The Chile Wire with Abe Baldonado. Hey, everyone. Welcome back to The Chile Wire. I am excited this week. We have a very special guest all the way from Illinois.

David Fromm from regional vice president of Americans for Prosperity and also the host of the American Potential podcast. David, thank you so much for joining us

today. This is fabulous. I always love to be in New Mexico. It's such a it really is an enchanted state. And, yeah, was really thrilled to come and talk to you.

Absolutely. And I know AFP is on a mission to even make it more enchanted, and so we're delighted to have you. David, just want to open it up to you really quick to introduce yourself, share a little bit of, you know, about you, where you come from, some of your experience. But first, I got to ask you, red or green? Green.

Alright.

Yeah. Perfect. So green.

Sarah went Christmas, so I think we're she's becoming very, very New Mexican being here on the ground. So

Yeah. I feel like that's a compromise. I I reject that.

Absolutely. Well, David, I'll I'll open it up to you just for a few minutes to just share a little bit about yourself.

Thanks. Yeah. No. I so I'm original vice president with America's Prosperity, New Mexico, fortunately, is in my region. So I've had the opportunity to come here, kinda help form this team.

And it's just I've got it's gotten me so excited about the the potential here. You know, there I think there's a lot of folks in New Mexico who don't feel well represented by the leadership that is right now running the state, and and, I think that there's a real opportunity for for change and reform. I happen to come I live in Illinois outside of Chicago, and I know something about poor leadership that passes bad policies. And, you know, one thing that New Mexico and Illinois have in common, unfortunately, there's not much. The weather's very different.

The the landscape's very different. But, unfortunately, one of the things, that we have in common is there are great resources, great people, great culture, you know, great institutions, just all kinds of things that that really should make our states wonderful. And yet, bad policies passed by bad leaders or, you know, bad leadership is really holding the state back. Absolutely. And so I think that we can change that.

You know? It really unleashes unleashes the potential for a lot of these places. So I happen to I live in the suburbs of Chicago. I got I'm with my 11 kids. I got a lot of kids.

And, I've done that for a long time. Been been with Americans for Prosperity for going on fourteen years and a few weeks, and it's been wonderful. We really enjoyed it. Enjoy kinda empowering folks and trying to make a difference.

Absolutely. You got your hands full.

I do. Yeah. And then this year I mean, this this past year, took on our podcast, which you mentioned, which I appreciate, the American Potential podcast. So like and subscribe, everyone. Absolutely.

And, you know, we try to tell stories of folks who are, I say, like, you know, kind of ordinary Americans who said try to do extraordinary things and change their community.

Yeah. Absolutely. And that's the mission of the ChiliWire at a local level. We want to talk about issues that impact our local communities and our state. And so it's great that we have a podcast that talks about national issues that you're running in.

So appreciate you being here today. On that note, you you know, you talked about representation, leadership matters. This last presidential election, nearly about 46 give or take of New Mexicans voted for president Trump.

Mhmm.

And they they sent a message nationally. Unfortunately, when it comes down to that representation, we think of nearly half of the individuals voted for conservative policies and America first policies. And yet almost half of these New Mexicans do not have representation in Congress. So, you know, we hear oftentimes from the left, you know, about disenfranchised voters. New Mexico is severely struggling with disenfranchised voters.

Yeah. I mean, I can identify personally. I I happen to live in a in an area that's, like, forty five minutes West Of Chicago. So very suburban area, you know, doesn't share a lot in common with Downtown Chicago. And yet my member of congress is a very progressive Chicago Democrat who lives on the West Side Of Chicago.

And what they did is the town I live in happens to be, like, 50% Hispanic. And so they went and gerrymandered all the towns where there's any sizable Hispanic population until they got into some enclaves in, you know, in in Chicago. And so my voice doesn't matter to to her. And, and I think a lot of the folks, you know, here in New Mexico probably feel the same way. I mean, you know, it's like, I can petition my government and my legislator, but does it really make a difference?

Yeah. And I think that the way maps are drawn is problematic in a lot of lot of states, Illinois, especially in New Mexico too. But I think, you know, unfortunately, we're have to go and force our voice to be heard by kind of aggregating those voices and kinda coming together and really demanding, you know, better policies and reform and then getting involved in elections and, you know, trying to elect folks who are gonna listen.

Yeah. Absolutely. And I can agree with you more that the system right now is broken when we talk about redistricting. We always hear nonpartisan committees, but at the end the day, we know they're partisan, and that's unfortunate.

You know what's funny is I don't if you remember the Texas Democrats in the legislature fled Texas a few you know, maybe a month or so ago to so that the redistricting bill that the Texas Republicans tried to pass, couldn't be voted on. The ironic thing well, they came to Illinois, and they stood up there with governor JB Pritzker, the governor of Illinois. And the ironic thing is that the maps that the democrat that the republicans were proposing that the democrats were fleeing, were less gerrymandered than the current maps that governor Pritzker signed in Illinois. And so the hypocrisy was pretty thick, but, you know, I it's just unfortunate beca and I think the the supreme court has started to rule on this has ruled on this and, or is is considering a case that'll could be really impactful. You know, people wanna feel it it's kind of a like, just a basic fairness.

Yeah. You know, people wanna feel like their voice is gonna be heard. And you understand that, you know, we have an even election. We can kinda all you know, you win and lose elections. Those of us who've done that for a lot of years understand that.

But when it feels like it's kinda rigged that, you know, it's not in your favor or when it's rigged against you, then it doesn't feel good and and it really can cause problems.

Yeah. Absolutely. And I think there's a lot of information and background that hasn't been shared with folks that aren't in the political world. You know, I think of everyday New Mexicans, but they don't realize that the Census Bureau made a big mistake under the Biden administration where they overcounted in some states and undercounted in some states. And now some states have taken action saying, hey.

You actually undercounted us. We're gonna redo our districts because we need a few more districts. Or, hey. You overcounted here, and, you know, you added districts in another state to benefit you. And the the there's a correction there that is happening right now at the Census Bureau as well to get those numbers as accurate as they can be.

Yeah. I I had kind of forgotten about that. I heard about it and, you know, but that's it's like one of those underlying things that's so impactful.

Mhmm.

And the census is a big deal. You know? Yeah. It determines so many things for us. And, I know when, you know, there's been a lot of folks kind of saying that when, one of the motivations to kind of unchecked immigration on the Southern border, you know, that fortunately isn't really happening anymore, but was to skew census results because that's how we determine how our congressional districts are made.

Yep. Exactly. David, you come from a blue state, and I'm sure you've had some uphill battles. But I'd love to hear about your experience in Illinois and any parallels that you see with New Mexico and maybe some of the wins that you've been able to accomplish in Illinois that you're now looking at here in New Mexico that it seems maybe like a right time in New Mexico. I think New Mexico is in a perfect position right now.

I think people here are frustrated with New Mexico being last in everything good and first in everything bad. And I think they are looking for the moment where New Mexico can aim towards prosperity.

Yeah. You know, it's just harder in politically difficult states to enact reform. I think that'll improve people's lives. But, you know, I I was the Illinois state director for five years before I moved into this role, and, you know, we had some really aggressive fights to try to stop you know, in in in a place like New Mexico or Illinois, you really you really have to start by stopping the bad policy. Mhmm.

Then you try to change leadership and then pass good policy. And I think that's the formula for both states and any state that's really, you know, trending in a in a progressive direction. But, you know, we started fighting at the local level. Like, we fought property tax hikes and other things at the ballot box. And what that allowed us to do is give hope to some folks so that you can start winning by being holding down property taxes.

But then it had the dual effect of being able to identify like minded people who wanted to, you know, limit the size of government and wanted to keep taxes low. Was like, okay. Well, let's all come together and kinda build a community that way. And eventually, we had some tax, some legislative battles over taxes, particularly the progressive income tax. They're trying to pass, a millionaire's tax, extending an income tax increase that had gone on.

And, you know, I I I'd like to say, you know, AFP led the charge in in those, and we were successful. And, you know, people didn't think that we could be, and we were. And, you know, that saved taxpayers billions and billions of dollars.

Absolutely. And that millionaire's tax, is that similar to the mansion tax?

No. This was just if you make over a million dollars, you pay more in tax. You pay an added surcharge in taxes. So, you know, a lot of small businesses and job creators are really gonna be it's it's taxes and folks who you want to keep in your state. And, we have a real problem in Illinois with people leaving.

I mean, a place like Tennessee, Iowa, Texas, Florida, Arizona, you know, hopefully someday it'll be New Mexico. You're taking Illinoisans and especially our job creators and our successful folks. But but, you know, by by being able to engage in those fights, you know, what happened right after those fights is that people were fed up with the status quo. Of course, was Illinois, so there's a dose of corruption mixed into that people were were fed up with. And we elected a a Republican governor who's very well aligned.

Now, he only lasted four years and he didn't want a second term and that there's other reasons for that. But most people would have thought that, you know, in the last decade, Illinois were, you know, elected a Republican governor. Right. Yeah. And he wasn't like a squishy weird guy.

I mean, he was was pretty hardcore and really had had a a heart for good policy. So I and I think, you know, places like New Mexico has has always kind of cycled through politically in the governor's mansion and in terms of leadership. And so that's why I'm I'm hopeful is sometimes we have to build the infrastructure more so than you would in like a red state or a swing state. So, you know, by building that infrastructure for change, when that wave comes or a positive environment or something happens on the other side politically that makes their candidate vulnerable, we're in a position to take advantage of that, who sees that moment. And I I think the best example of that is Wisconsin.

So, you know, if you remember in, like, around 2010, Scott Walker comes into office Scott Walker. And then passed act 10 and all these reforms that were really transformational and have set that state on a much better path. But before that, that was like a bash in a progressivism. I mean, literally the progressive party from Bob LaFollette was born in Wisconsin. Mhmm.

And they had that tradition. But there were some folks who really, you know, starting in o eight and maybe even earlier, were laying the groundwork to build so that all of a sudden, when 2010, that wave election came, Scott Walker would come in and they can pass those reforms, and they're still benefiting from them now. And they've gone back. They have a democratic governor. They go back and forth, but, they locked in some real positive change that has changed the trajectory of that state.

And I think if we you know, one of our missions at Americans for Prosperity, know a lot of things that all of our groups that are working together are trying to build that infrastructure so that when we have that opportunity and that change can happen, we can take full advantage of it.

Absolutely. And and I love the point that you made about working at the local level because I think when you get down to people, they care about what's happening in their community. But I think there's a a wake up call that happens when you motivate them and you get them interested in what's happening locally, they realize or something tells them, well, if this is happening here locally, what's happening at a statewide level? And so they become aware. They start thinking

Mhmm.

Well, if this is happening here in Albuquerque, is it happening around the state? Are there state policies? Are there are there state lawmakers who are passing bad policies that are now trickling down to why we're dealing with this issue here at the local level? And I think that that's a great, again, it goes to everything that AFP is about. It's grassroots and it's it's down at the bottom.

And, know, I read the prize, you know, the whole New Jersey education reform plan where it was a very top down initiative, you know, starting at the top. They thought they would come in and throw all this money from, the Gates Foundation and, you know, Meta. And in the book, it says they broke their pick because they couldn't fix it top down. They thought we're going to bring in all these celebrities, all this money, and we're going to fix education in New Jersey. Didn't work.

What we found were its grassroots movements. Mississippi grassroots. It really started at the bottom with organizations really tackling the issues that were hurting their education system. And New Mexico was leading those initiatives under governor Martinez, and unfortunately, they were rolled back under this current governor. And so oftentimes we hear people say, you know, what didn't Mississippi do that New Mexico was not doing?

I'm like, well, New Mexico was doing everything Mississippi stayed course on with their secretary, Kerry Wright, who just stuck with it and said, hey. These programs are gonna work. And, you know, I we you mentioned it a little bit earlier, you know, it it takes time to see the fruits of the labor put in. And I think a lot of times people want instant gratification that change happens overnight. We know that's not a reality.

I think we look at, oh, if it didn't change in one, two election cycles, it's not working. And that's not the case. Usually, you have to look at what happens over the next decade. Yeah. And how do those mindsets change?

Yeah. Look, I mean, just culturally, we really believe that bottom up solutions are what Mhmm. Carry the day. I mean, one of the things that that we're kind of focused on as we move to the two hundred fiftieth anniversary of America, you know, one of our themes is, we call it our one small step campaign. And what it is is, you know, you look at the founding fathers or you look at anybody who's making changes, they all took a step.

They all did make a decision to take a step, to get involved, and, you know, the rest is history. There's so many and there's so many examples of it, but, you know, I think of people, I was staying at an event last night, like, you know, so many times there's people who are, you know, yelling at Fox News or they're, you know, complaining to their spouse on the couch, but they don't think their voice matters, especially in your state like New Mexico or Illinois. I think one of the things that groups like ours can do is to to aggregate those voices. And and and sometimes at the local level, it's kinda looking around and be like, oh, there's 10 other people here who are upset about this tax proposed tax hike or how this, you know, how this money is being spent. And then you start to realize, oh, there's more people in other towns or there's more people throughout the state.

And you realize you you feel empowered, and you feel like you can make a difference. And, you know, it it's a little cliche, but kind of taking, you know, one plus one and two and three and four and five, that's how you start to build a movement. I think that, you know, when when people feel empowered and, you know, that's one of the things America's Prosperity tries to do is give people the tools and the platform to aggregate their voices with other like minded people to try to make a difference with their elected officials and change their government. And, I just think it's it's still, you know, those bottom up grassroots voices that, that produce sustainable movements that create real change in America.

Absolutely. I couldn't agree more. And, David, I gotta ask, and I had the privilege of attending the AFP's defend prosperity, protect taxpayers. And, you know, that event last night, we talked a lot about entitlement programs. And, you know, I I think about the One Small Step campaign and looking at, you know, America's two hundred and fiftieth birthday.

But I gotta look around and I see this of what's happened nationally, but also here at the state level. But I feel like we're stripping away dignity from people. You know, we're we're taking them away from being entrepreneurs and, you know, very individualistic.

Yeah.

And we're saying, hey, government, we're gonna take care of you. We're gonna handle everything. And I think we've hindered our economic growth in our nation because we've let government get so involved in people's everyday lives. But is that something you've seen through your experience? But I I just look around, and I see that we are slowly just stripping away the dignity out of people from being creators.

So, you know, it's it's really fascinating because the principles that organ our organization kinda built on, we call them the principles of human progress. And it's just the principles that have applied throughout history. We when we look at history in free societies, they they they lead to human flourishing, and one of those is dignity. Mhmm. And I think you're totally right.

You know, when we are telling people, hey, you can't, you know, you can't make it on your own. You know, you you the hard work that you could be doing isn't necessary. You're not capable of that. We'll have to we'll have to bail you give you money to Yeah. Support you or but even more so, you know, hey, you're not worth your parents to be able make a decision as to where you go to school because of where you live.

We can't allow you to change that because of funding or some we need you to just sit there in that failing school, you know, and we're just we're robbing that person of their future and their and their dignity. And I think even the way, like, societally, we you know, we've seen over the last decade how people talk to one another, you know, or how we refer to groups. It's such like a you know, someone you know, the way that we identify people are not as individuals. Yeah. And, like, recognize and dignity in them, but, like, just as different groups of whether it be racially or gender or anything else.

I mean and and then even in our in our discourse in in politics, you know, and in government, I mean, there's look, I love a robust debate over issues, over the direction of the country, the vision for a state, all that. But we you know, I think, unfortunately, in a lot of our discourse, we've kind of sacrificed, you know, recognizing the dignity of the person that we're disagreeing with. Absolutely. And, you know, I think people back to the founding and and since have, you know, duked it out with bare knuckles at times, you know, metaphorically speaking, sometimes literally, I guess. But I think that there's probably a little more recognition of the the dignity of individuals because we gotta work together and deal with one another.

So I I think that, you know, people really recognize the dignity of individuals and saying, hey, you can make some of it yourself. Empower I I think empowerment is one of the real key things that we really want in our society because then people innovate and, you know, make things better, and we can engage those bottom up solutions we were talking about. Absolutely. You know, folks kind of those bubble up, and we're we're just really harnessing the greatness of America and Americans in that case.

Absolutely. And I I love that you brought up educational outcomes for students. And, you know, it's one belief I have as a former educator, as a school board member that regardless of your zip code, you should have access to the highest quality of education. Yeah. And unfortunately, we don't have that here in New Mexico.

The working families tax cuts bill provided a tax credit for states participating and for families to take advantage of to get their kids the tutoring and access to high quality education. Unfortunately, we're hearing our governor is not going to opt into that program and it's very unfortunate because that's money that can then be returned to the taxpayer for making the best choice for their family. And I know AFP has long supported education choice. No. But what have what have you experienced in other states?

I mean, do you see difference in states that AFP has been in that have instituted universal school choice? Or I know there's education savings plans, options as well for for families, but do you see that difference when you come to New Mexico versus another state that has access to those programs? Do you see where, hey, New Mexico has a chance here to do something like that, but they're not doing it, and we just continue being last in every education statistic possible?

I mean, man, we could talk about New Mexican education for another episode. At the end of the day, it's it's unconcautioned unconscionable that it's last. It's just failing its children, and it that's terrible. I talked about the federal program. I think it's really fascinating that we for a long time, folks like current governor of New Mexico, current governor of Illinois, they'd say, oh, you know, any kind of choice programs, education freedom programs are gonna take away money from public schools.

Well, this federal program does not do that. Right. Absolutely not. And yet they're still opposed. So really, were they really being truthful that that's why they were opposed to, you know, a voucher program or an ESA, an HSA savings account program or a refundable tax credit?

No. They they're beholden to the teachers' unions. Yep. They're beholden to the current established, the failing system. And that is that's coming at the price of getting better educations, better education outcomes for kids.

So I think, you know, look, neighboring states east and west, Arizona and now Texas have passed education savings accounts. They will and they'll Texas will ramp up over the next few years. I happen to I actually lead our education portfolio for AFP. And so I've I I have a lot of knowledge of, like, these of what we're doing in all these states. And it's still early in a lot of states to see the outcomes, but places like Florida have been a little while.

Arizona has been one of long established ones. West Virginia has been a long established one. You're seeing families engage in, like, the flexibility to be able to give their students the best education that they, you know, that that they think is appropriate for them. Yeah. And frankly, we want to empower families to choose what's best for their kids, you know, rather than governments bureaucrats.

So we think really that more flexibility and more choice is the way to create more and more of a marketplace. Because frankly, you know, a lot of public schools didn't have competition. Yeah. Competition breeds, you know, hopefully improvement and excellence. And so the more you know, look.

People are are voting with their feet on this. You know, still the vast majority of kids are in public schools. But for the first time ever, you know, with Texas coming online, half of the students in the nation have the option of doing some of of, you know, having some sort of school choice. And I think what we're seeing and what we're seeing, especially post the the lockdown and the pandemic Mhmm. A lot of kids going to private school, and, an explosion in homeschooling and microschools and learning pods.

And the fastest growing group, over half of the people going towards homeschooling and micro schools and kind of non traditional ways of educating are lower income, particularly minority communities. Yeah. And that's a real change. And so I think that that's that's really encouraging. And I'm so excited these kids who've been trapped in a lot of failing schools Yeah.

You know, that their parents can kind of make better decisions for them. And so we need to give families some of return to giving them some of their hard earned money Absolutely. To let them go make those decisions, the best decisions that they can for their kids. Because it's so important. I mean, that's that's our future.

The reality is is that public school enrollment is going down, but if spending keeps going up Right. Then that's that that's not sustainable and it's not appropriate.

Well, and they argue that, you know, private schools and charter schools and, you know, alternative schools are taking money away, but yet you keep getting bigger budgets.

Right.

And I and I love that you brought up the teachers' unions and other organizations because we've really prioritized the interest of adults over children, and that's problematic. A lot of the education reform work that I worked on, it was clear that adults were wanting to be taken care of first Mhmm. Rather than the children that they serve, and that's unfortunate. And along with the tax credit, there's a lot of misinformation out there this, last school board election here in Albuquerque, but I saw a lot of the questionnaires of candidates and the media is pitching them saying, do you believe in vouchers like the one provided in the working families tax cuts bill? And I'm I'm saying it's not a voucher, it's a tax credit.

And I've seen other folks say that it's a incentive for the rich. I'm like, no. It's an incentive for everybody, to get some of their hard earned money back for making a choice for their their student, and it doesn't discriminate on income or economic status. It's open for everybody to take advantage of. But I saw a lot of misinformation out there.

And, of course, the unions were the ones calling it a voucher program and a subsidy for the rich. And I'm like, clearly, that's wrong. But just a lot of misinformation out there for these programs, which, again, it just it's there to help children. It's helped children get access to the education that they deserve and they actually need. There's a lot of things that I'm a product of our public schools here in New Mexico.

I'm I'm proud of the education I got, but education has changed since my twenty plus years ago of being in our public education system. It has changed. And I actually had the privilege to be a charter school teacher. Oh. And so I saw how charters helped certain students.

And so while public school was good to me, it doesn't mean that it's good for every other student. And there there are needs that need to be met, and that opened up my eyes. And I've had the privilege of seeing private schools at work and other charter schools at work, and they all have some sort of uniqueness to them that may apply to a certain family, and every family should have an option for

Right.

Their kid to go to that school if it fits their needs. But, again, just we're always battling misinformation out here in New Mexico.

Well, you know, look. A few years ago, right, right, eight years ago, Illinois passed a, tax credit scholarship program. So, you know, and and very similar to what the federal passed to the federal level this time. It's like and, basically, it's like if you're someone who wants to make a donation to a scholarship fund to go to low income kids to go to a school of their choice, you can get a tax credit for that. And Illinois had that.

It was one of biggest in the nation, actually, right off the bat. But it it was only for, I think, four or five years. And the reauthorization came up, and the unions made it a litmus test for the Democrats who obviously dominated Illinois politics and legislative politics. And we had a new governor, governor J. B.

Pritzker. And even though, like, there were so many voices and busloads of of kids coming from Chicago from the most diverse backgrounds you can imagine, You know, you had the you had the Jewish school coming down, the Muslim school coming down, the primary African American school, you know, the the the suburban predominantly white, you know, evangelical school. It was just in the Catholic schools and every and everyone was on the same page and they the union still won, and they let that program expire. And what does that mean? That means that poor kids who would not be able to go to those private schools where they were getting a better education, they couldn't go anymore because they had money.

Just because the because the unions didn't want it. And, you know, the the Democrats in the legislature and governor Pritzker said, no. We're gonna take away your chance to have that education. It was it was snatched away from them. And I thought that that's that's just cold hearted.

It's been terrible. Yeah. I mean, we had a we did an an effort this year in Illinois, and I'm proud to say Illinois that AFP in Illinois was one of the main, one of the main actors in in preventing this. They were they, for the first time, tried to regulate homeschooling. Homeschooling in Illinois, you would never guess it.

It's one of the freest states for homeschooling in the world. We homeschool our kids and send them to private school, but they wanted a registration, and if you didn't register, you'd be subject to criminal penalties, which just seemed really bizarre. So the homeschool community is really pretty activated. You know, the homeschool legal defense association and other groups all partnered. They have people who came together, mobilized.

Literally thousands of people came to the capital. They had to shut the capital down. Like, remember I had to wait for people to leave to be able to get in because it was too crowded and it was packed. And and but bottom line is we mobilized over the course of twelve weeks and stopped this legislation. Never got called.

It got we passed the committee. It didn't get called in the house. But I think what the Democrats on the committee who introduced the bill and were pushing it, and and really engaged in a lot of misinformation, what they did not anticipate is how diverse that coalition was. Yeah. I mean, we had Aziza Baker.

She, or Aziza Butler. I'm sorry. She's a mom. Her husband's a pastor of a of a good sized African American church in in on the West Side Of Chicago. And she was a Chicago public school teacher.

She had her kids. She said, I'm not sending them. I'm gonna homeschool them. That was her step that she said, okay. And then more moms came to her and were like, hey.

Can you help us out? And they started a microschool. And then she's out there, you know, testifying in front of the committee. She's debating the bill sponsor on TV. It was amazing.

And and I think when they saw that it wasn't just a bunch of, like, rural evangelical white people, it was it was Latino families from the West Side Of Chicago and the South Side Of Chicago, African American families, the Catholic folks from the then they when they saw that, they were like, oh, shoot. And that's what mattered in the Democratic caucus. They were like, hey. This is not something we wanna do. So I think it was a great example of mobilizing voices across the the political spectrum and to to really come to you know, to make a difference and stop bad regulation, and then hopefully in the future to pass better regulation.

Absolutely. On that note about mobilizing, I saw AFP lead a great effort here to defeat the largest tax hike in New Mexico history on New Mexicans with the paid family and medical leave bill. If you were a business, you were gonna have to, you know, add this to your payroll taxes. You were also gonna have to take it out of folks every, you know, biweekly check, you know, penalize them for and, you know, again, things happen, people have emergencies. Any great business that I've ever seen has policies in place to take care of their employees for those hard times.

But it was interesting to see the government come in and call it a premium. I'm like, well, you're not an insurance company. That's a weird thing to say. But it was just because the Democrats didn't want to admit that it was a tax hike. They they kept saying it's not a tax.

And I said, anytime government takes money from someone's paycheck, that is a tax. And our our founding forefathers would probably agree. They would say Totally agree. Yeah. We'd probably rebel against you had you tried to do that to us.

People always forget. Like,

the The Boston Tea Party?

For the reason for the revolution largely was taxes.

Yeah. Taxes.

I mean, it is not a trivial thing, and our founders did not did not see it as a small item.

But AFP New Mexico led a great effort for one of the first times. They filled a room of folks to say, yeah, we oppose this. And on that note, David, as we get close to wrapping up here, I I wanna transition to what you're envisioning and what your plans are as regional vice president for AFP. New Mexico, I think, is in a prime place for change, and I know AFP New Mexico is gonna lead that with support of AFP National. But, you know, I just love to hear about the growth that you've witnessed here in New Mexico, but also the plans and initiatives that you are looking at moving into the future.

Well, it's been super exciting for me to watch. And, you know, I think we've put a team in place and a leadership team that is very capable, has a great vision for the state. I think the most importantly, it's a team that understands what our organization's comparative advantage is. Like, it's primarily grassroots. What how you know, so the Family Matters Leave Act, you know, that that that legislative effort there.

I mean, yeah, we we brought people to the Capitol and packed a room, and other groups did, you know, put petition signatures in, provided meaningful testimony, did media, did direct lobbying. We all have our role to play. And I think the only way that New Mexico changes for the better is when all of our, you know, those of us who share our, share our common values, you know, promoting freedom and liberty and creating opportunity for people, like we work together.

Mhmm.

And we figure out, this is I'm in this lane. You're in that lane. You're in that lane. You do that well. And then we we all kind of move together in tandem.

And I think there's real hope there because I think that's happening right now.

I agree.

And we are excited. We just brought on a new leader for Libre, which is our Hispanic outreach group. Christy Martinez.

Shout out to Christy. I got to meet her And, last yeah, she seems like a wonderful addition, very enthusiastic and energetic, and, you know, love that she's leading the Libre program.

Yeah. And so I I'm excited for that because that that's that's a place we we need to continue to build. Obviously, with the the makeup, you know, demographically of, New Mexico, it's the key demographic and population. And it's just it's a lot of folks who I think, you know, there there's real opportunity because I think there's so many values that are shared, around freedom and liberty and the desire for opportunity to to achieve the American dream. And so I'm excited for her leadership there.

That's what we're gonna probably this first half of this year, we're really focused on growing there. And just continually, you know, we were excited about our event the other night. You know, I think there's a 150 people there. And, you know, it's people who we can say, hey. We need to have hope.

I mean, that's the the biggest kind of one of the biggest messages. I get it coming from Illinois. Just so often people just throw up their hands and are like, what am I gonna do here? I'm gonna leave. Yeah.

It's hard to to blame people, but I think in New Mexico, there really is a reason for hope. I I look at how the president did in the Hispanic community. I look at, I think how out of touch the current leadership in Santa Fe and elsewhere are with regard to, you know, a lot of the values that that real you know, Mexicans share. And I think I look at those things and then and then, you know, I think a lot of us, in the right of center kind of coming together to try to work towards a common purpose. I think there's some reason for optimism, and we wanna play our part there and be good partners.

We've we've we've been blessed to really forge some great relationships with some legislative leadership, and they've just been an amazing part. I mean, they're they're out there toiling every, you know, every every time we're in session, taking their hand against the wall, throwing their arms up in the air, but they they're they're fighting the good fight. And, you know, I think we can come alongside our leaders there and really make it make a positive difference for the state.

Yeah. I couldn't agree more. David Fromm, vice president of AFP National and podcast host of American Potential. So glad to have you on the show, David. I appreciate you stopping in, and I appreciate your hope in New Mexico.

I mean, it it is great to know that there are people out there who look in New Mexico and say, that's the next place that we wanna see prosperity because I believe our people wanna see it too, and we're at the cusp.

Yep. Thanks, Dave. I really appreciate it.

It's been a My pleasure, David. Well, that's it for this week's Chile Wire. Be sure to subscribe and also be sure to subscribe to the American Potential. Thanks, y'all. Thank you.