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- [00:00]
A
Some outrageous reporting from the New York Times this weekend. The headline, trump administration admits canceling grants to states that did not vote for him. In little noticed court documents, federal officials and the Trump administration acknowledging that they terminated funding for clean energy projects in October of 2025 to the tune of more than $7.5 billion from Biden era federal grants. That they terminated that funding based solely on political criteria targeting projects in states that were represented by Democrats and have voted for Kamala Harris. Now, this is not just clean energy money. This is education. This is housing. This is food, this is childcare. These are benefits that are incredibly personal to Americans across the country. And yet Trump thinks that he can play games with people's lives, with their welfare, with their incomes, with their futures. I mean, this is why it's so important that Democrats regain the House and the Senate in November of 2026 and then the White House in 2028. There is so much at stake. And if you think that it's not going to take all of us in our individual jurisdictions and our individual neighborhoods and states, then you're not paying attention. And I had the chance to speak to congressional candidate from Texas, 13th Mark Nair. He's an entrepreneur, an inventor, a college professor, a father, a husband, longtime resident of Amarillo, Texas, served on their city council for a few years. And he said, enough. No more profits over people. No more aligning yourself like the incumbent Ronny Jackson does with convicted felon Donald Trump to the point where there's just no daylight between the two of them to promote, to protect, to promulgate policies of felon Trump that do nothing but benefit and pad the wallets and the bottom lines of Trump and his cronies and his billionaire buddies. Mark Nair is one of those just silent but strong people. He is soft voiced and, and, and just, you know, one of those people that just speaks with such authority but doesn't need it to be loud and doesn't need it to be shouted. He speaks from the heart. And when we had this conversation, I was struck by how much he cares and that how for him, he's putting it all out there for Texans to understand that this is an unsustainable path that Trump and the GOP has placed all of us on. And that is why he is running for Congress. He's truly wanting to make a change because for him, everything's at stake. Take a listen. Joining me now, I'm excited to be able to have this conversation with a congressional candidate, Mark Nair, who is running to represent Texas's 13th mark, thanks for joining me here at Katie Fang News.
- [03:18]
B
Hey, thanks, Katie. It's great to be here.
- [03:20]
A
Mark. Look, man, you have an impressive background, and part of the reason why I wanted to start there with you is I have been focusing heavily on candidates for Congress, either the House or the Senate, that really have lived, experience, experiences that are different, that informed where they have made their decisions, that have shaped what they've done with their lives, their families, and have driven them to the point now where they've said, you know what? I can do this, but I have to do this in Congress. So just share a little bit of background about who you are so that folks who are tuning in can get a flavor of that.
- [03:54]
B
Yeah. Okay. So most of my life, I've spent in innovation, building new things. So I have a couple patents, I guess I should say the patent portfolio. But I build companies. So through my whole life, I've been trying to find answers to problems. That's basically it. Innovation in the business world is really just doing things cheaper, better for people. So you make a new invention. Electricity is a good example of that. It just made life better for people. So, yeah, so I go through life and I try to do these things. I try to answer these problems. And then I get to the point that we're at today, that I look at the country, especially our district, and I think, boy, we have no representation. Things are completely nutty. We are not solving any of the problems that we're facing. As a matter of fact, I think what we have right now is. Is the story of America, which is the story of the con man ending exactly where we end right now. With Trump, it was time to do something.
- [05:08]
A
Mark, you are a husband, a father. You are an inventor, an entrepreneur. You're a professor. I mean, you've worn a lot of different hats. You've also spent time on the city council on Amarillo, which is where you're based out of. You know, why take those talents from a local and state level? Why actually take them to D.C. of all places?
- [05:29]
B
I think one word is corruption. So at the local level, I had a bunch of ideas, what I wanted to do, but I faced firsthand corruption, town corruption. Guys that are supposed to serve the people were serving themselves. And I see that magnified. I see it manifest now in everything we have. And what we are doing is we are teaching the next generation of kids that corruption is okay. We're teaching them that you can cheat the system and you can't. We're teaching them to look out for yourselves and not for your community. So we have to break it. And that's why I wanted to jump into it from what I learned at the local level.
- [06:09]
A
So the current congressperson from your district is a guy named Ronny Jackson. I will use the proper Moniker. It is Dr. Ronny Jackson. And for those of you that needed a reminder, not like I think you should, he did serve as a White House physician, not only in the Trump administration, but also in the Obama administration. But Ronnie Jackson has been beset with several scandals and problems. But most importantly, I think, Mark, the problem with Ronny Jackson is there's no daylight between him and who I call convicted felon Donald Trump. There's no daylight between him and Trump policies. And it's pretty obvious to me that, that, you know, the birds of a feather concept works very, very seriously here. But he clearly doesn't adopt your platform, which is people over profits. I mean, your platform very clearly says people first in every way.
- [07:02]
B
Yep, yep, that's right. So I have several problems with Ronny Jackson beyond just being a moron and shouldn't be in that role at all. One of my biggest problems is exactly what you just said. So if we read the Constitution clearly, I cannot find anything that says, hey, you have to report to the President as your boss. I don't see it. Article one doesn't say it. Article one actually specifically says Congress has a role. That role is to not treat the President as your boss. And that's what he's doing. Every single thing I hear from him is, how do we support this president? The president is great. He's the God among men. You name it. It's totally silly, ridiculous. And Ronny Jackson in this area is just a carpetbagger. I mean, he showed up, came in, bunch of money behind him, won an election here. He's never really lived here. Doesn't show up here. People in the district don't really know them. So it's, to me, the essence of representation is you show up, you live in your community, you help the people, and we don't get any of that at all.
- [08:17]
A
Yeah, I read that Ronnie Jackson hasn't held a town hall in more than a thousand days, which is outrageous to me to not be in touch with the people. You do block walks all the time. I saw that. You are out there literally pounding the pavement, meeting with the people. Talk about what the voters are telling you are the priorities right now. Because I know that you literally just did a block walk maybe like a day ago. What are they sharing with you? Are their Fears, their aspirations, and why they want to see somebody like you represent them in Congress.
- [08:50]
B
So, you know, this entire district is pretty big. It's like 40,000 square miles. And it goes from the top, the Texas Panhandle, all the way down close to Dallas. So it's a diverse group of people. Denton, Texas, is different than Canyon, Texas. But there's one theme that goes to the whole thing, which is, why is my life not better the way I was promised? And that gets to things are too expensive. I feel betrayed. So, like, you are working really closely on getting the Epstein files unredacted and getting them in public. And I think that's so great what you're trying to do. So many people say, I can't believe that this is what we're facing. And a lot of people say it in whispers because they don't want people to think that they're betraying the cause. But they say, well, I secretly will vote for you, but don't tell my friends over here. But then those friends tell me the same thing. So to answer your question, they're facing, life is too expensive in this area. Really expensive. There's no opportunity. No one's really building new stuff, new companies, newly new ideas is what I've always lived in. And then the biggest issue coming, and it's changing pretty rapidly, is this whole idea about data centers. Yeah, I mean, there's just anger about this.
- [10:07]
A
I spent a lot of time here at this channel focusing on the Stratos project out in Utah, because I spend a lot of time in Utah myself. And I know that you're an avid outdoorsman, cyclist. You spend a lot of time out in our environment. Talk about why Texans especially should be worried about people like Ronny Jackson and the Republicans. P for not only these AI data centers, but for a completely insensitivity to the idea of the future of water in a place like Texas. I mean, we see the crazy wildfires and even places like Europe. Right. I mean, the climate is. Climate change is very real. And I kind of feel like they're being incredibly ignorant about the kind of the convergence of all of these issues into one time.
- [10:49]
B
You know, the phrase climate change is softening of what we are seeing in the world. It's really global heating, and it's not warming, it's heating, and we're just cranking up the thermostat. We are doing it. The science is unrefutable. So I just know that as we see these data centers, one of my first patents in 1999 is on automation, it's like precursor to a lot of the AI stuff. And I know what's happening. People are lying to us, first of all on the technology. Okay, It's a normal technology. It's just regular. It's like electricity. It helps people, it will damage people. But the problem is we are doing a capital expenditure in these data centers that is so extraordinary that the only way to get that money back is to fire people. That's it. So the balance here is totally out of whack. Now if we talk about the environmental consequences, and I want to talk about one other thing which is economic, but we talk about the environmental consequences as traumatic. And another lie that they're giving us is this technical term called closed loop, which means the water system. The system, yep. Computers need to be cooled, right? You deal with electricity, with fans and water. And gamers know this. They have water cooled computers. But that doesn't really talk to the heart of the matter, which is about power. And most of the water that's going to be used is going to turn into steam for generators. Now here in the Panhandle, there's a project called Fermi. There are many names for this thing, but it's supposed to be the world's largest data center. And now they want to build something like four, it depends on the day, four nuclear power plants and several hundred gas turbines. Just the environmental consequences of this alone are pretty extraordinary. But the water, we sit on the nation's largest aquifer that provides about 20% of agriculture, culture in the country. And we're draining that pretty rapidly. The data center issue will drain it even more. We're thinking about this upside down. We're not thinking about how we replenish the water. We're thinking about how do we slow down the extraction. But still a hundred years out, we're going to extract all of it. Doesn't really matter. We have to think about it in a different way. Adding data centers just exacerbates a problem. But the economic cost of this. And Katie, I'll tell you, man, the one thing we're not talking too much about is the economic devastation that is coming. And I'll tell you flat out, it's going to happen. We are so overexposed in the market, on the investment, especially in debt, private equity debt. When that collapses, and it will, the ripple effects will be profound through the economy. And what happens, always through history, and you know this very well, is that the fascists, that's when they stand up and say, see, it's all Devastation, we will now go into austerity, we will not spend money and we will take over entirely all the power that we have. And austerity, we know it is not the solution, it is opposite. When you have an economic collapse, there are so many big things that are about to happen. We have to be very careful of the next few years. That's why this is the shot, this is it right now.
- [14:02]
A
And that's the reason why instead of getting more patents, teaching some more, inventing more things, you said my time is now. You, like many others that I have spent, had the privilege of spending time with here at Katie fang news. I interviewed a candidate who was told you need to maybe just wait your turn. And her answer was like, for what? Wait for what? My time is now. And it sounds to me like you've realized that there's a literal exigency for your, for your candidacy for congress. Because the world is literally burning, right? The world's burning and we need to do something about it. Including sending people to congress that have an understanding of what the people truly need versus the self serving. Which dovetails with something I thought was fantastic about you, mark. You signed the United states term limits amendment pledge. Whereas you've pledged that as a member of congress you will vote, you will co sponsor and vote for u. S. Term limits of three two year house terms and two six year senate terms and no longer talk about why this is a really important part of running for office for you. Because we've seen people go and park themselves and not leave. Yeah, like squatting there now you know that's right.
- [15:17]
B
So what happens, you get people in office, they stay there, they stay there, they stay there and they have no other skills except staying there. So then they realize, well, if I split, what am I going to do? Burger king? So they stay there some more, they make more money, they do insider trading. All the stuff we know is bad. It's really important that if you're going to serve the public that you serve it openly, transparently, with a good heart. I mean, it's easy to say but really have to go with good motivations. And my motivation is out of duty. And my motivation is to serve the people in this community who are underserved and they have no representation. So we have to have term limits and then we're, we're done. And when you have term limits, you do this the right way. Most of the job is to build for the future because really at my age and all the stuff I've done, I want to build A pathway for people who are younger generations because they are inheriting the burning planet and they're looking for solutions. And the solutions of carbon capture the solutions that some of the rest of the world are trying to work on right now. And some of the companies I'm trying to do right now are trying to answer these problems. That's their planet and we have to build the pathway for them to get to power. It is obscene to think that we're going to win and then sit there and feel important when we go to a luncheon.
- [16:44]
A
That's not the job you mentioned at the beginning of our conversation about the young people. You as a college professor, my late father was a college professor for decades. Talk about why this is really important too, to go and to serve in D.C. the 13th district, with an eye towards what you've heard through your interaction with these college kids. I mean, colleges and universities are under assault from this administration. They have to either bend the knee or fight back at great costs where they are punished and grants are taken away and research isn't being done and visas aren't being given to allow international students to come. We have a massive brain drain that's happening in our colleges and universities and yet our oftentimes this is falling on deaf ears. Because they don't care, right? Because if it doesn't serve their purpose, if it's not going to pad their wallets, what do they care whether that incredibly bright kid from some, some foreign country doesn't get to come here and make all of us smarter and better. Especially when they stay here and they bring their talents and they don't send them back to their home countries.
- [17:54]
B
You know it. Padding your wallets, that's the phrase. So it's true. They're such short sighted people that look just. I'll make an example. I'll do an analogy to the music business that I know pretty well. Yeah, there are executives in the music business that will say that sounds good, but what's that going to do for my quarterly bonus? That's what I'm aiming for is what am I going to get in the next three months. And the same thing with people in office and the same thing with people in Texas right now. So I'm a mentor for the National Science foundation and for Texas Tech for startup companies. And there's a program called I Corps that Congress established to compete internationally with companies coming up so we can give science, real science, to PhD students, you name it and give them a shot. Trump administration is cutting all of that national Science foundation, they're cutting it. When we cut science, when we cut our investments in the future, then we are just seeding the world. And there are other countries out there that are just taking it, and they will. And we are on this edge right now about the influence that America has in the world compared to other countries like China, for example, who are investing in their people. And I'm not making excuses for them. They have their own. Plenty of own problems. But we are making our own problems actively by cutting the funding. So when I talk to students, and I talk to a lot of them, and I keep in touch with as many as I can because the education system has failed them in certain ways. We say, learn this skill. Learn this. Aren't you amazing? Go forth and be plenty and be fecund and do things that you want to do. And it's very difficult because they don't have the infrastructure around them. So when they go into the world and they think, I can do these things, what now? I got an email a couple months ago. Previous student, McGinna, economics class. She said, I want to set up a bagel bakery and I don't know what to do. Can you help me? Absolutely. Look at the business plan. We'll figure it out, get you funding. I love that stuff. And it's a small restaurant, but it becomes a bigger thing when you magnify that by 10 or 20 people. But most of these students, they feel like they've been ripped off. They feel like I've done all this work and now what? So when I look at something like my alma mater at Texas A and M, one of the professors was fired. She was teaching, I think it was Plato, one of the classics, because it was dei. Come on, Jesus. So we can change these things. We can change these things overnight in Texas by getting the right leadership elected statewide. We can change these things nationally by changing the direction of the country where it should be going, which is investing in our own people. We're just not doing it. We're investing the people at the top that are taking the money, padding their wallets. It's, you know, it's frustrating, it's obscene, it's ridiculous, it's terrible. Everything is stupid. But it's time for us to change it.
- [20:55]
A
And that's why these kinds of conversations give me hope, because you are one incredibly amazing voice amongst several that have said, enough is enough. We may not have what looks like others that have, quote, formal training to be politicians because it seems like they've actually been trained to do this, but you have, like I said, the qualities and the life experience that lends you to be somebody who cares enough about everybody to want to make sure that the rising tide lifts all ships energy happens for all of us. Mark, where can people learn more about your campaign and donate and volunteer and chip in to be able to help you get across that finish line?
- [21:32]
B
So, yeah, the website isjustmarknair.com. one of the first times in my life having a really short name actually works.
- [21:38]
A
Yes.
- [21:39]
B
So like two syllables. So just M A R K N A I R dot com. And you can read all about things. You could read about the platform, you can contact me. I like talking to people. You know, Katie, you said that we train people to be politicians as if this is a skill set we need for the future. It isn't, but it is true that there is. Oh, and we could talk so long about the deeper point of the deeper meaning of campaigns and the structural components of this big industry we have, which is running political campaigns. I had no idea. I'm very used to running other things, but this is unique.
- [22:16]
A
It's very eye opening, isn't it?
- [22:18]
B
It is, yeah. It's. It's nuts. And if you just want to be. I just want to be honest with people. I just want to say, here's the deal. You might not like it. I'll tell you what. I met someone in Vernon, Texas, came to a meeting. We do these little things. We get pizza, we hang out, we talk to people. It's the essence of a small democracy. Totally love it. He came in, he said, the data centers are killing us. What do I do tomorrow? I said, well, you're kind of screwed tomorrow, but in November we can change the conversation. But he wanted to know right then what the solution was. Very, very angry. So all this ties into the answer. How do you get in touch with me? Just go to the website, you can get in touch with me and I'm happy to talk with anybody, especially if you're angry. You're living in a small town. What do we do tomorrow? Because the answer is all of us together getting the solution. That's it.
- [23:12]
A
What we do is we get Mark Nair to D.C. and Mark Nair, I'm so glad that we were able to have this conversation. I'll be following you along on your journey and come back anytime and let us know the latest.
- [23:24]
B
It's delightful speaking with you. Thank you so much.
- [23:26]
A
Thank you. Katie Feng here. We launched the Katie Feng News Channel in partnership with the Midas Touch Network so we could bring you the latest in legal and political news. Straight, no chaser. So if you're a fellow truth teller, hit that subscribe button and share the word about this channel so we can build a high information America together.