actually goes into these elections. The fact that millions of dollars goes into each and every one, and that is for every House race, that is for every Senate race, that is for every governor race, that is for every presidential race, to the point that we're talking billions of dollars every year. Carlos: Yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: Going into getting people elected. And when the average person is so tired from working two jobs, so broke from paying all the bills and then some, it's hard for the average person to get involved into politics. And so all that's left, right, it becomes this like compounding interest of the rich. Carlos: Yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: Keep getting richer. Like my grandmother has always raised me saying that, right? The poor get poorer, the rich get richer. And it is more true today than at any point in American history. We have more wealth inequality than the Gilded Age. We have for the first time since like the 1950s, the working class is taking home the smallest slice of GDP. We know that Americans are suffering. And The thing is that we have politicians just pointing the finger at each other. And the truth is, is that we have people on the Republican side. Yeah. We have people on the Republican side. We have people on the Democratic side who are taking money from people they shouldn't be. Right? That question that those questions Victoria brought up are questions that we're not just slinging at Republicans. They are questions that should be asked of Democrats as well. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Carlos: And they're doing that as a distraction. Yeah. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: Right. The question, Carlos, that you asked about APAC, right? That should be a question asked about every politician. Victoria Broderick: And down ballot. Joshua Sales TN7: Yeah. We deserve to know where these people are getting their funding from, where they're getting their help from. Because I've said it on the campaign trail numerous times. When you take money from a corporation, you are beholden to that corporation, not to your constituents. In fact, Carlos, I think you even like clipped that last time, ex almost word for word. ⁓ like that's how often I do say it, like, because it's true. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. It is true. And I mean, you know, like circling back to this conversation of like you have to do it all down ballot too, because you don't recognize the sinister relationship that the state of Tennessee has with Israel. I didn't know. I had no idea. I had no idea getting into politics what I had signed up for. I knew like the offshoot of it because I was a Democratic chair of a county party in a rural county. And I moved through the system that way. But as a political candidate, as someone who's running for office who's had zero support, I mean, I ran in 2024 as a first time no name candidate with no support. They ignored our district. And this is a product of the system because it's an it was like a 22 plus district at the time, and we're against a 16 year incumbent. So people walked away. They're just like, We got we're good, even now. The Tennessee Democratic Party and the DNC are only gonna focus on Josh's race and district five. They're not focusing on District Four. Does that mean that District Four is not worth it? No, it just means that the system, which is an umbrella, has made it so hard. You know, all the things that Josh is pointing out are products of the system. And then you compound that with people suffering, with people being tired. They're not gonna get involved in their local county politics. They're not gonna even have energy to go protest. If they're worried about their livelihood, if they're worried about catching a charge because they're protesting at No Kings, they're not gonna do it. And that's exactly what they want you to do. They want you to do that. And you know, it goes all the way down ballot. It's like these races shouldn't be partisan at a a school board or a county level, but they've become partisan because in 2010. Carlos: Yeah. Victoria Broderick: There was a down ballot initiative with the Republican Party and they flooded Tennessee. And they started with school board races. They started with school board and county commissioner. And then they groomed, I hate that word, they groomed those candidates up. If you look at the trajectory of some of the Republicans, they were hand-picked from school board races. I think like Marjorie Taylor Green was like, she was like a county commissioner. The I mean, this is Carlos: Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: The it's the trajectory of that. And we have to do the same. And that starts with candidates like Josh and I doing the work, even if it's exhausting. Carlos: Yeah, and that's one of the that's one of the things that I want to really bring home to the people listening to this is exactly what she was saying. If you pay attention when MAGA was starting to froth itself up and they're right before they climbed on the Capitol like a bunch of monkeys, they were telling each other to run for local offices. MAGA infiltrated your local. political offices because they championed themselves. They they went out and they said, hey, if we want to get this MAGA thing rolling, we have to take the local par offices and build from there. That's why you have that's why you have a lot of these knuckleheads. Every at any time voting happens Victoria Broderick: It's worse than that though. Carlos: There's like delays and there's all this stuff happening because we have knuckleheads in here trying to break the system. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. And I wanna I kind of wanna push back a little bit. It's worse than that. And it goes back further than that. So this didn't start in 2016, it didn't start in 2010. This was a coordinated effort from the 1980s. And it started then, but it didn't actually start then. What really happened is you had the southern Carlos: Yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: I was gonna say, Victoria, if you don't take this back to the Powell memo memo, we're gonna really be pushing back. Carlos: I gonna say we got a history teacher, we got Victoria Broderick: I know, I know, I know. I was gonna I'm like Slavery and say the most radical thing as the white person here, ⁓ as one of the white people here. Slavery never ended, it rebranded. Jim Crow never ended, it rebranded. That is why a segregationist who held office until 2002 was adopted into the Republican Party. He was best friends with my great grandfather, a state senator in South Carolina. Do you guys know who I'm talking about? Josh, do you know who I'm talking about? Senator Strom Thurman. Carlos: Two thousand two. Yeah, that's what I yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: The name escapes me right. Okay. Victoria Broderick: Senator Strom Thurman. He was adopted. This was a coordinated effort for decades. And yes, I love that he's rolling over in his grave because I'm gonna go to Congress. But we digress. But this is it goes back so far. Josh, you go. Yeah. Carlos: Hold that banner high. Joshua Sales TN7: And that's I I I agree with you, Victoria, right? ⁓ if you've never read ⁓ Dr. Heathercox Richardson, highly recommend it. She has a book entitled How the South Won the Civil War. And what she discusses in it is the fact that all these high-ranking members of the Confederacy, the vice president of the Confederacy, became a Georgia senator after the Civil War was done. He literally just got to walk back into the federal government, got a pardon. Got to walk back into the federal government and got to like write laws. The same man who was fighting our country. And we continue to see this, right? ⁓ I think Carlos, we talked about this last time where it's like a question I ask my students every year is, When did slavery end in America? And naturally they say, right the Civil War. And I go, No, it's never ended. It's a trick question, right? The Thirteenth Amendment. Slavery shall be abolished except Carlos: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: As a form of punishment. And so when you look at the fact that right now ICE is detaining, 93% of the people they detain have no violent criminal record. 65% of them have no criminal record, but they're being detained. And as they're sitting in these facilities, they're being put to work. And none of them are being paid. We have slavery in modern day America, and the Republicans are cheering it off. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Carlos: You folks need to remember the Republican business plan sucks. The Republican business plan is whoever is the leader gets all the money, and and that leader has to work you as hard as they can and pay you as little as they can. If you take Everything they preach, everything that they put on Fox News, everything that they sell you on the home shopping network, everything that they believe boils down to that. They have to make you work long and hard and give you the least amount of pay possible. That is their business plan. Victoria and Joshua are saying. Victoria Broderick: That's fascism. Carlos: We want to set you up for success. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Carlos: We want it to be where you can work and not have to worry about groceries. We want you to be able to go to school and not have to worry about paying the tuition. Joshua Sales TN7: The number one form of theft in America is wage theft. And it is seldom prosecuted, right? And that's by design. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. And they make it let me l cause now you're talking my language. This is where I get this shit. I was in Holly well, I worked in the advertising in Chicago and I worked in the movie industry in Hollywood. I used to work up to I would stop counting at a hundred hours a week. Not two weeks, not a month, a week. And they pay you by salary. So by salary, you're supposed to work 40 hours a week. My dumbass thinking, I'm gonna pull myself up by the bootstraps, I'm gonna work real hard and I'm gonna make a name for myself and all that bullshit that they sell you. That shit doesn't work, especially if you are tinted in any way, shape, or form. It doesn't work. Joshua Sales TN7: No. I mean, the the saying itself, right, was meant to be a nonsensical saying. You cannot literally pull yourself up by the bootstraps. It's physically impossible. And yet that is how we describe the American mentality. And it's almost fitting, right? Because like it literally translates to we are brainwashed into thinking that something that cannot work will work. And that is the definition of American capitalism. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it's all horseshit. 'Cause just take a look at the politicians. When you start running for and I'm now I'm not trying to bad mouth you guys. I'm just trying to make a point. I'm trying to make you a point. The first thing they do is I need your money. Victoria Broderick: ⁓ no, we're politicians, we're shady. me your money. Carlos: Because there's there's there's some there's a chore that needs to be done. There's a task that needs to be done. It's winning office. All right, cool. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. And that's what literally we're and as freshmen Congress people, what will happen is we don't get if we don't get enough of us elected, you know what the Hakeem Jeffries is gonna do to Josh and I? He's gonna sit us in a little room and it and he's gonna say, Hey, go do call time for the Democratic Party and raise money. That is literally what they'll do to freshmen. That is why we're telling you that you have to vote because the more of us that are there, I can give Hakeem a middle finger. Carlos: Stifle you. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. Victoria Broderick: And I can say, no, no, no, here's this legislation that I worked up with my friends at Flair and courage candidates. And I can say, no, I'm not going to do that. I'm going to come here to do the job that I want to do, and I'm not going to play ball, which is why you're seeing such a pushback. Just like the Republican Party pushed back against MAGA in in the beginning, before they fell in line, the Democratic Party is watching the same thing happen. Parties are meant to change. Politics is meant to grow. The Constitution is a living document. Don't let anyone tell you that two hundred years ago that every single one of those signatures was agreed with slavery, because they didn't. They didn't agree with it. And not all of them were religious because with so Carlos: Yeah, 'cause what they know about the internet, they didn't. What they know about fifty caliber ⁓ automatic machine rifles, you know? Like Victoria Broderick: Exactly, exactly. And like the assumption that these people 200 years ago, 250 years ago, didn't know that slavery was wrong, that enslaving a person, a living being, was wrong, saying that they all agreed with it is is asinine. As well as say that they were all religious is also asinine because the people who came over from Europe were religious extremists. Okay, I'm done, I'm off my soapbox, sorry. Carlos: Let me Let me let me jump on that too. Cause supposedly the Republicans are a bunch of business owners, right? Victoria Broderick: Uh-huh. Carlos: But to me, business owners are people that refuse to do their own work. Victoria Broderick: Are you talking about like a micromanager? 'Cause I think we got one in the White House 'cause he not very good at his job. Carlos: No, he's ⁓ I can't I can't imagine the the all the things that we haven't seen yet. This is just what we see. And I've been telling people this about AI and stuff like that too. I live I can drive to Silicon Valley and be there. Well traffic is probably I can probably be in Silicon Valley in about an hour, hour and a half. I'm pretty close. When I tell people Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Carlos: This is the AI. The AI that you see, that's what they're showing you. We're not seeing all these idiots in their in their garage or in their in their basements like tip tap tap tap tapping away. When I was still I'm telling you. Victoria Broderick: It's already breaking out. We're gonna eye robot this guy. We've seen this movie. I don't know about you. Joshua Sales TN7: When one again, it's it's it's public record, right? We know that some of the AI companies anthropic, right? The fact that Anthropic was disowned by the federal government because Anthropic said no, you cannot use our AI to make killer robots. And the federal government said, Cool, we're not only dropping your contract, we're gonna say you're a national security thing. Carlos: Ha ha. Yeah. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: And then OpenAI, who just chat GPT, said we'll do it. Right? And you Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Carlos: Bomb away. Joshua Sales TN7: And we know, right, there is a lot of evidence to it hasn't been proven, so I I don't want to say it has been, but there's a lot of evidence pointing to the girls' school in Iran that was bombed was targeted by AI. There there's a massive theory about that as to why that actually happened, that the school was named after like a famous general. And so like the AI just thought it was a target. Victoria Broderick: Yeah. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: and attacked it. And it's scary to think that we are literally handing over control of the strongest military in the world to and AI. Carlos: Yeah. Trying to and trying to meld them all together. Victoria Broderick: And I mean And I mean, like, this is it gets more sinister. Like, when you have tech companies like you know, Facebook and YouTube building literal profiles out of children, every child in the United States or just across the world will have a platform, like a whole like this is who they are before they turn 18. Say this child is born in 2020 and has does not touch. Any like does not get on social media until 18. 18 years and it's literally they're getting online, you know, like they're getting online here soon. Like they have whole we we have to put these in because we've seen this when you have AI, it's like technology like AI in the background. You have tech companies grabbing data and saying this is the child, this is what they're interested in, building out profiles on them, and you have AI now coming into the into the mix. And literally telling you what that child will be. We like again, we've seen these TV shows, we've seen the movie, we know how this ends. It's like, why do you guys feel the need to live this out? Like, again, like if you want to work and trail yourself, go ahead and do it. I'm good. I've seen the movie, I'm good. But we have to put these in place, and we put a literal person incapable of managing anything into the most respected person. Or at least to be used to be the most respected office in the world. And we've given him just free range to just do whatever. I'm sorry, no, like this is not acceptable. What is happening? And he he just is just throwing ketchup at the wall somewhere, guys. Like we need representation that understands that actually is some critical thought. And he doesn't have any of that. He's too busy, busy seeing what happened as someone getting a red card at the World Cup game. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: As well as yelling about what, you know, I don't know, making some AI video about Rosie O'Donnell. Like this is what this man is doing with his free time. And he's doing all of it. Like, there's no mistaking that that's that is who's doing those midnight tweets. Like, that's him. Because he's a micromanager. He's just an a deranged micromanager and an old man. Yes, I hope you see this, dude. Like, you're an old man at this point. Somebody needs to take. Carlos: Yeah. Victoria Broderick: The catch up and the phone away from Papa and stick him back out in the backyard and say, Go go eat your pudding. Like move on, bro. Carlos: Mm. And holds him down. Joshua Sales TN7: And so I think when that's the conversation we're having, right? It needs to be a question of like how did we get here? Because if we don't understand how we got here, it's that much more difficult to understand how we get out of it and how we prevent it from happening again. And like one of the major things goes back to gerrymandering, right? When we see more and more intense gerrymandering, we see Thomas Massey stood up to Donald Trump and got gerrymandered from the right. Victoria Broderick: Yeah. Carlos: We're gonna keep sliding back. Yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: Pushed from the right, lost his election, and especially after the latest ruling by the Supreme Court, where now political parties can infuse money into races, which I want to be clear, it's not for primary races, it's for general ones. But there's so many tools in the arsenal of the GOP and the DNC to get the person that they want elected in office. And it reminds me when we're talking about the Constitution. And we're talking about the first president. Washington's farewell address literally warned us against party politics. And yet here we are today. And it's one of the main reasons why I am so vehement to point at a Democrat doing wrong before I point at a Republican doing wrong. Because I wanted to be clear that I am not playing by party rules, I am playing by what is truly best for the American people. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: What is best for the people I am seeking to represent? And if I can't stand for that, then I shouldn't be your representative. And to me, it doesn't matter if it's a Republican policy or Democratic policy. I like to joke. I agree with Ronald Reagan. 1986, he did his migrant amnesty bill that took three million migrants in America. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: And made them legal citizens. I think that's a great policy that we could bring back. Individuals that have worked hard and deserve to be actual American citizens, and allow them to be that so that they don't have to hide in the shadows. Reagan in the 90s said we should ban assault weapons. I agree with him. Richard Nixon said that clean air and clean water are the birthright of every American citizen. Victoria Broderick: Yeah. Carlos: Yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: There are so many times where it's like the Republican Party has walked away from what it once was. The Democratic Party has too. If you look at Kamala Harris and you compare her policies to JFK. Victoria Broderick: Kamala, sorry. It's Kamala. Sorry. I was like, I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna do it. You're fine. Joshua Sales TN7: You're right. My apologies. It's it's fair. You should correct someone when they say you're wrong. ⁓ But the point stands, right? We need to hold our parties accountable, and that starts by holding your own party accountable. Carlos: Ha ha. Ha ha. Victoria Broderick: Yeah. Wait and and accountability. Carlos: That's my calling and voting. Victoria Broderick: Yeah. Accountability is hard. Carlos: You have to Yeah. Yeah. And there's more than that that normal folks can do. You can communicate. You can go to your representative's office. You can talk to them. We know Republicans are cowards these days and they don't do the ⁓ the town halls and stuff like that. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Carlos: But hopefully they'll pluck their heads out of their collective asses and and hopefully we'll get back to actually communicating with the people that we give these jobs to. Victoria Broderick: Yeah. Don't hold your breath while you're waiting for that. Carlos: Yeah, no, I know. But that's the that like think of it like that, you guys, like normal folks. Think of it like every time you every time you go somewhere. When you go to work, you get income taxed. When you shop, you get taxed. When you die, you get taxed. When you when you do anything, you get taxed. So all of this all this money that they're nickeling diming you, they're they're putting in this bowl. Now what are they doing with that bowl? Do you want all that money to go to killing people overseas? Or do you want it to like fixing infrastructure and fixing the schools so you can maybe have some after school programs to keep the kids busy instead of spray painting on the walls that piss you off? Joshua Sales TN7: How does that make Boeing money? Carlos: And and even before we get to that, like let's we know that it works, just go to the rich neighborhoods. Do you know what you you know where the term soccer mom came from? From the rich neighborhoods, the moms having to drive these kids to all these fucking after school programs. You know why? Because you want a constructive member of society that's well ingrained, that that sees how it works. Joshua Sales TN7: Yes. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. That uses I uses alliteration about being a player on the field. Hint, hint, link, link. I guess play soccer. But I mean, this is that this is that thing. And I'm a mom. Light bulb. But like just to like bring this like as a conversation, I I talk about it, I got this from one of the creators that I follow. Activism is a muscle. Just like any other muscle, you have to stretch it. Carlos: When it works. Yeah And your mom? Yeah. Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: You have to exercise it. I would have never told you in 2021 that I would have touched politics and running for office with a nine-foot pole. I would have never, if you asked me in 2023, like just four just four months, that was the first time I ever considered running for office. Now at that point, I had been a county chair for two years or almost two years. And people apparently Carlos: Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: I didn't know it was a political trajectory to be a county chair and then immediately run for office. But people ask that question. I said, I got no issue. Nope, I'm not running for office. I'm terrible at public speaking. I don't want a people like that. I'm good. No, it's a no for me. And then fast forward, I find out my opponent in a district that has been underrepresented, that's been gerrymandered, that's been ignored by both the Republican Party and the DNC, that he's gonna run out of post. And I say over my dead body, and I pull a petition after some liquid courage and a weekend and just walking in and telling my husband after a call just like this that I'm gonna run for Congress. And here we are. I would have never you a go look at some of my speeches from 2025 or 2024. They were terrible, awful. I I literally I I wanna crawl under a rock and die when I watch them. But you know what? I'm learning. And I'm doing something that the majority of people will never do. They'll never understand that. And you don't have to run for office. I want to make politics boring again. I want to give you that good West Wing feeling. And know that your representation is like representing you. But like you just have to pick something. So start small. Feed a neighbor. Go out and help your local community. Go pick up some trash. And then maybe go to a county party meeting. Carlos: Exactly. Victoria Broderick: And ask just listen. Just say, hey, I'm new here. I just want to listen. They want you there. They're gonna wanna sign you up for everything, but first and foremost, they want you there. And that's yeah, get on the fake number. You know, as a rural county chair, do you know how many times never mind, I was ghosted by people for that same reason? Joshua Sales TN7: Give them a fake number. I I belong to my rural county party. I I understand perfectly. I just also know that yes, the second a new person walks in, we're like sign up for this and this and this. ⁓ Victoria Broderick: Yeah. I mean, I'm am literally in the Democratic Party. Like I'm an DC member. Like I represent a district. I'll be on the ballot twice. And I'm but that was my answer. I saw the all the like basically walls that were put in place to stop people like me and Josh from running for office. And I said, Okay, I'm gonna climb it. Because that's just who I am. That's just my personality. And You know, that's not everyone's cup of tea, that's not everyone's gonna do the thing, but we have to have people willing to do it. I recognize we have a two-party system and it is broken and it needs fixing. And until there is a clear path for a third party, we have to work within the confines in the system. So what am I doing? changing it from within to the point that I'm probably pissing off people. Ken Martin knows who I am at this point. Like he knows who I am. Carlos: Ha ha. Victoria Broderick: And that's not for the fact that I'm running for office. I can it's partly because of that. It's it's about that topic that we all were talking about offline, which I'm not gonna mention here. But that's part of the reason, like this is how we bring change. I'm gonna be a thorn in all of their sides because I'm fun sized and feral. I'm a lot of things, but above it's not one of them. Joshua Sales TN7: And I think, right, it it's good to name that using that analogy, right, activism is a muscle. Just like any muscle, doing it the first time is the hardest. Right. But once you start doing it and once you start repeating it, and once it becomes a pattern, and once it becomes a part of your life, it gets easier and easier. And it's the amount of yeah, the amount of people that have told me that going out and volunteering is almost better than therapy. Like the the feeling it gives them of like, ⁓ I am actually making change. I actually saw I was Carlos: Once you start finding your people. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: You know, I was out picking up trash and I could turn around and see how much cleaner everything was. I was out at a food bank giving out food and I could see the look in someone's eye that they were gonna be able to eat that day and that they were satisfied because of it. I was out doing this or that, canvassing and whatever it may be, however you find your way to plug into your community. But you gotta have the energy and you gotta have the time. And that's why we need politicians who are pushing for no, we need the 40 hour work week to be pay enough for a person to live their life. We need utilities to go down in cost. We need groceries to go down in cost. We need to break up the four companies that own 85% of the beef production. Why is beef $12 a pound now? Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: Because they want it to be, because that is how they make the most profit. They don't care about you. They don't care about your family. They don't care about your livelihood. The way capitalism is designed, and I want to be clear, because like I have read Adam Smith, capitalism was not always designed this way. This is a more modern feature of capitalism where the mindset is how can I make the most profit? And the answer is Victoria Broderick: Yeah. Carlos: They want it to be. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: Yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: Charge more, pay labor less. Victoria Broderick: I mean candidates are changing. Like this is something I had a twenty minute conversation with the chief of staff of my opponent Republican opponent. They don't like pol the Republican Party does not like politics, but not because of the crazies on the like right doing their crazy like whatever posting or even the Democrats. Because it allows a level of accessibility and education that is has not been had. Candidates and like Candidates now, I I equate it to being a triple threat, old school Hollywood, Carlos, you might like this. We have to be able to sing, dance, and act. There is a level of that now that it's just like when Nixon and Kennedy debated each other. There we have it is changing the sphere. It is making us more accessible in a way that we haven't had before. And that means that candidates have to be more dynamic. And that's what we're witnessing in this election cycle, where we're seeing status quo politicians losing to non-status quo politicians because we have to be able, I can pinch a penny. Look, I can outw like my opponent, my primary opponent, might have seven hundred thousand dollars that he's raised, but I can outwork him. I've outworked him for two years. I can outspeak him because I'm standing on principle. I have a practiced. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: from doing it every single day because I don't just do this. I work and I do debate lives and I I engage with voters in a way that they've not been engaged with before. And that speaks for itself and it will play out in the prime primary. So maybe I won't have $700,000 in the bank. But you know what I will have? Two and a half years worth of work. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: And that's to Victoria's point, right? Getting out and talking to constituents in ways that candidates don't do. Right. I had a woman, I was at the Sumner County ⁓ strawberry festival, and I asked her, you know, like, ⁓ do you have a plan to vote? And she's like, I don't vote. And one of the county party people was like, ⁓ just l let her go. And I was like, No. Like Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Joshua Sales TN7: This woman needs to be talked to. And so I had a 30 minute conversation with her that by the end of it, she was like, Okay, when's your election? Cause I'm voting for you. Right. I was in Trousdale County the other day and asked a group of people, like, hey, what's something that matters to you? And they brought up Social Security. And so I started talking about my Mustard Seed Act, which revokes the income cap and turns capital gains into something that. Carlos: ⁓ yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: Spica can touch and bans Congress from ever touching Social Security again. Three things that guarantees Social Security becomes solvent for the next 75 years, and actually might let us allow retirement to go from 67 to 65, walking it back for once. And one guy started going off about like, ⁓ well, what about the scams and the fraud? That's 100 million compared to the 400 billion I'm talking about, that the 1% don't. pay into because they have scammed you into thinking they don't have to. And he walked away and this woman goes, Josh, I want to tell you two things. One, I am actually the treasurer for the Republican Party in this county. I was like, okay, we're about to fight. She goes, and two, if you're in the general election against Matt Van Epps, I'm voting for you. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: Yeah. Carlos: Hell yeah. Hell yeah. Victoria Broderick: But I mean Joshua Sales TN7: Because these people they wanna be talked to. They don't want to be talked at, they want to be talked with. Carlos: Right. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. And I mean, I've witnessed this too in 2024. I was at a f I was at a forum. I was the only congressional candidate to show up for district four. You know, my opponent didn't I didn't have a primary opponent. My opponent didn't show up. None of his opponents showed up because he was primary. And I'm at this forum and they asked that I was told it was going to be softball questions. I'm still learning at this point. I've like talked about politics for a long time. But I'm still learning the ins and outs. And they asked in a question about the economy. And I was like, Well, you're not asking me about the economy. You're asking me about milk prices and grocery prices. And the Republican chair of the party came up to me afterwards and said, You sound moderate. And I was like Joshua Sales TN7: The amount of times I have been told by people that they think I'm the like moderate candidate, I'm like, I'm literally the most left candidate in my race. It's that the way I talk about it and I make it sound reasonable because it is reasonable. Again, like going back to Victoria Broderick: No. Same. Every time. Carlos: Yeah. Well how much of that Victoria Broderick: What's what is moderate about the Republican Party? That begs the question. Carlos: But how much of that is the fact that you guys I don't know how much how many ⁓ how how much trans issues you have to deal with out there, but is do you guys think that you're a little more moderate because you're not talking about men and women's sports and all this stuff? Victoria Broderick: I I mean so like for me I use Gloria Johnson's approach. Yeah, like I d I'm like that's not affecting your grocery prices. And I'm like that like I use Gloria Johnson's I use Gloria Johnson's example. It's like, do you want the government to have more power? Because if you want me to legislate someone's body, then that's more power to the government. I kind of flip it of like that's a that's a governing body. Carlos: Like the distracting parts, you know what I mean? Yeah. Victoria Broderick: For like it's what whatever the athletic body is, I can't think of it at the moment. Do you want me to take that on? Because if you want me to take that on, then you're advocating for more government. Or radical thought here, we just leave people alone. Because I was like, you're talking about 10 P you're talking about 10 children. You're talking about 10 children across the globe. Why are you bullying 10 children? There are bigger things that we have to address. And I'm not worried about a child. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Victoria Broderick: Who needs who needs the medical attention and love and care that they need. Like, just like, you know, I rules that apply in my house, there are there are rules that I have in my house that don't apply in other people's homes. And that's the same in everyone. I know that when I leave my house, I'm part of a community. And like speaking to like what Josh was saying, activism does allow you to have a community. And when you're a part of a community, it feels good. We're meant to be a part of a community. And I don't think that we're not. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: I'm not skirting these issues. I don't know. I can't speak for Josh, but I'm not skirting these issues. If I don't know the answer, I say, I don't know. Let me, but here's how I will approach this. Cause I've done that before. And I think that that's what they're not expecting. You know, when they they're not expecting us to speak out actively about things. And they don't they don't know what to do with us. And I mean, I do a ton of debate lives. So like I have a lot of practice dodging, you know, dodging the Carlos: Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: The BS and not taking it personally because when the personal attacks come out, that's an emotional response to someone not knowing. They don't I gentle parent them, which they hate. ⁓ but like that's them not knowing how to respond. They're in an emotional state, and that's all the Republican Party can platform is keeping you in a state of heightened fear and you know emotion because you're less likely to make good decisions. And that's not a product of you, it's a product of the environment. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: Which is why they don't want us to put these policies in place. So to like to answer your question, I don't think it's that we're skirting these issues or not even having them. I think people are just so exhausted and so tired of status quo politicians. They want someone that they feel like they can go have a coffee with or some water with. Or if you're feeling froggy, we can go get some brown water because I live in the whiskey district. I like We can have a convers they want someone that they under that understands what they're going through. And I think that that I think that that's what it comes down to. Joshua Sales TN7: Yeah, and I would echo Victoria's sentiment around this thing of like I never skirt around these things, right? If you look at my 12 bills, none of them are designed to talk about trans people, none of them are designed to talk about like any of these like buzz cultural issues. They're designed to focus on what is affecting every American, right? We know that one to four percent of the population fall under the category of transgender. A hundred percent of Americans need to drink water to live, a hundred percent of Americans need to have a job or be with someone who has a job to pay the bills, a hundred percent of Americans need food to eat, school to be educated, all these things, right? And so it's a thing to me where I tell people I am focused on what is going to get the Biggest gain for Americans, the fastest. Now, if you want to ask me specifically what my opinion is, what my view is on trans rights, they're human rights. Because I'm not gonna hedge that. I will say that outright. I just don't think that's the thing we should be focused on when 68,000 Americans are dying because they can't afford health care. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. And you know damn well that you don't have anyone in your high school trying to play sports on whatever team. I d Victoria Broderick: Well and we've gotten here from dis sorry. Joshua Sales TN7: I mean it goes back to I was gonna say it goes back to years ago when they were saying that like teenagers in schools were adding asking for litter boxes. Like it was just an outright lie, right? It's the whole the Haitians are eating the cats and dogs. It's lie after lie after lie. And it goes back to Carlos: Hey, and let's go let's go even further back than that. That's why they made weed illegal. They made weed illegal. They said that the blacks and the Mexicans smoke weed and have sex with all the white women. And I'm like, that happens before the weed. Victoria Broderick: It was the gateway. Sounds like it sounds like that family guy episode. Joshua Sales TN7: He does. But right it it's this thing of and Victoria you touched on this, it's the fact that Republicans want you distracted. They want you in this heightened state of emotion that you can't think what's best for you. Victoria Broderick: It really does. Carlos: Exactly, They want you to feel comfortable that they're gonna take care of it. Don't worry, I'll take care of it for you. And then they say, ⁓ since I took care of this for you, ⁓ I need the spoils because I'm very important. And very important people need to be living large. Look at the pastors. Look at the congresspeople. Look at it. It's crazy. Victoria Broderick: And I mean Exactly. Mm-hmm. We're literally applying for a job where we only work 180 days a year, which sounds wild to me. ⁓ because I'm so used to working. Exactly. And I think that this goes to this other part. We're not going to like if winning an election by disenfranchising a marginalized community is what you want me to do, I'm not your candidate. If you want me to throw away someone's rights Carlos: A hundred and forty seven last year. Victoria Broderick: Because it makes you feel more comfortable to vote for me. I'm not your candidate. And like that is a not a radical thing, but people respect it. You know, they respect that you stand ten toes down. Everybody respects the pedo in the White House. Like they all respect him because he's he said the thing and made them feel seen. And let's give it credit where credit is due. He spoke to an issue, but he took it and weaponized it and took. Carlos: Exact Victoria Broderick: over a party and they are all kowtowing to him. Republicans fall in line. Full stop. There is no chance that the Republicans won't. That is why my lawyer is no longer voting Republican. He is a big fan of me. But I'm watching Republican after Republican come and speak to me at No Kings, speak to me at Town Halls because I'm hosting them. Speak to me in public and say I'm voting for you. And I'm having conversation with people who've left the Republican Party and they're not going to Democrats. They're going to like progressive working class politicians and candidates because they know we're speaking to what they already care about. And we're not talking, we're not skirting the issue, but we're also not making that our entire personality. Like, you know, there's nothing radical about saying trans rights are human rights. There's nothing radical about saying what's going on with ICE is unacceptable and that it needs to be abolished because when you cannot, when you have a Carlos: Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: An organization that's infiltrated with as many white supremacists as it is, and it is literally violating the constitution and human rights. There's no fixing it. We already have a platform. The INS was what we did prior to tw 2003. And we could go back to that. And we should go back to that and make change. But this is what we're Carlos: Mm-hmm. Victoria Broderick: This is what we're fighting against and that's what we're seeing and that's why they don't know what to do with us. Because candidates like Josh and I aren't going to kowtow to corporate money or corporate interest or even the party because we're saying, no, we like accountability, we're gonna call it out. Carlos: And I'm glad you brought that up. I wanted to share with people on this podcast. I talk to a lot of political hopefuls and creative folks too, but the political people that the politically minded people that I talk to are I believe one hundred percent of you guys that have been on this show have been the courage candidates that that are saying that you are willing to do this job for the salary. You don't need all the extra bonuses. You don't need the millions of dollars that these people keep s saying that they need. You guys are willing to do the job for the salary. Joshua Sales TN7: My wife and I have discussed should I win, right? One term of being Congress would set so much of my life differently, right? I could pay off what student loans I have. I could pay off my car. I can buy her the new car she needs. We could get the roof repaired like we need to. We can get all this stuff done. And then I could go back to being a teacher with no debt on my plate and be happy. And like Carlos: That'd be sick. Yeah. Victoria Broderick: And and that's the radical thing is and I we're gonna have we have to owe like we have to have a place to live in DC and here. And he's literally saying that we can do that because we understand how to penny pinch, because we're not spending money on our third jet. Carlos: Yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: It blows my mind, right? So travel is paid for. Yeah. Travel is paid for. And then your congressperson gets a per a living per diem. And it breaks down to if they're in if they're in DC for 180 days, it breaks down to about 200 a day. I've looked. You could get a nice hotel in DC within walking distance of the Capitol, easily for $200 a day. That I'm like, I'm happy with that. Carlos: And Doriat. Victoria Broderick: Literally was just there. Literally just there. Literally, literally possible. Carlos: Ha ha. Joshua Sales TN7: So so you know, when you have Mike Johnson saying, ⁓ well, we need to allow Congress to ⁓ buy and sell stocks because they can't afford to live otherwise. Yeah, allow them to do insider trading. It's like that is he's lying to your face. Or he's saying, We deserve, we the the Congress person deserve a better life than what you have. And the truth is, I think. Victoria Broderick: Ha ha Carlos: Do inser insider trading and stuff. These are the tricks. Yeah. Joshua Sales TN7: We should honestly, if we want to be representatives of the people, we should be fighting nonstop for their pay to be better. I would love if, again, Congress is paid if all you're doing is showing up, right? You're not in any committees, you're not in anything like that. Because if you are in committees, you get paid extra per the committee. ⁓ but if all you're doing is showing up and doing the base job, it's $174,000 a year. ⁓ Again, the median income in America, the median household income in America is $85,000. That's almost double the median income, household income. And yet they complain and say they need more. How are you supposed to live? Victoria Broderick: And and and they say anything more, while also knowing that they're getting lobby money. They're getting money on the side. This is not like how are you not and they're not living in district. Like I've already had this question. Someone asked me, they're like, Well, what are you gonna do? I'm gonna live in my house. I like my house. Granted, now because of redistricting, I have to move. But I'm a lot of things but but above it's not one of them, so call my bluff. Cool. ⁓ like this is the like how is it that they are not living in their district? My opponent, like his chief of staff, straight up lied. I've got videos coming out, guys. Straight up lied and said he's in district. He's in district. No, he's not. He has been my elected representative basically since 2012. 2012, I my family has owned property in this district. The entire time. I've owned property the major like five years. Yeah, because my oldest is six. So about five years. I he's never had a town hall here. His last town hall was in 2013, and his chief of staff is over here saying, ⁓ well, we don't call it town halls. I got I got words for it. You're not gonna like them. And they're over there tell trying to gaslight. literal like one the candidate and a constituent who's literally speaking for constituents because I'm the one who's out in the district talking and having these conversations. I'm the one who sees your nice little office and the fact that you've got a little snack kit center for your interns who are catching the brunt of your crap boss. And I'm saying, you know what, those MMs, how much do they cost? Because I can think of some kids that you would tell that don't deserve that on snack. Why does the intern like we know the interns aren't getting that because you're putting them on phones? Like you're making them answer your question. This is the fundamental problem. We have to be connected. We have to teach treat it no different than your local varista. Like it is the same. It is the same. And if you're looking at a politician and thinking otherwise, and granted, yes, there's a lot of stress. Can confirm, got gray hairs, been there, done there, got the t-shirt. That does not change the fact that better representation is possible and that there are hard parts of this job. But you know what makes it easier? A happy constituent, a happy community, a cared for community. We can bring change. I'll I don't know if that sounds radical, but like apparently that's radical. Carlos: Yeah, I think the message needs to needs to again normal folks need to ⁓ need to continuously hear that because normal folks see what's happening and they've seen, they've been seeing what's happening and they see that When someone finally makes it into office, they get the big check and it blinds them. And then they see the Mitch McConnell's and how like it's possible that this dude is dead and and the Republicans are like are lying. And then and then look at yeah, yeah. And then look at what Elon did. Victoria Broderick: They're lying. He's definitely he's brain dead. There's no way. Carlos: By stealing all your social security numbers and all that stuff. And then and then they're they're playing FTSE and he gets his money to flip rockets and then and then it was supposed to be a rocket thing, but no, now it's an AI thing. And all this stuff. And normal folks, normal folks, listen. We have a good group of people that are promising you they're not gonna take. this money. There's these small coalitions that you don't ever hear about. That that's having these guys promise not to take money. And they're saying if I take pack money, take my job away. I talk to all of these people from from East Coast to West Coast. I'm talking to all of them. You should hear about some of the stories that are coming from Florida. The Florida DNC is trash, from what I understand, is trash. They've all but given up on Republic on on Florida. So all these Democrat grassroots candidate folks, they're having to fight by themselves. Up against people that are getting funded by APAC that don't do shit for you. But you can go. Victoria Broderick: And I think Carlos: But you can go to Israel with some health insurance and you can get an abortion, that's for fucking sure. Victoria Broderick: That's for sure. And I think this is where we need to like pull back the veil a little bit for people. It is not like what you see on Scandal when a campaign is running. It is not like what you see in West Wing or in the American president. It is not the same. That is not the that is the exception. That is not the rule. A lot of these candidates are working with skeleton teams if they have a team and can afford it. They're working with a loyal volunteer base where you're literally just trying to figure it out. And they're being volunteering their time, not paying themselves back, because Lord knows there's an FEC rule for everything. And they're doing this knowing that they can lose their careers, they can lose their livelihood, they can do these things. Carlos: And volunteering their time. Victoria Broderick: And it's still not good, they're not they can lose at the end, and everyone's gonna blame them. And yet they're still showing up, they're still doing the thing, they're still advocating for change. This is what is so important and vital in this. You know, people ask me, Well, why did you sign on to a race with five months to go? Well, I had to find my why, and my why was to move the needle. And if I just move the needle a little bit. That was good. And it felt gratifying. Turned out I moved the needle a lot more than I thought. Because in 28% of the vote as a first-time no-name candidate, I had a quarter of the money, I had a quarter of the time, I did not have Democratic support at all. I was learning on the campaign trail how to speak, how to do the thing. Carlos: Yes, ma'am. Victoria Broderick: The system didn't want me, and I proved the system wrong. And now the system's fighting me again. There's no way that they did not, because they didn't vote in the state of Tennessee, they did not vote to tell us which congressional members, sitting representatives, were a part of this redistricting. They did not vote that. We don't know. We know Marsha Blackburn, you know, Grandma Gone Wild, as Afton calls her. We know. That Ken Pax we know that not Ken Paxton, I'm sorry. We know that like Bill Lee and whatnot were all involved in this. We know that Stephen Miller involved in it. We what we don't know, and what we can safely assume is every single Republican sitting representative was a part of this decision. Why? Because they wanted to protect their money. When you have a sitting member of Congress who's been in office for 16 years and doesn't feel like he should have. To help have town halls meet with constituents. Literally bought a a private building and a private office so that they could keep constituents out. That tells you all you need to know. And this man has been in office since twenty twelve. Everybody knows his history. They don't care about you. And the Democratic Party, they're trying, and there are some of us that are trying, but we need you. So show up. Pick activism is a month. Pick something. Do it and do it today and vote on August 6th because Josh and I need you. If you like what we're saying, vote. If you like it even more, donate. If you like it just that much more, come volunteer. That's my pitch. Joshua Sales TN7: Victoria is absolutely right. You know, it's so many candidates clearly do not care about their constituents. Right? So many of these candidates are wrapped around with hypocrisy. Matt Van Epps, my Republican opponent in the general, went off when Virginia voted, allowed their people to vote to redistrict. went off about how that was such a horrible thing and we shouldn't have that. And then when Tennessee did it, he was silent. And I called him out on it on the campaign trail and he dodged it. And he continues to dodge it because there is no answer besides for the Republican Party wants power, they want the money, they want to control you. And candidates like Victoria, candidates like myself, Carlos: Mm. Cheating. Joshua Sales TN7: You have candidates all over Tennessee. Christy in one, Michaela in two, Anna in three, Victoria in four, Crowley in six, myself in seven, Pearson in nine. All of us are literally saying we don't care about doing what the DNC tells us. We care about what's best for you. We don't care about making the money. We don't care about the fame. We don't care about any of that. We care about you, the people. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Some of us are putting our lives on the line at this point. And that's a big deal. And continuing to do that, you know, Justin Justin ex like the amount of backlash Justin has gotten for standing on principle, for voters, for standing with constituents, time and time again. This is what we need in DC. And if you guys if you I Carlos: Yeah. Victoria Broderick: I know there's a lot of petty people. If you really want to be petty, make it so that the entire state of Tennessee flips. You want to see some good trouble? Let's flip all these districts. Send us to DC. See what happens for funsies. And then in two years, if we're not doing our jobs, vote us out. ⁓ Carlos: Mm-hmm. It's two years. Two years of trying something different. And I think I think I think it was my my when I first met Victoria, I think I think that's the conversation that had me going down this path about how again, normal folks, I'm talking to you. You have two umbrellas. You have the Republicans and you have the Democrats. And and for me I've lost faith Victoria Broderick: It's two years. What what do you got to lose? Carlos: in on the right side of that argument. So I'm looking at folks like Victoria, like Joshua. ⁓ Victoria Broderick: That's right, I was your first candidate. Okay, it's all coming back to me now. It's all coming back. The stor ⁓ my god, there's a s there's there's lore here, guys. Carlos: But it's how but it's how If you have a group of people under the Democratic umbrella that we have been voting for for since 2012, since whatever, they've been in office for 20 years and we're here. That means that the current group of people that are under this umbrella that are pushing this umbrella forward, they're pushing it in the wrong direction. But what I didn't understand is if you change the people within that group under the umbrella, you can change the makeup of that umbrella. Or you can change the trajectory of that. It's not, it's not necessarily, and it might be some of this, but the way I understand it after talking to a handful of you guys is you have the Democratic umbrella and you have right now the people that are in control are the ones that that can Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. They have to answer. Carlos: Hold the most money so they get to make decisions. And because they're pulling money from corporate packs, that's why it looks very corporate y under the Democratic umbrella. That's why we don't see any daylight between what the Democrats are trying to do and what the Republicans are trying to do. There's very little space in between there. But if we get if we get the Democratic umbrella full of progressive people. Then we can start changing the direction in which that party is moving. So that's why it's important to get in there locally and get your folks in there that are not going to be taking pack money. Whoever lines up with your values. My values are I don't need my politicians to be having corporate pack money because corporations and me don't have the same. We're not even the same type of enter tea, len let alone we have the same wants and needs. I want water and food and and a house. A corporation don't give a fuck about any of that. It's just a legal entity. It doesn't need water. It is it it doesn't need food. Victoria Broderick: ⁓ Carlos, I think they lost you. Come back. Come back. Carlos: ⁓ Joshua Sales TN7: He was on a roll too. Victoria Broderick: on a roll. So sorry. Carlos: It says it's uploading so hopefully it's ⁓ hopefully we'll ⁓ hopefully we'll still be there, but Victoria Broderick: It's tak it it's starting to it's starting to tap out. Carlos: ⁓ no! Damn it ⁓ I hope if this is recording I'll fix it later but let's see if this catches up. Victoria Broderick: You were on a roll though. You had it. It's late, guys. Joshua Sales TN7: Yes. It's it's my understanding that Riverside will up upload it later. It's it's saved to your computer, Carlos. It should be uploading even if it takes it a minute. ⁓ Victoria Broderick: ⁓ it really is late. Okay you're back. Kinda, maybe? Yes, you're yes. Carlos: Am I back? Can you hear me? All right. I forgot what I was saying, but I know it's getting late. We will, we will do it again. all that's to say, normal folks, please take a look at at these grassroots candidates, Victoria and Joshua. ⁓ and with that being said, Victoria, take a couple minutes to give your final Joshua Sales TN7: Yes. Victoria Broderick: We should do this again. Carlos: Pitch to the good folks of Tennessee four. Victoria Broderick: I all right guys, I need your help. Yeah. We're in a primary. Josh and I are both in a primary, but I'm Victoria Broderick. I'm running for Congress in Tennessee's district four. I ran as a first time no-name candidate in 2024 in five months with two China Humans, four fur babies at the time, fostering with the local humane society. I was able to raise money without taking a single corporate PAC dollar or a PAC money. I raised $120,000 as a small dollar donation candidate. Carlos: And let ⁓ know where they can find you too. Victoria Broderick: I need your support. I need your help. Help me bring this through to the end. Because if anyone's going to flip it, it's not gonna be status quo. We need fighters in DC. We need fighters going up against the GOP because what is going on here is not moderate. And we need change in DC. So if you would like to support me, you like anything I say, follow me all the social medias, learn more about being involved in politics. I break it down, I talk about it because education is elevation. like Conscious Lee says. And you know, if you want to donate to my campaign or see more about my platform, you can go to Victoria the number four Tennessee dot org or dot com, donate, look at my platform, follow me on all the social medias, and stay hydrated and vote blue. Carlos: Go ahead, Josh. Joshua Sales TN7: Y'all, thank you so much for listening to what is going on almost two hours at this point. I I want to just reiterate like what Victoria's talking about, right? I I'm running up in Tennessee Seven. We are watching within these primaries choices happening. I do think we're going to see a lot of Democrats across the country winning as we see this blue wave materialize. I don't want that to be for naught. I don't want another corporate Democrat in who isn't going to actually do the things that we need them to do. We need candidates like Victoria. We need candidates like myself in office because we are the ones who are promising and pledging from day one to get shit done. You can find me on my website, salesforcongress.com. You can follow me on social media. But the greatest thing you can do, if you live in our districts, vote. If you live outside of our districts, you can donate or volunteer. You can even do phone banking to call people and get the word out there. But I think the greatest thing you can do is start having conversations with the people around you. Because when we build this community, that is going to be the driving force that lasts the test of time, that gets us through this storm we're facing right now, so that we can get to the other side and get through it together. Victoria Broderick: Mm-hmm. Carlos: What's your website? Joshua Sales TN7: Salesforc.com. S-A-L-E-S, the number four Congress.com. Check it out. Carlos: Yes, sir. Victoria Broderick: Thank you, Carlos, for having us. Thank you, thank you, thank you. It's Joshua Sales TN7: Thank you, Carlos. Carlos: You're very welcome. Thank you for ⁓ what folks don't understand right now. It's like literally bedtime for you guys. ⁓ they're in central. I'm over. And she's gotta she's gotta rest up because she's gotta be fur ⁓ fun size and feral. ⁓ But thank you guys again so much for not just coming on here to to like share some of your stories with us, but Victoria Broderick: I I gotta work my liberal job in the morning and I got more events. And I got kids. Every day, twice on Sunday, guys. Carlos: All the time and effort that you guys are doing to like literally put skin in the game and to and to literally make change. you know, I I walk around saying change ain't gonna make itself, you know, and and you guys are examples that I can go to every time and just say, look, when normal folks are tired of the bullshit, look at they're going and they're they're Getting it done. They're just getting out there and getting it done. So thank you guys for all of your hard work for trying to make this place a better place. Victoria Broderick: Thank you. We appreciate all the work. Joshua Sales TN7: Thank you for having us, Carlos. Carlos: And with that everybody, we're out.