Latest / Why Not Today? with Leslie Kane / Why Not Today? Season 1 - Episode 7 with Merritt Hale who is running for election to the U.S. House to represent Virginia's 6th Congressional District.

Transcript

Why Not Today? Season 1 - Episode 7 with Merritt Hale who is running for election to the U.S. House to represent Virginia's 6th Congressional District. · Why Not Today? with Leslie Kane

• 0:00
  Hello, my name is Leslie and I am the host of the Why Not Today podcast.
• 0:06
  This is a podcast to celebrate people who have been courageous and said, why not today?
• 0:12
  I started this podcast in honor of my father, Patrick Cain, who often said, why not today?
• 0:18
  I am based in Reston, Virginia, a planned community right outside of Washington, DC.
• 0:23
  And thanks for joining us today.
• 0:25
  I'm super excited to have Merritt Hale as my guest today.
• 0:31
  And before we hear from Merritt, I always like to talk about connections and you never
• 0:36
  know where you're going to meet somebody that's going to lead you to the person to connect
• 0:40
  with you in your life.
• 0:41
  I was just actually getting my hands done earlier and sat next to a lady and stuck up
• 0:47
  a conversation and we had all these things in common and you just never know.
• 0:51
  So it's just being friendly and talking to people and building those connections.
• 0:55
  So I'm really excited that we have Merritt Hale here today.
• 1:00
  And I know Merritt because of his mother.
• 1:05
  His mother is actually a Mary Kay consultant on my team and we were just trying to decide
• 1:10
  how long ago it was.
• 1:11
  It was a while ago.
• 1:12
  Merritt is only 28 years old and he's got some exciting things going on.
• 1:17
  I was talking to his mom the other day and she was telling me what was happening.
• 1:20
  I'm like, I would love to hear his story and what courage means to him and why he said
• 1:26
  why not today.
• 1:28
  So before we start, why don't you introduce yourself Merritt, tell us a little about you
• 1:32
  and a fun fact that people might not ever know about you.
• 1:36
  Absolutely.
• 1:37
  Well, thank you very much for having me, Leslie.
• 1:39
  My name is Merritt Hale.
• 1:42
  The big thing I'm doing with my life right now is running for Congress in Virginia's
• 1:46
  sixth congressional district.
• 1:48
  I grew up in Virginia, born and raised my whole life.
• 1:51
  I went to the University of Virginia, served as a naval officer for four years.
• 1:56
  I got out, worked as a systems engineer supporting the intelligence community before running
• 2:02
  for Congress.
• 2:03
  And let's see, one fun fact I guess would be that I was a cheerleader in college.
• 2:09
  Really?
• 2:10
  Yes.
• 2:11
  Yeah.
• 2:12
  Interesting fact.
• 2:13
  And I don't think I knew you went to UU.
• 2:15
  I actually went to Virginia Tech.
• 2:16
  So rivals there.
• 2:17
  Yeah, and I don't know if I knew that you were in the Navy.
• 2:22
  So that's kind of cool too.
• 2:25
  You know, your mom and I have kind of known each other, but lost touch and not talk that
• 2:30
  often, kind of loose track.
• 2:31
  And as we were talking about when we started, like you were a little kid with your mom started
• 2:35
  Mary Kay.
• 2:36
  It's kind of fun to watch people grow up.
• 2:39
  All of a sudden it's like, we're not getting old, but you guys are.
• 2:41
  So before we kind of hear your story and what you're doing running for Congress, like that's
• 2:47
  super exciting.
• 2:48
  And I so admire you at 28 years old.
• 2:51
  You're the second person we've had on a podcast running for an office, which I, as I said,
• 2:56
  really admire because that is definitely not me.
• 2:58
  So for you, what does courage mean to you?
• 3:03
  Being able to do the hard things in the face of adversity.
• 3:07
  And I think a lot of that comes from knowing what your core beliefs are and being able to
• 3:15
  stand by those beliefs when the world challenges you with whatever inevitable life circumstances
• 3:24
  the world will throw at you.
• 3:26
  And you're fairly young and you've had some hard things happen with your dad.
• 3:30
  That's definitely not an easy thing.
• 3:33
  I've heard from your mom, so that was definitely a hard journey and having to be courageous.
• 3:40
  And I'm sure being doing hard things and courageous things to help your mom and support her.
• 3:45
  What's happened with your dad?
• 3:48
  Absolutely.
• 3:49
  So let's talk about what have you done in your life that took courage.
• 3:56
  So right now you're running for Congress.
• 3:58
  So talk about that.
• 3:59
  Tell us the story behind that.
• 4:01
  Yes, absolutely.
• 4:03
  So as I said, I got out of the Navy.
• 4:06
  I was working as an assistant engineer and I never pictured myself getting into politics.
• 4:12
  What got me into it was my dad, which you alluded to.
• 4:14
  He was diagnosed with degenerative brain disease, Alzheimer's, and he passed away on December
• 4:22
  24th, which was Christmas Eve of this year.
• 4:25
  It was incredibly hard on my mom and myself, my family, my sister.
• 4:34
  And obviously losing a loved one is never easy and he was a massive impact on my life.
• 4:39
  He was a great father, like the best you could hope for.
• 4:44
  But what made the situation even worse for our family was having to deal with the VA
• 4:50
  and all the other government bureaucracies surrounding the healthcare system.
• 4:56
  And that's what inspired me to run for Congress was I didn't want any family to have to go
• 5:00
  through what my family went through.
• 5:02
  When you're losing a loved one and going through those challenges in life, you don't
• 5:07
  want extra burdens from the government and systems that are supposed to be taking care
• 5:14
  of those loved ones.
• 5:17
  They shouldn't be a hindrance.
• 5:18
  They shouldn't be something additional on top of that stress.
• 5:21
  So that's what got me into it.
• 5:24
  But obviously running for Congress is a small commitment.
• 5:31
  It can be very nasty and people take very personal attacks at you.
• 5:36
  Thankfully, we haven't had much of that yet, but there's always the potential and you have
• 5:41
  to really choose what's important to you and do that self-reflection.
• 5:49
  So tell me, so was it like, okay, one day you just woke up and thought, I'm going to
• 5:53
  run for Congress?
• 5:55
  Or what was the motivating factor?
• 5:57
  I love people's stories.
• 5:59
  What motivated you to say, okay, I'm going to do this?
• 6:02
  Yeah.
• 6:03
  So as I said, I've always followed politics, but being up close and personal and seeing
• 6:09
  the effect that it can have on people's lives is what really motivated me to do it.
• 6:16
  So the idea was in my head.
• 6:18
  To me, my faith is very important to me.
• 6:20
  And I felt that tug, like this is kind of a calling.
• 6:24
  Like I feel like this is where I'm being led to go to go serve.
• 6:29
  And then obviously you have to do your research, figure out if it's plausible if you can have
• 6:34
  enough money and the resources and the time.
• 6:37
  And as I said, just having, you have to have the support of your family and your loved ones
• 6:41
  because no one can do it by themselves.
• 6:45
  And it's going to take a toll on everyone around you that you're doing this.
• 6:49
  And you have to make sure that they're up for it with you.
• 6:54
  And once they gave me their blessing, I said, all right, that's all I need.
• 7:01
  I'm in it.
• 7:02
  Let's go do this and hopefully make an impact for people.
• 7:06
  So when did you make this decision?
• 7:11
  Right around after my father died, early January.
• 7:17
  And then what did that look like?
• 7:18
  How do you run for Congress?
• 7:19
  Like, what do you have to do?
• 7:20
  Yeah, there's no Google form that says this is how you run for Congress.
• 7:26
  They intentionally make it very hard.
• 7:29
  You know, the good old boy system is not meant.
• 7:32
  Congress is supposed to be representative of the people.
• 7:34
  No one's supposed to be able to do it, but it's become such a system where you have to
• 7:38
  pay thousands of dollars just to set up a campaign, much less to actually run it and
• 7:45
  do all the marketing and advertising you need to do for it.
• 7:49
  So you have to, we had to get 1500 signatures, 1000 technically, but they throw out some
• 7:54
  to get on the ballot.
• 7:55
  So we did good old fashioned door knocking and get out in the community, meet people.
• 7:59
  You have to set up all sorts of regulations with the FEC and the IRS and all the nice
• 8:06
  little government agencies to qualify and make sure you're following campaign finance.
• 8:11
  And that's all the technical stuff, but the fun part's been just meeting people, getting
• 8:16
  out in the community and really seeing what affects everyday people, what's important
• 8:21
  to them and how much of an impact you can have in your government.
• 8:28
  And so where is the district that you're running?
• 8:32
  Yes, it's a very long district, which is a lot of fun to drive with gas prices the way
• 8:39
  they are, but every 10 years they do redistricting, so it's the new six district.
• 8:45
  So it's Clark and Frederick counties, which are some of the northernmost counties in Virginia
• 8:51
  on the western side, all the way down to Roanoke, so the 81 corridor basically.
• 8:57
  And how many people are in that district?
• 9:01
  It's almost 800,000 I believe, about 540,000 of those are registered voters.
• 9:08
  Yeah, so it's quite a good number of people and I think a lot of people don't realize,
• 9:14
  especially in off-year primaries, it's only a few thousand people who come out and vote
• 9:19
  and out of those hundreds of thousand who actually get to choose who represents them.
• 9:24
  So it's crucial that people get involved because obviously you're not going to agree with everything
• 9:29
  any politician says, but you need to get involved and hold our elected officials accountable.
• 9:34
  And that's how our system's supposed to work.
• 9:40
  What does that look like to get on the ballot?
• 9:41
  So what have you done so far and what do you need to do?
• 9:44
  Yeah, so getting on the ballot, as I said, the biggest hurdle is getting those signatures.
• 9:49
  So you have to go out, we did get that, that took a lot of time.
• 9:55
  It sounds simple to get 15,000 signatures, but you have to make sure they're all registered.
• 9:59
  You have to make sure, yes, 15, sorry, 1500.
• 10:02
  That was like 1000s a lot.
• 10:04
  Yeah, yes it is.
• 10:06
  We have to make sure they're registered voters and you have to compare it contrasted to the
• 10:10
  registered voter list.
• 10:12
  And you have to make sure that they're legible, which is another fun thing.
• 10:18
  So did you travel up and down all the way and hit all different areas on 81?
• 10:22
  Because that's a lot of area.
• 10:23
  Or just constantly on your area.
• 10:26
  Yeah, so for door knocking, we focused a lot on the northern part just because it's easier
• 10:34
  as far as driving.
• 10:36
  But I've done a ton of campaigning throughout the entire district.
• 10:39
  I've been down in Roanoke and Battata and the central part of the district, Harrisonburg,
• 10:44
  and Rockingham, you learn all the places and all the other places very well.
• 10:52
  But I mean, I've lived in the area my entire life.
• 10:55
  I know the area, but it's a lot of travel.
• 10:59
  Yeah, so now that you're on the ballot now, is that correct?
• 11:03
  Yes.
• 11:04
  You voted in with primaries?
• 11:06
  Yes.
• 11:07
  So you're running against you?
• 11:09
  What does that look like?
• 11:11
  Yes, so I'm facing an incoming congressman.
• 11:14
  He was the representative of the old sixth district, which is now the new sixth district.
• 11:22
  He's been in there since 2018.
• 11:24
  He's been in politics for about 20 years.
• 11:28
  Career politician, nice guy, but it's me and him in the primary.
• 11:33
  Then the winner of that will move on to face the Democrat, Jennifer Lewis in the general
• 11:39
  election in November.
• 11:40
  Okay, and so when's the primary?
• 11:43
  June 21st.
• 11:44
  Okay, so you're coming up soon?
• 11:46
  Yes, but early voting.
• 11:48
  It's a good time.
• 11:49
  Hopefully we can share it.
• 11:50
  Absolutely, absolutely.
• 11:52
  Early voting has already started, so they changed up the rules a little bit with all the COVID
• 11:57
  regulations so people can already go out and cast their ballots.
• 12:00
  So it's a sprint to the finish here.
• 12:03
  Right.
• 12:04
  Oh, that's exciting.
• 12:05
  So in my eyes, you're super young to be running for Congress, but is that a true fact?
• 12:10
  Are people running that young or are you below the average age or above?
• 12:16
  Yeah, so obviously most people in Congress are a lot more old than I am.
• 12:23
  We'll put it that way.
• 12:24
  But there are younger people than me who are in Congress.
• 12:27
  Madison Cawthorn, who he just actually lost his second election, but he was younger than
• 12:34
  me, 25.
• 12:35
  Bo Heinz, I believe, he was just elected at 26.
• 12:40
  AOC was elected, I believe, when she was 26 or 27.
• 12:45
  So yeah, there are definitely people younger than me.
• 12:48
  They call them the baby of the house.
• 12:50
  Yeah, well, I bet.
• 12:52
  But it's rare.
• 12:53
  Yeah.
• 12:54
  So I've actually had the privilege with being with Mary Kaye, to lobby on Capitol Hill on
• 13:00
  behalf of Mary Kaye, which has been really cool to have that opportunity.
• 13:04
  And we've met with Congressional offices and Senators Office.
• 13:07
  And honestly, who you meet with, I always say they're 12-year-olds, but they're 20-somethings
• 13:10
  right out of college is who you really talk to.
• 13:13
  So I'm sure it's a breath of fresh air to have somebody young in there.
• 13:19
  So I interviewed somebody, I don't know if you've listened to this episode, but you'll
• 13:23
  have to check it out.
• 13:24
  Maybe I'll connect you guys.
• 13:25
  Sarah White, who is running for representative in false church.
• 13:31
  And then there's somebody else I know that might be a good connection of just grassroots.
• 13:35
  It's another Mary Kaye consultant.
• 13:37
  Her husband ran for treasurer or something in their county.
• 13:41
  I'm not sure the exact title.
• 13:44
  What is, but it was, they live in Grundy, Virginia.
• 13:48
  Do you know where that is?
• 13:49
  Did you discover that part of Virginia?
• 13:51
  I'm not familiar off the top of my head with that.
• 13:54
  So it's still in Virginia, but it takes you all day to get there.
• 13:57
  So it's past Blacksburg, all the way down.
• 13:59
  I think you actually, I went through tennis back to West Virginia or Tennessee to get
• 14:03
  there.
• 14:04
  It's way down the end.
• 14:05
  And it's a very, very cool area.
• 14:07
  They've got howlers.
• 14:08
  And it was like one gas station and one hotel in the town, but he ran against an incumbent
• 14:14
  that had been in office forever.
• 14:16
  And it was knocking on doors and they had all the money, the incumbent had all the money
• 14:20
  and they didn't.
• 14:23
  And he won, but it was knocking on doors and nobody thought he'd win.
• 14:27
  And they basically told him, don't even bother making like a banner for election day because
• 14:31
  nobody's going to pay attention to that thing, but he won the election.
• 14:35
  So I did the good resource to talk to about somebody that's gone through and just knocked
• 14:40
  on doors and, you know, one person can make a difference and they tell one person and
• 14:44
  they tell them one person and it's just, you know, growing it that way.
• 14:49
  You just never know.
• 14:50
  100%.
• 14:51
  And that's one of the benefits of the modern age is we have social media and technology
• 14:57
  and the incumbencies aren't as entrenched as not so much the good old boy networks and
• 15:02
  the smoke filled rooms anymore.
• 15:04
  It's a lot easier to get your message out there and people can easily compare and contrast
• 15:10
  your different ideas.
• 15:11
  And I think that's a really good thing for our country.
• 15:14
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 15:15
  So when you made the decision, like have you been all in or have you thought, what the
• 15:21
  heck am I doing?
• 15:23
  Yeah, no, I've been all in.
• 15:26
  I mean, once you commit to something of that level, you can't go in halfway.
• 15:34
  You've got to be all in.
• 15:35
  It's not fair to the people who you're going through this with and your supporters if you're
• 15:39
  not going all the way in.
• 15:41
  So that's not to say that aren't days that are very hard or disappointing.
• 15:45
  And they're obviously are days that you're riding high and feeling good, but you got
• 15:49
  to get through the lows and not get too high with the highs and just stay low ahead and
• 15:55
  keep going on forward with it.
• 15:57
  So is there anything that you've regretted not doing in your life that you're like, I
• 16:02
  wish I would have done that or I didn't mind you that or?
• 16:06
  Not on a massive scale.
• 16:07
  I mean, there's always like relationships with people that you wish you could have said
• 16:12
  something different or, you know, isolated events.
• 16:17
  But for the most part, as I said, I was very blessed to be raised with a very good family
• 16:22
  and parents who gave me the support structure I need.
• 16:25
  And to me, I said this in the military to my people, you can kind of start backwards
• 16:31
  with how you define the outlook of your life and to your point, what courage is.
• 16:38
  I'll get is what happens when you die and if you have that faith figure, God, whatever
• 16:43
  you want to call a religion, if that's what's important to you, like follow that code and
• 16:51
  you can't really go wrong.
• 16:52
  I mean, life's going to be scary and there's going to be bad things.
• 16:55
  But if it's in the for a greater purpose, then that's kind of self reassuring and that
• 17:01
  kind of gives you a clarity to go do what you need to do.
• 17:04
  Yeah, leave that legacy, make a difference.
• 17:07
  Absolutely.
• 17:08
  Absolutely.
• 17:09
  Because we only, you know, none of us know if we're going to be gifted tomorrow.
• 17:12
  So you might as well make a difference today.
• 17:14
  No, we're not going to really talk about what happened yesterday because that's what we
• 17:17
  are missing and sad, but yeah, you just never know.
• 17:21
  And yeah, life is short.
• 17:23
  I mean, how old was your father when he passed away?
• 17:25
  He was 77.
• 17:26
  He was born in 1944.
• 17:29
  A lot older than you.
• 17:31
  Yeah.
• 17:32
  Yeah.
• 17:33
  So my dad passed away nine years ago and he was probably about the same age, but I'm
• 17:40
  a lot older than you.
• 17:41
  But yeah, it's never easy losing a parent.
• 17:43
  I don't care how old you are.
• 17:46
  You know, one of the things talking about regrets is, and I tell people often, like,
• 17:51
  do the thing, make the connection, spend the time that people you care about because just
• 17:56
  like you know, you never know when they're not going to be around.
• 17:59
  And your dad with his brain disease was like, was there physically, but not always mentally?
• 18:06
  Absolutely.
• 18:07
  And yeah, I mean, I think anyone you ask will say with some of the laws, they, they regret
• 18:13
  not doing more with them.
• 18:16
  I was fortunate that my dad and I had a close relationship.
• 18:18
  But obviously, like hindsight being 20, 20, there's always the I wish I'd done, you know,
• 18:23
  something else more, but that'll always be there.
• 18:27
  And you just got to live true to yourself.
• 18:29
  Exactly.
• 18:30
  So what encouragement would you give to somebody else to do something courageous or be brave
• 18:37
  or say, why not today?
• 18:39
  I would say, know what you want and go get it.
• 18:44
  Know what's important to you.
• 18:46
  If you want to be the best painter and that's what defines who you are, go do it.
• 18:52
  Don't let anyone tell you not to.
• 18:53
  If you want to go be a preacher, astronaut, it doesn't matter.
• 18:58
  It's what's important.
• 18:59
  It's what's in your heart.
• 19:01
  You set your own course in life.
• 19:04
  Circumstances matter.
• 19:06
  But the person you are is irrelevant to those circumstances.
• 19:10
  You can always overcome what's around you and the most important things of person's
• 19:14
  character.
• 19:15
  So that's how we should get each other.
• 19:18
  Yep.
• 19:19
  Yep.
• 19:20
  Absolutely.
• 19:21
  I'm actually reading a book and I wish I knew the author had it in front of me, but
• 19:22
  basically talking about your calling, what your calling is.
• 19:25
  So whether it's, she said a painter or a politician or a preacher, you know, whatever your calling
• 19:34
  is, that God has that calling for you and yet this book has a really good analogy.
• 19:38
  Like there's a whole puzzle put together and God has all our pieces out there.
• 19:42
  When we don't, we aren't true to our calling.
• 19:44
  Then that piece kind of falls apart in the whole scheme of things.
• 19:48
  And so, you know, when you're called and it's, you know, it's that nudge, just that God
• 19:53
  wink.
• 19:54
  It's the do the thing that's scary and we rarely regret do the thing that's scary.
• 20:00
  And I say this often on podcasts.
• 20:01
  I always tell people like, think about the outcome like, yeah, it's hard and it can be
• 20:05
  scary, but think about the day that you win the election and how exciting that's going
• 20:09
  to be.
• 20:10
  And I might be there cheering you on.
• 20:13
  Celebrate it with you.
• 20:15
  Absolutely.
• 20:16
  I think you're right.
• 20:18
  It's usually the things we don't do that we regret more than the things we do end up
• 20:23
  doing.
• 20:24
  Because even if you fail on what you're doing, yeah, exactly.
• 20:27
  Even if you fail on what you're doing, you're going to get something out of that experience
• 20:30
  and the journey there.
• 20:31
  But you don't gain a lot from sitting on the sidelines.
• 20:35
  Absolutely not.
• 20:36
  Yeah.
• 20:37
  So I've referenced many times a book that I read right before I started doing the podcast
• 20:40
  and it's called from Daniel Pink called Regrets.
• 20:43
  And just talking about we rarely regret the things that we do.
• 20:46
  It's more the things that we don't do.
• 20:49
  Absolutely.
• 20:50
  Yeah.
• 20:51
  So I did this in honor of my father, who as I said passed away nine years ago and I
• 20:56
  started this podcast in his honor and he always said why not today and he was a problem
• 21:01
  solver.
• 21:02
  And so I always try to connect back and I interviewed somebody that like I never met
• 21:06
  your dad.
• 21:07
  I'm like a lot of people haven't.
• 21:08
  But when I do the interview, I try to kind of connect back to what I've heard your story.
• 21:14
  And I think one connection is the dad thing that we both have that connection with our
• 21:17
  dads.
• 21:18
  But also my dad didn't run for a big office but helped in the local community.
• 21:24
  And he was always a problem solver and he saw problems like okay, there's a way to solve
• 21:28
  this and I can definitely see that in you.
• 21:32
  And a very positive, faith filled young man that's just ready to tackle the world.
• 21:38
  And I think that's who my dad was.
• 21:40
  And it's fun to watch and I'm excited to cheer you on and watch.
• 21:45
  So tell us how can people find you?
• 21:47
  How can we support you?
• 21:49
  People I have people all over the listeners podcast.
• 21:52
  I'm actually, because my business is now virtual, I'm not home and nor at my house
• 21:56
  very often.
• 21:57
  I'm actually down near Roanoke right now, Smith Mountain Lake, which I know is not your
• 22:01
  district.
• 22:02
  I looked it up.
• 22:03
  It's right, but it's closed.
• 22:04
  Less than an hour from Roanoke.
• 22:08
  So tell us how people can find you and connect with you and support you.
• 22:12
  Absolutely.
• 22:13
  So if you go to MerrittHaleForCongress.com, I have a unique name, M-E-R-R-I-T-T-H-A-L-E.
• 22:20
  So not many other things will pop up, but MerrittHaleForCongress.
• 22:25
  You can check out my website.
• 22:27
  I try and lay out my values and my beliefs there.
• 22:29
  If anyone has any questions, they can feel free to reach out to me.
• 22:33
  On my website, I also have a Facebook and a Twitter at MerrittHale.
• 22:38
  And I would appreciate any of your listeners if they want to go check it out, follow along,
• 22:44
  maybe send a small donation if they believe in my message.
• 22:49
  I'd be incredibly humbled by that.
• 22:51
  Okay.
• 22:52
  So, and I will share how to contact you with show notes and stuff with the information.
• 22:58
  So yeah, as far as finding this podcast, we're on Spotify.
• 23:01
  We're on iTunes.
• 23:02
  I am working on a website.
• 23:04
  We're not quite there yet.
• 23:05
  We're going to have some fun merchandise.
• 23:07
  I just met with somebody today.
• 23:08
  We're going to have some cups and some t-shirts on why not today.
• 23:12
  And I really want to start a movement.
• 23:14
  Encouraging people just to say why not today?
• 23:17
  So thank you, Merritt, for joining me.
• 23:19
  It's been fun to kind of hear your story and we can't wait to cheer you on and hear the
• 23:22
  results.
• 23:23
  And this podcast will air on Saturday, which is the 28th of May.
• 23:31
  So a good time to have this as it is Memorial Day weekend and you were in the military.
• 23:37
  So appropriate that it's at that time of the year.
• 23:41
  So thank you again.
• 23:43
  And I'm excited to have people hear your story.
• 23:46
  Actually, thank you so much for having me, Leslie.
• 23:48
  You are welcome.