The New Third Party

What an amazing 48 hours! Upon the announcement of the new Forward Party over 20,000 Americans signed up in all 50 states; at one point every 35 seconds someone new was joining. We raised well over $100,000 in grassroots donations too, demonstrating just how hungry people are for a new alternative approach to our politics. Thank you for being part of it!

Perhaps equally important, mainstream news coverage of Forward was everywhere. Every major news outlet covered it, reaching nearly 40 million Americans on TV and radio alone. We trended #1 on Twitter and 500+ articles were posted about the new common sense party that Americans have been waiting for.

I’ve heard from myriad friends that people at work or online were curious – “Can a third party work? God knows we need one.” It has entered the consideration set for millions of Americans in a country where 62% of Americans want a third party and 88% think we are on the wrong track.

People want this – need this – to succeed. That is why we will.

But of course, nothing matters if we don’t start delivering. Most people will be eager to see what comes next.

Happily, that’s where our focus has been the whole time.

In real life, nothing happens without people working on it. This week on the podcast I interview Matt Shinners, co-CEO of Forward, for the background on how we reached this point and, perhaps more important, what the plan is.

A national party consists of 50 state parties. We are launching our national tour on September 24th in Houston, Texas and then heading to 15 states where we hope to be on the ballot by year-end. We already have ballot access or recognition in 4 states thanks to the merger. We will announce more Tour dates in the coming days so keep an eye out. Our goal is to be recognized in all 50 states by 2024.

There are about 506,000 locally elected officials around the country, from school board to city council members to county executives. More than 20% of these positions are non-partisan or uncontested; our goal is to recruit or elect 5,000 local officials by 2024. The fact is, many are functionally Independent and would love to join Forward to have a new base of support – some will come speak at our first national convention next summer. We already have many officials reaching out to us, so we are on our way.

There are important elections and ballot initiatives in November, just weeks away. Evan McMullin in Utah in particular presents an historic opportunity as an Independent running a competitive Senate race against a Trump-endorsed incumbent. I wrote about Evan here and Politico covered his race this week. Lisa Murkowski prevailing in her Alaska Senate race against another Trump-backed figure is crucial to demonstrating the power of open primaries and ranked choice voting. On that front, there is a ballot initiative for ranked choice voting and open primaries in Nevada that would dramatically transform the political landscape there. Clint Smith, Betsy Johnson, and Bill Walker are other independent candidates who are aligned with Forward. We have our hands full already in vital, competitive races.

And yes, people associated with the two major parties are reaching out to us to discuss joining us. The dysfunction runs deep, and some who are immersed in it are looking for a new home.

There is a balance between what national press will find interesting and what we have to do. We are building Forward for the long-term and want to put points on the board in communities now. We are doing this to help people, and the fact is your locally elected officials or other leaders in your community often have a greater impact on your day-to-day well being than someone in Washington D.C. Lasting change generally happens from the ground up.

These are exciting times. We would love your help building Forward. If you haven’t already done so, please sign up at forwardparty.com and perhaps make a donation. And then reach out to people in your network and say, “Hey, have you seen this new party? I think it’s exactly what the country needs.” That’s how the wave will build – on the ground in our own lives and in our communities.

For all of the interest in Forward, it’s up to us to build the party that most Americans want. Let’s deliver it to ourselves and reclaim our future as quickly as possible. The world is waiting to see what we do next. Take action today! We are just getting started.

HUGE News re: the Forward Party!

About 10 months ago, I left the Democratic Party.  I did so because I knew the country needed a new kind of party to help realign our politics and reverse the polarization that is tearing our country apart. 

Some of you reached out to help—thank you!!  It has meant the world to me.  Thanks to you, we enlisted volunteers in all 50 states and began backing both aligned candidates and reforms like non-partisan open primaries and ranked choice voting that would give our country a real chance. 

During my travels, I’ve met other leaders and organizers who recognize both the perilous state democracy is in and the opportunity for a new kind of politics; some of them have been working on alternatives to the two major parties for years. 

After hundreds of hours of meetings and conversations, we realized that we could do more together than we could apart.  We decided to undertake something that NEVER happens in politics—we would join forces. 

Today, I have some incredibly exciting news: The Forward Party is merging with two phenomenal organizations—the Serve America Movement (SAM) and the Renew America Movement (RAM)!  The new Forward Party will immediately be the biggest third party in the country by resources at the time you read this. 

That’s right—the new Forward Party is now the biggest third party in the country!  Our reach will expand very quickly.  We are already on the ballot in several states with a goal of 15 states by the end of this year, twice that number in ’23 and all 50 in ‘24. 

I now have amazing new colleagues who have been working their hearts out to put our country on a better path for years.  One of them is David Jolly, a former Member of Congress from Florida who has been leading SAM.  Another is Miles Taylor, formerly known as Anonymous, who has been leading RAM.  Former NJ Governor and Cabinet member Christine Todd Whitman (a Republican who endorsed Joe Biden in 2020), former Admiral and Congressman Joe Sestak, Reverend Ira Acree of Chicago, and many others are part of the Leadership Circle, with many more on the way. 

What is the main objection you hear to third parties?  “They can’t compete.”  Well, we are demonstrating that we can generate the resources necessary to elevate and elect candidates around the country with the support of tens of thousands of Americans and millions of dollars of grassroots funding. 

Thanks to SAM, we have a lot of experience building and supporting state parties. And thanks to RAM, we now are poised to reach a whole new audience of Americans who want to take this country in a better direction. Together, we are not left, not right, but Forward.

If the above weren’t exciting enough, we are announcing a national building tour starting this Fall—I’ll be on the bus—that will bring us to communities around the country culminating in our first national convention next summer!  With each stop, more and more Americans will join the Forward movement.  It’s going to be epic.

I’m super pumped about this.  If you were interested in the Forward Party but weren’t sure that it could make a positive difference, now is the time!  Sign up for our mailing list and maybe even donate a buck or two.  Find out if we’re coming to your town and how you can be a part of it!  We have no time to waste. 

It’s time to deliver the new approach to party politics millions of Americans have been waiting for—Forward!  Let’s go!!!

Two Sides of a Breaking Coin

Hello, I hope that your summer has been going great.  

This is a very exciting time for the Forward Party – we will be making a major announcement later this week!  It might even make history. 

This week on the podcast I interview Matthew Hoh, the US Senate Candidate for the Green Party in North Carolina.  Matt recently made news because the Democratic Party kicked him off the ballot despite his submitting thousands more certified ballots than required.  Their reasoning?  “There could have been fraud,” despite there being no evidence.

“This reminds me of some of the arguments made by Republicans,” Matt says in our interview, and it’s not hard to see what he’s talking about.  It’s apparent that the Dems simply didn’t want the Greens on the ballot.  

Many are concerned that the Republican Party has taken on an authoritarian nature in the age of Trump.  Brian Klaas wrote about it this week in an excellent piece in the Atlantic.  I agree with this read wholeheartedly, and distinguish between the tens of millions of Americans who identify as Republicans and the Party itself.  If one of two parties goes dark in a two-party system – as it has in the United States - the entire system can crumble very quickly. 

Logically then, some people see Democrats as the last hope for American democracy.  There are structural reasons why that’s not going to work.  As Klaas writes, “In a two-party system, the other side will win eventually,” particularly in a country where 88% of people think we’re on the wrong track.  For example, the Democrats are virtually guaranteed to lose the House in the Fall. 

It’s the system itself that needs to evolve.  Everything else is a holding action, at best.

And it’s not as if the Democrats are immune from political temptation.  They kicked Matt off the ballot, regardless of the laws as written, because it serves their short-term ends.  They are spending millions boosting extreme Republican candidates in primaries – those who are ‘threats to democracy’ – because they think these candidates will prove more beatable in the general.  This could come back to bite when some of these extreme candidates – for example Doug Mastriano in Pennsylvania – wind up competitive in the general.  Indeed, there are officials rooting for Trump to run again – which he will – because they see him as the only candidate they can defeat.  Democrats in Nevada are spending seven figures fighting a November ballot initiative for open primaries and ranked choice voting because they see it as against their political interests, even though the Democratic Party of Nevada uses ranked choice voting in their own operations. 

If there’s one thing the parties agree on, it’s that competition is to be avoided.  The two parties have carved the country up like a turkey.  90% of Congressional districts are uncompetitive in the general election – most people have no meaningful say in their representation.  In this system there isn’t any real need for either party to actually tend to or respond to people. Problems get worse not better, and people lose faith and become dispirited and angry. 

When I was running for President, I would often say, “We automated away 4 million manufacturing jobs in the Midwest and the South.  That’s what turned many of those communities from purple to red.”  You know what no one would ever say to me?  “Wow.  When we get to 8 million we should really do something about it.”  The reality on the ground is irrelevant except to drive discontent, which is rising everywhere. 

There needs to be a new movement – and party -  that includes people of different backgrounds and beliefs to rise up and change things for the better. We are building it now; the Forward Party is gaining steam more quickly than I could have imagined.  And this week is an enormous week for us. 

One race in November that could demonstrate what a third-party movement can do is in Utah.  Here, the Democrats did something very selfless – they declined to run a candidate.  This has left Evan McMullin, an Independent, with a chance to defeat Mike Lee, a Trump-endorsed incumbent, in a competitive Senate race.  Utah is a state that Trump won by 21 points, and would ordinarily be thought of as entirely uncontested. 

Here, Democrats realized that they would be the spoiler.  And, after a year of courtship, they voted 782 to 594 to decline to run a candidate, despite being exhorted to do so by many within their ranks. 

This was remarkable in part because we rarely see this kind of perspective and patriotism from within our party politics.  Can millions of others break free and begin to put country over party and work together in new ways?  The survival of our democracy depends on our being able to answer yes.  

The Invisible Storm

Hello, I hope that your summer is going great!

Last week, I wrote that I expected Donald Trump to declare for 2024 by October. News came out that he is planning a September announcement. Time will tell, but I confess; I’d like to be wrong.

This week on the podcast I interview Jason Kander, author of the new bestseller “The Invisible Storm: a Soldier’s Memoir of Politics and PTSD.” Jason was the youngest statewide elected official in the country at one point as the Secretary of State of Missouri. He then ran for Senate and outperformed Hillary Clinton by 16 points in his homestate. You might remember his campaign ad in which he takes apart a rifle blindfolded.

He learned how to do that while serving as an army captain in Afghanistan. He details his tour in his new book, including some harrowing stories about friends being killed, pulling a gun on a cab driver who took him on a circuitous route, nearly shooting a child who had jumped onto his military vehicle, and being in dozens of conversations with unsavory characters who could potentially become hostile. These experiences left Jason with post-traumatic stress disorder, which took him years to recognize and grapple with.

His PTSD started to spill over into his family life after his return. Night terrors infected his wife’s mental state. He threw himself into his work in part to distract and ease his mind. His work became politics, which was a childhood ambition. He ran for office and won twice, lost a narrow Senate race and was considered a potential presidential candidate in 2020.

I remember announcing my presidential run in 2018, which didn’t get much notice at the time – if you’re OG YangGang, thank you! – and hearing about Jason as one of the other candidates in the field. He had started a voting rights org with operations in Iowa and New Hampshire.

Jason then made some more history – he announced that he had PTSD, and was withdrawing from politics to seek treatment.

He didn’t have to share this news. Political figures pull back all the time for myriad reasons. But Jason decided to share the truth, in part because he thought it might help others.

I’m sure that it has. Hundreds of people reached out to Jason to recount their own struggles with mental health, veterans and civilians alike. Friends of Jason’s from the military told him that they sought treatment due to his example. Jason now works for Veterans Community Project, an org that helps military veterans gain camaraderie and access tailored support that is expanding quickly.

It’s no exaggeration to say that Jason’s public decision has saved lives and done more good than the vast majority of presidential campaigns. Jason also saved lives by getting 1,800 Afghans out of the country during the Taliban takeover.

It was heartening to interview Jason this week – you can find the convo here and pick up his book here. It’s a universal story about trauma and family that most everyone would enjoy and get a lot out of.

I took a number of lessons from Jason: first, take care of yourself. I’ve pushed myself a number of times over the last number of years because I felt like my work was super-important. Alleviate poverty. Help millions of people. Reform America’s broken political system.

But you’re not good for anyone if you are breaking down internally or your family is on the brink. External validation doesn’t quiet the storm within; sometimes it makes it worse. Mind yourself and your family, which are often the same thing.

Second, sometimes sharing your story can really help other people. People respond to truth and struggle. Jason writes that he didn’t realize that PTSD can be improved and treated in a majority of cases, because he hadn’t seen that. Now, he’s a walking role model.

Last, measure success for yourself. What’s more important, waging a campaign or preserving your marriage, having a healthy daughter, and spending time with your dying grandfather? Jason literally experienced that tradeoff, and I have no doubt is glad for the way things turned out.

I’ll admit that reading Jason’s story struck me on a personal level, as someone who has run a campaign or two. I used to say, “I have two jobs: run for President and stay married.” Those two jobs were not exactly aligned all of the time. I’m grateful every day that I never had to choose.

November and 2024

Hello, I hope that your summer is going great! I’ve been getting some family time in, which has been wonderful.

Last week, a Monmouth poll came out that said that 88% of Americans feel the country is on the wrong track; that might be the highest level ever recorded. The top concerns in the poll were:

33% inflation
15% gas prices
9% economy
6% bill/groceries
5% abortion
3% guns
3% health care
3% unemployment
2% tuition costs
2% housing/rent
2% safety/crime

The top 4 all have to do with affordability, with 67% of Americans citing something to do with their pocketbook and economic circumstances.

It makes sense; the economy is on everyone’s mind. You get reminded of higher prices every day at the pump or picking up groceries. This is what forms the political climate.

These are terrible numbers for the incumbent, and Joe Biden’s approval rating has slipped to 36%. It’s one reason why most people expect a Republican sweep in November.

I expect that to play out in the House. The Democratic advantage is currently 5 seats. The average number of seats lost by the incumbent party in a mid-term is generally around 20 seats and this will probably be worse than that.

The Senate is a bit more complicated; the nature of the seats that are being contested in November favor Democrats just based on the number of Republicans who are defending seats and where the races are.

Republicans have nominated a couple candidates that are now in very tight races in Ohio (J.D. Vance vs. Tim Ryan) and Pennsylvania (Mehmet Oz vs. John Fetterman).

J.D. Vance of Hillbilly Elegy fame won the Republican Primary with only 32% of the vote. His popularity and connection are yet untested, and recent polling has Tim Ryan leading slightly despite the fact that Trump won Ohio by 8 points. I know Tim Ryan, and he’s a great candidate with a strong connection to Ohio.

Similarly, Mehmet Oz won the Republican Primary in Pennsylvania with only 31% of the vote, beating David McCormick by fewer than 1,000 votes. His opponent, John Fetterman, is a candidate with real energy among the Democratic base. Unfortunately, Fetterman was hospitalized with a stroke in May and has not campaigned publicly since, which leaves this race in a lot of uncertainty.

(Note that if both parties used Ranked Choice Voting, you would have candidates with demonstrated appeal with a majority of voters rather than only 32%. Better yet, you could do away with closed party primaries and open it up to the general public, which would really improve the process! This is on the ballot in Nevada in the Fall! But I digress.)

Georgia and Nevada are also tight. The stealth race that could determine control of the Senate is in Utah, where Independent Evan McMullin is taking on incumbent Mike Lee. The Democrats aren’t running a candidate, leaving Evan with a clear shot by uniting Democrats, Independents, and Republicans who are tired of Trump (who endorsed Lee). A recent poll had Evan within 4 points. Evan’s race is the most important race for Independents in the country and could be a model for success. For more on Evan’s race, click here. I’m backing Evan and hope you will too.

Still, if the House changes hands, what happens in the Senate will be dramatically diminished as we will have a divided government with Biden in the White House and at a minimum a Republican House of Representatives. There will be no major legislation, probably House hearings about Hunter Biden’s laptop, and Biden will be reduced to messaging and executive orders.

The attention will then turn to 2024: will Biden run for re-election? And who will he be facing?

Reporting has come out recently that Biden has been sending political operatives to the DNC and trying to manage the primary schedule. These steps strongly suggest that he is planning on running again, with a likely decision early in 2023.

Trump was leaning toward declaring in July, and has since shifted to indecision. I spoke to someone who had dinner with Trump recently and he said, “It sure seemed like he was running.” I think he chooses to run again – what else is there for him? – and makes an announcement sometime before October.

58% of Americans don’t want to see a Trump-Biden rematch – but that is likely what we are facing.

One thing about Biden – he does not respond much to naysaying and handwringing. He became a U.S. Senator at age 29 in 1972. He has run for President three times and now he has the job. He sees it as his God-given responsibility to defeat Donald Trump for all time. If he goes down, it will not be without a fight.

Things can change. Health concerns can arise. A lot of news will come out between now and November. But look again at the list of concerns driving the American people. How many of these things will shift in the next 3-and-a-half months? The pendulum of our increasingly dysfunctional two-party system will swing the way it has for years, while most of us look on and think, “There has to be something better than this.” There will be, but only if we build it.

For the Next Generation

Hello all, and Happy 4th of July! I hope you are celebrating this Independence Day with friends and family.

I spoke at the high school commencement at Stuyvesant in New York last week. I thought my remarks to the next generation would be a nice way to ring in the Holiday Weekend. Have a great one!

Hello everyone it’s great to be here. My wife Evelyn, who is here with me today went to Stuyvesant. This is an amazing school with a singular place in American life.

To the parents who are here - congratulations! Many of you sacrificed a lot for your kids to get to this stage and you should see today as a real culmination of your work.

For the young people who are graduating today, congratulations as well. You have made it through one of the great high schools in the country and are on your way.

This class in particular has been through a lot. Covid came and disrupted our lives on a level that we couldn’t have imagined just a few years ago. Our neighborhoods are changed. And some of us felt as if our place in this city, our home, has been called into question for the first time in our lives.

I reflected on why I was asked to address you all today, and I realized that I may have a great deal in common with some of you. I was the son of immigrants from Taiwan who emphasized education at every turn. The message I got from my parents was to get good grades, go to a good school, get a good job and make a place for myself in this country. I imagine it’s a familiar message to many of you.

My brother is a professor at NYU today, so you know at least one of us listened. But one thing we didn’t really talk about in my house growing up was politics. My parents were never like, “You’re going to be President of the United States one day!” It was more likely to be “Clean your room” or “do your homework.” It’s possibly why, when I told my parents in 2017 that I was going to run for President, their response was less enthusiastic and more concerned.

You all likely remember my presidential run, when I appeared on your TV screens in 2019. I hope it made some of you proud.

But the decisions that led me to that stage took place over years and even decades, and probably not in the way you’d imagine. You see, I’d been disappointing or alarming my parents for a long time. When I was 25 I left my first job at a New York law firm to try to start a business. What’s funny is that my respect for my parents was one reason I left that job. It didn’t make sense to me that I was making more money than they were straight out of law school when they were actually inventing things or helping people and I wasn’t.

So I set out to start a company back in 2000. I put my heart and soul into it, reaching out to anyone who I thought could help. Starting a business was a massive challenge. Too big a challenge, as my company failed pretty quickly. That failure hurt. I remember lying on the floor wondering what I had done wrong, feeling like I would never accomplish anything.

But for years afterward, I would think, “Well, whatever happens can’t be as bad as when my company failed.” It made me very resilient and able to weather difficult situations. I joined another company that was just finding its feet. A few years later I became the CEO of a small education company that grew to become #1 in the country and was bought by a bigger company in 2009. I would not have been able to do any of that if not for my experiences as a failed entrepreneur years earlier.

As Evelyn can attest, running for President was not the result of some laid out plan. If she had known that I was going to run for office when we were first dating, she would probably have run the other direction. It was the culmination of a lot of cumulative experiences, both good and bad, successes and setbacks in equal number. I can trace it all back to that decision I made when I was 25 to start a company that I had no business starting that didn’t work out, because each experience, happy or sad, success or failure, prepared me and led me to the next.

You’re all about to head to college. And right now your biggest choice might be what course of study to pursue. You should take it seriously, because your time is important, but know that it’s not something that will determine your direction or lot in life. The average young person will now hold 12.3 jobs during your career. Even if you come in below that number, you will probably find yourself in a range of different environments doing different things. I guarantee you’ll do something at some point that you didn’t study.

Some of you are heading to your dream school in the Fall. Others of you aren’t so sure. Don’t be overly concerned. It’s the individual and what you make of your own experience that will matter, not the starting point. I know a ton of very successful people out of every school or no school, and a lot of people in reverse. What you do is going to be much more important than where you do it.

You’ve been in a very competitive environment and some of you feel immense pressure to succeed. I know that I did when I was your age. Realize that you cannot be perfect; none of us can. You are going to make mistakes. Some of them will even hurt. I know there were times when I was 20 or 25, some of my missteps felt like the end of the world, whether it was relationships or school or work. That’s fine. As long as you keep moving forward, you will come back from them and continue to grow. What feels like a life-altering failure one year can become the story you tell with a smile just a few years later.

Your class has been through a lot, but I believe that has raised, not lowered your potential. Because after what you’ve all seen and experienced, what can the world do to you now? The best companies are started in times of adversity, and the best people will emerge from this time more resilient than ever.

I have a world of confidence in you in part because I know that the country needs what you bring to the table. If my math is right, most all of you just turned 18. That means you’re an adult and can vote. In America today, so much is polarized and tribal. We can’t agree on much. And I believe that many of you here today may carry the antidote.

What is that?

Here is where I may be projecting my own nature and experiences onto you, but I’m guessing that many of you are introverts. The author Susan Cain wrote, “There’s another word for introverts: thinkers.”

In an era of social media and disagreement, we need more of the opposite: Deep thought. Reflection. Curiosity. People who think for yourselves, who form your own ideas and judgments and viewpoints. Who are truly independent because you arrived at your own conclusions and then have confidence in your beliefs.

This, to me, may be the biggest need– that you have been trained not just to work hard in pursuit of goals, yes, but that you form your own perspective as products of this exceptional high school in the most dynamic and diverse city in the world.

In America today, there are two dominant ways to interpret the world, with neither of them truly speaking for most or improving our lives. I believe it may be you all who bring a different perspective in American life that centers on solving problems while others are arguing about them.

This is a tough time, yes, but tough times breed great people, and great opportunities for the right people. You all have the potential to be the right people at a pivotal point in our country’s history. You can make this your time as long as you continue to think and learn for yourself, grow from your successes, and from your mistakes, and continue to move forward.

I know you’ll do just that. And I’m excited to see you make your mark on this city, this country, and this world in the years to come.

Congratulations Class of 2022! The future will be what you make of it. I will see you out there.

Roe v. Wade

On Friday, the Supreme Court overruled Roe v. Wade, the 1973 case that held that women had a Constitutional right to an abortion.

We had known that this was likely ever since a draft of the ruling was leaked a number of weeks ago, but I’d personally held out hope that the Court would relent and issue a narrower ruling that left Roe intact.

On a personal level, I hate this decision and find it to be immoral, out-of-step and vastly destructive. Those who are impacted will be poor women in red states who struggle to access reproductive care or exert their own choices safely and effectively. I find it bizarre that supposedly conservative judges would overturn such a longstanding precedent with massive importance to the way of life of millions of Americans. Conservative typically means “respect institutions, including what has gone before you.” This isn’t that.

Indeed, this ruling seems to firmly cement the Supreme Court as a political institution as opposed to a judicial body. That’s intrinsically a bad thing.

Protests are now raging across the country. In the hours after the ruling, I received dozens of fundraising overtures from Democratic candidates across the country. I do think that this ruling has the potential to activate voters and energy in a way that may diminish what is expected to be a red wave in November.

But at the same time, I found myself wondering, “Why didn’t Democrats do something about this when they had the chance?” Democrats commanded legislative majorities multiple times over the last 49 years. They could have codified Roe v. Wade into law. They could have played hardball when Mitch McConnell refused to consider Merrick Garland, which I found to be incredibly cynical and corrosive. They could have asked Ruth Bader Ginsburg to step down while Obama was still in office instead of deferring to her wish to stay in until her health failed.

They didn’t do any of these things, and now the people who will pay the price will be poor women with limited resources in red states.

This ruling will categorically polarize the country for the worse. I fear for what’s left of our institutional trust which is diminishing quickly. I’m deeply saddened for the women and families who will be hurt and have their lives altered.

For me, the ruling only elevates the need for a political realignment and institutional reform. Judicial appointments are being made that cater to the desires of a relative minority of the country because that minority commands outsized influence in our unrepresentative two-party system with closed party primaries. Parties run on issues but don’t legislate. Failures fuel fundraising appeals. People become more angry and frustrated and inflamed and the two sides become more entrenched.

These are difficult times in the U.S. But we have to continue to live with each other and find avenues for coming together and allowing Americans to feel that they are being heard and respected on matters most dear to them, or we will see our country fail and ripped apart. There should be more than two parties at the table to make a more nuanced and representative case for the tens of millions of Americans who are now on the outside looking in.

Our system must evolve and move forward, even as forces seem intent on hurtling us backward and into opposing camps. Those forces are growing stronger. There is no time to waste.

Lessons from KIND

Hello, I hope that your summer is off to a great start.

Before I got into politics I was an entrepreneur. I ran an education company that was acquired by a public company and started a national entrepreneurship non-profit. My first book, “Smart People Should Build Things” was about the need to cultivate more entrepreneurs in America. I love entrepreneurship and see it as one of the answers to our problems – indeed, at its best entrepreneurship is solving big problems.

One of the country’s greatest entrepreneurs is Daniel Lubetzky. You know him as the founder of KIND Snacks, the ubiquitous bars you pick up in convenience stores when you feel like eating something healthy (try their frozen snacks, you won’t be disappointed). KIND went from just an idea to a multi-billion dollar business over the past 18 years due in large part to Daniel’s focus and indefatigability.

Daniel’s story starts in Mexico. “I immigrated from Mexico when I was 16, and I couldn’t hold any job as an employee because of my status, a lot of immigrants start businesses because we can’t be employed. I used to drive 2 hours to sell watches at flea markets on the outskirts of San Antonio. Eventually I had a couple kiosks at local malls . . .it was the fancy thing to be at the mall there.”

Daniel went to college in San Antonio and law school out West, and then went to the Middle East to try to bring people together through a non-profit called Peaceworks. “What’s interesting is how little I knew, and hence how lucky I was. Had I known how hard what I was undertaking would turn out to be, I maybe wouldn’t have had the courage to do it . . . that innocence is actually a blessing, because maybe you will make more mistakes but you will do things that are meant to be done but that others who ‘know better’ wouldn’t do.”

While running Peaceworks, Daniel got interested in healthy foods. “I was criss-crossing the United States, skipping lunch or dinner, working at my desk, wanting a healthy snack. Back in the early 2000s, snack options were nothing like today, nothing led with nutrient-rich ingredients.” KIND got started during a dark and difficult time for Daniel. “It was the toughest year of my life. I’d just lost my father. My Dad was my role model and my hero. He approached life with kindness towards all. We sat around the table and almost didn’t launch KIND. I’d just had a business setback. We’d just lost our business on a product overnight. Should we throw in the towel? I’d already been doing this for 10 years. Fortunately we decided to give it a shot. We almost didn’t launch. I almost wanted my team to give me permission to say no, let’s do something else.”

After KIND launched, it grew quickly via word-of-mouth. “We were very true to the brand. This is what it stands for. We are not going to deviate.” Some of the lessons he’d learned running Peaceworks needed to be revised. “I saw everything as an expense. Everyone who tried KIND bars would love it, but I didn’t know better and treated sampling as a cost. In 2008, our budget for sampling was $800 just for product buyers. When we finally brought in investment, we started sampling and you could see the data that it was growing like this. A few years later our sampling budget was $20 million.”

The corporate culture of KIND became something to tend carefully, particularly when you’re the CEO. “When you’re trying to be kind out of fear, it’s not the best motivator. But when you see the power of kindness, kindness is magical because it doesn’t just make the person who receives the act of kindness have a better day, it also helps the person doing the kind act feel better about themselves and it becomes addictive.”

Daniel has now achieved more business success than most of us can imagine. But he’s driven to solve bigger problems,. “I’ve been noticing the erosion of American values like creativity, resourcefulness, respect. Respect is one of the greatest things that America has that we take too much for granted but doesn’t exist in other places. What does it take to respect each other’s humanity and people who are different than them? America has always been the place I’ve drawn inspiration from, and now it’s under threat.”

Now, Daniel is trying to bring Americans together through a campaign ‘Starts With Us’ to encourage civic unity and bridge building. It Starts with Us revolves around 3 values: curiosity, compassion and courage. They are lofty ones, but the message of the campaign is that little changes in habits can change how we operate. He’s certainly right that if Americans were more curious, compassionate and courageous, we’d be in much better shape.

Says Daniel, “We share more values than most people realize. Americans have this beautiful temperament about helping those left behind. It unites us all. Giving everyone a fair chance.”

I believe that, if there’s going to be a positive movement in America, it’s going to be led by entrepreneurs like Daniel who are digging in to try and guide our country in a better direction while also admitting that business – or politics – as usual isn’t going to work. We are in a tough spot with struggling institutions and growing frustration. We need something new.

“The polarization in this country terrifies me . . . what’s happening to our nation is we’re losing that curiosity gene, that self-reflection skillset and muscle that made us the most amazing nation on earth, that hurts not just civilization, that hurts not just being a better parent, that hurts you being a better entrepreneur because how are you going to have drive and creativity if we are scared to debate and to listen to one another and to learn from one another?”

For my full interview with Daniel click here – he and I discuss the path forward and much more.

The Independent Governor

Hello, I hope the summer is going great. The January 6th hearings are highlighting for the country how deep our challenges are.

I spent a couple days in Oregon last week. The people in the state are struggling with many of the same issues as the rest of the country: affordability, public safety concerns, underperforming schools, homelessness, a shifting economy and polarization. Oregon is a blue state – Biden won it by 16 points – but most of the state’s counties are rural and right-leaning.

Betsy Johnson was a state representative for 4 years and state senator for 16 years representing Columbia County in Northwest Oregon. She is an aviator by training, operating a helicopter business and participating in international competitions; she has dropped fire retardant on a burning mountain in real life. She was a Democrat but, representing a rural area, found herself in position to be the swing vote on many issues. She became concerned that the Democratic Party was constantly beholden to certain groups, like teachers unions. She left the Democratic Party at the end of last year to run for Governor as an Independent who can work across both parties to deliver what the people of Oregon want.

And she can win.

We all know that politics today is driven in large part by money and resources. Remarkably, Betsy has raised over $6 million - enough money to be competitive by people who believe her to be the best choice for the state. And her longtime record of service has led to endorsements from former Democratic governor Ted Kulongoski and former Republican U.S. Senator Gordon Smith. People who know Betsy regard her as the common sense leader that most Oregonians – and Americans – want.

I met with Betsy while I was in Oregon and she is exactly what you’d hope for – a no-nonsense spirited problem-solver who just wants to get things done. Stories of her going above and beyond to come through for constituents are consistent and legendary.

We can sense instinctively that our current system is not delivering the kind of leadership that we need. People are fed up but don’t feel they have a choice.

With Betsy’s election, we can establish that yes, we do have a choice, and that a different approach to politics is possible.

Says Betsy: “Democracy needs to stop being so contentious. We need the parties to bring people together to get stuff done instead of running through our partisan tribal corners and just poking at each other. We need an independent governor to make the parties work together for the common good and move Oregon forward.”

I’m pleased to endorse Betsy, and – like Evan McMullin in Utah – believe her to be a potentially powerful emblem that Americans can choose leaders who will operate for the people free of the entrenched political interests and knee-jerk ideologies that have come to dominate both major parties. An Independent Governor is just what Oregon – and the country – needs. Her victory will help establish that politics-as-usual isn’t cutting it, and that if given a real choice, people will take it.

Can an Independent win in Oregon? We will find out in 5 months. I’ll be helping Betsy and hope you will too. And if it can happen in Oregon, it can happen anywhere.

The Rise and Fall of Nations

Hello, I hope that your summer is off to a great start.

As shootings plague our communities, there is a growing sense that America is struggling and in decline. That our best days are behind us and that we are unable to rise to the challenges of this time.

One of the world’s greatest investors, the founder of Bridgewater and #1 NYTimes Bestselling Author Ray Dalio, recently wrote a book, “Principles for Dealing With the Changing World Order: Why Nations Succeed and Fail” that tries to place our current challenges in context. Where are we in the long-term?

Dalio posits that there are 3 concurrent megacycles working against the United States at present: the end of a huge credit cycle, the latter stages of an internal order/disorder cycle, and the relative rise and fall of great powers.

First, the credit cycle.  Inflation dominates our headlines and our daily lives.  Ray describes 6 stages of a credit cycle that typically play out over 50 to 75 years – he believes we are in Stage 5 of this particular cycle which includes rising debts and increased money supply.  As public debt goes up, there are four approaches that policymakers can take:

1.     Austerity
2.    Debt defaults and restructurings
3.    Transfers of money (e.g. raising taxes)
4.    Printing money and devaluing it.

Ray suggests that #4 is always the politically easiest path, and the US is currently on this path.  He cites a striking statistic that of the roughly 750 currencies that have existed since 1700, only about 20% are still in use, and all of them have been devalued.

The U.S. has a distinct advantage of having its dollar as the global reserve currency.  However, Ray says that historically, capital has found its way out of a currency into other stores of value even if another reserve currency hasn’t been available, and that some form of devaluation of the dollar seems unavoidable.  In our interview, Ray predicts both a recession and some very difficult adjustments.

The second megacycle will be familiar to many of you: it’s what Ray calls the cycle of internal order and disorder.  This describes the rising and falling integrity of the American political system.  Again, he believes that we are in Stage 5 of a 6 stage cycle, with Stage 5 denoting ‘the Decline’ that includes bad financial conditions and intense conflicts.

Polarization is at historic levels. “History has shown us that greater polarization equals either (a) greater risk of political gridlock, which reduces the chances of revolutionary changes that rectify the problems or b) some form of civil war/revolution.”  Ray stipulates that “the odds of the US devolving into a Stage 6 (civil-war-type) dynamic within the next 10 years are [around] 30 percent . . . a dangerously high risk that must be protected against.”

Read that again; perhaps the world’s most successful investor projects a 30% chance of a civil-war-type situation in the United States within 10 years.  During our interview, he said, “the odds are higher now” than when he wrote those words in 2021.  This seems like headline news to me and a call to action.

Ray has also argued that there is a need to declare a national emergency to reform capitalism because the benefits of increased productivity are not being shared with the bottom 60%.  “I really got it when I saw that if you were in the bottom 60% you weren’t experiencing” the rise in productivity, Ray said in our interview.  This also struck me as headline news.  Ray writes, “To have peace and prosperity, a society must have productivity that benefits most people.  Do you think we have this today?”

The third megacycle is the external order and disorder cycle, which in this case is the US in relative decline while China is rising.  Ray believes that this will lead to increased friction between the two countries in terms of economic, technological, capital and geopolitical competition and conflict.  The major question is whether this will escalate into a hot or shooting conflict, which is something that the world would vastly prefer to avoid.  “The only thing that most informed people agree on is that such a war would be unimaginably horrible,” Ray writes.

These challenges are obviously massive.  “There will be a battle between humanity’s inventiveness and these . . challenges.”  Which will prevail?

We certainly have our work cut out for us.  On American politics, Ray writes that “The [peaceful prosperous] path requires a ‘strong peacemaker’ who goes out of their way to bring the country together, including reshaping the order in a way that most people agree is fair and works well.  There are few such cases in history.  We pray for them.”  Can America produce the kind of leadership that will help us avoid some of the historical patterns that Ray lays out?  A lot is riding on our answering yes to that question – perhaps the fate of the country.

To listen to my interview with Ray click here and for his video on his latest book click here.