Like the joke was it's like
everything's gonna be decided by
three people in Ohio.
Like now Ohio is so far out of it
that no one even thinks of Ohio.
Now it's Wisconsin. Yeah for sure.
Okay, we're good.
We are good.
All right. So you can just talk to
me. Yep.
We'll edit if something catastrophic
happens, but otherwise we'll just
have a conversation.
Mm-hmm.
Right, Sarah Rodriguez, thanks for
joining us. Thank you so much for
having me. So for voters who don't
know who you are that well, tell us
who you are and why you're running
for governor.
So I am the current lieutenant
governor here in Wisconsin, but
I have spent most of my career in
healthcare. I'm actually a nurse by
background, and I've worked in
so many different roles within
healthcare, whether it's night
shifts in the ER, all the way to
being an executive within a
healthcare system.
And one of my roles
as lieutenant governor is that I
get to go to all 72 counties.
And I have done that every single
year that I have been lieutenant
governor.
And when I talk to people there,
they're telling me the same thing
that they are doing everything
right, but they're feeling squeezed.
And whether that's accessible,
affordable health care, cost of
housing, cost of child
care, we keep raising
our taxes to pay for our public
schools.
I mean, these are the things that
people are talking to me about, and
these are the things that I would
like to be able to address as
governor.
Is there a single issue that drives
you as a candidate, or perhaps a
lane within the Democratic Party
that may define you?
I I think that I have so
much experience within healthcare,
which is a complicated space.
And we've seen what's happening now
in Washington where they're taking
away the subsidies for the
Affordable Care Act.
So people who are gonna get their
insurance on the exchange, these are
small business owners, these are
farmers, these are people who are
trying to make a living, and their
premiums are going to double, maybe
even triple in Wisconsin.
And so having somebody who has that
expertise in healthcare to be able
to do that here in Wisconsin and
actually make a demonstrable
difference in people's lives, that's
something that I'm really excited
about.
How much money do you think you're
gonna need to raise in order to be
successful in this primary?
So oh I you know, we
you know, I've been talking about
this with so many different people
and it is going to be millions
of dollars to be able to be
successful in the primary.
But I've got support all over the
state. I've got endorsements
in all 72 counties.
I got the first statewide union
endorsement. It's AFSME, it's
the public workers, municipal
municipality workers, and was
just really proud and honored to be
able to get that endorsement and
excited about all the support that
I'm seeing all across the state.
When it comes to a competitive
primary, how do you personally
define the difference between
negative campaigning versus defining
differences between candidates?
Well, we're all gonna have to make
our arguments to the voters.
We're all gonna have to say what
we're bringing to the table and what
type of experiences we have that are
gonna make us good governors.
And I would say for myself, I'm one
of the only candidates, I am the
only candidate in the race who's
actually been able to flip a
district from red to blue.
I did that when I was in the
assembly.
I'm also somebody who has extensive
private industry experience, but
also has been in elected office.
That's a good balance between those
two things. I know what it's like to
work shift work, I know what it's
like to be an executive within a
large company, and I know what
it's like to be an elected official.
You're gonna need all those skills
to make sure that you have a
governor who's gonna be ready on day
one.
When voters are looking at all these
candidates, should we think more in
terms of which candidate maybe has
an issue they most closely align to,
or is it about electability?
I think it's both.
I think you can look at the issues
for all the different candidates and
see if they align with your values,
but then we also have to look to the
general to see who's gonna be able
to get across the finish line in
November.
Most of the candidates in this race
have connections to either Madison
or Milwaukee.
What are you doing to reach the rest
of the state? Rural areas, exurban
areas.
Yeah, and I actually live in
Waukesha County.
And so that is not that is
very different than Milwaukee
County. But what I am doing in the
primary is I am again going to all
72 counties.
We are doing listening sessions all
across the state because I firmly
believe you can't lead unless you
listen. And so that's how I'm doing
my outreach. I'm gonna continue to
do that tour all across the
state, hearing what people want in
their governor, hearing what's going
on in their communities, because all
politics is local and we need to be
able to listen to our constituents.
What impact do you think Donald
Trump will have on this election?
You know, you we see the chaos in
Washington right now, and I
think when we're looking at
who could possibly be the Republican
governor candidate, that's Tom
Tiffany, there is very
little daylight between him and
Trump. And so if that
chaos in Washington
could absolutely trickle down into
into Wisconsin if somebody is
going to be electing Tom Tiffany as
governor.
When you look at the diverse field
that the Democrats have put out
there, you still hear rumblings of
other candidates.
Why does it seem like people in the
party still want a white guy to get
in this race?
I don't know that that's true.
I think we've got some really,
really exceptional candidates
on the Democratic side.
We've got some folks that have a
wide variety of experiences.
And looking at all of the different
candidates, you know, that's what
people are gonna have to do.
They're gonna have to look at their
websites, look at their policy
positions and see who's gonna be
able to get across the finish line
in November.
If elected it's possible you have a
democratic legislature behind you.
What's your A B one?
What's the first bill you want to
sign into law?
So the things that I wanna make sure
that I'm signing into law are things
that are gonna reduce costs for
Wisconsinites.
And that's gonna be healthcare costs
primarily, but also looking at
childcare.
We've got other states that we can
look at for examples where they've
been able to subsidize child care
for folks. Treating that as
infrastructure is gonna be something
that's gonna be a priority for me.
It's also possible that there's a
Republican legislature.
What's your history of working
across the aisle?
So coming from a Redder
community, I'm used to having those
types of conversations with
Republicans.
I represented a purple district.
And so my strategy would
be to look at things that have wild,
you know, mo the most popular
my strategy would be able to
things that have, you know, wild
popular support in Wisconsin
and be able to start
with those types of things.
So whether that is fully funding
our public schools, we know that
that's something that people want to
do within Wisconsin.
We want to make sure that we're
gonna be able to get some relief
for health care across across the
finish line.
I'm willing to work with anybody
who's going to make life better for
Wisconsin.
Right now the Public Service
Commission is looking at large
utility rate hikes.
There's data centers that are
popping up all over the state.
What's your position on those
issues?
So the data centers have
to be a conversation with the
community.
And we want to make sure that those
data centers are in a
community that wants them.
But what we have to do on the front
end is to make sure contractually
that the energy uses are not
going to be born on the back of
taxpayers, that they are going
to be investing, particularly in
renewable energy, and
that they are going to be bearing
those costs for those energies
because we certainly don't want it
to be on the backs of taxpayers.
When it comes to public education,
is it simply a matter of investing
more money or does there need to be
reform?
Both. We need to make sure that we
are investing the money because what
we see all across the state is
that there are all of these
referendums and people are voting
to increase their own taxes,
not to pay for a new science
lab, not to pay for a new middle
school, but to pay for operational
expenses, teachers'
salaries.
And that is just unsustainable
moving forward. So we have to put
more dollars into the public school
system, but we also have to look at
reform to make sure that kids are
getting the education they need to
be able to succeed.
What would you like to see happen
with the voucher system?
I think we need to absolutely
address the voucher system.
We need to make sure that the
voucher system is what it was
originally intended to do, which
was for low-income families to be
able to have some choices.
And right now we do not have an
income limit on the voucher system,
and we're going to be taking off the
cap for the vouchers.
That is going to be funneling public
money into private schools.
We cannot afford to have two
separate school systems within
the state of Wisconsin.
So we're going to have to have some
reform in that area as well.
What's your number one?
Okay. That you'd like to see?
The number one tax change I'd like
to see is that we look at
tax relief for our lower
income and middle income families.
Right now our tax system is
absolutely skewed toward the most
wealthy in Wisconsin.
And so we want to make sure that the
most wealthy are paying their fair
share while we're able to
have some tax relief for middle
class families.
Over the course of the last year
we've seen the Supreme Court
eliminate legislative oversight of
the rulemaking process in a lot of
areas. Would you like to see a
bipartisan compromise to restore
some oversight?
I I think the Supreme Court was
right, in terms of making sure
we have separate branches of
government. We have the executive
branch, we have the legislative
branch. Let's make sure everybody
stays in their lane.
As far as funding for local
government, does there need to be
more investment or once again is the
reform needed?
I think both as well.
We do need more investment in
local government.
When I talk to municipalities
and cities all across the the
the state, they are really
struggling to be able to provide the
services that their constituents
expect. Basic services.
We're talking about making sure that
their parks stay open, their public
libraries stay open, that there's
a public pool that that kids
can go to in the summer.
So we're gonna have to look at that
formula of how we
fund municipalities and cities
to make sure they can provide those
services.
Right now we've got active
exploratory drilling projects
across the Northwoods, looking at
different mining projects down the
road. What would you like to see
happen as far as permitting for
those those mines?
What I think we need to do is to
make sure we have a really good
environmental assessment for
permitting for those mines and
to make sure that we are talking
with the local communities.
If tribal nations are involved, we
are having those open conversations
with them and making sure that we
don't have the environmental impact
that would be negative for
Wisconsin.
Do you have any concerns about your
personal safety in this political
environment?
You know, I I don't.
I love Wisconsin
and I believe in Wisconsinites
and I believe that they want us
to have an open dialog for politics,
and so I do not have any
concerns about my personal safety.
What's your plan to address the
affordable housing crisis?
So affordable housing across the
the state is something that I've
been very, very interested in.
I'm actually the chair of the
Interagency Council on Homelessness,
and we need to look at it as a
three-legged stool.
There is the legislation
that we have to make sure that
we have laws that allow us to
build affordable housing.
There are administrative rules
and making sure like,
you know, how you can build, what
type of permits that you need, and
then there's funding.
And right now there is nobody who
is looking at all three of those
things to make sure that they're
aligned. So as governor, I would
assign somebody to make sure that
they are looking at housing overall,
having a statewide strategic plan
to make sure that we have some of
those starter homes that we
certainly don't have in Wisconsin
anymore. If you look at somebody
who's on the average salary
making $50,000 a
year, they could possibly afford a
home around $100,000, $125,000.
That simply doesn't exist in the
marketplace today.
So we need to get back to making
sure that we are building starter
homes with a priority on home
ownership, not just rentals.
Governor Evers has got an ambitious
plan to overhaul the Department of
Corrections and the prison system.
Would you carry that forward?
Absolutely.
We absolutely have
to make sure that we
are doing what's best for
people within our prison system
and correction system and it needs
an overhaul.
Would you like to see any changes to
Wisconsin's abortion law?
I would.
What we need to do is to make sure
that we enshrine Roe within
Wisconsin.
That's what I've always been really
clear about. I'm again a nurse
by background.
We know that these type of
healthcare decisions are best made
between a patient and
their doctor.
And Roe has been something that
has kept women safe for
decades. And we need to make sure
that we have legislation to keep
women safe in Wisconsin so that it
does not go back and forth between
if we have different leaders between
Republicans and Democrats.
Sarah Rodriguez, thanks for your
time. Thank you so much for having
me. All right.
That was it. Okay.
Thank you so much. Good.
You are still tethered, so don't run
into the table.
Oh yeah, I I do like to run away
with these things.