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U.S. House Rep. Adam Smith Talks World Cup, Youth Soccer and Iran Deal
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United States House Representative Adam Smith (WA-9) spoke with Lobbing Scorchers' Noah Riffe about the World Cup in Seattle, Smith's personal experience with youth soccer in America, and the Iran War deal signed by Trump.
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Lobbing Scorchers is a production of Just Once Media.
Lobbing Scorchers is a Seattle Sounders and MLS focused show brought to you by Sounder at Heart. Hosted by Major League Soccer's Ari Liljenwall and Producer Noah Riffe. Join us as we lob our scorching takes on the American soccer landscape, Seattle Sounders, Major League Soccer, USMNT and more.
Contact: lobbingscorchers@justoncemedia.com
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Transcript
Introduction and Guest Welcome
00:00:00
Speaker
Well sir, we got a scorcher today. Gonna be a real scorcher today. Quite the scorcher today. Well it's gonna be scorcher.
00:00:21
Speaker
Welcome back to Lobbing Scorchers. My name is Noah. We have a very special episode and a special guest today. going to let them introduce
Adam Smith's Soccer Journey
00:00:29
Speaker
themselves. Hi, Noah. I am Adam Smith. I'm the congressman who represents the 9th District of the state of Washington and ah played soccer as a kid. My son played soccer.
00:00:39
Speaker
I'm reasonably big soccer fan. Don't follow some aspects of it as closely as I would like, but a really exciting time here in Seattle. It's very exciting. ah Do you want to tell us a little bit about your your soccer journey, your soccer path? Sure. I mean, i so i was a kid growing up in the 70s, and soccer soccer was phenomena, certainly in the Pacific Northwest in the 70s. It was what you know all of a sudden every kid was doing. This was when the Sounders had their first iteration, the North American Soccer League.
00:01:08
Speaker
There we go. I actually, I'll tell you, i i went to the very first event at the Kingdome, which was the Sounders versus the New York Cosmos. My dad and I sat pretty much right at the top of the Kingdome, but Pele scored two goals, and it was really cool. So, yeah, I played soccer as a kid. um i screwed I screwed up my knee when I was like 12 or 13, and that was pretty much the end of that.
00:01:29
Speaker
But always followed it. And then my son was was a you know really good soccer player as a kid. So we got to follow him for, what, gosh, eight, nine years there as he was playing throughout you know club level high school. He got caught by COVID.
00:01:43
Speaker
He was a junior you know when COVID hit, so that you know at Iskra High School. But got to follow that. And then so I followed Sounders a little bit. Also, my son got me into Premier League. he He was an Aston Villa fan, so I'm an Aston Villa fan too. And they're coming back. They are. They had a good year.
00:02:00
Speaker
So enjoy
Soccer's Community Impact
00:02:01
Speaker
that. And just the other piece of it for me has been just youth involvement. I represent the 9th District, which is basically Bellevue, Seattle, down to Auburn in Federal Way. Incredibly diverse community. We speak over 160 different languages.
00:02:14
Speaker
But as they say, soccer is the universal language. So I worked a little bit with Adrian Hanauer and then Maya Mendoza. Mm-hmm. um I used to work, I worked for her father at his law firm. And they are very focused on how can we make soccer more accessible, more available to broader, diverse, poorer communities. So work with them a little bit on that because I see it as something that can strengthen our communities.
00:02:38
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, if you want to speak more to that, I know that's like the Rave Foundation yeah and things like that. um They've done some amazing work in building a lot of soccer pitches across Washington State. um Yeah, how how do you see soccer in general as bringing together a diverse community like yours um as something that, you know, can can be something that everyone could get behind?
00:03:01
Speaker
yeah Well, first of all, it's the most popular sport in the world. Literally everybody plays it. um you know People come from all different countries. Maybe they don't know what basketball is or what cricket is or whatever, but everyone knows what soccer is, first of all. And second of all, the barrier to entry is so low.
00:03:19
Speaker
Roll a ball out somewhere, put up two posts out of every whatever you want, go kick it around. So it's not something that you have to be wealthy yeah to play, um at least at the initial level. So I think it's an opportunity to get the youth involved, to get the communities involved, and something that brings them together.
Challenges in U.S. Youth Soccer
00:03:37
Speaker
with the World Cup being here in Seattle, did you ah work on any of the planning? Because I know you've been in the house for a while. yeah And as well, just how does it how does it feel to have the World Cup in your backyard? It's incredibly exciting and it's been it's been great for the community. um You see all the different watch parties all across um the city, across the community. I was mentioning that down the city of Renton, they opened up Legacy Park, which is gonna be an open air farmer's market, but also a park where kids can play. And now they're they're having viewing parties for FIFA for right now for the World Cup. So I've been involved in that. Also, I'm the ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, so we worked on some of the security aspects of it. Worked with the local organization trying to get the federal government to help them make sure we're providing adequate security. So I've been aware aware of it for a while, not necessarily intimately involved, but certainly supporting the local community.
00:04:30
Speaker
I want to get your takes on the U.S. men's national team. we have one We have one game to go on. um And I think initially I was a little bit questioning if they would close i yes well if they would be able to do it. But very strong performance against Paraguay, who is...
00:04:46
Speaker
Not quite good defensively. And, you know, their qualification run was was pretty impressive. So after that first game rolling into the first time the U.S. men's national team has played in Seattle since 2016, where Clint Dempsey scored. um I remember how loud it was at Lumen Field. How are you feeling about this Australia match and then just going forward the U.S. in the World Cup? Well, it's interesting. I have a somewhat aggressive take on yeah soccer development in the US. Because as I mentioned, I went through it with my son. thing about my son was, he is a lot better than I was.
00:05:18
Speaker
um And when he was like six or seven years old, he had a talent for scoring. um Actually, i'll tell you one of my favorite parenting stories. He played soccer for the first time when he was four. They started a lot younger than when I was growing up, as as you know. And we had a really good coach, a woman who had coached high school soccer and was teaching all these things. But the first game, the kids were out there and it's pug goal, you know, soccer and everything. And they're all sort of run around circles. And I i watched this and i and I took my son up to the field afterwards and i said, look, there's a lot going on here.
00:05:47
Speaker
But at the end of the day, your job is to put this ball in that goal. However you want to do it is fine. He scored seven goals in the next game and the little you thing and basically became a very effective striker throughout his career. Also passed the ball well. It was just he had a way of figuring out how to score. um And the problem for me in this is I remember when he was nine and he had been playing rec league in a premier league, saw him and said, hey we want you to try out. and he came out, he scored a goal in the first game he played with them. and it was actually one of my more frightening moments as a parent because I was like, do I have to do something with this?
00:06:24
Speaker
okay He's good. He could be really good. um And that started a eight-year very painful journey in the world of premier level soccer. Now, part of it is as good as my son was from a yeah physical ability to score, he didn't have the fire.
00:06:40
Speaker
he he got nervous and was tense about things and the pressure got to him. And he just, at the end of the day, he didn't enjoy that high level of pressure thing. So it wasn't a long-term thing he was gonna do, but I didn't know that when he was nine or 10 years old. And you soccer in America is driven too much by money and winning at a young era ah young age. and And what that means, I'm gonna get really sort of dorky here. Let's do it, yeah.
00:07:06
Speaker
if you're trying to win when you're seven, eight, nine years old in soccer, the simplest thing to do is kids develop differently. There are some kids who are gonna be bigger, stronger, faster at eight or nine, and it's later. so Boot the ball forward to the bigger, stronger, faster kid. He will outplay and he'll score. But that's the absolute wrong way to develop as a soccer player. Because once you get up to a more competitive level, it's about passing and and the beautiful game, if you will, and how do you get in the right position and work with each other. and and But we develop them around that. and part of the reason we develop them around the you have to win thing is it's all about the money.
00:07:40
Speaker
my God, that the competition between these clubs to get kids there, you know, and, you know, in how do you convince them that your club's better than the other club? Hey, we won eight leagues last year, you know, in the U9 division. So they teach them to be that way. And then also we take too individualistic an approach to it. You know, there are too many parents out there who are like, I'm going to get my kid that scholarship.
00:08:04
Speaker
Now, the irony, of course, is how expensive soccer is, and that's the final problem. You wind up spending more money. If you just put the money into a savings account, you could have paid the kid's tuition when he got there, right and the scholarship's going to get you there. But that's the focus. And so individually, you want to be the guy who scores.
00:08:19
Speaker
you know And soccer, if it if if you're too selfish in soccer, you're not going to develop well. And then the final piece is the money. I mean, you know my family is not wealthy. We fortunately had enough that we could pay the yearly fee. You pay the yearly fees and then- And travel. Exactly. You go into tournaments in Spokane and Arizona and all over the place. So you can have an incredibly talented soccer player, but if his family doesn't have the money,
00:08:42
Speaker
And a lot of clubs say, well, we have a scholarship program, which they give out like two or whatever. where So all of that makes it difficult for us to develop talent. And I've seen the US team struggle. Now, the the interesting the aspect of it for me, so you got Pulisic and then i'm fittting the other guy, the guy scored the two goals in the first game. Balogun. Balogun. Yeah.
00:09:03
Speaker
Both developed not in the US. One was developed in Great Britain. One was developed in Germany. Yeah. And I think there's a reason for that. um So I was skeptical of how we were going to do if we're based on how we develop soccer players here in the U.S. But we got two really good players who would develop. And I don't know the detail. I think there may others as well. And so, yeah, I mean, on that first game, they looked like they could compete with anyone in the world. Now, it's one game, and you never know, but it's exciting. I thinkre i think they're going to be vastly more competitive than I thought they were going to be. No, I completely agree. And it's it's interesting that you note on all of the youth soccer stuff. I think I mentioned Clint Dempsey. His parents would drive him three hours to and three hours back to Dallas so that he could play. And truly the only reason that he was able to do that at the time, because he had siblings, his older sister was actually a really good tennis player. She unfortunately passed away.
00:09:57
Speaker
and so his opportunity came up and he was able to play, but it literally took A family tragedy and lots of money and lots of driving them buying an ah RV so they could go and stay and like putting it all into Clint Dempsey, who, in my opinion, is the greatest American soccer player of all time. 100%. Yeah.
00:10:15
Speaker
You have. Yeah, like that's that's an immense amount of support from parents who, frankly, in our day and age, people can't even buy a house. Right. I know. And then more and more families are struggling to get by. And that gets into some of the stuff that I'm working on, you from an economic populist standpoint and policy. But in terms soccer, yeah, it's harder. We're drawing from a smaller and smaller pool. And then you look at a place like Great Britain. I remember my son was probably, don't know, how old was he? Seven, six, seven years old. They had one of these British soccer camps where they bring over a British soccer player. They do like a two-week course in the summer or whatever. And we were talking to them about it.
00:10:51
Speaker
That's when Jack was five and and the guy was saying, you know if Jack was in in England, they'd already have him you know assigned to a club. And those are clubs, they're in every community. You know you don't have to drive three hours. all right No one's trying to say, oh, Crossfire is better than Seattle United, so you gotta go up here. And you know you're in Eastern Washington, so you gotta come over. No, I mean, every single place in Great Britain has their their territory divided up between Arsenal and Man City and whoever. And at a young age, well, I think Balagan was with, was who was he with? um
00:11:23
Speaker
I can't remember. We'll we'll say. Arsenal. Arsenal. He was with a Arsenal? Okay. When he was eight. When he was eight. Yeah. They recruited him and he got into the Arsenal program. and yeah know And so they have a system throughout the country that develops soccer players no matter how much money they have and no matter where they're from.
00:11:38
Speaker
in a way that's manageable for the families. right And I think that's going to be a challenge for us in the
Capitalism and Regulation in Youth Sports
00:11:43
Speaker
US. And i don't i mean I'm suggesting that we that a major national policy issue is making sure we develop better soccer players. But if we wanted to, we would follow the UK model. I mean, I think in a sense it it can be ah a national issue for certain things. You know, the the privatization and the hyper... How do I say it? Like private equity taking over so much of youth sports in general. I mean, hyper-financialization of children and just experiencing things in their life and growing up, that is... mean, that can be a concern that the government could no take a look at. And I think it is. and You know, certainly social media, the way it has exploited children, but then yes, it's it's all about the money. And we got to regulate that. yeah I mean, I'm not one of these people who thinks that, you know, we can get rid of capitalism. mean, capitalism is just human nature.
00:12:37
Speaker
mean, I say being against capitalism is like being against gravity. It just is, okay. But where capitalism is concerned, you have to regulate it. It's also not some perfect thing that, oh, just let it fly and magic things will happen. Now, capitalism disproportionately rewards some people at the expense of others and you have to have a system that regulates that to control it, particularly when you're talking about children um and trying to help them develop into healthy, happy human beings.
00:13:03
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, you know, I think maybe we differ on that perspective, but, you know, fair enough all all things, all things considered, I mean, you know, I think um that that is the truth of it, right? Like, regardless of if I'm on this side or you're on that side of the idea of capitalism, the thought that it cannot remain unshackled from any sort of regulation and we must do that. I think we would probably both agree that that's a winning message yeah for Democrats going forward that they should be pushing on. For people in general, and i you know all this I remember people talking about the free market and with a name like Adam Smith. I know. I was yeah listen i you know but i always the time, oh, we you know the conservatives, so we must let the free market reign. The only thing I remember, I took an economics course. and The only thing I remember about it is there are four things that are necessary for a free market to exist. yeah Now, I don't remember what those four things were, but I do remember that they literally never exist.
00:13:59
Speaker
okay Never. right So there is no free market. Everyone's trying to get an advantage one way or the other. So why this resistance to regulating it in an aggressive way that that that helps our society? Now, it has to be regulated. It has to be controlled.
00:14:18
Speaker
and And we're letting it get out of control in too many places. Yeah, i mean, you look at American sports in general, stadium deals, all that kind of stuff. The the profits are privatized and the losses are to the public. They're socialized. So that's how we're operating right now. Well, speaking of regulation, I do want to talk a little bit more about um you're on the House Armed Services Committee. You're the chair, correct? I'm the ranking member. Ranking member. Democrats are on the minority. yeah I
Critique of U.S. Immigration Policies
00:14:44
Speaker
was the chair for now four years. Yes, I know. For now. I fully expect to be the chairman come January. There we go. Well, that's going to be that's going to be very big, especially as we today learned that um the U.S. and Iran signed potentially an MOU memorandum of understanding with 14 point plan. um
00:15:03
Speaker
i want to touch on that. But first, I want to want to hit that, you know, the World Cup kind of plays into this. um The US s and Iran and Israel to some extent are engaged in a war, a conflict, and that has trickled down to the Iranian national team not being able to stay in the United States, um even though they are playing matches here in Seattle and other places in the US. and They've had visa issues. And additionally, um you know, with the Trump administration imposing strict kind of regulations around who can come in, what fans can and can't from certain countries. Somalian referee was not allowed to officiate the tournament. um
00:15:41
Speaker
How do you feel that you know this the Trump administration and and just generally the politics of America have kind of put a stamp on this World Cup? Yeah, it's incredibly negative. I think what Trump is doing is undermining some of the core values that have made America, that are the best aspects of America.
00:15:59
Speaker
And one is from our founding. People have wanted to come here to build a better life for themselves. And inconsistently, I'll grant you, but by and large, we have welcomed people over generations. And there's always been waves of anti-immigration. But I don't think we've seen something as aggressive as this, where where Trump is trying to block just about everybody from coming into the US and just completely flipping on its head the notion that we are a welcoming country that wants new people to come in here and totally loses track of the fact of how much we benefit from that. We all benefit from the immigrants who come who want to work hard and build a better life for themselves and their families. That's central to the American ethos, but it's also central to what has made us successful. It's that constant sense of renewal and and and about possibilities and optimism and where we can go to the future. And instead, Trump is just brutally suppressing immigration and he's doing it in a blatantly racist way. I don't know if you saw the Danny Westneat had a column in The Times that um
00:17:01
Speaker
Washington State, which has historically accepted a whole lot of different different refugees, in the last year we've only accepted something like 170 refugees and they're all white South african Africans. Okay.
00:17:12
Speaker
And Trump is very blatant about saying we need more immigrants from Switzerland and Norway. And we are it's not about race. It's about do you believe in the American ideals of freedom and opportunity?
00:17:23
Speaker
And Trump is just undermining our credibility by making the rest of the world not want to come here. And ah every story about the Somali refugee with the Iranian, i sorry, Somali refer referee. yeah so yeah um And it just drives home that message to the rest of the world that we are no longer a welcoming place. We are hostile to it. And that undermines, I think, the success of of our of our country. And I also think Trump's overly militaristic approach, what he did in Iran, The wars that he has supported is making the world a more dangerous place and, again, undermining US credibility. The war with Iran never should have been started in the first place. It wasn't going to accomplish anything. And we've seen that now bear out.
00:18:07
Speaker
We're now paying Iran to open up a strait that was open before the war even started and we've accomplished none of the objectives on their nuclear program, on their support for terrorism, on their ballistic missile program, accomplished none of that. And it's all because we fell into this false notion that violence solves problems.
International Relations and U.S. Defense Policy
00:18:25
Speaker
um So yeah, no, I'm deeply concerned about it. I will say that the local communities, I think there have been some great stories out there. Gosh, my son was telling me about this. Japanese down in Texas visiting people there, you know different people getting to experience America. And I think the communities themselves, like Seattle, have been very welcoming. And I think that sends a positive message. But the overall national policy that the Trump administration is driving,
00:18:54
Speaker
sends the the wrong opposite message. Yeah. I want to get your perspective on this MOU as I may be the first person to talk to you about it. you know um This is what's being reported right now. We don't actually have the information in front of us. We do. we do. The MOU is, I read it like an hour and a half ago. I read the 14 points that are in it. We've signed it. So it is now public. It's in, okay, it is public. Last time I checked, it wasn't. So it's been, you know, that's how the world works. But, you know, this plan includes down, potentially down blending of enriched uranium, lifting naval blockade of Iranian ports, waivers for oil transport, um lifting all of the international sanctions against Iran, unfreezing Iranian assets to the tune of potentially billions, $300 billion dollars in reconstruction funds that Trump is saying is paid for by the Gulf state partners. I'm,
00:19:45
Speaker
Obviously this is an MOU so these are not things that have been signed and agreed upon. This is we're taking a ceasefire. We're going to negotiate these things and we're going this is what we're going to work towards. Correct? Yes. one The only thing you said there that wasn't correct is there's nothing in here about the nuclear program yeah other than let's keep talking. Okay. So there's nothing in there that says that Iran has to do anything with their nuclear program. Well, I think it does say that Iran will continue the position they've had from the beginning. They've always said they're not going to develop a nuclear weapon. Sure.
00:20:13
Speaker
We've just never believed them. So they're continuing to say that. yeah Other than that, it doesn't say anything about the nuclear program except for the fact that we'll negotiate for the next 60 days. Yeah, well, I'd love your perspective on the deal and um you know hopefully bringing this war to an end. Yeah, well, it's interesting because I have sort of two perspectives on it. and I'll start with the second one. First, I'm glad the war is over.
00:20:33
Speaker
I mean, and I think this deal, given where we were at, given that the hole that Donald Trump dropped us down in getting involved in this war, I think it you know I'm glad it's being done.
00:20:46
Speaker
So I don't want to say, that I'm not going to, oh, we can't do this. to I don't want the war. If this ends the war, if it opens up the strait, if it takes the pressure off the global economy, that's good. I don't think we were in a position to negotiate a better deal because of how stupidly Trump put us in this position with the war and with the way he conducted it and talked about it. So I'm glad it's done. I hope it holds. I want the war over. over I want the strait open. I want the global economy to get back back going in the right direction again. But the deal just reflects just how stupid it was to have started this war in the first place. It has clearly strengthened Iran. And as much as I don't want a war with Iran, never did,
00:21:26
Speaker
I acknowledge that Iran's a challenge. mean, they are supporter of terrorist groups. They're anti-American. Their pledge in 1979 to destroy Israel has further created problems in the Middle East. I would like to figure out how to deter and contain that threat.
00:21:43
Speaker
um I never thought war was a way to do that. And now we're in a weaker position to do that. And Iran is a much stronger country now than they were before the war started. And the Iranian people are you know not going to be, well, the Iranian people are not going to have their freedom.
00:21:59
Speaker
And keep in mind, Iran killed tens of thousands of them for daring to speak out against their government. And I have an enormous amount of sympathy for the Iranian people as well. I was going to say the Iranian people aren't going to be in but any better off, but if they in fact have lifted economic sanctions, they may they may start to have a better economy. in they And they're no longer being killed by you know Israeli and American weapons as well. Well, that that too. yeah They are better for that. they still They still face the threat from the Iranian government, certainly they're better that the war is over and they will be better off in Iran from the economic opportunity that the lifting of sanctions will generate. Yeah. You know, you you shared a little bit that the Trump administration made a pretty big blunder in entering and engaging in this war. From the reporting that I've seen, it seems as though the the Israeli government was the one pushing the White House to engage and in fact yeah basically...
00:22:53
Speaker
told them this was going to happen. You know, I you're going to be potentially the the the ranking member or you are the ranking member, potentially the chair of the Armed Services Committee. The 2027 National Defense Authorization is proposing to further integrate the U.S. and Israeli militaries together.
00:23:11
Speaker
And that provision, there's you can read more about it if you're actually interested. I would hope people would. um But there's i' always been partnerships. Yeah, just to describe to the viewers, you know, there's always been partnerships with Israeli and Americans in terms of military, but funding and research and development across warfare, biotechnology, AI, cyber warfare, all of that.
00:23:34
Speaker
would be even more combined with this. Do we think that is a good idea to continue to support that when we were kind of driven into this position? Yeah, first of all, let's explain things better. that Certainly, Netanyahu drove, you know one, to get US involved in this war, but I think the United States of America, claiming that Israel dragged us into it is just an abdication of Trump's responsibility. at the end of the day, we're in this war because Trump decided to start the war. He made that decision. He never should have done it.
00:24:00
Speaker
um And I think we should make sure that we hold him accountable for that. The second problem with what Netanyahu is doing is Netanyahu is operating under the delusion that he can vanquish all of his enemies.
00:24:12
Speaker
And I have more sympathy sympathy for Israel than a lot of people do in that they have faced enemies that want to destroy them, that want to eliminate them. The Iranian Republic, when it was founded in 1979, Israel had never done anything to Iran.
00:24:27
Speaker
There was no beef between the two of them. And Iran's new government made it a central plank to destroy Israel. And they've been acting on that. They've been funding Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, bunch of other groups that have killed many, many Israelis and have consistently attacked the government. So I understand that they have to deal with that, but you have to find partners for peace.
00:24:48
Speaker
And this is where Netanyahu has totally led Israel down the wrong path. And I like to draw an analogy to Egypt and Jordan. For decades, Egypt and Jordan were in a bitter fight with Israel.
00:25:01
Speaker
Then they made peace. Israel didn't destroy Jordan and Egypt. They didn't eliminate all of their enemies. They fought when they had to to defend themselves, but they also found partners for peace. They made peace deals and they found a way to get to peaceful coexistence with Egypt and Jordan. Netanyahu is not doing that with the Lebanese, with the Palestinians, either in Gaza or in the West Bank.
00:25:22
Speaker
He has the opportunity to find partners for peace. He's choosing not to. Instead, he is choosing perpetual war under the misguided notion that eventually all of his enemies will be destroyed and he'll be fine. It's not going to happen.
00:25:34
Speaker
It's not making Israel safer. um So I'm deeply concerned about that. Now, as to the particular provision within the defense bill, it has been somewhat grossly exaggerated. Right now, we have three co-development programs with Israel.
00:25:51
Speaker
missile defense, drone defense, and a counter tunneling technology, whereby our defense firms and our defense department work with their defense firms and their defense department to develop technologies. okay We don't jointly use them. We jointly develop them and then we can use them as we want. And I saw the provision. The provision basically organizes those three programs and puts one central person in charge of it and suggests that it would be a good idea to find other opportunities for other co-development programs. It doesn't authorize any other co-development programs. It doesn't grow this. It doesn't integrate our militaries in any way. It's co-development around those isolated programs. I saw it initially primarily as a benefit to the US.
00:26:33
Speaker
We are not good ah drone at counter drone or missile defense. Israel's got a lot of experience. We could benefit from that. All of that said, I do not support inclusion of that provision in the defense bill. And I had conversations with several of my constituents who were concerned about and I think they made a compelling argument that given what Israel is doing in the perpetual war cycle that I just described, pride anything, however small, and this is very small, that appears to endorse that and integrate with them, this is the wrong time to do that until some of those changes are made. So yeah, I oppose that provision, and we'll try to get it out of the defense bill.
00:27:13
Speaker
It's good that constituents are
Constituent Engagement and Economic Focus
00:27:15
Speaker
pushing back and that's good to hear yeah um on that sense. And I appreciate you clarifying on on all of those things. I think it is interesting to a lot of our viewers as well. So we tend to be quite progressive soccer fans here. yeah And if I could clarify in just one thing that think is really important. yeah um The constituents who contacted me, I had very you know long detailed conversations, respectful conversations that were helpful. I've also had a major problem of some people who have been harassing and threatening me, my family, my neighbors, my staff that have been showing up at my house at all hours of the day of night, you know, threatening my life. You know, they physically assaulted one of my staffers at a town hall meeting. They vandalized my house.
00:27:59
Speaker
That's not helpful. Okay. And that was the initial wave that came at me. And frankly, I was like, yes, screw these people. But then constituents that that had contacted me within the format of our representative democracy, And we had a good, sensible, reasonable conversation. They made coherent arguments. We discussed it for a while and I was like, yeah, you're right.
00:28:21
Speaker
I appreciate taking the time to explain that. I really wish we would do it that way instead of thinking that screaming insults at somebody is the way you get to persuade them. Yeah, I can i can definitely understand that. I think it's in ah in a very heated moment in our in our world, in our culture, I think, you know, obviously there are lines that you have to draw. And I think that drawing that between people who are going to be radical in their messaging terms is maybe not the correct way to do it. But sometimes cutting through that messaging is important, which it seems like you have been doing and hearing that. But um Yeah, I think, um is there anything else you know that you have been working on um as we we come here towards the end that you have been working on that you wanted to highlight for this community and just in general? Absolutely. i think one of the biggest things, economic opportunity. you know I grew up in SeaTac. My father was a ramp serviceman at United Airlines. So I grew up in a blue collar working class family. um And I had opportunity.
00:29:21
Speaker
um Education was more affordable. Housing was more affordable. So I'm really focused on how can we build more housing to make housing more affordable? And how can we give young people in blue collar communities greater access to the workforce development that they need at an affordable rate so they can get the skills they need to have a good life?
00:29:39
Speaker
Work hard, get ahead, play by the rules, all of that. So I'm really focused on economic opportunity, focused on bringing down the cost of housing, cost of health care, cost of education. And then also just give a shout out to the union movement. My father was a machinist. I'm sorry. My father was a baggage handler, but he was in a machinist union. Sure. Yeah. That's how they organized. And when I was in college, I worked for UPS. I was a teamster.
00:30:01
Speaker
And the only reason I made a decent wage loading trucks to pay my way through college was because of the American labor movement. We need to do more for the working class of this country. Too few have too much and too many are struggling to pay the bills. We need to balance that out.
00:30:16
Speaker
So I think, you know economic populism that gives greater opportunity to more people and makes middle class life more more accessible is the center of what I'm trying to do for the 9th District and for the country.
00:30:27
Speaker
Well, we really appreciate it. And i hope that ah Democrats can continue with that message as ah as a general central theme, because I think a lot of us, even here in Seattle, like I'm the silliest working class of all time. I'm a podcaster,
Conclusion and World Cup Excitement
00:30:40
Speaker
but I, you know, I don't make that much money. I can barely pay my rent. And I've I've worked secondary jobs and stuff. So we ah you know, I encourage all of you and your your colleagues to continue on that fight. And thank you so much for joining us. Well, thanks for the chance, and let's have fun with the the World Cup. It's going to be a great, what is it, six, eight weeks? Yeah. Something like that. So and think it's really exciting for our city and really exciting for the country.
00:31:04
Speaker
appreciate it.