Live from Music Row Thursday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed Deborah Fisher, the executive director of the Tennessee Coalition for Open Government to the studio to describe reports lacking transparency where clawbacks have not been redeemed after large corporations shut down.
Leahy: I am joined in studio by our friend Deb Fisher, who heads the Tennessee Coalition for Open Government. You were going to tell us about the results of all of these funds spent in secret agreements by the Economic Development Administration here to induce a large corporation to come to Tennessee.
Supposedly, if they don’t hit their employment objectives. There are “clawbacks” where they’re supposed to give us back the money. How’s that working out according to this report, Deb?
Fisher: This is the first report, and it was acquired by lawmakers to be presented to the fiscal committee. And I’ll give you just one example from it.
Service Master Global Holdings have received grants I found online on the ECD website of about $5.5 million, $385,000. repaid to each to ECD.
Leahy: Whoa, whoa, whoa. They got $5.5 million in grants with clawback provisions? Is that it?
Fisher: Yeah. The report is sketchy. So I don’t know how much of that was subject to the Clawback provisions, but they received a lot of money from the state.
And that’s the only one listed in this report where they actually did get the clawbacks. There are almost $11 million in clawback owed from previous years that have not been collected.
Leahy: So let’s talk about the not collected bit. And so we don’t have the details of these. These are all secretive deals. To me, you had up a transparency group, why should these deals be secret?
Fisher: Well, they shouldn’t be secret. The public needs to know the performance of ECD. If we’re going to give taxpayer dollars to companies to do things and they don’t do it, we need to know how it works out.
And we’re starting to get just a very small peek at what’s going on. And this has been because some lawmakers have passed laws forcing it, but we still don’t have a full picture. There was a good question yesterday about it.
Leahy: In the Tennessee General Assembly at a committee? House or Senate?
Fisher: House. Bobby Ross. He’s the economic development and asking, how is the performance gone before? And of course, he gives an example of something that’s gone really?
Leahy: One example.
Fisher: But we don’t know the full picture.
Leahy: Why don’t we know that? Why shouldn’t we have accountability, complete detail of comparing every deal where Tennessee taxpayers gave millions of dollars to corporations compared to what they said they would do, what they actually did, how much they owed back in these, and how much they actually paid?
Fisher: I don’t know why we don’t. They don’t provide it. They make it hard to find. They have a lot of discretion to make things confidential. And they have.
A lot of the discretion to make things confidential end up being up to one man, either at the discretion of the ECD Commissioner. In some cases with tax credits. It’s two with a revenue commissioner.
Leahy: Let’s go to that. The clawbacks first, you said $11 million owed in clawback. Who owes the clawback that hasn’t given the money back? Are these companies that went broke?
Fisher: That information is not in the report.
Leahy: You can’t find that out. I would like to find that out, wouldn’t you?
Fisher: Yeah. It’s not clear how many jobs. So the report is pretty sketchy, but it is our first clue. Our first window into the fact that the state is trying to get money owed and hasn’t been able to.
I think these clawback provisions are super important to be put in the contract, but we just have to be realistic about them, and we need to see how they turn out. I mean, it’s not just the magic bullet to the deal.
Leahy: You said something else here about the discretion that some of these folks have, and it’s not just in grants for capital improvements or building buildings or other stuff. It’s for tax credits.
What’s the law on it? And tell us who the Tennessee state officials who have this discretion are? Do they exercise it on tax credits?
Fisher: Right. In statute, there are certain requirements you have to meet to get, say, a job tax credit or a capital investment tax credit, and it’s open to everybody. But if a business doesn’t meet those qualifications, it still can be awarded the credit if the revenue commissioner and the ECD commissioner decide that it’s in the best interest of the state to give that credit to that business.
However, our problem with that is that we don’t have to know who they have decided to give it to. And we think that’s a problem when you basically have two people who can make a decision to give millions and millions of dollars in a tax credit to a company, and that’s not public.
Leahy: And there’s no way to find that out?
Fisher: No, it’s confidential. And it’s confidential by state law.
Leahy: Who voted for that state law?
Fisher: This goes back.
Leahy: How far back does it go?
Fisher: These have been in state law for a while. I don’t know. But they add to it. They subtract from it every year. This year, they added one more of those discretionary tax credits.
Leahy: In the statute.
Fisher: In the statute. Usually, it’s targeted to a company that they want to give incentives to, but they don’t quite meet the qualifications laid out in the state law.
They applied to everybody else, and they want to just bend the rules, basically, for a particular company.
Leahy: Bend the rule. And I’m sure lobbyists have nothing to do with this. That was a little satire there. (Laughs)
Fisher: The state of the credit thinks it’s in the best interest of the state, so they think it’s going to help economic development. So I don’t want to discount that. We just think it should be transparent.
Leahy: Yeah. I think a lot of things should be transparent, and a lot of things that aren’t particularly about this Ford deal. I think a lot more should be transparent. But I want to go back to the two people that can give tax credit at their discretion.
Now, you said it’s the director of economic development, Bob Rolfe. Whoever the revenue commissioner is, it’s a known thing. (Fisher chuckles) But they have a lot of power. A lot of discretion.
Is there any element Deb within the Tennessee General Assembly to limit those discretionary powers that give lots of money to these Fortune 500 companies and sometimes smaller companies?
Fisher: Yes. They wrote the law to allow it, and they could write the law to not allow it, or they could write the law to make it transparent.
Leahy: When you talk to legislators about transparency, what kind of feedback do you get if you say we need more transparency, do they say, oh, yeah. That’s great. Let somebody else do it. How do they respond?
Fisher: Some of them want it. Some of them want it. But they also feel pressured that they need to have jobs brought to their community. And ECD says we can’t deal with companies if we’re going to reveal who we give the money to.
They’re caught between a rock and a hard place because jobs are really important in communities. That’s why we have a whole state agency focused on it. The political angle there is you want the jobs? We got to keep these secrets.
Fisher: To some extent.
Leahy: I think that’s terrible. But that’s the way it is.
Fisher: Not everything is secret, but there are some pretty big holes in this.
Listen to the full second hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “Tennessee Capitol” by Peggy Anderson. CC BY-SA 4.0.
Live from Music Row Tuesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed Maury County Mayor Andy Ogles in the studio to discuss Governor Bill Lee and 26 other Tennessee state Republican’s letter to Joe Biden regarding Afghan refugees and the administration’s bias against southern states.
Leahy: And that is Behar County Sheriff Javier Salazar commenting about the border crisis. Andy Ogles Mayor of Maury County, there’s a story sort of related to that at The Tennessee Star. Right now, Governor Bill Lee has joined 25 Republican governors and requesting a meeting with Joe Biden regarding the border crisis.
The letter reads, as chief executives of our states, we request a meeting with you at the White House to bring an end to the national security crisis created by eight months of unenforced borders. Do you think Joe Biden is going to take that meeting Andy?
Ogles: (Sighs) Who knows? But even if he does, what does anyone really expect to come out of it? That proclamation, that announcement is nothing more than a campaign soundbite. It doesn’t have any action attached to it.
What I would love to see is governors across the country refuse services to illegals or migrants settled in states without the state’s permission.
Don’t give them any state Medicaid or dollars or those sorts of things and put it back on the federal government.
Leahy: This is interesting because Governor Lee has signed this letter, along with 25 other Republican governors. Say, pretty, please, Mr. President. Meet with us so we can complain about what you’re doing, which will have zero zip nada effect.
And yet at the same time, he appears to be welcoming with open arms, a wave of unvetted for security or health purposes Afghan refugees. Already over 400 have arrived in Tennessee.
More than 300 apparently have been resettled in Tennessee. Governor Lee has said, well, gee, I’m not so sure I like this, but he’s doing nothing to change it. Your thoughts on that?
Ogles: Well, keep in mind, those numbers are just for Nashville. And we have documented cases in Memphis, Chattanooga, and Knoxville now where Afghan refugees have been resettled there, so one can only guestimate.
There’s not a lot of clarity here that that number could be closer to 1,000, if not more. But again, I appreciate their service for those that actually may have helped us.
Leahy: Well that’s a very, very limited number. The reports are 95,000 Afghan refugees are coming to the United States of America. A very small percentage of them were the interpreters that helped us.
Most of them are unvetted, possible terrorists, and certainly possibly unvaccinated. (Chuckles) And they’re going to be paid with all their social welfare. In the beginning, I think it will be covered by the federal government. But after eight months, it’s all on Tennessee taxpayers.
Ogles: Yes, that’s right. Look, again, I appreciate your service. But for those that helped us in Afghanistan, why didn’t we help resettle them to Kuwait or Jordan, the UAE, or somewhere else like that?
And at the end of the day, you have to be a fool if you don’t understand that Islam and Christianity, just don’t mix. Islam and a free Republic don’t mix.
And so we now have imported hundreds of thousands of people who at the end of the day, the religion hates America.
Leahy: That’s interesting because now we’re about maybe two percent of the American population is Muslim. My view is that there are those of that background who assimilate to America.
But there are quite a few whose general worldview is not consistent with the American concept of a constitutional Republic. They want to have a caliphate.
Ogles: And that goes back to the whole unvetted problem. And that is you have so many of these folks who are truly unvetted. We have no idea who they are.
All they came with is scraps of paper. And so who they claim they are, it may not be who they actually are. There’s no way to know. And we’ve just opened the door. Come on in.
Leahy: We have a law called the Refugee Act of 1980, which set standards for the legal admission of refugees in the United States. It’s a lengthy process, and they have to be reviewed and vetted.
I have yet to figure out why these 950 Afghan refugees are not going through that legal process. Apparently, the Biden administration is bigfooting American governors and bringing them all in. Here’s the story.
Andy, from Eric Lender at The Tennessee Star. We have only one story that says 26 Republican governors sent a letter to Biden. Please meet with us so we can talk about the southern border.
But 18 Republican governors apparently support Biden’s Afghan refugee settlement plan. Last week, the White House declared that at least 360 Afghans will be resettled in the US across 46 different states.
The only states that will not be receiving refugees or Hawaii, South Dakota, West Virginia, Wyoming, and Washington, D.C.
Ogles: Again, why is Tennessee not in an opt-out position? When I look at this and you mentioned the federal government kind of pushing the governors around, I think this is part of a larger problem and a larger agenda where you have the federal government overstepping its authority and forcing the states to become co-opted into a program and co-opted into a policy.
And so it’s incrementally marginalizing our governors in our states. And keep in mind, we are a free Republic. We have the 10th amendment.
And whether it’s COVID or refugees or whatever, these governors have to stand up and start fighting. And playing footsie with a President who does not like us is not getting us anywhere.
Leahy: Yeah, it’s and it seems to be pretty transparently not liking the southern states.
Ogles: It’s blatant.
Leahy: Here’s an example. This is a story from Fox 17. Distribution changes in monoclonal antibody treatments may cause shortages in Tennessee hospitals. Did you see this story?
It seems to be a blatant political punishment of his opponents by the Biden maladministration. Here’s the story from Fox 17. The demand for the monoclonal antibody treatment for COVID-19 patients has led the federal government to change the way it allocates its supply. This is a very kind of neutral reporting from Fox 17.
The Department of Health and Human Services announced they are distributing the antibiotic treatment doses based on state and territory, instead of allowing hospitals to directly order the number of treatments they need. And, yeah, a week and a half ago, if you wanted it, they distributed it to you. What’s wrong with this picture?
Ogles: They’ve kind of danced with this idea that they’re going to ration it to the states that don’t have the highest vaccine rates. It’s a dangerous position they’re putting themselves in. They being the federal government.
And so I think they’ve walked that back a little bit. But what you’re seeing, what they’ve done is you have a time of increased demand for the monoclonal antibodies.
The federal government is stockpiling a reserve, which is creating a choke point in the distribution. And so that they’re making states feel the pain through a kind of a stockpiling measure knowing, at the end of the day, you’ll start refusing treatment.
You’re going to have anarchy on your hands when you have someone who is sick. There’s a known treatment and they’re not able to get it.
I did see a different kind of on the idea of COVID that Israel is now beginning to recognize a natural immunity. It’ll be interesting to see if other states, businesses, et cetera reacts with a treatment that’s available.
You have the vaccines that are available. Where does natural immunity fit into this dialogue? And that’s, I guess, yet untold.
Leahy: Interestingly enough, last week, the entire Republican congressional delegation, all seven members, sent a letter to the Secretary of Health and Human Services.
And basically, they said, why are you changing the distribution policy, and why are you limiting it to Tennessee? They haven’t gotten an answer yet. I kind of like what Ron DeSantis said.
He said, okay, you want to ration the distribution of this stuff to us? We’re going to go out as a state and buy it from another vendor. I like that idea.
Ogles: Absolutely. And kudos to Ron DeSantis on this whole COVID vaccine virus issue, he has truly been a leader.
Listen to the full second hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Live from Music Row Tuesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed Jackson County, Texas Sheriff, AJ ‘Andy’ Louderback to the newsmakers line to discuss the chaos at America’s southern border and the Biden’s administration’s denial of it.
Leahy: I’m excited to welcome on our newsmaker line. Our friend, Sheriff AJ Louderback from I guess it’s Jackson County, Texas. Sheriff, welcome to The Tennessee Star Report.
Louderback: Thank you, Sir. I appreciate you invited me to say a few words this morning. Thank you.
Leahy: Well, look, we met two years ago in Washington, D.C., and had a great conversation there. It’s been a bad two years for border control, hasn’t it?
Louderback: It’s the worst we’ve ever seen in the history here at the southern border here with Texas. We haven’t experienced anything like what we’re seeing today from the effects of the policies of the Biden administration and the chaos and destruction they’ve created.
Leahy: Here’s my question to you as a Sheriff enforcing the laws of the state of Texas, you look at the failure of the Biden administration to enforce our federal immigration laws. And my question to you is, is this intentional on their part? And what impact does it have on you?
Louderback: Michael, it’s not just intentional. It’s strategic. It’s planned, it’s operational. It’s a very concerted effort. Probably a year or more prior to there’s evidence of a year or more prior to the Biden administration taking office and anticipation of the implementation of the policy changes to completely gut the INA were more clearly done on purpose to achieve exactly what we are doing today and we see every day.
So this is not anything that is haphazard. They were told repeatedly. It was written by senior staff of CBP. And if you do this, this is what you’re going to do. There is ample evidence of that from the directors at CBP.
People have been there for 30 plus years, true experts in border security told this administration repeatedly meeting after meeting what was going to happen if they persisted in doing this to the United States?
Leahy: The Biden administration knew this would happen, right?
Louderback: Absolutely.
Leahy: So as a Sheriff there, what recourse do you have against a federal administration that is violating federal law?
Louderback: Well, not much. Really the first duty here for most of us is to inform. I mean, that’s what most of us are trying to do. When the American people are uninformed or misinformed we don’t get any results at all.
And we see the results of that. We’re in the informed stage right now urging governments, state governments, to go to work here and try to alter these policies or trying to get them to all these policies, which is exactly what Governor Greg Abbott is doing in Texas.
Leahy: Now, you mentioned Governor Abbott. There was a big press conference where he said, we’re going to build a wall of our own and we’re going to arrest people that come across it. Now, that’s a good thought. How practical is that?
Louderback: The complexity of finishing portions of the wall exists. The ability for the state of Texas to strategically place the resources necessary to start filing criminal trespass and the child endangerment charges would probably two most prevalent other than human trafficking, smuggling.
The state of Texas put a ton of resources and over a billion dollars dedicated to some different changes. And, of course, there’s a special session coming up legislatively that would go along with the declaration of disaster that he has done.
These things, we hope, will start to turn. And, of course, one most significant thing, Michael was the signing of the Emergency Management Assistance Compact in Arizona. So as these movements build, where we see more and more states coming on board, where federal policies are destructive to states, we’ll see where this goes.
But it’s obviously moving in the right direction for the rule of law and for us to try and have some recourse to the border issue and to the national security issue and border security.
Leahy: What does this do to the morale of your department and your employees when you see that you’re being undermined?
Louderback: Well, in our business, we’ve been under attack before the Biden administration took office. We’ve been subjected to all types of things, from the funding to qualified immunity to just outright racist attacks that every law enforcement officer in the United States is a complete racist.
Which is absolutely wrong. But we’ve got to keep our heads up. I don’t like falling into that kind of trap like that. We’re going to do our job here. We’re going to keep our heads up. We’re going to enforce the law as we know and keep citizens safe.
And that’s what we have to do. Yes. It’s demoralizing. It’s more demoralizing for the men and women of the border patrol working there. Imagine working there or any job that you had in the United States. It’s no different than a County Sheriff saying to his deputies I’ll tell you what? (Inaudible talk) We’re not going to accept any cases. I don’t want you to arrest anyone unless they are .20.
Leahy: We’ll just make up that new law, right?
Louderback: Yeah. We’ll just make that up. That’s a policy now for us.
Leahy: By the way, what did Vice President Kamala Harris say when she went down to the border and visit with you? (Laughter) That’s a joke.
Louderback: Yeah. Understood. She won’t go to the border. Going to the border with her, she’s obviously unable to find it would simply prove that there’s a problem there, and they don’t see it as a problem. They don’t want the American public to see it as a problem.
Leahy: They think we’re really pretty stupid, don’t they? (Louderback chuckles) Well, I know you are measured in your statements, Sheriff. I can say that.
Louderback: Let’s move onto other questions. Regarding the Vice President, I think it’s pretty obvious as to what’s going on here.
Leahy: (Laughs) Yes, I can do that. And we won’t give you a hard time about it. Jackson County. Is that right between, like, McCallen and Corpus Christi? Is that where it is?
Louderback: Just passed Corpus. We’re on the geographical major corridor into Houston, Texas, which is, of course, a huge magnet for all time. Whether it’s narcotics or human trafficking or human smuggling.
Leahy: You have what? 12,000 residents. How many residents of the county?
Louderback: We’re just under 20,000. Under 20,000. I remember that now. Have you seen an uptick in this travel going through your county by illegal aliens in the past five months?
Louderback: (Inaudible talk) The bailouts, the crashes, they’ve stolen vehicles, license plates, the increased methamphetamine, increased fentanyl. There’s not an agency around me that doesn’t have increased narcotic issues. The empowerment of the cartel has been done.
Leahy: Nothing says safety and security of citizens of Jackson County, Texas like a Biden administration that won’t enforce immigration laws. Right, Sheriff?
Louderback: Yes, sir. You got it.
Listen to the full second hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “AJ Louderback” by AJ Louderback.
Live from Music Row Friday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed the original all-star panelist Crom Carmichael to the studio to discuss recent legislation in Florida that would prevent private funding of elections.
Leahy: We are joined in studio by the original All-Star panelist, Crom Carmichael. Crom, we’re talking about election integrity reform. I have a story published last night at Breitbart.com. Headline: Florida Becomes Fifth State to Ban Private Funding of Election Administration. In other words, the Zucker bucks that we’re talking about that $419 million that Mark Zuckerberg gave to these nonprofits that they use to basically get out the vote for Democrats.
Illegal in five states. Florida became the fifth state. On Thursday after Governor Ron DeSantis signed a comprehensive election integrity bill into law with a clear and enforceable ban on that controversial practice. Florida joins Georgia, Arizona, Idaho, and Louisiana, all of which have enacted similar laws in Texas. As you heard in the news, Texas has passed an election integrity bill in the House last night. I think that does include a similar measure there.
Carmichael: And this is becoming clearer and clearer to me, just based on the actual facts. When Gavin Newsom thinks that he has the right, which he does have the right to verify signatures and throws out 400,000 signatures, that’s not called voter suppression. (Leahy laughs) And the Democrats don’t want Republicans to be able to do an audit in Maricopa County that won’t even overturn the election.
It’s just trying to determine whether or not there is an election integrity problem. And Democrats a claim they don’t even want to know based on their actions, they’re saying I don’t even need to know whether or not there’s an integrity problem. And I’m assuming Michael, so I’m not going to assume anything because you’re much more familiar with this than I am, what about states like Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, what’s going on there?
Leahy: Let’s talk about the others like Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania. Wisconsin narrowly won by about 20,000 votes by Joe Biden. And Michigan not quite as close, but narrow in Michigan and Pennsylvania, all won by Biden. Those three states have something in common, Republican-majority state legislatures and Democratic governors.
Then you also have any legislation that would be passed by the state legislature has to be veto-proof. And I believe all three states require a two-thirds majority to override a veto, unlike here in Tennessee, which is only a majority of 50 percent plus one. Any electoral reform legislation passed in those states that would be signed by the governor would be extraordinarily watered down and most likely rejected.
I know in Wisconsin they’ve tried one little minor thing that would require any private funding to go through the Wisconsin Election Commission and be distributed equally throughout the state, that’s been passed in the state legislature. I think even that little minor thing, the Democrat governor there, his name is Tony Evers, would veto it in a heartbeat.
Carmichael: Let me ask you a question because the Constitution leaves the election laws in the various states up to the legislatures.
Leahy: Yes.
Carmichael: Has that ever been adjudicated at the Supreme Court level?
Leahy: I don’t think it ever has been because it’s clear there in black and white that it’s a state duty and a state responsibility.
Carmichael: No, I understand it’s a state, but it says the legislatures. It doesn’t say the governor.
Leahy: State legislature. Yes.
Carmichael: So if a state passed a law, and the governor vetoes it, it would seem to me that that there ought to be a court decision on whether or not a governor can veto a legislation reform bill.
Leahy: I think those are related to federal elections in the Constitution, not necessarily state.
Carmichael: That’s what I talking about. I’m talking about the federal elections.
Leahy: I don’t know the answer to that. It’s a very good question.
Carmichael: The House members, the Senate, and the presidency.
Leahy: I’m going to have to do some homework. I will accept your assignment. I’ll find the answer.
Carmichael: Arizona did pass election reform, is that correct?
Leahy: Oh, yeah. They’ve made it and the strongest prohibition on private funding of any of the states is in Arizona. And they’re very strong.
Carmichael: But have they also changed their election procedures?
Leahy: Yeah. They’ve changed some election procedures. They’ve done it piecemeal in Arizona. Other states, like Texas and Florida, have done sort of these omnibus, comprehensive bills. And so there’s more to come in Arizona.
Carmichael: Well, it’s going to be very interesting.
Listen to the full third hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Live from Music Row Tuesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed Maury County Mayor Andy Ogles in the studio to talk about the corporate wokeness and its disregard for their constituency and how other states need to act now and follow Florida’s lead.
Leahy: You are a small business guy. I think Alfredo Ortiz made quite a case there. (Laughter) It was kind of funny right?
Ogles: Oh, my goodness. As we sit here and talk about this billboard, I was trying to think of a funny quip. I’m usually pretty good at that. And I’m speechless. Sometimes we say things in jest and we lighten them up a little bit. But he’s really talking about something serious that wokeness that is sweeping the country. It has a dangerous, ugly side to it in that it’s ready, fire, aim. And we’re no longer processing things through an objective lens. That suddenly everything’s tainted.
And that’s problematic. Could have should have the All-Star Game been evaluated? Well, of course, that’s what you do in any business model. But just to pull it a knee-jerk reaction because of Coca-Cola and Delta, these woke corporations trying to push. They’ve become oligarchs now where they are pushing their agendas onto the American public. But because they have such a market share we don’t have a voice.
Leahy: It’s a very good point. When we grew up, the idea was, well, this is a capitalist society. And businesses were in business to make a financial return for their shareholders and do a good job in providing products and services to their customers. That’s the model that’s being replaced now by a concept called stakeholder capitalism.
I call it basically an early version of Marxism. What’s happening is these large publicly traded companies, the left is trying to turn them into, like, public benefit corporations. And they are making decisions not based upon their products or services or what their customers need but what the left activists are trying to push them into. It’s a very bad sign.
Ogles: And the problem is that most of us we’re busy with jobs, mortgages, and kids and we’re trying to figure out life. And then you’ve got this minority, this small portion of the left. They’re loud, they’re angry, and it terrifies these corporations. And so they’re moving in directions that their constituency really doesn’t want.
Leahy: Their customers don’t want, their investors don’t want. But these stakeholders are basically a bunch of left-wing Marxist types that want a version of neofascism in the United States. There’s a lot of words but that I think describes what they’re trying to do. They’re trying to serve the authority of state legislatures around the country.
Ogles: Yeah. They totally bypass. For example, the Tennessee legislature, they’re not going to do some of the things that Coke or Delta or some of these other companies are suggesting. And so what are they doing? It’s a run around you and I, as we try to say, hey, wait a minute. We value the Constitution. We’re governed by elected people, not by corporations.
And because you’re Coca-Cola and you have such a large market share, now you have a disproportionate voice and telling me how to live. Look, I don’t care what Coke thinks. I really don’t. Make soda, do it well, and be gone. That’s it.
Leahy: Yeah. I think I’m going to stop drinking Woka-Cola myself.
Ogles: Woka-Cola. That’s almost as good as that billboard.
Leahy: All strikes and no balls for the Major League Baseball Commissioner. The thing is, when you look at that, you look at the social course, as you know, 2nd Vote, our friends Amy Wilhite and Chris McCarran are the executive director and CEO of 2nd Vote. They rate large corporations based upon whether they’re neutral or conservative or liberal.
The vast majority of large corporations now are pretty liberal in terms of their policies, and it’s just not what they should be doing. And people are pushing back now when you talk about as a consumer, you look at that. If I tell you I’m not going to drink Woka-Cola, okay. If you like to drink Colas, there are a few less woke versions of it. Pepsi-Cola is sort of in that crowd, not quite as bad as Woka-Cola. Royal Crown Cola.
These are all kind of politically correct. There is this thing going on in American capitalism, and you’re a student of economics Andy. There’s a thing going on where all of these big funds that manage all the money that invest in corporations are pushing the publicly traded companies to do something called ESG. And it’s a big code word. It’s for the environment and social governance. In other words climate change and equity, diversity, all that kind of stuff. And there’s huge pressure on these publicly traded corporations to kind of comply. Not a good sign, I don’t think.
Ogles: No. And that’s why it’s imperative that our state legislators and the legislature step up and do something about this. You had Senator Mike Bell in the first segment, and there’s the opportunity to follow Florida’s lead and to push back against some of this Big Tech censorship, kind of draw a line in the sand if you will. And they’re going to study it for another session.
Well, the time is now to act. And so I would call on the legislature to go ahead. I sent a letter to the governor, the speaker of the house, and to the lieutenant governor saying, we have to stand up collectively as a state in the same way Florida has done. And that’s the other thing that’s important is we need these legislatures, these governors from conservative states to work together to be a chorus of conservatism because that’s what the left does. And they do so well.
You’ll have these factions of the left that otherwise would never want to be together because they’re so distinctly different. But yet when it comes to fighting against conservatism, they are one voice and they move and they march together. And then you get here on the conservative side, we’re too busy bickering as to which one of us is the most conservative.
Leahy: I’m more conservative than you.
Ogles: That’s right. Ron DeSantis is out there getting it done. And in Tennessee and Texas and some of the other states. We’re a little tepid.
Leahy: Lagging behind.
Ogles: That’s right. You look at the election, the lawsuit that the Texas attorney general filed. Tennessee, we finally signed on, but we were like 16th out of 17th by the time that we signed on. It was so far in the process, it was irrelevant. We should have been tagalong beating on the door to say, no, we’re next. We’re next. We’re going to file, too. So that way, if your lawsuit doesn’t work and we have one. And so we as a state, as elected officials, we’ve got to work together and be a chorus of rationalism in a crazy world.
Leahy: You said something very interesting and very important. There is leadership, I think, going on in the conservative world, and it’s coming from the state government. But particularly there’s one state I think that’s leading the way. And there’s one governor who’s leading the way and that’s Ron DeSantis in Florida.
Ogles: Going back to the baseball analogy, he’s knocking it out of the park. I mean, he really is. I mean, if you’re a conservative in this country, man, do you wish you had Ron DeSantis as your governor or perhaps as your president.
Leahy: Now you use the baseball term. You know, the story about Ron DeSantis?
Ogles: He’s quite the ballplayer. From Yale?
Leahy: He was the captain of the Yale baseball team and hit 345 his senior year. I never even in high school, I never even got close to 345. So this guy’s pretty good. He’s a very talented guy. And that’s one of the reasons I think since last you’ve been here, we have a little bit of news. The Tennessee Star and our parent corporation is Star News Digital Media. And we have the Star News Network. We do state-based conservative news in now seven States. And we have added, wait for it….drum roll, please. The Florida Capital Star.
Ogles: There you go.
Leahy: Up next, The Texas Loan Star.
Ogles: That’s a good one. Again, if you’re a conservative publication, the state that’s really helping drive conservative content is Florida. So it makes absolute sense to have something like that there. But again, they are leading the charge, knocking out of the park as I said.
Leahy: That was our thinking as well. And so far, the stories that have been great about conservative leadership from a governor and a state legislature down in Florida.
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
