| Speaker | Time | Text |
|---|---|---|
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, so they're deep ties. | |
| There has been long-term affection on the part of a lot of people. | ||
| But I don't think it's overstating this to use the family metaphor. | ||
| And families have good times and bad times. | ||
| And sometimes you cross a line in a family that you wonder, will you ever be able to come back from that? | ||
| I'm not saying that's happened, but I'm saying that some of the rhetoric, some of the feelings, some of the anger makes me wonder if we're at that Thanksgiving dinner, for example, where some things have been said and some actions have been taken, but mainly things have been said that are going to be very, very difficult to forget about and to walk past, you know, back from that line. | ||
| The call-in program sponsored by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, taking a look at issues between the United States and Canada will be simultaneous by C-SPAN starting at four o'clock. | ||
| If you're interested in hearing what the Canadians have to say and possibly the members of the United States calling it as well, you can see that on our main platform, C-SPAN, our app, C-SPANNOW, and our website at c-span.org. | ||
| Ian Hanelmansing joining us from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. | ||
| Thank you for your time. | ||
| And before I let you go, how can people view in if people are, if our audience is interested in getting into this? | ||
| How can people, if they have the ability to call it, what's the number they can call in or that kind of information? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, so our number will be mentioned a lot on the air. | |
| I don't want to say it now because I'll probably get a digit wrong and create chaos. | ||
| So once they're watching on your channel, the number will be prominent. | ||
| And I can't overstress, we really do want to hear from U.S. callers. | ||
| Thank you, sir. | ||
| I appreciate your time. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| This is Amanda Lippmann joining us. | ||
| She is the co-founder and president of the organization, Run for Something. | ||
| She's also the author of the forthcoming book, When We're in Charge of the Next Generation's Guide to Leadership. | ||
| Amanda Lippmann, thanks for giving us your time today. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thanks for having me. | |
| How do you describe your group to other people? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Run for Something recruits and supports young diverse leaders running for local office all across the country. | |
| It's pretty straightforward. | ||
| We ask people to run, and then when they say yes or maybe, we help them do it all the way through to Election Day. | ||
| What made you come up with this organization as far as the need that you saw to recruit people into office? | ||
|
unidentified
|
So I worked for Secretary Clinton's presidential campaign for two years. | |
| Right after Election Day, I started hearing from friends I'd gone to high school and college with. | ||
| Hey, Amanda, I'm a public school teacher in Chicago. | ||
| I'm thinking about running for office. | ||
| What do I do? | ||
| And at the time, November 2016, if you were young, if you were newly excited about politics and you wanted to do more than vote and more than volunteer, there was nowhere you could go to answer your call. | ||
| So along with my co-founder, Ross Morales-Ricqueto, we wrote a plan, we built a website, and then we launched Run for Something on Trump's first inauguration day, thinking it would be really small because who wants to run for office? | ||
| Instead, we had a thousand people sign up in the first week. | ||
| And as of today, we're up to about 190,000 young people all across the country who've raised their hands to say they want to run. | ||
| So as when someone says they want to run, they get your interest. | ||
| What happens then as far as vetting them to see if they go further? | ||
|
unidentified
|
So it works a little bit like a marketing funnel. | |
| So you sign up on our website, runforwhat.net, where you can look up all the offices available to you at your address. | ||
| You then start getting information and invites to calls like one we're doing this Tuesday, where we talk about all the first time questions candidates have. | ||
| How do I know what to run for? | ||
| How do I raise money? | ||
| How does any of this work? | ||
| We also talk through Run for Something's offerings. | ||
| You can then talk to one of our volunteers and you'll start getting emails and text messages from our team giving you resources, trainings, events that us and our partners are doing. | ||
| This is all available to everyone of any age. | ||
| Then we have an application once you've actually filed to get on the ballot where you can apply for Run for Something's endorsement. | ||
| That's where we really winnow it down. | ||
| We look at your application. | ||
| We want to see your campaign plan, your budget, your win number. | ||
| That's where we do a value screen. | ||
| And our endorsements are limited to folks 40 and under to make sure we're really bringing in young leaders into the process. | ||
| I was just going to say, once we're endorsed, we have a whole bunch more support for you one-on-one, depending on what your campaign needs. | ||
| And because you focus on younger people, particularly progressive people, what drives them in your mind to get into politics? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Oh, it's a whole range of issues. | |
| It's one of the things I love most about our candidates is the only thing they all really have in common is a willingness to serve their communities. | ||
| It's really do something when they're in office. | ||
| They're running for representation, for housing, for their families, for childcare. | ||
| They're running because the Republican incumbent in office hasn't been challenged for decades or because the Democrat incumbent hasn't been serving them the way that they want. | ||
| They are all so committed to solve problems in a way that I think makes their campaigns really strong. | ||
| Because you used the term progressive, I guess, what does that mean in your mind? | ||
| And how does that say differ than a typical Democrat running for office? | ||
|
unidentified
|
You know, we have a really expansive definition here because we work with candidates in all 50 states running for a range of offices. | |
| So a candidate running for a city council here in New York, where I live, needs to talk about the issues and show up for those issues in a little bit different way than maybe a school board candidate in Alaska or a city council candidate in Iowa. | ||
| That being said, all of our candidates are pro-equity, pro-tolerance, pro-affordable housing and education, pro-health care for everyone, pro-climate change is real and we have to do something about it. | ||
| They're all ready to tackle the issues of gun violence. | ||
| They're pro-choice. | ||
| They're pro-democracy and pro-facts. | ||
| But we really ask folks, what does that look like in your campaign and how does it show up for you? | ||
| Our guest is with us. | ||
| And if you want to ask her questions about this effort of recruiting young progressives for political office, 202-748-8000, one for Republicans, 202-748-8000 for Democrats. | ||
| Independents, 202-748-8002. | ||
| You can also text us questions at 202-748-8003. | ||
| There was an article in the New York Magazine last year featuring you. | ||
| The headline says you've helped more than 1,000 young people get elected. | ||
| I'm sure that number has changed. | ||
| Elaborate on that and who are your standouts? | ||
|
unidentified
|
So we've actually now helped about just under 1,500 people win elections in the last eight years. | |
| Nearly every state except for Idaho. | ||
| And you might know some of our alumni. | ||
| They include now Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett from Texas, Sarah McBride from Delaware, Yasimin Ansari from Arizona, Emily Randall from Washington, Suhasubrenyam from Virginia, who are now all members of Congress. | ||
| On the state level, we've got Senator Mallory McMorrow from Michigan, Pennsylvania Representative Malcolm Kinata, Florida Representative Ana Escamani. | ||
| Down in Texas, a Harris County executive, Lena Hidalgo, State Senator Megan Hunt in Nebraska. | ||
| I could go on and on and on. | ||
| These are all amazing young leaders who really know how to show up for their communities and show up in places to really reach the voters we need to reach. | ||
| When it comes to Yasmin Crockett, you've probably seen the news over the last couple of weeks, her back and forth with North Carolina Republican Nancy Mace. | ||
| What do you think about those exchanges, her role, or at least the statements she's making when it comes to politics in Congress? | ||
|
unidentified
|
You know, I think she's emblematic of a whole generation of leaders that Run for Something works with who know the Republican Party is not on the level and they're not ready to be good faith partners in governance and that this idea of civility or decorum is behind us when it comes to them. | |
| So she's ready to call them out like she sees it and to do so in a way that draws attention, which I think is really good, especially in this environment. | ||
| Pew Research says that the largest generation of now those belonging to Generation X are in Congress, 180 members. | ||
| What do you think about that number compared to what you've seen in years before when it comes to Congress? | ||
|
unidentified
|
You know, this is, I believe, the third oldest Congress ever and it keeps getting older. | |
| And I think we're seeing the byproduct of that in some of the images that we're getting out of the fight back against Trump right now. | ||
| Seeing leaders who really don't understand how to wield attention in this economy, they don't really understand where their voters are because they're not hearing from their voters as much. | ||
| We've seen, I think it's really helpful to note that some of the leaders of the pushback have been some of these younger politicians and even slightly younger. | ||
| The average age in Congress, I believe, in the House is, I think, 68 or something like that. | ||
| And in this 63 in the House, 68 in the Senate, I believe. | ||
| Young people are just left out of these spaces. | ||
| And I'm glad that Gen X is making representative. | ||
| And I think we're going to see even more millennials in Gen Z in the years to come. | ||
| Do those members, those younger members of Congress, talk to you and your organization about how they're perceived by older members of Congress? | ||
|
unidentified
|
You know, I've heard that over the years as I've gotten to know some of these younger members. | |
| And they'll talk about how sometimes their colleagues just like don't understand how they communicate. | ||
| They've talked about things like they don't understand why they use Instagram this way or, you know, it's their dress, their tone. | ||
| They're really entering an institution that wasn't built for people like them. | ||
| I think that often creates a sense of disconnect. | ||
| I love that they're brave enough to do it anyway. | ||
| This is Michael. | ||
| Michael is on our independent lines from Florida for our guest, Amanda Lippman, of Run for Something. | ||
| Michael, go ahead. | ||
| You're on with our guest. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, good morning. | |
| My understanding of progressives is that they believe in equality of outcomes. | ||
| They do not believe in equality of opportunity. | ||
| What is your position on that? | ||
| An interesting question. | ||
| I don't know if I agree with that assessment. | ||
| I will say that the candidates that Run for Something has worked with over the years who generally do identify as progressive really see both sides of that equation. | ||
| They want to make sure that their constituents and their community members have both equality of opportunity and equality of outcome. | ||
| And they've looked at that through things like housing, education, public transportation, clean water, clean roads. | ||
| It's a little bit of both. | ||
| Laura's next. | ||
| Laura from Texas. | ||
| You're on with our guests. | ||
| Go ahead. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes. | |
| Thank you for taking my call. | ||
| I have a, I'm a baby boomer, but I'm on the tail end of it. | ||
| And I am a bit concerned with the younger generation believing that the older generations don't know what they're doing. | ||
| And in some respect, I kind of agree with that. | ||
| But I would hope that the younger generations understand that this is a collective effort. | ||
| We cannot stand against tyranny and dictatorship and even acts of treason committed by the president unless we stand together and this nonsense about generational divide is put aside. | ||
|
unidentified
|
So I'm interested in your thoughts on that. | |
| You know, I think we can agree we need all generations to come together. | ||
| You know, the reason that Run for Something works exclusively with younger leaders is because historically, young people have been left out of this conversation of leadership. | ||
| You know, as of a couple years ago, fewer than 5% of state legislators were under the age of 35. | ||
| The median mayor of a big city was 59. | ||
| Median school board member, similarly, 59, 60. | ||
| Even in Congress, they're just not reflective of where the American people are. | ||
| The median American is 38, 39 as of the last census. | ||
| So I agree with you. | ||
| We need generations to come together, but young people have been entirely left out of that leadership conversation for so long. | ||
| And we are just on the tipping point of starting to change that. | ||
| So I think baby boomers, of which you're right, some really do understand how to communicate, need to make sure they're making space for younger folks to come up to. | ||
| Somebody asked from, this is Mike from Wisconsin about your organization's funding and how that works. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Oh, it's a mix of people giving $5, $500, $500,000, a whole range of folks. | |
| We've got, I think, about 40,000 individual givers at this point. | ||
| We have a couple of different entities folks can give to, a PAC, a C4, a C3. | ||
| And I am so grateful for every person who contributes because when we started this so long ago, so much of the advice that we got was like, great idea. | ||
| No one's going to run a run and no one's going to want to give to that because it's just not sexy or exciting. | ||
| I'm so glad that eight years in, we've proved that wrong, but we need to keep it going. | ||
| When it comes then to political, do you get money from political parties? | ||
|
unidentified
|
No, I do not think we've ever gotten money from one of the formal Democratic institutions. | |
| You know, we certainly work with them as appropriate, but I don't think we've ever gotten money from them. | ||
| Here's a viewer from someone on X asking, considering campaigning has changed a lot, can you explain how run for something turns a newbie into a viable candidate and what's the most critical skill they have to have first? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Love this question. | |
| So we really help people figure out what is their reason for running and what is, how is the office they're going to run for give them an opportunity to solve this? | ||
| What's the problem they care about solving? | ||
| And three, why should voters want them to win, which is different than why you want to win? | ||
| You want to win because winning is great and losing is terrible. | ||
| Voters want you to win because you're going to do something specific and tangible and practical for them. | ||
| So once we help candidates really figure out how to tell that story, the rest of the campaign is just logistics. | ||
| It's hard logistics, but it's not complicated logistics. | ||
| We'll help candidates figure out how to get access to the voter file, how to file to get on the ballot. | ||
| And then we help work with them to make sure they're running really strong voter contact campaigns. | ||
| Might look like knocking on doors, might look like phones, might look like print ads or radio, might look like text messaging. | ||
| And we definitely encourage folks to think about social media in a way that is genuine and authentic to them. | ||
| But we know that the way, again, you want a race in New York City is a little different than the way you might run one in rural Iowa. | ||
| Neither of those are right or wrong. | ||
| They just want to make sure we're running the right race for the right place. | ||
| Because you listed a lot of those that you got into Congress, can you describe a winning story as far as one of those candidates and what worked and why they got into Congress because of that story? | ||
|
unidentified
|
You know, I actually want to talk about someone besides in Congress, if that's okay. | |
| So in 2023, we recruited and then helped this incredible leader named Justin Douglas in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, around Harrisburg. | ||
| Justin was a former pastor who'd been fired from his church for being too welcoming to LGBTQ congregants. | ||
| He's a CrossFit judge. | ||
| He'd worked with people who were homeless. | ||
| And we recruited him to run specifically for the county commission position, which is a position that both oversees the county budget, oversees election administration, deals with the county jail system, and a whole bunch of other stuff that really affects quality of life and democracy. | ||
| We got him to run against a Republican incumbent. | ||
| And Justin ran this incredible campaign. | ||
| He spent, I think, maybe $12,000 on his race, but he was out there knocking doors, talking to voters. | ||
| He left this incredible campaign lit that was like the mayor in JAWS in JAWS 2. | ||
| No, the mayor in JAWS 1 was still the mayor in JAWS 2. | ||
| Vote in your local elections. | ||
| Justin was ultimately able to beat a Republican incumbent by about 140 some odd votes on election day, ultimately flipping control of the commission for the first time in over 100 years. | ||
| He immediately went forward to do stuff like make it easier for people to vote in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, and reform the way they were caring for inmates in the jail system. | ||
| It's a really incredible example of the thousands of candidates we've worked with over the years who show up, who knock doors and who win in really long shot races. | ||
| Amanda Lippmann with us for with Run for Something. | ||
| Let's hear from Gary. | ||
| Gary is in Pennsylvania, Philadelphia. | ||
| This is on our Democrats line. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi. | |
| Hi. | ||
| I just wanted to salute her for what she's doing and mention something that could really complement her work. | ||
| I'm with getcouragenow.org and Gary at getcourageenow.org. | ||
| And we're developing something called Adopt an Organizer because there's almost a million people working in coffee shops and other meaningless jobs. | ||
| And if even 1% of those people, and I think there are quite a bit more, but if even 1% of those people wanted to become organizers and they don't have rich parents, their only option is GoFundMe. | ||
| So we're developing something called Adopt an Organizer that'll make it much easier for people to quit those jobs and get what they need to become organizers. | ||
| Because if you're going to run for something, you need a lot of organizers. | ||
| If you're going to overthrow this fascist coup, you're going to need to help a lot of organizing. | ||
| And the engines of organizing are organizers. | ||
| So we hope we can work together. | ||
| And I hope she will contact us, Gary, at getcouragednow.org, because we're going to make it much easier than GoFundMe. | ||
| We're going to have people be able to, for example, donate free housing, which is already worth $700 or $800. | ||
| We're going to have a pool of 2,000, 3,000 well-off people that can match with $1,000. | ||
| Okay. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thanks, Gary. | |
| I love that. | ||
| And thank you for what you're doing. | ||
| We need every possible avenue of support, both for candidates and for staff and volunteers, because you're right. | ||
| These institutions aren't meant for people who aren't independently wealthy, both on the candidate side and the volunteer and staff side. | ||
| Another viewer off of X asked you this question. | ||
| She says that, or this is the viewer MLB saying, I don't think you're getting younger, getting younger candidates is your biggest problem. |