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Dr. Nirav Shah · Newsradio WGAN

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  As we March on to the program, though, as promised before we
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  went to our last break, I want to welcome on to the show a
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  voice you used to hear here quite a bit back in the day, for
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  reasons I never want to revisit ever again.
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  Doctor Nirv Shah is joining us, of course.
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  He's now a candidate for governor of Maine on the
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  Democratic side this year. Used to hear him give us a lot
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  of COVID updates back in the day.
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  Welcome back. It's been many years, Sir.
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  How are things? Things are going well.
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  It has been a minute. It's great to be back on, and
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  it's even better not to be talking about a pandemic.
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  Indeed it is. So tell me a little bit about
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  the intervening years that that you've spent around doing a
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  number of things. Obviously, you're here during
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  the COVID experience. You actually moved on to the
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  federal government. You've now returned and you made
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  the decision to run for governor, right?
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  Tell me about this journey a little bit, Doctor Shaw, why you
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  decided to do this and how things are going so far.
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  You got it, I certainly will. I want to first start with a
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  very brief remembrance. So a recollection, you know, you
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  and I chatted about once a week pretty steadily there.
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  And, and I, I have not had a chance to share this with you in
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  private, but certainly a good opportunity to do so in public.
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  The conversations you and I had were, as I look back on them
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  incredibly instrumental because you had a very well reasoned
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  perspective on many of the COVID issues and you were really adept
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  at pushing me and holding me accountable and clarifying terms
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  and whether it was pre symptomatic versus asymptomatic.
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  And I recall a lot of those conversations.
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  And I want to really commend you for doing a lot of great public
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  service there and pushing me and holding me accountable.
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  That's the way that should work. And I hope thank you very much
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  if we have going forward. No, I appreciate that very much
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  and I definitely appreciated you being on my show and having
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  these conversations with me throughout that period.
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  I think this is the the audience benefited from it and I think
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  that's what we should do in these kinds of situations, which
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  hopefully, as we said a minute ago, never come again.
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  Hopefully never come again, but that, but that segues into the
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  question you asked me, which is what's going on and why am I
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  doing what I'm doing? Well, you know, I, I want to
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  draw just based on the exchange you and I just had a second ago,
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  because a lot, a large part of why I'm running is to bring back
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  accessibility and accountability back to our government.
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  As you mentioned, I, I was asked by the Biden administration to
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  help be one of the senior leaders at the USCDCI was the
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  number two official there. I stayed throughout the Biden
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  administration came back to Maine when the administration
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  changed over. I wanted to continue in public
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  service that there was a reason I left the private sector 11
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  years ago and I wanted to stay in public service.
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  And I was approached by some different groups of friends and
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  colleagues to consider running for higher office.
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  And when I looked at what I wanted to do with my career,
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  which is to continue you making a positive impact on the state
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  that we love, this seemed like an opportunity to do so.
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  So that's why in October, I declared my candidacy.
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  And we can talk about some of the issues I'm focused on,
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  without a doubt, childhood hunger, healthcare, the housing
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  crisis. But just to the exchange we had
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  a moment ago, a big part of what I'm hoping to bring to the
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  Blaine House is that same degree of accessibility and
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  accountability that Maynard's got to know me for.
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  We certainly disagreed. You and I disagreed on a number
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  of issues, but we did so respectfully and in a manner
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  that made sure that everybody knew what the parameters were,
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  and that's what I'd like to do in the future as governor.
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  As well, well, you end up blending your obviously welcome
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  to the program every week. If you'd like to give me an
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  update on the state government that entirely would be
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  appropriate. So the invitation is open if you
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  end up getting that far. But to get that far, you have to
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  get through the primary 1st and then obviously the general
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  election. You're running against four
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  other Democrats for that nomination.
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  And you know, each of you has a, a different story to tell, a
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  different background to, to, to lean on as you judge yourself
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  versus them. Why Doctor Shaw, why you and not
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  them? I mean, you got you're down to
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  three weeks here. So I guess you got to make your
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  pitch on, on why me. So let's do it.
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  How come? Fair, fair.
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  OK, well, you know, at a, at a, at a high level, Matt, I'm, I'm
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  nobody, that nobody said, you know, I, I, I come to these
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  issues without any long standing connections to them.
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  When I, when I make decisions, just as Mainers saw me do in the
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  past, it's based on the data that I've got in an effort to be
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  transparent and make a decision that's best for the entire
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  state. So that's my overall approach
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  that we talked about a minute ago.
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  But what what are some of the reasons why in this moment, I
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  feel like I'm the right choice for the Democratic candidates?
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  One is, you know, when you think about what state government is,
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  it's a large, sprawling bureaucracy, 30,000 employees of
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  12 to $14 billion, biannual budget.
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  And I have run an organization of equivalent size and scope.
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  When I was there, the USCDC didn't have quite so many
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  employees, but in the 20,000 range of employees.
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  But it had a budget that is twice as large as the state of
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  Maine on an annual basis. And it is just as large, just as
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  sprawling and just as complicated.
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  Offices in 78 countries, so on and so forth.
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  And I was the number two official at that entire agency.
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  And so when it comes to management, particularly in a
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  crisis situation, which is a large part of what the governor
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  has to do, I'm really the one candidate that has had that
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  depth of experience. The other piece that I think is
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  important now is I I'm also the only attorney that is running on
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  the Democratic side. And, and as we think about a lot
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  of the challenges that are facing the states, they will
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  often be resolved or involved resorting to the court system.
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  And as governor, I will be able to navigate that and use the
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  judicial branch of government as both a sword and a shield.
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  And then again, as I go back to I'm also the one candidate who
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  has a demonstrated track record of showing up and having
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  people's backs, particularly in a crisis that was important
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  before and it's going to be just as important in the future.
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  We're speaking with Doctor Nirav Shah, the one of the candidates
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  running for the Democratic nod for governor of Maine in 2026,
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  just three weeks away. As you would Fast forward to the
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  general election, obviously, I think that Democrats feel like
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  this will be a positive year for them, given that it's a
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  Republican midterm year. You can never guarantee
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  anything, but that's generally what the trends obviously show.
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  But you also have a sort of weird and competing kind of
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  element that's taking place in Maine too, right now, which is 8
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  years of control by the Democratic Party, pretty much
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  top to bottom, and the Republicans being completely
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  irrelevant. So I wonder to what degree they
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  will be fired up to come out and vote more so than maybe
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  Republicans in other areas of the country.
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  And when you look at the right track, wrong track numbers and
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  you look at some of the polling, there is a blanket
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  dissatisfaction with a lot of things that are happening in the
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  state right now, from energy prices to education to
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  healthcare to the state budget ballooning to the size that it
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  has. How do you navigate all that and
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  would what do you think you can say to people that might be a
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  little bit of a little apprehensive about kind of
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  returning another Democrat to the to the Blaine House this
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  year? Should they be fearful of that?
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  Is that something to worry about?
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  You have a different plan. Tell me more.
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  Great. What a great question.
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  Well, first, I think the word you used a moment ago is right,
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  which is will turn out among Republicans be higher more so
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  than it is than we expected to be among Democrats.
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  And that's really that that that really comes down, I guess to
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  the heart of the matter. Nothing is assured.
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  There is a possible blue way that history is any is is is any
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  guide. But then again, as you
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  mentioned, Republicans are also going to be quite motivated to
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  take control of at least one of the two houses, if not the
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  Blaine House as well. So it's a toss up to really
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  figure out where things are going to go there.
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  And to put it differently, nothing is assured.
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  And so we still got to get out there and earn every single
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  vote. That said, I think there are a
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  couple of factors here as I think as we think about the
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  general where I to make it that far that are that are really
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  helpful. One, as to me as the candidate
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  you heard me mention in a moment ago, Matt, but I'm nobody that
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  nobody said. Again, I do not come from the
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  establishment wing of the Democratic Party.
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  And to the extent that there is dissatisfaction in some of the
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  polling data that you mentioned, but one wonders whether really
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  what it is, is a proxy for the establishment doing it the way
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  that it's always been done before rather than the
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  Democratic Party itself. And what I bring to it is,
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  again, the history of not having been tethered or tied down to
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  any particular view or any particular faction there.
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  I, I, I call it like I see it. Even during the time that
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  manners got to know me, some of the decisions that we made at
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  the state level were more in line with what Republican
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  administrations were doing. Some were more in line with what
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  Democratic administrations were doing.
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  And I think that sort of unorthodox way of going about
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  things is what I'll be as governor.
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  I, I think a lot of folks out there might be surprised about
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  some of my positions on a number of issues.
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  They are definitely I, I think in some cases not in line with
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  what a lot of folks might expect.
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  So in that respect, I think in the general I, I'm optimistic if
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  I were to make it that far. Speaking with Doctor Nirv Shaw,
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  who's joining us, talking about his campaign for governor in
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  2026. We don't have too much time
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  left, Doctor Shaw. But, you know, I did mention
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  some of those issues as you're going on the trail, talking to
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  voters, frankly of all stripes. I know you're talking more to
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  Democrats now, obviously, but you're hearing from other
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  people, too. You know, those issues have to
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  dominate. And do you have specific things
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  to say about them that would make your administration address
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  them in a better way that we've seen done recently?
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  What would you do about them? And you can pick any one of the
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  and one of the three, all three of them.
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  I don't care how you how you answer it, but obviously there
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  have to be some plans. Cooking from Doctor Shaw's
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  campaign. Great.
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  You know, I'm going to try, Matt, to try to find the through
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  line that unites a lot of what I'm hearing and also the way I'd
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  like to go about it and whether it's housing, food availability,
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  healthcare. The one thing I hear repeatedly
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  from folks is that there's just not enough of it.
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  There's not enough doctors, there's not enough housing,
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  there is not enough electricity, there is not enough food, you
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  name it. And so I, I view this as
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  fundamentally a problem of scarcity and the need to bring
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  more to Mainers, more housing, more healthcare, you name it.
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  And so for me, a lot of what I'm going to be focused on is just
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  that making sure that Mainers have access to more in the
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  language of economists working on the supply side of things.
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  I want to build more housing. I want to bring more healthcare
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  providers to Maine. I want to bring more people and
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  more businesses to Maine to broaden our tax base, because
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  that's the engine that's going to pull a lot of the social
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  services I want to deliver. So my theme is more.
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  When you talk about more though, I mean, I, I, this is probably
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  my final question for you, 'cause we're running out of
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  time, but let's take education just as a brief example of this.
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  I think one thing that you hear Jana Mills tout pretty
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  frequently, and she's right about it, is the fact that they
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  have increased funding to the Department of Education.
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  They've hit that 55% mark. There's been record investments,
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  etcetera. All that's true.
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  That's all true, but the results have gone down and they've been
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  going down for quite some time. Exactly how do you evaluate sort
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  of trying to make investments and trying to provide the more
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  that you're talking about with say what results efficiency and
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  maybe are you doing the right thing?
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  Good. Recognizing time is short.
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  So I can't wait to pick this one up again.
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  First, first point, you know, I think it's, it's a bit too early
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  to assess the impact of being at 55%.
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  We just got there. So we might need a little bit
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  more time to really assess the impact.
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  But more generally, Matt, when I think about education,
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  additional funding are is necessary, but it's not
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  sufficient. The funding is what gets you in
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  the door, but there it's also got to be matched with
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  curricular changes, accountability.
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  Other states, as I'm sure you are aware, like Mississippi,
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  have turned things around with only modest increases in their
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  overall budgets. We should be charting a course
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  here to do the same in Maine. All right, sadly, that is all
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  the time we have this time. Appreciate it as always.
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  Doctor Shaw, I know that you got three weeks to go, so it's fast
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  and furious rush to the end. But if you make it through the
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  end, we'll chat again. I have no doubt about it.
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  Thanks so much, Doctor. I have no doubt, always a
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  pleasure. I can't wait.