Latest / Breaking The Meta / Coast Guard Captain, White House National Security Staff — Now Running for Congress | James Martin

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Coast Guard Captain, White House National Security Staff — Now Running for Congress | James Martin · Breaking The Meta

• Breaking The Meta: was actually very fortunate to be the captain of two ships here in the district, which was ⁓ very, very charmed to have that experience to patrol, you know, the waters I grew up in sort of a thing. a lot of presidential security patrols at Mar-a-Lago, that kind of thing. And then the last assignment I had on active duty was working in the vice president's office at the White House. you Hello everyone. And welcome to breaking the meta. My name is Mike Quinton. Today we are sitting down with James Martin. is running for Florida's 21st district, U S house of representatives. Correct. I to make sure I that right. Okay. Perfect. So looking forward to talking to you and learning more about you. Thank you for being here. No, well, thanks so much for making the time Mike. And I'm really looking forward to this and talking more about my, my vision for new leadership on, ⁓ On the treasure coast as we call it here in the twenty absolutely. ⁓ To start out for people that don't know Florida very well would you mind going over what part of Florida is encompassed in the twenty first district. Absolutely. So we are on the south east ⁓ coast of Florida. ⁓ Really what I would consider probably like the northernmost part of South Florida. So it's all of St. Lucie County all of Martin County and then a large part of northern Palm Beach County, right down to about West Palm Beach. Gotcha. ⁓ So to start out, would you mind giving us a little bit of background on who you are? And then after that, why you decided to run for Congress in the first place? So I'm a fourth generation local to the Treasure Coast. My great grandparents came down here in the wake of the the Great Depression and my dad actually still runs the small business my great grandfather started, ⁓ you know, just down the street from our house here in Hope Sound in the district. ⁓ my dad was small business man. Mom was a public school teacher. And after high school, went to the US Coast Guard Academy and joined the Coast Guard, ⁓ which was really a product of being from here, being on the treasure coast, a lot of people are very serving, fishing, diving, and that was definitely a huge part of my childhood. when it came time to make a choice, it was a very natural extension to want to serve my country as well as do, I mean, get paid to do a lot of the same stuff I like to do kind of a thing. So I was in the Coast Guard for about 10 years, 14 if you... include the time at the Coast Guard Academy where similar to the Naval Academy or West Point, you're ⁓ in college, you're property of Uncle Sam and your summers are not your own and all this stuff. ⁓ So after graduating, I served on a number of ships. I was on four different ships ranging from the Caribbean, ⁓ over to the Middle East where I was actually the second in command of a Coast Guard cutter. And I was actually very fortunate to be the captain of two ships here in the district, which was ⁓ very, very charmed to have that experience to patrol, you know, the waters I grew up in sort of a thing. ⁓ a lot of ⁓ presidential security patrols at Mar-a-Lago, that kind of thing. And then... The last assignment I had on active duty was ⁓ working in the vice president's office at the White House. ⁓ I got that opportunity, you know, as people always ask, it was a little bit of luck, a lot of hard work kind of a thing. ⁓ Essentially the job came open and it was solicited through the Coast Guard to be the executive assistant to the vice president's national security advisor. said, that seems like the thing for me. And my boss at the time said, yeah, you can put in for it. You're never going to get it. ⁓ because I would have had to leave the, ⁓ leave the job I was in to go there. So they would have had been gapped and sure enough, I got it. And I was in that job for about a year and it was. Yeah. As you would imagine, all very exciting, terrific experience. So really I did that job for the last two and a half years of. ⁓ the Biden Harris administration while I was, you know, still wearing the uniform and that was, you know, an incredible experience. ⁓ so our team, I'll just kind of elaborate, ⁓ cause some people will think they, they hear national security or security and they think that I was on the security detail and that was not the case, you know, not doing secret service, ⁓ the very capable, ⁓ men and women of the secret service. ⁓ We, our team was charged with ⁓ advising the vice president on national security and foreign policy. So in that job, it was mostly vice president Harris. ⁓ But I did work for vice president Vance for about 10 days. And then the reason for the separation was, was, you know, not anything to do with like being fired or anything. It was just, that was when I was separating from the Coast Guard. And so... It was just the natural conclusion. So I knew I wanted to get out of the Coast Guard and this sort of bleeds into why run. I knew I was getting out of the Coast Guard and this would have been Christmas time of 2024. My wife is also from the same place that I am. And we were actually at a stoplight in town and coming back from somewhere and it's at the stoplight. that is right next to where my family's business is. And she said something to the effect of like, what are we going to do? Like, do you want to stay in DC and like, keep doing policy stuff? Like, do you want to move back? what, like, what, like, what are you thinking? It's just like really Republican and like all the stuff. Do you really want to raise our kids here? Kind of a thing. And I just kind of like looked over and I see my family's business right there and I said to myself, you know, we can't give up the ship sort of a thing. we can't, like we gotta be the change we want to see. like, you know, like screw that. And so to me, that was a big motivating factor, right? Like I, you know, I have a daughter, she's almost two, um, another, another kid on the way and, you know, looking around, especially at the start of this, this current administration, didn't like what I saw. And I also strongly felt that my member of Congress, Brian Mast, not only, I think it's twofold, right? Not only just gone too far extreme and too of a piece of this administration, my other strong view is that he sort of had taken his eye off the ball on a lot of the priorities of the good hardworking folks in the district. and wasn't focused on the things that they actually care about and was becoming, you know, of a piece of Washington too focused on the DC power plays, right? Like he, because of his extreme loyalty to president Trump, he's become chairman of the foreign affairs committee, which is, you know, a very senior position and he's, you know, skipped several steps on, on the ladder. as a result of that. so ⁓ that was a big part of it. And the other part of it was, frankly, I had the best resume to take them on. ⁓ And my view was that Democrats in previous cycles had not fielded ⁓ candidates that were a strong matchup to him. ⁓ you and that's not to say, you know, it's not a value statement. It's not to say that they weren't wonderful people and good people. And I, you know, got a good advice in council on many of them before, before running. But it was my view that they, he had not been matched up to in the right way in the past. And if you can do something about it, you should. So give us a little idea about your district. What are the pain points that you were hearing as you're going around talking to people, what are the things that people are in the most need for, especially help from the federal government in your district? Sure. It's a great question because fundamentally that's the job, It's what can you do at the federal level to bring results to the folks here? I would say, I think it's important to caveat that the district is incredibly diverse. And then what I mean by that is Compared to many districts where, you know, it's made more or less the whole thing suburban, more or less the whole thing's a city. This has a lot of extremes where you have, you know, by some definitions, some would say the richest zip codes, one of the richest zip codes in America in certain parts of the district, you have in other parts of the district, lots of agriculture, you know, fifth, sixth generation ranches. You also have ⁓ Hispanic populations. ⁓ There's a town in the district, Indian town, which actually has the like the highest ⁓ percentage of Mayan population outside of Guatemala in the entire world. For example, ⁓ you have urban centers. So all that's to say, you would think given that diversity that there is an extreme like breadth of what people care about and to a certain extent, you know, like maybe some of the more wealthy folks in the district, you know, they're, sort of care about like, you know, what kind of country are we leaving our kids sort of a thing where, but I think the through line through all those districts are this affordability issue that we all keep caring about. And, you know, I always like to say, you you can go back to the press release. feel as if I was talking about that before it was cool, sort of the thing, because that's what that's just what people wanted to talk about is, you know, whether it's ⁓ the gas pump groceries, any of that stuff, that's the economy is what we interface with every day, whether whether we like it or not, sort of a thing, ⁓ not necessarily foreign policy, or various other domestic policies. ⁓ So I would say most people are focused on the economy. ⁓ But I think there's also a secondary to that. There's also a strain of that I hear from a lot of Republicans candidly. And they say, I don't know, like, and they'll kind of sheepishly admit, I voted for him this time around, but this is a little crazy kind of a thing. I think there's an in this redounds to how I think about policy. And when people say, well, what are you going to do for me is I think there's kind of two buckets of policy. There's a bucket of things that we can do that makes sense to do to push back on the current administration. And you know, I'd be the first to say if the current administration is doing good things, then we should not curtail those. And then there's sort of the secondary bucket that you see a lot of folks talk about of like, you know, the big ideas of tomorrow, what are we for kind of thing. But I think there's kind of the, there's a sense of urgency on the pushback. I think Within that bucket of pushback, there's a lot of economic things because what we see in this administration, you see the tariffs, you see the erosion of things that really helped consumers like the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau or like the Federal Trade Commission that were doing really important anti-monopoly work. Those sorts of things are A, what people are concerned about and kind of leads into how I think about policy. Yeah. One of the other issues that is a pretty common issue with a lot of voters across the aisle, doesn't matter whether you're progressive or conservative, is this idea of ⁓ accountability or the lack thereof when it comes to our politicians. ⁓ So what does accountability mean to you? What does being held accountable by your constituents look like to you? Sure. So I come at this from the perspective of, ⁓ you know, as a military officer, as a ⁓ Coast Guard officer in particular, who's held command at sea, you know, accountability is one of those things that is inescapable. And, you know, to me, they're tied, it's closely intertwined with responsibility. ⁓ yeah, I always would tell folks, you know, if the ship runs aground at night while I'm sleeping, it's my fault. And people say, well, that's kind of crazy, right? And it's like, well, it's my fault because the guy who ran aground, I either didn't train him well enough or I created the culture that made them feel like they couldn't call me in an emergency to get them out of whatever situation they were in. ⁓ So that just sets the table for sort of the culture in which professionally I was raised when it comes to responsibility. So when we talk about it from the perspective of a member of Congress, I think, you know, this idea of a radical transparency and then these feedback loops ⁓ are so important. ⁓ I saw something the other day that Mark Kelly claimed that he was the only member of Congress that keeps a public schedule, which to me, like, if true, insane to me, right? That, like, that people cannot see what, who members of Congress are meeting with, right? Like, just like, whoa. You know, certainly there was this moment in the spring, and I think it's a big deal here, too. Were town halls had a moment because, um, for obvious reasons, right? Like, like, can you, how can you not engage with your constituents? No, my member of Congress did hold, he did hold town halls, but he did, he on short notice did three in one day on like a Tuesday. And it was just like, you know, he announced it on a Friday dinner on a Tuesday. Yeah. And you know, you can find them online that they were pretty ridiculous. ⁓ yeah, so all to say important to me and something, something that I seek to to bring transparency and accountability and with some of the policy we've already rolled out, for example, I we had this Indy insider privilege policy we rolled out, which the core of it is ⁓ you stock trading, which, you know, something that is like bipartisan, like everyone's like, are you kidding? You know, crypto and sports betting, you know, in these prediction markets, like most people probably saw someone somewhere magically made 400 grand on the Maduro raid in Venezuela. Like that's a problem. Right. Like ⁓ so that's a little bit of how I think about those, those issues. Since the end of World War II, America has placed itself kind of at the head of every table around the world. unfortunately, in the last year, because of things such as tariffs, Venezuela or Greenland or a myriad of other things that have happened, this administration has in many ways destroyed that seat at the table that that America used to have. ⁓ How do you see America's foreign policy moving forward after the knowledge that many, even in NATO, some of our closest allies, there's a loss of trust that what we say or a deal we make with them might be kept? So where do you see us going forward in foreign policy after what this administration has done? is such a terrific question. I think it's, A, it's one I don't get to talk about enough on the campaign trail because a lot of folks would, know, rightfully so they're focused on domestic policy and pocketbook issues. fundamentally, this is one of the biggest things, the biggest black eyes that the Trump administration. has given this country moving forward is this erosion of America's brand on the world stage. to get to the core of your question, the next step in rebuilding this trust is it's going to take time. And that's unfortunate because in many respects, we don't have time, particularly in ⁓ some of these conflicts that we see in Ukraine, in Israel. ⁓ the great power competition with China, we really need to keep our eye on the ball and keep engaged with some of allies because they're one of our greatest assets, right? Particularly when you talk about a problem like China, ⁓ because head to head, America and China, it might be a near run thing. But when you combine, just for an example, in the Indo-Pacific, when you combine in Australia, in India, ⁓ And Japan and the United States. That's, tough. That's a team. so I think moving forward, it's really going to frankly take a lot of trust. ⁓ short pipe, my, like the hard, but truthful answer is it probably candidly takes at least a decade. And it's probably going to take having assuming a Democrat wins in 2028, it's probably going to take having another Republican president who, you know, what we would say is like normal, right? It's probably going to have to take a full cycle and shift the power for for people to take us at our word, ⁓ which is deeply unfortunate because we don't have time in some of those some of those respects. Or or putting in place some sort of safeguards that protect agreements that we make, etc. Yeah, I think that's right. that's some of the, you know, I mentioned it was ⁓ great to talk about these issues. unfortunately, and this is something people don't appreciate enough is, especially when we talk about China, right, is the US's role in the in people make fun of it, the rules based international order. ⁓ And even if the US retreated and and you know, we were a country of farmers like, you know, Jefferson may be envisioned. ⁓ the people, the middle class and lower class of the United States is not going to like a rules based international order that the United States is not at the head of, particularly if China is at the head of it, because that rules based international order is going to be a world that no one wants to live in. I can assure you that. So We need people in Congress who understand that and who can cast an eye, the shade of trees they'll never sit under kind of a thing to rebuild those systems, as you said, and build in those safeguards. But I won't be all doom and gloom because I do think out of some of the breaking of some of these systems, I do subscribe to the ideology that or the idea that there's going to be there's real opportunities to rebuild some of these things in new ways that are going to be even more effective to meet the moment. ⁓ So there's a sliver of hope if we can get the right folks to DC. Exactly. ⁓ There have always been issues and sometimes you have to break things to build things back up as long as we get the right people in office. ⁓ Let's do a little future casting if you wouldn't mind. So ⁓ let's say you get through primaries. I'm not sure if you are running against anyone in the primary, but let's just say you get through them. You get through the general election, you win. January 2nd comes around, you were sworn into office. What is the first thing or things that you want to do? Sure. So I think besides if the Supreme Court has not ⁓ knocked down tariffs, tariffs I think are one of you know, and especially we're seeing in the news right now, one of the most bar none destructive things this administration's undertaking. But two, ⁓ I think we really need, and this is sort of at the intersection of like the pushback against Trump policies and the big ideas of tomorrow. I think the thing that's at the threshold of those is this idea of like the ending the insider privilege and, you know, end Citizens United and the insider trading. Because to me, That's foundational to making all of those big changes because you can't regulate AI. can't tackle any of those big issues if you haven't gotten that done. And I recognize that that's going to be really hard. I think that's where our focus is going to be. And I would add too, right? Like some of the big things that are really going to cut costs. For example, people always ask, Well, how can you really bring bring down the price of groceries? Like you can't do that. That's like price control. And then when you say, well, you know, did you know that there's like three or four meat packers that basically control the price of meat in this country? Like, did you know that? this is like, what? And you know, when you when you start talking about those issues and in those respects, but that's never going to get done if you don't get money out of politics, because then, you know, the meat lobby is going to put all their money behind. ⁓ The guy or you pick the issue you are not going to be able to deliver results for for hard-working folks if the money out of politics Yep In this country there is division ⁓ Regardless of whether or not some of that division is kind of in our own head or at least built into this identity politics that we deal with there's people that feel that we are we are drastically different. You did talk about it a little bit in the beginning that your district is at least somewhat Republican. What has been your experience walking around talking to people who are Republican or at least consider themselves Republican or conservative when they find out that you have AD next to your name? So what's interesting about that question is when I first told my parents, know, I think I'm really gonna run for Congress here. you know, we're like, this is for real. This isn't just like, ⁓ you know, maybe I'll do this one day. ⁓ They said, are you sure like, Martin County, the county where I'm from is like very red? And I said, well, that's interesting. But Martin County is the reddest part of the district. And it's also the least number of voters. So I look at this from the perspective of coming from the reddest part of the district. Right. And ⁓ When I walk down the street, and this is what I say when I go meet with people at ⁓ different events, whatever I say on social media, I need to be able to walk down the street, walk my dog, and I need to, because I live on the same street that I grew up on as a kid, live eight houses down from my parents, I need to be able to look people that I've known since I was a little kid in the eye and... and be able to defend it and say, Hey, how are you? Good. Good to see you. Kind of a thing. So to me, it's, and I get that it sounds hokey and people will say, ⁓ you know, but they support policies that, you know, do terrible things. And, know, that, that might be true, but I still believe that fundamentally we agree on much more than we disagree on kind of a, kind of an idea. and People might think that's crazy, I live in the reddest part of this district and that's just my lived experience. Yeah. Yeah. And one of the reasons that I ask is with everything that's gone on with the increased costs, affordability with loss of the ACA subsidies and healthcare costs and energy costs and all these other things that have happened in this country that have, as you have said, in some ways have surprised a lot of people. It was, I was interested, I'm always interested to see what people's experience if, if there's been a more openness to at least having the conversations with someone who normally they may not want to talk with because they're more focused on a D next to their name than the actual policies that they, that they, that they say they support. Yeah, you know, it's interesting. I, I think that's a That's an interesting way of looking at it because to me, I think where I've gained the most traction is people are willing to have that conversation with me because it's me and they know my family. Sort of a thing versus generic, you know, generic Democrat. Hey, I'm here to talk to you about this. You know, of course you have to do that with people. And this does, you know, you know, to talk about, you know, sort of the plan, how are you going to do it? Right. This does dovetail nicely with that. Like a third of this district ⁓ is registered independents or no party affiliation. So whenever I talk to folks, I always say, if you can't win those voters and some Republican centrist, then then what are you doing? You're wasting people's time. So you need to be able to have those conversations. And my view and of course, know, self-interestedly, maybe my view is The fact that I'm a veteran and outdoorsman, I'm able to go into those spaces and have, and by virtue of being a, you know, long time local, I'm able to have those conversations with certain people that other candidates just aren't going to be able to have, like no matter how great and persuasive and all the rest of it. So for anyone that has listened this far and heard everything that we've talked about up until this point, what are one or two things that no matter what, you would want to make sure that that they come away with knowing about you or your campaign. Good question. I think well, first I'll just mention one issue that I guess we didn't talk about in the issue. Sort of part of this is I am this is a big, big issue in our district and it is cross cutting both economically and the environment is we have a major clean water crisis. The 32nd version of it is the big lake in the center of the state of Florida, Lake Okeechobee. ⁓ The level of that lake is highly regulated due to hurricane season. ⁓ So, but there's also lot of agricultural runoff in that lake. ⁓ And so the Army Corps of Engineers will do discharges from that lake to our estuary, the Indian River Lagoon, which happens to be the most Biodiverse estuary in North America more biodiverse than the Everglades ⁓ and so ⁓ And it's it's the nursery really for almost all the fish that we catch offshore kind of a thing ⁓ So all to say that is a ⁓ very big cross-cutting issue that people a ⁓ Both from fishermen to boatbuilders to real estate agents to just Everyone finds really important. So that's a big priority for me. And the reason for that is, of course, my my path to public service was largely through a love of the water. So that's something that's near and dear to me. And it's not important to me just because someone threw a briefing book at me and said, you got to care about this issue. So that's one thing I would I would say. And then I would say. I think that I think that it's important and especially this age of social media clicks and there's a lot of silliness online and I get it, people need to do different gimmicks for attention. But fundamentally, especially having been in the room, in the situation room on Air Force Two, all of these things, government is serious business for serious people and... We and I totally respect the idea of a diversity of thought and opinion in the halls of power, so to speak. But I think to meet this moment, we're going to need folks that have been in the room, have a proven track record of delivering results. ⁓ And, you know, that's something I always talk about on the campaign trail, but I think just in as a, you know, as a meta. ⁓ a meta commentary about these these policymaking jobs like, you know, I love that young people want to run for office or, you know, first time candidates, all this stuff. I'm a first time candidate too. ⁓ But I just think it's really important that we send good people with real credible experience to these roles, because it's, it's important work and we need good people doing it. ⁓ James, if anyone wants to learn more about you or support you, whether it's volunteering or giving, where can they find you? Sure. ⁓ They can head to James Martin for Florida. That's all spelled out and it's F O R and Florida spelled out dot com. And that's our website. And that will, you all the information on how to donate, contribute, as well as the links to all of our social media were ⁓ on. whatever your preferred social media platform is, we're there. And some people say it's good. So if you think so, give it like and subscribe. And ⁓ if you don't, feel free to send us an email and tell us what we can do better. But that's where you'll find us at jamesmartinforflorida.com. Awesome. James, thank you for sitting down and giving us a chance to get to know you. I really appreciate it. No, thank you, Mike. This is terrific. And ⁓ I appreciate the work you're doing. And can't wait to give this a listen. Yeah. And for everyone else that listened and got this far, thank you so much for listening. Please, if you like what we're doing here, us a like and subscribe, hit all those buttons down below. It makes it possible for me to keep doing what I'm doing here, which is trying to interview as many people, especially grassroots people that want real change, that want to be held accountable, ⁓ that want to fix the problems that we have complained about for ⁓ decades in some cases. So. ⁓ Please like, subscribe and share this content, share these videos, follow these people on social media, help them get the name recognition and the visibility that's necessary to get in the office. Like these things are necessary if we want this kind of change. And just as a last thing for people that haven't heard about this podcast, just know that breaking the meta is all about having hard conversations when necessary, breaking the status quo and fighting for the idea that all people, no matter your race, religion, gender or identity, get rights, respect, dignity, and safety. James, again, thank you so much for being here, and for everyone else, we'll see you next time on Breaking the Meta. Bye, guys.