Speaker 1: Wow, My Billy Cunningham, the Great America and of course
Speaker 1: Reds Baseball kicks off in about an hour and a
Speaker 1: half in Boston. They had a suspended game. They're losing
Speaker 1: two to one in the fourth fifth. They're going to
Speaker 1: hopefully win two today. But until then, Vake Ramaswami, the
Speaker 1: man who would be governor, welcome again to the Bill
Speaker 1: Cunningham Show in veg. First of all, before we talk
Speaker 1: about property tax relief two point seventy five percent flat tax.
Speaker 1: Before we talk about overriding governmental governor's vetos some I'm
Speaker 1: sixty seven of them. Fundraising hall, I saw this in
Speaker 1: the Columbus Dispatch. A record was set by you in
Speaker 1: raising money to become the next governor of Ohio. Please
Speaker 1: tell the American people what happened.
Speaker 2: Well, look, I think we have unprecedented unity in our
Speaker 2: Republican party, Billy. At this point, I'm running unopposed in
Speaker 2: the Republican primary.
Speaker 3: We've achieved great unity.
Speaker 2: I've traveled over sixty of the counties in the state
Speaker 2: already in the last several months. We raised what no,
Speaker 2: Nine point seven million dollars in the first four months
Speaker 2: of this campaign, which sets a record and history of
Speaker 2: our state for what a first quarter of fundraising looks like.
Speaker 2: And yet at the same time, that's coming from bottom
Speaker 2: up donations forty thousand plus donors, and a lot of
Speaker 2: these are small dollar.
Speaker 3: Donors as well.
Speaker 2: To me, that shows a grassroots uprising that really says
Speaker 2: that we want to take our state to the next level.
Speaker 2: And that's the message that really is getting people aboard
Speaker 2: this campaign across the state, up and down. Billy is
Speaker 2: We're not just leading Ohio to be one of the
Speaker 2: best in the Midwest, because frankly, we are already the
Speaker 2: best in the Midwest. I'm in this toled Ohio to
Speaker 2: be the top state in the country, to raise a
Speaker 2: young family, to build a business, to give our kids
Speaker 2: a world class education. And the fact that as a
Speaker 2: first time statewide candidate here we're able to achieve this
Speaker 2: level of unity not just in our Republican party, but
Speaker 2: to have even in that base of donors many independents,
Speaker 2: many first time political donors, forty thousand of them. And
Speaker 2: to break fundraising records when you have seasoned political veterans
Speaker 2: that have historically been the ones who have run for governor,
Speaker 2: I think it just says a lot less about me,
Speaker 2: but more about the energy that we have in our
Speaker 2: state for this new vision.
Speaker 1: And Vivek, when you talk to the power brokers of
Speaker 1: which you're not a part, when I talk to those
Speaker 1: who have raised money for a long time, and some
Speaker 1: of the gray beards, they won a Republican party like
Speaker 1: a country club Republican party and not a cloth coat
Speaker 1: Republican party. When you say like, we're going to make
Speaker 1: the states so much better for those who've been entrenched
Speaker 1: in power for a long time, they don't want to
Speaker 1: hear that. They think the state's already wonderful, can't be
Speaker 1: any better. So when Viveke Ramaswami comes horizontally to politics,
Speaker 1: not vertically, some of the power brokers say, well, who
Speaker 1: the hell is this guy? Even though he was a
Speaker 1: valedictorian in the Senate class, he spent a lot of
Speaker 1: time out and out west. He's a billionaire and he's
Speaker 1: here now in Ohio. Who in the hell is the
Speaker 1: bag Ramaswami? Why does he think he can be the
Speaker 1: next governor? And we have a lineup of other shall
Speaker 1: we say, office holders ready to take over. Why does
Speaker 1: the vag Rama Swami want to do this? When you're
Speaker 1: a billionaire already.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Sometimes members of my family have asked me that
Speaker 2: question as well, Billy, But when you have a call
Speaker 2: to serve, you can't put that call back in the bottle, right,
Speaker 2: And I think we're each put here for a purpose.
Speaker 2: This country, in this state, frankly, has allowed me to
Speaker 2: achieve an American dream at a height that my parents
Speaker 2: would have never imagined when we were born and raised
Speaker 2: in Cincinnati, growing up in Westchester, and then growing up
Speaker 2: in Evendale, Ohio after that. This is what makes this
Speaker 2: country extraordinary is that now I'm in a position to
Speaker 2: lead that very state. After founding successful businesses, after marrying
Speaker 2: my wife, Aporva, who's one of the most successful throat surgeons.
Speaker 3: In the country, she's at Ohio State.
Speaker 2: She's lived the American dream, the kid of immigrants to
Speaker 2: this country who came here again with little to their name.
Speaker 2: The extraordinary thing about that story is that it's not
Speaker 2: that extraordinary in the United States of America, and I
Speaker 2: don't think it should be extraordinary in the state of
Speaker 2: Ohio either. I want every one of the kids born
Speaker 2: and raised in our state to be able to live
Speaker 2: that same American dream at even greater heights.
Speaker 3: Than I have. But that's going to.
Speaker 2: Take I think somebody who's willing to lead our state
Speaker 2: to the next level, somebody is willing to be ambitious.
Speaker 2: And I want to bring that sense of ambition back
Speaker 2: to our country, our culture, our state, our politics, to
Speaker 2: say that we're the state to put a man in
Speaker 2: the moon. We're the state that sent the first American
Speaker 2: into orbit around the Earth. We're the state that sent
Speaker 2: the Right Brothers to fly at a moment they were
Speaker 2: told to believe that was impossible. I think that ambition
Speaker 2: is part of our heritage as Ohio. It's part of
Speaker 2: our heritage as the United States of America. And I
Speaker 2: want us to aspire to more, to be more ambitious
Speaker 2: in education, in academics, to be more ambitious from science
Speaker 2: to the arts, to economic ambition, to even ambition in
Speaker 2: what we hope to achieve for our kids, Spiritually ambitious,
Speaker 2: morally ambitious in every domain of our life, to expect
Speaker 2: more of ourselves. And yet in order to do that,
Speaker 2: I don't think it's going to take a politician from
Speaker 2: yesterday's model of coming out on an assembly line that
Speaker 2: produces politicians that climb the rungs of a ladder and
Speaker 2: then end up in the seat of governor, inspiring their
Speaker 2: whole life.
Speaker 3: To do it. That has not been my life aspiration.
Speaker 3: I promise you that you bring up the same point
Speaker 3: in your question.
Speaker 2: I've never set up my whole life with the goal
Speaker 2: of being a governor or even being a politician. But
Speaker 2: I'm in this because I've lived that American dream. I
Speaker 2: think it's going to take a businessman and someone with
Speaker 2: an entrepreneur's mentality to bring that ambition of leading our
Speaker 2: state to the next level. And I'll be glad to
Speaker 2: work with many of the people, and we will work
Speaker 2: with many of the people who have that experience in
Speaker 2: our state to be able to not only bring the ambition,
Speaker 2: but actually get things done, like moving to zero income taxation,
Speaker 2: like putting a cap on property taxation, like lifting up
Speaker 2: our educational standards.
Speaker 3: I'm not just going to talk about it. Really, we're
Speaker 3: going to get it done.
Speaker 2: That's that's part of an entrepreneur's mentality too, and that
Speaker 2: requires working with many of those people who have been
Speaker 2: experienced in state government, most of whom are already supporting
Speaker 2: me in the state. But it's going to be that
Speaker 2: team effort led by a businessman, an entrepreneur, and at
Speaker 2: this point in our history, a political outsider at the
Speaker 2: top to help get Ohio to be the top state
Speaker 2: in the country, not just living in the shadow of
Speaker 2: Texas or Florida. If we do our jobs right, it's
Speaker 2: going to be Texas and Florida following Ohio's lead, not
Speaker 2: the other way around.
Speaker 1: Favek Ramaswami, you talk about a zero percent income tax.
Speaker 1: Right now, the state budget appears to be a flat
Speaker 1: tax of two point seventy five percent. And when I
Speaker 1: talk to Matt Huffman and others in Columbus, they tell
Speaker 1: me there's a potential catastrophe coming next year that you'll
Speaker 1: have to deal with, and that is that if Ohioans
Speaker 1: vote to eliminate all real estate taxes and vivek Ramaswami
Speaker 1: wants to eliminate all income taxes, I'm told by Huffman
Speaker 1: and others at these sales tax would have to be
Speaker 1: like twenty percent to make up the differential.
Speaker 3: There's such a thing as a pretty Look, there's a
Speaker 3: lot of extrapolation going on there.
Speaker 2: First of all, they're saying that if there's a new
Speaker 2: ballot measure that does eliminate the property tax. Obviously, in
Speaker 2: that scenario, we'd have to take a revised look. But
Speaker 2: the catastrophe that I see is actually the catastrophe of
Speaker 2: property taxes being way too high and burdening Ohioans in
Speaker 2: a way that too many of our politicians have ignored
Speaker 2: for too long. Correct And to be clear, I want
Speaker 2: to praise the legislature for getting to a flat income tax.
Speaker 2: I think that's a great step forward. But I also
Speaker 2: think that you know, at least as where we're sitting today,
Speaker 2: there is no major property tax reform that people have
Speaker 2: been clamoring for. And I do think that property tax
Speaker 2: reform is necessary. And so if people across the state
Speaker 2: are clamoring, and they are with good reasons, paying more
Speaker 2: in their property taxes than they do on the principle
Speaker 2: and interest repayments on their mortgage combined, that's unjust.
Speaker 3: It's Unamerican.
Speaker 2: It's antithetical to our values in Ohio. It's your land,
Speaker 2: not the governments. But when you're paying more in property
Speaker 2: taxes than you are on your principle and interest on
Speaker 2: your mortgage, it feels like the land that you own
Speaker 2: is really just the least from the government.
Speaker 3: And that's wrong.
Speaker 2: So it's the job of elected leaders to stand up
Speaker 2: and deliver that reform that are people need, that they're
Speaker 2: clamoring for. And if they don't, then you know what,
Speaker 2: the people are going to take it into their own
Speaker 2: hands and do it via constitutional amendment. But what I
Speaker 2: will say is that I'm prepared as governor to look
Speaker 2: to the future of bringing down property taxes, putting a
Speaker 2: ceiling on them, while also sensibly putting our state on
Speaker 2: the path to.
Speaker 3: Zero income tax.
Speaker 2: If that ballot measure passed, we'd obviously have to rethink
Speaker 2: the overall approach to tax policy.
Speaker 3: It'd be a zero property tax then.
Speaker 2: But my view is we have a coherent plan to
Speaker 2: both cap property taxes as well as to take income
Speaker 2: tax including capital gains taxation, down to zero in our
Speaker 2: state to make Ohio the most competitive state in the
Speaker 2: country for entrepreneurs and younger workers to move into to
Speaker 2: remain in. So many of our young people, Billy, you
Speaker 2: know this, they'll leave our state to pursue opportunity elsewhere
Speaker 2: after getting educated here. I want to turn that ship around,
Speaker 2: not by forcing them to stay here, but by making
Speaker 2: this so obviously the state where the best opportunities are
Speaker 2: available to them, and that means that we have to
Speaker 2: compete with Texas and Tennessee and Florida states that are
Speaker 2: zero income tax states. Today, so many of our people
Speaker 2: are flocking and I'm not going to be a governor
Speaker 2: of a state where people are leaving. I want to
Speaker 2: be a governor of a state where we have people
Speaker 2: and businesses moving in and moving back in. That's what
Speaker 2: motivates me to run, and it's a big part of
Speaker 2: why I think it is going to take someone coming
Speaker 2: from the outside to lead our state to the next level.
Speaker 2: A great state already, I want to give credit where.
Speaker 3: Credit is due.
Speaker 2: We're a great state, but great is not good enough.
Speaker 2: We want to be the greatest version of ourselves. And
Speaker 2: that's where I'm here to lead us.
Speaker 1: Serveg Ramaswami way of cities and collapse. Of course, you're
Speaker 1: a Cincinnati, and I think the last Cincinnati and we
Speaker 1: had his governor. It was probably John J. Gilligan, and
Speaker 1: I thought he ran a good funeral homes, but he
Speaker 1: was terrible. But nonetheless, you may not be aware of this,
Speaker 1: but Cincinnati is in the throes of a terrible crime
Speaker 1: wave in which every year, according to a shot Spotterer.
Speaker 1: There's about twenty thousand shots fired in the city of
Speaker 1: Cincinnati and about ten different zip codes. We have hundreds
Speaker 1: of people that are wounded. We had another rash of
Speaker 1: shootings last night. The night before we had five. We
Speaker 1: have a police force which is down one hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty cops. We have many judges that don't want to
Speaker 1: send people to prison. The governor's job I guess specifically
Speaker 1: about crime, and I would think Cleveland, Toledo, Dayton, Columbus.
Speaker 1: I don't know much about Columbus, but I assume it
Speaker 1: was not much different, just as his son of immigrants
Speaker 1: and a person of color. Why do we have such
Speaker 1: unspeakable violence in urban areas? Because we can't be a
Speaker 1: great city and great state unless we have great cities.
Speaker 1: And right now there's fleeting out of Cincinnati and Columbus
Speaker 1: and Dayton and Toledo and Cleveland. And what can you
Speaker 1: say to those that see crime as the way out
Speaker 1: of the circumstances in which they find themselves. We can't
Speaker 1: be a great state with lousy cities.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Well, look, I don't speak as a person of color,
Speaker 2: or as a Republican or any other label. Let's put
Speaker 2: it aside because I don't view everything through a racialized lens.
Speaker 2: What I view it through the lens of consense.
Speaker 3: Most Americans, I don't care whether you're black.
Speaker 2: White, brown, or anything in between. I don't even care
Speaker 2: whether you're a Democrat or Republican. Most Americans believe correctly
Speaker 2: that we're founded on the rule of law, and we've
Speaker 2: got to fly that rule of law even handily in
Speaker 2: all directions. And right now, the fact of the matter
Speaker 2: is the police in our cities are not fully equipped
Speaker 2: and able to do their jobs well. I don't want
Speaker 2: them to look over their shoulders the fear of being sued.
Speaker 2: I want them to be able to apply the rule
Speaker 2: of law regardless of I don't want people to bring
Speaker 2: any color focused or raised focused legs in a color
Speaker 2: blind way, in a neutral manner to restore law and
Speaker 2: order to actually apply the laws we already have on
Speaker 2: the books. In many cases, we don't need new laws. Arguably,
Speaker 2: I think in the country and even in the state,
Speaker 2: we have too many laws, and it's very confusing for
Speaker 2: people in ordinary citizens to follow them. What we need
Speaker 2: is simple laws that are actually enforced in an even
Speaker 2: handed way. I don't think that's too much to ask.
Speaker 2: This is not about left versus right. This is about
Speaker 2: up versus down. It's about common sentence, and that's certainly
Speaker 2: what I want to bring to the leadership of our state.
Speaker 2: But there, I say, Billie, hopefully in a way that
Speaker 2: sets the standard for other states across our country as well.
Speaker 2: I was in Los Angeles a couple of weeks ago
Speaker 2: the areas where buildings were being defaced. Earlier this month,
Speaker 2: I was in Minnesota as earlier this month, in the
Speaker 2: last month as well. Is are states where when I
Speaker 2: say we're the best in the Midwest, I can confirm
Speaker 2: that after having visited Minnesota, we are the best in
Speaker 2: the Midwest.
Speaker 3: But it's sad because I've had.
Speaker 2: A story from somebody who was in Minnesota who told
Speaker 2: me that he had had a hole in the glass
Speaker 2: of his car put there because of the bumper sticker
Speaker 2: he had in the back of his car.
Speaker 3: That's not America. That's not American.
Speaker 2: If we disagree with one another, let's settle it at
Speaker 2: the ballot box, through civil discourse and debate at our best,
Speaker 2: even getting together at the dinner table.
Speaker 3: At the end of it. That's the Cincinnati I grew
Speaker 3: up into.
Speaker 2: That's the Ohio I grew up into, and that's the
Speaker 2: Ohio in the America I want to bring back to
Speaker 2: our country. But it does start with an even handed
Speaker 2: enforcement of the rule of law. We're fully behind our police,
Speaker 2: were fully behind our sheriff's offices across the state, many
Speaker 2: of whom I've already visited with to bring back that
Speaker 2: common sense of law and order. Frankly, some of it
Speaker 2: starts even at a young age. Billy, one of the
Speaker 2: things I want to do in our educational reform is
Speaker 2: actually to give teachers, especially in our inner cities, something
Speaker 2: they've been clamoring for, something they've been asking for but
Speaker 2: have been falling on deaf ears. We have the ability
Speaker 2: to bring discipline back to the classroom many principles. Teachers
Speaker 2: no longer can discipline a student, even for issuing threats,
Speaker 2: sometimes even for physical violence that teachers' hands are tied.
Speaker 3: That wasn't that way in the nineteen nineties, and I
Speaker 3: think it's wrong today.
Speaker 2: I think we need it to be able to be
Speaker 2: a state of common sense that sets a standard for
Speaker 2: the United States. Eighty plus percent of US across the country,
Speaker 2: and I believe more than eighty plus percent of us
Speaker 2: in Ohio are rooting for that outcome.
Speaker 3: There's a governor.
Speaker 2: That's what I want to bring, not in a partisan way,
Speaker 2: but in a unifying way. Even as parents of children
Speaker 2: in the next generation, that's.
Speaker 3: Part of what we want for our kids.
Speaker 2: I'm a father of two sons, and I speak for
Speaker 2: my wife and I both when I say this is
Speaker 2: we want them to grow up into a country in
Speaker 2: a state where law and order is respected, where they're
Speaker 2: in an education system where there's a sense of order
Speaker 2: and discipline. That's part of what it means to be
Speaker 2: an educated citizen in the state of Ohio. That's part
Speaker 2: of what we're going to bring here, and it's a
Speaker 2: big part of why I'm in this race.
Speaker 1: Well, we have to run but a veg rama swamp.
Speaker 1: You've set records when it comes to fundraising, and we
Speaker 1: can't be a great nation when New York is run
Speaker 1: by a communist named mom Donnie that Johnson and Chicago
Speaker 1: is in complete collapse. The school system is awful. In
Speaker 1: Los Angeles, there's skid row and fornication and urin nation
Speaker 1: all over city streets. And there's ten cities one hundred
Speaker 1: thousand homeless and two hundred thousand gang members in the
Speaker 1: city of Los Angeles, and I wont Cincinnati, Columbus and Cleveland, Toledo, Dayton.
Speaker 1: I went to law school in Toledo to be shining
Speaker 1: cities on the hill and right now they're not. And
Speaker 1: it's said, we can't be a great state with lousy
Speaker 1: cities and viveke Ramaswami. We'll see what happens down the road.
Speaker 1: But once again, thanks for checking in to your hometown
Speaker 1: here in Cincinnati, and may God bless you and God
Speaker 1: bless America. I have a great Fourth of July you
Speaker 1: and your family, Thank you.
Speaker 3: Of AC Happy for my friend.
Speaker 1: Take care, God bless America. Let's continue with more your
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