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Ep. 44: A Family Ticket: Justin & Matthias Early on Running for Congress and the Texas House-Together
1 Playsin 19 hours
Most families argue about politics at the dinner table. The Early family put two names on the ballot instead. Justin Early — Army veteran, cybersecurity architect, and Democrat running in Texas's 31st Congressional District — is challenging 13-term Republican incumbent John Carter. His 21-year-old son, Matthias-Jonah Early, is running for Texas House District 20 against Republican incumbent Terry Wilson. This week, Kate and Alex sit down with both of them to talk about what it's like to run for office as father and son in the same election cycle — and what it'll take to flip two Republican-leaning districts north of Austin.
Plus: Kate saw The Odyssey on opening night in IMAX and loved watching audiences root for a flawed hero, Alex is (very carefully) avoiding Spider-Man spoilers ahead of a date night, Justin's summer garden and Sunday family card games are keeping him sane on the trail, and Matthias is just happy his dad lives two minutes away. Plus, a deep dive into the world of anime.
What we cover:
- Justin's path from voting for George W. Bush in his first election to Army veteran and Democratic organizer — and how growing up near Fort Hood during a deployment exodus shaped his politics
- Matthias's political awakening: a childhood medical crisis that revealed the true cost of healthcare, followed by the 2016 election
- Why the Early family is "all in" — Matthias volunteering for Justin's campaign, plus a stepmother who gives stump speeches for both candidates, a daughter running social media, and even siblings' girlfriends tracking opponents' primary content
- The 2025 Texas redistricting fight that pulled a heavily veteran, Black and brown community into TX-31 — and why that makes the district more winnable
- John Carter's crowded nine-candidate Republican primary, and why more GOP primary voters chose someone other than the incumbent
- Data centers and hyperscalers as a breakout 2026 campaign issue — water rights, local control, and surveillance capitalism
- A patient-outcome-based alternative to America's treatment-based healthcare system
- The "three hats" of running for office: candidate, business owner, and fundraiser — and Matthias's advice for first-time candidates
- Reaching Gen Z voters when the algorithm buries politics under car content (and neither candidate had social media before running)
- What it'll actually take to flip Texas by 2030: map, math, and mobilization
Support the show:
Love what we're doing? Become a member at patreon.com/missiontexaspodcast — just a few dollars a month keeps independent Texas media alive. And if you can't spare the cash, a five-star review goes just as far. God bless Texas. 🤠
Support the Early Family:
https://votematthiasearly.com/
https://www.votejustinearly.com/
Recommended
Transcript
Intro
The Early Family's Political Campaigns
00:00:13
Alexander Clark
Most families argue about politics around the dinner table. The Early family put in two names on the ballot. Justin Early, an Army veteran, cybersecurity architect, and Democrat running in Texas's 31st congressional district, is challenging longtime Republican Congressman John Carter.
00:00:31
Alexander Clark
Boo.
00:00:32
Kate Rumsey
Boo.
00:00:32
Alexander Clark
justin ah Justin's 21-year-old son, Matthias Jonah Early, is running for Texas House in District 20 against Republican incumbent Terry Wilson. Also, boo.
00:00:44
Kate Rumsey
Boo.
00:00:45
Alexander Clark
These two candidates are part of a very engaged political family. And this is not only a story about father and son. It's ah it's about the family labor behind the campaign and whether this family can persuade two Republican-leaning districts to try something different.
00:01:00
Alexander Clark
And just as a personal point of privilege, I will say that I've known in Justin for about a dozen years because back in 2014, when I was working on the Wendy Davis campaign, I got to stay at his house.
00:01:13
Alexander Clark
Small world.
00:01:13
Kate Rumsey
Wow.
00:01:14
Alexander Clark
Yeah.
00:01:14
Justin Early
Yeah, that's great.
00:01:15
Alexander Clark
So welcome. Welcome to Mission, Texas.
00:01:18
Matthias Early
I'm sure I was there at some point.
00:01:18
Justin Early
Thank you very much.
00:01:19
Matthias Early
I would have been 10. Yeah. ten yeah
00:01:22
Kate Rumsey
hu
00:01:25
Kate Rumsey
It's always a game of who knows Alex on this podcast. He's so the self-professed Kevin Bacon of Texas politics.
00:01:31
Alexander Clark
I'm the Kevin Bacon of Texas Democratic politics.
00:01:32
Kate Rumsey
So I love that.
00:01:34
Justin Early
That is phenomenal, though.
00:01:36
Kate Rumsey
yeah um But it's good to meet you I'm glad that I'm meeting y'all. It is such a family affair for politics and it definitely resonates with me. My family helped me in my race.
00:01:47
Kate Rumsey
So we wanted to hear about all your your races.
00:01:50
Justin Early
Yeah. Matthias, you want to kick off first or you want me to go first?
00:01:53
Alexander Clark
Well, before we jump into your races, I want to back up to the beginning.
00:01:54
Matthias Early
Yep.
Justin's Political Awakening
00:01:57
Alexander Clark
So obviously I've known you for a long time, but let's back it up.
00:01:57
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:02:01
Alexander Clark
That probably wasn't the first time you've ever been involved.
00:02:02
Justin Early
Okay.
00:02:04
Justin Early
No, it was not.
00:02:05
Alexander Clark
how How did you become a political person?
00:02:06
Justin Early
No.
00:02:07
Alexander Clark
Because political people are weird. We we are a rare group of people.
00:02:09
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:02:11
Kate Rumsey
Hmm.
00:02:11
Alexander Clark
In a midterm like the one we're in right now, we're talking like nine out of 10 Texans don't even vote in a primary. So how did you become one of these primary people?
00:02:18
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:02:21
Justin Early
Great question. So, you know, i wasn't really raised a very political and a political family, um but politics was always surrounding us, you know. um ah You know, my my parents are black.
00:02:33
Justin Early
My parents are both in the military.
00:02:34
Alexander Clark
right.
00:02:35
Justin Early
And so things that affected us were always something that happened in policy that would affect us back at home. And that conversation would come up, but it wasn't really at the policy itself. It was more of the effect of what those things were. I joined the Army right out of high school.
00:02:50
Justin Early
um Well, let me back up a little bit. My father was stationed at Fort Hood in Killeen, which is actually part of the district. And right before Desert Storm Desert Shield, they moved away from Killeen down to Leander, which is just south of it about 45 minutes south.
00:03:06
Justin Early
and i don't know if anybody, you guys have ever been around a military installation when there's a mass exodus. um It is a ghost town. It is really, i joke, the only thing that open are liquor stores and pawn shops because it is just a ghost town.
00:03:18
Justin Early
And my father and mother didn't want us to suffer through those things. And so that was really, i would say, my first real introduction to understanding what could happen. But very shortly thereafter, i got a knock on my door.
00:03:31
Justin Early
Um, and, uh, it was JJ pickle. He was block walking my neighborhood and I got a little pickle. It was awesome. I thought I was the coolest kid in school when I went to school at 10 years old to explain how this happened.
00:03:43
Justin Early
Um, I joined the army and then right the army, mm-hmm.
00:03:44
Alexander Clark
Wait, sorry. Can I interrupt you for just just a minute? Did you just say a politician handed you a pickle?
00:03:51
Justin Early
A pickle, yes.
00:03:52
Alexander Clark
Like an actual edible pickle?
00:03:52
Justin Early
J.J. Pickle had these little – they were like not stuffed pickles, but they were tiny like – it was like a little campaign deal, right? um
00:04:02
Matthias Early
Like a little squishy thing?
00:04:03
Alexander Clark
Campaign dill?
00:04:03
Justin Early
Yeah, squishy pickle.
00:04:03
Matthias Early
Yeah.
00:04:04
Justin Early
Thank you. Yeah, dill.
00:04:05
Alexander Clark
Did you?
00:04:05
Justin Early
There you go.
00:04:05
Alexander Clark
Okay, sorry.
00:04:06
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:04:07
Alexander Clark
I interrupted.
00:04:08
Justin Early
And so – no.
00:04:08
Alexander Clark
And then you joined the army. Go on. I'm sorry.
00:04:10
Justin Early
And then I joined the Army, yeah. But I joined the Army myself, and when I first joined the Army, it was very much you know the Republicans serve the the veterans, and if you want to keep your paycheck or anything like that, you want to vote a Republican in.
Matthias's Early Political Influence
00:04:25
Justin Early
And so my very first election, I did vote for George W. Bush. And shortly thereafter, I recognized that that was probably not the right answer for the livelihood and everything else we were doing because those people who say they support the veterans from that perspective really support the people who make the weapons of war, not necessarily the people who you know actually serve in the military.
00:04:46
Alexander Clark
and And I'm sorry to clarify here.
00:04:46
Justin Early
um
00:04:47
Justin Early
So after, yeah.
00:04:47
Alexander Clark
Are we talking George Bush Sr., George Bush W., governor or president?
00:04:53
Justin Early
W, the younger, yeah. The governor who became the president, yes.
00:04:56
Alexander Clark
Okay, you voted for governor, but okay.
00:04:58
Justin Early
No, I voted for President Bush as when he became from governor to Bush. and So 2000, the 2000 election was my first presidential lettering.
00:05:02
Alexander Clark
Got it. So 2000, right? and who can Who can forget the the election of 2000? Oof.
00:05:09
Justin Early
Correct. That was my first one.
00:05:10
Alexander Clark
oh
00:05:10
Justin Early
And so um you know I realized thereafter that it was like – the The people who actually get the weapons of war were the ones were getting all the benefits from those who said support you know um the veterans and the warfighter.
00:05:25
Justin Early
So then I kind of flipped it up and said, hey, I need to do something that's more serene around people, centered around working families. And I started volunteering for the Democratic Party in various avenues. Yeah.
00:05:36
Justin Early
I did a lot of volunteering for a lot of campaigns. Wendy Davis' campaign, Beto O'Rourke's campaign. um i worked on other congressional campaigns in and around the Fort Worth, Tarrant County area.
00:05:48
Justin Early
And um then I moved back here to fort or to Georgetown. And I said, i want to be close to my parents. And Here in the area, i had recognized the same problems that I had seen in Killeen when I was 10 years old.
00:06:03
Justin Early
um It's still happening today. And for such a pro- pro-veteran, pro-soldier congressman, as John Carter purports himself to be, the policies that he signed or didn't sign really did not reflect that.
00:06:17
Justin Early
um He does a lot. He says he does a lot for Fort Hood, but that really just pays the contractors who build things on Fort Hood. you know He says he does a lot of things for veterans, and he built a veterans memorial, and But at the same time, he's enacting um laws and rules that actually allow soldiers to go to die. And he's not preventing that as well. And so I said, you know what, if somebody really wanted to stand up for veterans, who better than somebody who served themselves? I just want to make sure the voice got out there and I did my best. And now I'm sitting in front of you here today.
00:06:48
Kate Rumsey
right, Matthias, what about you?
00:06:49
Alexander Clark
Yeah. That
00:06:51
Kate Rumsey
Were you persuaded by that experience? What got you into your race?
00:06:55
Matthias Early
So my political life, I'll say I was eight years old. That was the first like political thing that happened to me, which was the run for, in 2012, Obama versus Mitt Romney.
00:07:01
Justin Early
Thank you.
00:07:07
Matthias Early
We a little mock election in my ah elementary school.
00:07:11
Alexander Clark
would have been like your third grade class.
00:07:13
Matthias Early
Yes, yeah. So I remember that.
00:07:14
Alexander Clark
Okay.
00:07:16
Matthias Early
and I remember being interested because I had one side of the family that was very, you know, Mitt Romney, Barack Obama, they didn't know. Then one side of the family was like, absolutely, we're voting for Barack Obama.
00:07:27
Matthias Early
That was this side of the family fought with. So as time went on, I didn't really pay attention to attention until 2012. I got very sick. I became septic and i was very close to death.
00:07:43
Matthias Early
I was in the hospital for the next three weeks and then I had to have a permanent IV ball, PICC line it's called, connected to my arm for the next six months. And after all that was said and done, my father had told me about the cost of health care and how that hospital visit itself, not even the procedures afterwards, was well over a million dollars.
00:08:06
Matthias Early
And my thought immediately went to, okay, but what about the other kids who they don't have health insurance? Their parents, you know, aren't able to provide that life for them. How much different would my experience have been?
00:08:18
Matthias Early
And incidentally, whenever I was 12 years old, this was the first Trump run in 2016. So the experiences of one, my political life beginning really at the Trump term, and then also understanding what it was like, how politics had already affected my life at the young age of 12, I began getting interested.
00:08:41
Matthias Early
and everybody around you know me and school, blah, blah, blah. It was always, oh Hillary Clinton, brought ah Trump, they're both terrible presidents. They'd both be awful. And I didn't know enough to know what that meant.
00:08:53
Matthias Early
But as I've gotten older, I've realized that when people say it's just you know between two ah bad options, they don't realize how strong their vote is. They don' realize realize how strong their voice is.
00:09:04
Matthias Early
Because one, you have more options. It's not just the presidentials, it's the midterms, it's the city council races.
00:09:10
Justin Early
Mm-hmm.
00:09:10
Matthias Early
And your option for who you want to see on that ballot in November comes in the primaries. It comes in March. So the the vote, yes, but you also have your voice, you have time, you have energy, you have volunteerships. There's so much you can do.
00:09:25
Matthias Early
And that leads me to 2018, when my father was very excited about Butter Orch's first run. And they were out volunteering. helped out a little bit. And I started to become more aware.
00:09:39
Matthias Early
Every Sunday, my parents always watched Meet the Press. If it's Sunday, it's Meet the Press. um
00:09:44
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:09:45
Matthias Early
My mother, my biological mother, my father lived an hour away. So every time my father would drive us to school, he would always play NPR, the morning show, morning news. oh So then as as that 2018 started to ramp up, I started to become more aware of what my father did in his everyday life and how what he did in his political life, what he did to try to help the candidates he believed in.
00:10:08
Matthias Early
And so now Beto O'Rourke was not only the first person I helped volunteer for at 14 years old, he's also the first person I voted for at 18, 2022. Yes.
00:10:18
Kate Rumsey
Oh, my God. How cool is that?
00:10:21
Matthias Early
yes
00:10:21
Kate Rumsey
Well, Justin, how do you feel listening to that and also seeing your son run?
00:10:21
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:10:25
Kate Rumsey
Like, is this this a proud papa moment or are you like, whoa, I want to protect ah my son from doing this?
00:10:35
Justin Early
All the above, you know, all the above. um I'm so very proud of him. You know, i could not be prouder. He's just making his own lane in life. He's doing the best he can.
00:10:46
Justin Early
um You know, he hears, I hear his story and he talks about what he's experienced with me. And my thought is I'm just glad he was there to absorb. Right. Yeah. parents teach you two things. They teach you what you want to do and what you don't want to do.
00:11:01
Justin Early
And I'm just very proud to hear that he's chosen so many things that he's liked but in his past for me to say, this is what I want to do. So I'm very proud of him. I'm very proud of that.
00:11:11
Matthias Early
I'll also say, i my father, he knows how to pick his battles. And I think he knows i would be doing something like this regardless. I was always going to be.
00:11:20
Justin Early
Yeah. Yeah.
00:11:20
Kate Rumsey
Mwahaha!
00:11:20
Matthias Early
Yeah.
00:11:21
Alexander Clark
Couldn't talk him out of it, huh?
00:11:22
Matthias Early
Yeah.
00:11:24
Alexander Clark
And my parents couldn't talk me out of joining the Air Force. And i will also echo this idea that like you you either want to be your parents or you want to be like 180 degrees. And so good on you for being the former.
00:11:34
Justin Early
Correct, yeah.
00:11:36
Alexander Clark
ah
00:11:37
Justin Early
Thank you.
00:11:38
Alexander Clark
Not everybody can say that as a dad. So that's great.
00:11:41
Justin Early
well, thank you. we've We've worked really hard with our children, and they're you know I'd say that there are varying levels of capitalism, um but I think they're all wonderful people, and they're all trying their hardest to make a difference in the world, and i'm proud of that.
00:11:54
Alexander Clark
It's amazing. Well,
Justin Runs for Congress
00:11:56
Alexander Clark
let's hear more about these races in particular. I mean, why, why why these, why now?
00:12:00
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:12:03
Alexander Clark
What, what, what, what got you jumping in and, uh, the midterms here in 2026?
00:12:03
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:12:08
Justin Early
Great question. So you know after 2024, I'm a hopeless optimist. 2016, I said people are not going to vote for Donald Trump.
00:12:19
Justin Early
I have more faith in humanity, more faith in the American people. um I was proven wrong. And then in 2024, I said the same thing, ah because if not, it's going to be detrimental to seniors, to healthcare, to women, um to minorities, to, I mean, you you name it, you know, it's going to be different. um And then again, it happened again.
00:12:40
Justin Early
and in 2024 in November, I definitely hit a slump. Um, I was in my fields. I didn't know what to do. And I said, I'm just going to take everything I have and try to make a change in my area and my neighborhood for my neighbors. Um, the doge cuts started happening.
00:12:58
Justin Early
Um, my parents received, um, over a seat, see about 80% of their income from the federal government. Um, ice was ramping up and, you know, picking up our neighbors off of the streets.
00:13:09
Justin Early
Um, Seniors were getting you know more expensive health care, and in the big, beautiful bill stripped all the protections away in the Affordable Care Act. And this was just something I think if – it would spurn almost everybody and anybody in my eyes to stand up and do something.
00:13:26
Justin Early
And I said, let me just take my talents, my blessings that I have, and at least get my voice heard to say we need to move this party. We need to motivate people um because Texas is not a red state. You said it was a very red or Republican district.
00:13:40
Justin Early
I believe it's a very non-voting state. And in my calculus of running for this position, i looked at all the past um candidates who ran in the Democratic primary for here.
00:13:51
Justin Early
And I said, very few of them were very motivational. Very few of them were talking to people to say, how can we actually be with you to make things better in your life? And so i said, that's something I can talk to because that's absolutely what I want. And looked at it, how can we move do move things around and then get it done? And then we had a 2025 redistricting.
00:14:11
Justin Early
And that actually opened up the race more for me. It made it more competitive because prior to 2025, Colleen, very um colleen which a very Black and brown ah community, very veteran heavy community was not in this district.
00:14:26
Justin Early
And once that was redistricted and Supreme Court said, we're just going to wait to the election. I said, what a better opportunity for a young you know veteran who is in this area, um who is a minority to run for this area in this district.
00:14:41
Justin Early
um I live in I work in tech. I live in the southern part of the district. um There's a lot of tech people who live here, and in they're concerned about their jobs. AI is a big concern for me as well, and happens what happens to people's jobs. um Veterans benefits, we have veterans hospitals in this area.
00:14:57
Justin Early
Very big concerns for me that I can speak directly to, and not just talk about these issues that we see on TV, but talk directly to voters and constituents on here's how we can make your life better. And I said, hey, you know what?
00:15:09
Justin Early
Let's just try our hardest and put everything on the table and try. And so today um yeah i did I won the primary, which is phenomenal. I'm i'm very glad this the voters heard my voice and my message and supported me. But I tell people it takes three things to win this district to flip it.
00:15:24
Justin Early
And that's the map, which the Republicans have made more competitive for us. um It's the math, which is the people who are here getting them out to go vote. and We saw that in the primary where we had 55,000 people vote in the Democratic primary for this district alone.
00:15:40
Justin Early
That was unheard of. That never happened before. um But also the mobilization. We've got to take that energy, that math and the map that we have, and mobilize people and get them out on the ground. And that's something I've been doing you know since before I met you, Alex, right? Just trying to get people involved.
00:15:55
Justin Early
and in politics and understanding how it affects their life. And so that is how we're going to win this district. And that is who I talk to. and That's what I talk to people every day about, about doing these things. And so far it's working. so
00:16:08
Kate Rumsey
I have a curiosity. i was doing research on this race, Justin, before we get into Matthias's.
Election Strategies and Challenges
00:16:12
Kate Rumsey
But what's going on with the Republican side? I saw a big primary. Like, what what the heck is going on in that side of this race?
00:16:17
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:16:19
Matthias Early
Yeah.
00:16:21
Justin Early
John Carter is a 13-term incumbent. He served for 23 years. And a lot of people on the Republican side feel that it's time for a change. It's time for somebody new in there.
00:16:32
Justin Early
um He actually himself, um I don't believe he wanted to run this term, but he was asked to run again. um So they had a very crowded primary. There were nine people that ran against John Carter.
00:16:45
Justin Early
And more people voted for someone other than John Carter than the people who voted for John Carter in the primary.
00:16:50
Alexander Clark
Another reason why we need ranked choice voting immediately, because it sounds like not John Carter would have won.
00:16:50
Kate Rumsey
Wow.
00:16:50
Justin Early
um
00:16:53
Kate Rumsey
Yeah.
00:16:53
Matthias Early
Yes, absolutely.
00:16:53
Justin Early
Absolutely. Absolutely. Not John Carter would have absolutely won.
00:16:57
Kate Rumsey
Yeah.
00:16:58
Justin Early
And so that right there, that that math, that calculus right there would have really but boiled down to um a change, right? That's what it boils down to.
00:17:09
Justin Early
People want a change. And when you look at from the, you know, over high on from the you know whole system of the United States, like which races are competitive, they don't see this race as competitive because they don't see because the system is built for an incumbent.
00:17:22
Justin Early
But if we actually put the ground game in, do the actual work, he is one of the weaker Republicans here to go against because his own party thinks so. And so that's where I think it's important to to focus on this race.
00:17:34
Alexander Clark
Well, and Justin, ah from dad to dad, i have to ask, is part of your ground game plan to get them to vote on election day or to get them to vote early?
00:17:46
Justin Early
they Definitely vote early for Justin early, vote early for Matthias early. That's something we say a lot. So yes.
00:17:52
Kate Rumsey
Yes.
00:17:53
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:17:54
Matthias Early
I also like to tell people, voting election day is voting late. You should have already voted by now.
00:17:59
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:18:00
Matthias Early
Yeah.
00:18:00
Alexander Clark
Well, here's a hack for all of our listeners.
00:18:01
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:18:03
Alexander Clark
If you don't like being bothered during election season, vote on the first day of early voting because then that gets you off the list.
00:18:12
Justin Early
yeah
00:18:12
Kate Rumsey
Yeah, they stopped talking to you. Yeah.
00:18:14
Alexander Clark
It makes them more efficient with their time and it stops you from being bothered.
00:18:21
Matthias Early
Yes.
00:18:21
Justin Early
Agreed. People don't realize that we do watch when people do or don't vote. and it's like, hey, you're a voter and you haven't voted yet. Let's get a hold of you to make sure you go vote.
00:18:29
Matthias Early
Yes.
00:18:29
Justin Early
so yeah.
00:18:30
Alexander Clark
Especially if you consider yourself a ah safe democratic vote and you want these campaigns to spend their time more effectively.
00:18:30
Matthias Early
Oh
00:18:36
Alexander Clark
That's the best thing you can do is just go vote early.
00:18:37
Justin Early
Agreed.
00:18:38
Matthias Early
yeah,
00:18:39
Alexander Clark
And speaking of voting early, there's more than one early to vote for. So how about you?
00:18:43
Matthias Early
absolutely.
00:18:43
Alexander Clark
Tell us about your race.
00:18:45
Matthias Early
So my race, I got involved in 2024.
Matthias's Career Shift to Politics
00:18:51
Matthias Early
I had already, I wanted to be a doctor actually since i was eight years old, side note. and Whenever I started working in the emergency room, whenever I started working as an EMT, as a phlebotomist in these different fields, I realized the issue wasn't that there's not enough healthcare care providers, it's that there's issue in our politics.
00:19:04
Justin Early
Thank
00:19:09
Matthias Early
There's too much money in our politics, there's too much corruption as far as the cost of healthcare or the cost of prescription drugs. So I changed my major political science and I started working on these campaigns. I started doing all this stuff.
00:19:22
Matthias Early
And i will say the likelihood I felt that Donald Trump would win in 2024 mirrored my mental health of all of 2024. And the confidence as after the infamous debate between him and Biden, I was just in the slumps.
00:19:39
Matthias Early
Then he won in 2024. I can tell you exactly where I was at, what I was doing, what time it was. And i just cried my eyes out. I was in my car and I was just sad.
00:19:51
Matthias Early
So whenever he gets inaugurated, everything started happening. Everything, everything, everything.
00:19:57
Justin Early
Immediately.
00:19:57
Matthias Early
Ramesa Ozturk, if you remember in the early 2024, she was the Muslim woman. Seven, eight ICE agents came out masked and kidnapped her. um And every every day I'm like, you know, calling my father, this crazy thing happened, this crazy thing happened.
00:20:12
Matthias Early
And then one day he calls me and he says, you know, I think I'm gonna run for Congress. So I know my father, you know, he does what he says. So I'm like, all right, well, I've been working on these campaigns. I've been, you know, political science major.
00:20:26
Matthias Early
I want to come down and support my father. So I come down here and I'm meeting with people. I'm also a very, you know, people person. I like going around. And I was very in tune with Texas politics.
00:20:41
Matthias Early
I saw the Texas voucher system um you know ramp up. I saw all the attacks on the transgender community, on the migrant community, and I wanted something to be done.
00:20:52
Matthias Early
But I was you know still 20 years old at the time, so was like you know I don't wanna step on any toes. i you know i felt I felt weird about getting into this space. And then so many other people have kept saying, you know I'll run for House District 20 if nobody else runs. I'll run if nobody else runs. I thought that's not a reason to run. You should run because you're passionate about what's going on in Texas politics, because you're angry about what's going in Texas politics.
00:21:15
Matthias Early
And my father, the ever supportive father that he is, said, you know, maybe you should run.
00:21:19
Justin Early
Thank you.
00:21:22
Matthias Early
And it was such a light bulb because it was something I didn't even consider. But then it was, yes, I need to run. I don't want to just... It wasn't about you know riding the blue wave to me. It wasn't about just trying to get this position.
00:21:36
Matthias Early
It was the fact that I am 21 years old. I know I can bring a new type of person to the polls in a year that we need more people in the polls.
00:21:42
Kate Rumsey
Yeah.
00:21:45
Matthias Early
So that's, I didn't just want to be, it wasn't just about winning the election. It was about moving the democratic base, moving the younger people to see that there was somebody like them who stood up for what younger people believe.
00:21:59
Matthias Early
And that's kicked off this whole thing. And I'll say this is one of the most winnable districts in Texas. um Terry Wilson, my opponent, he's not, you know, the extreme, you know, out there Republican doing all this crazy stuff.
00:22:14
Matthias Early
But he is absolutely for the Republican policies. He voted for the gerrymandering. He voted for the school vouchers. He's voted against the migrant community. He's been very MAGA in that way, I'll say.
00:22:26
Matthias Early
And I can say the election has gone amazing and terrible at the same time. I met so many people. I've knocked so many doors. But i can tell you, fundraising is a headache and a half, which I'm sure is somebody who's run, is.
00:22:42
Kate Rumsey
Yeah.
00:22:42
Justin Early
Mm-hmm.
00:22:44
Kate Rumsey
Yeah. No fun.
00:22:45
Matthias Early
It is no fun.
00:22:47
Kate Rumsey
ah
00:22:48
Matthias Early
But it's exciting.
00:22:48
Kate Rumsey
Well, I'm just curious, Matthias, I started jump in here, but what one of my fears is that there are a lot of candidates or future candidates out there who really want to run and yet don't know how. They don't even know how to start.
00:23:02
Kate Rumsey
And they're just like, how does one even begin? and so I'm wondering, was there a roadmap that your just your dad, Justin, was able to help you or provide you with? And are there any lessons learned that you'd give people to say, like, you can do it? Like, you you can get out there and you can run?
00:23:17
Matthias Early
Yes, I'll say so. My father, I feel like, and I have very much supported each other um from a, you know, I can get people interested with 21 years old. He's got different connections and meets new people being the congressional member.
00:23:31
Matthias Early
So the first thing is you have to be able to build relationships first with the other candidates who are running because they will have resources and they will fall upon things that you never knew were there. But also, I had worked on other campaigns, but I can tell you it was nothing like being the candidate.
00:23:48
Matthias Early
And people will tell you, you know raise money, raise money, raise money. People will tell you, you know this this is the best plan to win, this' is the best plan to win. And at the end of the day, you need to listen to yourself.
00:23:59
Matthias Early
You listen to know what you need to do, what you need what you need to work on And it takes money, but also takes time. It takes work, it takes effort. And it's something you never really know how to do until you do it.
00:24:13
Matthias Early
And thats that's the unfortunate side of it. but You need to, if you're going to run, I say my recommendation is to start running as soon as possible. So you get used to that feeling, you get used to those spaces, but also you won't know what's the best course of action until you actually get close to the election.
00:24:31
Matthias Early
So build up money and build up connections as much as you can before the November.
00:24:37
Alexander Clark
That's a lot. And, uh, you know, I think it's ah often a thankless job. So I'll just want to say thank you to both of you for stepping up and putting your name on the ballot. Cause it is, it is a lot harder than it looks.
00:24:49
Alexander Clark
I mean, just being on the, like you said, like being on a campaign, you can see it that it's hard, but to be the candidate, I mean, gosh, put your name on the line and to, no, I know.
00:24:58
Kate Rumsey
You're the only one that doesn't know what it's like, Alex. So the three of us.
00:25:00
Alexander Clark
Well, yeah, I've never been on a, on a real Texas ballot before.
00:25:01
Justin Early
yeah
00:25:05
Kate Rumsey
Despite being the Kevin Bacon. um
00:25:06
Alexander Clark
Despite, yeah.
00:25:07
Kate Rumsey
But you I had heard that.
00:25:08
Justin Early
There's always time. There's time.
00:25:10
Kate Rumsey
Yeah, I heard that in Sherman, Texas, you were asked to run. So was that right?
00:25:14
Alexander Clark
It's true. well No, no, I didn't.
00:25:15
Kate Rumsey
Yeah.
00:25:17
Alexander Clark
I wasn't asked to run. I wanted to run, but then i I realized that didn't make sense. So I got someone else to do it. And I was his campaign manager until I left.
00:25:23
Justin Early
Hmm.
00:25:25
Alexander Clark
This is before I started teaching for context for you two.
00:25:26
Justin Early
Hmm.
00:25:29
Kate Rumsey
See, i we have to mention Sherman, Texas in every episode. And so I won that.
00:25:32
Alexander Clark
I haven't yet.
00:25:33
Kate Rumsey
Yeah. I won that bet.
00:25:35
Alexander Clark
my shirt My shirt says it.
00:25:35
Kate Rumsey
I got to...
00:25:37
Alexander Clark
It's right here.
00:25:38
Justin Early
Nice.
00:25:38
Alexander Clark
It's Sherman right there.
00:25:39
Matthias Early
Yeah.
00:25:40
Justin Early
I tell people, you know, being a, you know, running a congressional campaign is you're you're three different, you three hats at least, but I say three hats. Hat number one, you're the candidate. That's what everybody sees, you know, speech, speech, speech, kissing babies. That's what everybody sees. Right.
00:25:54
Alexander Clark
How many babies have you kissed so far?
00:25:55
Justin Early
um I haven't kissed any babies. I try to stay away from babies.
00:25:59
Alexander Clark
Okay.
00:25:59
Justin Early
They're, you know, there's a germs.
00:25:59
Kate Rumsey
like germs post COVID.
00:26:00
Alexander Clark
that's ah That's an old...
00:26:01
Kate Rumsey
Yeah.
00:26:01
Justin Early
Yeah. Yeah.
00:26:02
Alexander Clark
That's out now. No more handing out pickles.
00:26:02
Kate Rumsey
Yeah.
00:26:03
Kate Rumsey
ah so
00:26:03
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:26:04
Alexander Clark
No more baby kissing.
00:26:05
Kate Rumsey
Yeah.
00:26:06
Justin Early
Yeah, yeah.
00:26:07
Alexander Clark
i want to know what the new campaign, like because Matthias, you're talking about like, we're going get the new people.
00:26:07
Matthias Early
There's this old.
00:26:08
Matthias Early
Yes.
00:26:12
Alexander Clark
Like, I know what like cutting edge young people targeting looked like back in like 2008. Right. I have no idea what that looks like today. So what, what, how do you reach these people?
00:26:24
Alexander Clark
What, what are the, the
Running a Campaign: The Multi-Hat Challenge
00:26:25
Alexander Clark
tactical strategies here?
00:26:25
Kate Rumsey
Well, Before we go there, let Justin finish his three
00:26:29
Alexander Clark
Yeah. Sorry. I apologize.
00:26:30
Justin Early
oh Oh, yeah, it's all good.
00:26:30
Kate Rumsey
excited.
00:26:31
Alexander Clark
Your three hats.
00:26:31
Justin Early
Yeah, the three hacks.
00:26:32
Alexander Clark
Three hats first, and then I want i want to know.
00:26:33
Kate Rumsey
we're so excited Gen z yeah.
00:26:35
Justin Early
Oh, no, no. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:26:37
Matthias Early
I'll say my, but sorry, actually to interrupt you, Papa.
00:26:37
Justin Early
So you're the candidate and things go for it.
00:26:40
Matthias Early
we There's this running joke we always talk about, because we're both candidates, and there's this old show called Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law.
00:26:40
Justin Early
Yeah, yeah i know what you're going say.
00:26:46
Alexander Clark
Yes! Yes!
00:26:46
Matthias Early
And yeah, and in one of the episodes, he becomes, he runs for president, and he goes shake hand, kiss baby, shake hand, kiss baby.
00:26:47
Kate Rumsey
but
00:26:47
Justin Early
Yes.
00:26:53
Matthias Early
But he gets it mixed up, and he goes, shake baby, kiss hand, shake baby.
00:26:55
Alexander Clark
Yes!
00:26:56
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:26:56
Matthias Early
Yeah. So sometimes we go, yeah, shake babies and kissing hands, that's what we do.
00:26:57
Alexander Clark
I love that show so much.
00:26:57
Justin Early
So we we do say, yeah, to to through each other, yeah, to each other we say,
00:27:01
Alexander Clark
You can still watch it on HBO Max, by the way.
00:27:01
Matthias Early
Yeah.
00:27:04
Justin Early
Yeah, we do every once while.
00:27:05
Alexander Clark
Okay.
00:27:06
Justin Early
Yeah. To each other we say got to shake babies and kiss hands.
00:27:08
Matthias Early
Yeah
00:27:08
Justin Early
um
00:27:09
Alexander Clark
Please don't.
00:27:11
Justin Early
Yeah. The second thing is you're a business owner essentially, right? You got to build a team. You got to manage people. you have to know what everybody's doing, whatre what what the outcomes are going to be.
00:27:23
Justin Early
And then the third one is a fundraiser. You have to be able to go out there and grab money, you know, in order to do all these activities. um And a lot of people see the first one and like, oh, I can talk to people or they think, oh, I can i can get people around me and and do these things.
00:27:36
Justin Early
But it's difficult to wear all three hats and especially at the same time. And I think that's one thing that people should recognize is that you need to actually have a plan to do all three in order to be a successful candidate. I'm not successful yet. I'm still um still running. so
00:27:52
Matthias Early
I'll also add to that, the it's not just about being the candidate, but so much of our modern politics is about the attention economy.
00:27:52
Kate Rumsey
Lessons learned.
00:28:00
Matthias Early
And the more attention you have, the more attention you can hold on to.
00:28:00
Justin Early
attention.
00:28:05
Matthias Early
that's That's your power as a candidate and as a politician. And you have to be good at forming those coalitions. You have to be good at getting people interested or excited to even be the candidate, much less to be the politician.
00:28:15
Justin Early
and
00:28:18
Kate Rumsey
Well, skipping to Alex's question, I mean, I'm an elder millennial and I don't want to guess Justin's age, but I might be the oldest person here. But like how are you reaching folks in your from your generation, Matthias? I mean, is it through TikTok? Is it through Instagram? Like, how are you thinking that we should communicate to folks like you?
00:28:39
Matthias Early
So here's here's the secret people on the campaign trail, they always assume, oh, you're 21, you know, you know how to like reach all the TikTok and Instagram social media. I didn't have any social media before I started this campaign.
00:28:50
Kate Rumsey
ha
00:28:51
Matthias Early
So that itself was a learning curve, but
00:28:55
Alexander Clark
Do you think that's probably indicative of your generation though? Like, do you think people are opting out?
00:29:00
Matthias Early
It's possible. I'd definitely say i have friends who they're on TikTok or theyre like on Instagram, but a lot of it, because of the strength of the algorithm, it doesn't ever cross over to political stuff.
00:29:13
Matthias Early
They want to see, you know, cars and that's what they get cars, cars, cars, cars. cars
00:29:18
Justin Early
jokes yeah
00:29:18
Matthias Early
So for me, yes.
00:29:20
Alexander Clark
Marvel content.
00:29:22
Justin Early
there you
00:29:22
Matthias Early
Yeah. Yeah.
00:29:22
Alexander Clark
My algorithm is full. like Trying to avoid the Spider-Man spoilers, I feel like I'm i'm like doing my Spidey thing.
00:29:29
Matthias Early
Yeah. Yeah.
00:29:29
Alexander Clark
I'm like, I've got to use my Spidey sense to avoid all that stuff.
00:29:30
Justin Early
yeah
00:29:32
Matthias Early
Yeah. Spider-Man skit. I definitely will say it might be indicative of my generation and the people around me. I think the biggest part, so I try to get into the spaces of college and the like local community college in the area.
00:29:51
Matthias Early
But the bigger thing is whenever I talk to my friends, people my age, it's really about The touching in with the nervousness that they feel for their future.
00:30:02
Matthias Early
So right now with the new AI economy, with it changing so much, there's been a lot of reports that what's been falling are entry level drops. Nobody actually wants to take on the burden of bringing somebody into their company and then having to train them.
00:30:18
Matthias Early
Once upon a time, that's you know they said, I like your character. I'll bring you in. I'll train you. And then you'll go from there. But nowadays, I want you already trained. I want you already know how to do the job the moment you get in there.
00:30:30
Matthias Early
And that's really what I've been trying to talk about is right now our politics focuses on one demographic, which is 65 and up, the retirees. And whenever I try to represent the economy or whenever you want the economy represented, they see a completely different aspect of the economy than the people in the workforce or trying to join the workforce do.
00:30:51
Matthias Early
So whenever I go to these colleges, that's exactly what they're worried about.
00:30:52
Justin Early
Thank
00:30:54
Matthias Early
What am I going to do after college? My entire life, there's been this roadmap of go to high school, get good grades, go to college, graduate. What do I do now that I'm in a workforce that is failing younger people?
00:31:06
Matthias Early
So I think that's where most of my connection with the younger generation has been other than just being, you know, me, you know, look at me.
00:31:15
Kate Rumsey
ah Well, Justin, i have a question for you.
00:31:17
Matthias Early
But
00:31:18
Alexander Clark
How do you do fellow kids?
00:31:20
Kate Rumsey
yeah
00:31:21
Matthias Early
yeah.
00:31:22
Kate Rumsey
ah But Justin, I mean, i'm I'm looking at your website. You have whole sections on AI and data centers. And I don't know if I can go to a politician's social media speaking of without seeing what's going on with data
00:31:28
Justin Early
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Technology and Privacy Concerns
00:31:34
Kate Rumsey
centers and AI.
00:31:35
Kate Rumsey
So being somebody that maybe works in a space similar or around it or adjacent to it, how do we balance the use of what AI is bringing to some businesses while at the same time regulating or doing something with data centers.
00:31:49
Kate Rumsey
Is AI the enemy or is it something that we need to kind of like, you know, hold with a lot of like regulations?
00:31:58
Alexander Clark
great Great minds, Kate, because that was exactly what I wanted to ask him next, too because like you mentioned you brought up data centers as a campaign issue before the rest of the political class caught up
00:31:58
Justin Early
Great question.
00:32:07
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:32:08
Kate Rumsey
Yeah.
00:32:09
Matthias Early
Yeah.
00:32:10
Justin Early
yeah it's It's a huge concern, right? And for me, um so first, the first thing they question, is it the danger? The answer is no. And it is a problem, and it needs to be regulated.
00:32:22
Justin Early
But people will can so conflate data centers that we had for 20 years, you know Netflix, storing clouds on iPhoto or whatever, right? Those are all held in data centers. We've had those for decades.
00:32:36
Justin Early
They're confusing those with hyperscalers, which is what we're using today in order to just flood um information and data and processing power into computer systems in order to create thought.
00:32:48
Justin Early
That is completely different from what we have here. And then the outcome is going to be a system that will then essentially take our jobs from us. um This is going to be an imagination engine that human beings have held for ever since the dawn of time, they, those who own these systems want to own them.
00:33:06
Justin Early
And while we see that the data centers are coming in into municipalities, they're blowing through local control. They're, you know, paying or not paying. me not say that out loud. They're going to city councils. They're going to um individuals and getting um their, you know, their deeds, abatements, all those things in the middle of the night without any kind of public interaction.
00:33:30
Justin Early
with any kind of public consent. And that is very you know direct to us. We have been taught since ah young as long as you remember in school that you know the frontier is the West and we can go build where we need to be. And you can have your homestead and you can live your life on a peaceful, you know on a farm somewhere.
00:33:47
Justin Early
And now today, these data centers want those farms because that's where the water is at. That's where the land is at. And so they're not going to ask you for your favor. They're going take those things. So the people in those communities are very upset visually.
00:34:00
Justin Early
But underneath all of that is what they're using these systems for. And that's what touches every single person. And a proponent of hyperscalers, a proponent of AI will tell you, well, then stop using Netflix or so get off your phone because that's where AI is.
00:34:15
Justin Early
That is like saying, you know, save $5 in order for the US government to balance their budget, right? Those are completely separate things. And we can have innovation, we can have technology without just destroying our environment, going through and taking our resources and literally taking the value of those resources and sending them to Wall Street.
00:34:37
Justin Early
The last thing I'll say on this is that I love technology. I've been a technologist my entire career. I love innovation, but innovation without accountability or responsibility is completely wrong.
00:34:50
Justin Early
um We've seen this throughout time. The Gilded Age is the exact same thing where railroads are just going through areas and they had no responsibility. They were polluting the water, polluting the air. We had to build all these systems to protect land, protect water.
00:35:02
Justin Early
And now that these AI companies are figuring out in another way or ah to do the exact same thing, it's not a new argument. We just have to protect what's already there for human beings in their lives to continue in existing.
00:35:14
Kate Rumsey
That's such an incredible way of saying that, Justin. Thank you. i can only speak that my parents have a house on a lake and there was a data center going up right next to it, south ah east of Dallas. And ah they were able to successfully litigate and prevent it from actually coming.
00:35:28
Justin Early
That's great.
00:35:29
Kate Rumsey
And they wanted to take out millions of gallons of water a day from the lake, which would have diminished everyone's property and ability to actually access the lake and the water, which obviously impacts everyone's property.
00:35:40
Kate Rumsey
And so was just amazing to see this very rural community who are predominantly represented by Republicans, to be standing up.
00:35:48
Justin Early
Mm-hmm.
00:35:49
Kate Rumsey
I mean, everyone's got buttons, we got signs. I mean, it's like an incredible to see what that is. and And so I'm just curious how you see this plays out politically. I mean, is this the issue du jour of this campaign season?
00:35:57
Justin Early
Mm-hmm.
00:36:01
Kate Rumsey
It seems like it is. And how do we combat that with what's going on?
00:36:02
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:36:03
Alexander Clark
Yeah, I just saw a clip of ah i just saw a clip of Gina Hinojosa speaking to some Republicans and what appeared to be, I think, they're like their living room.
00:36:06
Kate Rumsey
Yeah.
00:36:13
Alexander Clark
And they were wearing shirts and buttons that said, break rank. right people who had voted Republicans their whole lives, and they feel so strongly about this data center issue because it's making them sick um that they are going to break rank and vote for Gina and vote for Democrats in general.
00:36:18
Justin Early
Wow. Mm-hmm.
00:36:32
Alexander Clark
um And I feel like, Mathias, for you, I mean, it's so personal, ah the health and human safety element of all of this.
00:36:33
Justin Early
Mm-hmm.
00:36:42
Alexander Clark
I mean, you've you've supported... you know massive changes to the healthcare system. And in the Texas legislature that there's a really low hanging fruit in terms of like Medicaid expansion, but like, are there, are there other ways that you think about how we can prioritize, um, health and human safety?
Healthcare System Critique
00:37:05
Matthias Early
Yes, so I will say do believe in universal healthcare. I believe there is a much cheaper and better and faster alternative for the American people than for-profit healthcare system.
00:37:18
Matthias Early
But that is up to the federal government to decide. It is not something we have enough money or enough energy at the state level to do. But what I do advocate for is a patient outcome based health care system, as opposed to what we have now, which is treatment based.
00:37:34
Matthias Early
So if you go to the doctor and they say, oh, my back hurts. All right, let me give you an X-ray. Let me give you an MRI. Let me give you all these different tests. And every test I give you, you're going to get charged again, again, again.
00:37:46
Matthias Early
And that is because one, the healthcare providers make more money off of that. And two, it on the other side of it is the health insurance company saying, no, no, no, yes, ill I'll let you do that. No, yes, yes, no.
00:37:58
Matthias Early
Whenever at the end of the day, you as the person wanting to be treated, you're saying my back hurts, I want to know why, or my back hurts, I want it to stop hurting. That is the outcome I want. So then you should be able to work with the healthcare providers to say, this is the different issues that you know it could be caused by, and we will start on the outcome first and then go from there.
00:38:20
Matthias Early
And the insurance company, they should not be able to deny you based off of the treatment. They should be able to say, okay, well, you know, this is the outcome you want, you know, this is, i want to not die because if it's cancer or whatever it may be, then they should not have the right to say we will deny treatment because survival should always be a covered outcome.
00:38:42
Matthias Early
Now, if somebody wants to, if we want to talk about the Republican side of it, when they talk about cosmetic procedures, perhaps, then yes, the insurance company can argue with the person, the patient to say, is this an outcome we want to cover? Is it not?
00:38:59
Matthias Early
So it's really just about separating, removing this, you know, insurance company that that is between doctor and patient and bringing the doctor and patient closer together.
00:39:09
Alexander Clark
Yeah. And look, Republicans of ah individual Republicans can argue health care policy in good faith, but it's really hard for me to take elected Republicans seriously on health care anymore because we're still waiting on that Trump health care proposal.
00:39:25
Alexander Clark
i mean, how many years has it been?
00:39:26
Justin Early
There's plan somewhere, right?
00:39:27
Alexander Clark
Right.
00:39:28
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:39:30
Matthias Early
Also, just to add very quickly, also the the amount of money you pay for treatment is not close to the amount that you would say is the market rate.
00:39:30
Kate Rumsey
you
00:39:39
Matthias Early
It is exploitative at its nature. they It costs pennies to produce this medicine, and they you know sell it for hundreds. Insulin, for example, was $600 month. And then then now they've kept it at 30. That's a 20 times difference.
00:39:55
Matthias Early
So obviously this company was never, you know, oh, you know, this just the cost of insulin. No, they were always exploiting people. And this is happening at every level of health care. So we need to, as legislators, revamp it and say, look at every single thing and say, is this the actual charge or are you being a monopoly that is now exploiting people?
00:40:13
Alexander Clark
Now look, as an attorney who sues insurance companies for a living, you're singing my song. That's great.
00:40:20
Alexander Clark
And it's a bipartisan issue. I remember even, I certainly don't congu condone killing CEOs that you don't you don't like, um but you yeah you you you mentioned someone talking about a back hurting that made me think of Luigi Meggioni.
00:40:29
Justin Early
And we're there.
00:40:36
Alexander Clark
I remember when that first happened, like of all the like right wing podcasters were talking about, you know, look, look at these sick Democrats celebrating the death of a father.
00:40:49
Alexander Clark
and like in their comment sections, it was like, I'm a Republican and I'm happy to, and like, I'm, I'm as right wing as they come. And the insurance industry is, is crooked. And like all of these, like it was very much immediately clear like this is tapping into something that is not left or right it's a top versus bottom issue
00:41:11
Matthias Early
Yes.
00:41:12
Kate Rumsey
As Tyler Rico says, yeah. I mean, I'm wondering for y'all, are you both focusing on health care? Like, are you both, do you have synergies for your campaigns on the messaging or is it completely separate?
00:41:24
Matthias Early
and We definitely have such a change.
00:41:24
Justin Early
I'd say we're pretty synergistic.
00:41:26
Matthias Early
Yeah, absolutely.
00:41:27
Justin Early
Yeah. Healthcare is a big one. um Women's healthcare, technology and AI is a concern, just different levels and different perspectives um to try to get it done.
00:41:40
Matthias Early
I talk about AI from the perspective of the economy and the way it's changing, especially if, as you know these CEOs say, if they're really going to replace 80% of jobs, then we are looking at a post-labor economy, a economy a a world that has been built up by my ability to sell labor to a company.
00:41:58
Matthias Early
So what where are people at in a world where now a machine is cheaper than any sort of labor you could do, whether it be your mind or your you know physical body? What can you sell?
00:42:09
Matthias Early
How can you get money? And that question is not being remotely asked philosophically or economically in these legislative fields in these houses.
00:42:19
Justin Early
Yeah, and my perspective as well. I mean very similar in that. But also, I also talk about the perspective of surveillance capitalism, like these systems are being built to surveil us.
00:42:29
Justin Early
And that is real freedom at risk. That is real liberty at risk. um You have these billionaires who think that they can you know control us by knowing and understanding everything we do. And that is what they're putting the data into these data centers. That's what they're looking for is who do you talk to?
00:42:44
Justin Early
um Who do you visit? What do you spend your money on? Where are you going? Where'd you come from? um Part of it is to exploit more money out of you. But part of it is also to know and understand and control you.
00:42:54
Alexander Clark
Thank you.
00:42:55
Justin Early
And surveillance capitalism with Flock, Flock, you know, all the different social media companies that just store your data and then sell it to other people. That is a problem. And as a cybersecurity architect, as a data security architect, um we have almost non-existent data security laws or laws for security here in this country. Russia has stronger laws than we do on the protection of your data.
00:43:17
Justin Early
And I think that should change.
00:43:17
Kate Rumsey
Yeah. It's so interesting that you're bringing this up because I was, I'm a lawyer, I'm on the criminal defense side, and we've been talking a lot about flock cameras and whether they violate some of our constitutional rights.
00:43:29
Kate Rumsey
And yesterday I was in a training and we were talking about how Trump has appointed so many of these uber conservative judges so much so that they are like very like crazy originalists.
00:43:39
Kate Rumsey
Like they want to think about what we're doing now, but in terms of what they people would have perceived these things back in the 1700s, which is crazy.
00:43:40
Justin Early
Hmm.
00:43:47
Kate Rumsey
But what it's doing is that it's creating a very pro defendant set of cases in a world where, Now the Trump administration has to decide whether they want to be an originalist and think about things in that conservative way or be more pro-law enforcement. And it's a very like huge tension in what's going on that we, a lot of criminal defense attorneys are,
00:44:10
Kate Rumsey
putting things on appeal because we're saying, look, our client has been, you know, their rights have been violated according to your judges. So let's bring some things up. And it's very interesting to see that.
00:44:19
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:44:20
Kate Rumsey
But before we head into our next segments, I wanted to ask y'all, I've heard that other members of the family are involved in the campaign. Like, let's get some shout outs to them. Like, I want to make sure that they're brought into this conversation.
00:44:32
Justin Early
yeah Yeah. You first, Matthias.
00:44:36
Matthias Early
So of course the two people to, you know, beat a cliche to death, the two people that I have to thank for this campaign is my father and my stepmother.
00:44:37
Alexander Clark
Thank you.
00:44:47
Matthias Early
My stepmother, she's been able to balance both campaigns, jump back and forth, make sure we're on the schedule, make sure, you know, all the literature's in the car, drive enough to and fro. She has been a superhero.
00:45:00
Matthias Early
So absolutely. It's, you know, the three of us here in Georgetown and we're all colluding together.
00:45:07
Kate Rumsey
I love it.
00:45:07
Justin Early
She also speaks for both of us. Whenever we can't be somewhere, she'll speak for us. She gives her own stump speeches for the two of us. um Sometimes together, sometimes if I can't be one, she'll speak for the other or vice versa.
00:45:21
Justin Early
um Also, my daughter ah runs our social runs my social media. um She's been doing phenomenal with that. A lot of people give us lots of um
00:45:29
Alexander Clark
Thank you.
Family Dynamics in Campaigning
00:45:31
Justin Early
kudos on that.
00:45:31
Justin Early
i don't i don't Just like Matthias, I didn't have a social media account before this. um I got off the Facebooks and all that years ago. But you got to reach people where they are. And that's where, you know, we want to connect it there. And it's to me, it's funny, because when our daughter, Kiana was ah younger, it was like, get off TikTok, get off Instagram, do more with this, do more with yourself. And now it's like, get on TikTok, get on Instagram and keep promoting me, you know. So it's, it's definitely a family affair. We're all doing something. And I'd say also, you know, um another son, you know, he's done some tech work for us in the background.
00:46:06
Justin Early
We've just, it's just been a family affair all around to help and promote what we can do for our democracy.
00:46:12
Matthias Early
or my brother's girlfriends. They were watching the other you know competitors' social medias for the primaries.
00:46:18
Justin Early
end Yeah.
00:46:19
Kate Rumsey
Amazing. Yeah.
00:46:19
Matthias Early
each Each girlfriend had a different person had to watch.
00:46:24
Justin Early
Different person they were watching.
00:46:24
Kate Rumsey
Well,
00:46:25
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:46:26
Kate Rumsey
I'm, you know, there's so many depictions of family businesses and pop culture and there's like the succession, you know, like they're not all getting along.
00:46:33
Justin Early
No.
00:46:33
Kate Rumsey
And then there's like other parts of it. Like, which spectrum are we on? i It sounds like y'all are doing pretty good. It's on the opposite side of succession.
00:46:40
Matthias Early
Yeah.
00:46:40
Alexander Clark
Yeah, it doesn't seem like the Logan Roy.
00:46:41
Kate Rumsey
ah
00:46:44
Justin Early
no
00:46:44
Alexander Clark
like yeah
00:46:44
Kate Rumsey
ah
00:46:45
Alexander Clark
I'm sorry, but you're not serious people.
00:46:48
Matthias Early
Yeah. Nobody's died yet. Yeah.
00:46:51
Justin Early
No, I don't think so. I think we, you know, just like any dynamic, you know, it's, you know, we're around each other a lot. And so we're, you know, we're frazzled sometimes, but at the end of the day, we know we love each other and we know we all have the same mission, right?
00:47:04
Justin Early
We're trying to make better for everyone else. And so, um, If somebody is feeling like they're getting, you know, a little bit overburdened, they will either say that out loud and say, hey, look, can we have some help here? Or they'll say, hey, look, maybe, you know, I need to pull it a little bit more because, you know, this is important. i mean, we've got 90 some days left till the election, right?
00:47:22
Justin Early
um
00:47:23
Kate Rumsey
Can you believe? Yeah.
00:47:24
Justin Early
it's it's it's a It's flying by, but every day we're talking to people. Every day we're connecting with people. And every day we lean on our support system to get us there. And we just have a great one to to help us along.
00:47:36
Alexander Clark
So at the end, we will ask for your last word, not only on how we're going to flip the state by 2030, but how are we going to get you you both past the finish line? 50% plus one.
00:47:47
Alexander Clark
But first, before we do that, a little detour into happiness.
00:47:49
Justin Early
Yeah. Hmm.
00:47:52
Alexander Clark
I want to hear some good news from everybody. Something that is just so good, you got to share it. Something personal, something professional, something completely random if you want.
00:48:02
Alexander Clark
But I think Republicans have gotten better than us at spreading their gospel, about letting their good news be spread. and We got to flex that muscle and get our reps in on that. So what's something in your life you'd like to share?
00:48:17
Justin Early
you know the first thing I think of, and I don't know if this is anything the Republicans will be talking about at all, but you know I love that my um summer garden, my flowers are doing really good right now. um Sundays, I take a little bit of time in the morning and I can piddle around in there clean things up. and It's my little Zen time and Zen spot. and so I feel great that some of my you know things are just popping in doing well.
00:48:40
Justin Early
um Even though it's hot, even though I'm tired, um I have a place that I can sit down and just center myself and just enjoy. And also every Sunday we all play cards together. My my parents, my my wife, we we do that every Sunday and, you know, I've been winning. So, ha ha, that's my good news, you know.
00:49:00
Kate Rumsey
ah
00:49:00
Justin Early
okay
00:49:01
Kate Rumsey
That's fun.
00:49:05
Matthias Early
um no I know. I'm happy every single day that I live very close to my father. um i go to his house probably like three times a day. he lives two minutes away.
00:49:16
Matthias Early
So I pop in, hey, where's the food at?
00:49:18
Justin Early
Yeah. Literally.
00:49:19
Alexander Clark
yeah
00:49:20
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:49:21
Kate Rumsey
What a good thing to hear as a parent. Like, I'm glad I'm near you.
00:49:23
Alexander Clark
Yeah, that's amazing.
00:49:24
Kate Rumsey
i just am like, I hope my daughter says that. Yeah.
00:49:27
Alexander Clark
Goals, dad goals.
00:49:29
Kate Rumsey
Yeah.
00:49:29
Kate Rumsey
Yeah.
00:49:29
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:49:30
Justin Early
yeah
00:49:31
Matthias Early
It's funny, a lot of times on the campaign, as they hear that you know that we're father, son, they're like, oh, you're like do you agree politically? Yeah. I don't.
00:49:39
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:49:40
Matthias Early
I don't know.
00:49:40
Justin Early
It's kind of funny. It's kind of like, you know, and they also ask us, are we, are we,
00:49:43
Kate Rumsey
yeah
00:49:43
Alexander Clark
Well, I know this is like a mid-happy session, but I know i do want to know, like is there one item that you butt heads on?
00:49:52
Justin Early
Hmm.
00:49:53
Alexander Clark
you you can You can invoke the fifth.
00:49:53
Matthias Early
don't
00:49:53
Justin Early
So...
00:49:55
Matthias Early
i
00:49:56
Kate Rumsey
Yeah, well, let's go not political.
00:49:56
Justin Early
I mean, you want politically or not politically?
00:49:59
Kate Rumsey
I think that'd be more fun.
00:50:00
Alexander Clark
Anything.
00:50:00
Matthias Early
Yeah,
00:50:00
Justin Early
Okay.
00:50:00
Justin Early
Not political.
00:50:00
Alexander Clark
Anything at all.
00:50:01
Justin Early
we We both like anime. We just have a differing opinion of which ones are better.
00:50:06
Alexander Clark
Okay.
00:50:07
Justin Early
And i I don't know if you guys are familiar with...
00:50:07
Alexander Clark
Just like prioritizing it.
00:50:09
Alexander Clark
Okay.
00:50:09
Matthias Early
yeah.
00:50:10
Justin Early
But but but the anime Bleach, I think, is straight trash. And he disagrees with me. So... Yeah.
00:50:16
Alexander Clark
His face, as soon as you said that.
00:50:16
Matthias Early
I'm starting to come around on that, got that's the I
00:50:19
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:50:19
Kate Rumsey
All right, Mathias, defend it.
00:50:24
Matthias Early
I will definitely say the action is there, the music is there, the story maybe not so much.
00:50:30
Justin Early
See, there
00:50:30
Matthias Early
I would say though, ah as far as happy figures.
00:50:31
Alexander Clark
I'm such an anime poser. You guys, I, my, my anime knowledge and ah background is like whatever Toonami was putting on front of me after school. Like I was like Dragon Ball Z, Gundam wing, Sailor Moon.
00:50:46
Justin Early
go.
00:50:47
Alexander Clark
That I feel like there was some Ronin samurai show where they all had different color armor.
00:50:53
Kate Rumsey
You guys have lost me completely.
00:50:53
Justin Early
It happens.
00:50:53
Alexander Clark
That's, that's all I really got.
00:50:56
Matthias Early
Seven Samurai?
00:50:57
Kate Rumsey
hu
00:50:57
Alexander Clark
<unk> I don't, don't remember the name of it. Well,
00:51:00
Justin Early
I will say they definitely watered those down for American children audiences.
00:51:04
Alexander Clark
you
00:51:04
Justin Early
The stories are very rich. They're very steeped in Japanese culture. And there's a lot of um betrayal for the right reasons. And you have a hard time understanding who the bad guy is sometimes.
00:51:16
Justin Early
um
00:51:17
Matthias Early
Deep relationships.
00:51:18
Justin Early
sometimes you you really feel invested in the character and you're like wow i did not know that's their motivations and then you have to really assess is this what happens but it's what human beings are and do and i think in american um pop culture we have these very black and white characters you know spider-man is a phenomenal character but you know he's always going to do what's right um the only time he did something wrong was when he was infected with you know this symbiote you know um but then in anime
00:51:39
Alexander Clark
Symbia, yeah. Well, it's in the contract. There's actually like a a no joke like selling the rights to Spider-Man from Marvel to Sony. like it's in It's in black and white.
00:51:48
Kate Rumsey
you had Oh, I didn't know that.
00:51:50
Alexander Clark
He has to like do certain things and not do certain things.
00:51:50
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:51:51
Matthias Early
He also can't drink.
00:51:52
Justin Early
Yes, exactly.
00:51:53
Matthias Early
Yeah.
00:51:53
Alexander Clark
Yeah.
00:51:54
Justin Early
But and but even in the comics, he couldn't he didn't do anything in the comics at all.
00:51:57
Alexander Clark
Yeah.
00:51:57
Justin Early
Now, I will say, little diversion, if have you read Superior Spider-Man?
00:52:03
Alexander Clark
I haven't read it.
00:52:04
Justin Early
ira If you like...
00:52:05
Alexander Clark
i've only i only read comics kind of like
00:52:05
Justin Early
if you
00:52:07
Alexander Clark
here and there. um i didn't have like my own collection or anything. Okay.
00:52:12
Justin Early
Take a tiny bit of time, go find Superior Spider-Man. It is phenomenal. It's actually Ock, Doc, Doctor Octopus transfers his mind into Spider-Man's body and becomes Spider-Man.
00:52:17
Alexander Clark
Okay.
00:52:22
Alexander Clark
I've heard of this. I've heard of this storyline.
00:52:25
Alexander Clark
That's crazy.
00:52:25
Matthias Early
Yes, and and it is good.
00:52:25
Justin Early
And it is phenomenal. Yeah, it's good.
00:52:27
Matthias Early
So I will say and now that we talk are talking about this, I do have my moment of happiness every week. Every Friday, the new chapter of One Piece is released. I read the manga, my father reads the manga, and then we talk about it.
00:52:37
Justin Early
Mm-hmm.
00:52:39
Justin Early
And then we talk about it, yeah.
00:52:40
Alexander Clark
That's so cool.
00:52:41
Matthias Early
Yeah, one of my...
00:52:41
Justin Early
And we have to do it coded because ah my wife, she likes to watch the anime when it comes out.
00:52:41
Kate Rumsey
Have
00:52:42
Matthias Early
Oh
00:52:47
Justin Early
And she'll stack up and wait for time. So we have to talk in coded language. Like, you remember when this character did that? And then he did this?
00:52:52
Matthias Early
yeah, I'm happy.
00:52:53
Justin Early
We did that, right? That was cool, right?
00:52:54
Matthias Early
yeah
00:52:54
Justin Early
Yeah. you know so
00:52:54
Alexander Clark
ah Well, before we lose the thread, I'll just throw out my good news, which is I'm going to go see brand new day tonight.
00:53:03
Justin Early
Oh, nice.
00:53:03
Alexander Clark
um so I'm taking my wife's date night.
00:53:03
Justin Early
Awesome.
00:53:05
Alexander Clark
ah my my my ah My mom is watching the kids and I'm very excited. I really have been trying to avoid these spoilers.
00:53:12
Justin Early
Awesome.
00:53:13
Alexander Clark
i don't I don't want to know who Sadie Sink's character is until tonight.
00:53:17
Justin Early
Yeah.
00:53:18
Alexander Clark
No one should tell me.
00:53:18
Kate Rumsey
Yeah.
00:53:19
Justin Early
That's great. Got
00:53:21
Matthias Early
I don't know anything.
00:53:21
Kate Rumsey
Well, it's funny mention that because my good news is going to be movie related to we haven't seen Spider-Man yet.
00:53:22
Matthias Early
Yeah.
00:53:27
Justin Early
it.
00:53:28
Kate Rumsey
And my husband definitely wants to. But we saw the Odyssey on opening night and it was not in 70 millimeter.
00:53:31
Alexander Clark
Hmm.
00:53:33
Justin Early
Oh, nice.
00:53:36
Kate Rumsey
It was in the like other IMAX. I guess they're calling it LIMAX. And so i just loved seeing it and talking about rooting for a character that is ah has troubled past.
00:53:48
Kate Rumsey
you know you're You're kind of struggling to root for Matt Damon in parts of the movie and the story of the Odyssey and just interesting to see the cultural reaction, even politically with people, like some of the right has come out against it with what's, know, how it's being depicted and, uh, Elliot page and all these other things.
00:53:50
Justin Early
Yes.
00:54:06
Kate Rumsey
And, and what a resounding counter just surgeons of people so loving the movie. I mean, and, And I love that it has brought people back to the theater. And i hope that people like Matthias can appreciate going to the movie theater just like I did when I was a kid.
00:54:16
Justin Early
yes
00:54:22
Kate Rumsey
You know, like it was just such a big part of my ah growing up that I hope that that is not lost on the future generation with so much streaming. So I thought that was pretty incredible seeing a full house like cheering for the Odyssey.
00:54:35
Justin Early
That's great.
00:54:35
Kate Rumsey
Did you guys see it?
00:54:37
Matthias Early
We haven't seen
00:54:37
Justin Early
I've not seen it yet. No. Been campaigning.
00:54:39
Kate Rumsey
Yeah.
00:54:39
Justin Early
So, you know.
00:54:40
Kate Rumsey
Yes. Well, I remember...
00:54:41
Alexander Clark
You know, fun fact, Beto O'Rourke has a son named Ulysses because of the Odyssey.
00:54:41
Matthias Early
it.
00:54:47
Justin Early
Oh, wow.
00:54:47
Matthias Early
Oh. Interesting.
00:54:48
Kate Rumsey
Wow. Okay. Well, I guess.
00:54:50
Alexander Clark
A little bit of Texas Democratic trivia for you.
00:54:53
Matthias Early
Yeah.
00:54:55
Kate Rumsey
Well, I will just say that when I was campaigning, I didn't have time for anything and I never saw it. Like I didn't see a movie and I was like the first time that I went to a movie theater, but i was like, I'm free. Like, I don't know how I act now without campaigning.
00:55:05
Justin Early
Yeah. Mm-hmm.
00:55:07
Kate Rumsey
But anyways, that's our good news. We wanted to give you guys the last word. Obviously, our podcast is completely about flipping Texas for the future for this generation and for 2030 before
Political Accountability and Community Mobilization
00:55:19
Kate Rumsey
ah the next census. And so I want to give you guys both from your very different perspectives, what do you think it's going to really take to flip the state, flip your seats?
00:55:29
Justin Early
Yeah. talked a little bit about what it's going to take to flip my seat. Um, you know, i'm going against an 84 year old incumbent. Um, John, uh, Stewart had a piece on, uh, the age of, you know, people, members of Congress and specifically talked about my opponent and about his age.
00:55:45
Justin Early
And one of the things that he had, he did.
00:55:45
Kate Rumsey
Wow, I didn't know that.
00:55:47
Justin Early
Yeah. One of the jokes he made is that somebody talking about the modernization of military should not look like they're steam powered. And, you know, that's a funny joke, right? Um, But the unfortunate thing is is he is funded by these AI companies as well. Like if you look at all of his FEC filings, Sam Altman has connections to over $400,000 worth of money going into his campaign. So he's very pro data center, very pro AI. And um what we need to do is understand that some of these people who don't get out there and talk about data centers or get out there and talk about the things that we're frustrated about today, they may be funded by those same entities because the status quo is what these same entities want.
00:56:29
Justin Early
And so for us to flip this state, for us to flip these seats, you have to understand everybody who's there, who's keeping the status quo the way it is, needs to be voted out. This is the time that we need to get out and understand, research, know who is on the ballot.
00:56:44
Justin Early
Make a plan to vote and bring somebody to vote because it's not just about you getting off the couch and doing something. You have to get your friends, your family, and your neighbors as well. um That's the most important thing is going to get out to flip flip the seat. Once we get a hold of our democracy, once we get some things, some you know sanity back in our lives, we can start talking about the allocation of money. we can start talking about some of these other things that we like to talk about in politics.
00:57:08
Justin Early
Politics can then be boring again. But until we actually get up and do something and move, Man, it's it can it can only get worse from here. The last point I'll say about this is pick any dystopian novel that you've ever read, and we're in the first couple of chapters of it. This is how things happen. And if you don't want to continue seeing the slide into those dark things you want to do, that is the reason alone to go vote.
00:57:32
Justin Early
But also vote because of what you want. Not because of what you don't want, but vote for what you do want. And hold us, these politicians, these candidates, hold us accountable for what you do want. If you want health care, accessible health care, make sure that we do that and hold us accountable to it. If you want to make sure the voting rights is you know strengthened for everybody to be to write to vote, hold us to that.
00:57:53
Justin Early
Because our job is to write those bills, vote on those bills and make sure you get exactly what you want because government should work for you.
00:58:01
Kate Rumsey
Amen. Matthias, send us off.
00:58:05
Matthias Early
I say pay attention and volunteer. I mean, every single day in the news, it's it's sadness, it's anger. There's every feeling of frustration.
00:58:15
Justin Early
Mm-hmm.
00:58:15
Matthias Early
And it's hard it's easy to just look away. But the more you are engaged, the more emotions you'll have and the more it'll be talked about in your everyday life. Hey, did you see, you know, what's going on in Gaza? Did you see what's going on with ice and these ice raids?
00:58:31
Matthias Early
Now, Republicans have won the rural area, but once upon a time, those the rural areas were Democrats. And it is the sheer fact that the Republican Party made a commitment that we are going to invest in every single race, every single year.
00:58:45
Matthias Early
So we are going to flip Texas by volunteering. There is a candidate who needs your help. There is a person you can reach out to to to remind them to vote. There's always somebody.
00:58:56
Matthias Early
And even if you live in the deepest, deepest part of red part of Texas, Volunteering now is making, is helping build up these relationships later. If you have a conversation with somebody in West Texas today about what's going on with Trump, they'll, you know, okay, yeah, you're right. I'm going to vote Democrat.
00:59:14
Matthias Early
And you may not win the election, but it'll help with the next election and the next election. It's about an investment in our politics. And it's about starting these conversations now.
00:59:23
Kate Rumsey
Amazing. Well, one of the things we wanted to prove in this podcast is that we are the party for families as well, and if not more so, and you are the living proof of it. You're the epitome.
00:59:35
Kate Rumsey
So as they say, vote early, and I'll sign off by saying God bless Texas.
00:59:40
Matthias Early
Thank you.
00:59:41
Justin Early
Thank you.