Transcript for “Electing Younger Leaders" with Steven Olikara
Even with President Biden not seeking reelection, age in American politics is still a highly debated issue. Americans overall want younger candidates in office. While the U.S. House of Representatives median age is slightly under 60 years old, it’s the mid-60s for the U.S. Senate. Meanwhile, the average age in America is under 40.
About two-thirds of U.S. adults back an age ceiling on candidates for president and Congress and a mandatory retirement age for judges. As we head into an election cycle across all levels of government, how do we vet and position younger candidates who don’t possess a track record to match more seasoned opponents? How can younger candidates take on entrenched incumbents and win?
In this interview, Steven Olikara provides insights from his own Senate candidacy experience and as a founder of the largest nonpartisan organization of young elected leaders in America. Steven discusses why getting younger representation in government strengthens democracy, the wisdom and experience that older politicians provide, his ideas on term limits, and how voters should be thinking about the future.
Steven Olikara is a nationally recognized changemaker, entrepreneur, and speaker at the intersection of media, politics, and culture. He serves as the founding President of Bridge Entertainment Labs (BEL) and as Senior Fellow for Political Transformation at the USC Schwarzenegger Institute. Steven founded Future Caucus (formerly Millennial Action Project), the largest cross-partisan organization of young elected leaders in the U.S. In 2022, he made history as the first South Asian candidate for U.S. Senate in Wisconsin, garnering national attention for his debate performance and fresh approach to politics. Steven is an on-air political commentator for both national and Wisconsin media. His analysis has been featured on CNN, NBC News, Fox News, NPR, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, USA Today, Variety, and more.
Thank you to Starts with Us for their collaboration on this series. Starts with Us is an organization committed to overcoming extreme political and cultural division. Check them out at startswith.us.
Steven Olikara: How is this next generation going to govern our country? Are we going to fall into the same polarizing habits of the status quo which is incentivized to promote partisan conflict over constructive solutions and sort of propagate this divisive culture in our politics? Or are we going to buck those trends? Are we going to transcend the divide? Are we going to create new incentives and new governing paradigms that makes collaborative governance more of the norm?
Don MacPherson: That is Steven Olikara, founder of Millennial Action Project. Steven joined 12 Geniuses to discuss age in American politics.
My name is Don MacPherson, your host of 12 Geniuses. Heading into any election season can be divisive, that’s why 12 Geniuses has partnered with Starts With Us on this series to help you navigate the overall 2024 election. Even with President Biden not seeking reelection, age in American politics is still a highly debated issue. While the U.S. House of Representatives median age is slightly under 60 years old, it’s the mid-60s for the U.S. Senate. Meanwhile, the average age in America is under 40. Steven Olikara is President of Bridge Entertainment Labs, an organization helping to reverse the trend of deepening division in America. Steven also founded Millennial Action Project, the largest nonpartisan organization of young elected leaders in the U.S.
Steven and I discussed why getting younger representation in government strengthens democracy, the wisdom and experience that older politicians provide, and how voters should be thinking about the future.
Thank you to Starts With Us for their collaboration on this series. Starts With Us is an organization committed to overcoming extreme political and cultural division. Check them out at startwith.us.
Steven, Welcome to 12 Geniuses.
Steven: Thanks for having me, Don. Excited to be here.
Don: Let’s start out with your background and how you got interested in politics.
Steven: Well, I came to politics in an unexpected path. I grew up in the suburban part of Milwaukee. My parents are immigrants from India. And so, needless to say, politics was not on the list of preferred career tracks. But the first passion I had in life was music. I picked up the guitar when I was in fourth grade, picked up the drums when I was in fifth grade, started playing in rock bands, and music became that rare force to bridge what I started experiencing are pretty stark divides in the greater Milwaukee area. Those are divides around along racial, political among other lines of difference. And I became very interested in how we can create healthier discourse both in our state and in our country. A lot of people have seen Wisconsin in the headlines as a state that’s a purple state politically. But I don’t know if that even fully represents us.
We’re really a collection of red and blue that’s not talking to each other. And so, through music, I found this calling around political bridge building. And my first big expression of that was through the Millennial Action Project, which is a national group I founded in 2013, and has grown to be the nation’s largest organization of young elected leaders — Democrats, Republicans, and independents — who are coming together across party lines to focus on generational issues. We, for example, passed the first major gun violence prevention bill through Congress with bipartisan support after the Parkland shooting. We’ve passed many bipartisan criminal justice reforms, climate bills among others, and our network is organized across these bipartisan, what we call future caucuses, which are groups of these young legislators at the congressional and state level.
And after that, I ran for the U.S. Senate in Wisconsin. And now I’m focused on culture change and storytelling through a new organization called Bridge Entertainment Labs. So that’s how I got into this. And I think initially when I got involved, the work along how we deal with political polarization, toxic polarization in our country, we’re maybe a bit ahead of the curve, but I think the times have caught up with us. And now you see, consistently, in public polling, a concern among all Americans about the political divide, about these divides that are ripping our families apart, ripping our friends apart. What can we do about this? And I think the moment has come and the solutions have met its moment in terms of how we take on this issue of polarization.
Don: You mentioned the Millennial Action Project — you founded it. Why did you found it?
Steven: I saw two trends that would most shape the future of our politics. One is the worsening polarization, which my initial founding team and I, we felt like this toxic polarization would reach a breaking point somewhere in the middle of the decade. So, depending on what you point to, whether it’s 2016 or some of the things that happened after that, definitely we’ve reached a breaking point. The second trend is the rise of the millennial generation and Gen Z following us that would enter public office. And so the core question was, how is this next generation going to govern our country? Are we going to fall into the same polarizing habits of the status quo which is incentivized to promote partisan conflict over constructive solutions and sort of propagate this divisive culture in our politics?
Or are we going to buck those trends? Are we going to transcend the divide? Are we going to create new incentives and new governing paradigms that makes collaborative governance more of the norm? That was the big question we wanted to take on. And that’s what led to establishing the first-ever bipartisan caucus of young members of Congress, which is the Congressional Future Caucus. And then we expanded that model into, now, over 35 state legislatures.
Don: What’s the process of bridging this divide among these members? Because I’ve seen some video that you were featured in a movie, The Reunited States. Okay, so you’re featured in The Reunited States, and you do see these young people from different parties collaborating, talking, having really civil discourse. So, what’s the magic? How are you doing this?
Steven: Yes. Well, there three pieces to that solution, I think. So, one is it’s tough to collaborate with anyone across a line of difference if you don’t have a trusting bond. And so building relationships is a key model of success. The second is finding ideas that don’t necessarily fit neatly into the left-right paradigm, but are more reframed as future versus the past. And keep in mind, when we, as Americans, learn about issues, whether it’s climate change or criminal justice reform, there’s a specific interest in the media and major party leaders to frame these in partisan ways that make the other side always seem like the enemy or that they’re evil. Two thirds of Americans today see the other side as being fundamentally evil, not just different.
And so when you can identify these issues that cut across that grain, then that creates new opportunities. And it’s important to mention here that the style of bridge building that I’ve called for, for the last 15 years, and our whole movement is calling for, is not one where you’re just meeting on the 50-yard line, where you have an A position and a B position and you divide by two. That doesn’t always lead to good things. How do you divide by two on, say, civil rights issues? The key idea is that we’re bringing people together to listen, learn, and move to a new playing field altogether. And that’s why I use music, jazz music in particular as a good metaphor.
So, it’s not about a transactional thing, it’s more of a transformative endeavor. And so I think that’s important to realize that when people come to these bridging conversations, it’s not about leaving your ideas or checking your identity at the door. Bringing your full lived experience is essential to build a strong bridge. So I think that gets lost often in bridge in sort of the conversation about how we come together as American people. The third thing that’s important here is to bring this conversation into the light, into the public. Narrative building is one of the most important things that Millennial Action Project and my new effort Bridge Entertainment Labs does.
Because I can tell you that being behind the scenes with many elected officials, as well as some of the most prominent media personalities that you would see on CNN, they have extremely constructive, respectful conversations behind closed doors, behind the scenes when the camera’s not on. And then they go on cable news or they go on any kind of media platform, and that tone changes. So what’s really going on there? There are a lot of incentives, media, political and otherwise, which I’m happy to jump into, that is causing them to polarize as they go into the public limelight. But I think we have a responsibility to counter those narratives with stories where we do bridge a divide and get something real done. Because for the American public, they don’t realize this game that’s being played against us.
They don’t realize that a lot of the division we see on media is performative, and so therefore we don’t realize that there is a bridge to build; that there’s someone to build a bridge to. So, it’s very important that we’re elevating these narratives that we’re able to change the culture of our country. Because if not, people don’t believe it’s possible. So those are the three big things we like to do.
Don: Regarding the members of the Millennial Action Project, how do they feel about this division in our country? Is it one of the top important issues for them or what is their feeling in general?
Steven: It’s definitely one of the top issues for them. Now, this is a group that came to our organization that in some ways was already predisposed around that. But also we have people who… I just want people to know that when you come to this conversation about building a more pluralistic nation, this is not about moderates and centrists. We have people in Millennial Action Project who span the entire political divide, from some of the most progressive, the most conservative and libertarian elected officials you can imagine. And so what’s important there is that people are bringing their principles and their values to the conversation. And again, I just think that often gets missed. I think the concern around the political divide is definitely front and center.
But I also think for a lot of people who get involved with Millennial Action Project, they see our generation as being underrepresented, the future being underrepresented in political decision-making. And so they also have an interest in centering that as a mission.
Don: What are the top issues that younger voters and younger people who have political aspirations, where are they finding common ground?
Steven: First, how you build economic opportunity that makes sense for younger people especially in states that are losing their young people. So, how you attract and retain young talent as a workforce development issue is definitely an area we’ve seen a lot of action. Gun reform is definitely a big one as well. But I also think criminal justice reform is one that may not be explicitly seen as a next-gen kind of issue. But you really see a lot of the creative solutions coming from these younger legislators to, for example, deal with the fundamental issue of how you give people a real second chance in terms of expunging criminal records so people can get jobs so they can get loans and financing to be able to start new businesses and become entrepreneurs. So, there’s a lot of exciting stuff happening in that space.
And I also think another big one is just what some people might call government reform, but just making government work better. And part of that democracy reform, we see, for example, a ton of cross-partisan action to end partisan gerrymandering. The state of Ohio is where we had a particular win there. Or there’s this new conversation about how we can open up primaries and get rid of the partisan primary, which I know sounds like a ‘unsexy’ process issue, but it’s one of the sexiest ways to get an incentivized elected officials to work together on behalf of the public. So, I think democracy reform is also a big issue. We found a lot of traction. And then the final one related to that is anti-corruption. There is a system of legalized bribery right now in Congress.
And you see this perpetual race for self-preservation which also calls them to question the need for term limits. I think those type of issues are also big areas where younger people in particular are interested in working.
Don: The idea of term limits or age limits or anything like that, how do you get people to vote against their best interest? Because they’re incented to stay in office. And I get that younger people with political aspirations, yeah, they’re going to be in favor of that, but once they get in, how do you get them to vote for these things?
Steven: Very fair question, easy answer, which is you grandfather people in. And so the leading proposals, the bipartisan, right now with members like Ro Khanna, progressive Democrat; Mike Gallagher, conservative Republican, who want term limits, is to say that it applies to new members coming in. Because you’re right, otherwise you have members often voting against their own self-interest. But let me also highlight that not all members of Congress are created equal, obviously, and that’s not just a partisan thing. It’s also kind of a mission statement divide that I’ve seen.
Because yes, there are a number of members who are there for self-preservation. A lot of the newer, younger members I’ve found are more interested in seeing public service as a gig as opposed to a career. And so you would see, if you actually put term limits up for a vote in Congress, you would see a substantial number of people who vote for it, even for themselves. I know a number of members of Congress, like a former member named Chris Gibson from New York, for example, who self-term limit themselves to, say, three terms. I’ve seen a few other approaches, but people who really want to model what they want to see and promote the idea of a citizen legislature where you’re not there for 40 years, but instead you go in and make a difference.
So, there are a number of solutions to this, and, I think, more people than you would expect in Congress would actually vote for term limits on themselves.
Don: We talked about where there’s common ground among younger voters and younger political aspirants, people with political aspirations, where is there divergence?
Steven: Yeah. Well, I think you mean among young people or?
Don: Among young people, yes. Sorry.
Steven: Yeah. I think that there are a few interesting issues that come up. So, one is definitely the national debt, which is an issue that divides, I think, a number of Democrats and Republicans, like how much deficit spending is healthy. And I definitely see a healthy interest among a lot of younger Republicans who want to get our fiscal house more in order. And I think that’s definitely a healthy conversation to have. I think that young people are just not a monolith. And I see a big divide among people who are on the sort of political career ladder versus people who are not. Because if you’re on the career ladder, you might be willing to do whatever it takes to get a job or to advance your career versus there’s everyone else who’s just wondering why the system is so dysfunctional right now. I think there are healthy disagreements around immigration reform too, but I think many of those disagreements are reasonable to have.
Don: Yeah, the immigration reform, it seems like both parties should be incented to find common ground there because we need people coming into this country. We’re an aging nation. So, republicans typically vote in the interest of business, and business is going to have a labor shortage. There’s no doubt about it.
Steven: Let me put it this way. If there was a constructive immigration reform right now to enhance the legal immigration system for the exact reason you mentioned that businesses need workers right now and there’s a huge skills gap in our country, a humane path to citizenship for people, there are roughly 10 or 11 million people who are here in an undocumented fashion, as well as to have smart ways to secure the border, which involves a lot of technology, among other things, that type of proposal would get a majority of Congress to support it right now if it were a secret ballot. So, in the absence of that, there’s way too much incentive to actually not pass the issue and keep that on the ballot. So, this is an issue where there is an existing consensus that cannot be realized because of these broken political incentives.
Republicans, take Marco Rubio, for example, who was part of bipartisan immigration reform until he was told by both his party bosses as well as his own grassroots that you’re going to get primaried if you jump on this issue. And similarly, well, in a different way, I’ve seen an issue on the Democratic side where there are broad-based solutions here, but some democrats want sort of all or nothing kind of approach. For example, the Dream Act which ensures that these dreamers who are here, for no fault of their own, they came to this country as little kids with their parents, who, by all intents and purposes, are Americans and are contributing to our country, including serving in our military and doing a number of great things, might not have access to in-state tuition benefits.
They don’t have the full status of being documented. So the Dream Act is something that has wide bipartisan support, but will not also be put on the floor. And that’s because there are some members of actually the Democratic Party who don’t want to see only the Dream Act pass without some of the other pieces as well. Again, this is an issue of incentives right now.
Don: If I lean left and I watch CNN or if I lean right and I watch Fox, a lot of what they do is try to outrage me based on their reporting. And I just realized why would I want to tune in to a network that is trying to outrage me, even though I might agree with their point of view? And that’s why I had to remove myself from watching either of those channels because they are in the business of working up their base. And it’s not good journalism, in my opinion.
Steven: Yeah. You’re exactly right. One of the most insidious tactics that they use is selective truth. So, this is something where, now, certainly sometimes you’ll see outright lies, but more insidious is when they share some things that are technically true but are without context and don’t present a balanced case. And so that also leaves you with a misunderstanding of what’s going on. And so what can people do? Because one of the most common things I hear on the herd, on the campaign trail is, “Where can I get good information?” And it’s really hard. And like you said, one of the best things you can do sometimes actually to be better informed is to not watch cable news all the time because that really does sometimes give you a warped perspective of what’s going on.
At the same time, I do think finding thoughtful journalists as well as commentators who you can follow and read — I think the key here is having a diverse media diet. View your media consumption like you do having a meal or having a diet. You wouldn’t want to have all sugar all the time or want all carbs all the time. You want to be able to balance that by read, if you’re a Democrat, read maybe David French from time to time. If you’re a Republican, maybe read Thomas Friedman from time to time. And I know those are two more established examples, but maybe names that people are more familiar with. There are many, many other interesting ideas and commentators out there as well.
The key is to have a diverse diet and don’t just have one media source that you’re tuning into. And to, frankly, just be aware of exactly what you said, which is what the New York Times or what Fox News is trying to do is they’re trying to advance the narrative as opposed to advance good, thoughtful discussion, and just be aware of that. And again, a lot of things you see in print, whether it’s like the Washington Post or New York Times is not necessarily that it’s false, although sometimes they do get it wrong. It’s more just that you need to get a more well-rounded picture of what’s going on. And so that’s just important for people to keep in mind.
Don: Let’s get back to electing younger people. How do you feel it strengthens the country by having younger representation at the local, state, and federal levels?
Steven: Hugely important because we have a bias towards the future and issues that we’re going to inherit in the future. And that’s why it’s no surprise that the environment and climate change is a generational issue. You see a majority of young Republicans who want to take action on it, and that translates into younger Republican members of Congress and state elected officials. So, A, having a bias towards the future is really important. The second thing is having a fresh approach to politics. I think that younger people, as they get involved, aren’t necessarily seeing this as something that they want to do for 40 years. They are interested in having an impact, and by nature of getting elected at a young age, they’re certainly a healthy impatience there and maybe even a healthy disregard for the status quo. Just because something’s been done one way for a while doesn’t mean that a younger elected is going to follow suit.
And I think the final thing is having fresh legs is certainly very helpful, not having as much baggage about what’s happened in the past, but also a willingness to use technology to enhance transparency around what’s going on. I know a number of young legislators who use online blogs, use TikTok, use social media to be able to just share what’s going on in a pretty impartial, nonpartisan way. Like, “This is the bill that’s just come up, here’s what I’m thinking about it, here’s what I’m being told by my party.” I think being able to peel the curtain back and share the behind the scenes of what it’s really like to be a legislator through all of these new means of communication is really helpful.
During our campaign, we use TikTok really effectively, and we were quite impressed with the kind of response we got — To do live town halls when we’re on the campaign trail, livestream things when I’m in between campaign events, go live on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, and have live exchanges with voters. I think that kind of campaigning is something that people are yearning for. And I see more younger candidates willing to do that.
Don: I want to ask you about a word that you’ve used a couple times, and that’s the future, and I want to ask you about what your definition of the future is because my definition has changed. I was thinking a couple of generations out, I have young children, so I’m thinking about their future, I’m thinking about their children’s children. But recently, I’ve started to think real distant future. And so, for our country, the next 250 years. How are we going to make this happen for the next 250 years and even generations beyond that? I want to ask you, when these young leaders are thinking about the future, what does that mean to them?
Steven: Yeah, that’s a good question. It is definitely a big question, but I think, well, let’s start with some of the polling data we’re seeing right now. So, if you poll Generation Z right now, one of the most common feelings that comes up is the sense of tragedy. Like, we’ve had all of these mass shootings, we have climate change looming both presently as well as in the future. And we’ve grown up, or I shouldn’t say we because I’m a millennial, but younger people, both millennials and Gen Z, have come of age in a time of systemic government failure. And so a lot of major institutions, whether it’s government, media, financial have all failed in our lifetimes. And meanwhile, we’ve had these endless wars going on abroad and many members of our generation going to serve and coming back with PTSD or other forms of long-term injuries. So, all of this is happening, and I think that’s why we see such an interest among young people for system change. The idea that sort rearranging the chairs on the Titanic is not going to be enough. We need a systemic change in our politics, in our economy, in our media, as well as in our financial industry. Just look at how, for example, the sharing economy has disrupted a number of incumbent industries, whether that’s hospitality or taxis or things of that nature.
And so I think that a number of these system changing approaches is going to be the calling card for young people as we come of age. And I think that that system change in the realm of civic engagement and government is probably our highest calling because the question of whether or not we have a functioning diverse democracy to take on these generational challenges is the fundamental issue. And I think that, increasingly, we’re seeing young people be concerned about it. The real question is, do we get enough young people involved to do something about it as what I call political or civic entrepreneurs? And so I think so far, there’s been probably a bit of a bias towards talented young people going into Silicon Valley, into tech startups, and you can certainly do a lot of good through that.
We need to fundamentally change the pipeline, the talent pipeline, where our best and brightest are seeing civics and governments and public service as a calling for their talents. And I should actually add one bit of nuance to this narrative, which is young people generally do have sort of an optimism about finding solutions to these problems but a deep level of disillusionment about the role of government to solve those problems. And so I often talk about the civic idealism gap where young people care about the issues but they’re skeptical about our existing institutions to solve them. And we got to close that gap.
Don: I want to ask you about younger candidates, and there’s going to be an inherent bias that they’re less experienced than older candidates. So, how do you overcome that?
Steven: I think one of the best sources of talent is the nonprofit sector. And I do run into a lot of young people who say, “I’ve got this experience working on educational access issues, but I just don’t know how I’m ever going to run for office. I won’t be able to get enough money. I don’t know a lot of rich people.” Those are the types of barriers that we really do have to address so we can broaden and diversify the talent pipeline going into politics. Now, if it’s for other things like starting a nonprofit or running some kind of new initiative, know that youth is a huge asset in that you have fresh legs, you have that energy, you don’t have as many obligations and responsibilities as of someone maybe twice your age, but the chance to be entrepreneurial at a young age is definitely something to take advantage of.
There’s no coincidence that if you look at some of the great entrepreneurs, we often idolize the tech entrepreneurs like the Steve Jobs and the Bill Gates of the world. But even civic entrepreneurs, if you look at when they made their biggest game-changing actions, it happened when they were in their 20s and 30s. Look at a civic entrepreneur like Dr. King. Dr. King said every single word that we remember that’s been quoted millions of times in his 20s and 30s. He led the Montgomery Bus Boycott when he was just 26 years old. He delivered the I Have a Dream speech when he was 34 years old. So, the real story, whether you’re a tech entrepreneur or civic entrepreneur, is that the chance to really change the paradigm can happen at any age, but definitely of the most chance to take big risks and take big leap of faith when you’re in your 20s and 30s, or potentially even younger than that.
Don: Let’s talk about term limits really, really quickly here.
Steven: Yes.
Don: What do you think the term limit should be?
Steven: Yeah. Well, first, I love this topic. I love talking about it because it’s a great example of an issue that a lot of people support. 75% of Americans want term limits, that’s majorities of Democrats, Republicans, and independents. And, simultaneously, is the kind of issue that has very little oxygen among the political establishment for D.C. circles. So, it’s a great example of an issue that I think whose time has come. And I think that if people mobilize around it, it can be put on the agenda. To answer your question, there are a few interesting proposals out there, but I would say, on the House side, where you have two-year terms, if it is three or four-ish terms, that’s definitely a healthy amount of time. I think if you have 12 years total, say in the Senate, which would be six terms, and then on the… Excuse me, on the House side. And in the Senate, you have six-year terms, so that may be, say two years. Then something in that range, I think, is reasonable. And that’s generally where the term limits movement is right now.
Don: Two terms, right?
Steven: Yeah, that would be roughly 12 years in the House, 12 years in the Senate. You could potentially do both if you serve in the House and in the Senate. So that would be like 24 years total that you could serve. And I always say, if you have a whole generation to make a change and you haven’t made your intended change, it’s probably time to step aside and allow some new people to step in. And having seen, look, there are very… I’ve been explicitly focused on creating change through the legislative process, and I can tell you that if you haven’t figured it out by your 12th year, you just have different goals or you’re maybe not equipped to do the job.
I’ve seen a number of members do great things within a six-year timeframe or eight-year timeframe. The biggest counterargument you hear to term limits is the idea that you lose institutional knowledge and the staff become super empowered and they end up running Congress. And that’s not totally accurate, in my opinion. My rebuttal to that is, one, you already have huge staff turnover in Congress right now. I mean, if you look at a congressional office, I mean, it’s very rare you would see someone there who has more than six or eight years of experience because, frankly, those jobs just don’t pay well. So they have a lot of turnover. And on top of that, there’s a professionalized staff in Congress where it’s good for them to have institutional knowledge. You need them helping to train up these members of Congress so they know how to do their jobs more effectively. I just don’t see that as much of an issue, but it’s good for your listeners to know what the major counterarguments are as well.
Don: So a couple of comments. The first comment is I would imagine that it’s not just the politicians who are opposed to term limits. I would imagine that lobbyists are opposed to term limits as well because they have relationships with existing legislators. That’s one comment. The second comment is around that institutional knowledge. And I think there are some things that can be learned very quickly, but foreign policy, for example, I think, I’m grateful that we have some senior members of Congress and the Senate and in the House right now because of all of the things that are going on with Ukraine, with the war in the Middle East. I think it’s really, really important for them to possess that institutional knowledge and also have relationships with leaders in other countries.
That’s the main pushback that I would have on that, but I think there are ways to overcome it, right? You could create an advisory body of some of these longer-tenured politicians that maybe they don’t require the elections and maybe they can serve in that capacity. So, I think there are ways to overcome some of these things while imposing some term limit. In 2022, you ran for U.S. Senate in Wisconsin, what did you learn about our political system from that experience?
Steven: Well, I’ll point to two things — One is that the so-called exhausted majority, which are most people who are not hyper-partisan activists, who are just going about their normal days, want a more rational system and leaders who can help bring this together, that exhausted majority is real. And I think that the populist movement for a more effective governance is also real, which our campaign tapped into as well. So, I saw a lot of hopefulness being on the campaign trail, interacting with real people across party lines. And we ran the kind of campaign where we did attract this sort of unlikely coalition of people from the left to the right. And I thought the core issue that attracted everyone was the idea of rebuilding trust in our government. Whether you’re from left, right center, a lot of people just don’t trust what’s going on right now, and for good reason.
And so talking about changing the system was very attractive. The second thing I’ll just point to in terms of key learning is that media is a democracy reform issue. When you have these media deserts and one or two people with all the power to decide media coverage, that’s just not a healthy democracy. And for example, we had a situation in our race where there was just, if you’re being realistic, like one statewide print reporter that was covering this race, and that’s not a good thing. And we saw a number of unsavory practices and poor journalism practices without any accountability.
Don: It’s a lot of power in one hand, one set of hands.
Steven: It’s a lot of power in one hand. Exactly. I’m a big believer in debates, by the way. We need more debates. We only had one at very end of the process after most of the early voting, I think, had already happened. I think, increasingly, you’re seeing the playing field move towards the big money in ads as opposed to ideas and debates. And we got to change that. And so I think any politician who’s afraid to debate is someone who needs to reexamine things. And I loved our debate because that was our big breakthrough moment. A lot of our dreams came true after that debate. And so I just think that was a key moment. So, I would say the goodness of people and the role of media as a democracy reformer, those were the two big things.
Don: That’s your mic drop moment. Steven, thank you for your time, and thank you for being a genius.
Steven: Thank you. Thank you so much, Don. It was real pleasure.
Don: Thank you for listening to 12 Geniuses. In our next episode, I interview Tara McGowan, Founder and Publisher of Courier Newsroom. Tara and I discuss what is being done to combat media and institutional mistrust. If you’re learning from and enjoying the podcast, please share it with others who might find value in it and please consider rating the show on your favorite podcast app. Thanks for listening, and thank you for being a genius.