Matt Meyer (21:14)

Not everyone.

Alison Gill (21:15)

Not everyone enough.

Matt Meyer (21:17)

Most a majority Enough.

Alison Gill (21:19)

Yeah. Elected to be their governor in 2024. Please welcome Governor Matt Meyer. Hi, Governor. How are you today?

Matt Meyer (21:24)

Thanks so much. It's, it's, it's great to be here on the Daily Beans.

Alison Gill (21:28)

Thank you. You sure it wasn't just literally everyone? Like, everyone voted?

Matt Meyer (21:31)

I actually don't know. It's a secret ballot, so it's possible. My mom definitely voted for me. My wife, you can ask her who she voted for.

Alison Gill (21:39)

Ah, that would be interesting. Yeah, my mom would probably vote for me, too. But I appreciate you coming and joining us today. And I wanted to talk a little bit about blue states versus red states and this budget reconciliation bill, which I have been calling the billionaire bailout bill, because, let's face it, they're gutting our Medicare and our Medicaid and our SNAP and our food assist in order to pay for their tax cuts for their wealthy friends. So talk a little bit about your constituents and, and, and Delaware, because Delaware is a, is a giving state. We have giving states and taking states when it comes to federal money. And, and Delaware gives more than it takes. So talk a little bit about that.

Matt Meyer (22:15)

So, first of all, I'm a school teacher. I'm the first public school teacher ever to serve as governor of Delaware Math. The first, the first math teacher. That's right. Not just a teacher, but a math teacher. And the first member of a program called Teach for America, the first core member of a program called Teach for America ever to be a governor in America. And I ran for office because I think that ethos of a teacher is fundamental to the fabric of our country, the sense that we're all in it together. It doesn't matter where you were born, what you eat for breakfast, what your parents do. The fundamental promise of America is that we're all in it together. And this bill, I don't. People attach. Also, you call billionaires bill. People attach all sorts of adjectives to it. This, this bill does the exact opposite of why I, you know, what drove me to go into public service in the first place, and that is leaving certain people behind, favoring some over others, saying, if you're having a hard day, a hard week, a hard month, a hard year, or a hard decade, we're not going to help you out. We're not going to give you a hand to get the health care you need, to get the education you need with cuts to the, to the Department of Education. And that's just not acceptable. I think that because the media environment we work in, too many Americans aren't getting the full story on what is coming. Too many Americans aren't getting the full story about what this could mean in terms of something called sequestration with respect to Medicare and potential cuts hidden in this bill to Medicare. But look, I like to say that what, what Trump is doing a good job of these days is turning the country into a cyber truck, a huge monstrosity, that's all. Those policies seem subject to constant recall, and nothing they're doing is affordable to the American working family, just like these cyber trucks. So we got to fight. We appreciate your role here on this podcast and in doing that. What we're trying to do in Delaware is, in spite of all this, roll up our sleeves and get to work for Delawareans to show, like I know my colleague Governor Newsom is in California and others around the country to show that regardless of what craziness is going on in Washington, we're going to get things working for working families here in Delaware.

Alison Gill (24:27)

Yeah. And let's talk about that. And thank you very much for the kind words. I also appreciate your role in showing up on podcasts and independent media to get the word out where it might not necessarily get out, but let's talk about what states need to and are doing to kind of push back on what this administration is doing. I guess we can start we'll end up at budget reconciliation, but I guess we can start with what you mentioned, the Department of Education trying to dismantle it and leaving it to the states. Now, I know there's a temporary restraining order in place barring the dismantling of the Department of Education, because, you know, it was set up by Congress, and that's a little bit of a separation of powers issue. So talk about what Delaware may be prepared to do in order to take over what might end up being dismantled in the Department of Education, because if a lot of this is left up to the states, I think that we could see a lot of chaos. We could see 50 different things going on in 50 different states. I worked at the Department of Veterans affairs for over a decade, and the famous saying is if you've seen one va, you've seen one va. And I'm worried about the Department of education in all 50 states kind of ending up the same way.

Matt Meyer (25:33)

Yeah. You know, I think the Trump administration is thriving off confusion and a lack of information in a lot of areas. And it's definitely true in education where kids go to school and parents send kids to school to get an education. They don't know very often where the resources come to provide that education. They don't know where the training comes. They don't know where the protections come for disabled students. They don't know where the additional resources come for students who don't speak English as their primary language. And a lot of that, a lot of those supports for most vulnerable students across our country is provided by our federal government. And so when that goes away, it'll be up to states, to a state like Delaware. We've already taken action. I've already proposed actually a new tax structure in our state that's going to make the wealthy pay their fair share. We recognize that at the federal government, they're saying that billionaires basically should be paying less and less and people should be get fewer and fewer services. So what we're doing in the state to counteract that in Delaware, what I'm attempting to do, assuming our state House and Senate go along with it, what we're trying to do is saying we're going to have wealthier Delawareans pay a bit more, and in turn, we're going to be able to restore many of these services that the federal government is trying to take away. At its heart, there's a different philosophy on what government should be and what America is. The, the Trump vision is a, is a government where if you're a private school kid that went to, you know, got the best education or didn't get the best education, but had opportunities through, through dad or an uncle or grandpa to go make a billion dollars, you're going to benefit, and if not, you're left behind. Whereas we think America should be something different. We think we got to work in the government to make sure everyone in Delaware and everyone across our country has a fair shot. And our education system is the primary way. For me, as a former math teacher, that the most important part of governance and governing fairly for everyone.

Alison Gill (27:38)

Yeah. And I love this, this idea of fixing things or reforming things in the state to get the wealthy to pay their fair share. I know a lot of Democratic governors are doing this and the Democratic Governors association working together, talking about best practices. You know, over here in California, we learned how to do mail in voting from our friends in Colorado, for example. So there's a lot of reaching across state lines with the DGA to help realize that. And let's talk about the wealthy paying their fair share and how this is going to end up federally with this potential budget reconciliation bill. Because mathematically speaking. And you're a math teacher. I think I posted like, I can't wrap my head around how Big. These tax breaks for the wealthy are when we are gutting a couple trillion dollars in earned benefits, like for us to still have a $4 trillion deficit over the next decade after we're gutting all these other programs. But then you realize, you know, he's also spending $150 billion on his mass deportation stuff and things like that. But it's the tax cuts, the extended Trump tax cuts are really digging into our national debt. Moody's downgraded us. So how is Delaware preparing and maybe even, you know, Democratic governors writ large for that kind of, you know, eventuality? I mean, assuming, you know, you fix the, are able to fix the tax structure with your legislature in your state, that'll definitely take care of quite a bit of that. But what else, what other things are you seeing on the horizon with this bill?

Matt Meyer (29:04)

So, first of all, I can just say with this bill. So I think there was some uncertainty when Trump was elected. What he was saying was that he was the candidate of prosperity for everyone. He was going to bring prosperity, black and brown communities like never before. We'd see the Ukraine war would be over. His first day in office. We heard all this stuff that was on one hand, and on the other hand, we saw Project 2025, the Project 2025 handbook. And polling back then and now consistently showed that former version of what Trump talked about actually had significant support across the country, even among moderate Democrats. But it turns out that was all, quite frankly, a lie. That what really this was all a trick to implement the Stephen Miller Project 2025 playbook. And if there was any doubt whatsoever through this litany of not very well thought out and not legally reviewed executive orders, it's absolutely clear in the, in this billionaires bill that they are, I mean, in addition to being a math teacher, my wife is an emergency room physician. She spent 15 years in an emergency room. Just over the weekend, she did a couple shifts. And what she sees and what she has seen in recent years is a declining healthcare system, a healthcare system that's increasingly being taken over by private equity, a health care system that is increasingly shutting people out and trying to, you know, and not affordable for most Americans. What, what this bill does is it's a leap forward in that same direction of really turning our healthcare into third world type healthcare. And I, I don't want to overstate it, but one thing I don't understand is these billionaires, they and their families and their friends need to go to the hospital too. And right now you have this bill that's going to our U.S. senate that if it gets all Republicans to support it, it's going to dramatically spike the number of uninsured, which according to the National Hospital association, is going to cause numerous hospitals across our country to collapse. It's going to cause additional chaos and crazy third world conditions in emergency rooms across the country. That's already terrible. And they have a vision of a society that I don't think many Americans want to live in, thanks to you. Hopefully we can communicate that to people. Hopefully a few courageous Senate Republicans will be able to block this and restore some semblance to the America that we know we can.

Alison Gill (31:52)

Yeah. It seems so far the only Republicans who don't like this bill don't like it because it doesn't kick enough people off healthcare. It doesn't cut enough of our earned benefits. So we'll see what the Senate does with it. And you know, nothing prevents a super rich person who might happen to live in rural America from taking a helicopter to their favorite fancy hospital in town, leaving the rest of us to fend for ourselves. And let's end on that privatization issue and how you're gonna push back against that in Delaware because we're seeing privatization of schools through school voucher programs, police, prisons, health care. What are you doing in Delaware to ensure that public programs are available to your constituents?

Matt Meyer (32:36)

Well, we have a House bill or we have a hospital advisory board that we're just setting up now to make sure our hospitals truly have the public interest at part. Almost all of our hospitals in Delaware are 501c3 nonprofit hospitals. And so we also have systems in place to prevent for profit, you know, ownership of our health care system. And we're going to continue pursuing those. With regard to education, I believe strongly in public education. I've said that time and again. We are going to go to extreme lengths to make sure, like the craziness that's come to Oklahoma of having sort of publicly funded religious schools that fortunately just a few days ago were stopped by our highest court. We need to make sure it's fundamental to the American dream and our collective future. And it's fundamental to addressing the intergenerational needs of working families and this belief that the next generation will be more prosperous than this generation to make sure that public education is not only continued, but it's fully funded, that every kid, regardless of their background, regardless of how connected their parent is to get them into one school or another, none of that should matter. We want to make sure each kid has an opportunity and is not only able to go to a public school, but as a choice of public schools to go to, and each of those public schools are well funded, that we have great, well compensated teachers to deliver the highest quality education. And also we're doing a lot to make sure our public schools are on the cutting edge, that the finest in technology education, the finest in learning language immersion, having a Spanish or Chinese immersion classroom is right here in Delaware.

Alison Gill (34:23)

Yeah, it's a great part of having an educator in charge. And I appreciate what you do and thank you for being a bulwark against these draconian federal policies that are coming down the pike to protect the people, the working folks and working families in your state. And I hope that other governors take note and tell everyone where they can find and follow you and keep up on what you're doing and the work that you're doing. For everybody in Delaware, thank you.

Matt Meyer (34:46)

Matt Meyer. D E M A T T M E Y E R D E We have exciting new innovative programs. Everything from keeping your eggs cheap to attracting companies in times of these crazy sales tax, national sales tax they call tariffs to innovative educational programs that the country can learn from. I encourage you to follow us at Matt Meyer.

Alison Gill (35:09)

Thank you so much, Governor. I appreciate your time today and wish you well. We'll check back in soon.

Matt Meyer (35:15)

Thanks so much.

Alison Gill (35:16)

All right, everybody, stick around. We'll be right back with the good news. Everybody, welcome back. It's time for the good news.

Matt Meyer (35:22)

Who likes good news? Everyone?

Alison Gill (35:25)

Then good news, everyone. All right, everybody, if you have good news, confessions, corrections, you want to give a shout out to a loved one or yourself or a small business in your area or your small business or a government program that's helped you or a loved one, whether it's Medicare or Medicaid, SNAP, WIC, Section 8, free school lunches, some great VA healthcare, you've received, student debt relief, anything like that, you can send that to us. Also, since I just rescued a Siamese cat, if you have a Siamese cat, or if you've had a Siamese cat and you have any recommendations or information you would like me to know about my new mezer, you can send that to us too. And all you got to do to get your submission read is to pay your POD pet tariff, which means attach a photo of your pet. If you don't have a pet, you can send an adoptable pet in your area. We'll try to find him a home. If you don't have that, you can send us any animal photo that you grab off the Internet. And if you don't have that. We're taking bird watching photos, which can be an actual bird, or you and your family and friends flipping the bird to Trump and Musk Properties. And if you don't have any of that baby pictures, always send in your baby pictures. Send it to us@dailybeanspod.com click on Contact. Also, I'm very, very excited. My good news Aside from being asked to emcee the no Kings Rally at the Waterfront at the County Admin Building here in San Diego on June 14, I'll be hosting a private meet and greet event for our patrons. And it's also going to be my my very good friend is a drag queen and she's going to host it with me at a very wonderful drag venue. So we are going to have a blast. I think we're probably going to play trivia or something like that. And I can't wait to see and meet you all and hang out and have some food and drinks after the march. So if you want to join us on that, we only have about 15 spots left. Please check your inbox if you're a patron to RSVP quick because the spots are filling up. If you want to become a patron and join us, you can do that too. Patreon.com miller she wrote all right, first up for Peter pronouns, he and him. Here in Manitoba, we have two common squirrels, the red squirrel, which is tiny, and the gray squirrel, which is about three or four times bigger. Detractors have called it a rat with a big tail. In the winter, the gray squirrel grows a thick, reddish brown coat, and this is the first time in 67 years living here that I saw one in the process of changing. The short arms are effective for grooming the upper body, and it has rubbed off the winter fur on top but not on the back, and that gives him the appearance of having a gray shirt and brown pants. The picture is zoomed and cropped, so it's a little grainy, but I thought you'd enjoy this as just an animal picture in its own right. Peter I do enjoy this. This is amazing. Thank you for sharing. Look at that guy. That's so cool. It's just where his arms reach. So funny. Next up, Kathy T. Pronoun she and her A correction from Tuesday's show with respect to the person from my hometown of Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, who gives the bird to Mercury Marine due to his dislike of Ron Johnson, I think they might want to check their sources. Senator Ron Johnson married into a family that founded a company called Pacour and gave him his career and fortune before running for office. I loathe the man and don't respect the owners of Mercury Marine who have treated employees terribly, but I don't think there's a connection between the two. My pod tax is my niece's Siberian husky, Jester. Jester has been so valuable as a support to my niece as she dealt with traumas of all kinds in her short 20 years, and now she's facing his eventual death from cancer. What a beautiful baby. Thank you for sending that in, Kathy. Appreciate you. Next up from Tiffany, Tiffany's pronouns she, they I love waking up to your podcast in the morning. A quick run through of the most fucked up headlines with a few swear words to boot is better than morning coffee. Thanks, Tiffany. I want to let you know that There's a website, nokings.org where people can get the toolkit you mentioned and sign up to host their own rally. That's how they list their events on Mobilize so others can find it. Also, this may just be a Colorado thing, but I work with Colorado 50501 organizing rallies and they say 5051, not 50501. All right, well, I'll say 5051 then. Also, the national website is 5050.1, so there's that again. Not sure if this is different regionally. No, it's probably correct for my pod pet tariff. Here's my cat Paquita giving no and my dog Hannah. It's like the pretentious form of Hannah, Hannah, not Hannah. Mad AF that I dressed her up in a shark costume for Halloween. She had such sharp teeth as a puppy that I call her Shark Tooth or Sharptooth if I was in the Land Before Time mood. So it seemed fitting. Okay, the cat's amazing, the dog and the shark. The dog does not look pleased to be in in the shark costume. Tiffany, thank you very much. 50:51. Good to know. Next up, Anonymous Pronouns they and them hello Queens of the Beans. I saw the thunder jacket episode, was included in the refried beans on the weekend and thought it might make you smile to get an update on Mr. Thunderjacket himself. By the way, I think. I think the episode is called Lightning Vest Anonymous because I'm just My brain works very weirdly and my friend's dog was afraid of the thunder and I asked if they tried a lightning vest instead of a thunder jacket. Anyway, this is my dog Sammy, Mr. Thunderjacket himself. He's pretty relaxed these days, as you can see in the photo, and doesn't need his thunder jacket at all and spends most of his days wagging his tail and doing natural doggy things like hanging out upside down on the couch with all his rude bits showing, doing a lewd in fact, I approach the people who have Schnauzer Poodle cross dogs, Schnoodles and Shepherd poodle crosses Shepherdoodles who have shown me photos of their dogs who are dead ringers for Sammy. I haven't gone to the expense of a doggy DNA test because he's just perfect the way that he is. Oh yes he is. Look at that. I can't tell where the head is or the tail. I mean I can because the back feet are bent that way but oh my gosh. What a sweet baby. Thank you for that that. Next up, dawn pronouns she and her shout out to Dana in the hopper. Or maybe you said can. Freaking Loved hearing her comments in absentia yesterday brought a huge smile and an out loud giggle each time. Such a fun addition. Not to replace, but to remind us of her awesomeness when she's off raising money or raising hell or both. Love you both. Thanks for the daily dose of sanity in these insane times. For my podbet tariff I include a photo of our girl with our girl. Ferb is the kitty and she's posing with our daughter who will be starting high school next year. Yay high school. Dawn dawn, this is a beautiful family you have. Thank you for sharing. Next up, Heidi pronoun She and her Good morning Beans Queens. Today I sat in the neurosurgeon's office with my 23 year old son. It was a good appointment. Actually, it was a great appointment, but so many in the last seven months have not been. Seven months ago, early on election day, my son asked me to take him to the doctor for weird headaches he'd been having that were getting worse. He'd been woken up in the middle of the night and now was getting dizzy. The next 48 hours were a blur from our family physician to the emergency department where initially they told us they'd humor us with a CT and just send us home to then being admitted with something showing up on his CT to more scans, more doctors, and then brain surgery Thursday evening to remove a mass that on top of the election results led to many middle of the night hours of me sitting in my car in the hospital parking lot playing every song that said Fuck you literally or figuratively at top volume. The Linda Linda's racist, sexist boy was especially therapeutic. Pissed off teenage girl energy is exactly what I needed. In December, we got the pathology and it was a very, very rare form of cancer. So rare his neurosurgeon had never seen it before in his 25 year career and his local oncologist had only seen it once. We ended up traveling from the south to New York City to see one of three experts in the US on this cancer. His recovery's been slow. The brain doesn't like being messed with and it's been hard on all of us as he's had to adapt to his new baseline. We were prepared with his last MRI to be told we still have a long way to go, but we were pleasantly surprised to find no evidence of disease. We are thrilled to fully switch focus to just his physical recovery and hopefully back to school this fall to finish up his degree. This has been a very challenging season for us, but it would have been so much worse if it weren't for the aca. Because of the aca, my son was still on our health insurance when this happened. Had it not been for that provision in the ACA for young adults to stay on their parents insurance, my son would have been kicked off of ours on his 23rd birthday, three months before his tumor was found. I can't help but think how much worse this would have been had we been uninsured. Would we have gone to the doctor? Would we have waited too long? The one thing we know for sure is my son would have had medical debt for the rest of his life. Also, I want to say that on top of the aca, early voting matters. Because of early voting, my son and I had both already voted and didn't lose out on our votes because of the election day emergency. Election Day 2024 will probably always be remembered as the shittiest day ever in our house. But just like my son is resilient and through reaching out and forming the best alliances, we're kicking cancer's ass. So too we are resilient. Our connections and alliances make us stronger. And even when the diagnosis is scary and the prognosis isn't always good, we will kick fascism's ass too. As pod pet tariff. Here's a baby pic of my son. Oh, that's beautiful. And a link to Linda Linda's. Thank you. Thank you for that submission, Heidi. Y' all are warriors. And thanks to everybody for sending your good news to us. Please send it into us dailybeanspot.com and click on contact. Check out today's episode of cleanup on aisle 45 with our super special surprise guest trying to fill Harry Dunn's shoes, which physically is impossible to do. But we appreciate you listening and I'll be back in your ears tomorrow. Until then, please take care of yourselves, take care of each other, take care of the planet, take care of your mental health, and take care of your family. I've been AG and them's the Beans. The Daily Beans is written and executive produced by Allison Gill with additional research and reporting by Dana Goldberg. Sound design and editing is by Desiree McFarlane with art and web design by Joelle Reader with Moxie Design Studio. Music for the Daily Beans is written and performed by they Might Be Giants and the show is a proud member of the MSW Media Network, a collection of creator owned podcasts dedicated to news, politics and justice. For more information Please visit msw media.com msw media.