Thanks for tuning in.

The OTR guest this week is freshman legislator Representative Dylan Wegela.

Our lead story.

Lots of House incumbents had primary challengers, including the two top leaders on the OTR panel Kyle Melinn, Lauren Gibbons and Rick Pluta.

Sit in with us as we get the inside out, off the record.

Production of Off the Record is made possible, in part by Martin Waymire, a full service strategic communications agency, partnering with clients through public relations, digital marketing and public policy engagement.

Learn more at Martinwaymire.com And now this edition of Off the Record with Tim Skubick.

Thank you very much.

Welcome to Studio C for another edition of Off the Record.

Well, Governor Gretchen Whitmer's budget took a little bit of a hit in the House this week.

The Democrats raised their ugly heads and said Thanks, but no thanks.

Well, the.

House and the Senate Republicans are now taking the initiative and putting forward their own ideas on what they should be doing with the budget.

I know.

So no longer are the Democrats being kind of the rubber stamp when it comes to the budget, when it comes to the governor's idea, to take money away from the health care retiree system and put it toward other programs, the legislature is now saying, well, wait a minute, maybe we should give that money to the locals and let them spend that on reducing their own pension.

Costs.

Which is exactly what they want.

the locals want for sure.

And so then also the House Democrats said to the governors, ideas on job creation, you know, well, we got our own ideas on how we want to spend money on job creation money.

And then when it came to the her E.V.

proposal that also got nixed as well.

The E.V.

rebate.

And free college tuition for community college, well.

They're going to do something a little different with that one.

They're not going to do her exact proposal.

Their idea was to take the existing scholarship and expand it.

And then also the landfill tipping fees.

So that was that was cut out of the cut out of the environmental budget as well.

So, yeah, certainly we're seeing a lot of, you know, at least in this early stage of the budget process, some heartburn over some of the governor's policies.

Now, depending on how negotiations go, it certainly might not mean the end of all of the things we just lifted listed off.

But certainly, yeah, there's it seems as though the legislature has a different direction in mind.

So does the governor Divisions and second terms, which are final terms under term limits, are rarely kind to incumbents.

So the governor doesn't have heartburn over this.

Does she?

no, I mean, it's it's early in the process.

Also.

She has a lot of things, other things to worry about, particularly what happens with the Biden campaign in the presidential election.

And I think that that.

Are you suggesting that she is checking out on doing the budget.

You know what?

You can walk and juggle knives at the same time in that job.

It's gum, Rick.

It's gum.

No, no, no, no.

Not in this environment.

I'm sorry.

Put top on that.

I just think that the the House Democrats want to show their constituents that they're looking after their own dollars, that they're taking their own initiative, no money to big corporations, that they were going to try and get that, too, into the communities and help their local people with this budget.

That's the number one priority, help their local communities.

Because why they're running for reelection.

And so they can't go back home and say, I carried the water for the governor, reelect me.

No, I carried the water from the governor.

Now, reelect me right?

But this is also sort of an interesting break with history.

And I'd love to hear your guys take on this, too, which is, you know, this is not the the team ball that we've seen in a lot of previous sessions that these legislators aren't going back and saying, we're working with team governor on this with team Democrat on this, that we're seeing sort of a new area era of all politics is local.

Well, there are clearly people in the House Democratic Caucus that have not been here a long time and didn't get the memo that the water flows down from the top and you just pick up the water and you carry it.

Apparently, they didn't read that memo, right?

I think that's true.

And I also think to the point of 2024 elections coming up, this is a very, very, very tight election.

Regardless of how you cut it.

And so they need to get things for their local communities.

All those people in competitive districts need to go back and say, hey, look at this.

I was successful here.

And so that's that's going to be first and foremost other not necessarily the governor's priorities.

They've got their own priorities to worry about.

Well, that's a nice segue into the second part.

We've had filing deadlines for people running for office.

What was the lead story out of that?

Kyle?

Well, I think that the Republicans on the U.S. Senate side saw their number at one point.

We had 13 candidates filed with the FEC.

Now we were down to five.

It could go down to four.

And we're taping here on Friday morning.

It could go down to four by the end of the day, just the field shrinking as people who had high hopes of being able to raise 15,000 signatures by Tuesday finally realize how monumental that task was and was not successful.

I also I also thought that on the congressional side, everybody who said they were going to run ran, everybody filed.

And then on the House side, we saw quite a few incumbents, state House incumbents get primaried.

And I think that's a function of the new term limits law.

Well, let's let's talk about the House of Representatives.

There were 36 incumbents who had primary opponents, which is unusual.

That's a high number.

That that is a high number because the.

Drill is usually if you are incumbent, people leave you alone.

And you know, it is in this environment still, you know, reflection that it's better to be the office holder and have all of the attention and advantages that come with that.

But it also, I think, is an expression of friction within the Republican coalition as to who is the most, you know, whatever, fill in the fill in the blank.

Yeah, there's a couple of factors here.

On the Democratic side, especially in metro Detroit, we always see a lot of you know, there's always a lot of interesting primary activity there.

But this year the districts are different and that that could mean trouble for some of these incumbents, even though they're not running against each other.

They may see some some challenges or at least a little bit more so than if you're just the incumbent going into a regular cycle.

But then also on the Republican side, you're seeing some of these ultra conservatives who have really gone against the grain, you know, even broke with caucus on some of these issues, are starting to see some challengers from, you know, people who are saying we're conserving enough, but we want to actually accomplish things in Lansing instead of being the rabble rouser.

I also cannot remember a time when both the speaker of the House and the minority leader, whomever those people are, were in primaries.

Yeah, that's really amazing.

A lot of this.

Joe Tate and Mr. Hall.

That's right.

And you know, Lauren had some great points there about the ultra conservatives, all the people in the Freedom Caucus having primaries.

To her point on that, I also want to mention the new term limits law and the fact that these members of the House, many of them who would be term limited out, are seeking a fourth term because they can under the law, they can serve all 12 years in the House now.

And so if you are looking at running for the House at some point in the past or up until this year, you could say, well, they're going to serve six years and then I'll go for it when it's open.

Well, now you don't have that opportunity.

Now you got only 12 years, 12 years, a lot different.

And so for some of these members that have interests in their communities, they were like, I might as well run now because I'm not going to wait another six years and.

Had four seven former legislators.

Am I correct in the number who said, Hey, let's let's take advantage of that law, Come on back?

Yeah.

You're seeing a lot of former lawmakers at least consider it.

But yet in a couple of these districts on, it could set up some interesting battles, you know, not just in the primary, but in the general election as well.

You know, and especially in those competitive districts, You know, former Representative Sneller coming back in that, you know, mid-Michigan area is kind of interesting.

Yeah.

There's it's remains to be seen exactly like how much of former incumbents influences compared to a current incumbent.

But, you know, the name recognition may still be there for some of these folks.

I would strongly.

See in the appropriations process a lot of people looking to come up with things that they can go home and cut ribbons on and maybe get something in there in their local news.

Do they?

I thought.

But I think the two of the takeaways are discontent is in vogue and I guess alluding to what Lauren said is of opportunism is is still a thing.

Well, and it's another violation of that rule that you don't challenge the king.

Of an incumbent here.

If you're going to kill the king, kill.

Him, kill him, make sure he doesn't hang around to eat the poisoned food.

All right.

Tom Kunse filed more money than anybody else.

The story behind that is a little gem, isn't it?

Yeah, it is.

We're talking about PAC money.

So many legislators who are in leadership posts or desire to be in leadership posts, create their own political action committees and raise money through that so they can give that to folks who are in competitive districts or give it to the.

Caucus.

How sweet of them to do that.

Yeah, but you know what?

When you start doling out the money, you get a lot of friends and people will coalesce around you and then you become talked about for leader.

What makes this Tom Kunse thing interesting is that he raised over $100,000 in this last period from January one until April 20.

And now he is being seen as a real contender to be leader of the House Republican caucus at a time when Matt Hall, the current leader, only raised $13,000 but did give a lot of money, close to 50 to the caucus out of his own campaign account.

This brings to the surface the story that has been bubbling for well over a year that Mr. Hall is in a little bit of trouble.

Well, I remember that right now House Republicans went from being in the majority to being in the minority.

Clearly wasn't his fault, was it?

Well, it may or may not be his fault.

But yes, Hes the captain of that the ship.

He is the captain of the ship.

And Republicans both inside and outside of the house are looking potentially for someone who can fix that.

And raising money is a pretty big indicator of your abilities, although I think a lot of the ambitions that we're talking about depend on whether or not Republicans, House Republicans, can flip the script and win back majority, even if it's a slim one.

The theme of our discussion today is opportunity.

A lot of.

People.

A lot of people are seeing a lot of opportunities out there.

A lot of things are up in the air.

And, you know, that's as true in the Republican caucus as it is anywhere else.

It's it's one of those times where a lot depends a lot is riding on what happens in November.

And we'll see.

We'll see who comes out on top.

Watch this.

All right.

Let's take this opportunity to call in our guest.

Do you like that segue?

I laid awake all night trying to figure that out.

Representative, welcome to Off the Record.

How you doing?

Good.

How are you?

Thanks for having me on.

Likewise.

All right, listen, you're part of how many freshmen came in with you in office.

Oh, that's a good question.

I think it's a roughly half.

I'm sure somebody at the table can tell us a little better than I can.

Can you can you tell me off the record, has there been any chatter that assuming the Democrats take control of the House again of finding another speaker?

Yeah, I'm not privy to any conversations of that nature at the moment.

I think all of us are just completely focused on maintaining majority.

Do you think there should be a new speaker if you take majority?

I think those are discussions that we'll have to have moving forward.

I think we've done a lot of great things as a majority.

There's a lot of things I'd like to see us move towards.

But all in all, I think that's a caucus decision that will we'll make as we move forward.

The politically correct answer to that question should have been no.

Sure.

I mean, I clearly haven't done things politically correct.

My whole time in office, according to Lansing.

But I think as we move forward, we have to see what happens.

I mean, we have a whole nother budget to go.

There are a lot of priorities that people want to see.

You know, I think Speaker Tate has done a lot of things well, So well, we're going to keep truckin.

We're going to keep majority.

But he has done stuff that you didn't like.

I think that yeah, I mean, sure.

Yeah.

I think there's a lot of bills that I wouldn't have liked to see the light of day.

I mean, I clearly I voted no on them.

But this is a democracy and I think we each have our own ability to use our one vote.

And that's what I have.

And I've been trying to use that and use my advocacy as well.

Well, first of all, Representative, we should point out that the sign over your shoulder refers to an effort on the part of the House staff to unionize.

So just, you know, if anyone has any questions about why that's there, talk about the divisions that exist right now within the caucus between people who would be defined as mainstream versus progressive.

How much now that you've gotten a lot of the big things out of the way, how much does this impede progress on, say, the Whitmer and the leadership agenda, including things like business incentives?

Yeah, I mean, certainly there's been like some healthy debate, and I wouldn't say that we're divided by any means.

I mean, I think, you know, we are all moving towards the same ultimate goal of keeping it an expanding majority.

That being said, I mean, I very clearly have been an opponent of the economic incentives, what I call corporate handouts that we've done in Michigan over the last year.

We did something near $4 billion in corporate subsidies and tax breaks, which I believe is more than Republicans did maybe in the last ten years combined in one term.

I've already voted against more corporate handouts, I believe, than any Democrat in Michigan House history.

And I think that that is not something that working class people want.

I think we need to move away from that because these policies have shown to be ineffective and we need to move to what I call compassion economics, which is investing in public transit, mental health services, schools, roads, bridges, etc.. Can you speak to what the Senate came up with in terms of changes to overhauling how corporate incentives are done and the state's overall economic development strategy?

Sure.

I think that we're certainly making a step in the right direction, and I commend the Senate for the work that they've done.

That being said, I think some of the definitions for community investment are quite broad.

I think local economic development corporations are out there and some other housing is on there, which sometimes can mean a tax break for housing developers.

The point I'm making is I think the definition of community development is broad.

That does not mean that's not a piece of legislation I would support at this point.

I'm still kind of diving into it, but ultimately my philosophy is this If we think we need to do more community investment, we should just do it instead of, you know, finding different ways and doing mental gymnastics to make this fund continue to exist.

I absolutely do not want to see it expand beyond the sunset of next year.

And, you know, this idea that we would get immediate effect before the budget on the Senate's proposal anyway.

So we're really only talking about, you know, $500 million worth of super fund that would essentially be cut in half.

So I think some healthy debate to be had on that.

And I think certainly people's minds are going in the right direction.

But I'm just adamantly opposed to tax cuts for corporations and and businesses in this fashion.

Representative, one of the key members of the House leadership team, Abraham Aiyash, announced that he is not going to be running for reelection yesterday.

Can you tell me what direction do you believe the Democratic caucus is going to go as they look for somebody to be the floor leader in the next term?

That's a good question.

I mean, certainly I think that position is is extremely important to making sure that the House runs efficiently.

So, you know, what I look for is obviously someone who shares my values, but also somebody who can, you know, make sure they're showing up every day.

They're efficiently answering questions.

They're the ship continues to run in an efficient manner.

And I think, again, kind of as discussed, I think all of these questions will develop over time and we'll have conversations as a caucus.

But I really do believe that we're united more than anything, because we have to be.

I mean, you know, the other side of the aisle doesn't want to pass any legislation ever.

So I think we have to have, you know, some real we have to come together.

I think it's just everybody knows that.

And I don't think that saying we're divided in any way is accurate.

Do you have a name?

Anybody in particular that you would really like to see run?

That's a good question.

The news is so fresh.

I haven't really given it too much thought.

Representative, you were hardly in this town for a half an hour and already you were making headlines as you stood up to the governor who wanted your vote.

Did she demand the vote from you on a particular piece of legislation, sir?

I don't know if demand is the right word to use.

Certainly.

A lot of pressure was put my way and I think there's been some good articles put out about that.

And I get it.

There was a lot of pressure to to pass this legislation.

I voted no on that ultimate bill because we had already proven that we could pass the retirement tax.

I got to co-sponsor and vote for it as well as the EITC.

And those bills maybe would have gotten immediate effect if we would have just ran them standalone.

And I just I ran on a campaign that said I wouldn't vote to give tax dollars to corporations.

And I stood by that for my community and I think that's what this job entails.

You know, you're supposed to be.

We should mention that when you talk about immediate effect, which you've brought up twice, it basically deals with how soon a piece of legislation can be enacted and enforceable.

Correct?

Yeah.

I mean, I think that we didn't get immediate effect on 4001.

I mean, we.

Hindsight is kind of 2020, but if we would have just ran those bills standalone, what do we have got an immediate effect?

I mean, I think Republicans wanted to repeal the retirement tax too.

tax too.

How did you like being squeezed?

Oh, it wasn't super fun, but it's a job.

And I am used to being in uncomfortable situations, you know, And when I was in Arizona, I helped organize one of the largest teacher strikes in U.S. history with 50,000 teachers.

I got squeezed a lot at that point as well.

So this is nothing new.

And I signed up for this job.

And, you know, I'm here to fight for the working class so.

class so.

That they offer do something for your vote.

Yeah.

I mean, I think that was reported as well, right?

There were discussions and I think offer is the wrong way to phrase it.

I liked the term and the term that I use is held hostage because everybody in Lansing knew that one of my priorities was, you know, canceling the Inkster school debt, which I will say we ultimately did.

But to say, you know, hey, we're going to trade this for this vote for a billion and a half dollar handout to corporations, that's just not something that I was willing to do, because I believe that the school that would be canceled anyway because it's the right thing to do.

But also I think that's one of the problems with Lansing, is that we use appropriation dollars to to get people to compromise on their values.

I believe that we need people in Lansing who are representative of their district, but also of their conscience and the values that they went ran for office for.

And if we're constantly making trades on those things, I think we're going to lead.

It leads to the people in power having their values reflected rather than the ones you ran on.

Via the state House staff, as Rick had mentioned, is looking to unionize and it looks like you are in support of that.

Why are you in support of having the House of Representatives staff join the Teamsters?

I mean, there's a lot of really good reasons for this.

Number one, I believe that all workers deserve dignity and deserve to have a say in their workplaces.

I think unions are the democratic way to run workplaces, and I certainly support that in the House staff.

But I also think we have this these disparities in pay from office to office, because depending on how much you pay your staff, it will affect the amount of money that you have to mail your district.

And I really imagine that through this process, there's some self-interest here of I have one of the higher paid staff in Lansing that moving that outside of the House office budget will allow there to be equity in mailing and other things.

But ultimately I think staff we want them around because term limits are still relatively short with 12 years.

They can carry institutional knowledge if we allow them to stay here.

And right now that's just not the case.

I think at most everybody in Lansing, knows staff don't stay in this business for too long.

I want to go back to Rick's question about the dynamic between progressive members of the caucus and more moderate and what's the best case scenario for progressives like yourself if Democrats retake majority next year?

You know, are you hoping to gain more influence or push harder to the left on some issues?

Yeah.

I mean, obviously, if you look at the work that my office has done, we're continuously pushing the envelope for the working class.

That being said, I think it's hard to say what the best case scenario is.

I think it's continue to advocate for the work that we're doing, continue to push our colleagues to pass different pieces of legislation.

You know, it's it's a really, I think, tough question.

But also I think like defining what a progressive is.

I don't even know if I would call myself a progressive these days.

I think I'm very publicly call myself a democratic socialist.

And I think the differences on economic policy, there might be some differences from progressives.

You know, I just believe that people have a human right to housing, a human right to health care and a human right to food.

You know, I want all of my neighbors to do well, and that's what that means to me.

But I it's I think it's a it's hard to define.

And labels aren't even really, I think, that productive in the long run anyway.

But let's go with labels anyway.

Do does the do the differences between the progressives or the Democratic socialists and what's commonly called the mainstream?

Is that affecting democratic prospects in November, especially when you're looking at things like the reelection and President Biden And I'm thinking particularly about, you know, maybe voter anemic voter turnout, which, you know, would give an advantage to Republicans.

I think the Democrats have a duty to turn people out to vote by giving them the vision for the United States that the working class needs.

And I would.

And also the action.

Right.

I think we will see as things move forward, how are things going to develop in, you know, in in foreign policy as we move forward and then in the state?

What are we going to do in the budget?

What are we going to do over the next couple of months?

And we also have done a lot in the last year that I think we can run on.

I think that we have a really strong position to take, and I think that's part of the unity that we've had.

Even though we're this big tent with different disagreements, we ultimately have had one of the most productive legislative sessions in recent history.

Representative The Democrats do take control again.

Would getting a graduated income tax be at the top of your list?

Are near the top of your list to get done?

That would absolutely be at the top of my list.

I think we should put it to the voters to decide.

I actually think that groups should be working on a ballot initiative now.

We're one of ten states with a flat tax here in Michigan.

And, you know, that's that's where we can get those revenue revenues for schools if everybody wants.

For the $4 billion a year in road bridge repairs we need and to make sure we have public transit across the state, which I think will ultimately attract more people here.

Have you heard.

Have you have you heard any chatter about a petition drive?

I haven't to this point, I think that people are just solely concerned on 2024 elections at this point.

Well, in fact, they want you to be quiet about the graduated income tax because that could mess up 2024.

Right.

I don't think so.

I think that we, the Democrats, our base should be working class voters.

Working class voters are tired of three people having more wealth than the bottom half of the country.

They're tired that even though we have a 3% or so unemployment in the rate in the state of Michigan, 40% of families can't afford to pay their bills.

I think that the point I'm making is working class people, I think, are ready for a change.

And you can't do that without tax dollars.

And we need to have better wealth inequality in this country.

And it's it's clear.

Representative, if you could pick who the Democratic nominee for president is going to be in 2024, who would you want to be the Democratic nominee?

I mean, right now, Joe Biden, I mean, he's and I say that because he is the only candidate running.

You're saying in the magical world who and I want I have given.

Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren like somebody who you think would be a sure fire winner and a great president for the next four years.

I mean, I think that Bernie Sanders would would win, I think.

But I think that if he could get to a general election against Donald Trump, it'd be a no brainer.

I view as a supporter of him in 2020 and 2016.

Representatives, somebody came to and said to you, Do you want to be speaker of the House?

What would you say?

I would say, okay, I don't.

I would say probably not.

It's certainly not at this point.

I have so much learning to do.

I'm just trying to navigate this very difficult place.

I'm going to go and do what I can for my community.

I'm going to save this tape representative.

Okay.

Hey, I'll say this.

If the universe calls me to do that at some point in my life, then maybe.

But I have no desire for that at the current moment.

You'll call me, right?

Sure.

I'll give you a call.

Thank you, sir.

Appreciate you doing off the record.

Also, thanks to our panel.

More of this stuff right here off the record next week.

Production of Off the Record is made possible in part by Martin Waymire, a full service strategic communications agency, partnering with clients through public relations, digital marketing and public policy engagement.

Learn more at Martinwaymire.com For more off the record, visit WKAR.org.

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