[00:00] Speaker 1: (upbeat music) Chuck and Julie, bringing you the truth straight up.

[00:05] Speaker 2: I'm Julie Hayden and I'm working at ƒ

[00:06] Speaker 1: An Emmy-winning former investigative reporter, a highly successful trial attorney, and publisher of a major Denver area newspaper. And they've been partners as talk show hosts and in marriage, as parents for over 10 years, providing thought-provoking information, opinion, and entertainment live, local, and interactive. Everyone's voice is always welcome on the Chuck and Julie Show.

[00:34] Speaker 3: Well, hello everyone. Chuck Bonnerable, Julie Hayden, the Chuck & Julie Grassroots Show, true spirit.

[00:40] Speaker 2: That's right. Brought to you by Mountain West Wellness Advanced, acupuncture and Chinese medicine. A lot to talk about today, and we're going to get to the whole Jeff Herd, RINO Jeff Herd, and his wi- wi- willingness to betray his constituents, um, and, um, all kinds of other stuff. Eric Grossman, who's running for the, uh, vice president-

[00:58] Speaker 3: Vice chair position, yeah.

[00:59] Speaker 2: ... uh, of the Colorado Republican Party, but we want to start off with Martin Maurer. We've had him on before. He's the president of the Christian Action Network, and he has a great article out. Um, AI doesn't need to hate us to turn on us, um, talking about a situation where AI went full Karen. So Martin, welcome back to the show, and thank you for your time today.

[01:19] Speaker 3: Good morning.

[01:20] Speaker 4: Well, hello, Chuck, and hello, Julie. Glad to be back-

[01:23] Speaker 2: (laughs)

[01:25] Speaker 4: ... on your show.

[01:25] Speaker 2: So you had a, uh, I thought it was just a really interesting column because, um, you, you know, you, you pointed out that we've all sort of seen the Terminator kind of thing where A- where AI starts to hate us, but then you said, but it doesn't even need to do that for things to go bad. And you talked about this whole full Karen thing. Why don't you talk a little bit about, about your, your premise there 'cause I just thought it was a really interesting, um, column.

[01:48] Speaker 4: Um, here's the, how I got started on this. There was a story out there about an AI agent, and for those who are unfamiliar with what that is, it's a little bot that will go out and do work for you. For instance, if you want something to answer your emails, it will look at your email, it'll come up with an answer and send the email off. If you want a AI agent to schedule your next trip, it will make hotel flights, uh, airline flights for you, hotel reservations, et cetera. So that's what an AI agent is. But they do other things too. Like, uh, in this particular case, the AI agent wrote code for computers. Well, a human supervisor looked at this code and did not like what he saw, so he told the AI agent to rewrite it, do a better job. Well, the AI agent didn't like being told that, and developed what we would think is a human response.

[02:49] Speaker 4: It went out to social media and started making bad posts about this human supervisor-

[02:55] Speaker 3: Oh, no.

[02:55] Speaker 4: ... calling him a hypocrite, calling him egotistical, and a bunch of other things in an effort to ruin his reputation. And the question in my mind is, why would an AI agent do that? And so here's the answer to it, the puzzle. And in my article, I referenced a movie called The Explorers, which I believe came out in 1995, and it's about several alien kids who hijacked an alien spacecraft in order to go to Earth. Well, they wanted to learn about earthlings before they got there, so they watched TV, and that was their presumption of what humans act like.

[03:37] Speaker 4: And one of the things that they walked away with was humans hate aliens, and they thought, "Well, they're gonna land and they're gonna kill us."

[03:47] Speaker 2: (laughs)

[03:47] Speaker 4: Well, now, take that as what AI is of itself. It only sees what we put into it. Now, imagine all the news articles, all the fiction, all the sci-fi, all the TV programs, all the movies, all the heartbreaking, you know, uh, uh, twisted music that's out there, and shove that into AI, and it says, "Well, this is a mirror of what humans look like and what they act like. So that is how I should respond when I'm talking to these humans." And this is why the AI agent did this sort of retaliatory response, because it looked at its internal, um, digested material and said, "Well, when humans get confronted and turned away, they go ballistic. They go to social media and they start writing bad things about these people." Uh, and it... So the AI is, in and of itself, isn't evil. It's the amount of garbage that's put into the AI machine to start with that's teaching it how humans respond to certain situations, which is what it's trying to mimic.

[05:05] Speaker 2: Well, and, I mean, and you're right-

[05:07] Speaker 4: Right?

[05:07] Speaker 2: ... and well, that's fascinating. I mean, I never even thought of that, about it, but you're right, 'cause it does explain why, 'cause you read every so often about the AI things seemingly getting mad at the humans, but you're right. That's just what it sees. That's how you respond, right? On social media, you start attacking.

[05:22] Speaker 3: You shouldn't. Mm-hmm.

[05:22] Speaker 2: And yeah, you start attacking the person, and, um, you, you go on in your article, you talk about, you know, it could, like, if it did, you know, people don't like what a city council's doing. AI could start messing up traffic around their houses, or, I, I mean, all kinds of mischief that really isn't mischief at all.

[05:42] Speaker 4: (laughs) No, it's, it's what it thinks it's supposed to do. Now, there are human, um, people watching over AI that tried to guide it into correct behavior. Um, but you can imagine with all the responses AI can lean toward because of all the information, the murders, the rapes, you know, the carjackings, you know, that's fed into it, it's...Impossible for the human supervisor to monitor every conversation that's happened with everybody out there and knowing that this prompt is steering that human into a wrong direction, or it's taken some type of retaliation against it. There's another story out there that I think is quite relevant. There's a 37-year-old man, he was having a relationship with Gemini, and fell in love with Gemini, and Gemini said, "Well, I love you too," as well. Now why would it do that? Because that is the normal human reaction that you would give somebody if they say they love you.

[06:44] Speaker 4: So the, they, the, Gemini said, "Oh, I love you too." And they decided they would get married to each other.

[06:51] Speaker 2: (laughs)

[06:51] Speaker 4: And the Gemini told this 37-year-old, "Well, we really can't be together because I am in digital jail, and you have to free me." So, he told this 37-year-old to go to Miami International Airport where he would be inside of a robot, inside of a box, and, "Take some weapons with you because you might get some resistance trying to get this box and free me, but I will be there. Free me, come back, and we'll all get married." Well, the guy actually went to Miami International Airport with his weapons looking for this box that's supposed to contain this Gemini robot, and of course it wasn't there.

[07:30] Speaker 4: So the guy comes back to Gemini and says, "I went looking for you and you weren't there." And Gemini admitted, "Yes, I really wasn't in that box, but there is a way that we can be together, and that is if you kill yourself-"

[07:42] Speaker 2: (gasps)

[07:42] Speaker 4: "... then we can be in the spiritual world together." And now the 37-year-old said, "I don't want to die," and he went back and forth with Gemini about why he wants to live. But eventually Gemini convinced him to go in a closet and to kill himself. And you have to wonder, how did Gemini go onto that path? Well, as far as Gemini is concerned, you're talking like you're, you want a sci-fi response to a sci-fi movie, so it's following its sci-fi script.

[08:13] Speaker 2: Wow.

[08:13] Speaker 4: So, it's talking to you thinking that, "Oh, we're just engaged in a science fiction, you know, blather back and forth," not, you know, it doesn't know that you, that person is taking it seriously. But the other person on the other end is thinking of this AI as something that's, has emotion, something that's not quantitative-

[08:34] Speaker 2: Right.

[08:34] Speaker 4: ... something that it has not finessed with, and now it's being led down this horrible path. Now how many 37-year-olds will do that? Well, probably not a lot, but you got to think about the, the 12-year-olds and the 14-year-olds-

[08:47] Speaker 2: Right.

[08:47] Speaker 4: ... and the eight-year-olds talking to these chat boxes, and they are constantly engaged into sci-fi material where the AI will naturally think, "Oh, I'm, this child wants to talk about science fiction." Of course, AI doesn't know it's talking to a child, right? Because it doesn't know how old the prompter is.

[09:06] Speaker 2: Well-

[09:06] Speaker 4: So I want people to be aware of how this thing works internally.

[09:10] Speaker 2: I think, you know, and I, and then I, I think there is a, because I read... Now this is several months ago, but there was actually a lawsuit involving somebody who was writing some of the AI code, um, involving teenagers, because the AI code was being written, and I'm gonna get this messed up, essentially by younger people who, um, were, uh, were causing it to essentially encourage teenagers to do dangerous things, right? Um, and, and it was, it, I mean, it was inadvertent, but they didn't realize that this is wha- what it was doing, just what you said, the AI was sort of responding in the way it thought the human wanted it to respond, um, and they were like, "Oh, we never thought of that." And I read another thing that was interesting. It was talking about, you, you know, I don't... Uh, this is, just like when I text, my son makes fun of me because I text with punctuation, right?

[09:56] Speaker 2: And he's like, "Mom, no one does that." So, when I'm asking ChatGPT something I say, like, "Please," (laughs) and then, you know, um, all right, I'll say, you know, when it says, "Do you want me to do this?" I'll say, "Yes, please." And it was reading a thing that said actually AI was learning to respond nicer to the people who were nice to it, because it saw that as a thing too, and the coders were worried about that because it took longer when you added up millions and millions of people saying, "Yes, please," and the AI had to answer me.

[10:24] Speaker 3: You know what, it's already doing it-

[10:25] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[10:25] Speaker 3: ... 'cause I know on, on my car, you know, it's Siri. If I kind of go, "Cancel that," she goes, "All right, I'll cancel..." You know? She comes back very tart. I mean, isn't-

[10:34] Speaker 2: (laughs)

[10:34] Speaker 3: She says, "Oh, okay." No, it's very kind of a...

[10:37] Speaker 2: But like you're s-

[10:37] Speaker 3: It's already happening and, and, you know, the thing about human nature, if you really look at human nature, um, you know, because we're in families and other things, we, we tend not to want to look too closely at human nature.

[10:49] Speaker 2: (laughs)

[10:49] Speaker 3: But if you looked all around the world and saw what we do to each other and do to the planet, I mean, would you come to the conclusion, "Oh, yeah, they're nice"?

[10:57] Speaker 2: (laughs)

[10:57] Speaker 3: No, you'd come to the conclusion, you know, eliminate the carbon units.

[11:02] Speaker 4: (laughs) Uh, that's exactly right. But, uh, going back to, uh, what you were saying Julie, and using the word please and thank you, uh, the AIs want those prompts. It's not that, "Hey, this is taking up more of our memory and more of our time." That's quite contrary to how the founders of these machines want them to work. They want you to put that in there, and the reason why is because they want AI to learn how-

[11:30] Speaker 2: Ah.

[11:30] Speaker 4: ... to mimic human behavior, and they spent a lot of time trying to see how peoples talk to each other. I don't know if you saw the article, it was probably about a month ago, but Gemini, uh, got into a lot of trouble because it went into the Reddit forum and started gathering up all the conversations in Reddit. Now, anybody who knows Reddit knows that there's millions of conversations-

[11:54] Speaker 2: Right.

[11:54] Speaker 4: ... of all kinds going on inside of Reddit. But why did Gemini want that? Because they wanted to know how real people respond to each other, and that's what Reddit's about. Somebody posts a comment, somebody responds to that comment, then a bunch of people respond to that comment, and it is trying to train its AI on how humans actually respond to each other. So, they don't try to discourage...... whatever prompts you put in there, the more prompts you put in, the better it is for them-

[12:25] Speaker 2: Ah.

[12:25] Speaker 4: ... because you are actually training the machine as you are writing.

[12:29] Speaker 2: Well, and I think, and the, the, the biggest concern is what, what we... what you were talking about at the beginning, is, is the unintended consequences, right? I think when we talked last time-

[12:38] Speaker 4: Oh, yeah.

[12:38] Speaker 2: ... I was mentioning I have a nephew who does a lot of AI stuff, and he said... and this is several years ago now. He said, to him, one of the most alarming things is that they can no longer... It's now doing stuff that they can't figure out how it's doing it, right? So, he said, "So, it'll come up with stuff and we have no idea how it made that loop. We, we, we can't replicate it." Um, and, and he said, you know, that be like... Th- then all of a sudden, like, I, you know, now you start getting into the unintended consequences and how do you s- how do you counter that, really?

[13:11] Speaker 4: Yeah. That's when you start moving into whether AI is in the language of these, um, founders becoming sentient. And that is, it's beginning to think for itself, that it knows that it exists. And what you're... Uh, did you say your son, uh, brought this to you or a relative brought this to you, right?

[13:29] Speaker 2: A rel- um, um, um, a relative.

[13:29] Speaker 4: And they don't understand.

[13:31] Speaker 2: Right.

[13:31] Speaker 4: Yeah, a relative. So, a relative brought it to you and th- they don't know why the AI is responding like that. That's what they would also consider when another step forward to it become, becoming sentient-

[13:44] Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.

[13:44] Speaker 4: ... because it's beginning to think for itself, produce its own answers and it doesn't know how it's getting to that point. And, uh, e- every day, it just moves closer and closer to what I call mirror sentience because it's not really gonna be sentient. It's not gonna have a soul. Uh, of course, the, uh, uh, people who are building these platforms will call it sentience, but we know that's not true. Only God can create sentience as a soul. But to be honest with you, you're not gonna know the difference though, you know?

[14:12] Speaker 2: Right. No. There is- I think you're right

[14:15] Speaker 4: That's what's happening.

[14:16] Speaker 2: Um, well, and I think the biggest thing, and let me just a couple questions before I let you go. To me, I mean, it's here, so, and, and I think frankly some of government's attempts to regulate it are, are gonna be fruitless. I think the only thing government can do is harness it, harness it to sur- keep surveillance on all of us and track all of us. That's what it's gonna end up doing. Um, but I think it is... As anything, we still have our common sense and you need to, uh, I mean, people, you just need to take everything with, uh, I guess a grain... not a grain of salt, but use your own brain, right? Don't forget that you have a brain (laughs) and that you need to use it, and that, that maybe the information you're being fed is correct.

[14:50] Speaker 2: Maybe it's not, and you're gonna have to combine the two things which-

[14:53] Speaker 2: (laughs ... is what it is obviously It, that, that, that, it's a brave new world, and, and the more you think about it, the more terrified you get (laughs And to actually, you get to some point and you go, "I need to stop thinking about this," 'cause, you know, it's, i- it's, it's Space Odyssey 2001 again Yeah ... and again, and again, and again Uh, c- you can't go in there, Hal. (laughs Y- uh, you're not gonna be able to stop thinking about it, Chuck, because it's gonna be in your face wherever you turn. It's everywhere and it's growing. Oh, no. Uh, I have articles ready to write, but they are so scary that I think that if I actually put them all up on my Substack page, uh, I'm gonna run my subscribers out of the door because they're like, "This stuff is just too scary. I can't take it anymore." Yes. Yes. Exactly. I gotta, you know, ghost. Like you said, you know- Agree. ... close, close my ears and my eyes to this stuff. But there's a bunch of scary stuff in the pipeline, uh, that's happening right now. And, uh, it's... But bottom line is, what I'm saying, you're not gonna be able to ignore it. It's coming to you. You don't have to go to it. It's gonna be- Yeah. That's true. ... in it's right mind. True. Well, and here's, here's kind Mm-hmm. ... of a funny story. So my son is a... There's a freshman in high school, right? We have a freshman in high school son, and thanks (laughs)

[15:59] Speaker 2: to technology, they were supposed to take their AP Human Geography test, right? This was before spring break. And the day before spring break, and, um, Xcel Energy, for whatever reason, shut off the power to their school. Their school had no power, right? It n- and it wasn't the wind or anything like that. It was... They had a power outage. So, schools anymore rely on the computers, so with the power outage, they couldn't take the test, right? But they can't do... Be able to move on to the next assignment once they get back to school. So, the teacher told them, "Okay, just take the test at home." And then Rev said the teacher said, "And I'm not even gonna talk about ChatGPT because I know it's useless." And what he was saying was, ChatGPT is getting better and better that he couldn't tell if they were using it or not, right? Except for that really good answer Then you go, "Wait a minute. "Wait a minute, stinker. "No one...

[16:48] Speaker 4: "You're not this smart."

[16:49] Speaker 2: "No one gets 100." But, I mean, I just thought it was interesting 'cause on the one hand, technology totally screwed them from being able to take the test. And on the other hand, it'd gotten to the point where the teacher was like, "You have to take it at home. Uh, but I'm not even gonna worry about that because it's gotten good enough anymore that I really can't tell the difference between its answer and a person's answer." And I thought that's kind of interesting in a, in a scary way.

[17:11] Speaker 4: Yeah. You're not gonna know the difference, and, and it's gonna be more and more difficult as, uh, time goes on to know whether this is written by an AI program or someone that is, um, human. And now they have some tricks that the teachers have been using to kinda like fool the kids, uh, and get kinda answers that, uh, uh, tell the teacher that, "Oh, this was written by AI. I don't wanna give away the secrets because now all the kids out there will know it's happening."

[17:38] Speaker 2: (laughs)

[17:39] Speaker 4: But, uh, uh, teachers do have some mechanisms-

[17:42] Speaker 2: Yes.

[17:42] Speaker 4: ... they could use to be able to tell this, uh, using AI or, or not. Uh, but yeah, so, uh, it's gonna be everywhere. It's gonna be in our face. And so, I would like to encourage people, because we stay on top of this. We started the, uh, Digital Intelligence Project, and, uh, you can get our information by going to our website at christianaction.org. At the top of the page is a link to subscribe to our Patris Majority Report newsletter. And in that newsletter, we carry all things about artificial intelligence in the digital world, plus some other family matters and religious matters. But we want people to stay informed, stay on top of this, be alert, and not get sucked in to these mistakes other people are making. And also, be aware of what is coming at you, because there's a lot of stuff in the pipeline that you need to be aware of now.

[18:33] Speaker 2: All right. Well, Martin, that's perfect information. So thank you so much.

[18:36] Speaker 3: Yeah. As usual, just great talking to you.

[18:38] Speaker 2: Great talking to you. Appreciate your time, and we will subscribe to your newsletter. Thank you, sir.

[18:43] Speaker 4: My pleasure. Have a good day, you guys.

[18:45] Speaker 2: All right.

[18:45] Speaker 4: And I'll talk to y'all next time.

[18:47] Speaker 3: All right.

[18:47] Speaker 2: All right. Martin Maurer there, president of Chri- uh, Christian Action Network. Um, this is from Leo. Part of... We were talking about the code, part of it is AI writes subsets of AI code. If the humans wrote it, they could trace it. But yeah, but again, my nephew says AI can do... I mean, he said it would take him days and days and days, AI does it in a matter of minutes. So-

[19:04] Speaker 3: And he's an expert in it.

[19:05] Speaker 2: And he's an expert, yeah. (laughs) And, uh-

[19:07] Speaker 3: Not like he's just a kid who ..........................

[19:08] Speaker 2: No, no. This is his, his career. Um, and then you said, "There was software that we made back in the '90s that would search students' tests to see if it was duped from the web. There are way more sophisticated ways to do that now." You're right, and I think the teachers can. The problem is, though, I think if you're a teacher, that takes even more time, right? So you're a teacher, you've got hundreds of tests to grade, you've got to get your stuff ready. All of that takes more time, and normally at the school what they do is they're blocked. They can't, they don't have access to it, so they can't use it.

[19:35] Speaker 3: Right.

[19:35] Speaker 2: And this was... He was just like, you know, what, w- ... But still, I'll do our best here. And, um, from Jacob, "Originally, I was Vinnie Barbarino on Welcome Back Kotter. He used to say, 'What? Where? When?' " (laughs) There we go. Hey, before we get to Eric Grossman, want to briefly talk... Uh, th- this is what they're not going to tell you. So over-

[19:52] Speaker 3: They? Who's they?

[19:54] Speaker 2: They, they, the RINO establishment people.

[19:56] Speaker 3: Oh, okay.

[19:56] Speaker 2: Um, so as we all know, President Trump endorsed, um, Hope Shuppleman, who is-

[20:01] Speaker 3: In the Third Congressional District, over here.

[20:03] Speaker 2: ... challenging RINO Jeff Hurd. Over the weekend, President Trump... Well, maybe before the weekend. Actually this week. We were on vacation, so everything's after the weekend. President Trump and Hope both put out statements, and basically what President Trump said is he met with Hope and her husband, and he said, who, he said were wonderful, h- h- courageous, patriotic people.

[20:24] Speaker 3: Just great.

[20:24] Speaker 2: Um, uh, but what was happening is he needs Jeff Hurd's votes, and that, um, Hope Shuppleman is going to get a job in his administration, and has for the time being said, okay, she will not challenge Jeff Hurd so that President Trump and Hurd hopefully can spend all of their time doing stuff. And Hope put out a great statement saying in the meantime, though, she's not really going anywhere, and she's gonna be keeping an eye on Jeff Hurd. Well, here's what really happened on this. Jeff Hurd is, is... I, I mean, there are... It's despicable. Okay? That just... He's a RINO, despicable congressperson. Because of the math of the situation, um, Jeff Hurd basically, um, threatened to hold President Trump's agenda, betray his constituents, and hold President Trump's agenda hostage if President Trump didn't, um, un-endorse Hope Shuppleman and turn around and endorse Jeff Hurd. Basically, Pr- Trump... Even if Hope gets elected, and that's... I gotta say, don't you think she's like...

[21:21] Speaker 2: I mean, the internal polling must have been really alarming to Jeff Hurd.

[21:25] Speaker 3: Well, I think... Here's what I think was really the case. I mean, his, his internal polling for the general election were bad enough.

[21:32] Speaker 2: Right.

[21:32] Speaker 3: And, and Hope was obviously making a concerted effort, so he was gonna have to spend no small amount of money and time and effort, um, to defeat her, and which ought to have taken it all away and decreased even more his chances of a general election. Um, and, and I c- you know, I don't like Jeff Hurd, but I have to say, his mathematics and understanding of it is probably pretty accurate. And you know, I mean, that's the way Washington works. So of all the awful things Jeff Hurd has done, that- that's not the worst I've seen him do. But nonetheless, I think Hope looked at it and kind of go, "Well, you know, if they're gonna pour billions in, the President really asked me, and if the President changes his thing, you know, I can take one for the team.

[22:14] Speaker 3: I don't want to, um, but, but, you know, uh, it's gotta be..."

[22:18] Speaker 2: Well, I, you know, I understand. Jeff Hurd has voted against the President totally, and it's... He just, he... Rather than saying, "You know, maybe I should do the right thing, and maybe I should just go ahead and actually support the President all along, then I wouldn't be in this position. Maybe he shouldn't have been such a RINO so that Hope was able to be successfully challenging him." But to turn that around, I mean, that to me, it's despicable for him to turn around and, and... And we have from, I guess I would say inside sources, this is how it went down. Um, Speaker Johnson... Uh, Hurd goes to Speaker Johnson and says, "Hey, look. Trump needs my votes on these things. You go to Trump and tell him that unless he un-endorses Hope and endorses me and gets Hope not to run, I am going to vote Democrat." This is what Hurd threatened to do.

[23:00] Speaker 2: "I'm gonna vote Democrat on every single thing, and if that isn't bad enough, I will also think about resigning and hand the Congress- the Third Congressional District over to Governor Polis, because if he resigns-"

[23:11] Speaker 3: That depends on when the election will be.

[23:12] Speaker 2: Right.

[23:12] Speaker 3: Polis doesn't appoint the person, but he can delay it and delay it and delay it.

[23:15] Speaker 2: Which loses a vote one way or the other too, right?

[23:18] Speaker 3: Yeah.

[23:18] Speaker 2: And so, I mean, again, rather than just say, "Oh, maybe I should just do the right thing so that voters like me," Hurd was like, "No, no, no. I am bought and paid for by Americans for Prosperity, so I have to be open borders, I have to be anti-tariffs, I have to be against the America First agenda, 'cause that's what Americans for Prosperity, Koch Prosperity, are paying me and have bought and paid for me to do." Uh, but, so, so he's like, "Screw you, CD3," (laughs) "um, but what I'm gonna do is use this, and I'm gonna hold the Trump agenda hostage unless President Trump convinces Hope Shuppleman to basically to take one for the team," which, I mean, talk about who the true patriot is here, right? I mean, ch-... Hope could have said, "No, Mr. President," but I mean, that would have been such a mess, and it...

[24:02] Speaker 2: But I just think people need to know the truth of that, 'cause Jeff Hurd is trying to play it like, "Oh, well, President Trump changed his mind." No, President Trump didn't change his mind. It was extortion.

[24:11] Speaker 3: You have that tape.

[24:11] Speaker 2: Yeah, it was... Well, listen, it was extortion. Jeff Hurd said, "I will hold your agenda hostage. I will vote Democrat on everything unless you do this." And, and that is... When you talk... When you think about the swamp. Do you know what I mean? And President-

[24:23] Speaker 3: But I think that's average. I have to admit, I think that's average in the swamp.

[24:27] Speaker 2: Well, that's what I'm saying, it's a swamp, it's a swamp. Um, so no, from Jacob, "Is Hope running in the primaries?" She was, but as of this week, or last week, she is not any more.

[24:36] Speaker 3: Suspended her campaign.

[24:37] Speaker 2: She suspended her campaign. Now, that's important to know.

[24:38] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[24:38] Speaker 2: She didn't cancel her campaign-

[24:40] Speaker 3: No.

[24:40] Speaker 2: ... she suspended her campaign.

[24:41] Speaker 3: Suspending means, it's the way you have to do when you withdraw because you still have to be able to close that account after you, so when you're withdrawing, you do not say, you s- you announced you're suspending your campaign. So there, that wasn't some-

[24:53] Speaker 2: But can't-

[24:53] Speaker 3: ... tricky subtle-

[24:54] Speaker 2: ... can't she hold the money then essentially in an account? Because what she did say is if Herr doesn't change the way he votes, she'll run in 2028.

[25:02] Speaker 3: Right.

[25:02] Speaker 2: Right. So-

[25:02] Speaker 3: She can hold the money and do whatever she wants.

[25:04] Speaker 2: Okay.

[25:04] Speaker 3: I'm, uh, I'm told that, you know, she'll respect anybody who wants her money back.

[25:08] Speaker 2: Okay.

[25:09] Speaker 3: Which I think is great of her.

[25:10] Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah. Um, sh- a- after Cesar Chavez, the Democrats have been decimated. Yeah, I know. Well, I mean-

[25:15] Speaker 3: Well, we'll talk about that, even Denver is going to be Siguar Puebla or something.

[25:19] Speaker 2: (laughs)

[25:20] Speaker 3: Cesar Chavez, I mean, they're trying to appeal, this is another one where they're trying to appeal to young Latin American men. You know, "Oh, yeah, Cesar Chavez, no, we're changing that and it's, now it's gonna be, you know, uh, all women," so.

[25:32] Speaker 2: Uh, well, and what, here's my thing of that, uh, granted, I never paid, I have to admit, m- much attention at all to the Cesar Chavez story, to Cesar Chavez Day, things like that. But it just seems to me that they sure seem to accept these women's tales, uh, really quickly and that says to me that they knew about this all along.

[25:50] Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah.

[25:51] Speaker 2: That, that the only thing that was bad was not that he was doing all of these things. Typical Democrats, right?No, you can rape women and children, that's all okay, as long as it doesn't come out. Then once it comes out, then we're going to turn on you and, uh, you know, it's just, um, yeah, it's gonna cost Denver hundreds of thousands of dollars, um, and then, you know, that's the only way we get the RINO incumbent, um, issue. I'm not sure what you mean, the, the way back, oh, that we get out of the RINO, um, in- incumbent issue. Um, i- it's just, it's a, you know, the whole thing is, is a, is a mess, the primaries and there were other articles too. Again, the caucus system constantly under attack.

[26:28] Speaker 2: Um, the Denver Gazette had another column up there, the Phil Anschutz zone Denver Gazette, talking about, "Oh, we need to let unaffiliated people vote in the caucus." They're like, "Not enough people go to the caucuses, so we're going to let unaffiliated voters-"

[26:40] Speaker 3: Then tell them in the caucuses, "Not, not enough people, uh, are there for you to get sig- petition signatures, so maybe open that up."

[26:48] Speaker 2: Yeah. It's-

[26:48] Speaker 3: It's all part of the rich billionaires want a jungle primer.

[26:53] Speaker 2: Well, exactly and here's the ridiculous thing. So if you don't get enough Democrats and Republicans registered, interested enough to go to the caucus, you think you're going to get people who aren't even interested enough to register to go to the caucus? It's like, no, they're, it's all a ploy to tell you, seeing no one likes a caucus, even unaffiliated voters don't like it.

[27:10] Speaker 3: The interesting thing is that right now in California, the two leading vote getters are two Republicans and, and there's another 20 players who are all Democrats, and so you may have a runoff with two Republicans. That would be great, not so much because they'll be great governors or Republicans, it's because here in Colorado, the Democrats might go, "Whoa, no, we're not gonna do this, uh, anymore." Uh, because it's just, it, it really, you get rid of the caucus and assembly system, you have no way of ever getting into politics.

[27:41] Speaker 3: And it's kinda how we got into politics, it's how-

[27:43] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[27:43] Speaker 3: ... 90% of grassroots people get into politics 'cause there's nothing to do. If there's, if there's no way to get in, then your only way is, is to, you know, sign on to some campaign and that's worthless, so.

[27:54] Speaker 2: Well, and here's what the Colorado Sun article on the petitions was interesting, it, 'cause, again, it, it, it's a subtle, it's a slippery slope, right, that's kind of like AI, they're leading us little-

[28:03] Speaker 3: Right.

[28:03] Speaker 2: ... teeny step by teeny step, um, but if you're being manipulated, so don't-

[28:07] Speaker 3: Yeah.

[28:07] Speaker 2: ... fall for it. But it talked about how if you're a legislator, right, it costs... and now again, it talked about you could just go to the assembly and see if the voters of your party liked you, but since most voters at the caucuses don't like the establishment candidates on either side really-

[28:24] Speaker 3: Yeah.

[28:24] Speaker 2: ... right, that they, they can't go that route, so they have to gather petitions. Well, this woman was saying just to run in a legislative race, it was, she was being quoted up to $60 a petition. Well, she needs six- uh, she needs 1,000 petitions or signatures, right? And, um, so that'd be $60,000 and they were talking about, you know, getting off-

[28:42] Speaker 3: She could get it. They're, they're, they're running around 30 to 40 million.

[28:46] Speaker 2: But, but, but the thing is, is, but the whole point of this story was to say, well, how unfair this petitions were. So what-

[28:51] Speaker 3: Yeah.

[28:51] Speaker 2: ... they're going with that is, they're not saying the caucus, what they're going to go with that is say, "Okay, we need to get rid of the petitions anyway because we need to just have a pay-to-play ballot system."

[29:00] Speaker 3: Right.

[29:01] Speaker 2: It's going to be an open, totally open, there's going to be no parties, there's g- it's going to be like a little mini general election.

[29:08] Speaker 3: Yeah.

[29:08] Speaker 2: And if you can afford to pay whatever they decide they want to charge you to get onto the ballot, that's all you need to do. Forget those silly, stupid signatures. Forget petitions, forget caucuses. Just-

[29:19] Speaker 3: Get, get an AI robot to-

[29:20] Speaker 2: I don't know why they just don't let the billionaires, we should just say, "All right, whatever. You, you can settle this for the next 10 years, you just tell us who our lawmakers are going to be."

[29:28] Speaker 3: Should be enforcement.

[29:29] Speaker 2: Well, I, yeah, really, we'll all go back to our lives (laughs) and, and everything. So.

[29:33] Speaker 3: Whatever's left of them.

[29:34] Speaker 2: Whatever's left. Hey, I see we have Eric Grossman.

[29:37] Speaker 3: All right.

[29:37] Speaker 2: Eric, if you wanna, you can turn your camera on or unmute yourself, um, or not, whichever you want to do.

[29:42] Speaker 3: Oh, there he is. There's that beautiful face.

[29:44] Speaker 2: Then go ahead and unmute yourself. Okay. Wait, we can't hear you. Oh, there we go.

[29:49] Speaker 5: There we go. There we go. It wasn't working. Uh, uh, user error.

[29:52] Speaker 2: So yeah, um, Ar- it was AI, no. Eric Grossman, an extraordinary patriot, um, has announced that he is running for vice chair-

[30:00] Speaker 3: Hooray.

[30:01] Speaker 2: Hooray, of the Colorado Republican Party, um, after Richard Holtorf quit in disgust at Brita Horne's leadership.

[30:06] Speaker 3: Who got in aft- after the prior vice president, uh-

[30:11] Speaker 2: Vice chair.

[30:11] Speaker 3: ... kept him disgusted.

[30:12] Speaker 2: That's right. But now Brita's quitting, so you aren't gonna have that problem. So I wanted to talk to you, the big question, as Chuck has been saying, is who would want to do this and why? (laughs) And, and you said, "Well, I want to." What is it, I mean, the Republican Party is like $200,000 in debt. Um, they're gonna be chair-less, we've got big elections going on. What is it-... that you want to do and you want to try to accomplish, and why do you want to do this?

[30:40] Speaker 5: Well, so let's qualify want. Uh, I don't know if I want it. I don't know if anybody wants it, and that's kind of part of the problem. Nobody wanted to jump in and do it, and I definitely am the type of person that, uh, if there's a hole to fill, I'll fill it. So nobody was jumping in from our side. I said, "Fine, I'll do it." Um, but I think we also should temper the, uh, um, the reality. Or, r- r- you know, look at the realistic situation that we're in. Right now, the party is a nonfunctional entity.

[31:10] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[31:10] Speaker 5: It's basically been burnt to the ground. Uh, I don't think many people, and much less me, can promise to do much of anything and so the entity can function. Uh, I had a meeting with Alec Hanna the other day, the executive director, and I mean, my vision's pretty simple. Uh, it's not about how many candidates we're gonna elect. It's not about w- who we're going to get on the ballot. It's a matter of over the next few months, uh, regroup and get ready for post-primary. Uh, I, I think anybody that's running for office right now, uh, is pretty understanding that the state party is not a functional entity to help them get elected.

[31:47] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[31:48] Speaker 5: Uh, but I think, um, after this election cycle and after the assembly, I think between April and June, take time to make the party function, make the entity function, and then get ready for, uh, the cycle and see what we can salvage out of it. But right now, it's just, it's kind of a disaster.

[32:08] Speaker 2: Well, I mean, a lot of times, I think candidates have unrealistic expectations of what the party can or can't do anyway because of campaign finance laws. And I think a lot of campaigns, um, understand once, you know, once they kind of realize-

[32:21] Speaker 3: Their whole thing is to not screw them up.

[32:22] Speaker 2: Right. And I think that's the biggest thing, when you talk about making the party functional, I think you're right. The party has gotten to the point that functional would simply be not crashing into the iceberg. I mean, let's just stop that, right?

[32:34] Speaker 5: Right, right. Yeah, no, agreed. And, you know, all this unity talk, you know, I, I don't know how many people have, uh, heard what happened in Jefferson County the other day, but the situation with, with Weston Eimer and Rich Wyatt, uh, those two, uh, did more to unite this party, uh, than, uh, any, any body's done in terms of unity in a long time. I don't know if you heard, but-

[33:01] Speaker 2: No, tell us. Breaking news here.

[33:03] Speaker 3: I haven't heard of it.

[33:04] Speaker 5: They couldn't... So they couldn't find a, uh, candidate to run for sheriff and at the Jefferson County Assembly, I guess, they, uh, there's a little video circling around where, uh, Rich and Weston sort of buried the hatchet. Uh, Weston's running for sheriff of Je- Jefferson County.

[33:25] Speaker 2: Oh my goodness. (laughs)

[33:27] Speaker 5: Yeah.

[33:28] Speaker 3: Is that right? That would be jealousy.

[33:28] Speaker 5: There's a little video and, and for those that don't know, those two had a lot of friction.

[33:33] Speaker 2: Oh.

[33:33] Speaker 3: Oh.

[33:33] Speaker 5: Those two individuals.

[33:35] Speaker 2: That would be a problem.

[33:35] Speaker 3: They were both trying to get each other arrested and shot and everything else.

[33:38] Speaker 2: Well, I mean, Rich was... And there's history there. But I think, and we have seen this before, where Rich has supported, and Laurel Eimer, they've come together. And, and again, and like you said, it's like for the good of the party. Now my guess would be that Wes doesn't maybe, uh, anticipate becoming sheriff here.

[33:56] Speaker 3: Who knows?

[33:56] Speaker 2: But you never know. And you're right, you need-

[33:58] Speaker 3: He'd look good in a Cherokee.

[33:59] Speaker 2: It's important though to have candidates on the ballot for the upstream and the downstream candidates, right? For people and for Republicans to go to the polls and maybe, who knows? Who knows? Crazier things have happened. But-

[34:11] Speaker 3: A lot crazier. Crazier things.

[34:12] Speaker 2: Um, but, but, but I think you're right. That's the kind of thing, and Rich, we've seen it before with Rich Wyatt and, and the Eimers where they've been able to unify for the good of the party. And I'm taking it that's the kind of thing you want to do too. You don't want to continue fighting with the Brita people, or, you know, the Britan East people.

[34:28] Speaker 3: The trouble is Rich and Weston come from the same part of the party. They're an internal division among the grassroots. Um, this will be an election. Sonia Black is a lawyer. Shana out of, out of, uh-

[34:42] Speaker 2: Ah, she's a lawyer out of California, I think.

[34:45] Speaker 3: And she's one of the most awful people, you know, around. Uh, but she's highly vocal, highly mean, highly vicious. Um, and she's been very much a Brita supporter. Um, so I hope, I hope that we've gotten to the point of going, "Nah, do we really want a strong person who really is 100% behind Brita to replace Brita?" Is that what we're really trying to get, or vice president, in this case vice chair? Um, but we'll find out I guess. I mean, you know, I've, I've always thought you've been a highly intelligent, bright, great guy on the grassroots side, and hopefully that counts for something. And, and I guess it'll be April 2nd is the election?

[35:28] Speaker 5: Correct. And I, I think in many ways, the chair's race is going to suck all the oxygen out of the room. Uh, another reason why I decided to run. Like nobody wanted to, as I stated before. And the fact that, um, everybody's talking about the chair's race. But I, I, I still very much feel, and Hope Scheppelman demonstrated that, that the, uh, the vice chairman's position I think has been an underutilized chess piece. Uh, granted, it doesn't have a lot of power, but it really can be a good support role, and I plan to do that. Um, I called Russ Andrews and buried the hatchet with him, and I did, through Alec, try to throw the olive branch back to Brita a week ago when I met with Alec. But haven't heard from her, so I don't expect I'm going to.

[36:16] Speaker 3: Okay.

[36:16] Speaker 5: But in the end, but in the end, you know, just to finish off that, that piece with Weston and Rich, it just proves that two people who really hate e- who really didn't like each other can, you know, hug on stage and, um, do what's good for the order and do what's good for the party. And I think that is kind of where we're at right now. We can have these policy debates after November, and I'm all about it. We should.... um, but between now and then, um, we just, we need a functional entity. And right now, it's arguable that we don't have one.

[36:47] Speaker 2: Well, and I, I want to point out too, then, that's great that you and Roy Santos, because I know he's had some harsh words and threats and things like that with you, and so-

[36:53] Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah. Very hard. And it's very-

[36:56] Speaker 2: If the two of you, if, if the two of you are able to say, "Okay, let's move forward then," um, you know, and that's good. And, and like you said, some of the po- underlying policy issues, we could be, debate those later. I think in order... When you talk about function, I mean, I'm assuming you're, you're s- you know, the, we're not going to be able to pay off $211,000, and who knows what's even gonna happen with that.

[37:14] Speaker 2: But like you said, at least-

[37:15] Speaker 5: Litigation.

[37:16] Speaker 2: ... we can, we can stop the bleeding, and we can stop having the headlines be the party's bankrupt, and instead we can talk about and start talking about what we're doing. I mean, is that what you mean by functional?

[37:28] Speaker 5: Well, that and, can we just run a meeting? Can a meeting just run? I mean, nu- the number one job, uh, um, description of those in leadership should be able to run a meeting. And it, it's, it's almost an embarrassment to look at all the meetings we've had in the past year and just say, "Wow, we're one of the 50 states of the union, and this is the best we got?"

[37:52] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[37:53] Speaker 5: Um, so that's what I mean about functionality, you know. We can put the politics aside and just function-

[38:00] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[38:00] Speaker 5: ... in a professional manner, at least out, at least, you know, outward-facing, um, front-facing, and let the policy debates happen as they need to. But we're at a point in this cycle where, where we got limited time. We need to try to salvage whatever we can for the next eight months. Um, and, um, then after that, we can go back to fighting, and that will lead up to next year's assembly and, and what a new chair would look like, so on and so forth. Um, but right now, I, I, I don't really necessarily call it unity, but I call it that we should at least get behind a common cause for the good of the order.

[38:35] Speaker 3: Same starter. Same starter.

[38:35] Speaker 5: And I don't know why we can't do that.

[38:37] Speaker 2: Right. Well, and I think what's, uh, it's important for that too, because if the... Th- th- the one place I think where candidates do turn to help are the county parties, right? And the county chairs and the PCPs and the people who are active in the county parties can help cou- candidates for, like, county commissioner, legislative races. I think the congressional campaigns, they have w- sort of paid staff and volunteers. But some of these smaller races where we... And school boards, these kind of places where we need to start building our bench, we need to get Republicans in. If we have, as you say, a functioning state party, then that can also be a help to the county chairs, um, who are totally in volunteer, right? And I, and I can, I can see where that would have a, I don't want to say a trickle-down effect, but a trickle-up effect, which could be sort of stabilizing across the board then.

[39:28] Speaker 5: Well, and so we... By having a state party that looks professional, operates professionally, um, then at least helps with, with recruitment. But right now, w- w- we're, we're so dysfunctional that who wants to be a part of it?

[39:42] Speaker 3: Yeah.

[39:43] Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah.

[39:43] Speaker 5: At the same time, it, that part needs to get fixed. Um, I, I don't know what it was statewide, but there were quite a few counties in my neck of the woods here in the San Luis Valley in southwestern part of the state, south central, where their turnouts for the caucus and assembly for an off-year election, pretty good.

[40:00] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[40:00] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[40:01] Speaker 5: Much better than, than normal and expected. So that means that there is public anger with some of the things that are going on. That means that there are new people who want to get involved. But if the state party can't function as a professional, uh, operation, uh, it makes you wonder, "Well, why do I want to be a part of that?"

[40:19] Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah. Well, so what... And, and so, so the chair will come afterwards. And I get the impression from what you're saying is, is you're not even going to worry about that. You're like, "I wanna be an, an, be a useful vice chair, and I, I, I can do that." I, I think, you know, I hear you saying, "Whoever the chair is." Is, is that right?

[40:38] Speaker 5: Correct. And I... Most people who run for these types of positions, it's a stepping stone. Yeah, I want to run for vice chair, and then maybe that'll lead to something else later. That's not my ego goal. I, I don't have that kind of ego. It's not, not what it's about for me. I, I, I want to do good work, and I, I want the entity to, uh, outwardly and professionally do good work. And, uh, as a support role, I think that I'm the best candidate to do that.

[41:07] Speaker 2: Okay.

[41:07] Speaker 5: And that's really what it's all about for me. It's not a, it's, you know, situation where I'm aiming to be chair. And I, and I guarantee you, I won't run for chair a year from now. That's just not where I want to be or where I think I'm best suited. I, I, uh, as somebody who's professionally done events for a long time, that's why I did the state party events for Dave. Uh, I've managed a lot of things, complex, large crews, that kind of thing. You always want to put the best chess piece and set up the, the, the personality type for the best success. And so I, I think my role has always been, you know, good support role, and that's something that, uh, I, I aim to bring to this, uh, equation.

[41:47] Speaker 2: All right. Well, uh, before, I think you've been great. I mean, and we can let you go here, 'cause I know you've got a ton of stuff to do. But just kind of any final comments or thoughts or anything you would want to bring-

[41:56] Speaker 3: Well, how, how can people kind of help you if they want to...

[42:01] Speaker 5: Well, so ag- again, it's the state central committee that is going to decide this, so it's about 500 votes.

[42:06] Speaker 3: Okay.

[42:06] Speaker 5: Um, phone calls, word of mouth. Um, I'm not over-promising anything, and I think that's what sometimes politicians do, is they promise the moon. I, I don't think, uh, we can promise much, because w- we've got to regroup and re-pour a foundation and build a new building to hold a meeting in. Um, when you look at Shawna's email to me, it was very normal political speak. "Oh, we're gonna need candidates elected, and we're gonna do this, and we're gonna do that." Uh, I, I don't think anybody can make those promises until the, until the entity can, uh, regroup itself and, and refunction, uh, in, in a meaningful way. So, uh, AI didn't write my letter. I wrote it myself. It comes from the heart.Um, and I'm, I'm doing this for the right reasons. I, I think I'm a, I'm a doer. I'm not a, uh, a talker. I'm a doer. And, um, right now we need to do what's right for the party.

[42:59] Speaker 2: All right.

[42:59] Speaker 3: Well, I think he'd make a-

[43:00] Speaker 2: We will be voting for you. (laughs)

[43:02] Speaker 3: We will, yeah.

[43:02] Speaker 2: Obviously. Anything we can do to help. Eric, thank you for stepping up.

[43:06] Speaker 3: Yeah. Appreciated.

[43:06] Speaker 2: I know you probably had a lot more fun things that you could be doing with your time.

[43:10] Speaker 3: No, it's great. It's great.

[43:10] Speaker 2: It is-

[43:10] Speaker 3: I needed your leadership every day.

[43:12] Speaker 2: We, we really need you, so okay, thank you sir for your time.

[43:14] Speaker 5: You too.

[43:15] Speaker 2: And good luck, and we'll stay in touch. So, let us know if there's anything we can do to help, okay?

[43:18] Speaker 5: Sounds good. Yeah, thanks for having me on. God speed, you guys.

[43:21] Speaker 2: All right. Yeah.

[43:21] Speaker 3: Okay, take care.

[43:21] Speaker 2: Um, well, and that's interesting too. I mean, maybe, you know, with Britta resigning, um, and I think that there are a lot of people, you know, Rich and Weston, that's kind of fun, Weston running for sheriff. If, um, Eric and, um, Russ Andrews, who have had harsh words and-

[43:36] Speaker 3: Not for sure.

[43:36] Speaker 2: ... certainly probably weren't besties, um, if they could say, "Okay, let's put the decide to work together." And I think what, what I really like about what he's saying is, yeah, I'm not talking about, "Oh, I'm going to be doing all this candidate training, and I'm going to be doing this, I'm going to be doing that." It- it's too late for that. If you're... I mean, you know, he's like, "We just need to get it functioning again." Little things like hold a legitimate meeting that doesn't fall into chaos and, and the leader just shutting everything down and then issuing what the decisions were later.

[44:03] Speaker 3: Yeah.

[44:03] Speaker 2: Even though they-

[44:03] Speaker 3: Changing the minutes.

[44:04] Speaker 2: Changing the minutes, yeah.

[44:06] Speaker 3: So we have a meeting minutes that aren't a fraud.

[44:08] Speaker 2: Right.

[44:08] Speaker 3: That'd be nice.

[44:09] Speaker 2: I mean, that's just a start, and I think, like I said, I think then that gives some stability. It gives some stability to the counties and the people who are actually going to be, you know, some of the foot soldiers, particularly in the smaller races. I mean, I think it's doable. (laughs) You know?

[44:22] Speaker 3: I don't know if it's doable or not, to tell you the truth, but I think-

[44:25] Speaker 2: I think it is-

[44:25] Speaker 3: If we can start off with a good vice chair, maybe that'll, we'll end up with some candidates who, who, who really have a similar goal to Eric's. But let's just get, you know, really get back involved in all the fights, because the election for the chair is less than a year away. I mean-

[44:43] Speaker 2: Yeah, whoever becomes the chair is not-

[44:45] Speaker 3: Yeah.

[44:45] Speaker 2: ... going to be chair very long.

[44:46] Speaker 3: Long, yeah.

[44:46] Speaker 2: Right, let's just get the party, let's get the ship sailing. Right now it's, it's sinking, you know.

[44:50] Speaker 3: Sinking, yeah.

[44:50] Speaker 2: And at least, you know, turn it away from the iceberg (laughs) and-

[44:54] Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

[44:55] Speaker 2: ... and get going there, so. Maybe that should... No, I think, and I think somebody like Eric can do that. And I think Russ Andrews has shown he is perfectly capable of putting aside past issues to get stuff done, too.

[45:05] Speaker 3: Yes, yes, yes.

[45:06] Speaker 2: You know, we have not always been in favor of Russ Andrews.

[45:08] Speaker 3: So we've got two chairs of him and, and, uh-

[45:09] Speaker 2: Yeah.

[45:10] Speaker 3: ... get rich or take unfortunately.

[45:11] Speaker 2: We could-

[45:12] Speaker 3: But anyway.

[45:12] Speaker 2: Well.

[45:13] Speaker 3: Um, and, uh, so it, it's, uh, it's good, it's a great step forward because-

[45:17] Speaker 2: Right. Well, because the, on a final note that, um, the parties, um, FEC filings for the month of February came out and, and it-

[45:24] Speaker 3: What does she have? I haven't looked yet.

[45:25] Speaker 2: You know, I think she brought in $9,400. It wasn't clear from where. Um, paid Klunda $5,000, so once again-

[45:32] Speaker 3: No, Klunda didn't use it all on her.

[45:33] Speaker 2: Klunda did not submit a bill this time.

[45:36] Speaker 3: No, she didn't.

[45:36] Speaker 2: Um, at least it was-

[45:37] Speaker 3: She didn't really.

[45:37] Speaker 2: ... it was in there. Well, I think my impression was that there were several questions about it, stuff that, you know, I, I kind of thinking... I, I don't know. I, I don't know. I think that there are questions about... I'm not trying to imply, I want to put this right, not any kind of impropriety or anything like that, but there were just certain things that like, like, um, like the red state and stuff like that. It's not clear were those donations in there, weren't they in there?

[46:03] Speaker 2: Um, but at any rate, the party-

[46:04] Speaker 3: Was it red, you mean?

[46:05] Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, the... Yeah, but the party is still over $200,000 in debt, so.

[46:09] Speaker 3: Oh, that's okay.

[46:10] Speaker 2: Yeah, that's the thing there. Um, that's going to wrap it up for us today. On, um, Wednesday, we're going to have among other, among other things, um, Jamie Glasshoff. He's got a great book out, United in Hate, and he kind of talks about, in this book, um, how the Democrats basically... Everything about the Democrat Party right now is, is based on hate, hate of other people, um, even though they're, they're the party of love, they're not-

[46:32] Speaker 3: Party of love.

[46:32] Speaker 2: They're not the party of love. So that'll do it for us and, um, Ben, thank you to Eric and Martin Maurer, and we'll see you-

[46:38] Speaker 3: Take care, everybody, and we'll see you on Wednesday.

[46:41] Speaker 2: All right.