We're back with another edition of the Federalist Radio Hour. I'm Emily Jasinsky,
culture editor here at the Federalist. As always, you can email the show
at radio at the Federalist dot com, follow us on Twitter at fdr LST.
Make sure to subscribe wherever your download your podcasts, and to the premium
version of our website as well. We're joined today by Timothy Head. He
is the executive director of the Faith and Freedom Coalition. Tim thanks for joining
the show. Hey, thanks so much for having me. This is I
think it'll be a good good chance to visit on some pretty interesting topics going
on these days. Oh absolutely, I cannot wait to dive into some of
this. You guys have been making big headlines recently. You hosted all of
the presidential candidates, the Republican presidential candidates for a forum where they work through
They talked through some of these issues out in Iowa. So you've been on
the ground in Iowa. You've been talking voters, talking to Christians who are
interested in hearing from these different candidates and who are working on some really important
and thinking about some really important issues around the country. Could you start by
telling us maybe if people aren't familiar with Faith in Freedom a little bit about
the group and what you guys do. Yeah, I'm glad to so.
Our headquarters is in Atlanta, Georgia, and we have a DC office where
we work on our federal public policy, and then we have state chapters now
in about twenty four different states across the country. We were starting in two
thousand and nine, founded by a guy named Ralph Reid who's still the chairman
of our board, and I've been the executive director here for about nine years
on most and you know, the way we sometimes say it is our role
is to try to work on public policy from a biblical worldview within a constitutional
framework. And so, uh, you know, some people refer to Christian
voters as social conservatives or faith based voters, you know, religious, religious
right, and you know, all kinds of different monikers there. But you
know, we tend to work on for kind of primary subject matters. Do
a lot on on pro life as well as supporting marriage and traditional family values,
certainly on religious liberty, and then also we support Israel on federal and
increasing on increasingly on state policies. But then a few years ago we started
branching a little bit more into education reform, also on justice reform, and
uh, you know, certainly trying to curtail human trafficking in the United States
and elsewhere. And then we also do a good bit on the federal side
on immigration. So we cover quite a few different topics kind of across the
you know, the the political front, so to speak. And but you
know, the thing that we're probably most known for and uh in political circles
is our program to get out the Christian vote. And so that's uh,
you know, when we went again. We started in two thousand and nine,
and so you know, they were they were fairly modest efforts in the
two thousand and ten and twelve and even fourteen cycles. But in the twenty
sixteen cycle, we we wound up knocking on just just over one point two
five million doors across the country. In twenty twenty eighteen, that actually moved
up to about two point two five million doors. In twenty twenty we hit
about five point nine million, and then in twenty twenty two last cycle,
we hit about eight point six million doors across the country in twenty two different
states last cycle. So our our expectations that will we will have either staff
or volunteers visit over ten million homes of targeted Christian voters across the country in
twenty twenty four. And and frankly, that'll that actually starts to become a
pretty significant portion of the entire American electorate. You know, when when you're
we generally find that in our households, we have about one point seven voters
statistically per every household. So if we visit ten households that I mean or
one household, that means we'll we'll actually see one point seven voters. So
you know, ten million households, seventeen million voters will will actually get a
direct home visit from a Faith and Freedom uh door knocker in twenty twenty four.
So we just got to make sure that people want to stay hun stay
home and complain. We got to get out on the streets and then eventually
get on into into the voting booth and make sure that our voice is heard.
Yeah, that's a something I want to ask you about. How it's
it's such an interesting time for Christian voters, Conservative voters who are on the
one hand, I'm sure you encounter some discouragement, but then also incredibly energized
and animated by some of the attacks on people's faith. As you guys are
out in the field knocking indoors and talking to people, have you encountered people
who you know don't? Is it a problem? I guess that people are
more and more discouraged about the process, maybe feel like their their votes aren't
going to be counted anything like that. Is that a real real problem when
you're out there trying to get people to make sure they show up. Yeah,
sure, good, good question, fair questions. I would say it's
it's a bit of a mixed bag. But I would say that the the
break for that question probably moves towards energy and animation. So, you know,
even examples I can give in the last just in the last about twelve
days, Faith and Freedom has actually done four different events and four different states
across the country. We did on September the eleventh, we didn't invent in
Atlanta, excuse me, Atlanta, Georgia our home, our home home base.
Then on September the fourteenth, we didn't invent in Nashville, Tennessee.
On September the sixteenth, we did a presidential forum, kind of town hall,
of kind of kind of event in des Moines, Iowa. And then
this past Saturday, on the twenty third of September, we did a large,
a large kind of half day summit essentially kind of like a miniature conference.
Between those four we had almost five thousand people in attendance, and uh,
you know, people were kind of showing up early and staying late.
So I would say, you know, at least in Atlanta, in Nashville,
in Des Moines, and in Charlotte or kind of just outside of Charlotte,
there is a lot of uh of energy that I can I can speak
personally too, just even in the last two weeks, and I would say,
you know, there are other anecdotal things that we're seeing across the country
that suggests the same. Our Prince our National conference that we held in DC
in June even was the best attendance attended conference that we've had in the now
fourteen years I think of doing doing these conferences. So uh, there is
energy animation hope. I would say, you know, I think after twenty
twenty, not only the the electoral result and to itself, it's certainly the
kind of uh, the pixelated uh processes that that that a lot of us,
you know, witnessed and UH and kind of saw around voter regularities.
We're certainly disconcerting to a ton of people. Thankfully, I think, you
know, in twenty twenty two, at least there was some redemption, if
you will, found and you know, we saw large turnouts sell positive electoral
results for you know, for conservative and for our perspective, a lot of
Christian candidates. You know. So the pause that was kind of carried coming
out of twenty twenty I think was largely resolved in twenty twenty two, but
there's still are definitely remnants that that that you know, kind of harbor some
some doubt. Will just say, you know that that we're doing everything we
can to issue those those doubts to make sure that we have maximum UH participation
in twenty twenty four. Yeah, I know that makes sense. And you
know, I'm in DC, you're in Georgia basically like the epicenter of concerns
about these things. And I've just never fully bought the argument that it's gonna
that would be enough to make such a big difference, because all the people
I know who have deep and serious concerns about voting are also still gonna They're
gonna vote because they're so amped up and energized about the threats that they're they're
voting against. Basically, well, well, I think that that generally is
the case. You know, the twenty twenty runoff election, so you know,
back to back to Georgia very quickly. You know the that the challenge
that's tried. There were there were two U two races, kind of unusual
situation. There were two center races that were both running kind of parallel to
one another, and unfortunately we lost lost both of those races for for what
I considered to be very good conservative and UH and and faith based candidates and
Kelly Leffler and David Purdue. The challenges in the runoff, So first of
all, in the presidential there were a record number of Georgia voters that voted
in the in the general election there in November, and we actually saw a
various I worked in politics, you know, in elections for almost fifteen years
now. If you would have told me that we would have ninety one percent
turnout two months later, about six sixty days later for a special election or
for a runoff, brother, I would have told you that we would have
won. Generally, you kind of say, eighty three to maybe eighty six
percent turnout is probably gonna win a runoff. Republicans actually had ninety one percent
turnout in the second election. The challenge was the Democrats actually had ninety five
percent turnout in in the runoff. So you know that I said, I
just to articulate, I mean, truly every vote counts. I mean,
when if you have eight eight cylinders, you need all eight cylinders to be
firing, and in order to win an election, especially in a very close
state like Georgia these days, that really in terms of kind of registered voters
favors Republicans slightly, but it really should. It rarely will be more than
a fifty one forty nine kind of state. And uh, and so all
that to say, you know, when you get ninety one percent and they
get ninety five percent of their voters to turn back out, you know,
we know what the elections look at, what the results look like. So
so that's the reason why we stay engage year in and year out, because
you can't just kind of, uh, you know, to try to gen
up the machine, you know, and like labor day before an election and
hope that everything turns out. This is twenty four just a twenty four seven
process, you know, throughout the week or the year, but truly a
twenty four month process in every electoral cycle. And hopefully there's some heat being
taken to that in Ohio where the post Labor Day push in that referendum cases
turning up but was really not turned on for the August ballot measure that actually
could have even prevented some of the some of the further measures for meeting to
be taken. And that actually brings me to the next question. It's a
big question, but I assume you'll have some kind of bullet point thoughts,
which is basically, just what are you hearing from people on the ground in
Iowa in particular, just I asked that, you know, just for no
reason other than of course it's the first state where people are actually going to
a head was going to say, head to the polls, but do their
caucusing. What are you hearing from people? What are the big sort of
top lines that people bring up? So I would say, uh, topically
just in terms of subject matter, you know, certainly so Iowa about we'll
see exactly what it breaks down to this year, but probably about seventy percent
of caucus voters and I will be will be self identified Christian conservatives. And
so you know, if you've got two at a little more than two out
of three voters are going to be strongly pro life. And so you know,
that's become certainly a heavy topic in Iowa that they you know, certainly
want candidates on the state and the and the federal levels to be strongly pro
life in action as and in word. You know, another piece I mean
obviously kind of the overall woke its genda, you know, is definitely stirn
people into a frenzy the way that that cookie crumbles. In terms of specific
public policy, you know, just about five months ago, Iowa pass the
i would argue, probably the single strongest school choice bill in the United States
of America to date, overwhelmingly favored by by Iowa voters, even a lot
of independent voters by the way, So you know, the school choice and
kind of public school agenda types of things are definitely resonating with a lot of
can with a lot of voters in Iowa. A couple of other things,
you know, I would say, you know, believe it or not.
Immigration, just in our event again to two weeks ago, a week and
a half ago, immigration was one of the top issues that that voter,
that voters wanted to hear here about from candidates, and so that was interesting.
Obviously I was not a border state, but the way Kim Reynolds articulated
at the beginning of the event was these days every state is a border state
in one way or the other. So I would certainly put that near the
top of the heap as well. You know, other questions about Ukraine and
kind of you know, Russia, Russia challenges. There are a lot of
questions about the economy, and you know, the list goes on and on,
but I would say that you know, live the economy, public safety,
and you know, the border border security are definitely kind of major driving
factors right now. Cold Turkey great on sandwich is probably not the best way
to break your bad habits. And I'm not talking about some weird mind trick
from your crazy neighbor or something you saw on an email forward from your mom.
We're talking here about our sponsor, FUME, and they look at this
problem in a different way. Not everything in a bad habit isn't wrong.
So instead of a drastic uncomfortable change, why not just remove the bad from
your habit. Fume is an innovative and award nominated device that does just that.
Instead of electronics, Fume is completely natural. Instead of vapor, Fume
uses flavored air, and instead of harmful chemicals, Fume uses all natural,
delicious flavors, so you get it. Instead of bad, Fume is good.
It's a habit you're free to enjoy, and it makes replacing your bad
habits easy. Your Fume comes with an adjustable airflow dial and is designed with
movable parts and magnets for fidgeting, giving your fingers a lot to do,
which is helpful for distressing and anxiety while breaking your habit. Stopping is something
we all put off because it's hard, but switching to Fume is easy,
enjoyable, and even fun. Fume has served over one hundred thousand customers and
has thousands of success stories, and there's no reason that you can't be one
of them. So join Fume and accelerating humanities. Break up from destructive habits
by picking up the journey pack today. Head to try fume dot com and
use the code federalist to save ten percent off when you get the journey pack
today. That's try fum dot com and use the code federalist to save an
additional ten percent off your order today. Head to trifume dot com slash federalist
and use the federalists to save an additional ten percent off your order. Today's
super super interesting, And that's also sort of where I want to There's a
lot there. I'm not surprised at all about the immigration point. But when
I talk to grassroots people, they also say something that surprises me, which
is they hear a lot from the kind of sort of activists bass the very
politically involved basse about something conservatives definitely didn't think too much about before Donald Trump
and before you know, after twenty twenty, and also Russia collusion and all
of that which is lawfair, and the kind of weaponization of the bureaucracy of
the intelligence apparatus. I've heard from people who are, you know, on
the ground with activists that they actually are hearing a lot about that. And
it's interesting because Donald Trump is obviously ahead in Iowa. He's not quite as
far ahead and iowas he is nationally, but he is. He is a
very comfortable lead in Iowa. Uh and I would imagine that gives some kind
of an advantage to be in the news all of the time, if that
is a really animating priority. But let me test that on you. Is
that something that you guys are hearing a lot of concern for? Oh?
Absolutely, you know. So the so called kind of two tiers, you
know, two tiers if you will, of uh. And you know,
what's what's kind of fascinating to me these days is that we actually have both
the political left and the political right that are animated around the justice system,
but for kind of like different reasons, you know, and both would actually
use similar terminology of a two tiered justice system. Those that, you know,
the left kind of talks about, you know, kind of access to
justice maybe based particularly on on socioeconomics and certainly about race and in a lot
of contexts. And then the right talks talks these days about two tier justice,
meaning those who are politically connected and those who are not. Are particularly
those who are kind of liberally politically connected in those who are not. But
all that to say, there is a kind of a blinking red light on
the on the walls of America right now across the country. S and uh,
you know, this justice system isn't really working for pretty much anybody unless
you're a billionaire, a multimillionaire, and then only if you're a liberal billionaire
multimillionaire, and and so, you know, we definitely that's one of the
reasons. I mean, we could go on for a while on this topic.
But one of the reasons why justice, the justice system is such a
high priority for US, I said, Faith and Freedom Coalition is that's kind
of one of these I would argue the justice system is maybe similar almost to
like a reliable you know, electrical grid, electricity grid, or like,
you know, reliable and clean water that you know, it's not like people
run for president and saying I'll provide clean water for the United States. But
anytime that these kind of foundation or fundamental infrastructural almost you know, services are
are lacking, they become very high priorities. And I think that that was
what we're seeing right now. And frankly, we need a lot of very
wise people running justice systems and not these kind of political hacks, in my
opinion, who are to your point, are weaponizing this thing almost beyond recognition.
Yeah, and to the extent that you know, conservative voters Christian voters
care about that. It's so interesting because now we're also going into well,
we're actually in this period where we're looking at potential government shutdown as September thirtieth
comes closer and closer, and conservatives Freedom Caucus, conservatives, principal conservatives are
are sort of going to the mat with not just Kevin McCarthy, who's who's
sympathetic to them, but also some moderate Republicans and then the larger sort of
we've seen Mitch McConnell way in and basically say shutdowns aren't good for everyone.
One thing that you didn't mention in priorities that you hear in Iowa is the
debt. And I feel like that would be different. And I'm not saying
it's it's inconsistent at all. It was a bigger priority for me, you
know, tea party years however, many years ago before we started to have
four indictments against the leading presidential candidate. But that's factoring into the decisions going
on around the debt and everything to that extent. How should Republicans in Congress,
Republicans here in DC be thinking about how conservative voters and maybe even Democrats
too, but how conservative voters, Christian voters are prioritizing all of this what
they want to see when it comes down to whether this government should get shut
down in the interest of advancing conservative priorities or not. Yeah, well so,
I mean, look, that's a that's a great question on on the
debt and on on shutdown, and I'll I will say that, uh,
you know, I'm going to give there there is a a valid public policy
analysis that can that can be made for sure about shutting down the government related
to debt, services and specific things within the budget on a pure political analysis.
You know, the really difficult situation is it has less to do with
kind of the wheels of kind of political power unto itself, and more to
do with who holds the reins to media, national kind of traditional media,
and certainly social media these days. The danger the Republicans run and shutting down
the government is that they will Republicans will be even if if it's equally you
know, if I blame quote unquote is equally distributed among Republicans and Democrats,
the media will wrap that around Republicans next, both in the Senate, especially
in the House, and when the implications for that start to kind of kick
in across a lot of you know, certainly paychecks for a lot of federal
employees, but then also kind of like other I mean, you know,
the military will will continue to be funded, of course, but but a
number of other realms that are funded by federal are supplemented by federal dollars.
You know, Well, we'll really really struggle and in a super super close
election. I mean, I think it's entirely reasonable to expect a presidential cycle
in twenty twenty four to come down not just a five states, but probably
three. Again. I think that it's you know, we do seem destined
for Arizona, Wisconsin, and Georgia one more time, and probably less than
a twenty thousand vote margin in each of those of those states. So literally,
you know, we could have one hundred and seventy five million votes cast,
maybe even one hundred and eighty five million votes cast, and still the
difference would actually be less than fifty thousand votes in three states determining the you
know, electoral college. It's just very precarious to kind of know that the
media is gonna gonna strap that shut down in those three states, you know,
around Republicans, so and I know that the McCarthy speaker, McCarthy's doing
everything he can to avoid that just because of the political messaging realities that,
unfortunately are the cards that he's sort of been dealt in the world of dealing
with a lot of legacy media out there. Oh yeah, he has been.
There's no question about it, whether he fumbles or not, he was
dealt about from the beginning, not in an easy position, definitely between Iraq
and a hard place, and also in actually this is kind of a strange
transition. But you mentioned life earlier, and this has been all over headlines.
This is the chatter and the conservative movement over the past week, which
was Donald Trump telling Kristen Welker now a week ago that he thinks the Heartbeat
bill, the six week bill run to Santa sund was quote terrible. It's
set off this huge conversation in pro life circles that I'm sure you've been part
of and have followed very closely. And you know, it's it's interesting in
a bunch of different ways. It's interesting in the sort of insight into the
way Donald Trump thinks. It's interesting in the way the pro life movement sort
of makes some of these calls and decisions and looks to the future, what
have What's your sense as to how that landed with you know, actual voters
in places like Iowa and places like Wisconsin in the last week. Yeah.
Well, you know, one of the reasons why I like doing interviews like
when we're doing right now is because it gives us, at least just a
couple of more minutes than normal normal media to unpack some of the most complex
analyzes, frankly, in American politics right now. So here's as quickly as
I can. Very important for every every voter, but especially kind of informed
voters, like like your listeners, to recognize what kind of what the margin
demographic is in American politics right now. So the holy grail, if you
will, for persuadable voters, kind of fence sitting voters right now are college
educated, white suburban females and so anybody. You know. I'm not a
female, but I am married to We have two kids. My wife is
an extremely sharp lady. But she also is not you know, following national
media political media twelve hours a day because she's raising our two daughters. You
know, we're we're both doing it, of course, but she's she's,
uh, you know, shuttling lots of kids to a lot of places,
doing all kinds of stuff. We're home schooling and on and on. That's
not that's not unique. You know, a lot of white, suburban college
educated moms are either you know, spending a ton of time with kids or
they're also maybe even working and then also doing things with kids. So I
say all that as it relates to the life question, because many of those
are are kind of like a little bit ambivalent on these questions surrounding life.
And so one of the reasons why we had faith and freedom are you know,
very nuanced and our approaches to life that we want to absolutely protect every
single child in the womb, but we have to make sure that the messaging
is tenable for basically suburban college educated females in Metro Arizona, Metro Milwaukee,
met Metro Phoenix, Metro Milwaukee, and Metro Atlanta, because they absolutely are
kind of the fulcrum to the political scales, if you will. Right now,
and Donald Trump, because of the lead that you alluded to, you
know, a couple of minutes ago, he is now really messaging more towards
a general election audience than to a quote unquote primary election audience. So he
knows that he might stuffer a little bit with the kind of base pro life
community. But and I will admit, I wish you would have phrased it
differently than that. You know, the six week band in Florida and other
states, by the way, by implication is terrible. I don't think that
that's. First of all, I don't think it's true, and it's second
of all, I don't think that's a way to communicate about that issue.
But I do think that he could be nuanced in that in a way that
communicates or messages nuance to those suburban voters while still defending and supporting in a
sup life. Hey y'all, this is Sarah Carter, investigative columnist and host
of The Sarah Carter Show. Thanks for listening to the Federalist. We all
have a heartfelt reason to support our blood pressure. In fact, more than
half of the US population would benefit from blood pressure support. Super Beats heart
shoes are easy and convenient way to support healthy blood pressure and promote heart healthy
energy appaired with a healthy lifestyle. The antioxidants and super beats are clinically shown
to be nearly two times more effective at promoting normal blood pressure and a healthy
lifestyle alone. I tell you this, I've felt it. I love taking
super Beats. Not only are they tasty, they're great to chew, but
I love to know that I'm supporting a healthy heart. It's effective and clinically
studied. Super Beats is the number one pharmacist recommended beat brand for cardiovascular health
support. It's blood precious support you can trust. Get a free thirty day
supply of super Beats heart shoes and fifteen percent off your first order by going
to get Superbeats dot com and use promo code Sarah. That's Saar eight.
Get Superbeats dot com code Sarah to get fifteen percent off your first order.
Get Superbeats dot com promo code Sarah. And what's a good way to do
that? Because following the Ohio ballot measure which would codify this is on the
ballot in November, would codify the right to abortion into the Ohio Constitution.
There was a vote in August. We covered this a little bit at the
time that would have said you need to have a sixty percent voter threshold to
make any changes to the state constitution and that failed. So there's a lot
of expectation that it's going to be easy for the left to get over that
fifty percent hurdle, especially given how things have gone in Kansas, at Michigan
and suburban women are the target, the demographic you were just talking about here
and so being involved in the space and this work. What is the way
to convey nuance? I'm thinking, even you know, just in a political
ad or anything like that, what's the best way to do that in this
case? Well, a couple of ways, I think. First of all,
you know, I articulating that a pro life position is actually a very
compassionate and uh you know, delicate position, and believe it or not,
the the sort of draconian position, and I would argue, you know,
pretty evil, just an unseemly position is the position of of California, and
of New York, and of Illinois and a couple of other states that basically
are allowing uh you know, termination or president of pregnancy not only you know,
up to the moment of pregnancy, but even in some situations after pregnancy.
Of Virginia, you know, we actually know that the previous governor of
Virginia had you know, was was willing to kind of work around the legislature
in Virginia to allow those kinds of uh practices in in Virginia, which we
think is a relatively purple or moderate state. So and by the way,
that that practice even on planet Earth, never minded in the United States of
America, on planet Earth, is actually an unthinkable practice. I mean even
Russia and China don't even have don't even allow no practices like that. So
the reality is that, ironically, in that very same article, a very
same interview, you know, with Meet the Press, I think, you
know, President Trump might have missed an opportunity when he was ying to kind
of uh, you know, pivot to this point. The Democrats position is
the one that's that's untenable and draconian, uh, you know, allowing pregnant
you know, terminations and abortions in the ninth month and even sometimes after.
Well the interviewer said, uh, Democrats don't believe that. Well, it's
not even like they have, like a couple of outliers have articulated this,
uh, you know, like the US House of Representatives under Nancy Pelosi two
years ago voted in favor of that bill. I mean, it's not like
it happened thirty years ago. It's not like three, you know, extraneous
people said this. The entire Democrat federal party voted for that within the last
two and a half years. So I mean, he, I just don't
don't think that he was quite prepared to kind of push back with you know,
specific either federal or again. I mean, we actually have seen you
know, several states moving that direction just since the Dom's decision in the last
year and a little bit, so, so you know, I think the
way to paint this is that we we you know, pro lifers believe in
obviously life, the sensitivity and delicacy of of of human life. And we
also in all of those states, by the way, are providing are providing
provisions for from mothers, uh you know, certainly for you know, they're
kind of like a maternity leave provisions that are also passing in a lot of
these states that that poll extremely uh well across demographics and geography across the country.
You know, So there actually are very thoughtful and again compassionate positions that
that the pro life movement is moving towards. And but unfortunately in the case
of Ohio, you know, I don't think the ballot initiative was terribly well
funded on our side. And you know, I think that's one of the
the faults that we can can we we kind of assume or presume that because
we have truth on our side. You know that just truth, unto itself,
will sell you know, we'll kind of sell itself. And unfortunately,
you do need to back that truth up with you know, you know,
with with a strategic communication plan. Uh. And and I think that that
assumption or political presumption, uh, you know, put us in a little
bit of a box in Ohio last year or last last month. You know,
that is a thing I've heard over and over again from people who are
involved, that the conservative donor class uh is just not interested and even the
pro life donor class uh to the extent that that's it's it's own sort of
entity. Uh. Just it was like pulling teeth to get people to pay
attention to Ohio. I don't know if that's a post Dobbs thing. I
don't know if it's a post can this Michigan thing, but or maybe it's
just because it's it's always probably been harder to raise money for for Life because
it's kind of it's not as political, but man, it's just so little
attention as being paid to something that is so monumental in Ohio. Well,
and bear in mind also that that a lot of the messaging on the political
left is actually done because they don't have to raise money on on facilities and
operations because they're largely is funded through unfortunately still through taxpayer resources. All of
the money that they raise goes into political strategy. So you know, playing
parent who doesn't raise money for operations and politics. Like all of the you
know, the the kind of pro life either advocacy groups or the you know,
the crisis pregnancy centers across the country, all of that is done by
by private dollars. So we actually have to fight on two fronts, whereas
they really from private donors perspective, they only really have to fight on one
front. Right. And it's as someone pointing this out to me last week,
it's it's also an industry. It's a for profit industry, and so
they have plenty of revenue streams coming in to fight against life correctly, right,
So actually on that, I know you guys have legislative priorities, and
it has been remarkable to see so much. I don't know, I can't
remember seeing so much. I think like legislative creativity or just like this invigorated
approach to like new types of legislation, new ideas for bills around the country,
especially especially especially when it comes to education. That's the space where it
seems like this is exploded, where states really are becoming the laboratories of Republican
government that they're intended to be. I'm obviously thinking a lot of Florida,
but other states Louisiana start targeting the pornography industry. There's really, it seems
to me, been a bounty of new ideas for how to approach some of
these things. What are the big ticket legislative priorities on your guys's agenda?
Well, gosh, where to begin. So I we can almost do an
entire segment just on the newly constituted Supreme Court US Supreme Court. That so
you know, clearly the kind of top of top of mind for everybody in
the world, as much as America is the Dom's decision. But ironically,
on the exact same day, part of the portfolio of opinions that was handed
down that day also was West Virginia versus EPA opinion that basically allowed state legislatures
statutes passed by the state legislature priority over a federal agency on interpret interpretation of
the Clean Waters Act. Well, bit by bit, the US Supreme Court
has been i would say, eroding maybe what's known as Chevron defference, which
is a doctrine that has for thirty years basically now has has allowed the US
Supreme Court to give preferential treatment to federal bureaucracies. Well, they're kind of
agency by agency, they're peeling that away. And what they're what that's doing
is it's taking different subject matters and kicking them back to states. And so
they truly are not in kind of one fail swoop, but incrementally they're they're
empowering state legislatures to do a host were about we're just over twenty opinions have
accomplished this now and we're seeing states take, uh, you know, take
these approaches. Another approach that I think is is we they're is there are
legislative components to this, but we also work a lot with with administrative heads,
agency heads and states around ESG programs that you know, as we've seen
corporations huge, huge hedge funds literally weaponize state retirement accounts against frequently the the
pension holders of that those state accounts, the interests of states and individuals.
Uh. You know, so we're we're actually you know, working in very
granular ways and about thirty states across the country not only on abortion, but
also on school choice, on religious liberty, on you know, accountability for
for transnational companies, uh, to not weaponize our monetary systems against all Americans,
but especially Americans faith From our perspective, you know, so we're actually
extremely encouraged. But it's you know, these are kind of like it's like
a death by a thousand cuts to the federal bureaucratic regime, and we're about
five hundred cuts into that process. And we're actually very cautiously optimistic. And
if we can get a friendly White House administration back in place, I think
we're going to be able to row those powers even more. The Washedolt on
Wall Street podcast with Chris Markowski. Every day, Chris helps unpack the connection
between politics and the economy and how it affects your wallet. Gas prices have
never been this high at this time of the year. Ever, with the
fall season approaching, diesel prices are expected to go up for farmers, which
in turn causes your grocery bill to skyrocket with no strategic petroleum reserve to tap
into, is there ever an end in sight? Whether it's happening in DC
or down on Wall Street, it's affecting you financially. Be informed. Check
out the Watchdolto on Wall Street podcast with Chris Markowski on Apple, Spotify,
or wherever you get your podcast. I was gonna say, I was really
happy to see you guys hosted Tulsa Gabbard. I think that was over this
last weekend, right, Yeah, she's actually been with us probably three times
this year in different events, but she was with us in North Carolina just
on Saturday, Saturday morning, and I was gonna ask, I mean,
she's representative of a not insignificant group of Christians who feel completely and totally abandoned
by the Democratic Party and by the broader left. And I'm just wondering if
you encounter you know, like I said, it's it's not you know,
millions of millions of people, but well it probably is millions of millions of
people, but you know, and I know you probably work with a lot
of traditional conservative type folks. But do you guys come across do you hear
from you know, the Tulsa Gabbards of Iowa, of Georgia, of Wisconsin
who are not just secular Democrats who feel abandoned by the left, but are
you know, genuinely conservative Christians who feel politically homeless. Well, yeah,
that's you know again, we could probably spend thirty minutes just on that one
also. But you know, I would say a couple of things are going
on right now. So you've got machine politics going on with the Democratic left
that are are systematically squelching any uh, you know, differing opinions out there,
which is ironically is actually also empowering those voices. So you know the
reason why why uh? You know, we've got another Kennedy here who is
actually you know, gaining in the polls. I mean, there's another recent
poll in the last week or so that has him up to about twenty four
twenty five percent. He's been hovering more like sixteen to eighteen percent for a
few months. But you know, a lot of of of kind of moderate
Catholics maybe will say, you know, actually identify with a lot of the
things that that he talks about, and then frankly a lot of those kind
of moderate Catholics and Evangelicals for that matter, that are interested in social programs
to help the poor, particularly which is you know, there are a host
of Biblical teachings on on helping the poor. I think we can, you
know, have have a meaningful debate on on whether Scripture actually contemplates governments helping
the poor. I mean, there certainly are elements to that, but I
would argue most of what the political charges is for individuals to help the poor,
not you know, for us to just set up Medicaid and Medicare and
uh, you know, snap snap programs and just say, you know,
we're complying with biblical mandates. But but nonetheless, you know, there are
many kind of center lefts uh Christians who feel strongly about those things, but
also don't like either the anti good kind of agenda and rhetoric of the political
left or or just the extreme kind of woke uh you know, stuff that
we've seen over the last three or four years. So those those voters,
I would argue, absolutely, you know, feel kind of taken for granted,
if not you know, completely uh sort of abandoned at this point,
and that's you know that that is actually part of our argument to a lot
of the candidates on the on the political right is you know, can can
we think through meaningful policies and messages that can can affect those disaffected you know,
otherwise very compassionate voters. Well, Timothy Head, there's so many big
elections coming out, not just the presidential election, and you have been so
generous with your time and giving us some insight into what you're hearing from the
people who will decide those on the state level the federal level. Thank you
for joining the show today. It's a trade to be with you, and
hopughfully we can do it again as as we continue to march towards you know,
the Republican primaries certainly early next year and then throughout the presidential next year.
Absolutely we will have to do that. Timothy Head is the executive director
of the Faith and Freedom Coalition. I'm Emili Jashnski, culture editor here at
The Federalist. Will be back soon with more. Until then, the Lovers
of freedom and anxious for the Prey