Minnesota Unity Looks Like What? | WHAT KIND OF UNITY? w/ Professor Penn & Mike Weiner | EP257

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Minnesota Unity Looks Like What? | WHAT KIND OF UNITY?

Real America’s Voice – EP257 | November 21, 2025
Host: David Penn (Professor Penn)
Guest: Rep. Mike Weiner | Producer: Tanner

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Episode Overview

This episode takes listeners deep into the question of Republican unity in Minnesota, using hunting, self-reliance, and grassroots organization as powerful metaphors for the political struggle ahead. Host David Penn is joined by Rep. Mike Weiner for a wide-ranging discussion on why unity hasn’t just been elusive but essential for Republicans amidst internal fragmentation and an emboldened Democrat machine. The conversation is candid, often personal, drawing on lived experience, recent party conflicts, and history, ultimately challenging delegates, party officials, and every listener to rethink what real party-building and winning actually require as 2026 approaches.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Opening—Why Unity, and Why Now?

Timestamps: 01:07–04:22

• David Penn reflects on the purpose of his podcast: “I really want to win for Republicanism… because I believe in it for human well-being. And I see all the division in the party, all the fractures, the lack of party coherence, the hatred, racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism… tearing us apart.” (03:06–03:59)
• Sets the theme: Searching for truth, questioning mainstream narratives, and striving for party coherence—is critical as a "house divided cannot stand.”

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2. Hunting, Self-Reliance, & Minnesota Culture

Timestamps: 04:22–10:35

• Rep. Weiner recounts family history of hunting/fishing, how these traditions bound his rural family during hardship ([05:34–08:14]) and shaped his value for self-reliance.
  • Quote: “If there wasn’t fish on the table, there wasn’t much to eat. I didn’t realize it… we needed that meat in the freezer. We needed those fish.” (06:08)
• David and Mike agree that such traditions unite diverse communities “instead of the wedge issues in politics all the time.” (08:25)

3. Hunting as a Cultural Bridge, Urban–Rural Divide

Timestamps: 08:55–11:10

• David presses Rep. Weiner on whether urban Democrats “support or understand” Minnesota’s outdoor, self-governance culture.
• Weiner criticizes what he calls the hypocrisy of political photo-ops—specifically, Gov. Walz touting new gun restrictions while posing as an outdoorsman.
  • Quote: “On the one hand, you’re going to tell us you’re going to take away our guns, and then you’re going to come out and act like you’re a sportsman… that’s political theater that just aggravates me.” (09:46–10:37)
• Warns that voters should look for “sincerity over manipulation.”

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4. Self-Governance, Dependency, and Off-Grid Living

Timestamps: 12:36–19:10

• The group discusses distinctions between rural self-sufficiency and urban dependency on government (“socialism becomes acceptable when somebody else is providing everything for you”). (16:10)
• Mike shares his family's ability to go off-grid if necessary (well water, wood stove, cattle).
  • David: “You have survival skills. We’ve lost that in cities now… they need their metropolitan amenities.” (18:47)
• Points to the disconnect in experience: many urbanites are “uncomfortable” even with the idea of gutting animals or direct self-reliance.

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5. Unity, Party Fragmentation & The Path Forward

Timestamps: 25:48–44:44

• David introduces the importance—and complexity—of unity by linking it to both the history of the American founding (“We have to hang together or we will certainly hang separately”—36:49) and the current Republican landscape.
• Key insight: The cost of division is a long-term Democrat “trifecta”—and describes the recent total exclusion of Republicans at the Capitol when Democrats held all levers (28:19–29:24).
• Weiner warns of “frightening” consequences if division allows Democrats continued dominance: “If you give them the trifecta again, they will only double down on those same programs.” (29:29)

Notable Moment

• The T-shirt Slogan Story: At a Park Rapids event, “Royce was riffing… ‘We’re not far right; we’re just right.’ I walked into the office the next morning… and I trademarked it. So we own it at Free People Radio.” (23:00–24:41)

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6. How To Build Real Unity? Endorsement, Primaries, and Education

Timestamps: 44:44–66:00

• The critical question is, can (and should) the party enforce unity by sticking to the endorsement process and avoiding brutal, resource-draining primaries?
  • Weiner: “Strategically in the party, we cannot afford a primary. Our delegates have to get behind a candidate… and the candidates themselves have to realize the bigger picture… it’s defeating Walz” (51:22–52:45)
  • Notable quote: “The endorsement is gold. Federal money won’t come in until either after the endorsement… or after the primary, which leaves us even a shorter time frame in order to win this.” (61:04)
• David offers realism: “I know we’re going to be fighting it out, and I’m all for the fight… but the day after the primary, I don’t care who’s got that R after their name, I’m going to doorknock for them because I agree with you.” (71:19–73:34)
• Both argue delegates must educate themselves on strategy for winning, and that division in primaries is an unaffordable luxury.

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7. Building & Mobilizing the Grassroots

Timestamps: 76:00–85:21

• David emphasizes the lack of precinct-level organization: “There’s 4,100 precincts in this state and every precinct needs a precinct captain who’s gonna get out the vote… and you know how many precinct captains we got? Zero.” (77:15–79:47)
• Weiner agrees: “We should be getting as many [citizens] to caucus as we can and explaining how important this next election cycle is.” (85:21–85:25)
• Discuss barriers from inside party leadership: “Leadership told me directly, don’t do that,” Penn observes. Still, he urges action: “Nothing stopping you from doing it yourself… I am.” (98:02–99:21)

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8. Principle vs. Practicality—Who Should Be the Candidate?

Timestamps: 86:13–89:10

• David raises the perennial question: “What’s more important—a principled candidate or one that can raise money?”
• Weiner is candid: “I prefer principles… But at the same time…” recognizing the tension between ideals and electoral realities.
• They discuss internal party debates, especially around abortion and 2A, highlighting the range of views within the party.
  • Weiner: “There’s a couple things I won’t budge on. I would not get behind a candidate that isn’t pro-life… and I’m also very strong in the Second Amendment.” (53:17)

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9. Changing Messaging, Cultural Renewal, & Winning Blue Collar Voters

Timestamps: 89:33–94:00

• Mike calls for more supportive messaging around abortion; 70% of women, he claims, would not have abortions if supported.
• Both men emphasize rebuilding family structure, cultural health, and male leadership, seeing these as keys to societal strength and perhaps as indirect answers to party division.

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10. The Existential Battle—Socialism, Communism, & The American Tradition

Timestamps: 106:23–117:56

• Weiner and Penn speak bluntly on the rise of socialism and communism, making the case that the core battle isn't just policy but foundational values.
  • Weiner: “Do we really want those people? Do we really want a socialist-communist mindset running our country?… I don’t.” (110:31)
  • Penn connects communism not just to economics but to “a theological strategy” replacing faith with obedience to the state.

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11. Power, Self-Governance, and Bureaucracy

Timestamps: 116:19–119:23

• Weiner insists the core principle is empowerment of the individual: “The individual makes the best decisions for themselves. When government says I’m entitled to 40%, 50% of what you earn, you’re taking away that individual’s right…”
• Discussion on paid family medical leave as an example of government overreach, replacing the creative flexibility of unions or small businesses.

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12. Final Reflections—What Now?

Timestamps: 119:23–end

• Both host and guest call for practical unity, mutual respect, and active organization—while acknowledging tensions and disagreements are here to stay.
• David closes: “What we’re really talking about is making a community of Republicans that’s statewide, an actual family of people that ascribe to the philosophy of republicanism, which is about self-governance… That’s community.” (104:22–105:13)
• Calls for open dialogue, for officials to get out of their lanes and do outreach everywhere, and for all Republicans to get directly involved via caucus and grassroots work.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “I see all the division in the party…A house divided cannot stand and a house built on sand cannot stand.” (David Penn, 03:47)
• “If there wasn’t fish on the table, there wasn’t much to eat.” (Rep. Weiner, 06:08)
• “We’re not far right. We’re just right.” (Royce White, story recounted by Penn, 24:30)
• “The endorsement is gold. Federal money won’t come in until either after the endorsement… or after the primary, which leaves us even a shorter time frame in order to win this.” (Rep. Weiner, 61:04)
• “There’s 4,100 precincts in this state and every precinct needs a precinct captain… you know how many we have? Zero.” (David Penn, 77:15)
• “Nothing stopping you from doing it yourself… I am doing it myself.” (David Penn, 99:21)
• “What we’re really talking about is making a community of Republicans… an actual family… which is about self-governance.” (David Penn, 104:22)

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Structure & Flow

The episode follows a natural, engaging arc—opening with personal stories, then leaping into the politics of division and unity, exploring the nuts and bolts of electoral strategy, and closing with a philosophical, even existential, call to action. The tone is open, sometimes combative but always respectful, and aimed at education and persuasion, true to the show’s stated mission.

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Timestamps to Key Segments

• Searching for Unity, History, and Division: 01:07–04:22, 36:22–44:44
• Minnesota Hunting & Cultural Bridges: 04:22–10:35
• Self-Governance vs. Urban Dependency: 12:36–19:10
• Party Fragmentation, Endorsement Process: 25:48–44:44, 44:44–66:00
• Building Grassroots Organization: 76:00–85:21
• Principles vs. Practicality in Elections: 86:13–89:10
• Existential Battle with Socialism/Communism: 106:23–117:56
• Final Reflection on Community: 119:23–end

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For listeners or readers seeking to understand the fault lines, hopes, and hard realities of Minnesota Republican politics—and how hunting, self-reliance, and open dialogue might find a path through them—this episode is essential, raw, and motivating.

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Action Item: “If you want to change your country and be involved in the most important moment in human history, in American history, just go to caucus and be a part of the party.” (David Penn, 121:28)

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Transcript

[David Penn]

This is an iHeart podcast.

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[C]

What do you think makes the perfect snack?

[D]

Hmm, it's gotta be when I'm really craving it and it's convenient.

[C]

Could you be more specific?

[D]

When it's cravinient.

[David Penn]

Okay.

[D]

Like a freshly baked cookie made with real butter, available right down the street at a.m. p.m. Or a savory breakfast sandwich I can grab in just a second at a.m. p.m.

[C]

I'm seeing a pattern here.

[D]

Well, yeah, we're talking about what I.

[C]

Crave, which is anything from AM pm.

[D]

What more could you want?

[David Penn]

Stop by AM PM where the snacks and drinks are perfectly craveable and convenient. That's Cravinience ampm. Too much good stuff. Cross our hearts and p by these.

[D]

50 countries differing so much in race.

[David Penn]

And religion, in language and culture, it.

[D]

Is a big idea. A new world order.

[David Penn]

Well, I know they're lying. They tricked me once, but they're not going to trick me twice. The time is now. Foreign. Welcome back to the Professor Pen podcast. David Penn, your host. Glad to be with you as always for this episode. Number 257 coming to you on Thursday night, the 20th of November, 7pm Central Standard Time. Glad to to have in studio again a. I guess a friend of the podcast representative, Mike Wiener is here today and I'm very glad you're here. As soon as we start seeing each other, we just start talking. I mean, so I told Tanner. Tanner, start up those video. Start it up.

[E]

Let it rip.

[David Penn]

Let it rip. Good morning, Tanner.

[E]

Good morning.

[David Penn]

All right, so where did we leave off? We were talking about a very critically important subject and that would be hunting. Sure, hunting. So let us know.

[E]

Mike, you got a nine pointer you said.

[D]

I did. I got a nine pointer on Sunday. Well, let me back up a little bit though. 257 episodes you said?

[David Penn]

Yes, sir.

[D]

So are you going to do a celebration at like five hundred and a thousand?

[David Penn]

I celebrate every day, but yes.

[D]

Okay.

[David Penn]

If we make it. Well that we're gonna have you in.

[D]

Yeah, that's a lot of episodes. And I mean we have to celebrate the things in life, the milestones and so forth. And I just, when you said that, I thought that's, that's a lot of episodes. That's really cool.

[David Penn]

We, we. They're all up on YouTube and they're all up on Rumble and anybody can go look at them. And you know, I act here's a crazy thing. And there's people out in the audience and good evening to everybody. I have people regularly come to my AX or go on YouTube and say I've watched every single episode.

[D]

Really.

[David Penn]

And I think to myself, wow. And at, at one point, I would say from episode one through about 150, they were really scholarly. I mean, I spent a lot of time researching all the hinge points of history that I think got us to where we're at. Because if we don't know how we got here, how are we going to get out of this mess? Right? So I'm, I'm, I'm not, I don't want to say I'm proud of it, but I think what we're doing at Free People Radio is important because before I go back to hunting, I'm going to tell you what this is about for me. I really want to win for Republicanism, the philosophy thereof here in Minnesota, because I believe in it for human well being. And I see all the division in the party, all the fractures, the lack of party coherence, the hatred, racism, xenophobia, anti Semitism, everything that's tearing us apart. Hey, a house divided cannot stand and a house built on sand cannot stand. There's a biblical reference, right?

[D]

Sure.

[David Penn]

You know, seeds thrown in sand don't grow. So what we're trying to do here is search for the truth. We never say we know, we say we're trying to, to know. We don't want to accept narratives that are in this, that are in the mainstream. We question them. And when you come in here, a legislator like you, you're giving an endorsement to what we're doing here. And I want to thank you for coming in. That's a reason for a blessing. We have a lot of legislators that come in here. We got a lot that don't tells us a lot about who's in the legislature. I want to go back to hunting.

[D]

Well, listen, I want to hear, I.

[David Penn]

Want to hear about nine because this last thing we heard just before we turned on the cameras, did I hear you say you got this nine polar pointer off your porch?

[D]

Oh, not quite that bad. No, no. Hunting is, it's always been a big thing in my family. My dad, who was kind Of a workaholic. There was basically two times that we took off. Springtime when we speared fish, and wintertime or hunting season when we deer hunted.

[E]

It's the same way. My dad, he'd probably. He would cry harder if I called and said, I can't make it to hunting, as opposed to if I called and said, sorry, I won't be there for Christmas. Hunting is just the holiday for our family.

[D]

It was. It was a huge thing. And as you grow up, I didn't realize how much both of those things the family relied on because it was. Things were pretty tough back in those days. I had a older brother who had cancer and tumor in his leg.

[David Penn]

You mean as a young.

[D]

Yeah, he was about 15, 16 years old, I think, when they found that.

[David Penn]

Did he survive?

[D]

He did survive.

[David Penn]

Oh, that. That's a. That's a miracle right there, isn't it?

[D]

Right. They. They chose some different paths at that time and try to do some natural and. And ended up with some chemotherapy and so forth. He was unable. He had health issues afterwards. But he passed away about four or five years ago now, and he was nine years older than I am. So, yeah, he lived a pretty good life. But eventually those. Some of the after effects of that cancer and that chemo just caught up with. Caught up with him. But in our family, it was always, we needed that meat in the freezer. We needed those fish, you know, when we put them up in the. In the springtime, because you can. You could spear after a certain date legal in the state of Minnesota. And. And I don't remember if I have shared this with you before. I know I've shared it with others, but mom would send us out, us boys out fishing. There was seven of us boys, and me and dad were on a hunting trip years later. And I said something to the effect of, I don't really care for fish anymore. And I said, I like fishing. I just don't care for fish. And he's like, well, why? I said, we ate so much of it when I was growing up. And he said, well, you realize why that was why mom sent you out of the house to go fishing. I said, I figured she was just sick of us fighting with each other and wanted us to get out of the house. He said if there wasn't fish on the table, there wasn't much to eat. I didn't realize it. I did not know that it was. Those were the 1980s, early 80s, when the interest rates were 20%. I had to go back and study that history because we moved off the home farm, moved to a place and rented for a number of years. My mom was a nurse and we moved closer. It was closer to her work. Dad's business was in Sauk Center. But I know later they almost lost everything. And if my granddad, grandpa hadn't helped them out, we probably would have lost everything. So it was, it was bad survival. Absolutely.

[David Penn]

But that's what hunting and fishing was always all about, was about survival.

[D]

But you talk about how it brings people together. You've had other guests in here. You had a Hmong leader yesterday.

[David Penn]

Yes, sir.

[D]

Look at the similarities between the Hmongs, Native Americans, the blue collar folks up in my area. What do we like? We like hunting, we like fishing, we like the outdoors. Those are all things that we can that bring us together instead of the wedge issues in politics all the time. I see hunting as for my family. But it's also a cultural thing too.

[David Penn]

Something that can unite us.

[D]

Absolutely.

[David Penn]

I have to ask a question because I don't know the answer. It's a very naive and very sincere question. You're in the caucus, you're in the legislature. There's a lot of urban elected Democrat representatives. I know they're anti 2A. I know that they would like to collect all the guns. You know, where are they on the hunting issue? Are they like supportive of the culture, the Minnesota traditions of living off the land and self sufficiency and self governance? Do they understand it? Do they acknowledge it? I mean, I'm asking a broad question. You can go in any place you want to on this one.

[D]

Sure. And I've thought about that because Comrade Walls recently was out in western Minnesota for the pheasant hunt and he's been talking about having a special session for guns. Well, the legislation that they had talked about that they had presented in the past would eliminate it said anything bigger than 50 caliber. A 12 gauge shotgun is bigger than 50 caliber. So you're talking about banning guns that we use for hunting. And then you're gonna go out to a hunting area and tout that you're an outdoorsman and you know, put yourself in that position. So when, when Walls does that, I look at that and say, what hypocrisy. On the one hand, you're going to tell us you're going to take away our guns and then you're going to come out and act like you're a sportsman. I mean that, that's that political theater that just aggravates me.

[David Penn]

Well, because it's. You're Saying it's hypocritical and insincere and manipulative. And manipulative, sure. It's a photo op.

[D]

Absolutely, it is.

[David Penn]

So it really validates a person who actually is working against the whole program. That's what you're saying, More or less.

[D]

Well, as a voter, think about those things a little bit. Are you going to trust somebody that says, we're going to take away the guns, but then two weeks later is out with guns, pheasant hunting? I mean, can you really trust that person?

[David Penn]

No, you can't, because it's, it's, it's part and parcel of the entire scam that I'm dealing with, from the feds to the international to the local. And this is, you know, we had a pollster on, and you go back if you, if you're driving the truck, Mark Mitchell, he's the head pollster for Rasmussen, and he says, and we're going to have him back, by the way.

[E]

Oh, sweet. I was going to say that he's a really good guy.

[David Penn]

You know what? He was just on Steve Bannon's War Room. He was, he made the, the round. He was on Alex Jones's Infowar, which we were just talking about Brian Strausser, who posted up, you know, Royce was a, you know, freaky deaky because Royce hosts Infowars. And I'm just going to say, let's remember we're talking about guns. I just want to say I've known who Alex Jones is as a name for 20 years. I never watched his show. Someone in the Republican Party of Minnesota said to me about two years ago, have you ever watched infowars? I said, no, I haven't. And this was, after all, the Sandy Hook controversy. And I turned him on for the first time. And I realized people are really polarizing. Like, Brian, if you're watching, I don't know if you've ever watched Alex Jones, but Alex Jones is a commentator who's searching for truth and he makes errors, but, man, he predicts stuff. He is prescient. He is tuned into what's going on and he is blowing the trumpet of alarm about issues we were talking about before we turned the cameras on. So Royce went on there and hosted Infowars. And then Brian Strausser used this as some kind of disc, you know, to discredit Royce. No, no, we want to go everywhere and talk to everybody. I was at a republic just before I was at a Republican Party event where President Trump was speaking. That was the Minnesota, the Republican statewide convention in 2024, you were probably there. And I sat down. It was a big banquet when President Trump spoke to everybody. And I was walking around, I'm doing my political thing, and I'm walking around the table shaking hands, and people know who I am. And I shook the hands of this woman who was there, and she was in the Republican Party. And I said, so nice to meet you. And your name is. I'm not gonna say your name. And then she excoriated me for five minutes. Just excoriated me. I felt kind of dejected, right, because, you know, I'm there for a happy event and she's telling me that what I'm doing is awful and. Okay, great. So I went and walked around, sat down in my chair, and I was all bummed out. And the guy sitting right next to me was about 55 years old, wearing a suit, looked like a standard stalwart of the Republican Party, looked over at me, he said, have I seen you on infowars? And I said, as a matter of fact, you have. You know, so this is another betting I want to go back to. We were talking about the legislators, we're talking about Waltz, where we didn't. And of course, this is completely unscripted. We found ourselves talking about gun rights and gun legislation, which is, you know, important. Go ahead. I was asked the question, do these metro people honor and understand the culture of self governance? Because there's nothing more self governing than going fishing to have dinner. That's pretty self governing.

[D]

It's an amazing process. When you go out there, hunt or fish, take that back home. And like I said, the cultural things at one of the museums. I take my kids to museums all the time. It's just, you know, learning and exploring. There was a whole section about Native Americans and what they do in their.

[David Penn]

Culture at the Minnesota History Museum. Are we talking about.

[D]

I think that is. Yes. Down in St. Paul, right across down by the Capitol.

[David Penn]

Right, that's, that's a great place. Everybody can check out the Minnesota History Museum. It's badass.

[D]

Yeah. The whole, the one section I'm referring to is all about Native Americans. And I, I showed to the kids, I said, look at, look at this. Tell me what the differences are here. They're talking about building birch bark canoes. We go canoeing all the time. Granted, I would love to build my own birch bark, but time just isn't going to allow. But they talked about the hunting, fishing, we spear during the winter. All things that these two cultures have that are so similar and yet what divides us? And most of the kids went, I don't know, couldn't tell you. So I think those things that outdoor activities, those type of things really could be what brings us together. Does self governance when, when you're down here in the Metro and that's. I, I can't remember if I was talking to you or somebody else about this one time, but that's what makes socialism so acceptable. When you have everything at your fingertips here, when somebody else is providing everything for you, that's what socialism really becomes.

[David Penn]

Dependency.

[D]

Exactly. When you're independent and you can provide for yourself, you don't need the government to come in with a snap benefit or a paycheck.

[David Penn]

Tanner, are you seeing I'm getting. Because of what I'm interested in. Are you seeing on your Instagram and your different feeds like TikTok? Are you seeing a lot of shorts from people who are advocating going off grid?

[E]

No, I don't see much of that.

[David Penn]

I do. Because of course, how is that even.

[E]

Possible this day and age?

[David Penn]

You know, this is an important. You're kind of off grid where you live. If you wanted to. Let me ask you a question. If you wanted to go off grid and be self governing and be independent, could you do that in your family?

[D]

I think we could probably. Well, we have had in the past storms that knocked out the power during the middle of winter and we have the means to survive.

[David Penn]

Do you?

[D]

So could we if we unplug tomorrow? Yes, I feel confident we could.

[David Penn]

Do you have a well, yes, we do. Of course you do. Do you have a firewood in the backyard?

[D]

We have a wood cook stove in the kitchen.

[David Penn]

Of course you do. Of course you do. Do you have the means of harvesting meat and fish? Yes, you do. Do you have a generator?

[D]

I do not.

[David Penn]

Well, there's an idea right at the.

[D]

Same time, I've always thought about that. I had one for a while when we never used it. I had a guy that wanted it, I sold it to him because I said, I'm just not using this thing. If there's ever an emergency, a long, drawn out process of no, no electricity, an EMP or some crazy thing hits and we don't have diesel. I don't want to be reliant on a generator either. So I mean everything that we have, if we go, if we get blown back into the stone age tomorrow, yep, we can survive. We have a hand pump for the well. All we've got to do is take off the electric pump. Now screw on the hand pump. We have Water for our cattle. We have water for ourselves.

[David Penn]

Oh, you have your own cattle too?

[D]

We do.

[David Penn]

See these dudes.

[E]

I'm going over to Mike's house. Whenever Mike.

[David Penn]

Okay. Cuz this is the thing now. You have survival skills. You have survival skills.

[D]

Well, it's just, I guess maybe just self reliance and growing up that way.

[David Penn]

We've. We've lost that in cities now. You know that, right? That I was kind of trying to. Cause we got legislators that they're not gonna be very comfortable out there with you. I mean, I'm just gonna tell you, I know these people and they're just not gonna be comfortable. They are not gonna be. They need to have their metropolitan amenities.

[E]

Well, I'll give you a prime example. Sorry I cut you off, but my call to fame in the office. You'll probably find this funny, Mike. Cause I kind of chuckled at it. The ladies down in the tire office cannot believe that I gut my own animal. That is something. So just that little aspect that, that would make them so uncomfortable. That they've just grown up a whole different life. They've never known that meat was that bloody.

[David Penn]

Well, let me just give you a little color on this. So, you know, little, little background. First of all, there's Tanner bringing up tires very subtly, very subtly. Which I want everybody to take a minute. Go to tireget.com we fund Free People Radio with tireget.com I logged into the administrative panel for that today. Had orders in this. This morning. New orders from people all over the country that are watching the podcast here at Free People radio want to support it. I want to thank those people. I can't remember this guy's name. I feel like putting out his name, but I think his, his handle included something about real lacrosse. So we had a lacrosse player somewhere bought some tires from us. We really appreciate it this morning. It was expensive order, but we have very expensive. He bought a very expensive Toyo tire. Best price in the country on Toyo. Toyo is a great name, but we have very low cost tires that are very high quality that will save people money. We do the service right by your house and you got to buy your tires, right? It's almost winter. This is a time when people buy tires. And if you think you need tires and it's about to snow or rain wherever you are, go buy them because it's your ass, right? So we'll put them on right by your house. We mount them and balance them and dispose of your old tires. It's a, it's really a great Service. Having been in the tire business for many years, I know it's the right deal. So please. Thank you. If you go to Target, go to the Free People store. Free People has a new T shirt. You're going to like this because we were there together when this happened. Do you remember when we were at Park Rapids together about three, four weeks ago?

[D]

Yes.

[David Penn]

And Royce was. Royce was talking, right? Yeah, Royce. We had. All the, you know, candidates were there, and you were there as an elected representative. There was 150 people in that room.

[D]

Yeah, there was quite a few.

[David Penn]

It was cool.

[D]

Yes.

[David Penn]

In fact, we went outside in the. In the entryway and we were talking politics, if I remember. But I went in when Royce was talking and Royce is riffing. You know, Royce, you know, we got other people. They only read. They got a script, right? Like, I. Cause you're here. I'm going to be kind. But there are people that I hear, because I'm going to all the. And every time, Tanner, if you travel with me, Adam Schwartze says the exact same thing every time he stepped. I mean, this has been going on for a year. Says the same thing every time. Every time. I'm on my most important mission. I could almost. I could almost repeat his speech because I've heard it so many times. It never changed. I've never heard Roy say the same thing two times because he doesn't prepare. And he's a different kind of a dude. He's a super smart dude, so he doesn't have to memorize anything. And he's riffing. We were there. He's riffing. Riffing. He's just. It's like jazz politics, right? He's. There's no. Now, of course, sometimes when you're jazz and you go right off the. Right off the road and you crash and burn. And I've seen that, too. Sorry, Royce. But hey, you know, that's the. That is the risk of making it up as you go along, but the benefit is creativity. And he's talking. Here's what he said, because he's talking about politics in Minnesota and all the things you're seeing down in the legislature that are out. I mean, you. From your perspective, it's out there, right? And he goes, you know, we're not far right. We're just right. We're not far right. We're. And you know, we're right, but we're right as incorrect. We have the right principles for a well being society and a well being life. And we got in the car I had. When we Were driving home, I said, man, do you know that is gold for T shirts? T shirts. He said, really, man? I said, that was brilliant. And I walked into the office the next morning, called the lawyer, and I trademarked it. So we own it at Free People Radio. And we now have T shirts up at the free peopleradio.com store. T shirts that say just right. And I think we all need to get them because we are right and we need to be proud about being right. It's almost like, okay, we know you believe something different and everybody has the right to flap their own ass. Okay, that's just experimenting. I don't mind that the left has an ideology that doesn't work for me and doesn't work for the majority of people. It's an experiment. I don't want to hate these people. They experimented with something. And I think what you should do, just because I'm riffing, I think you should start a tour for all the Democrat legislators and your colleagues and say, any of you that like to go hunting or fishing, I'm your guy. Let's go. Maybe somebody go with you. It's a good idea, isn't it?

[D]

That's not a bad idea.

[David Penn]

You talk about bringing people together.

[D]

That line that he used that evening, we're not far right. We're just right. I. That was a great line.

[David Penn]

It was.

[D]

I picked up on it right away. Other people did, too. I thought, that is a great line right there.

[David Penn]

Well, we need some hook lines to make our ideology, our philosophy, more accessible to people.

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[C]

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[David Penn]

And you know, if you think about Royce, you go one Step forward. Farther right than Rush. You know, where you end up. Nick Fuentes. So, you know, we as Republicans have got to take a look at where the party is at, where the people are at, where the base is at, and understand the fragmentation that's going on in the party, which I think is a great subject to transition into. If we're done talking about hunting and fishing, something really important, I could talk.

[E]

About it all day, but let's move on.

[D]

Yeah, we should move on.

[David Penn]

Are you. Are you a fish? Do you fish, too, Tanner?

[E]

I don't fish as much as I should, but I enjoy ice fishing. Ice fishing was a huge thing in my family.

[David Penn]

There was a dude up at that deal in Park Rapids that hand me his business card, and he said was something like, if you don't have time to go fishing, you're. You're screwed up. You know, he owned a bait shop. You know, it was cool. And what. I'm. Why I'm dwelling on this Park Rapids deal where I ran into you. That's like a three and a half hour drive for me. We're going all over the state to organize the state. And I. I did say to you, I have certain freedoms in my role that you don't have in your role. And what we're really. You talk about 257 episodes. I would like to create unity in the Republican Party. And that's a. That's what we talked about up in Park Rapids. You had a. I mean, you gave me a very passionate monologue about the party, and I want to talk about that because I think what you're saying is critical and very important.

[D]

Well, when we talk about the upcoming statewide races, 20, 26, and I've used the term unity many times, where we've got to work together, we've got to come together, and people say, well, how can you unify? How can you in the Republican Party? We have different points of view. Absolutely, we do.

[David Penn]

That's great, isn't it?

[D]

That's not a bad thing. I don't get along with my wife about everything. That's human nature. Right. We don't always agree on everything. But what do we have to do in the state of Minnesota? Because the flip side of this, to me, is very bad. The flip side, if we don't come together, if we don't unify behind a candidate, is we give the Democrats this state again and potentially a trifecta again. That is frightening to me, seeing how.

[David Penn]

Far they went in 23, 24.

[D]

Yes.

[David Penn]

And you were there. You watched it, absolutely.

[D]

We were basically excluded from almost everything. We had no say in any of the legislation. And people have said, well, you got to work across the aisle. How come you guys can't work with Democrats and how come Democrats can't work with Republicans? And that question came up in Wadena when we were doing kind of a legislative update and a reporter made the comment, you know, how come you guys can't do this? I said, let's look at the numbers. When the Democrats had the trifecta out of all of the bills they passed, which was 1400 page omnibus bill, both sides. So that's basically 2,800 pages on one side. Do you know the number of bills that were actually Republican bills in that, that whole conglomeration? About 10%. Okay, that's it. So while they held a trifecta with a marginal win, they governed like they controlled everything in the state.

[David Penn]

Well, they did control it, actually. Well, I mean, they were. The proof is in the pudding.

[D]

So here's what happens if you give them the trifecta again, they will only double down on those same programs. They will only double down on more spending, on the tax and spend. That's why we can't afford that. That's why we can't afford not to come together. And how do we do this?

[David Penn]

Well, how do we do this? Please, just let me start. Please give me. I've got to queue this up, all right, because it's very illustrative of where I think the problem is, because when you talk to the, what Royce calls the. Well, he got it from me. I call it the constabulary. I'm talking about the entrenched leadership statewide in all the BPO's and at the center of the party. There's an ideology there. And when I entered the party, I entered in 2021, I was as experienced as I am in life. I came into politics like a baby. And I did it on purpose myself as well. But you know why I did it? I mean, I did it because I am not going to let anybody tell me how to judge. I'm not going to prejudge people. I am not going to put my bias upon someone until they tell me who they are. And I came into the party to serve the party. I didn't. I knew there was divisions and problems. I didn't pay attention to them. I thought, hey, we're all Republicans. You're going to like this. We're all Republicans and we have differences and let's search for truth together by having open forums. And obviously you're sitting in the house that was built out of this. I started a thing that I called the master classes. I don't think we've talked about this. And I was doing it in CD3 at the Wayzata Central Middle School, and we did it every month. And I was doing it with a associate of mine, a man named Dave Kyllo, who was at the time, was the chair of 42 Senate District 42. And I came to this idea. He was my first boss, so to speak. I was a vice chair. And I gave him this idea. And I said, I'm going to go do this. He said, what do you mean you're going to go do this? I said, I'm just going to go do this. I'm paying for it. I'm going to go do it. He said, you can't do that. I said, what do you mean, Dave? He said, you are an officer of the Republican Party of Minnesota. You don't just go off and do things. You need to go to Randy Sutter, the executive of CD3 executive chair, and you need to ask him if it's okay with the district and will the district support it. So I went, made a presentation at a CD3 executive committee meeting. Randy looked at me, said, okay, here are my conditions. Number one, we're not paying for it. Number two, you can never talk about election integrity, ever. And if you'll pay for it and agree never to talk about election integrity, CD3 will promote it and we'll support it. And I said, thank you very much, Chair Sutter. And I started. And after about, I don't know, three or four of them, we were starting to get a lot of people coming in because, you know, I've got some skills. And then Randy started showing up. He ignored it until he heard it was working. Then he started showing up. And what he did was, is he infiltrated it and took it over and shut it down. And I was very unhappy about that. And I said, dude. I didn't call him dude in my mind, Dude. No, I was. I get along good with Randy on a personal basis. He always treated me with respect. We don't agree, but we were respectful with each other. And he's left the state now, by the way, he's not one of the Republicans that have moved away. It's getting a little too intense here. But when he was the chair, he came to me and he said, number one, from Chairman Han, we don't like that there's people mixing from the different districts. Stay in your lane. And number Two, why are you doing this? I said, well, I'm trying to get more Republicans into the party. And here was his answer. We don't need more Republicans. We just need more work from the Republicans that we have. So this is the idea. And I don't want to say that radicalized me, but I was already podcasted and I started calling Randy Mr. We don't need any more Republicans. And that is 100%, 180 degrees different for where I'm coming from. I think we need a lot more Republicans in the party. So I'm gonna set up this conversation about unity, saying I was gum dipped to unify and the people in the party that control the party identified me as got some skills. The word started going, oh, he's very ambitious. It's all about himself. You know, a whisper campaign started. People started talking ill of me that I never met before. I walked up to a state central committee meeting one time to register and I was talking to someone looking over my right shoulder and I hear David Penn. I looked over, I said, ma', am, do I know you? She goes, no. I said, well, you obviously know me. May I ask your name? I being super friendly. She goes, I'm Mary Amla. I said, mary Amla, you're the woman that's running around all over the state talking ill to me. Could we go out for coffee? I will never have coffee with you. She said to me, so when you talk about unity, I'm going to tell you directly from my heart. I'm all about unity. In my opinion, it's not me. Some people don't want any criticism. They don't want any feedback. Okay, you know what I say to that? Get out of politics. This is a rough and tumble experience. And if you can't take the citizens like me coming forward with some critiques, you know, what are we doing here? We running the American Nazi party? You know, we're about. You just said we don't agree with each other and it's cool. I think you just said you and your wife don't agree about everything.

[D]

Right, we don't.

[David Penn]

So I'm going to start this conversation with unity, saying, I want to unify. I have people on this podcast all the time that there's a wing of the party, they don't like them. I want to unify. I want everyone to respect each other, tumble it out, and find a way to defeat the communists. So that's my preamble on this part of the conversation. Here comes winter. In winter, good tires aren't a luxury. They're a necessity for safety. @ Tireget.com Getting your winter tires is quick, easy and priced right. With Tireget.com you order online, install right by your house and stay safe on the road this winter season.

[D]

So as you know and your listeners probably know, I like history. And there was division with our founding fathers. There was division in the thirteen colonies. This was not a cohesive group because what is one of the sayings that they had? We have to hang together or we will certainly hang separately. That's what we're at in the Republican Party right now.

[David Penn]

That'd be another great T shirt, wouldn't it?

[D]

Would that be an absolutely great one? They knew when you signed that Declaration of Independence, that was a death sentence. You pledged everything and that was treason to the government, to the British Crown, that was a death sentence.

[David Penn]

Can I just have a sidebar? Just hold your thought, please. Just remember there is a new group spaces every Thursday night at 7pm Called Minnesota Speaks. Hundreds of citizens are going to this. One of the key drivers of that, his name is Josiah Bartlett and that was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, his ancestor. We have a Minnesota Republican that's with us working for a resurgence of republicanism in the state whose direct ancestor is a signer of the Declaration. I just want to put.

[D]

That's really neat.

[David Penn]

Yep. Mr. Bartlett, I want to give you props, give you some kudos. I looked up Josiah Bartlett. I read his story. He was a doctor, he was a judge. This guy was cool. And we got his lineage right here working for our party.

[D]

So. So let's look at this and let's talk about that unity. But we've got to delve into it, I think just a little bit more to really for people to understand the challenges for a governor candidate. Because if we don't lay that out, I think some people have the impression that we might just see this red wave because Walz has been such a terrible governor that we don't have to do hardly anything and we're going to win. And the fraud in this state is so bad that people automatically are going to vote Republican. I disagree. I disagree. And I've looked at these things and I've thought about it, I've asked questions. I've actually called people who on the political realm probably don't see me as a friend, but I know they've been around the system a long time and asked them their opinion. So let's look at some things. Walls is a third term running for a third term. It hasn't worked very good. So that's another reason people are saying we're going to win governorship in 2026. But we know in midterm elections, the party that's in the White House gets waxed. Yes, they do. It is very bad for the party that's in the White House. That means we have a certain set of challenges already. Voter turnout low is always low.

[David Penn]

Midterm elections, 20% Republicans in the primary.

[D]

Historically, in my area alone, heavy red district, 75, 76%. Almost 3,000 voters didn't show up in a midterm election. When you look at the state, we had nearly enough registered Republicans that didn't show up. We could have nearly out voted or voted out walls. Last time we simply didn't show up. On the national level, Ken Martin was in the state of Minnesota, but he is now at the dnc. At the national level, he's the chairman, he's the chair. And I will give him credit, he is very smart when it comes to politics. He knows elections. He knows how to run them. He is successful. Now, they've seen challenges as far as their donations, their money coming into the dnc. He's even said that they were going to have to take out a loan just to operate. Okay. He's also very good friends with Tim Waltz because of his time here in the state of Minnesota. And in 2028, chances are walls will probably run for president. Correct.

[David Penn]

Depends what we do to him in 2026.

[D]

Exactly. If, for instance, he were voted out as governor in Minnesota, that would be.

[David Penn]

The end of his career.

[D]

That would be the end of his career. But what else would it say about the Democrat Party, the Democrat machine? Your VP pick couldn't get elected in his own state.

[David Penn]

Bombshell.

[D]

Bombshell, yes. So the Democrats, in my opinion, are.

[David Penn]

Going to pour a lot into this cycle.

[D]

Absolutely. They will throw everything and the kitchen sink at this next election. There will be money coming in from everywhere in order to prop him up, because what it would send the message, the ripple, the bombshell, whatever you want to call it, would say that the Democrat machine is not successful.

[David Penn]

And let me give you the converse. Just, let me just interject. I've been a critic of Tom Ammer because of the debt ceiling raise, which was in 23, early 23, and he's the House Majority Whip and he was out whipping votes and whipping up support and saying this is the greatest cuts to government spending in history. And I read the bill and I said, there's no really cuts here. And I Went and talked to him about it, and he left that meeting. And I thought, wow, wow, I'm an asshole. I don't understand. And I went home and it's a 99 page bill. I read it again very carefully, and I thought, you know, Representative Ammer, you're not telling the truth, dude. And then through a series of serendipitous events, my feelings Got broadcast to 10,000 Republicans. Caused a riff. And there's been a lot of bad blood because of that. A podcast that I did about this issue was widely distributed. I went down to carver county in CD6 for an event not very long ago, and I called Patty Williamson, who was putting on the event. She's a BPOU chair in Carver county. And I said, have you thought about security for this event? Because, you know, this was right after the Hortman killings. I mean, you know, what do we got going on? And here's what she said to me. She said, well, the Democrats got a gay parade in this town. They're doing this protest over here. And then I had just been down and gone to a PAC meeting, and there was more protesters than there were Republicans. And I had this revelation and I said, man, I mean, I. First of all, Tom Emmer is a phenomenal politician, just from the get go, super personable. I mean, he's got real skills. I mean, obviously he's the third most powerful guy in the deal. But I realized that nationally, they're pouring tremendous money and energy into CD6 to unseat him for the exact same reason. If we can smoke the House majority Whip, it's the same impetus that you're talking about for Walls and why I'm taking such a long time talking about this. If you're in the Republican Party in Minnesota, or you're a Republican in Minnesota, or you're listening in Minnesota, hey, we're ground zero, Minnesota. This is where Marc Elias cut his teeth on the Franken Coleman election when they, you know, that was where he started to get his election practice going as a lawyer. We've got the University of Minnesota turning out leftism on a worldwide basis. We've got Harold Stassen here, a Republican who was very involved in globalism at the United Nations. We got Rudy Boshwitz, a fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations right here in the Republican Party. I mean, this has grown. We are such an important state ideologically. So what you're saying. I've been in. Tanner will tell you. I've been saying this on the podcast for months. If we beat them here, we beat them in their home court.

[D]

Well, and this is the challenges we're up against. So you, you mentioned Emmer. Who would be the, the best choice to go up against Walls? Generally, statistically, historically, it's the person who has attained the highest political position in that state. Right. So if, if Walls is the governor, the next person would either be a senator or a House member at the congressional level. That would automatically lean towards Tom Emmer. But he is the third highest position in the House.

[David Penn]

I don't think he's given up his job.

[D]

He's not giving up his House position, that's for sure. And that's, that's fine. That makes sense.

[David Penn]

But I should.

[D]

One of the other congressional members have ran.

[David Penn]

I just want to say I have a new respect and understanding of what's going on for him. I just want to say this is part of being unified. I understand my criticism, but I also understand he's on my side of the football. That's what we're talking about. Unity.

[D]

Well, and that's the thing. I think sometimes if we explain these situations a little bit more, our delegates, the people who are in the Republican Party, would be maybe a little bit less critical or maybe a little bit more understanding because there's other things that are happening. It's not just in our backyard. It's not just CD7. There's things that are happening at the national level that this all ties in. Why do you think Trump came out and endorsed Finstead, Fishbach, Stauber and Emmer? Because we know that the House in 2026 at the congressional level is the key. If we as Republicans lose the House at the, at that level, that means it will be lawfare. The Democrats will impeach Trump instantly. We have to maintain the House at the con. At the congressional level, it's imperative.

[David Penn]

But at the same time, but at the same time, we got a lot of executive orders at the federal level, not a lot of legislation memorializing Trump's policies. So his agenda and why we're. This is another reason why we're going to have trouble in 26. I think now he's smart. He's smart and he listens to. Unlike a lot of the people in the bubble, Trump actually listens to the base. He does. There's a feedback mechanism there. He said something that was great. He said, well, the insurance companies are getting fat. Let's just give the money to the people. Well, the corruption's in the insurance companies. That's where the corruption is. So, you know, there's things he can do. But if he doesn't accomplish new ideas in the next year, because we're a year out where we're really hung up now in these midterms. And I'm going to speak about this because I'm intimately involved in it. These reciprocal tariffs, the IEEPA tariffs, are being reviewed right now by the Supreme Court of the United States. And from what I have gleaned, and I mean, I read the SCOTUS blog, I mean, this is important to me because of my tariff business, it looks like the Supreme Court is going to rule. 80% chance they're going to rule that these IEEPA tariffs are unconstitutional. This creates a tremendous amount of uncertainty in the supply chain. Port arrivals are down 17% the last 30 days in Los Angeles. I'm telling you, as you know, tires, tires are a leading indicator of what's getting ready to happen. And I'm going to tell you, the ass has fallen off the donkey when you get this kind of economic. So what I'm saying is very easy for his, which I think his economic ideas are sensational because I'm a player in the game. But it's very easy for it to all get focused on inflation. And then when it all falls apart, we don't get the recovery because they keep delaying it. We could go into those midterms and as a business person, and I know you're a business person, you're going to understand what I'm saying. In business, I always plan for the worst case scenario if the best thing happens. God bless me. Thank you, Lord. But I always think what can go wrong here and what can go wrong is that we have an economic situation that is not conducive to putting money back into people's pockets, which adds to the challenge that we face as Republicans in that midterm. Is that a reasonable thing?

[D]

I'm saying, well, in Minnesota especially, well, and it's going to be nationally actually. But if the economy is doing good next year, next summer, these, the tariffs, everything else that he's put in place as far as economy wise bringing businesses back. Saudi Arabia I think just increased their proposed investments to a trillion dollars into the United States. If, if we, if our economy is doing well, midterm next year or mid summer, our chances of winning as Republicans in the state of Minnesota increase because even the Democrats have figured out this is kitchen table issues. The Democrats have lost their blue collar voters. They need to get them back. And if Trump through his policies is able to say the economy is better now, your Paychecks are going further now. That's our best chance to success because most of these races are tied to the national level. It has changed significantly over the years. So let's get back to that. But let's talk about the election a little bit more.

[David Penn]

The unity issue.

[D]

Yeah. So the four congressional members, Finstead, Stauber, Fischbach and Emmer, it's best for them to stay in their positions to maintain the House at the congressional level. So who's the. Who's the next round of likely candidates to run for governor in this state? That'd be the Senate or the House. That's why we see right now with this wide open field, because you don't have one member who would be head and shoulders above the rest or one candidate. I'm sorry, that is really head and shoulders above the rest. That's why we have this big field now. Somebody's going to step up a little bit more and. Or start building rapport, start gaining momentum. But right now it's kind of one of those fields where you're looking at it and going, well, which one is it going to be? It actually bodes well for our grassroots because the best way for success to get a candidate across the finish line against Walls is to endorse that candidate as soon as possible. Because time and money are of the essence, which means we can't have a primary strategically in the party. We cannot afford a primary. Our delegates have to get behind a candidate. And the candidates themselves have to realize that the bigger picture here is not them. It's defeating Walt. Because let's. Let's admit it, politics is a lot of pride. It's a lot of me going on in politics. I feel I'm the best candidate to run this. But we need to educate the delegates to make sure that their endorsement is a candidate that can win. That's a good candidate. That can be Walt. Is it everything that I would hope for as a candidate in my area? Probably not. But I've also got to understand that it's a statewide race. It's got. Whoever that candidate is, has to appeal to the metro and my area just as well.

[C]

What do you think makes the perfect snack?

[David Penn]

Hmm.

[D]

It's gotta be when I'm really craving it and it's convenient.

[C]

Could you be more specific?

[D]

When it's cravinient.

[David Penn]

Okay.

[D]

Like a freshly baked cookie made with real butter, available right down the street at am, pm Or a savory breakfast sandwich I can grab in just a.

[C]

Second at am, pm I'm Seeing a pattern here.

[D]

Well, yeah, we're talking about what I.

[C]

Crave, which is anything from am pm.

[D]

What more could you want?

[David Penn]

Stop by AM PM where the snacks and drinks are perfectly craveable and convenient. That's cravenience ampm. Too much good stuff.

[D]

There's a couple things I won't budge on. I would not get behind a candidate that isn't pro life. And I don't know that any of the candidates don't. Don't fit that category. And I'm also very strong in the Second Amendment. Those are the two things I want.

[David Penn]

I've been to some candidate forums. Representative Wiener. Oh, you've got. I'm gonna have to take you along with me to some of these.

[D]

Sure. You know, and some of that stuff.

[David Penn]

Because some of these people don't like to drive three and a half hours on a Wednesday night. They like to stay here, close to home.

[D]

Understand? But now this is what it comes down to. If we're going to build to beat walls, like I said, we can't afford to primary. The Democrats we know are going to outspend us 10 to 1. They're going to bring outside resources. They are going to. They have to prop up that machine. When we go to primary, if you have two, three candidates who have the financial means to do it, you're looking at millions of dollars spent. That's millions of dollars we're not spending against the Democrats. Now there's some people in politics that say, well, you're still campaigning, you're still building a base, you're still working. It's not the point. Because what you're doing is still differentiating yourself between another Republican in a primary, you need to be campaigning against the Democrats. We can't afford that primary. And then what we see also is with primaries is the division in the timeline. We have an endorsement that's probably going to happen end of May, beginning of June. That means if we go to primary, you're going to have June, July, August, that we have candidates who are beating up each other before they win the primary. But the camps themselves, if you are in a Kristen Robbins camp or if you're in a Lisa Demeth camp or a Kendall Quals or a Jensen, there's division. And what we see is when they go to primary and their candidate doesn't win, they don't turn up the vote, they don't help out the other candidates because you've spent the last three months beating up on each other. It's kind of hard to shake hands and get along after that, you've created that division. We can't do that this year.

[David Penn]

Well, okay. Now, I was at a candidate forum. I was talking about. It was down in Chanhassen. It was run by a PAC down there. Jensen was there, and Phil Parrish was there. Kendall Quals was there. There were some other gubernatorial candidates that were there. Brad Kohler was there.

[D]

Sure.

[David Penn]

And two of those candidates, that would be Scott Jensen and Phil Parish, were asked. I mean, they asked everybody would they honor the endorsement. Those two both said that they are not going to. They're going to primary. They're going to primary. I mean, I'm just. I heard it with my own ears now. Scott Jensen, you're welcome on this show. I've called you. You haven't answered my call. And we know each other for many years. You know what? Please, come on. Because if I got this wrong, I was talking to you about before we came on how every word is important. So I have to, like, just tell you, this is what I heard. It doesn't mean it's what he meant. You know, I heard. It doesn't mean I got it right, Scott. So if you want to come on and clarify this, because what Representative Weiner is saying is we can't afford to waste resources and tear each other up in a primary battle. But I heard both Phil Parrish and I heard Scott Jensen say, from my perspective, could have got it wrong, that they were going to primary, that they would not be living with the Minnesota GOP process. And I do want to say about Candle, Candle, who have a particular bone to pick with. And we talked about that up in Park Rapids. You know, Kendall, Kendall, you're welcome to come on here, too, brother. But you know what? I'm not going to forget what happened in 2024, because, you know, Royce White works at this studio, and I was at that convention, and, you know, he got 70% of the delegate votes on the first go round, and people loved it. And then the next day, paid operatives of the Republican Party, paid by the party, paid by the party came out. Michael Broadcorp, paid by the party, started trashing Royce. And I got a little bit of dog in this hunt because he trashed me, too. And then we had Dustin Gragey, who's still trashing Royce, who's on somebody's payroll, and we got Brian Strausser. These people are not out there on their own recognizance. They're organized. I know that. I'm not going to go into it, but I know they're organized. At least from my perspective. They trashed Royce Kendall immediately came out and endorsed Joe Frazier. So did Gazelka, Coleman, Boshwitz, Benson.

[D]

Sure.

[David Penn]

And, you know, so this is the. I am with you on this, but this is a recent wound for me personally, as. And I was a delegate to the convention. This really shocked me that this happened. This is part of me becoming political, understanding how the game works. And then there was all these allegations that Royce is anti Semitic, which is preposterous and insulting to me personally as a Jewish person born in America. And then there's all this stuff about his personal life, which is nobody's frigging business. You were just nice enough to say you and your wife don't always get along. Okay. You know, that's something we all have to deal with in our own homes. So let's not be throwing any rocks at anybody. No, his politics is solid. And they trashed. I mean, they really went out of their way to trash him. So we got a Senate race with the same issue. And what I'm going to say to you and put it up for your rebuttal, what you're saying is correct. From a theoretical perspective, like we were sitting around at the university in a classroom, this would be great. It's not what's going to happen. Or let's put it this way, if we are going to plan for the worst case scenario, we will have primaries. And I'm planning for it because people have said they're going to do it. And then what is the response to that? I mean, what do we say to each other? Because candidates have already come out and said we're not going to honor this process.

[D]

So I think, first of all, the delegates are imperative. We have to educate the delegates on what it takes to win a statewide race. Like I said before, it might not be the bread and butter candidate that I want in my area, but I have to look at William F. Buckley's rule, I always refer back to that. You find the most conservative candidate that is viable and you back them. Does that mean a candidate up in my area that I want is going to win in the metro? Maybe not. So I've got to factor that in. When it comes to the decision of endorsement, the delegates have to figure out. They have to be. We have to talk about these things, how important that endorsement is. It's gold.

[David Penn]

It's worth big money.

[D]

It is worth a ton of money. Federal money won't come in until either after the primary and people drop out or after. I'm sorry, after the Endorsement and people drop out or after the primary, which leaves us even a shorter time frame in order to win this. We cannot have that. So the candidates you say that are going to go straight to primary, I would say that the delegates have to look at that and say, I can't support that candidate because we're risking something bigger here. The delegates have to have to step up and say, because you won't abide by the endorsement, I will not endorse you. That has to be. That has to be said, I feel. So let's look at the endorsement. Let's talk about the value, because I think this is huge sampling. If you're going to bring a product to market and whatever it is, your bottle of water, you bring 10 people into the room and they sample that product, this is generally what you do with your test group, right? If you can get six out of 10 people that like that product, you have a product you can bring to market, you might have to tweak it. You might have to do different things in advertising because you want a higher percentage. Well, that's six out of ten. Is 60% the same as what the endorsement process is? And it actually follows a pattern. If you get 6 out of 10, great. If you sampled a hundred people and 6 out of 10 like the product, chances are 60 out of that hundred are going to like the same product. If you sampled a thousand people, it's going to be 600 out of a thousand. That's why the endorsed candidate wins 95% of the time. I think it's 95, 96%. So even the statistics of going against an endorsed candidate doesn't make sense.

[David Penn]

You're just saying going to primary based on the institutional support of the party and the history is a good predictor of future outcomes.

[D]

Exactly.

[David Penn]

Generally speaking. Generally speaking, although Walt's primaried and he did, it happens, doesn't it?

[D]

It happens. There is anomalies, but statistically what happens is that endorsed candidate has the best chance of winning in the primary. It's the way this works. It's simple statistics. Now, when we know that, look at what we have to do. And this is where we have to unify. We have to talk to those delegates. We have to make sure that if their candidate they're backing. And personally, I've made the comment I don't endorse candidates because I believe in that endorsement process. I believe that the delegates make that decision. And I've always said that when politicians become delegates, it's kind of an incestuous relationship. I Don't believe that the politicians should be state central delegates as well, because.

[David Penn]

Or, or serving on congressional district boards, perhaps. Would you go that far?

[D]

Take a look at that as well.

[David Penn]

Sorry to put you in a corner there.

[D]

I'm looking at the delegates right now because that's what we're talking about. I don't think we should be, we should be delegates when we hold office, especially state central or the endorsing convention, the people make that decision and I will back what they do. But I also feel that I have to educate them because there's things that I didn't know as a delegate that I wished somebody would explain to me. And that's why I'm kind of going into this with a little bit of depth.

[David Penn]

Well, a lot of, let me tell you, a lot of delegates are listening to you. So it's a good demonstration. This is a, I mean, we're making this space. You're making a case. And we do have a lot of delegates that listen to this podcast. And I think it's great because I think what I'm saying so far, before you get to your, your, your summary statement, what you're saying is the delegates need education. I want to say back what I'm hearing as a, as a delegate. Got to get educated on what this. From your perspective. Got to get educated on what the process is. We have to understand that there is a process that could lead to victory and that to siphon off energy from that process with internal battling could actually contribute to another trifecta, particularly within the context that 26 is not necessarily going to be as simple as some of the pundits in the party want to keep touting. And so there's an issue here that you're trying to really, what you're talking about is winning. You are laying out your vision of what is the best path to win, because you're in the pit with these people and you don't want to get put on the sidelines for another two years. Haven't already done that. 23, 24.

[D]

I've seen the trifecta.

[David Penn]

So what you're saying is our state.

[D]

Can'T afford to go back to our state trifecta.

[David Penn]

That's the point you're making.

[D]

How do we get everybody on the same page? We have to explain it. We have to say why we can't afford to do this again and we have to move forward. It's. I don't know. To me it seems kind of simple, but at the same time, there's a lot of people that don't know the inside politics. Let's look at if you're training, if you're an athlete, do you spend time doing things that are, That wouldn't help you in your training process? So let's just say you're an Olympic athlete, right? And every day you're eating good food and you're exercising and you're getting maybe massages at the end of the day and you're taking, getting plenty of rest and all that stuff. Do you go out and drink on a regular basis? Probably not, because it takes away from your main focus and your main goal. When we're talking about politics and winning the state in the Minnesota, in Minnesota, we can't afford drinking that, you know, things that are going to take us away from winning. And that's what I mean when I talk about the endorsement or, I'm sorry, the primary that takes away from our winning that, that spending time and effort that we don't, we can't afford. If you want to be, if you want to go against this Democrat machine, we cannot afford the distractions. We cannot afford anything that's going to take away from our main goal here. We can't do it. Primaries are going to kill us in this state. Now, there was groups before that said we need to go, we just need to get rid of the caucuses. Some of those groups are starting to figure out too, that this election cycle, I've had conversations with more and more people saying you need to get behind an endorsed candidate as quickly as possible and we need to get the money behind that endorsed candidate as quickly as possible. Three months worth of campaigning, millions of dollars worth of worth of money spent in a primary we simply don't have. It's a distraction from the bigger goal. That's where our unity needs to come in. That's where we need to talk to the delegates. And I hope this message is well received. They are critical in this. They need to become educated on those candidates. They need to understand that their endorsement is absolutely gold and we need to move forward behind a candidate as quickly as possible, knowing what the Democrats are going to do against us. We have to. Otherwise, the other option of this, like we said before, is another Democrat trifecta in this state.

[David Penn]

Well, not, not necessarily, but you're what you're saying strategically, strategically, we're better off unifying and taking those three months in that money and getting it behind one person that would be better in the Art of war. Is what you're saying a better strategy?

[D]

It is, I think, the only strategy that we have, if they get walls across the finish line, the Senate is already in Democrats hands. Now there's the potential to flip that. There's basically four Senate seats at Kupec and Morehead House, Child in the Iron Range, Putnam in St. Cloud and Seaburger would be the four. Is it possible to flip some of those? Yeah, it is, yeah, we need some good candidates. But we also know midterm is really tough for the party that's in the White House and that that rolls down to those Senate seats in our state. The House is tied.

[David Penn]

We got two special elections coming up very shortly.

[D]

Exactly.

[David Penn]

Okay, I have a response I wanted to share with you just something because we're talking friends, we're talking. Okay, so the institutional support in the party is for candidates that are not aligned with the base of the party. I'm just going to speak for the base of the party because this podcast really speaks to the base. Now we got the Action for Liberty people out there which are not really fond of me. Cuz I have everybody on that'll come on. So you know, I'm invited. I've invited Kristen Robbins to come on, Lisa can come on. Anybody that would like to come on that would like to speak to this cohort of citizens. There's a lot of people that, I mean Jim Nash is not gonna come on here. It's just not okay. There's a division in the party. I mean you being here doesn't really say what's, you know, where you are in that division. And I'm not asking you to self reveal but the fact that you're coming on, at least the people that are listening here are important to you as base participants in the party and Minnesota citizens. We're not going to cut out anybody. And I'm saying in the preamble I said hey, I'm all about unity. I tried. It's not me that's beating down folks like me. I want to get along with everybody. I don't have a problem. I've never, I mean there's a few Republicans I don't like. But most of the time even if I don't agree with people, I'm okay with them as long as they don't lie to me. But the reality now, now we've got this perfect template now we're into reality and here's reality. There is a very large number of people in this party that have had it with the candidates in the machine that spit out those candidates. And so those people, here's what I say to them, I'm going to tell you what my strategy is. I'm just going to. Because I say it all the time on the podcast. Sure, there's going to be a primary because I'm listening to what people say. Scott, if you'd like to come out and correct me, you're more than welcome. If you're going to honor the primary process, just come on and tell me because I don't want to misquote you. Same thing with Phil. But I think these people have said they're going to primary. So there's going to be a primary, it seems to me, I think maybe not you might be able to get the delegates motivated. But what I'm saying on my podcast, because I'm into all about strategy and tactics, I'm all about, and this is my kudos to Dan Schultz, precinct strategy, which I want to talk about some other ideas about how these campaigns can be used to organize the state party. Because if the party was stronger, stronger if every billet was filled, and let me give you an example. I'm in CD3. My Senate district is SD45. There's no precinct action at all. There's no get out the vote mechanism. And that's the only purpose of a party, is to get out low propensity Republican leaning voters who don't vote, particularly in off year elections. We don't have that. So we haven't built that. Let's talk about that in a second. But what I'm telling my audience, because I'm a realist and I'm planning for the worst and the worst is there'll be a primary. Hey, you know what? The day after the primary, I don't care who's got that R after their name, I'm going to door knock for them and I'm going to promote them on this podcast because I agree with you. So what I'm saying, you said after.

[D]

The primary, if it happens, I say it's got to be after the endorsement. It has to be.

[David Penn]

But if there's a primary, it's a reality.

[D]

And this is where the delegates have their strength. If a candidate doesn't say that he, he or she would abide by the endorsement, don't endorse them. The bigger picture is we have to win. And if somebody says after they lose the endorsement that they're going to primary, our delegates should be up in arms against that individual because what they're doing is risking us losing this election again and handing it to walls.

[David Penn]

And what you're saying I'm saying the.

[D]

Grassroots has an incredible amount of strength. I'm sorry, not grassroots, the delegates. They have an incredible amount of strength. Their endorsement is gold.

[David Penn]

That, that's why in these forums they ask will you honor the process?

[D]

That's right. But now if you have a candidate that says they will abide by the endorsement, doesn't get it, and then goes to primary, you should have this huge outcry from the delegates. No faith in that person. You know, up in our area we have the Amish and they have shunning. If you're not part of the group. If we have a candidate that does that, we basically need to shun that candidate.

[David Penn]

Okay, so let me just break this back down into strategy and tactics. First of all, I'm going to take issue and say the worst case scenario I'm planning for there is going to be a primary. I'm not saying it's preferred, I'm saying I'm just going on what people are saying in the gubernatorial field. So I'm saying the day after that primary, if we can't unify after the convention, the day after the primary, hey, if your guy doesn't make it or your gal doesn't make it, hey, knock it off. We. Because what I'm hearing you say is, you're speaking about this from personal experience. You're saying, hey, 23, 24, I lived it, don't do that to me again people, I'm giving you the wake up call. The state can't afford another trifecta. So everything we need to do to avoid that, we need to be thinking about that strategically and tactically. Am I hearing you correctly?

[D]

Yes. We've seen in this state, when you have Omar Fattah and many others in the metro, around the metro who are socialist, they're self avowed socialists. And in the Democrat party they are picking up more and more steam. The Democrat. The socialists in the Democrat party are gaining more and more power. Not just in their party, in their party, not just in Minnesota, but across the nation. When you got Mandami winning his election out in New York in aoc. Exactly. We are facing an opponent here that wants to crush us. This is the story of the 1. As a maintenance supervisor at a manufacturing facility, he knows keeping the line up and running is a top priority. That's why he chooses Grainger. Because when a drive belt gets damaged, Grainger makes it easy to find the exact specs for the replacement product he needs. And next day delivery helps ensure he'll have everything in place and running like clockwork. Call 1-800-GRAINGER click granger.com or just stop by Grainger for the ones who get it done. So are we going to fight amongst ourselves or are we going to get behind a candidate as soon as possible? The alternative is horrible.

[David Penn]

I agree with you. Except. Except my exception is candidates that have a history of conceding and collaborating with the Democrat to govern. To govern. To govern, are really now governing with socialists. So there's a base in this party of which I am aligned, that want a more muscular, more principle driven party. See, this is the issue. There's two issues. Number one, we have a platform. If we're going to do what you're saying, that platform becomes very important because that is our rally point. That's number one. And number two, what you're saying really is toothless. You want to put teeth into it. Every elected official, every time you go in front of a group of people, urge them to go to caucus and become part of the party. Urge them. And then we can go all around the state and teach and share how to get out the vote. Because if this party could really drive out the vote, then that endorsement would be a insurmountable power. But see, without that actual grassroots participation at the precinct level. Let's build that. No, no, I agree with you. No, I'm agreeing with you. I'm saying you want to make this thing work, we need a platform that we actually follow. Because, see, some of our, like you said, life. Oh, hey, I was at the forums. Some of these people on that life issue, they're a little shaky on that 2A issue. Oh, they're real shaky. Okay, so we have a platform that we have candidates that do not honor, number one. And number two, if we really want to make this work, every time I see you in front of a crowd, what I'm asking you to do, and Walter Hudson and Drew Roach and everybody else that comes on here, Pam Altendorf, thanks for coming on and all the people are welcome. Bring them on down with you. We gotta get. There's 4,100 precincts in this state and every precinct needs a precinct captain who's gonna get out the vote. And you know how many precinct captains we got to get out the vote. I'm going to make a prediction. Zero.

[D]

And right now I spend as much time looking at Democrat stuff as I do Republican stuff. On their own web page, on their own, the Democrats sites, what are they promoting? Caucus training. Right now, they're going across the state and doing caucus training. What Are we doing. What is our state party doing? We need to. To your point, when I saw that, and then I. I compare that to our situation out in the CD7, where there's a huge conflict out there and an inability to get some of the things in place that we need to get in place.

[David Penn]

And where's that coming from? If you want to put your neck out there in the guillotine, where is that resistance and that lack of congruity really emanating from? Because I'll say it if you won't. You want to. I'm giving you a spot.

[D]

I'm going to say this. There's fault on both sides, and I do believe that firmly there is. We can. We can point blame all we want. How is that going to solve this problem? How will it. Will it come to a solution? I've had.

[David Penn]

I have a question. I have a question for you.

[D]

I've had conversations in the last weeks about CD7 and what we're going to do, and I've said, look, we should be fundraising out here, we should be doing caucus training, we should be doing all these other things.

[David Penn]

And all this energy is going into.

[D]

Conflict, and it's going into conflict.

[David Penn]

I want your opinion, if you'll share it with me. You say there's blame on both sides. Well, I only see the blame on one side. I don't see it on the other side. I don't see it in the Brett Busman, Steve Boyd, Otter Tail people. And if you want to tell me, I'm listening. What is the. What is the blame there?

[D]

When I tell my kids this on a regular basis, when they come to me and say, so and so did this, so and so did that, And I always say the same thing. What did you do? Well, I didn't do nothing. That's always the same response. No, no, no. We create about 90% of our own problems most of the time.

[David Penn]

But what did they do? I mean, I don't know. I'm not in CD7. What did they do?

[D]

So when there was a change in leadership, but you saw the structure of the board, there was not enough votes. I will say Brett, as a leader, did not have enough votes to do some of the things that he wanted to do, simply didn't have it. And. And that's the way these boards are work. If you don't have enough people supporting your ideas, there's going to be conflict. So now you have to carefully pick your battles. There was some things that were done as far as I don't agree with airing dirty laundry, which there was an email or a message that went out publicly on Facebook. Now you've created that conflict. That didn't need to be done.

[David Penn]

You're saying there was some bad tactics used?

[D]

There was some bad tactics used. Absolutely.

[David Penn]

In your opinion.

[D]

Do I. Do I. I look at both sides of that conflict, and I see some good people on both sides of this conflict. And then I look at. Okay, you guys can keep fighting about this, or we can actually do something productive. What's it going to be? You can stand there and fight all you want, or we can get something done. I care less about the squabble and more about what we're gonna. What we're going to do. Because I use this line all the time. Our best days are not behind us. They're in front of us. But it's up to us to make that happen. So when we have that conflict and those struggles, you guys. You guys can look at this and say, the sky is falling and we can't get nothing done because of this, that or the other issue. Go right ahead. It's up to us to make it happen if we want something better. Sometimes that's bending a little bit. Sometimes that's offering a mea culpa and apologizing even though you don't want to. What's it going to be? Are you going to keep fighting? And maybe this comes back to my Catholic upbringing and my mother with seven of us boys, dad was working all the time to put food on the table. She was the disciplinarian. And when we. When we were fighting, she would give us other chores to do. Quit focusing on this. Our bigger picture here, our biggest conflict, is the Democrats, but we're focusing on this. Why are we doing this?

[David Penn]

You know what? I'm in the center of this fight, and I have been here in CD3, and, you know, I've done exactly what you're just saying. I put down the fight, wasted my personal energy, and I'm just organizing. I mean, I'm just organizing. I'm just going out and doing what I think is right to create unity. You mentioned we had on a leader of the Hmong community. We've had leaders of the Somali community on. You know, I'm just trying to bring everybody together the best I can. I'm working in my precinct. I'm going all around the state, meeting people. We run into each other from time to time. And I'm not really into the conflict because you know what it is? It's a numbers game. So all of the. All of the squabbling. You're right. It takes away from getting things done. But I'm going to say what would really get things done is staffing 4,100 precincts. That would be. You want to talk about teeth in the endorsement process? Oh, that's called a. That's called a functioning party.

[D]

We should be getting as many delegates to caucus as we can.

[David Penn]

Citizens to caucus.

[D]

Sorry. I'm sorry. Yes, citizens. And explaining how important this next election cycle is. And if you want, say. And that's part of the reason I became a delegate to begin with. It's part of the reason I went to caucus.

[David Penn]

Caucus at the beginning. Back before you became elected.

[D]

That's right. I wanted to have say in who was going to be on the ticket, not just to get. Not to just decide. One of the decisions had already been made. I'm going to check this box for this candidate. The decisions were made way before that. I had to figure out, as a delegate or going to caucus, that my voice and who I backed, who I supported, who I made decisions for are the. Is what happened to put the names on the ballot?

[David Penn]

Well, here's a question. Elected representative. What's more important right now? A principled candidate or candidate that can raise money?

[D]

That's a difficult question. I prefer principles.

[David Penn]

Well, see, now I'm pulling you over into the muck and mire of this.

[D]

At the same time. Let me say this. Do you think by coming on this podcast, there's going to be people who are going to attack me for doing it?

[David Penn]

I hope I'm getting to be seen differently now. Well, I hope so, because I'm working at trying to make this a forum of just open dialogue and discussion.

[D]

But there'll be people who will say, oh, you're on Penn's podcast, therefore you fall into this camp. We don't want anything to do with you.

[David Penn]

You're really speaking for them, too, on the podcast, and I'm respecting you doing it. I mean, really, if we really wanted to pull back the curtain. You're saying something that I know is not going to happen. I'm saying I agree with you because I do, theoretically. But I know we're going to be fighting it out, and I'm all for the fight. And I'll tell you why I'm for the fight. Let me just share with you. I just asked you the question. You paused for a second. It was a tough question. Principal candidate, money. You know, if you can raise money to get elected at a statewide level, that Money. That money is where your allegiance is. If you got no money, your allegiance is the people. Here's the problem. We don't have enough people. See, if more people came into the process, if we had 4,100 precinct captains, if we had a functioning party that actually worked and we had a platform that we were proud of and we could really promote it and speak to it.

[D]

Hey, there's a differentiation there. You said principles.

[David Penn]

Right?

[D]

Now the platform is a little bit different because my thought process is on that my principles are going to be different than somebody else's. So it's kind of like dad used to have great sayings, but common sense isn't that common. Right. But he also said common sense, between you and me, is two different things.

[David Penn]

Well, you made the comment that if they're not pro life, you're not with them.

[D]

That's my stance on this.

[David Penn]

Okay, CD3. CD3. My chairman here, Stan Hamilton and his pal Rod Kern, they're promoting changing the stance of the Republican Party to more. I mean, you know what I'm, you know this is going on, right?

[D]

Oh, yeah.

[David Penn]

So, you know, we have, like you say, we don't agree. And I keep telling these people in CD3, if you keep pushing this change, you're not going to get any liberal people to vote for us here in CD3 and you're going to piss off all the outstate people that are really Christian.

[D]

Well, you know what the Democrats have done, even in my area, they've changed their messaging. Instead of being pro choice, what they're saying is that, and it's the mantra that they almost pushed in the 70s to get Roe vs. Wade, Roe v. Wade passed was they need to be abortions need to be accessible and few and far between.

[David Penn]

Right.

[D]

That's the messaging that Democrats in my area are pushing.

[David Penn]

Greats million last year, 1 million deaths.

[D]

I'm saying that that's what they're doing is changing their messaging. Our messaging on abortion I think should change a little bit too, because let's look at abortions. We run away from this and say this is a topic that we can't win on. I disagree. And the reason I say this is because if you look at the statistics, 70% of women, or it's nearly 70, like 68, 69% of women that have an abortion say they wouldn't have one if they had support. There are groups that are going across the state of Minnesota and the North Dakotas and they're course post abortive ladies Pals is their name and they describe some of the stuff that's going on after they go in and have an abortion, how the industry just kicks them out. Basically. They don't talk about the mental health issues. They don't talk about addiction. Addiction skyrockets after an abortion. Mental health issues skyrocket after an abortion. So as Republicans, let's talk about some of these things. I don't think that we would have nearly as many abortions if we supported pregnant women.

[David Penn]

You know what, here's another one to talk about. Hey, men, Men. Hey, are you a man? Step on up, man.

[D]

Okay, that's right.

[David Penn]

I mean we have to be responsible for our actions. That's self governance. I'm not.

[D]

Absolutely.

[David Penn]

We've had lust and out of wed like birth since the beginning of time. Okay, but what are men going to do? You know, you want to take. See, this is why I wish we had a party where we could go to any precinct and have a meeting and have young people there and talk to them and mentor them. I mean, really, we have an educational challenge and we completely underestimate and downplay the importance of what it is we're doing. Culturally, we're too focused politically. This is a cultural issue we're talking about.

[D]

So you had the guy from Rasmussen, what was his name? Mitchell.

[David Penn]

Mark Mitchell.

[D]

Mitchell. And some of the statistics and the differences between what is 18 to 25 year olds and what they want, men and women, what the differences that they.

[David Penn]

Want out of life, crushing for men.

[D]

Yes, but and here's an interesting thing. Men tend to lead a curve, so to speak, a societal curve. Men stopped going to church before women did. And I think now when you see that men are wanting to have babies again, that's the start of that societal curve. That's the start of the shift that's going to happen and women will follow. Michael Knowles talked about this in one of his podcasts recently and I thought he explained it so well. Men are saying we want to have families. Okay? First of all, don't have them out of wedlock. Don't have kids out of wedlock. If you want success in life, there's basically the three of the things that will, will statistically set you up is don't have children before you get married. Once you're married, stay married and raise as many kids as you raise a healthy, happy family. Success follows those three things.

[David Penn]

So blessings follow those three things.

[D]

Blessings follow those three things.

[David Penn]

You look at it from a religious frame.

[D]

So now when you have a married couple with a, with, with the family and they devote themselves to each other, success, a house, car, all those things you're gaining together and that builds a strong society. When we see the negative that we have in our society right now, I believe a lot of this becomes from, you know, the single family homes, the structures that have broken down in our society, the societal norms, those are all feeding the negative things in our society. If we want to get back to a healthy, happy, you know, functioning 50s sort of society. What did they do? The statistics said 90 some percent of people were married and had a family. We're not doing that anymore.

[David Penn]

Actually, there's going to be a point.

[D]

We're going kind of down a rabble.

[David Penn]

No, no, we're not. Because, you know, it's all part and parcel of the same, just a little different. Here comes winter. In winter, good tires aren't a luxury. They're a necessity for safety. @ Tireget.com Getting your winter tires is quick, easy and priced right. With Tireget.com you order online, install right by your house, and stay safe on the road this winter season. And I do want to say one thing, saying, going back to the 50s, I was out several times recently with people in CD5 because I'm trying to work down there with the urban voters. You know what they tell me down there? Nobody shows up from the Republican Party. I went over to the Arcade Street VFW in St. Paul, Man. I was asked to go over there by a party member. She said, will you come over and talk about precincts? I said, sure. This woman, her name's Kathleen Quist. And hi, Kathleen. If you're listening, thank you for setting that up and I'll come back. She had tablecloths and she had enough pizza for 100 people. Seven people showed up. She was embarrassed. And you know what? These people reminded me they were Republicans in the district. You may be a little too young. When I was young, like in my 20s was like in the 70s, there was these Japanese soldiers that were in the jungles and they didn't get the message. The war was over. So 20 years later, they were coming out of the jungles and they had this look on their face like, damn, I've been abandoned. That's what those Republicans look like to me. In St. Paul, the party does nothing for those people. They don't give them anything. And you know, when the party writes off the urban voters, we'll never win. The state can't. When the party writes off what Walter Hudson calls emergency emerging constituencies, which I'm trying to highlight here, Hmongs Smalleys can't get anything done. And then all the Christians that are not voting, allegedly, according to the party, you know, we're talking about strategy and tactics. We gotta attenuate our efforts to where the votes are. But I'm gonna say to you, because we're gonna close soon, my plea to all the elected representatives and they don't do it. I mean, the party, we don't need any more Republicans. Alex Plakish, I was on a board with him for two years. The board was trying to pursue some political dialogue. He said, we don't do politics here. What do we do here? Why am I involved in the Republican Party of Minnesota? No, we don't do politics here. I call him Mr. We don't do that here. So when we have this kind of barrier to change, it creates division. If we would just embrace each other and talk to each other and listen to each other, because I want to say this to you, this is my summary statement on this primary thing. I watched the Republican Party walk around. Well, Dustin Grage is a perfect one. We're going to win. We're going to win. We can win if we just put our mind to it. You know, it's an off year election 22. Was President Trump on the ballot in 22? No. If you look at the electoral map since 2016, it's not, in my opinion, it's not Mingop that's driving the state, it's President Trump drove the state in a direction. Would you agree with that?

[D]

The national politics heavily influenced state elections.

[David Penn]

Can we not have a party that goes around all of us, goes to every precinct, every city, every county, every board and start to promote citizen participation in the Republican Party of Minnesota. Why is the party resist. The party has told leadership, has told me directly, don't do that. You know, I'm just going to tell you that is my interpretation of leadership's opinion about this.

[D]

So I've run into some of that when I first got involved in politics and was told some of the same things that you were being told. We're not going to put any money into this. And if you're going to do it, do it yourself. And we did. Because this is a volunteer organization. Tell me where I can't do some of these things. Show me where it says in our rules and bylaws that I can't set up caucus training. Show me.

[David Penn]

I'm doing it.

[D]

Exactly. So the party is what we make of it. We can do pretty much whatever we want. What are you, you're going to tell me I can't train people to show up to caucus to make them better educated delegates. Good luck.

[David Penn]

And you know what? If I'm going to go out there and start organizing, which I am, and I've got all this media, which I do, and the party looks at this and it goes, man, look what this asshole's doing. And they do it themselves. That's just more Republicanism. That's great. We can unify, you know, in other words, by holding people accountable, not by squabbling, but by action. And action. We need action. We need people in the streets doing the deal we do.

[D]

And we often hear, how come the party isn't doing this? How can the BPO isn't doing this? How come the CD level isn't doing this? Nothing stopping you from doing it yourself.

[David Penn]

I am doing it myself and that's.

[D]

What I'm telling people across the state. So actually, after I'm done here, a meeting with a group of people down here in the metro, because one of the things that you brought up before we hear from people in the metro, and it might even been one of your guests, that we only see these people when it's election time. I'm not running for anything other than my House district, and yet I'm going to meet some people down here in the metro who feel abandoned.

[David Penn]

Great.

[D]

This morning.

[David Penn]

That's your own choice to do that. You're doing it at your own volition.

[D]

And I have gotten grief for doing things out of my district.

[David Penn]

Stay in your lane, Mike.

[D]

Stay in my lane?

[David Penn]

No, no. The lane is the state of Minnesota.

[D]

That's right. Because every decision that happens in this state is going to affect me one way or another when it comes to politics. I'm not campaigning down here. What I'm trying to do is help win this state back. And if that bothers you as a Republican, I don't know what to tell you, but you cannot stop me from being a Republican down in the metro or in my area. You can't stop me from talking to people in the metro or outside of my area. If a BPoU invites me to come in and talk to them, that's not my area. You'll do it and talk to them?

[David Penn]

Of course.

[D]

And I usually catch heck for doing that.

[David Penn]

Catch hack. Hey, the people that are giving you hack when you're there, tell them I'm doing the same thing. And let's drop the bullshit and let's start to really work our asses off. I'm working really hard to make positive change And I will unify.

[D]

That's, that's my message, is we should be able to go anywhere in this state and talk to people. If they don't like it, that's not my fault. I'm doing what I see as best. But I'm not coming out and attacking somebody else if because they don't like me in their area. I think it's counterproductive. If I go give a talk in St. Cloud, why can't I tell me where? It says anywhere in our party rules on our platform that I can't give a talk to a group of college kids in St. Cloud.

[David Penn]

Oh, hey. For the people that might be listening because they want to throw bricks at you or me, I'm going to tell you how I do it. I do a lot of outreach and here's what I tell people. I have a political opinion, but that's not why I'm here. I'm here to get you involved in the caucus system. And I don't care if these people are silk stocking country clubbers or they're the most out there. Far right. Not just right, far right. I don't care if they want a caucus with the Republican Party. Let them come into the party and let's vote it out. Let's clarify this over time because we do have a problem in the party. It's not going to go away. And what will solve it is which one of these two groups is going to go out and get the most people. It's a numbers game.

[D]

The numbers game, Our government is of the people, by the people and for the people. And our party is basically the same way. You get people to show up. It's a numbers game. Make it of the people, by the people and for the people, for our party.

[David Penn]

And you recognize there's people in the party that resist that tracked.

[D]

Sure.

[David Penn]

That sucks.

[D]

I get the pressure all the time.

[David Penn]

That sucks. I mean, really, that just sucks. Because now a volunteer organization, you really don't have really any power. You're volunteering to serve your community and you're trying to marshal your power and control it and keep other citizens out of participation. Now, I disagree with that. No.

[D]

At the same time, human nature is a complicated thing, but it follows patterns as well. Right? It's not just in Republican Party where this happens. Oh, 100 people will tear you down for being successful. They will attack you for, you know, whatever reason they want, whatever specific thing they don't like about you, they'll attack you for. So in the Republican Party we can choose to react to those attacks, or we can just do what we're going to do.

[David Penn]

I'm just going to keep organizing, really. I mean, I'm just going to keep organizing and I don't, you know, I don't have a bone to pick with anybody. I just want more. I want one captain in 4,100 precincts and then I want to train and work with those people to get out the vote. I'm working in my neighborhood. I mean, really, you're an elected official. You have a statewide platform. The rest of us pay attention to your neighbors. Hey, Tanner, I got a question. Yeah? Do you know your neighbors in the apartment?

[E]

Yeah, a couple. Not the whole apartment complex, by the.

[David Penn]

Way, but the next people you know.

[E]

Yeah, yeah, I know.

[David Penn]

I mean, I'm going to tell you down here in the Metro, if you ask people in CD3, do you know your neighbors? They don't. They don't know them. You know your neighbors though, don't you?

[D]

On a probably first name basis. I was just thinking of the circle around us that, you know, I could tell you who lived in their house before they did.

[David Penn]

I mean, this is, that's, that's. That's community. What, what I'm really trying to drive at here, Mike, and I'm doing it with you. I mean, I think we're friends now. We have a relationship. I mean, I would call you a friend. And I know we're not 100% aligned. Maybe we are. As we were saying before we walked in, you have a completely different set of pressures that impinge upon you than do I. But what we're really talking about is making a community of Republicans that's statewide, an actual family of people that ascribe to the philosophy of republicanism, which is about self governance, which is why I thought it was cool. We started out talking about hunting and fishing and putting food on the table and having a well and having a wood burning stove and having a forest in the backyard. You know, I bet you got chainsaws, but I bet you got axes and hatchets too, don't you?

[D]

Yes, we do.

[David Penn]

Okay. I mean, I love chopping. Invite me up sometime just to chop wood. I haven't chopped wood for a while. But, you know, it's just important now, I think, strategically and tactically that we start to make real relationships with people, real ones, where we really don't have to agree with people 100%. Just have to be friends and be able to talk and not be putting each other down just because of an ideological division. No, we're on the same side of the football. When I come out and say, hey, Representative Ammer, yeah, maybe a little bit hard on you now that I understand the better because I'm more mature about the pressures you're facing, doesn't mean I agree. It's just that when the push comes to shove, I would like to think we're on the same side of the football. I'm not sure, but I would like to believe we're on the same side of the football. All the Republicans, the unity you're seeking is. And if we're not on the same side of the football and we're calling ourselves Republicans, that's what we're trying to sort out, isn't it?

[D]

Well, there, there is some of that, of course, but you're always going to run into that. I think the thing is, who is our real opponent here? Who was our real enemy? George Washington when he was president, Revolutionary War. Part of the biggest problem he, in his early writings was, was spies, was subversion. He didn't think that was how you function as self respecting people. Politics has got a lot of that into it. We've got to understand it, we've got to see it, we got to recognize it. Some people will say we have to call it out on a regular basis. Yep, it's there, we know it. But my thought is, if I'm not doing good enough job of articulating why we need to join together, why the people who are are breaking things apart and causing division, maybe I'm not saying that. Right. I've got to say why we need to unify versus the people who cause division. I don't have to attack them on a regular basis. I don't have to say that I have to articulate a better message and a better reason for doing what I'm doing. Well, you're living people. If people need to get or want to get behind that, then great.

[David Penn]

Well, no, but you're laying out a vision of unity as a guy who lived through 23, 24 and you're saying, please don't let that happen to me again. It's awful. And the results for the state is going to be awful and it's going to be awful for Republicans. I think you have a very compelling argument in that. And I think that we need to be unified. And I think this is my own perspective. I think we can fight and be unified simultaneously. I can walk and chew bubble gum and at the same time I don't think everybody can do that. I mean, I don't have any personal animus towards anybody I disagree with. But of course, I'm a very experienced business person, and I just. It's just business. It's not personal. So for me to unify. And I've trashed Christian Robbins in two podcasts. But if she's the endorsed candidate, I will support her, you know, because I want. Because I understand what you're saying. The ultimate enemy is communism. That is the ultimate thing that we're fighting here.

[D]

I was doing some more studying recently on Margaret Thatcher, and it was amazing what she came up with and what she talked about. And this resurgence of communism and socialism, it comes in waves, and we're dealing with another one right now. We have to be. We have to realize how serious that is. We've let education get completely out of control.

[David Penn]

Just.

[D]

We have young people who are looking at socialism and saying it's a good thing. I'm old enough to remember when the wall came down in eastern. In Germany, right. It was a really bad time. That was a really bad way of living for those people. Socialism and communism killed so many people, it's unbelievable. We always hear about the 6 million Jews in Germany, concentration camps. What about the 40 to 50 million that were starved to get to death by the socialists, by the communists in Russia? Do we really want those people? Do we really want a socialist communist mindset running our country? Because they are coming back full force. They had made incredible inroads in the United states in the 20s, 30s. We went through the McCarthy era, which was basically pushing that down. It drove it underground to a certain extent.

[David Penn]

Came back in the 60s.

[D]

Came back in the 60s, exactly.

[David Penn]

Got beat down again. The silent majority came forward.

[D]

That's right. And we are dealing with it again today. And if we don't get our stuff together, do we really want a socialist country? Do we really want a communist country? I don't.

[David Penn]

I don't either.

[D]

I don't.

[David Penn]

We're united in that. And this is. And this is really what it really comes down to. It takes some courage now to say these things. What you're saying is not part and parcel of everyday republican discourse. What you're saying is we're fighting communism. Are we on the same side of the football now? And what I'm saying is there's a set of principles here. There's a set of principles, because I'm going to just break it down one step further. Communism is pitched to people as an economic strategy. I think it's a theological strategy. So, you know, if you have faith In God, could be Allah, could be Yahweh, could be Christ. But if you're a person of faith, because, you know, under our republican form of governance, we can believe what we want to believe, right? If you believe in God, if you believe in something we don't understand bigger than us, that's what they want to take away. They don't want me to be answering to a higher power because then I'm going to be as ethical and moral as I can be under my own recognizance. They don't want that. They want to set the rules set by man. I mean, we have very clear principles to defend, to speak about eloquently. And I'm going to say if people in the party. This is another little squabble thing. We squabble with the Democrats about, you know, picking the dandruff out of their combs. We got big time arguments to have here now that we can rally our Republicanism around. But who are the. Who are the eloquent articulators of that idea? Well, we. You're getting there. We got to get the people out in front talking about the danger that we face and treat the. Treat the citizens as if they are not 12 years old because there's too much of this talking down to the citizens. And this discourse is pissing me off. We got to elevate the. If we're going to beat the communists, we got to elevate the citizens.

[D]

So everybody says that history repeats itself. Mark Twain said history doesn't repeat itself, but it sure rhymes. We see this, and I love reading, I love studying. It's. You see the patterns. Last summer, what I wanted, I got through most of it. History of the Russian Revolution by Trotsky. I needed to read that. And now Margaret Thatcher, seeing how these things developed. And when you talk about a godlessness, well, communism and socialism is godlessness and it replaces it with the state. The state is the ultimate power. Then instead of God, that's what we're looking at and that's what we see in government. When every solution to every problem is government is government. And I disagree.

[David Penn]

And you're right in that government. And you know the fastest way. This is why the action for liberty people are so strident. They want the government shrunk, budget wise, you know, starve the beast. Because we already see this is an art. Tanner.

[D]

Yeah.

[David Penn]

Can we go over two hours? Are we two hours?

[E]

Two hours is probably max.

[David Penn]

Okay, we got 11 minutes. So I just want to say we've.

[D]

Been on two Hours already.

[David Penn]

Yeah.

[D]

Holy smokes.

[David Penn]

It's great to talk, right? You know, it's great to have you and thank you for coming and for the people that are going to judge against you for being here. I invite them to come on these kind of conferences, put them right here, and let's have these dialogues publicly. Because I know these people that oppose where I'm coming from have very valid things to say that I could learn from. And what they don't get is I'll listen to them. I want to learn. We're not going to have unity if we don't talk to each other. That's really critical. But this a 4L crowd, which I respect and I repost a lot of stuff that Jesse Smith writes because he writes some great stuff. What they really their bone to pick is, you know, starve the beast. And you're in the beast. And so what I want to say in this last few minutes, we're sold this lie from kindergarten all the way through graduate school. And the lie is you got the far right, which includes the Christians, the right, which they put the Nazis over on the right. And then you have the far left, which is the communists. And democracy is in the center, which, first of all, we don't live in a democracy. But let's just. This audience knows that. But this organization, this worldview that has been implanted into everyone's head is so false because the Nazis are leftists.

[D]

Yes, they are.

[David Penn]

So you got the communists on the far left, the Nazis are on the left. And then where is really a republic? Well, where a republic is, is right at the edge of chaos because we're self governing. And what the impetus is in government is to govern. Like if you go to a surgeon, you're going to have surgery. You go to a lawyer, you're going to litigate. You don't have your big government, it's going to govern you. And what we want to do, I, what I want to do is have people self govern. So the whole constellation of how we think about this political spectrum is not correct.

[D]

See, and even the term self govern, I tend to view it or describe it a little bit different. I say it's empowering the individual because I believe that the individual makes the best decisions for themselves. And then it becomes, you know, the family, they make the best decisions for themselves. When government says I'm entitled to 40%, 50% of every dollar that you earn, you are taking away that individual's right to figure out what they need to spend that money on. This is a Problem. And I think that's where. When you have groups like Action for Liberty saying they want to shrink, shrink the size of government, most people go, well, what does that mean? I say, I want to empower the individual. I want you to make the decisions for yourself and not have a bureaucrat that has no idea who you are. You're just a number tell you how to live your life, how to spend your money. I don't want bureaucrats tell you how to run your business. We talked about the paid family medical leave before we came on the air. Businesses used to offer that as a benefit to pull employees in. Now the state is telling you, you have to do this.

[David Penn]

You're the same as everybody else.

[D]

Exactly right.

[David Penn]

Part of a cookie cutter approach to life.

[D]

And we took this, or we talked about it a little bit before we came on. The unions should be upset about the paid family medical leave because it's taken.

[David Penn]

Away their claim to fame.

[D]

It absolutely just made the unions irrelevant because now government can step in and tell you what to do with your businesses. What's the point of having a union if the government is going to come in and say, this is what the wages are going to be? What are unions negotiating?

[David Penn]

You know, if you study the Chinese flag, there's stars on there. One of those stars is for the workers. Because there are no unions in China, Right? There's there. I mean, you know, union busting in China, there's no court to injunct that union busting. So when the workers get uppity in China, guess what happens? The constabulary comes in and cracks everybody's head. In fact, it's even farther than that now. They have facial recognition cameras everywhere. There's no cash anymore. They have a social credit score and they have a compliant culture. And you know what Chinese people say? They just say, I follow constitutional law. I don't care. It's good for me. I feel safe. I feel safe. So, you know, we the people are bringing this upon ourselves. That's why I said, you should take those Democrats up and take them hunting and fishing, get them out in nature. Some of the people that you serve with maybe never put on a flannel shirt in their lives.

[D]

I could bring them up to the range and we could show them the joy of an assault weapon.

[David Penn]

I would like to go. I would like to go along for that one, Mike. It was a great conversation. And I don't think you mind the rub that we have because we're just. We're discussing tensions in the party. And I'm Going to just say in closing, I would like to see 4,100 precinct captains that could turn out the vote. And if that happened, there wouldn't be any primaries. That'd be the end of that. Because if the party had teeth, real teeth, nobody would get in its way. See? And that's what we don't have right now. So I'm about building that cohesiveness where we actually can turn out the vote, where we actually have a community of neighbors. And then all of a sudden, what you're saying your template is correct, but I do say your idea is right. I'm a realist. I hope what you're saying happens. But I'm planning for the worst. I'm just going to share with you.

[D]

Understand that. But if we don't talk about it.

[David Penn]

Got to start somewhere.

[D]

Nothing is going to change.

[David Penn]

That is. We are talking about it.

[D]

That's right.

[David Penn]

We weren't talking about it a year ago. We didn't know each other. I'm going to invite you to invite other people in the caucus that you're friendly with or not friendly with to come on in here and let's really start to intensify this dialogue because by talking, we're going to find out we're friends.

[D]

That would be. I would love to have three people, four people bring them two, four, two against. And debate ideas back and forth because that's.

[David Penn]

That's good. And I've told people I'll go any place in the state, but if we come here, we can get thousands of people involved in the dialogue. Tanner?

[D]

Yeah.

[David Penn]

Thank you very much for recording today. Mike, thank you very much for coming in.

[D]

Thanks for having me.

[David Penn]

I hope everybody you're welcome to come back soon. Again, I hope everybody enjoyed this dialogue. T.com free people store go to caucus. Get involved. If you're sitting on your couch complaining, it's entertainment for you. Go to therapist. If you want to change your country and be involved in the most important moment in human history, in American history, just go to caucus and be a part of the party. Tanner, are you going to do that?

[E]

Go to caucus?

[David Penn]

Yes, we'll try. No, there's no. You're going to make me be like Yoda. There's no try. Just do.

[D]

We're going to have to call him caucus night. Make sure he shows up.

[David Penn]

Oh, I'll drag him. I'm dragging him. Thanks. Thank you very much.

[E]

Of course. Have a good night, everybody.

[C]

Disclaimer the information provided in this podcast is for general informational purposes only. All opinions expressed by the podcast host and their guests are solely their own opinions and do not reflect the opinions of any entity they represent or are associated with. This podcast is not intended to provide professional advice or political guidance and should not be relied upon for such the content of this podcast is based on the host's knowledge and understanding at the time of recording and is subject to change any fact, presented or factual statement made by the podcast. The host or guests are generated by available mainstream media sources, social media outlets, and artificial intelligence, including grok, the Artificial Intelligence module of X. Although we strive to provide accurate and up to date commentary and opinions, we make no representations or warranties, expressed or implied, about the completeness, accuracy, reliability, suitability or availability with respect to the podcast or the information, products, services or related graphics contained in the podcast for any purpose. By accessing and using this podcast, you acknowledge and agree that the hosts, guests and any affiliated entities are not responsible for any actions you take. Based on the information provided in this podcast, you agree that the use of this podcast is at your own risk. The hosts, guests and any affiliated entities are not liable for any direct, indirect, incidental, consequential or punitive damages arising out of your access to or use of this podcast. This includes any damages related to the loss of use, data or profits, whether or not advised of the possibility of such damages. In no event shall the hosts, guests and any affiliated entities be liable to you or any third party for any claims, losses or damages arising out of your use of this podcast or reliance on any information provided herein. By listening to this podcast, you agree to release and hold harmless to hosts, guests and any affiliated entities from any and all liability, claims, actions, demands and expenses arising out of or relating to your use of this podcast. Thank you for your understanding and cooperation.

[D]

This is an I Heart Podcast.