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Real News For Real New Mexicans.
The Chile Wire with A. Baldonado. Hey, everyone. Welcome back to The Chile Wire. This week, I have a guest who is a candidate for House District 44 that encompasses the Corrales and North Valley area of Bernalillo, Sandoval Counties.
Abe Baldonado:I am delighted to introduce Adam Prior. Adam, thank you for coming on The Chile Wire.
Adam Prior:Thank you for having me.
Abe Baldonado:My pleasure. Adam, I gotta ask right away off the bat because we are The Chile Wire, red or green?
Adam Prior:Both.
Abe Baldonado:Christmas. Awesome. Christmas. Love it. Love it.
Abe Baldonado:You know, surprisingly, for the first time, we had someone say neither last week and they caught me off guard because I'm usually used to like a green or red Yeah. Christmas and then all of a sudden it was neither and it it took me off guard. Yeah. So, but big shout out to our guest last week, who had a fantastic interview. Actually, we had discussed, about getting independent voters out and how critical that is to
Adam Prior:get Independent DTS.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. The DTS voters and how important they play a role. Unfortunately, they're not turning out. We saw during the primary, not a big chunk of them turned out to vote. I know Sam Bragman was relying heavily on them, less than 10%, I think, maybe showed up a
Adam Prior:lot more would have voted
Abe Baldonado:for him. Yeah. So very low propensity. So ultimately, we had a conversation on how can we get independents motivated because really their votes do matter. I know a lot of independents believe that, ah, my vote doesn't matter because I'm not associated with the party.
Abe Baldonado:But come November, it's gonna matter. And independence are really what's gonna drive whether New Mexico changes direction or we stay status quo. And so Correct. We're really big on getting independence out to vote. And hopefully, some independence in your district will also listen to today's podcast and say, hey, you know what?
Abe Baldonado:That's the guy, that we need running. But, Adam, I love, you know, just reading your bio. You're a mover and shaker. You know, you're you're you're a fixer. Literally.
Abe Baldonado:Yes. Like, you're a fixer and now you're Santa It's my job. Exactly. And I'll I'll let you elaborate a little bit more for our audience. But Sure.
Abe Baldonado:Adam, just wanna give you a moment to share who you are and why you jumped in. Know, everyone that we talked to that runs for office, there's usually something that a line has been crossed. Whether, you know, it's, a business related issue like, hey, we have legislators making bad business policies that impact me, you know, instead of complaining about it, I'm gonna Complete. Do something about it. Yes.
Abe Baldonado:Or sometimes it's just our own values, you know, our New Mexican values that say, hey, you know what? I don't agree with the direction New Mexico's going. I I wanna start making a difference and start sharing my thoughts and what we need to do to Yeah. Be better. So, Adam, just wanna give you a moment, share a little bit with our audience who you are and why you're running.
Adam Prior:Okay. What I wanted to say on on the House District 44, also East Rio Rancho as well.
Abe Baldonado:East Rio Rancho.
Adam Prior:Okay. Yes. Yes. So what I wanted to go on real quick independence, I'll kinda go on my on my why, is I know a lot of independence in, like, one of my neighbors, he's frustrated on left, right, left wing, right wing, same bird. You know, we've all heard that.
Adam Prior:And when I talked with him, he he's vote he's going with me because I'm for the people. Yeah. So You have a conversation with him. Totally. Yeah.
Adam Prior:Yeah. He doesn't like it just yeah. I just had a lot of talks with him about it and, like, my direction, and so he's going with me as an independent. But he's like goes, you're for the people. So my my why, that goes back to probably when I was 15 and where I really got I saw how government did Mhmm.
Adam Prior:And, like, what happened, and then it it kinda went from there and then where I jumped in. So, like, when I was 15, I was actually in Germany, West Germany at the time, and over Christmas time, and that's when the Berlin Wall fell. Yeah. So I was actually there. I walked.
Adam Prior:One of my trips, I walked through Dachau. I went to, you know, concentration camp, and I saw what government did to their people. It's it's horrible. Like, when I went through, even my dad made comments. He goes, are you gonna read every plaque and look at everything?
Adam Prior:And I look I read every plaque. I looked at every single photo.
Abe Baldonado:Wow.
Adam Prior:And I saw stuff there that I never saw in history books. And it was sad what what government did, and that's government power. So remember thinking on that, I was like, man, this is you know, so I I just was always against government control. Yeah. Yeah.
Adam Prior:And big government. It's just absolutely not.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. And it's scary right now, you know, when we talk about the foundations of our government and a free market system and a system that allows, self determination and and freedom Yeah. And entrepreneurship. But what we're seeing right now in these, Democratic primaries across the nation, these Democratic socialists that they're calling themselves that. You know, this isn't a name that I'm making up.
Abe Baldonado:They they literally go on record calling themselves, yeah, I'm a Democratic socialist. And Yeah. And I'm like, people, are you paying attention what they're telling you? Because people in Germany will tell you what happened under a democratic socialist. Right?
Abe Baldonado:And and what that leads to, and when government is involved, you know, they start telling you. Government wants to take over your private businesses. Government wants to take over your your grocery stores.
Adam Prior:Because the government knows better for
Abe Baldonado:the Right. Right. Versus the families know what's best for themselves. Individuals know what's best for themselves. And it is a scary thing to hear how common this rhetoric is becoming, you know, because it goes against everything that America was founded on.
Abe Baldonado:And and also running away from. Right? You talk about no kings. Well, hey, that's why America was founded because we were escaping the persecution of an actual monarch.
Adam Prior:Right.
Abe Baldonado:And so to hear now these individuals saying, hey, we want to go back to government controlling everything gets better for the people. And, you know, like I've told people, you know, over the last year as we've heard about like the snap audits and also the consumerism around groceries and affordability, those those costs will skyrocket under a government controlled system.
Adam Prior:And it's audits on Medicaid as well? Right. They're not they're not doing it.
Abe Baldonado:Well, the thing is is that, hey, government's great, but guess what? We control it so we can starve you whenever we choose to.
Adam Prior:Those should give those they can take.
Abe Baldonado:Absolutely. And so I'm glad you got to see that. I wish more, especially younger generations. I wanna see younger generations get involved. I do feel bad that a lot of our younger generations have been left behind from a historical standpoint because I don't believe that they've gotten a really good education on the history of The United States and also world history to understand what separates The United States from other countries.
Abe Baldonado:And it's it's those basic pieces of knowledge that make you say, hey, I don't like what you're saying because history has shown this doesn't work out well in
Adam Prior:the And so the the the fear that I have on that is America is the beacon of the world. Mhmm. And, you know, freedom, I mean, around everywhere. I mean, we we
Abe Baldonado:That's why immigrants wanna come here. Right?
Adam Prior:Yeah. Well, yeah. I mean, it's it's the greatest country around ever. So if we fall, who protects us? Yeah.
Adam Prior:We're the I mean, we're the last one standing in a sense. I mean, we're it. Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:And other countries rely on us as well.
Adam Prior:Oh. Oh, big time. I mean, we find a lot of other countries. So it's yeah. If we fall, that's why we have as voters and going back to your independence as voters, we have to protect this country.
Adam Prior:Mhmm. We have to keep our freedoms. We have to keep our for me, it's yeah. It's a free our free market. We can't have government control and big brother.
Abe Baldonado:And defend the greatest document ever created in our constitution because it Yep. I mean, thinking about how we just celebrated our two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of America's founding and woo hoo, America two fifty. Yeah. It is something to recognize about how forward thinking are the founders of our country were, you know, to to provide the Bill of Rights, to to provide those opportunities for a country to thrive and to defend itself and to Yeah. Become a republic.
Adam Prior:Yeah. And if you look at that time of countries that have been around for, you know, for, I mean, a lot longer, thousand year, I mean, all that. And for American, two hundred and fifty years of us being the dominant in the world in that short period of time, we did something right. Mhmm. And so to to try to undo that, I just that's backwards.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. Well, Adam, we know we got a little sidetracked, but wanted to I'll let you finish talking about your experiences and Okay. Why you got here. And, I I really wanna hear I wanna hear about your story on how you're a fixer and how you plan to fix things up in Santa Fe.
Adam Prior:Sure. So yeah. So it went back to on on my why is then during COVID I'm in construction. I'm a contractor. At the time, I was I was running a large roofing company.
Adam Prior:And so during COVID, the government deemed a lot of businesses not essential. Yeah. So if you are a business owner, it's essential to you. It's essential to your employees. It's your livelihood.
Adam Prior:Yeah. But they deemed your business not essential. So there's over, like, 750 businesses shut down. So I remember, you know, thinking like, what the heck? I mean, it's major overreach and on our freedoms to be able to have our own I mean, just it just wasn't right.
Adam Prior:And so I was getting really frustrated. I mean, luckily, in construction, I was deemed essential, but it was just it was just a massive overreach and then on executive overreach as well. So with that, like, even, like, the the real quick on the governor, she did the executive on on the power for the thirty days, but she's extended it every thirty days since then. Yeah. She's never let go.
Adam Prior:So when about that no kings and no dictators, you know, we gotta kinda look back in our own home and what's going on. So that so I I saw problems in our state, and it we used to be booming. I moved here in '99. And so, I mean, we were we were in an awesome state. I mean, we're doing really good.
Adam Prior:And then during COVID, it just it went back you know, it went downhill. I felt and there was a massive control from the government shutting us down. And then I remember driving around. I had a piece of paper in my car that if I got pulled over, it's like I'm like in Germany or something, that I was allowed to be on the road, and I had the freedom to drive because I was with an essential company. Wow.
Adam Prior:So it's like you might as well put a tattoo numbers on my on my arm. Yeah. You know? So it just I just had some problems with that seeing what government was doing to the people here.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. And, I mean, I remember when you had to carry your little card saying you were vaccinated. Right? Yes. Like, they would let you in somewhere.
Adam Prior:Yeah. Well, you couldn't travel. You couldn't go into I mean, just yeah. There was a lot.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. That that should've worked a lot. People are like, hey. This doesn't feel right.
Adam Prior:And then they were watching you on your phones.
Abe Baldonado:Mhmm.
Adam Prior:If we were going together, you know, to be careful. And, you know, governor Grisham even with said that, we're watching you. Yeah. So I just don't see that as a
Abe Baldonado:I I remember during that time, I took a trip over to our twin sister state, Arizona, and talk about day and night, man, because that they were out, they were everyone was out eating. I mean, it was like the world didn't stop. And so leaving New Mexico to see that just right next door and then having to come back and be like, oh.
Adam Prior:They were
Abe Baldonado:fully open. Isolated again. They were open. They they were open for business. I mean, some people wore masks.
Abe Baldonado:A lot of people didn't. Like, they it was their choice, but they were just living life still. Yeah. They were just moving on. And, you know, their schools were open and come back to New Mexico and, I mean, the streets are dead.
Abe Baldonado:Everyone's locked up at home. You had a governor telling you to stay home while she's out shopping for jewelry and spending money on Wagyu steaks and alcohol. Yeah. You know, these these are the things that people need to to pay attention to and really think of like, hey. Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:That that just it doesn't pass the smell test for me.
Adam Prior:No. And, you know, for me is it I would have said something completely different is if you had a business and you felt where you want your safety, you know, with COVID going around, then you would have masks, you know, to go into your store as as a requirement or something in that nature, but it wasn't the government's job to shut you down.
Abe Baldonado:Right. Well, we saw that a lot of across New Mexico, especially, a lot of businesses didn't recover. A lot of them tried to. They tried to hold on as long as possible, but we still see businesses shutting down today because they could never catch up for the losses that they suffered Yeah. Over those two to three years.
Adam Prior:And I was voicing a lot of of where our economy is going to suffer our economy. You cannot shut us down. I mean, it's gonna hurt Yeah. Later on in well, it's coming. Yeah.
Adam Prior:Mean, it came.
Abe Baldonado:Well, in the most recent in your worlds, another overreach of government, which I'm sure you're familiar with, was the heat rule for general contractors and if you work outside that, you know, you have to give if it reaches a certain temperature, your employees have to take a certain length of break. And it was all the way up to about a forty five minute break. And I'm like, nothing will ever get done. And so if you have these folks that are roofers or homebuilders, you know, you're I mean, even just some of the like, oil and gas workers, I mean, just everything that it takes to build, you know, whether it's businesses, if it's homes, manufacturing, you know, folks that are outside exposed to to the sun, exposed to heat. It was just a big overreach to say, hey, if it's 90 degrees or above, they have to take a forty five minute break after twenty minutes of work.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. And it's like, no projects ever gonna get done if that's the case.
Adam Prior:Yeah. My guys would take they would get there, like, it's hot, they'd get there at six because I do roofs a lot. Mhmm. And they'd get there at six in the morning, you know, with the customers going. And then later on when it got hot, they may take a little bit break and then they come back again when it was a 105 degrees outside.
Adam Prior:But it wasn't government mandated. It was just, you know Well for the just my guys want
Abe Baldonado:And I felt that was a slap in the face to businesses because every good business owner knows how to take care of their employees. Yes. Ensuring that they're protected, they're safe out on the job site. My father-in-law does construction, has done it his entire life. And he'll be the first to tell you that, hey, you learn how to protect yourself from the elements.
Abe Baldonado:So you you make sure that you have the appropriate gear to cover yourself up from the sun exposure during the heat. And if you don't, it's a rookie move and you make that mistake, you'll learn never to do it again.
Adam Prior:Yeah. Oh, definitely.
Abe Baldonado:So you learn how to pack appropriately, you know, how to protect yourself depending on the season and also to stay hydrated. You know? But this rule went above and beyond to where, like, you had to provide shade for your employees. So if you're at a job site, you have to build some sort of shade mechanism. You have to provide water.
Abe Baldonado:You have to do Yeah. A lot of these things. I'm like, well, you're taking away a lot of self responsibility because if you work in those roles, I mean, obviously, you should be aware, hey, I need to pack my lunch, pack my water Yeah. You know, whatever I need to to get me through the day and also protect myself.
Adam Prior:Yeah. Definitely. Yeah. My guys always had a lot of water. I mean, they'll have, like, the two big old packs of water Yeah.
Adam Prior:And go through it. But, yeah, it's not the I don't I just don't view it as the government just always overstepping into how, you know, everything's done through the day. I mean, they know how
Abe Baldonado:to It was definitely a New Mexico government move. That's for sure.
Adam Prior:I'm like Definitely.
Abe Baldonado:This is excessive.
Adam Prior:Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:Well, Adam, you are running against an incumbent in Kathleen Cates. Her record is not good. She's voted terribly on a number of things, paid family medical leave which would have been the largest tax increase in New Mexico state history. She sided with trial attorneys on the medical malpractice issues, trying to protect trial lawyers lining their pockets.
Adam Prior:And with that, we have a lot of out of town lawyers here because we're
Abe Baldonado:Oh, yeah.
Adam Prior:The highest payout here in the state.
Abe Baldonado:I mean, look look at the billboards, man. You drive up and down I 40, I 25, it is Lawyers everywhere. Trial lawyer billboards just about Yes. Everywhere.
Adam Prior:And so, yeah, that's why we're having a hard time, you know, retaining doctors here and when we go to the office, I mean, a lot of them are NP nurse practitioners. We don't have a lot of doctors. Yeah. And I went through it literally like without what you're saying, You probably know a year and a half ago, I had a heart attack.
Abe Baldonado:I did not know that.
Adam Prior:Yeah. Triple bypass, and then I'm getting back in the and I had, like, eight months to wait to go to a doctor here. And I'm like I go, man, I could be dead by then. And they're like, that's not funny. I well, eight months, ten months.
Adam Prior:So we have a major medical problem here. Yeah. I know what's going on. Just with on malpractice and be able to retain doctors and they want to come to this state.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. I mean, New Mexico, bang for your buck is beautiful. You get all four seasons. We have some of the best scenery across the entire state. Oh, yes.
Abe Baldonado:If you want mountains, you go Northern New Mexico. If you want desert, you know, very warm climate, you go down to Las Cruces.
Adam Prior:Oh, yeah.
Abe Baldonado:Just very gorgeous. And then you have the the small spots too. Rio Dosso, Cloudcroft, Silver City. You have some really wonderful small towns that just throughout the state have that charm and that appeal for, you know, just small town life. You just don't want the big city and you want to, you know, you have a great career and, you know, sometimes, yeah.
Abe Baldonado:There's doctors that want to come back to their communities and serve. Unfortunately, there's no opportunities to do so or it's not a friendly environment for them to do so.
Adam Prior:Yeah. I moved I moved out here originally because I felt it was a little bit less regulations from California. Mhmm. And and just the outdoor life. I mean, I could be in three and a half hours.
Adam Prior:I could be at, like, seven different resorts to go snowboarding. Yeah. So if there's a storm over in Cebu or Red River or, I mean, go up to Santa Fe. I mean, Santa Fe, I mean, it's that's a great great resort or even, you know, up Colorado, you know, Purgatory and Durango. Yep.
Adam Prior:I mean, we have all around. We could be anywhere in the state in, three and a half hours. So I came out here and then camping up in Jemez, I was like, man, I love it out here. So I was like, I I moved, like, pretty pretty quickly after that.
Abe Baldonado:And a lot of people experience that realize, oh, man, you wanna sue me and take my entire life savings and my kids college fund and
Adam Prior:Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:My house and might as well take my dog too. I mean, that's just how bad the trial lawyers are going in Yeah. On their punitive damages piece. And it is unfortunate because it's a reality. And this is really the conversation I've been trying I want younger people to get involved in this and and actually care about it because I do remember being very young.
Abe Baldonado:And if you would have talked to me at 21 years old, I probably wouldn't have cared about health care because I'm young. Right? I'm Yeah. I'm healthy. Yeah.
Adam Prior:I'm I'm
Abe Baldonado:immortal. Like, nothing's gonna happen to me. Nothing's gonna happen to me. And then you get to a certain age and you're like, oh, man. Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:You know what? My knees are hurting now. The cold
Adam Prior:Arthritis is kicking.
Abe Baldonado:Kicks in. You know, everything's popping. But in all seriousness
Adam Prior:though Yes.
Abe Baldonado:And, you know, your your parents age, you you have family members that age that, you know, they develop certain issues, diseases, whatever it may be, and then you realize they don't have access to the appropriate and high quality care that they deserve. And if they're not in a position to advocate for themselves or maybe don't have great insurance, if you're stuck on Medicaid in New Mexico, your options are pretty slim, you know, and so fortunate for you, if you can advocate for yourself and go to the Mayo Clinic, go to MD Anderson, you know, somewhere out of state that has a better program to really hone in on whatever complications you're suffering from. But it is difficult to watch when you see your family members aging, you realize they don't have access to high quality health care.
Adam Prior:Well, my mom's complained on the same thing. She retired out here, and she was born in New Mexico, then she came back out here to retire. But she's like, Yeah, all my friends She goes, Our complaint is, you know, they're worried with the health care, being older.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. Especially when you start talking about specialty doctors, you
Adam Prior:know? Yes.
Abe Baldonado:Certain specialists, I mean, it's hard to find. And if you don't have it, you're gonna have to go out of state and that costs a lot more money.
Adam Prior:Correct. Yeah. We have a we have a but we have a big problem here on just like with, like, you're talking about the Medicaid. So when you have, like, Medicaid, Medicare, SNAP, and so forth, and you do that as a whole population, you know, for example, our border states, 10 and Utah is, 10% of the population that's on it. Wow.
Adam Prior:Arizona is 26 to 28%. New Mexico, 42%.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. Almost half of New Mexicans. I
Adam Prior:mean, we got a problem. Yeah. So it's just what the government's pushing on their policies, it's not it's not working.
Abe Baldonado:Well, that's because we've created an environment where we've told New Mexicans be dependent on your government. We we will take care of you. And with that, we've not put in business friendly policies. You know, we've pushed businesses away to say, hey, you know what? I'll go to Arizona.
Abe Baldonado:I'll go
Adam Prior:to Yes.
Abe Baldonado:Texas. I'll go to Colorado. I'll go to Utah.
Adam Prior:Right.
Abe Baldonado:Oklahoma, whatever it may be. I'll go anywhere but New Mexico because New Mexico doesn't care to have my business. They don't have the policies in place. They don't have the tax structure in place that makes it a place for me to create a very good business, but also be able to employ people.
Adam Prior:Right.
Abe Baldonado:You know, I understand. Yes. You know, you have to pay taxes. I I get that. But when you have a a GRT that is focused on like completely wiping out any profits that a business can make, what's the incentive?
Abe Baldonado:I mean, you can't run a good business just, you know, getting by. It just it doesn't work that way.
Adam Prior:Yeah. And so like on that is is when I used to work for the people and then about five and a half years, I went on my own. So I'm a small business owner now. I'm a general contractor and I have to like you're saying, fix things and to go out. But now the the issue is is is the tax structure that's going on here is is killing it.
Adam Prior:One, there's the f s p one fifty five. That's a corporation and, like, employment tax. So now I gotta pay more. It's a $111,000,000 a year. That's just getting taxed.
Adam Prior:So now as a company, there's is more of a payout. And then on the like on property taxes, you have residential is a 3% increase, like max, like every year. Commercial, whole different subject. Think last year, it went up 60%. Wow.
Adam Prior:So now as a business and we have a commercial property, well, now I have to pay a lot more in taxes. Mhmm. So it's not when you and then you went back during COVID and and small businesses trying to thrive and to get back at it. Well, they just keep it's like it's just dumping stuff more like if we're in a hole and trying to get out. So, yeah, you got people closing up.
Adam Prior:I mean or people leave. Yeah. I know I know I know people who have property here, Texas, like other states, and if they only had it in New Mexico, they wouldn't have survived. Yeah. Because of the way that the taxes and all I mean, it's just it's not a good it's not a good practice in how they're doing their policies in Santa Fe here.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. Definitely not. And, you know, I'm all about that. If you own property, you pay it off, you pay off your home. Why are you still paying taxes on that?
Abe Baldonado:You know, you paid it off. Like, why are you still required to pay taxes on
Adam Prior:it? Yeah. And, like, so like that like the s p one fifty five, the incumbent of where I'm going in, the incumbent voted for that Mhmm. I wouldn't have because I'm going for the people. I'm not I'm not better than anybody.
Adam Prior:I'm just like you, anybody else that, you know, I've worked. I got my bills to pay. Just like all of us. And I wanna be able to survive. I want all of us to survive.
Adam Prior:I want my neighbors. I want people down the street, people in Clovis. Now I'm running for my district, but, you know, I'm still voting. I would be voting in in Santa Fe
Abe Baldonado:Yeah.
Adam Prior:For For something that's gonna but happening. It's the state. Mhmm. So it's state representative. So you're representing I know I'm voicing for the people in my district, but you're also impacting people in the entire state.
Adam Prior:Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:So Yeah. And our our state is definitely underrepresented. And by that, what I mean is our our state is truly conservative, you know, in your family values and Yes. Just in general, we are a culture that is family oriented, protective, you know, and traditional. And unfortunately and we saw this in the presidential election.
Abe Baldonado:Almost 46, you know, voted for president Donald Trump. Yet Republicans have no representation anywhere in New Mexico. No. Yeah. Not in the 4th Floor, the Governor's Mansion, not in the the roundhouse, in the legislative bodies, not in congress, you know.
Abe Baldonado:And that tells you almost half of the state voted conservative yet have no representation.
Adam Prior:Supreme Court, Democrat.
Abe Baldonado:Supreme Court, all
Adam Prior:of them. The senate's run for the state Democrat. Are are congress Democrat? No. And then the state representative is majority is Democrat.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. And over the last hundred and fourteen years, it's predominantly been run by Democrats. Yes. You've had windows where you've had a Republican governor, but a Republican governor cannot do anything if the house and the senate are run by Democrats. They will
Adam Prior:They're just
Abe Baldonado:stuck. Hijack everything. Yep. Right? And so and they will put a roadblock to a lot of of policy issues.
Abe Baldonado:And so we've never had a trifecta where republicans have been in control of both the legislature and the executive.
Adam Prior:Yeah. And it's so like when people I talk to, they go Republicans don't fix anything in the state. Well, we
Abe Baldonado:can't. Yeah. Republicans can't.
Adam Prior:We can't. So when you go vote for you know, you go into committees and you go vote for a bill or if that committee
Abe Baldonado:You're playing defense more than you're playing offense.
Adam Prior:So if you go to committee and there's, say, seven people in the committee, five are democrat, two are republican, well, there's nothing that you can, I mean, they they'll those
Abe Baldonado:are number You know, when we talked about, you were talking about the corporate, income tax bill, senate bill one fifty one, and then, also paid family medical leave, medical malpractice? You look at the partisan vote? Well, yeah, it's the Democrats that were supporting these pieces of legislation. And you see the lone Republicans on the committee, the two or the three, they vote no. But they they even tell you in committee, Republicans would be like, hey, I know it doesn't matter.
Abe Baldonado:This is terrible. I'm voting no on it, but it's gonna pass anyway because it's already been predetermined that this legislation is gonna move.
Adam Prior:Yeah. Yeah. So it's a fight and I know some people even ask, are you sure you wanna go in there and, you know, because you're gonna you know, most stuff might lose. But if we if we don't do anything about it, if we don't change our voting, it's then we are where we are. It's Or
Abe Baldonado:we don't have anyone running, right, to to push back against these ideas, and these decisions, we then give up. And at that point, okay. We're just laying down our swords and saying, you know what? New Mexico is a lost cause and I don't wanna see that.
Adam Prior:No. That's what I mean. So that was one of the reasons why I jumped in. So I got, you know, it's that kind of that saying, you know, when you're sick and tired of being sick and tired. And I was done in status quo in New Mexico, I'm not okay with it.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. And big kudos by the way because it was kind of a late jump in so you had catch up and get petition signatures as Yeah. A writing candidate but y'all got across the finish
Adam Prior:and people say black on that, but it doesn't matter, whatever. It doesn't
Abe Baldonado:matter. You know what?
Adam Prior:Yeah. I need to dig after seven and I got five thirty four. So which which is more than enough, which is good and and we hit it. We hit it pretty good. So, you know, now it's
Abe Baldonado:Which is amazing. That just shows that there was determination and that y'all were in it to say, hey, no, we're gonna get this done.
Adam Prior:Yes. Yeah. And like the I'm not bothered by, you know, going upstream. I'm I've been at companies where I felt like I was in like a survivor. You know, and everybody's kinda at you, want wanna get you out.
Adam Prior:And so for me, I got thick skin on that. It doesn't bother me. So when people ask like, are you sure you wanna go up there? You're gonna you're fighting upstream. Bring it.
Adam Prior:Yeah. You know, I I don't I don't mind because I'm my why and what's at stake is way bigger.
Abe Baldonado:Mhmm.
Adam Prior:So I'm taking the fight in, you know, public service. You know, some people are kind of brutal out there. Yeah. You know, against me even on social media and I just it doesn't bother me. I kinda laugh about it.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. You can't worry about No. What people say.
Adam Prior:Because it's it's there's there's a bigger it's it's bigger than myself. It's for everybody else. So I'm not running. I mean, I'm running because I got tired, but it's the why also is for everybody else. And so for me, it's I don't I don't like where it's going.
Adam Prior:I don't like the status quo in New Mexico. I don't like how things have been run. I don't like how the government has treated our our companies. I don't like how the free our freedoms on our people just it's it's gone. And then even the second amendment.
Adam Prior:Yeah. Yeah. Saw that and I was like, no, no, no, no. I was like, you can't So they wanna restrict your firearms.
Abe Baldonado:But you won't let criminals
Adam Prior:But you want criminals to be free. Yeah. Violent criminals, they'd rather put them on pro they're gonna put them on probation instead of serving time.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah.
Adam Prior:Well, our catch and release, this is a joke. Like, if you do violent crimes and murder, to be out on probation?
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. And get what was coined homicide scholarship. Yeah. So if you kill someone, we're gonna give you $2,000 a month until you're up on your feet. What?
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. Why?
Adam Prior:They need to go now, I'm up for rehabilitation. Absolutely. Completely. Yeah. But if they just committed this crime, they need to go do the time.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. There's a consequence there.
Adam Prior:Yeah. There's a consequence for the action. So if you don't if even on juveniles, if they don't have consequences, they'll keep committing the same crime. So they're it's like they're wanting our streets to be filled with criminals.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. Because otherwise, tell me Tell me benefits. Trial attorneys. Yeah. It all goes back to the trial attorneys.
Adam Prior:Well, then we can keep crime, we can keep poverty, we can keep entitlements, and we can keep the government being big brother because we need them.
Abe Baldonado:Mhmm.
Adam Prior:And to me, that's just not okay.
Abe Baldonado:And we need some judicial accountability as well. We see a lot of Emerge graduates becoming judges now and they're being very sympathetic in their determinations and their rulings. And you know, it's not for the benefit of all New Mexicans. It's for the benefit. And and I think to me what bothers me is that they they side with the criminals rather than the victims who have been victimized by, you know, whether it's murder, rape, human trafficking, you name it.
Abe Baldonado:I mean, we have completely lost sight in New Mexico of the victims and their families and and the justice for them. Instead, we have very progressive democrats saying justice for the criminals. And it's like, no. No. No.
Abe Baldonado:No. No. No. No. No.
Abe Baldonado:Accountability for the the criminals, consequences for the criminals
Adam Prior:Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:Sympathy, compassion for the victims.
Adam Prior:If they do the crime, I I don't I am not for a catch and release. Now after they've done their time and they're back out, I'm completely up for rehabilitation and getting to be a productive member of society. Yeah. Because we don't wanna have them going back and then the revolving door of Training. After they did their time.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. Yeah. Pay the consequence, do your time, then we'll work with you on, you know, workforce training, getting you prepared for Correct. Transitioning into workforce and back to civilian life. And yeah, I mean, things are all natural.
Abe Baldonado:But when you have no consequences and you're saying, hey, we're just going let you go. You know, we're going to let you out on bail and you're going to go do it again. And and you know, I'm
Adam Prior:Then why not? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Criminal.
Adam Prior:Not not how I use
Abe Baldonado:learning and you're like, that's it. Like Yeah. You know, like
Adam Prior:A slap on the hand.
Abe Baldonado:It. Like And you give
Adam Prior:me $2,000?
Abe Baldonado:Oh, okay. $2,000. Exactly. Well, I'll tell you. I I'm not afraid to admit this.
Abe Baldonado:I'm a big fan of three strikes law. Right now, I think what we're dealing with in New Mexico, we have no choice but to say, hey, look, you know what? We're gonna give you three strikes. But after the third one, clearly, you're not changing your ways. So why are we gonna let you out?
Adam Prior:But that's not yeah. The three strikes don't work because when you're getting a third strike by the time court and then delays and delays, it's a ten year. You actually have the three strikes, it's within ten years. So a lot of times once it goes past that Yeah. Then the three strike
Abe Baldonado:Well, maybe that's where we need to extend it. Right? I know
Adam Prior:you go to the twenty years. Is the I think it was like habitual, like, the bite like a, you know, they're a criminal.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. Repeat offender. Yeah. Yeah. Repeat offender.
Abe Baldonado:But I I just I I really think we need to crack down on criminals. We need to say, hey, you know what? We're not gonna tolerate this, you know. First time, maybe it's a mistake and there's certain things that, you know, even if it was a mistake, there's right and wrong. And clearly, you didn't understand that.
Abe Baldonado:And I'll tell you, there's some things that are unforgiving. There's some crimes that are unforgiving. Crimes against children. I mean, New Mexico right now, ranks near the bottom in child well-being, and that should frustrate New Mexicans.
Adam Prior:We we gotta get better on our schools, our education, and then I think it's now it's the kids at 14 years old. Mhmm. They don't even they can keep it now everything private from the parents. Yeah. So parents have no say.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. I don't know if they understand
Adam Prior:that but at 14, once your kid, they can keep everything private from you. It could be at at school or Yeah. Wherever else.
Abe Baldonado:Or at a doctor's office, whatever it may be, a medical. And that should concern parents like, hey, you're letting 14 year olds, and I'll tell you as an educator, 14 year old minds aren't developed. My wife who's a social worker will tell you, yeah, a child at 14, their mind is not fully developed to comprehend a decision they're making, whether it's on their health care or whatever it may be. I they're not developed enough to understand the long term effects of that decision just yet. Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:And so you're you're opening a a pa a Pandora's box for a lot of issues later on because these children don't understand that. And quite frankly, parents should be upset that their underage minor can make those decisions without them as the parent and or guardian.
Adam Prior:Yeah. So yeah. It yeah. Like with that is even with CYFD, how that's even with the government and they failed. And then Kara's with the MCOs, but they pulled it
Abe Baldonado:Yeah.
Adam Prior:From the MCOs. So now it's gonna be at the government. It's gonna be another issue just like CYFD all over again. Yeah. But I don't I don't know why people keep going and voting for the government doing it, but the government, they're they're running all the and I some of that with the MCOs, you gotta let them do it on insurance because they know how to run their part of the business, but we need to fix it for the kids here.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. Too too many times we've seen children putting being placed back into homes that were unsafe and tragedy occurs, and and it could have been prevented.
Adam Prior:Correct.
Abe Baldonado:And that should frustrate anyone. Anyone who has a soul, anyone who who cares should really reflect on that and say, why was that child let back into that home?
Adam Prior:Correct. Yes.
Abe Baldonado:And push back. Well, why CYFD? Why did you allow that? Yep. You know?
Abe Baldonado:I I understand. Hey, if if we can make and work towards reconciliation between a parent and a child, great. But that parent has a lot of work to do to prove that they are ready to be a parent and provide a safe home for that child. And I understand from that perspective why it's important to get kids connected back with their parent. But you got to do your due diligence.
Abe Baldonado:You you just can't say, hey, this is the right thing because it is the parent. Okay. She may be the parent or he may be the parent, but if they're abusing the child, if that child is in danger with drugs, you know, exposure, you can't let that child go back there regardless if that's the parent or not.
Adam Prior:Yeah. You Even if it's a foster, there needs to be some sort of accountability and we there needs to be
Abe Baldonado:the argument is, well, this child's gonna suffer suffer trauma being away from the parent. No. They're gonna suffer more trauma by being with that parent and being exposed to abuse.
Adam Prior:Correct. Yes.
Abe Baldonado:You know, in the long term. So you know what? Yes. Short term, yeah, the parent doesn't get to have custody of them. They're gonna have to earn it back.
Abe Baldonado:Long term, that child is protected from some things that they could have been exposed to.
Adam Prior:Yeah. And so even with our going on something we separate with our with our education, we put in, I think it's Academy High School Mhmm. Academy School. They have about 32,000 per per child and our APS is 36,500.
Abe Baldonado:Cost per pupil is, you know, what we're
Adam Prior:increased it again.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. So And with with declining enrollment. I think that's important to note that, you know, they're asking for a lot more money doing a lot doing a lot less. You know, you have a lot less students enrolled. And that should be eyebrow raising.
Abe Baldonado:But anyway, I encourage you walk into APS and into their twin towers and start questioning why are we so top heavy?
Adam Prior:Yeah. Well, top heavy and where's where's our money going? So Mhmm. There needs to be accountability and to improve because I mean, we're we're like fifty first. I saw some of we might be forty ninth now.
Abe Baldonado:Well, among
Adam Prior:Fifty first among
Abe Baldonado:the states, we're fiftieth. Right? But if you look at territories and stuff, we're like fifty first. I think Puerto Rico or DC. Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:One of those beat us out.
Adam Prior:But that we don't have any accountability. I mean, who's who's watching? Why is our testing not getting, you know, is is increasing? Why are we not getting better with our schools? So Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:Well, and I think a lot of that has to do with the turnover at the governor's public education department, public education department I worked for. Oh. So I I worked there. I went through five secretaries during my time there. Oh.
Abe Baldonado:And that was a matter of four years, you know, three years.
Adam Prior:Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:And so that matters. Leadership matters. So when you don't have consistent leadership, that plays a part, but also you have the pendulum swings. You know, when a lot of people ask me, you know, what are other states doing right that New Mexico's not or, you know, what did Mississippi do that New Mexico's not? I'm like, in fact, under governor Martinez, New Mexico was doing everything Mississippi was doing except Mississippi stayed course and it paid off.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. New Mexico got
Adam Prior:They were right close to us and now
Abe Baldonado:they're Yeah. Michelle Lujan Grisham came in and she rolled back a lot of the education policies that were implemented by the Martinez administration and that pendulum swing hurt New Mexico and also shutting down our schools during COVID. I think that's something that we're still trying to recover from, and I think there's a generation of students there that were lost. I mean, I I don't know how we get
Adam Prior:My daughter was one she was Yeah. In high school. So sports, she was playing soccer, that all changed. Her husband now at the time like she's married, but he was in football, no more football. Yeah.
Adam Prior:But she was in high school when all of it was like two years. Yeah. Yeah. She was
Abe Baldonado:Lost a generation there with, you know, extracurricular activities, academic excellence
Adam Prior:Social. Social
Abe Baldonado:interaction. Just and hopefully, they have worked a lot of those folks have worked their way back to being able to communicate and, you know, kind of be normalized now into
Adam Prior:Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:Traditional communication. But in education, I mean, there's there's a generation there that we've lost and that, you know, we we can't change that. And I'll tell you, I I've been an educator. I inherited a class that was reading at a sixth grade level. How how do you fix that?
Abe Baldonado:You can't. You can't fix that. You can only hope that those those kids thrive in some way. And the reality is some did, some didn't. That's the unfortunate reality.
Abe Baldonado:You know? And there are those who are able to excel and catch up and you know, it may take a little bit longer, but they can. And then there's the ones that that don't. There's some that, you know, go down a life of crime, you know, and poverty and, you know
Adam Prior:Well, what is that? A 50% graduation rate?
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. Well, we we celebrate mediocrity here in New Mexico and that frustrates me. It's like, oh, 80% of our kids graduated. I'm like, okay, celebrate that. I I don't think that's good enough.
Abe Baldonado:We should say, why aren't a 100% of our kids graduating? Yeah. And then the kicker, what's the the reading proficiencies of those kids that are graduating? What what are their proficiency levels? If we're graduating 90% of our kids and 90% of them are reading at grade level proficiency or math and science, I can tip my hat off and say, great.
Abe Baldonado:They're prepared. But when you graduate them and you're celebrating, oh, we graduated and we got them out the door. Okay. But are they prepared for that
Adam Prior:next left behind. Yeah. Yeah. And just keep passing them. Everybody gets a trophy.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. Absolutely. And it's unfortunate. And I I don't like graduation rates. Like, I I can't stand them.
Abe Baldonado:When I see people celebrating graduation rates, I'm like, why are you celebrating that? Because you need to ask a lot more. Okay. They graduated 80% of their kids, but where were they at when they graduated? Were they are they prepared for a career or post secondary education?
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. Were they given those tools? If they were, great. But if not, then we have to question why did they graduate? If they weren't prepared, why did they graduate?
Adam Prior:Yeah. If they're like at a tenth grade level and graduating, we got something wrong. Yeah. And then there's I can't remember what the exact number from like 18 to 25. They're not even going to school or anything.
Adam Prior:I mean, we have I mean, as long as you have a decent GPA.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. We have disconnected youth right now and and there's some great programs and I'm I'm glad we brought awareness to it. A while back, we had Sendero Prep come on to the podcast to talk about their reengagement school. So they reengage with students who have fallen off the the beaten path, and so they try to reengage them, bring them back into workforce training programs, get them graduated with a diploma or at least a GED, but also get some hands on technical skills and some workforce skills that they can market. And so it's a really good program.
Abe Baldonado:I don't know how many people know about it, that's why I'm glad they came on to to share more because I think more people need to know about programs like that. They're not the only one. There's others. But it's good to hear that, hey, those options are out there. So if you know someone who is a disconnected youth between 16 and 21, twenty twenty two, encourage them to to go back.
Abe Baldonado:There's opportunities there for them to get it into the workforce and be employable and get some real skills, you know, get some skills that you you can market. And so but it is shocking that we had 32,000 individuals between the ages of 16 and 24 that are not participating Yeah.
Adam Prior:I couldn't remember if it was 35,000 something around there. But They're not going to and it's it's what are they gonna I mean, they're gonna be behind. Mhmm. I mean, if they're not in a trade school, I mean, we gotta have them in something. So we have I mean, they gotta have something to do.
Adam Prior:I think when we feel productive, if I feel like go out and I did something good and productive for the day, you know, you end up feeling good about yourself. But if you're just not doing anything at all and you're not being productive
Abe Baldonado:There's also something about earning something that Yeah. You worked hard, you achieved something and there's something about that, you know, I think a lot of us can remember our first paycheck. Just I earned that. Yeah.
Adam Prior:That was amazing. I achieved. Like I did.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. I did that. Yeah. You know, I didn't I didn't know what to expect, but I did it.
Adam Prior:Right.
Abe Baldonado:And it's just and it sets that challenge in, okay, hey, I like this. I want to get better. What can I do to make myself climb a ladder now? What can I do to get better in my career and excel, you know? And I I always tell I used to tell my students, and I still tell a lot of my friends who are a little bit younger and still kind of navigating career life who maybe haven't found what it is that they're looking for.
Abe Baldonado:But I tell them, I'm like, keep striving. Keep keep keep that motivation. And and even if you fail, that success is gonna be that much better if you fail at something. And Yeah. And also don't get content.
Abe Baldonado:You know, if you're in a trade and a lot of my friends who have gone into the trades, I tell them be forward thinking. Don't think like, hey, I'm just gonna do this. No. Say my next step, I'm gonna be a business owner. I'm actually gonna own a business and then I'll move out from, you know, whether it's being an electrician.
Abe Baldonado:I'm gonna start up my own company. I won't have to do this the all the time. I won't have to be the journeyman that I am. I will have staff to do that now. And, you know, I can step back and run more of the business stuff and Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:You know, transition over, make more time for my family, create more opportunities for my kids. And so and those are important things that folks like you who are running, I think they bring to the table to to motivate children for, you know, as they go into their careers, just think forward, you know. Don't don't just get content if you do become a plumber and electrician, don't stop there. Say, hey, you know what? I'm going start my own company.
Adam Prior:Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:It may it may piss off your current employer, but that's good. Competition is good.
Adam Prior:It it does. They weren't quite happy when I left. Yeah. But You see? But but I ran it and I was, you know
Abe Baldonado:But it made them wanna probably be better and they knew, hey, I'm gonna have to compete with Adam now. He's moving into this field.
Adam Prior:Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:Now, I'm gonna have to work hard a
Adam Prior:lot of people there depend on me I had all the answers, and they wouldn't grow. So I told I even said I go to probably the best thing for your company for me to leave. Yeah. Because then everybody else won't have the they'll have to figure out the answers for themselves, and they'll actually have to do it.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah.
Adam Prior:So but, yeah, so it's achieving. And, you know, and life's a gift. Mhmm. So, you know, it's even for me, like, when I had the heart attack. I had a heart attack, and it was like, alright.
Adam Prior:You start kinda facing the wall a little bit and doing some really internal thinking. And but, yeah, life's a gift. I mean, we're not always promised tomorrow, and we gotta live life. But you wanna be you know, you wanna plan for tomorrow Yeah. But we gotta be able to live it, and you wanna be able to achieve.
Adam Prior:And and if it's like a plumber, get that license, and don't just get you know, if it's like for, like, I have my GB 98, which is commercial and residential. And then you can get, like, your GB two. You can get you for like, why? Go go for the go for the big one. Yeah.
Adam Prior:You know, go for the go for the go go for the gold. Yeah. And if you end up, you know, end up getting silver, hey, great. But you never wanna go for just mediocre. Right.
Adam Prior:You know, then you'll never you you just you'll never get where you want in life.
Abe Baldonado:And our legislature needs to think our same way. Our education system needs to think the same way as they, hey, we can celebrate mediocrity. We want New Mexicans to, as you said, live life to the fullest, have a thriving economy around them that they can pick and choose whatever they want to do and Yeah. They have a pathway to be successful in that.
Adam Prior:Yeah. So I I know a lot of people end up saying, Republicans are kinda like for the rich and then they'll say Democrats are for the poor.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. And that is
Adam Prior:You know? But now Completely opposite. Here, if if I was now, I'm for the poor, would it benefit me to make you rich? Probably not. No.
Adam Prior:Because then I wouldn't have my voter. Right. So for me is and then if you overregulate, you make things harder. So, like, for me is I wanna have less regulations. Yeah.
Adam Prior:Less taxes. I wanna if you wanna have your like your business and you wanna do it, it's easier to achieve. I don't wanna have every single red tape to hold and lock you down. Right. We gotta have people to be able to have their companies, be able to have their business and just
Abe Baldonado:And if there are bad actors, they also eliminate themselves. Right? Well, they will. They won't have customers. Right.
Abe Baldonado:You won't have customers like and that's what I've tried telling people. I'm like, look, no business is successful if they're terrible to their employees or terrible to their consumers. Like, they won't last. They won't stay in business. So Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:Even with burdensome red tape, I mean, you're not doing any favors. I mean, if even if you deregulate, those bad actors, they're gonna weed themselves out anyway.
Adam Prior:Yeah. Word-of-mouth and all that is huge. So I mean, you don't if you don't like as a contractor, if you don't take care of your people, they'll go somewhere else and believe me, that word-of-mouth will hurt you way more than than a positive review. Absolutely. So I think we're at like 4.7 stars out of five.
Adam Prior:You know, you're not gonna make everybody happy. Right.
Abe Baldonado:Mean, it's just
Adam Prior:Or it's four point something like that.
Abe Baldonado:But
Adam Prior:But you gotta still strive. You gotta still strive good. You still wanna take care of people. And sometimes, you know, things may slip through the cracks. I mean, it happens, but you wanna be able to take care of people.
Adam Prior:And so for me is even, you know, running for office, I have the like, it's like the same philosophy. You gotta take care of the people, and you gotta represent. So, you know, like you're saying, there's a lot of the conservative or even, like, moderate. They're not being represented. I you know, for me me running, I'm not serving a special interest.
Adam Prior:I'm not like, for me, I don't care if someone's Republican, Independent, DTS, Democrat. To me, it has no bearing. I'm here to to help and represent and to serve.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. I'm trying to be
Adam Prior:a statesman.
Abe Baldonado:I I work for all of you. And when I'm elected, I work for my entire district. I work for all of New Mexico to make sure that I support or oppose policies that could hurt New Mexicans or help New Mexicans. Yeah. And it's my job to think about that.
Adam Prior:Yeah. And so if we've all we've all been at companies and and run it where you have that one manager and they climb up and they're power hungry
Abe Baldonado:Mhmm.
Adam Prior:And they get to where they wanna have the power to run-in. For me is, I've never been that way at all. Is, you know, you like when they say you build a lot that you have a ladder, you could either climb up by yourself or you can build it where other people climb up and you have like an entourage. Yeah. I would much rather have the entourage.
Adam Prior:I don't wanna be anything by myself and be up at top by myself. I want to bring people up.
Abe Baldonado:Yeah. Because someone brought you up. And Yeah. I'm glad you brought that up because I always feel the same way. Like, I always tell people, like, if you give me credit for something, thank you, but the credit is not to me.
Abe Baldonado:It's to the mentors. It's to the people who helped me get here. I mean, me sitting right now having these conversations with you is all due in part to mentors of mine who have helped me and lifted me up through the years, had that faith in me and saw a potential in me that maybe at that time in my life, didn't see in myself. But
Adam Prior:Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:They saw it. They lifted me up. They gave me the opportunity for whether it was a position or an experience. It it put me right here in this chair to where I can have a conversation with you. So there's someone to to thank.
Abe Baldonado:There's many people to probably think. I probably Yeah. Think of like a number, like probably more than 10 right now that I'm
Adam Prior:like Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:This person impacted me, this person impacted me. But there's always people that have lifted you up and I was always told as I was starting out of my career, lift others up.
Adam Prior:Yes.
Abe Baldonado:You know, as you're you're lifted up, lift others up with you.
Adam Prior:Yes. Yeah. And luckily for me is where I've worked back from, I think, my early twenties. I worked for everybody who was self made. They they made themselves.
Adam Prior:So I always I always saw them climb and and to get better, so which was good. But when you're talking about on motivation where I used to work, the owner, he he he helped me on kinda opening my eyes on a lot of that stuff too. So, you know, like, motivation and went to the like, a Tony Tony Robbins seminar. So I went to one where, you know, the coal like, I walked on the coal.
Abe Baldonado:Oh,
Adam Prior:wow. That stuff legit is hot. Yeah. I started wondering if it was a little fake.
Abe Baldonado:And don't know if you get me to do that. That that
Adam Prior:I was five people. I was like, there was five people in front of me. And but I'll go back. So when I was walking up to the coal and there's like a thousand people. And I'm walking up and you feel the heat.
Adam Prior:It was in Texas, and it was in June, like, but you felt heat just from the coal. And I was like, oh, is this like for real? And then I saw the coal black with a little red. I'm like, oh, this is like not that hot coal or something. I was like, maybe it's not really for real.
Adam Prior:It's just kind of a gimmick to do it. Yeah. And then when I was five up, they moved all the coal, moved it all around, and it was just bright red. And I was like, you gotta be kidding me. And I was like, okay, just do it.
Adam Prior:Just do it. But the whole point of that on the coal is, you don't look down when you're walking and look at all your obstacles. You look at the direction of where you're going. Mhmm. So the people there was a couple people that got blisters because they looked down, they're filming Snapchat and recording it.
Adam Prior:Well, I looked at where I'm walking. So I looked at the direction and then it was probably 25, 30 feet, something like that. Maybe Yeah. So not that or 40 feet. It was a good Yeah.
Abe Baldonado:It's not that short.
Adam Prior:No. No. It was I'd say this room, twice this room, at least. Hot coal. And by the time when I was at the end, I started thinking about me walking in the coal, and then I started feeling it.
Adam Prior:But I never felt anything the entire time when I wasn't, like, concentrating to the coal. Yeah. So the whole point is is looking at where you wanna go. So that's on on for me, it's like even even like with running, like with this, is looking at where I wanna go and what my objectives and serving for the people and to be there and, you know, actually, to be a to represent. You're a state representative.
Adam Prior:You're representing the people, and you're serving. So I don't wanna get in the noise and get just all the other stuff going on and just look at, you you look at the end goal.
Abe Baldonado:Mhmm. Well, Adam, I don't think we can finish off better than that last statement right there. Just as we wrap up, do you want to share with your audience where they can learn more about you? Also, you know, hey, y'all find out where you're registered to vote. You may be in Adam's district.
Abe Baldonado:And so Yeah. Pay attention for him on that general ballot out Adam Prior. But if you'd like to share your website where folks can learn more about you, maybe even contact you.
Adam Prior:Yeah. Yeah. The website is adam prior four and that's a number4nm.com. My number, if you guys need to reach out to me or you guys got questions, mean, if you guys even need anything, my number is (505) 261-2244. And, you know, me, I'm one of the people.
Adam Prior:Like, I'm just one of you guys. I'm general contractor. I'm a father. I have my daughter. And I just I'm here to represent, to serve all of you in the district, no matter what party you guys are in.
Abe Baldonado:That's awesome. And, Adam, big kudos to you. We've had a handful of candidates that are confident enough to to share their their phone numbers and I know that's not common these days, but I think that just really truly shows that you are happy to have conversations with whoever, whomever, and just talk about why you're running. And that that's true statesmanship.
Adam Prior:Yeah. And if if anybody wants to to, you know, meet go over it. To me, I had a I went at a I was at a barbecue over the weekend on on Sunday for the fourth, and, you know, a few of them were were democrat and talking to them, and they they go Republican, Democrat, doesn't matter. And I'm I'm open. You know, I just wanna I'm here to serve the people and take care of it and see what their concerns are and what do they need.
Abe Baldonado:Yep. Adam, we we love that and appreciate you. We'd like to share our gratitude with you for just even making that step to run for office. It's not an easy And so like we tell all other candidates because it truly is a selfless act to run for office and put yourself out there. And so a big thank you to you for doing that and for wanting to represent the state of New Mexico.
Abe Baldonado:So thank you very much.
Adam Prior:Alright. Thanks.
Abe Baldonado:Well, y'all, that's it for this week's Chile Wire. We'll see you next time.