272: We Are Stronger Together. America and Aloha with Tulsi Gabbard.

0:00:00 - Opening 0:05:32 - Tulsi Gabbard 3:43:112 - Final Thoughts 3:59:48 - How to stay on THE PATH. 4:58:33 - Closing Gratitude. Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Jocko Willink?

  This is Jocko Podcast number 272 with Echo Charles and me, Jocko Willink. Good evening, Echo. Good evening. So when I worked with SEAL leaders and, and then on top of that, interacted with leaders from the Army and from the Marine Corps, sometimes things went great and sometimes they didn't. And if there was a problem between leaders, between leaders, between people, between troops, 99% of the time, when I would pull the thread on that problem, at the end of that thread

• 0:43Jocko Willink?

  would be ego.

• 0:48Jocko Willink?

  You'd find it all the time. I'd find it all the time. And when I retired from the Navy and I started working with leadership in civilian companies, no shock, I found the same thing. When, when leaders can't get along, when, when they can't find a solution, when they can't even move forward despite having a common goal, when I'm working with companies and I pull the thread on that problem, I find the same thing.

• 1:21Jocko Willink?

  I find ego. And egotistical leaders scream and they yell and they get emotional and they would rather lose.

• 1:35Jocko Willink?

  They would rather lose than admit that they're wrong.

• 1:38Jocko Willink?

  They would actually rather die in some cases than admit that they're wrong. And, and if you think that that's an exaggeration, history is full of leaders, military leaders that died clinging to their plan, even in the face of their own death. Or worse, the deaths of their troops.

• 2:07Jocko Willink?

  All because there you go.

• 2:10Jocko Willink?

  Now, look, of course, it's a dichotomy. We know that not all ego is bad. You need ego to push you and drive you and make you want to win, and that's great, but overinflated ego is the root of a vast majority of problems that people

• 2:30Jocko Willink?

  and leaders face.

• 2:34Jocko Willink?

  And as I look at the divisiveness in America right now,

• 2:42Jocko Willink?

  the people that are screaming

• 2:47Jocko Willink?

  from the extreme ends of the political spectrum, when I listen to what they're saying and why they're saying it, I try and figure out where this is coming from. When I pull the thread on all that screaming and all that anger, yes, once again, I find ego.

• 3:10Jocko Willink?

  Because if you, if you think you're right about everything, if you think that you're right about everything, then that means everybody else is wrong.

• 3:23Jocko Willink?

  And if you think that you know everything, then that means no one else can know anything.

• 3:32Jocko Willink?

  And if your ego is so big and you think you're so smart, why would you even have to listen to anybody else?

• 3:40Jocko Willink?

  Because you already have it figured out. Why not just scream at them to shut up?

• 3:47Jocko Willink?

  And you gotta watch out, especially when, if, if, if someone is saying something that actually makes some kind of sense and it hurts your ego, then just scream louder.

• 4:01Jocko Willink?

  And when I look around and I see people that are screaming and not listening, that's what I see. I see ego.

• 4:11Jocko Willink?

  And sometimes it's driven by insecurity, insecurity that they think they're might be wrong. And so then, again, what do they do? They just scream louder. Don't let anyone else talk.

• 4:27Jocko Willink?

  Shut them up.

• 4:30Jocko Willink?

  That's what the ego does.

• 4:34Jocko Willink?

  That being said, there are people out there today, many of whom are humble, people that do listen, people that can have an interactive conversational exchange with someone else that might have opposing viewpoints. And they're confident enough in themselves to actually listen and discuss and compromise and change their minds and learn and grow and understand and empathize.

• 5:06Jocko Willink?

  And those types of people.

• 5:11Jocko Willink?

  Well, they make good neighbors.

• 5:15Jocko Willink?

  They make good soldiers, they make good friends, they make good human beings, and they make good leaders.

• 5:24Jocko Willink?

  And I'm lucky enough to have one of those people here with us tonight. A soldier.

• 5:31Jocko Willink?

  A martial artist. A surfer.

• 5:37Jocko Willink?

  A former congresswoman, a Hawaiian.

• 5:42Jocko Willink?

  And an American.

• 5:45Jocko Willink?

  You might have figured it out, Tulsi Gabbard.

• 5:49Jocko Willink?

  Tulsi, thanks for joining us.

• 5:51Tulsi Gabbard?

  Aloha.

• 5:52Jocko Willink?

  The last time we were together was on Joe Rogan's podcast.

• 5:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yes. That was fun.

• 5:58Jocko Willink?

  When was that?

• 6:01Tulsi Gabbard?

  I think that was sometime in 2019.

• 6:05Jocko Willink?

  Were you running yet? Yeah.

• 6:08Tulsi Gabbard?

  I was.

• 6:08Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 6:09Tulsi Gabbard?

  I was.

• 6:09Jocko Willink?

  Crazy.

• 6:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 6:12Jocko Willink?

  And, um, yeah, it's been a wild ride. Been cool. Um, well, it's been cool for me to watch. I know it's not always been cool.

• 6:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  I'm thinking like, hmm, I don't know if cool is the word I would use.

• 6:23Jocko Willink?

  It's always cool for me to look at someone that's like trying to make something happen and coming up against all kinds of obstacles and still striving forward and pushing forward. So from that perspective, it's been cool.

• 6:35Jocko Willink?

  So let's, let's kind of like, um, I always like to start from the beginning. It's kind of what I like to do. So I have a better context and understanding of where someone ends up because we know more about where they came from.

• 6:46Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 6:47Jocko Willink?

  So let's talk about where you came from. How did you end up here today? It started off where? American Samoa?

• 6:55Tulsi Gabbard?

  American Samoa is where I was born. Um, I am the

• 6:59Jocko Willink?

  Did you just subtly correct my pronunciation of Samoa? What's correct?

• 7:05Tulsi Gabbard?

  It's, it's, you gotta, you gotta elongate the A a little bit. It's Samoa.

• 7:09Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. It's, I don't, it's just a fact, right? I've, I feel very comfortable speaking. I mean, obviously I speak all the time, but words that I don't know how to say, I just do my best and move on. And I, I will cover books where I've got French words and German names and what I just run into total things that I, I just don't know how to say them. And so what I do is I just do my best and move on. And I think I get a certain level of forgiveness from people. I do get tightened up from time to time if I really make something awful. But yeah, I guess you have to forgive me a little bit because I just kind of say what I, what it looks like to me phonetically and move on.

• 7:53Tulsi Gabbard?

  No, no judgment whatsoever. I however, would get in trouble if I am not

• 7:58Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 7:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  Pronouncing my homeland properly.

• 8:01Speaker 02

  If you say Samoa though, like Samoa or Samoan, that, that's more like forgivable, right?

• 8:05Tulsi Gabbard?

  Totally. Yeah, it's not a big deal.

• 8:07Speaker 02

  The proper way, that's like you use the proper way.

• 8:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 8:11Speaker 02

  But if you don't, it's kind of like, okay, then it's, it's way more forgivable with Samoan.

• 8:15Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 8:16Jocko Willink?

  Okay. So it's not a major violation?

• 8:17Tulsi Gabbard?

  Not at all.

• 8:18Speaker 02

  It's actually not a violation, right?

• 8:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  No.

• 8:20Speaker 02

  Like really?

• 8:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  It's not.

• 8:21Speaker 02

  It doesn't make it correct.

• 8:22Tulsi Gabbard?

  Literally, it's only people from Samoa who say Samoa.

• 8:25Speaker 02

  Yes, yes.

• 8:26Jocko Willink?

  Is it insulting that I would say Samoa?

• 8:28Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's a good question.

• 8:29Jocko Willink?

  A little bit?

• 8:29Tulsi Gabbard?

  No.

• 8:30Jocko Willink?

  Okay. So we're good either way.

• 8:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, you're good either way.

• 8:32Jocko Willink?

  All right. When I went to Guam, there was people from Samoa there and we hung out. Most good people.

• 8:37Tulsi Gabbard?

  Nice.

• 8:38Jocko Willink?

  All right. So how'd you end up there?

• 8:39Tulsi Gabbard?

  So, um, my mom was born in Indiana, grew up in Michigan. Uh, dad born in, uh, born in Samoa. Um, my grandfather was in the air force. And so he was born there, but he spent the first years of his life in Hawaii. My grandfather was stationed at Hickam. And then, um, you know, moved around a few other places, but ended up growing up in the Panhandle of Florida.

• 9:05Jocko Willink?

  So, so wait, so your grandfather was in the, in the air force?

• 9:08Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, both, both of my grandfathers on my mom's side and my dad's side served, uh, served in the military.

• 9:15Jocko Willink?

  That must've been around World War II.

• 9:16Tulsi Gabbard?

  It was, yeah. Um, so my mom's dad served in, I believe he served in Europe. I don't know exactly where. And then, uh, but, but for a shorter stint, he didn't spend a career in the military, but my dad's dad did spend his career, uh, in the military and at different times served. I think he was in the army for a little while, then he was in the army air corps and then he ended up in the air force. And, um, so they both had completely different upbringings. Uh, you know, my mom grew up in East Grand Rapids, Michigan, which was during that time, a very kind of well-to-do area. Um, in her school, there were no, there were no non-white people.

• 10:00Tulsi Gabbard?

  And so, you know, she grew up, she's a cheerleader, she was this, she kind of had the all-American upbringing.

• 10:06Jocko Willink?

  So she's a white person too?

• 10:08Tulsi Gabbard?

  She is a white person. Holly, as we say in Hawaii. Which, which, you know, little digression here. People say holly is a derogatory word. It all depends on how you use it.

• 10:19Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 10:19Tulsi Gabbard?

  It can go, it can go either way.

• 10:21Jocko Willink?

  That's sort of like.

• 10:22Tulsi Gabbard?

  And it can be, it's, it's, it can be referred to as an attitude. Like, I don't care what your skin color is. It can be used in a derogatory way. Or it can just be like, okay, you happen to be Caucasian and holly. But yeah, so yes, my mom is holly.

• 10:37Tulsi Gabbard?

  Based on her skin color and, uh, and, uh, yeah, my dad, Polynesian, grew up. Grew up essentially in the South and it was so stark their upbringings and to hear both of them tell stories about it because you know my dad's going to elementary school and he's told me how like the teacher asked, asked all the kids, okay, where are you from? And he raised his hand, he's like, I'm from Samoa. And she said, what? Somalia? You're from Africa? He's like, no, no, no, Samoa. It's, you know, and that was it. Like, all the kids started making fun of him. He's the only kid with brown skin in the

• 11:17Tulsi Gabbard?

  class and, you know, would go out, go out in town and, and, and get called, get called the N-word, get scolded out of, you know, the men's bathroom and told you gotta go use the colored bathroom. You know, there's no water fountain, you gotta go use the hose in the back because the water fountain is for whites only. And, and so as he was so confused, coming from Samoa and then Hawaii, and he's like, I mean, I'm not, I'm not black. Like, he was, it was, it was at a young age, this kind of being confronted with racism, obviously, but also just confusion on his part. And that, that kind of was the, made

• 12:01Tulsi Gabbard?

  a huge, a huge impact in his, in his formative years in life. And so, fast forward, he's going to college in California, mom's going to University of Michigan, they both had summer jobs at Yosemite, and which is how they met. And famously-

• 12:20Jocko Willink?

  I wonder what year that was. You know what year that was?

• 12:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  That would have been in the 60s. And-

• 12:26Jocko Willink?

  Maybe they know tilt. One of our, one of our frequent podcast guests, John Stryker Meyer, who ended up being a Green Beret SOG guy in Vietnam, before he went in the Army, he, he went out to Yosemite and worked there in the summer.

• 12:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  Is he the guy who has come with some of the Vietnamese?

• 12:45Jocko Willink?

  Yes.

• 12:45Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, okay, that's cool. That's cool. Those are amazing. Oh, my God, I love those. Hearing from those guys is out of this world.

• 12:52Jocko Willink?

  So they're working, so they meet, they're-

• 12:54Tulsi Gabbard?

  So they're working at a cafe in Yosemite.

• 12:55Jocko Willink?

  Oh.

• 12:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  Dad's checking mom out. And asked her out, and she's like, okay, like, let's go, she's like, do you play tennis? He's like, yeah.

• 13:09Tulsi Gabbard?

  He didn't play tennis at all. She's like, okay, cool. Let's go play as their first date. So they went out in the tennis court. She beat him six love, six love.

• 13:19Tulsi Gabbard?

  For the non tennis players, that means zero. He got zero points.

• 13:22Jocko Willink?

  But I think the key word was actually love.

• 13:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  Exactly.

• 13:26Jocko Willink?

  I can see where this is going.

• 13:28Tulsi Gabbard?

  Love and what became a very healthy competition. He then later on went and became a actual tennis pro. And they've been married now almost, I think 53 years and still play tennis almost every day together.

• 13:46Jocko Willink?

  That's awesome.

• 13:49Tulsi Gabbard?

  But that was how, that was how Mike and Carol Gabbard began. And the first, I think one of the, yeah, the first time he went to visit my mom in Michigan after they were, they were going out for a little while.

• 14:07Tulsi Gabbard?

  And my mom, I think, actually, I think they were going out for a little while and my mom had decided like she wanted to marry this guy and told my grandma. And my dad happened to be in the garage about to walk in the door and started to overhear this conversation inside the house. And heard my grandmother's response to my mom saying, Carol, but he's not even white. How can you marry him? And dad was a little taken aback and turned around and went back and got in the car and went, went and took a little bit of time.

• 14:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  But it was just a reflection of the complete stark differences and where they were from and, you know, their views of, of the world and, and obviously they fell in love with my dad and.

• 14:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  It was, uh, yeah, a bringing together of two different people, two different backgrounds. And ultimately, you know, my dad took her away from the mainland and to Samoa where they both went as teachers. They both got jobs as teachers there. My mom was doing, um, she's a speech therapist, so helping kids who had different kind of speech issues. And dad became, I think, the assistant dean of the community college there. He was an English major. And so they, the three, there's five kids in our family and the three middle kids were all born there. And then we moved to Hawaii when I was two years old. So Hawaii's been home for me ever since.

• 15:40Jocko Willink?

  You get to Hawaii and, I mean, you're, what's, what's it like when you get there? What like, what are your memories of growing up in Hawaii? What were your formative memories?

• 15:49Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. So it was one of my earliest memories. So, so I'm four of five. So my little sister was, is the baby of the family and she was, she was born in Hawaii and, um, she, basically she came a little sooner than expected. And so my dad delivered her at home quickly and I watched that happen.

• 16:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  That was, that was a big, strong dose of reality. And, you know, I'm, well, I'm three years old at the time.

• 16:18Jocko Willink?

  Can you remember it?

• 16:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  I have, I vaguely remember.

• 16:21Jocko Willink?

  Or you just have PTSD.

• 16:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  Pretty much. I, I don't remember, like, I can't visualize it, but I do remember being somewhat traumatized by it.

• 16:31Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, well.

• 16:32Tulsi Gabbard?

  And the story goes that like my babysitter who was there also that, that after witnessing that, um, I told her like, I'd never, ever want to do that.

• 16:46Tulsi Gabbard?

  But, um, yeah, so, uh, we, we moved around and grew up on the island of Oahu.

• 16:51Jocko Willink?

  What was your parents doing for work there?

• 16:54Tulsi Gabbard?

  They were teachers. Um, they were teachers there. Um, they had started kind of a small, a small private school. That we went to and then, um, and then they ended up, the school had to close down for, for one reason or another. Um, but then anyway, they, they ended up teaching us, we were homeschooled. And they ended up teaching us and a bunch of other kind of kids in the neighborhood at home. And then they, they're entrepreneurs at heart. They've always been even in back in Samoa, they were teaching, but they had a Mike's tenant or Mike's sports shop. They had a little sports shop. And so they've always had some kind of side gig happening and always different ideas for new businesses and, and eventually they opened a kind of family style deli restaurant, healthy,

• 17:37Tulsi Gabbard?

  healthy eating. Um, so they, they've done a lot of different things in their lives and it's always been, uh, family, family affairs.

• 17:49Jocko Willink?

  Everything that's going on, you, you, did you have involvement? Were you making sandwiches down at the deli?

• 17:53Tulsi Gabbard?

  I'm the one, I get to take credit for coming up with the name of the restaurant. It was called the natural deli and we, I remember us sitting around in the family living room and having a brainstorm session and we're all, we are all quite competitive. Uh, and the, the deal was whoever get, whoever comes up with the name of the restaurant gets one free dinner at the restaurant.

• 18:13Jocko Willink?

  Wow. Apparently you're competitive, but not a great negotiator.

• 18:17Tulsi Gabbard?

  Exactly, completely. I had no idea. I felt very victorious in my, my, of my win. However, had no idea that we would pretty much be eating there every day.

• 18:30Jocko Willink?

  And so how long were you in this homeschool before it was cool scenario?

• 18:36Tulsi Gabbard?

  I, um, all the way through high school.

• 18:38Jocko Willink?

  Really?

• 18:39Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. Yep. And, uh, it was, so there, there's a five year gap between me and my closest brother. The three boys are about two years apart and then the, there's, there's, there's a story that my dad loves to tell, which is that after the three boys, my mom was like, that's it, I'm done. She got her tubes tied. She was seriously done. It was, she wasn't just saying it. And this is in Samoa, like way back when, where the hospital today is still probably about, you know, 20 years behind modern medicine. So it took my dad a few years, but he finally convinced her to, to have more kids. So she went to the hospital in Samoa. She's like, okay, gotta undo

• 19:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  what I did here. And it worked. And so my sister and I came along and that's so there's a five year gap between us. And every birthday for me and my sister, he's like, girls, better thank me.

• 19:36Tulsi Gabbard?

  Wouldn't be here without me. And your mom, your mom too, but.

• 19:39Jocko Willink?

  What were you thinking of when you were, when you were going to high school? What are you thinking of doing with your life?

• 19:45Tulsi Gabbard?

  Um, I didn't have, I didn't have a specific profession in mind or career path or, or anything. I did understand and realize from a really young age, even before high school, that,

• 20:04Tulsi Gabbard?

  I think, I think two big, two big things. Number one was that I was happiest when I was,

• 20:13Tulsi Gabbard?

  when I was doing things for other people. So, you know, we'd go out and we'd do like beach cleanups and, and, you know, growing up in Hawaii is, I love the ocean. I literally like, I learned how to swim at Alamoana Beach, you know, in, in the, in the shore there and, and just, just loved our home and, and from a really young age, had a really, um, deep appreciation and a kind of a sense of being a protector for our home. And so, you know, we, we'd go out and,

• 20:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  you know, do beach cleanups and do other things. And I just, I just felt happiest when I was doing things for others, when I, when I could be of service. And, um, understood and realized from a young age that that's what I wanted to do. And, and really in a deeper spiritual way, understanding that, um, I was happiest when being of service to God and.

• 21:06Tulsi Gabbard?

  What better way to be of service to God than to care for and to serve God's children? And and this this planet. So that was something that I knew in a decision I made very early on. But what exactly that would look like, how you know, what path that would take, I had I had no. No idea, but I also knew and I I distinctly remember.

• 21:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  I was probably eleven or twelve and I felt. This reality. That. I didn't know how much time I would have in this life. And that. Death was something that could come at any time. And I knew that I. I wanted to and needed to make the most of my life and the time that I had. And understanding how precious that was.

• 22:08Jocko Willink?

  Was there anything that triggered that? Or did you lose a family member? Did you see a? A fish die on the beach or something like that? Or was it just? Something that came from?

• 22:19Tulsi Gabbard?

  I mean, it came, it came from.

• 22:24Tulsi Gabbard?

  That there was no kind of external trigger. Um, I think it really came from.

• 22:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  Spending time in prayer and meditation, frankly.

• 22:37Tulsi Gabbard?

  Because I mean, this, this was something, this was something that, you know, God, God has been the center of. I mean, it's the center of my parents' marriage and and it's not, not in a sectarian way at all, just understanding, hey, real religion is love for God and. However, you choose to worship at home or a church or a temple or or mosque or what whatever, however, you choose to. Develop that relationship with God, that you're happiest.

• 23:03Tulsi Gabbard?

  That is where you can find peace and shelter and happiness. And that, I think is the foundation that allowed me at a young age to realize that truth. And not in a way that like, oh my God, I'm so scared I'm gonna die, like I could die tomorrow. Not, not, not in a fear-filled way at all, but rather just a sense of understanding the truth.

• 23:34Tulsi Gabbard?

  That is not only, you know, we have no control over when our time will come. And therefore surrender that, surrender to that and surrender to knowing that, hey, my, my life is ultimately in God's hands. And also knowing that

• 23:57Tulsi Gabbard?

  the death of this physical body does not mean the death of me, the soul within the body. And therefore, understanding that, being free from the fear of death. But understanding also how precious this, this life is and wanting to do my best to make sure that I didn't waste, waste it.

• 24:27Jocko Willink?

  Well, it's amazing that you and I can actually even have a conversation as two human beings. Cause if you're talking about when you were 10 or 11 years old and you're thinking about what you were thinking about when you were 10 or 11 years old. First of all, I didn't, I didn't think I could be killed. And that lasted until my mid 30s, I think. And then on top of that, like you're talking about serving people and helping people. And I, more than anything, just wanted a machine gun.

• 24:55Jocko Willink?

  Did you, so you, you, you mentioned that, that religion was part of your life. What, what, you know, what religion did you get, obviously that must have come from home because you were homeschooled. So it was your parents, what sort of religious view did you all have? What was it?

• 25:13Tulsi Gabbard?

  It, it was, it was the, I think the deepest, um, truest meaning of religion itself, which is, is that real religion is, is love cultivating a loving relationship, personal loving relationship with God. And so the, the backdrop on that, which is, um, I appreciate so much not having, not, not understanding kind of what is sectarianism, um, as, as a, as a kid growing up at all. My mom grew up in a Methodist family. My dad grew up in a Catholic family. My dad went to seminary for a while. He thought he wanted to become a priest and, and both in their own ways,

• 25:57Tulsi Gabbard?

  um, ended up coming to a point separately and then later together in, um, wanting more than they were getting from the, the religious or spiritual practice that they had, that they had grown up with. And like for my dad, he, he's told me how, um, in the seminary when he went, you know, as a kid, he had grown up memorizing a verse, I think, or, or a, or a prayer that said, uh, something like, "In order to be happy, one must know, love and serve God." And so as a kid, he's thinking, okay, know, love and serve God.

• 26:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  In order to love, like the first step of that is you have to know God. How can I know God so that I can love and serve Him? And he asked one of the priests at the seminary that question like, where can I, where and how can I know more about God? And the priest kind of patted him on the head and he said, you know, this is a mystery, my child, this is a mystery. And so for my dad is like, well, I don't like, that doesn't compute. How do you, how do you love someone if you can't know who they are? And so he like even as, I don't know, he was a teenager, I think at the time and that, that kind of

• 27:22Tulsi Gabbard?

  planted the seed of that hunger for more knowledge and that more, you know, having the depth of that personal relationship with God. And ultimately, they both found their ways again through different paths to

• 27:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  looking at, you know, eastern spiritual practices and meditation and found

• 27:48Tulsi Gabbard?

  scriptures and teachings based in the Vedic scriptures, which come out of India and Hinduism. But that are also not sectarian, like you don't convert into Hinduism, you don't convert out of it. They're timeless, kind of universal spiritual teachings of bhakti yoga, something called bhakti yoga and karma yoga, bhakti yoga being

• 28:17Tulsi Gabbard?

  a spiritual practice in seeking to live your life in, in loving service to God. And karma yoga, if people are familiar with the word karma, which really means action and karma yoga, meaning

• 28:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  doing your best to take actions that have a positive impact, to be of service to others. And so those, those are the spiritual practices that, that I have in my life.

• 28:43Tulsi Gabbard?

  And that I was introduced to from, from a really young age. So it's not, to answer, this is a very long answer to your question, but it's not about like, it wasn't like we, you know, we went to bed, my mom would say the Lord's Prayer and read stories about, you know, Krishna from the Bhagavad Gita and, you know, we'd watch Jesus of Nazareth like 1600 times because that was one of the few movies we were allowed to watch as kids growing up. And, um, you know, celebrate, celebrate, um, celebrations like John Mostemy, which is, which is the, the celebration of the appearance of Krishna in this world over 5,000 years ago and celebrate Christmas and set up the nativity scene and sing Christmas carols.

• 29:26Tulsi Gabbard?

  And there was never, ever any, any sense of contradiction or having to choose one or the other. You know, we'd go to mass with my grandmother when she came to town and go to, and, and there was no contradiction because frankly, when you get right to the heart of it, once you get past all the, all of the unfortunate, um, like bureaucracy and divisiveness that, that exists too often, that create conflict amongst people of different spiritual practices, you just get to the heart of it. What is it? It is about loving God and whether you call God Krishna or Allah or Jehovah, God has many names. There's one God, he has many names and it doesn't matter.

• 30:10Tulsi Gabbard?

  None of that, none of, none of the, the superficial matters if in your heart, um, you're doing your best to love God and to serve him. And so that's, that, that I'm grateful to have been able to realize myself from a, from a relatively young age and knew that that is how I wanted to live my life.

• 30:35Jocko Willink?

  So how did you end up with, so you have this really kind of heavy spiritual background? What, what, where were you grounded to like interacting with other kids who were jerks? And you know, it seems like you could be sort of a, a little bit sheltered in this world. I could be totally wrong, but it seems like if that's the way you're raised and all of a sudden, you know, you go down to the market and someone says, you know, get out of my way, you, you know, you little brat or whatever. How do you, what was the, what was, how did the rest of, how did you interact with the rest of the world when you were in this stage of your life?

• 31:12Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, you know, we weren't, we weren't, we weren't sheltered, it kind of closed off. Um, we had a lot of, you know, there's a lot of kids in the neighborhood and, um, we, we, you know, oftentimes like my mom was the head cook at the restaurant. And so she'd go in at like two in the morning to start cooking. We'd go in with my, my sister and I'd go with my dad a little later on, we'd do school in the office with him and then spend the rest of the day, like either wiping tables or hanging out with customers and just talking story and, and, um, like that, that was a little bit of a second home for us. You know, did gymnastics, did martial arts, did, did all the things. And, um, you know, there was no, there was no, um,

• 31:54Tulsi Gabbard?

  I don't know, separation or, or anything like that.

• 31:58Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, no. So it sounds like there was balance and, and, you know, working at a restaurant, that's what I should have put that together. Cause when you're working at a restaurant, you got customers, you got people, people that are happy, people that are sad, people that are mad, people that are going to tell you to, you know, go screw yourself and that your sandwich sucked. And people that are like, oh, this is wonderful. And you get all those people.

• 32:13Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 32:14Jocko Willink?

  So you learn a lot about the world. And so that's a good, that's a good balance.

• 32:18Tulsi Gabbard?

  Very much so, very much so.

• 32:19Jocko Willink?

  So sports, you just mentioned kind of like no big deal, martial arts, gymnastics, how into you were, how into you were all, how into all of that were you?

• 32:29Tulsi Gabbard?

  Very much so. Um, I loved, I loved gymnastics until I started to suck because I got really like too big, I think. I started to grow.

• 32:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  And then I, I transitioned, I was definitely more of, I, you know, tried ballet as a little girl too, and me and ballet didn't jive so well.

• 32:53Tulsi Gabbard?

  Uh, my sister was definitely more of like the, the, the, the ballerina type and I don't know. I just, it was not, not so much my, my flavor. So, um, I, I definitely gravitated towards martial arts and earliest did, um, taekwondo and started learning tai chi and, um,

• 33:15Tulsi Gabbard?

  oing chon and, um, Filipino stick fighting, our niece. And so got, got introduced to a lot of different types of martial arts. And I was that kid that was told like, okay, if you wanna like toughen yourself up, you need to go across the street to the park and kick a tree trunk over and over. I was like, sweet. Awesome. I was the kid that, and maybe Echo can relate, I'd never liked wearing shoes. And would purposely, like we'd go hiking up a mountain and I'd be like, shoes, shoes are for weak people. I need to make my feet tough because I don't want howly feet.

• 33:55Tulsi Gabbard?

  So that was, that was kind of me. Growing up and, um, and maybe, you know, having three older brothers who, who had a lot of fun. Um, making me and my sister do really stupid, uh, torture is a strong word, but you know.

• 34:10Jocko Willink?

  We'll call them challenges.

• 34:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, let's call them challenges. Challenges that really had no good outcome, one way or the other for, for us.

• 34:17Jocko Willink?

  Other than being tough.

• 34:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  Other than being tough.

• 34:21Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Uh, have you been to Yosemite?

• 34:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  Have not.

• 34:24Jocko Willink?

  I forget which hike it was, but you know, my son was the same way, like no shoes ever. And we hiked one of the legit hikes at Yosemite, just a day hike, but you know, many thousands of feet of altitude and many miles of walking. And he did it bare feet, barefoot and people were walking by him. And they're just disturbed. They're looking at me like.

• 34:46Jocko Willink?

  It was literally no factor for him. I mean, zero factor because the kid would never wear shoes ever. So that, and you know, the kid's got tough feet. He can sprint on just gravel.

• 34:58Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 34:58Jocko Willink?

  You know, are your feet still tough?

• 35:01Tulsi Gabbard?

  Probably not as tough, just because, you know, like I have to wear like a suit and heels and all those things. For work. That was an adjustment.

• 35:10Jocko Willink?

  Now your feet are weak.

• 35:12Tulsi Gabbard?

  I know. I have work to do.

• 35:15Speaker 02

  Where was this, by the way? What part of Oahu did you grow up on?

• 35:18Tulsi Gabbard?

  So my sister was born in Waihewa and that's where we lived then, but most of my childhood was in Kalahi Valley.

• 35:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  And, and then later, later was like downtown Honolulu. So little, little diverse, little, little slice of each, each of the different kind of cultures and communities on Oahu.

• 35:40Jocko Willink?

  What, what year did you graduate then from high school or graduate from homeschool?

• 35:45Tulsi Gabbard?

  That would have been like 97, I think.

• 35:51Jocko Willink?

  Okay. So you get done with high school, then what? What are you doing?

• 35:55Tulsi Gabbard?

  Um, so I had started an environmental nonprofit.

• 35:59Jocko Willink?

  Spirituality doesn't pay the rent.

• 36:03Jocko Willink?

  Unfortunately, so.

• 36:05Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, I had, um, so I had started, uh, co-founded an environmental nonprofit, uh, called Healthy Hawaii Coalition. Um, maybe I was 16 or, or 17 and I was thinking about, I figured out like, okay, you know, we're going and doing beach cleanups on the weekends. And every weekend we come back and there's more trash on the beach. Like, how do we start to try to solve deeper problem? And, and came up with an idea of, of going and talking to elementary school kids about like, hey, guys, here's why you shouldn't like throw your soda can and your chip bag, um, on the beach because this is our home. This is our playground. And, and here's what happens when you, when you do that. And, and I came up with like, um,

• 36:51Tulsi Gabbard?

  Like a fun little skit called The Adventures of Water Woman. And a friend of mine who's an artist came up with like a workbook and a coloring book for for kids. And I thought elementary because you know, obviously, kids are starting to figure things out. And um, yeah, so we we had this this two day program. One day was the skit and the workbook. And then the next day, we actually took kids out to to like a field trip and like testing water and understanding like, okay, here's like clean water versus dirty water and why and how it gets contaminated. But in a very simple, practical way that they could really relate to in their lives. And so I was the original Water Woman. Had like the blue board shorts and the cape with the big water drop on the back. And it was so much fun.

• 37:36Tulsi Gabbard?

  They exist. There may even be a video somewhere. I don't know. But so it was Water Woman and her nemesis was Oily Al. And the skit was really a day in the life of Oily Al. And you know, he'd be out there like, you know, throwing his trash out on the street or changing the oil in his car and then dumping the dirty oil down a storm drain. You know, dumping a bunch of pesticides in his garden. And and every step of the way, um, you know, Water Woman comes in just in the nick of time and saves the day and tells Oily Al like, if you dump your dirty car oil down the storm drain, it's going to kill all the fish in the water. And you know, went telling the kids, when you go surfing, the water's going to be really gross.

• 38:19Tulsi Gabbard?

  And it was just the coolest thing to like, see all these kids sitting cross legged on the ground, like, you know, first, second, third graders and seeing kind of like the light bulb go off in their eyes. Um, because these were examples that they could understand and and relate to. And that was my hope in doing this was that, you know, it would at least plant a seed for them to understand and appreciate their consequences to your actions. And um, we care very much about our home. And so stop and think for a minute before you do something. Or if you see uncle or auntie like, Auntie, don't throw your trash out the car window.

• 39:01Tulsi Gabbard?

  And and be able to start to make more of a, you know, behavioral kind of change and impact

• 39:10Tulsi Gabbard?

  to protect our home.

• 39:12Jocko Willink?

  Did you get these, now was your dad, your dad was in politics at some level in Hawaii, wasn't he?

• 39:18Tulsi Gabbard?

  He, he, um, he and I, my, so the first person in our family who ran, actually ran for office is my mom. She ran for Board of Education. Um, I think it was in, yeah, it was in 2000.

• 39:29Jocko Willink?

  Oh, okay. So, so the water woman, that was just-

• 39:33Tulsi Gabbard?

  Pre-dated that, yeah.

• 39:35Jocko Willink?

  That's just-

• 39:36Tulsi Gabbard?

  But that's what inspired me eventually, like, it got to a point where, and, and, and, uh, Healthy Hawaii Coalition still exists today. There are other water women's have, have, who've come after me. Um, but she's still out there. But it got to a point where I, I, so I started going to community college and, um, with the aim of working in the TV and film industry. Um, Leeward Community College and, uh, started in the TV and film production course out there. And then was going to transfer to a mainland school, um, to be able to continue, continue that kind of education. Um, but a couple of things happened. Uh, my financial aid package fell through and I couldn't afford it.

• 40:21Tulsi Gabbard?

  To come to the mainland and so, and then the other thing was just, um, uh, there, there was a, an open, uh, seat in the state legislature where I lived. And I, I, I've, you know, I, I started to think about, okay, um, I have an opportunity here to stand on the outside. And there were other things, you know, we, we, they wanted to build a, a huge landfill over one of our biggest water aquifers in Hawaii. All of our, our water comes from groundwater. So, you know, I and a whole bunch of other people, we went out and got petitions and we organized. And, and ultimately thankfully we were able to get that, that project canceled.

• 41:00Tulsi Gabbard?

  But it, it got as far as it did because of a politician who was kind of in the pocket of the landfill company. And so I started to think, you know, I can, I can stand on the outside and hold a sign or circulate a petition. Or I can try to put myself in a position of influence and decision-making to, um, directly impact a lot of these environmental issues that I really cared a lot about. And that's what led me to, uh, run for state house in 2002.

• 41:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  My dad How old were you? I was 21. And my dad, that was the first, that my dad ran for city council that same year. So it was kind of, it was kind of fun for us to share. He ran for city council out in Y and I. And I was running for state house in Eva Beach. And so our districts, like, they, they didn't overlap really, but they were adjacent to each other. But every morning it was like, okay, my mom would pack a lunch and um send him out and, and I went out and we were sign waving every day and knocking on doors every day for, for months. Um, but that was, that was both of our introduction into running for office at, at the same time. And it was, for me, it was a totally, it was a totally foreign experience.

• 42:15Tulsi Gabbard?

  Because I had no, you know, formal education in it. I was not a part of a debate team, had not been trained to public speak in any way at all. Um, and on top of all of that, total 100% introvert. Like, you know, I had my circle of friends growing up. But I was, I was so shy. And I was fine with it, because I just hung out with who I wanted to hang out with. But anybody outside of that, I would not, um, it, it, I wouldn't talk to people. I'd make my sister go out and talk to people and uh, I'd read books and do my martial arts and, and yoga and just do, do my thing.

• 42:58Tulsi Gabbard?

  And so to then put, choose to put myself in a position where I'd have to learn how to give speeches. I'd have to figure out how to pick up the phone and call total strangers, which was anxiety inducing in and of itself. But not only do that, but ask them like, hey, would you like to donate to my campaign? For state house? To then go like, I, I'll never forget the first day I went to go knock on doors. Like I knew enough about, I'd, I'd done enough research to know, okay, if I'm gonna run for this seat, I'm gonna run to win. And in order to do that, I have to convince this many people to vote for me in order to win this race. And so I had, I had the math figured out and I had the voting list, people's addresses and names.

• 43:43Tulsi Gabbard?

  And um, Literally got on the computer, made like this black and white, kinda janky brochure, saying this is who I am. And so I had, you know, copies of that that I went and made at the copy shop. And, and I sat in my car. It's like a aqua colored Geo Metro, two-door Geo Metro, um, on Old Eva Beach Road in, in Waipahu. And, um, it took me about 30 minutes in the car to summon up the courage to go knock on that first door. And I was terrified, absolutely terrified, just thinking of every scenario that could

• 44:24Tulsi Gabbard?

  possibly go wrong. But also like, what are the first words that need to come out of my mouth? And then what if they asked me this question? What if I don't know the answer? Just all of these different things. And, and like, when I knocked on the first door and like this wonderful old Filipino lady answered the door and she's like, "Hey, how are you?" Just wonderfully kind and offered me a glass of water and like the whole thing. I was like, "Oh my God, okay." Then went through the whole scenario all over again for the next door. Whole scenario, like every single door was, was a major obstacle for me. And, and ultimately like, why put myself

• 45:04Tulsi Gabbard?

  through this? And, and how did I get through it? It really just, that groundedness and, and the ability to step way outside of anything I was comfortable with came from, um, that, that desire to serve and knowing that ultimately keeping reminding myself ultimately like, "Why do you care so much about yourself? This is not about you. If you wanted to do something for yourself, you would certainly not be doing this. You'd be out surfing right now." And, um, and that was, that was my introduction into, uh, Into elected politics.

• 45:40Jocko Willink?

  So you won. Did your dad win?

• 45:42Tulsi Gabbard?

  I won and he won. Yep. And my mom, my mom was serving, she served one four-year term in the Board of Education. So for two years, from 2002 to 2004, the three of us were all like in, serving in different buildings, all in the same kind of, you know, quarter, quarter mile, quarter square mile area in Honolulu. It was fun.

• 46:04Jocko Willink?

  And, and obviously you liked, at some level, you liked the impact that you were able to have because you carried on with this sort of

• 46:13Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 46:14Jocko Willink?

  Life.

• 46:15Tulsi Gabbard?

  I never once thought, you know, when I won that election, it was a five-way Democratic primary first that I had to get through, and then a general election that I got through.

• 46:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  I, I, yes, I liked the impact, but I never once thought that I want to have a career, quote unquote, career in politics. I was absolutely not attached to that. I thought, okay, hey, this is something I can do now and I'll make the most of it. And then, you know, we'll see, we'll see where it goes. And I ended up serving just one term there because of Iraq.

• 46:58Jocko Willink?

  So when did you, when did September 11th happen?

• 47:03Jocko Willink?

  Or what, when you rephrase that, where were you at the time?

• 47:05Tulsi Gabbard?

  So I was, I was just starting my, my campaign to run for the State House when that happened.

• 47:16Jocko Willink?

  And at what point did you decide you wanted to enlist in the National Guard in Hawaii?

• 47:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  I, I knew in some way when 9/11 happened and obviously we're in Hawaii, you know, we're six hours behind New York on that day. So we woke up to turning on the news and it had already happened.

• 47:47Tulsi Gabbard?

  And, you know, I think like, like everybody in our country, it was, it, it,

• 47:54Tulsi Gabbard?

  it deep, it's, it deeply impacted me in a way that I felt Almost right away that I wanted to do something to, to, to go after and defeat the terrorists that attacked us then.

• 48:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  I just didn't quite know exactly how to do that because I was, I had already made a decision to pursue this particular path of, of being able to serve Hawaii.

• 48:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  And so eventually, eventually I felt that, that I had learned about the National Guard and what it's about and, you know, serve your state in its time of need, but also be ready to stand up and serve your country and, and decided to enlist in early 2003 because I felt that would be a way that I could accomplish both objectives essentially.

• 48:49Jocko Willink?

  Did you have familiarization with the military because of your grandfather that had spent his whole career in the army and in the air force?

• 48:58Tulsi Gabbard?

  Oh, not really. Just, just through stories. He passed away while I was still relatively young and, and because they, he and my grandmother lived in Samoa, we didn't get a ton of time together. My dad had, had, and his high school best friend had tried to enlist to serve in Vietnam. They had both gone to, I guess it would have been MEPS or some sort of version of it. And they both walked in together and went into different rooms to go through all the medical exams and stuff. He wanted to be a medic. And when they came out, my dad had been rejected for medical reasons. It may have been flat feet or something like that.

• 49:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  And he was, he was totally heartbroken, but his best friend came out and was enlisted. And so ended up going and, and, and serving in Vietnam. But it was something that my dad always wished that he had been able to do, just to, to be able to serve. And so that was, that was pretty much the most of my personal, no, no one else in my family. My, my, some of my uncles had served, but again, we're in Hawaii. So like, we don't, you know, they, we don't get to see him or hang out with them that much.

• 50:10Jocko Willink?

  So, so you show up to boot, you go to boot camp?

• 50:12Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. So I, I had, I was in the state legislature at the time. And so I had to, I, I, you know, took the ASVAB and everything. The recruiter's like, yeah, you can, you can have whatever job you want. Just tell me what you want to do. And literally made the decision, I was like, look, my session is done on this date. And then I gotta be back by this date. So find me a basic training and an A I T that can fit within these like this five month period. I gotta knock it all out at once. And so I ended up in a

• 50:46Tulsi Gabbard?

  like medical operations or something like that because the A I T was only seven weeks long. I was like, oh, I want to do like, uh, what is it combat journalism or something like that, but you gotta go to school for six months or whatever. But so I shipped out right after the legislative session was done. I enlisted on the, uh, actually on the floor of the state house. And, um, went to Fort Jackson the summer of two thousand and three.

• 51:13Tulsi Gabbard?

  Managed to, um, not get noticed by the drill sergeants for my political job until like week seven of nine, which I was pretty happy about. And only got found out because, um,

• 51:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  me and my, my assigned battle buddy,

• 51:34Tulsi Gabbard?

  we were pulling duty at like the battalion headquarters one afternoon. Uh, like watching the door, whatever it was. And the battalion sergeant major walked in. And did what sergeant majors do. Uh, like, hey, privates. How are you? And where do you come from? And what'd you do before you joined the army? And you know, that whole conversation. And so he talked to my battle buddy first and she told him, I think she was from the Midwest and she's like, yeah, so you know, I was working at McDonald's and decided to join the military and this is what I want to do. And he's like, oh, you know, that's great. It's great. And what about you? It's like, oh, yeah, I'm from Hawaii and

• 52:15Tulsi Gabbard?

  um, I'm a state representative there and you know, this is what I want to do. And, and he just looked at me. He's like, you wait, you, you said what? You do what? He's like, how come I don't know about this? He asked me that. How come I don't know about this? Like, I don't, I don't know. I, you know, the in-processing paperwork that says, what is your civilian occupation? I, I wrote it down and, and turned it in, but you know. Who's your drill sergeant? And I knew it was all downhill. All downhill for me from there.

• 52:50Jocko Willink?

  Going from Hawaii, going from like the kind of cruising mode of Hawaii.

• 52:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 52:56Jocko Willink?

  Which I know it sounds like there's, there's a little bit of, well, there's, there's also like this whole competitive thing with your family and you're, obviously we're driven because you're out creating these things and running for office and all this. But I mean, all of a sudden you're in boot camp. Was it a shock?

• 53:13Tulsi Gabbard?

  Of course.

• 53:14Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 53:14Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. I mean, it's, I'd be worried if, if it wasn't a shock.

• 53:19Tulsi Gabbard?

  But I, I'm really, you know, I, I'm happy that I went in with the perspective of at least just understanding that whatever the madness is, there's a purpose to it. And don't get, I, I just, I've never, I've always been a pretty chill person and I don't get freaked out by that much. And um,

• 53:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  yeah, so I, I actually in a very weird and twisted way really loved it. It was, it was the camaraderie and the kind of bond that, that is built in a very short period of time with a whole bunch of strangers from all over the country. Knowing that and appreciating that like all of us are there for the same reason. All of us are there for the same purpose. Whatever the motivating decision was to enlist really didn't matter. That um, you know, we all wore the same uniform and, and all on the same team. It was, I loved it.

• 54:12Jocko Willink?

  How long after you got back from boot camp in AIT was it that you went on your first deployment?

• 54:19Tulsi Gabbard?

  Came back home at the end of 2003 from training and then the 29th Brigade Combat Team from the Hawaii National Guard was activated. I want to say, um, the notification came out in the summer of 2004.

• 54:34Tulsi Gabbard?

  I was campaigning for my reelection at that point in time. And remember going in and taking a break from knocking on doors, knocking on doors again. And I got an email at home, checked my email at home and got the notification of the deployment. But I was not on the, I was not on the deployment roster. Because they, they already had somebody who filled, you know, that job in the medical, in the field medical company. And so I immediately called my commander and just said, hey, like, what's, what's the deal here? I don't see my name on the roster. And he said, Tulsi, congratulations. Like, you get to stay home. You don't have to go.

• 55:19Tulsi Gabbard?

  And that bothered me a lot. And I, I just said, no. I, I, I just, you know, I, I knew that there was no way I could stay back. And that to, you know, sit in my office in the state capital and watch everybody leave was not an option for me. And so I, I continued the conversation with my, my, my commander and I just said, sir, I'm going. Tell me what job I need to get trained in that you need filled so that I can go. And that's, that's, that's what happened. So I, I kind of, I publicly withdrew from my reelection campaign.

• 56:01Tulsi Gabbard?

  It was too late to take my name off the ballot, but told everybody like, I'm not, I'm not running for reelection. Volunteer to fill this position and we left. We started our active duty train up. I think it was in August of, of that year, 2004. And then we were in country in early January 2005.

• 56:23Jocko Willink?

  What job did you get trained for? What job, what ballot did you fill?

• 56:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  It was medical logistics. So supply.

• 56:32Tulsi Gabbard?

  Which, as you know-

• 56:33Jocko Willink?

  And you're a specialist at this point?

• 56:34Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, I was an E4. Kind of a fresh E4.

• 56:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  And as, as you know, like, okay, I filled- I filled the position, but once we actually got there, I ended up becoming, I ended up filling a position that was previously held by an E7 as the Brigade Surgeon Operations Person. And so kind of was working, you know, like line of duty paperwork and injuries and tracking supplies for all of our medics and docs and PAs who were attached to all of like the infantry units and, and also every day just tracking, going through, going through the, the report

• 57:22Tulsi Gabbard?

  every day for our, our Brigade Commander of, of looking name by name down this list of, of casualties that had occurred in the previous 24 hours to see if there was anyone there from our nearly 3,000 person Brigade and make sure that they were getting taken care of, whether in country to stay in country or getting them evacuated and then, and staying with them and tracking their care every step of the way until eventually they made their way home.

• 57:53Jocko Willink?

  Where were you actually stationed in Iraq?

• 57:55Tulsi Gabbard?

  We were in Balad in LSA Anaconda. Most of us were there, that was kind of the base, and then we had units in Camp Victory in Baghdad and in a couple other kind of smaller FOBs out in different areas. And so I moved around, I moved around a little bit, kind of going out and visiting some of our, our units and checking in on them, where they, you know, where they were, but that was, that was primarily where I spent most of the time.

• 58:23Jocko Willink?

  And how did you, what was that deployment like from, you know, your perspective now looking back? What kind of lessons did you bring back? What did you learn from that, from that deployment to Iraq?

• 58:38Tulsi Gabbard?

  A lot. Yeah, I came back and my family told me this after I don't think I fully realized how much I had changed, but it was something that they immediately noticed in coming back just more sober and more focused. And that really came from, you know, I talked a little bit about how realizing from a young age, like death can come at any moment. Well, that's that's a philosophical realization. And being there, that became very real, very quickly.

• 59:24Tulsi Gabbard?

  And, you know, there was, have you been there? Did you ever pass through there?

• 59:29Jocko Willink?

  When I went to Balad, I'd be there for like 20 minutes and go to a meeting and leave. So I barely remember anything about Balad.

• 59:35Tulsi Gabbard?

  Did you come in like vehicle or bird?

• 59:38Jocko Willink?

  Helicopter.

• 59:38Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. So there was, there was, within the first couple of days of us arriving there, it's a big camp, massive. And so, you know, kind of was going out and like, okay, orienting myself, where is everything at? And I noticed right away at the north gate of that camp, at least at that time, I don't know if it's still there, but there was a big, there's a big, huge sign that someone had put up on, you know, that you would see every time you leave camp out through the north gate, which is where most of our patrols use that gate, that the sign read is today the day. And I just remember being stopped in my tracks

• 1:00:15Tulsi Gabbard?

  and just taking a minute to take that in and the meaning of it. So that none of us would ever forget that today could be the day.

• 1:00:29Tulsi Gabbard?

  And that, that was the welcome message. And it really, it, it hit home so much.

• 1:00:46Tulsi Gabbard?

  In, in that daily task that I had of, of actually seeing names of people who I never knew, people in different parts of, of, who were serving different parts of the country, but also people who I did know, whose names would pop up on that list every single day that I went through. And recognizing again, how precious life is and any, any, any day, any moment, you know, that, that could be your last. And then of course, we, we had unfortunately, you know, we lost, we lost a lot of people during that deployment. And to me, it, it, it really, it, it changed everything for me because ultimately,

• 1:01:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  coming home, I knew there was absolutely no way that I could just go back to the life that I had left behind, as though I didn't just experience it. Like the people were like, "Oh, you're gonna go back and run for your seat in the state legislature, you're gonna pick this up and kind of like hit the play button on my life that had been paused." And it was impossible. I didn't even think about it because I knew that somehow, this experience that I had had, I wanted, I wanted to do something positive with it in, in being able to impact the kinds of decisions that took us all to that war in the first place.

• 1:02:15Jocko Willink?

  So then, so then what was the next move when you get home? It's two, is it now 2005?

• 1:02:19Tulsi Gabbard?

  2006.

• 1:02:19Jocko Willink?

  2006?

• 1:02:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, so we were in country for a year. And then, you know, had the demobilization when we came back. And so it was 2006 and I was trying to figure out, okay, what, what am I going to do? There was no obvious answer to the question that I was asking, which was how can I, you know, how can I take this and turn it into? Something positive. Ultimately, I ended up volunteering our, one of our US senators from Hawaii at that time. Senator Akaka was being challenged in a primary election. Which kind of unheard of. You know, the, the power of incumbency is, is very real.

• 1:02:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  Plus, he's like the kindest, most aloha guy you will ever, ever meet in your entire life. No one has a bad thing to say about him, but he got this challenge that came out of nowhere. And I didn't know him at all personally. I had no personal relationship whatsoever.

• 1:03:16Tulsi Gabbard?

  The guy challenging him.

• 1:03:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  I did have some, some interaction with that was not positive. And so I was, I was like, okay, I'm going to go volunteer full time for Senator Akaka. Make sure that, that, that he wins his reelection. And he did, and he, I don't know if he was already, or I think he was, after the reelection, he became the chairman of the US Senate Committee for Veterans Affairs. And so after volunteering on the campaign, his chief of staff said, hey, do you want to come and work in Washington? And as a legislative aide and, and help him with that work on the committee and, and, you know, environment and energy, natural resource, a few other areas. And so that's what I did.

• 1:04:03Tulsi Gabbard?

  I ended up going and, and working with him in Washington for a couple of years.

• 1:04:09Tulsi Gabbard?

  Went through OCS while I was there and.

• 1:04:14Jocko Willink?

  How'd you get an OCS billet? Did you graduate college somewhere along the way?

• 1:04:19Tulsi Gabbard?

  Good question.

• 1:04:22Tulsi Gabbard?

  I forgot about that part. I was working, I was, I was.

• 1:04:29Tulsi Gabbard?

  While in Iraq, working on my degree. Going in the education center tent and, you know, like, okay, sometimes you got mortars coming in and the alarm sounds, you gotta go in the bunker and come back out and. So yeah, I was, I was continuing my education while I was there. And I had gotten just enough credits. You needed 60 credits to go to OCS and I had just enough credits to go. And I was still working on my degree when I was in DC and I was, you know, working there. And so I was kind of working full time and doing school at night. But yeah, slid in, slid in. And then got, I think you needed 90 credits to get your commission.

• 1:05:06Jocko Willink?

  Oh, so you still had to keep squeaking them out?

• 1:05:08Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. So I just, I barely squeaked by.

• 1:05:15Jocko Willink?

  And then, so you go to OCS. Is it anything, anything shocking about OCS? Anything that was?

• 1:05:22Tulsi Gabbard?

  I loved, I, I, I knew obviously OCS is to train leaders, but I didn't know going in the depth of that. And that was why, that was why I wanted to go through OCS. When I graduated from basic training, I was like, I want to be the sergeant major of the army one day. All about it. And then, you know, I got a deployment under my belt and got to witness some, some examples of, of great leadership. Also some examples of leaders that were lacking in, in a lot of areas and especially in a deployed, deployed setting in a dangerous way. And that was, that, that made a major impact for me coming back to say, okay, you know, I, same thing, like, I can complain about having shitty leaders or I can actually go and try to be,

• 1:06:07Tulsi Gabbard?

  be a, a good leader of soldiers. And, and I love, and I tell kids who come and ask me like, hey, I think I want to join the military, become an officer. Very biased. Yes, you can go do the West Point thing and that's great. Highly, highly, highly recommend OCS because it is, it is intense, it is relatively short. And it is just like, it is, it is the essentials of provide, it provides you with the essential tools to, to begin your leadership path. And I just, I loved it so much that I ended up going back as attack officer after I had gotten a deployment as a platoon leader under my belt. And then I loved it even more.

• 1:06:53Jocko Willink?

  How long is Army OCS?

• 1:06:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  So there's the active duty Army OCS at Fort Benning, which is I think three, maybe between three and four months.

• 1:07:05Tulsi Gabbard?

  I went through an accelerated National Guard OCS in Alabama at Fort McClellan that uses the same program of instruction as the Fort Benning program, but just condenses it down to, I think it was maybe 10 weeks. And the like, you know, the difference is like they get weekends off at Fort Benning. Like they get to use computers and phones and shit like that. And we got none of that. It was, it was seven days a week, you know, 4am to midnight. All op orders, like no access to technology whatsoever. So everything you were doing, it was like you're writing it, you're writing your, your six-page op order yourself and, you know, it sucked as you're going through it, of course.

• 1:07:50Tulsi Gabbard?

  But, you know, I'm old enough now, I'm approaching 18 years now in, in the Army reserves. And so I'm like one of those old people who's like, man, you guys got so good now. Back in the day. Back in the day.

• 1:08:07Jocko Willink?

  You, uh, so then you go on another deployment and this time you go to Kuwait? You're in Kuwait that time?

• 1:08:12Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, yeah, we were, um, it was a different, it was a different mission for the brigade and kind of each of the battalions were tasked out in a lot of different areas. A lot of our infantry battalions or Cav battalions were doing convoy security from within Kuwait and out of Iraq.

• 1:08:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  My platoon was attached to a field artillery battalion and we were, we, and I'm so grateful for this, but we were, we were physically located very, very far away from the flagpole. And then the big bases that, that exist in Kuwait. So we were within an active Kuwaiti naval base and right on the water, which you know, it's my gig. I gotta be close to the water if I can. But our, our main mission, um, the artillery battalion had a kind of a force protection mission.

• 1:09:02Tulsi Gabbard?

  But my platoon, we had had two things. One was kind of security, like like high level security. If we had VIPs coming into Kuwait or and we worked with the embassy a lot. We did a lot of stuff in and around the embassy. So like PSD, like personal security. You know, we did security for a lot of the ammunition movements from the ports to where they had to go. And then also, we did, I had a training mission, which was the, which was the fun one for me. It was being able to go and train the Kuwaiti army on, you know, marksmanship, basic, you know, how to clear a building. What do you do if you're dealing with like a civil disturbance or a riot?

• 1:09:47Tulsi Gabbard?

  Tactical Tulsi. I like it. Tactical Tulsi, teaching the Rome Ferris. Hell, yeah. It was, it was, it was interesting for me, though, because, you know, I, platoon leader for an military police platoon in Kuwait, where I didn't realize until we got there, they don't allow women on their bases at all. It doesn't matter if you're the general's wife, or you're a janitor. There are no women. What if you're Tulsi Gabbard? Tulsi Gabbard showed up. And I really didn't know. When we rolled up, like, that first day to go in and meet the unit and meet the unit commander, obviously, I'm in

• 1:10:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  uniform and my hair is up. I got, you know, a big ball of hair on the back of my head and I didn't know what they were gonna do at the gate. Did you have other females in your platoon? I had, I had two, two females in my platoon. They're, one was an E3 and one was an E4. The rest were, you know, these are guys who are, work in state, local, or federal law enforcement, mostly at home in their civilian jobs. And just about all of them had at least one or two deployments under their belt. And so they're, they're seasoned, experienced guys. But yeah, so I showed up, I showed up on day one and, you know, kind of showed my ID card at the gate and the gate guard was, didn't really know what to

• 1:11:10Tulsi Gabbard?

  do, but he saw, you know, he saw the American flag and he was like, okay.

• 1:11:18Tulsi Gabbard?

  Go ahead and so my partner in this was a master sergeant at E8. And super, super cool, easygoing guy. And so we went and we started to, we got introduced to the guys that we'd be training. We ended up doing a number of iterations of different groups of guys, but you know, kind of went down the line shaking hands and saying hello. And there was probably half of the Kuwaiti guys who I was invisible. There certainly was no shaking of hands, certainly no eye contact, or even acknowledgement that I was standing there. And you know, okay, got it. Challenge?

• 1:12:00Tulsi Gabbard?

  How do you go from like, I don't exist in your universe to actually being able to help provide you with some instruction? And develop the rapport necessary to be able to do that? And you know, so I, I kind of drawing from maybe the aloha in Hawaii of just recognizing, hey, you know, we're, we're different people, different backgrounds, different language, different culture, different everything. But I respect, like, I respect you. And I'm gonna treat you with that aloha, that respect. And gradually I started to see the ice kind of started to thaw.

• 1:12:43Tulsi Gabbard?

  And ultimately, you know, when we're out on the range and I'm walking up and I'm telling them like, hey, like, okay, here's this, like, basic safety things. And, and then like, okay, I'm gonna show you how to do it. And then, you know, gradually it got to the point, and I knew, I knew I had made progress. We sat down for lunch and they started to share their lunch with me.

• 1:13:04Tulsi Gabbard?

  It's all like food, food is, food is the ultimate, you know, bridge builder. And I knew once we were like, hey, like, yeah, here, try my food. Like, oh, yeah, oh, awesome, like, cool, yeah, that's really good. And it got to the point where On their graduation day of that first group, their commander had everybody in the room, everybody seated there getting all their graduation certificates and everything. And their commander asked me to come forward and presented me with this plaque of appreciation and thanks. And there were some American civilians who were also working that mission and they had been there longer than we had. And they said afterward, they're like, Tulsi, I hope you understand what a big deal that

• 1:13:47Tulsi Gabbard?

  was for this Kuwaiti military officer, you know, the traditional bearded Muslim man to recognize the accomplishments of a woman. And I was very grateful to have been able to experience that and recognizing the bigger significance that, you know, not so much about like, well, this is about women's rights or empowerment, but more so about how to overcome seemingly impossible barriers to

• 1:14:26Tulsi Gabbard?

  get to a place where you have mutual professional respect and understanding and the power of that alone. And there are obvious parallels that we could point to in today's world here in America.

• 1:14:41Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, no, that's an awesome story. And lately, I've been talking a lot about the fact that if you want respect, you've got to give respect. If you want people to listen to you, you've got to listen to them. If you want to have influence over people, you've got to allow them to influence you. And if you want to build trust with people, you've got to trust them.

• 1:15:00Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yes.

• 1:15:01Jocko Willink?

  And it's interesting, you know, you kind of captured, well, at least for sure, the respect part is aloha, right? It's the aloha spirit of, hey, you know what? You're a little bit different than me, but it's all good. We'll figure it out. And that way of building relationships is so much better than you saying, hey, look, I might be a woman. You might not think I'm here, but I am a second lieutenant in the United States Army, and you will, like, okay, good luck with that. You never would have made any progress at all.

• 1:15:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  None.

• 1:15:31Jocko Willink?

  And, and so, taking a little, a little bit of aloha, apparently with a little lunch as well, goes a long way over time.

• 1:15:39Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:39Jocko Willink?

  And, and people want to be confrontational because it seems like, well, it's the least offensive thing to your ego, right? When, when someone looks at you or doesn't look at you, treats you like you're not there, that's, that can be a blow to your ego, that your ego can't, can't repress it. It just has to come out. Your ego has to say, "You will look at me, damn it." You know, "I am Tulsi. Li- listen to me. You have to listen." And, and all those things, even though it seems like it would be, you know, this direct, "I just need to be direct with them and tell them that I..." And it's like, "Okay, I'm telling you that that attitude doesn't work." And, look, we're talking about a pretty serious cultural divide.

• 1:16:18Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:18Jocko Willink?

  But it happens with everything. It happens if you and I are trying to figure out how to execute a mission, and you think we should do it one way, and I think we should do it a different way. And I tell you, "Well, Tulsi, that's because you don't, you haven't done this kind of operation before, or because you, you haven't been in as long as me, or because you don't, you, you went to OCS and I went to West Point, so therefore I know..." But, all those things are wrong. All those things are going to make it harder for us to come to a good, an actual good, the best possible decision, which is what we want. So, putting your ego in check, add a little aloha to that, and, and we can actually make some progress. And, and unfortunately, you know, it's kind of like what I started off talking about. You know, if you have an idea about something, and I have an idea about something, and my, my default mode is to say, "You're freaking wrong."

• 1:17:04Jocko Willink?

  How are we gonna have, how are we gonna talk about it? How are we gonna actually figure out what to do? No, you stay on your side and I'll stay on my side, and we won't do anything, which is a freaking nightmare.

• 1:17:13Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. And that's where, that's where I see, um, the parallel in that experience with the aloha that, that I strived to bring every day to my work in Washington, is you start with, you know, finding that common ground, even with such incredible stark differences that, that are real. You start with, okay, what, what is, what is the common ground that we can stand on comfortably together, coupled with, what is our shared objective? What is the thing that we are trying to accomplish? And recognizing that... Whatever your personal feelings may be, however strong they may be, what your views are. Ultimately, if you can find some commonality in both of those places,

• 1:17:58Tulsi Gabbard?

  then you recognize that it's not about you. It's about this shared goal and purpose that you have. And then like you'll find a way, you'll figure it out.

• 1:18:09Jocko Willink?

  Again, this is another thing I've been talking a lot about lately is if you and I can get aligned, we can come to a solution. But we sometimes have to go pretty high up the ladder of alignment to get to a point where it actually meets. So we have a mission and you want to attack the target from the left and I want to attack the target from the right. Well, that's, that's okay. As long as we both know that we want to secure that target, that's what we want to do. And then all one of us has to do is put our ego in check for 15 seconds and say, you know what, Tulsi? Attacking from the right sounds good. Let's do it your way.

• 1:18:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  Right.

• 1:18:42Jocko Willink?

  Cause I just want to get to, I just want to get the target secured. That's what I want to do. That's, that's okay. Where we also get into a problem is agendas. Now you have an agenda where you want your platoon to do it and I want my platoon to do it. So then we have to rise above those agendas. Now it's possible that our agendas, that your agenda is still aligned with the goal. You want to get the target secured? Great. You want your platoon to do it? You know what? If I can put my ego in check for 15 seconds and say, you know what? Sounds good Tulsi. Why don't you take your, your platoon can take lead and I'll support you.

• 1:19:10Tulsi Gabbard?

  Right.

• 1:19:11Jocko Willink?

  Sounds good. All I want to do is get the mission done.

• 1:19:14Tulsi Gabbard?

  Exactly.

• 1:19:14Jocko Willink?

  And people run around in circles and attack each other. And worst part, they never make progress. They never make it to the target because they can't even, they can't even come to any kind of agreement.

• 1:19:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. That, that's, that, that sounds exactly like one of the first things I was introduced to as a new member of Congress. Where I, the, the message was delivered very clearly from the leadership um, within the, within the Democratic Party and, and some of my Republicans went through some of the same stuff on their side. So this isn't about one party or another, but the message being like, hey, look, this is about winning the election. And if we're in power, it's about keeping power. If, if we are not in power, it's about how, how do we get it back? And so if there's a bill, for example. That deals with whatever, let's say it deals with transportation, something about as universally agreed upon as you can get, like, we need to move from A to B, all of us do.

• 1:20:09Tulsi Gabbard?

  So if there's a bill on transportation infrastructure, and it's introduced by a Republican, you don't support that bill, you should support one that could be virtually identical, as long as there's a Democrat name at the top that's leading that effort. Because that will allow the Democrat person and the Democratic Party to then take credit for it, which will then be put on a brochure or a TV ad that you can use in the next campaign, which will get us closer to getting power, or maintaining power.

• 1:20:43Jocko Willink?

  And this is where we run into problems in the world.

• 1:20:46Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:46Jocko Willink?

  Is when ultimately, we're not aligned. That's where the actual problem comes in, is if you, where you want to go, the target that you want to hit is not the same as the target that I want to hit. And then we can't, we can't overcome these problems because we are not going to the same place, they don't, they don't, they're not the same place. So how are we gonna go, we can't be at two places at once, we're either going to your place or my place. And that's where we run into a problem, when people are saying, well, the main point of us doing this is to get power, not to help American people, not to move transportation in a good direction, but just so we get reelected. And if that's what the goal is, we can't get aligned, and it's a problem.

• 1:21:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  And that is exactly where the lack of alignment exists, because you have a political infrastructure where both political parties are ultimately, and this is not every single person, but if you look at the goals of the leadership of both parties, it is about power. So, right, you know, I served in Congress for eight years, for the first, like, half of my time there, Republicans were in charge, Democrats were in the minority, and then Democrats won and took over the House, Democrats are in charge, Republicans are in the minority, and you just see it play out, where... Whoever's in power is trying to keep power, whoever's not is trying to, is trying to take it. And there's no alignment because they're looking out for their own interests, for the parties.

• 1:22:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  And they are not ultimately making decisions about what legislation comes to the House floor, or what issues are being tackled based on what's in the best interests of the country, which is where that alignment must be. And, and it's how our system of governance was set up, that not that you have everybody as part of one party, or marching in lockstep, or, or having all of the same views, but instead that you bring the diversity of different views, experiences, and backgrounds, and ideas by having in the House of Representatives, 435 people from all across the country, all elected by constituents in their districts, who can then bring their ideas, where you have debate and conversation.

• 1:22:55Tulsi Gabbard?

  You have bills that, that theoretically go through committee, where you can offer amendments, and try to strengthen whatever the proposal might be, or kill it if it's a bad idea. And then you've got to vote on the floor. Like, this is civics 101 that we learn about in school. It, it does not exist in reality, though, today, because instead of figuring out, hey, how do we work out our differences and come to that same goal of like, how do we fix all of the potholes in our roads in Hawaii and all over the country? Okay, we need to invest in some infrastructure. How do we do that? How much money? How is this best going to be executed? Instead, and, and we saw this play out over, you know, when Trump first got elected, reporters

• 1:23:36Tulsi Gabbard?

  asked me, what, what do you think, Tulsi, is the one thing, like, what's the low hanging fruit, where there were bipartisan agreement and work is possible? I, and most other people, said, "Infrastructure. Every community needs it. Every, um, this is a domestic job creator that actually solves real problems that need to be solved." It never happened. There was no infrastructure bill that even really came before Congress for any serious consideration. And why is that? Like, the most low-hanging fruit that everybody agrees on that objective didn't happen because of partisan differences and an unwillingness to say, "Okay, yeah, Democrats had a certain idea and a certain dollar amount. Republicans had a

• 1:24:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  different idea and a different dollar amount." But there was never any real, good-faith, serious effort to say, "Okay, where can we meet in the middle? What am I willing to give up? What are you willing to give up so that we can actually start to deliver on fulfilling the needs, the very real needs that exist within our communities?"

• 1:24:38Jocko Willink?

  So I know you said not everyone is so entrenched. But what percentage of people are entrenched on the left and the right?

• 1:24:46Tulsi Gabbard?

  I would say most. I would say most. And not because they're bad people necessarily, but if you look at the system that exists, the power that the political parties have is massive. And unfortunately, there are too few people who go to Washington willing to buck that power and deal with the consequences of that. And the consequences being, "Hey, if you don't, if you don't toe the party line, then if you've got a tough challenge in your reelection campaign, we're not going to help fund TV ads for you," for example, "or we're not going to deploy

• 1:25:29Tulsi Gabbard?

  resources to support you, or we'll pull you off the committee that you're on that you really like, or maybe we're not going to consider your bill. We won't allow your bill to come to the floor for a vote." And sometimes, these are very direct statements that are made, and sometimes, they're signals that are sent in an indirect way. And so, the result of having too few people who are willing to kind of stand up and make decisions based on, purely based on merit versus the political pressures, is you end up having a lot of people who...

• 1:26:07Tulsi Gabbard?

  Either enjoy and get right into playing the political games. Um, and are all about it. And then you have other people who maybe unwillingly or, or, or even as they are disheartened, but feel like they have no other option than to play the game. And so it, you know, uh, and, and frankly, it's because they see, they see people like me, uh, you know, President Obama was president during, you know, two, I came, I was sworn into Congress in 2013. So his first four years, and then I had President Trump as president for the last four years that I was in Congress. And in both cases, you know, if, if there was an issue that I agreed on, it was Obama or Trump, I spoke out and said it. If there's an issue I disagreed on Obama or

• 1:26:52Tulsi Gabbard?

  Trump, I spoke out and said it, which is, which is, is, is kind of heresy in Washington because the expectation is even if it's the same exact scenario, the same exact situation, if it's your person in the White House and you don't like it, you don't say anything. But if it's the other party, then I mean, the world is going to end. Look at how this terrible thing. And it's such a blatant double standard and so hypocritical. I think this is one of the reasons why voters are just like, come on, like, we can see what you're doing.

• 1:27:26Jocko Willink?

  So ridiculous.

• 1:27:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  Exactly. But the, you know, they exist within this bubble where the, the, it's, I mean, it is, it's, I've talked about this before. It's kind of like high school. There is a popularity contest. And it's both people, it, it's this ecosystem where people really care a whole lot about what parties they're invited to, or who answers, answers their phone calls. Um, as far as politicians.

• 1:27:53Jocko Willink?

  I'm just going to point this out because I've heard you talk about this before. You're not saying like, oh, it's like high school where people care about what parties they're invited to. You're saying people actually are thinking, well, Tulsi didn't invite me to that party. So we're going to step on her bill that she put forth.

• 1:28:10Tulsi Gabbard?

  I'll give you an example, very, it is, it is literal. It's not like, you know, it's not an analogy. It's, it's literal. There, there was, you know, in the, in the pre-COVID world and maybe even in the pre-Trump world, um, the White House Correspondents Dinner is like the big event of the year. And it is hosted by the media. For the media and you only get invited as a politician if someone in the media invites you to go as as your guest. It's kind of like Washington DC's Oscars kind of gala type situation. So, you know, it's all of the fancies, everything and Hollywood celebrities

• 1:28:52Tulsi Gabbard?

  fly in for it and it's it's like a it's a really big thing. And I remember, you know, I I happened to get an invitation to go the first year I was there without knowing anything about what it was. And I was talking to some of my colleagues are like, Tulsi, you got an invite. Like I've like this guy, my friend, he's like, I've been here seven years and I've never been invited to that. Like hook a brother up kind of thing. And it was so, I mean, it was so surreal to me, especially because having gone from that where I was invited to go to that or other things, you know, like the first few years I was there. And then, you know, I stopped getting those invitations because like, hold

• 1:29:34Tulsi Gabbard?

  on a second, she's actually like challenging whatever the narrative is or challenging decisions made within her own party or saying or doing things that didn't fall within the mainstream of popularity in Washington DC. And so I've I've experienced the arc of like, okay, you're cool. You seem kind of cool. And like, you know, you're a surfer, you're a veteran, you're this, you're that. And then all of a sudden like, oh, wait, hold on, you actually have something to say? That's not just whatever literally the email talking points are of the day? Then, you know, it turns into something else.

• 1:30:11Jocko Willink?

  Let's let's let's rewind it a little bit to when you actually ran. So you get home from in in what 2009 you get home?

• 1:30:21Tulsi Gabbard?

  2009. I came back from my second deployment in 2009 and kind of faced a similar pivotal decision point on on what to do next. And just like the first deployment, I came back with this same kind of sense of purpose and mission of wanting to find a way to be in a position where I could I could help influence decisions or make decisions about our country's foreign policy and about our military and But didn't know exactly what or how I would do that. There was no obvious choice. At that time, I had applied for something called the White House Fellows Program,

• 1:31:03Tulsi Gabbard?

  which I thought would have been a great opportunity where basically it's a highly competitive. Have you heard of it before? Yeah. Yeah, so it's this highly competitive program that ultimately if selected, you serve for a year as a senior special assistant to a cabinet member or to the president or the vice president. So you're kind of, you know, jumping your way up to directly being able to help influence and impact issues. So I had applied for that, got through to the regional finals, and then got through to the final interviews, which was, I think, three days of assessment essentially, which consisted of, you know, we're told, okay, literally as soon as you arrive there,

• 1:31:48Tulsi Gabbard?

  you're being assessed by the judges. I think there were 12 judges and ultimately they would choose probably 12 people out of maybe, I think, maybe there were 20 of us there. And so whether it was the welcoming reception or these actual boards essentially that you would go individually and sit before. There's, you know, I think four different boards of three judges and, you know, do a Q and A kind of thing. And then there was something that they gave us an exercise. Where all of us who were there, we had to pull names or positions out of a hat. And so I think the position I got was White House Chief of Staff. Someone else was the president, someone else was the vice president.

• 1:32:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  And then they say, okay, here's the scenario. I don't remember exactly, it sounded like Country X has just launched an attack on us and you have, you've convened a meeting in the Situation Room. Execute, like you've got 15 minutes to prepare and then you go and execute. And so role-playing scenario, kind of wargaming thing. And the judges are just standing there watching and just trying to figure out, okay, what are the dynamics and, you know, who are the alphas? And who's taking charge and who's just like the wallflower sitting on the edge? And how do you make decisions, thought process, that kind of stuff? It was a really cool experience. Long story short, I didn't get picked.

• 1:33:11Jocko Willink?

  Why don't you think you got picked?

• 1:33:13Tulsi Gabbard?

  Um, I don't know. I really don't know. I sought out a couple of the judges that I had developed a little bit of a rapport with to kind of get some feedback. And this was part of the thing, like every step of the way, people who were former White House fellows who had given me some mentorship on how to approach the process in advance. And some of the judges, like, they were like, oh, you're a shoo-in. Like, you are exactly the kind of person that this program was built for. And so I stupidly had started to believe all of that. And, you know, went through it and was careful and did my preparation and went into it. But, you know, in my mind, I had already told myself, like, you got

• 1:33:57Tulsi Gabbard?

  this. Like, you're in. And then, so, when I was riding the metro in DC, and I remember getting off at Union Station and coming up the escalator, and then my phone buzzed with a voicemail. Of course, I was waiting for the call. And the voicemail said, hi, Tulsi, we regret to inform you. So, for that moment, I was just like, I was incredibly disappointed, obviously. But then had to reset, be like, okay, so, like, that's off the table. And so I ended up, I ended up, you know, I knew that I was continuing to see what can I do. And I ended up running for and getting elected to the Honolulu

• 1:34:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  City Council, and focusing on those potholes. And, you know, trash and sewers and parks and law enforcement for two years, until my former boss, Senator Acaca, retired from the US Senator, announced he was retiring. And the, one of the members of Congress said that she was going to run for his seat, which left a vacancy in the House. And ultimately, that's where I made the decision. I made the decision to run, knowing that specifically in the United States Congress, I would be exactly where I needed to be to try to influence and impact those decisions.

• 1:35:22Jocko Willink?

  Was it a tough campaign? I mean, it seems like-

• 1:35:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  Incredibly tough.

• 1:35:24Jocko Willink?

  Who are you going against?

• 1:35:26Tulsi Gabbard?

  There were six people who ran. You know, it's a strong democratic state. So, the real election is the primary election. And there were six people who were running in that democratic primary. But, the main person, who was kind of the assumed winner of the election, even, you know, nine months out from the election, was a guy who had just run for and lost a race for governor. But, who was also the former mayor of Oahu, the city and county of Honolulu. And so, you know, just for some perspective, our state has about 1.4 million population. Around 980,000 of which live on Oahu.

• 1:36:12Tulsi Gabbard?

  And, the district that we were running for, there's two members of congress from Hawaii. One is kind of the urban representative that has almost the whole south shore of Oahu, the urban, the kind of densely urban populated area. And then, the other member of congress, which was the seat that I was running for, has the west side, north shore and east side of Oahu, and all of the neighbor islands. And so, I came into this with, I think it was about 2% known name recognition in that district. Because my city council district was actually in the other, it was in the urban part of Oahu. So, there was, again, no overlap in those districts. And the guy, you know, the frontrunner in the race,

• 1:36:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  he had, everybody in the state knew who he was. He also had a little bit of baggage that came with having just been the mayor. And, that's a whole other conversation. But, so, the challenge was pretty great to go from like 3%, against 100%. And somehow, I had to try to cover that gap. And I just, you know, I remember meeting with some of the political,

• 1:37:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  you know, elders, for lack of a better word, in Hawaii. And letting them know that, people I had decent relationships with. Letting them know that I was gonna run, and why. And, getting a lot of patronizing responses back, saying, you know, tell us your, I think I was 30 at the time, 31. You're young. You have no chance against this guy. So just, you know, don't waste your time and come back and try again in like 20 years. You'll be great in 20 years.

• 1:37:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  I was like, I don't operate on that timeline.

• 1:38:01Jocko Willink?

  So you were like, hold my beer.

• 1:38:04Tulsi Gabbard?

  Pretty much, pretty much.

• 1:38:06Jocko Willink?

  Did you just go super aggressive? How did you, how the hell did you make up that kind of distance?

• 1:38:10Tulsi Gabbard?

  Well, so first I had to, fundraising is a huge thing because I needed to be able to have the resources to let people know I existed and who I am, first of all, just my name, period. And then to let them know, you know, my experience and my background and why, why I was wanting to serve them in Congress. And so, you know, we started out, we started out just like putting signs up around the district and hoping that that would cause for people to say, who's Tulsi Gabbard? What is this about? And, and, and it was, it was a lot of time going and doing what, what I called the most extensive job interview ever.

• 1:38:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  Where I went and traveled to each island and spent a lot of time in communities with individuals, with groups, small groups, large groups, introducing myself to them and answering their questions. And letting them know why I wanted to serve them in Congress, what kind of leadership I would bring, where I stood on, on different issues that they cared about. And ultimately what happened was, wow, five months before Election Day, my, I was polling at 20% to the frontrunners, 65. And then the rest was split between the other people. And I was like, awesome, progress.

• 1:39:36Jocko Willink?

  So you're saying there's a chance.

• 1:39:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  Exactly. And I just, I just continued, you know, I was, I was on the phone and I was asking people for support and raising money and then also out on the road, just, you know, seven days a week, all day. And it was, it was, it was an incredible, incredible experience. Election Day comes around in August of 2012.

• 1:40:02Tulsi Gabbard?

  And all the way up until about two weeks before the election, the local media and even some of the national coverage was just like, this guy's, this guy's got it. I had heard from other people, he was already interviewing staff a few months before the election that he planned to hire once he won.

• 1:40:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  Our debate, we had one big televised debate. We had a few others, but there was one big televised debate. I, I passed him in the hall, um, right before the debate. And he was singing that song, um, Black Eyed Peas, I think. Tonight's gonna be a good night. As he looked back at me and, and I will, I will, um, I have been told I killed it in the debate. And that was where a lot of people first started to take notice, like, who is she? And, um, I think, I think it may, may have caught him by surprise, just a little bit. But still, like, all the way up until about two weeks before, it was like, he's got it. And then some of the polls started to shift.

• 1:41:09Tulsi Gabbard?

  And some of the local news, they were like, hold, wait, I, this can't be right. These polls can't be right because you can't see a big turnaround. I ended up winning the primary election, going from that 20% five months before to actually beating him by a 22% margin on election day. And it was, it was, uh, people. Tonight's gonna be a good night for Chelsea.

• 1:41:36Tulsi Gabbard?

  People in DC, like, the next day, they're like, okay, like, what scandal caused him to, to, allowed you to win, essentially? Or what was the thing that, you know, that happened? And it was, it was, there was none. It was literally, um, I think the difference between someone who felt they were entitled to the position because of a number of reasons. And, and me recognizing what the position really is. It's a position of trust and responsibility that is, is granted to you by the voters in the state. And they are the ones who I'm accountable to and who I work for. And, um, it was just, it was, it was a, it was a.

• 1:42:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  Our local kind of Walter Cronkite anchor of our news station who's been doing it forever, longer than I've probably for about thirty or forty years, he's still on TV now, he's a Vietnam veteran. And that election night, he was reporting the results and he actually started to get choked up and got a little, got a little tearful. Because he understood why I was running, bringing that experience of service and having been deployed. And the significance of

• 1:43:00Tulsi Gabbard?

  that I was going to Congress not for myself, but that I was bringing my brothers and sisters in uniform with me. And, and it was, it was a heavy night, I mean, it was, you know, there were parties and things going on, but I remember leaving the hall that night on election night. And my sister was walking out with me and she's like, Tulsi, you know, you're allowed to celebrate, you know, you're allowed to be happy about this. But I was just, I was immediately like, okay, all right, these are the results. What are we waking up and doing tomorrow? What's the next task? What do we have to do now in order to make sure that we, we hit our next mark? And that's, and that's kind of the

• 1:43:46Tulsi Gabbard?

  the focus that I, that I carried with me throughout is, you know, I'm not entitled to anything and I am here only because the people in my community, in my home state have trusted me to, to work for them and to be their voice and, and to represent them to the best of my ability.

• 1:44:08Jocko Willink?

  So the hype of you winning that and come being the, being the underdog champ, rolling into deep, did that, that kind of came to you to DC, right? I mean, that, that hype, there's some hype train.

• 1:44:18Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 1:44:19Jocko Willink?

  Some Tulsi hype train.

• 1:44:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:44:22Jocko Willink?

  So the Tulsi hype train shows up and you're sort of um you're viewed, I think it's actually Nancy Pelosi's called you like a rising star, which is you seem to hear that okay, it did not like it doesn't get thrown around. That term doesn't get thrown around about political people, but you were like a quote, rising star in the Democratic Party. So you came with some hype.

• 1:44:48Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, I didn't, I didn't fully understand why. But yeah, it was there. I mean, I had, you know, she, I was actually making up drill time with the National Guard after that primary election. I remember being at my unit and she called my, my cell phone. I hadn't, I hadn't talked to her before. And she called my cell phone and left a message and introduced herself and just said, Hey, you know, we have a Democratic convention coming up in a few weeks. I would love to have you come and be one of the featured speakers during prime time as um and speak about veterans. Let me know if you're interested. And so again, like, that's not an opportunity that one gets.

• 1:45:33Tulsi Gabbard?

  When you've just been elected to Congress to go and speak to, I don't know, 50,000 people in an arena in the whole country.

• 1:45:40Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it's the whole, it's everybody.

• 1:45:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. And, and so, you know, I mean, I was grateful for the opportunity and went and um. It kind of, yeah, and then, you know, shortly after getting sworn in as a member of Congress, I was asked, Hey, will you be vice chair of the DNC? And like, what, what does a vice chair do? What is, what is actually that you're asking me to do and what, what can I do in that?

• 1:46:07Jocko Willink?

  Sell your soul. That's what they're asking you to do. It's freaking weird, right? This is all, they, they kind of saw you, they saw a, a good horse to put money into and invest into, a great story. And they, they wanted to get some control over that hype train.

• 1:46:26Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. And I think use. You know, be able to say, hey, you know, there are, I mean, there are biographical boxes that I checked, a lot of boxes for, you know, the diversity pick, the diversity hire. And, and, you know, for me, I'm, you know, just coming into each of these experiences completely clear eyed and not getting googly eyed at all, like, oh, my God, they love me so much, but just recognizing, okay, like, what are you, what are you trying to use me for even? What do you get out of this? And then for me, thinking, okay, like, weighing pros and cons and saying, is this an opportunity that I can use to try to get some, some good done?

• 1:47:09Tulsi Gabbard?

  And if it is, then, okay, that makes sense. Like, maybe there's a mutually beneficial thing here. And if there's not, then, you know, no thanks. But yeah, that's, that's, that's where, that's where things started.

• 1:47:22Jocko Willink?

  So they started off like, really awesome.

• 1:47:24Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 1:47:24Jocko Willink?

  Hey, you've got all this hype, you've got opportunities, they're looking at you as a, as a potential kind of horse to put money into and invest into, as long as we can control you on the track. Right?

• 1:47:39Tulsi Gabbard?

  That, that's the fine print.

• 1:47:41Jocko Willink?

  At what point did you, did, when was the first sort of time that you kind of bucked a little bit? Do you remember what it was?

• 1:47:49Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, absolutely. It was my first year in Congress in 20, summer of 2013. Every year in Congress, and I, I don't know, I think this may date back to pre-air conditioning days, but every year in August, Congress goes into recess. It's the hottest year of the month. It's, you know, DC is a literal, actual, like, geographical swamp. And so you go, you go back to your... You, you, so you go back to your district, everybody in the House and the Senate, there's a recess in August, you go back to your district and you get like four or five weeks at home or to go and do a congressional delegation trip to another country or whatever, you

• 1:48:34Tulsi Gabbard?

  said that space and time to do that. And so I remember being home and getting word that President Obama wanted to go and launch airstrikes and a military attack in Syria.

• 1:48:51Tulsi Gabbard?

  I was filling up gas in my car. So I started to get a lot of calls from constituents, from people about this. And this is where this is very quickly developing. I don't have all the facts or information or intelligence or anything at that point. But people were concerned. And I was filling up, I was filling up gas one day in Capella. And a woman who pulled up her car next to me, she saw me there and she came and walked over and she grabbed my arm. She's like, Tulsi, you know, my kid's in the military.

• 1:49:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  Please don't do this. Because I don't understand what it's for.

• 1:49:34Tulsi Gabbard?

  And, and there was a number of other kinds of messages coming from people, just either expressing total opposition or concern and just coming out of like, you know, Iraq and just everything that had led to that kind of cynicism and fatigue. Or, okay, you want to go start another war in another country? Like, what, what did they do to us?

• 1:49:58Tulsi Gabbard?

  And so the recess time was cut short. I was on the Foreign Affairs Committee at that time. And I was throughout most of the time I was in Congress. And so we got called back to DC early so that we could go through and get the intelligence briefings and actually get, gather the information. And then that was when I first started to take kind of a deep dive into what was happening in Syria and why he was proposing this. And ultimately, after going into the issue and the question, and, and really, he was not going to come to Congress at first, but then enough members of Congress said, you can't, like, the Constitution does not allow you to unilaterally just start a war. You have to come and get congressional approval for that.

• 1:50:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  And so that's we went back and started to prepare for that that vote that would happen. And I just I came to the conclusion after studying the facts that it would be a counterproductive military action. And much of it came from, and we had hearings with Secretary, then Secretary of State Kerry and others at the time, who were trying to tell Congress like, well, you know, this is not going to be a pinprick strike, but it's not going to be a decapitation. It's going to be a punch in the gut. And, you know, some of my follow up questions were like, okay, so you're going to go and deliver a punch in the gut attack. How will they respond? Oh, you know, we don't really know, but we don't think it'll be a big deal.

• 1:51:29Tulsi Gabbard?

  Okay. Who are their friends? Who are they going to call for help? And how may they respond? How could this potentially escalate into something that is no longer a punch in the gut? But something that first, second, third, fourth order of effects, their response will require response from us, which require response and all of, you know, the tit for tat that then begins once you go over and say, I'm not going to cut your head off. I'm just going to punch you in the gut and think that you're not going to do anything in response. And I just saw so many of the similarities of a lack of foresight and strategic planning.

• 1:52:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  And for me, again, as a military officer, basic level, like military decision making process and actually thinking through these things. And I saw similarity like this could very easily become another kind of Iraq kind of situation where you start making these decisions and then they're on the fly and then you're not realizing or thinking through, what do we do tomorrow? And then the next day? And where do we go from here? And so I wrote, I wrote like an opinion piece expressing my opposition to the President, President Obama's proposal, published it and was the first Democrat to do so, to express

• 1:52:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  opposition to his proposal and very quickly got a call from the White House.

• 1:53:03Tulsi Gabbard?

  Basically saying, "How dare you."

• 1:53:05Jocko Willink?

  Who in the White House?

• 1:53:07Tulsi Gabbard?

  It was the, um, the First Lady's Chief of Staff. And I, I, I still to this day, scratch my head about why they asked her. I, I knew her and maybe that was just simply the reason why. But I would think that on a matter like this, you would wanna have, I don't know, maybe the National Security Director, Secretary, like, I don't know, somebody. But that was, that was essentially the message is, "How dare you."

• 1:53:36Jocko Willink?

  Now-

• 1:53:36Tulsi Gabbard?

  Not only as a Democrat, but because like, "You're from the President's home state. How could you, how could you so publicly disagree with him on something?"

• 1:53:43Jocko Willink?

  That's right. You guys should have been Hawaiians.

• 1:53:48Tulsi Gabbard?

  But the thing was, Jaco is, is nowhere in that conversation was the substance of the issue raised. Like, "Hey, here's why we think your opposition is misplaced," or "Here's what you're not seeing," or "Here's what..." Nothing.

• 1:54:06Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:54:06Tulsi Gabbard?

  Nothing at all.

• 1:54:08Jocko Willink?

  You know, I, I wrote down while you were talking, "What's the Commander's intent? Like, what are we trying to do here? Because if you can't tell me what it is, why we're gonna do what we're doing, then we need to talk about it more."

• 1:54:19Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 1:54:20Jocko Willink?

  That, that, that's number one. And the, you know, as you just put it, the reason why, why are we doing something? Why are we doing it? And by the way, I tell people all the time, "If you work for me and we're doing something that you don't know why we're doing it, you raise your hand and you say, 'Hey Jaco, why the hell are we doing this?'" And I say, "Well, here's why." And you say, "Well, that doesn't make any sense." And I go, "Please explain that to me then, so that I can make a better decision." Because if, if I can't get my team on board, then I must be, I must not be seeing something. Or I'm not explaining my perspective well enough that they can go, "Oh yeah, got it Jaco, thank you. We now understand that. Thank you." That's number one. Number two, so when you fire off this article, is that a good tactical move for you?

• 1:55:01Jocko Willink?

  In other words, you know, would it, may, may it have been a better move to say, "Listen, I need to talk to, you know, you tell your friend, the, the, the First Lady's Chief of Staff, 'Listen, I want some clarification. I, I don't wanna get crazy here, but look, I just got back from Iraq a few years ago. It gets bad, it gets ugly, we gotta make sure we know what we're doing. Can, can we have a further conversation? Because I, I, no one seems to be listening to me right now, and it's a problem."

• 1:55:29Tulsi Gabbard?

  I chose to take that public course of action because I had just gone through days of internal discussions, Q and A, expressions of concern, and essentially expressed all of those same points of opposition internally to members of the administration and saw that nothing was, nothing was breaking through. And that the answers that they were delivering were pretty canned and set. And that there was not, there was not really an interest of a discussion or a response,

• 1:56:14Tulsi Gabbard?

  like of introspection, saying, hey, maybe we're missing something here and, or maybe we're not communicating clearly, or, you know, it was just like, this is it. This is what we're doing. And the why, like, why? What are you trying to accomplish? Well, we need to send a message. Okay? Send a message. And then what? Like, you can, like, communications is a two-way street. I can send you a message, but if, if I want that message to be effective, like, I need to anticipate how you might respond. And so there was, I chose the course of action that I chose purely because I felt I had

• 1:56:51Tulsi Gabbard?

  exhausted internal or maybe kind of back-channel means of addressing those concerns.

• 1:57:00Jocko Willink?

  It seems like, did you also sort of had already done an assessment to think, like, these people don't listen?

• 1:57:08Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 1:57:09Jocko Willink?

  This wasn't, this wasn't just one day you decide, you know what? That's it, I'm going to fire off this article. It's a pre-existing condition that is when people say, hey, I got an issue with this, we get told, shut up, get, get on board with the program. That's what we're going to do. So you'd already experienced that?

• 1:57:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, so I mean, this, this, in this specific situation, it was not, so there were other Democrats who, who shared these concerns, and Republicans who shared these concerns, and that were raising these questions within the hearings, both, both public and, and closed hearings.

• 1:57:42Tulsi Gabbard?

  So it wasn't like, hey, we expect everybody to like, there was not a pressure coming from the democratic leadership in this example, saying, hey, we expect you to toe the line on this and just support this because it's President Obama. So this was not that kind of situation. There are other examples of that. But yeah, it just, it was clear, it was clear that the message that was coming from the administration was, was really, it was kind of a one-way communication. And, and so I knew enough to know that when, when they're, they're kind of locked and loaded in their position, the only thing that may cause them to change or to budge is public pressure.

• 1:58:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  And that's ultimately what happened. The public pressure was bipartisan and, and reached such a volume that they never even brought the vote to Congress because they knew it would be an abject failure. And, and the, the, the military action never happened. And Obama got criticized for that because I don't know if you remember, but he, this was like, this was a red line, right? Like, okay. And he got vastly criticized by Republicans and I think some Democrats, like, how, how dare you not enforce your own red line? And I still, you know, I think this was one of ultimately the final decision that he made.

• 1:59:08Tulsi Gabbard?

  It was the right decision because, because of all the reasons that I felt it was the wrong decision to, to, to make in the first place, but also it forced him to take a diplomatic path to resolve the issue that he was trying to address. Which is, you know, hey, like, maybe that should have been your first, first primary course of action.

• 1:59:27Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, don't paint yourself into a corner.

• 1:59:28Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, exactly.

• 1:59:29Jocko Willink?

  Just like, don't, don't put yourself in a situation in a combat scenario where you can't maneuver. Don't do that. Don't, don't put your, you know, don't, don't put your back against a cliff where you can't go anywhere else.

• 1:59:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yes.

• 1:59:41Jocko Willink?

  Don't, don't, don't do that. It's not a good move. It's not a good tactical move. It's not a good strategic move. You know, this, this whole thing, when I, when I ask you these questions, one of the things that, well, you're gonna, I know, I know you just told me you were reading About Face right now. Well, the crux of About, spoiler alert, in About Face, he ends up at the end of the Vietnam War, well, it's not the end of the Vietnam War, it's the end of his Vietnam War. He goes and gets interviewed and says, we're gonna lose if we don't change the way we're fighting. And of course, he gets drummed out of the army in a matter of months, you know, it's all bad. And the question that I always kind of consider is, well, if he would have

• 2:00:17Jocko Willink?

  kept his mouth shut, he would have had, you know, he would have had a brigade, he would have had a division, he would have had the influence of all, many, many more soldiers and much more strategy and, and could have perhaps steered the war in a better direction. If he would have played the game more. Now, there's an emotional component to it, which is completely understandable, which is that Hackworth absolutely loved the army. And he loved his soldiers and he was seeing soldiers get killed and wounded every single day and he got to a point where he, it was unacceptable to him. We had a similar thing, you know, that you and I were talking about with General Mattis. And at what point,

• 2:01:00Jocko Willink?

  you know, if General Mattis, who's so highly respected and just smart and, and, and

• 2:01:11Jocko Willink?

  resolute in his beliefs and, and kind of unflappable. So it was really nice when he got appointed, I was so happy. I'm like, okay, we got some sanity going on here. We got somebody that's, that's rational, right? Very rational guy. And it's at one point it's over. And then you wonder, okay, look, I know it sucked and I know you didn't like it, but don't you have more influence when you're sitting in the seat? That's, that's, that's a, an issue that people, leaders have to deal with on all different levels, you know, I talk about it a lot in leadership strategy and tactics, not a lot, but I read a section about it. You know, if you're my boss and you tell me, hey, Jaco, I want you to do this mission here. And I say, well, I don't think it's a good mission.

• 2:01:53Jocko Willink?

  And I think, you know, it's going to cause casualties or I don't think it's got a good strategic objective or, and you say, I, Jaco, you do what I told you. And I say, but hey, you know, ma'am, it's, doesn't seem like a good plan to me. And you say, hey, Jaco, shut up and do it. Now I can either draw a line in the sand and say, I'm not going to do it. And then what do you do? You fire me, you put Echo in charge and Echo goes, goes and does it because he's just a yes man.

• 2:02:16Jocko Willink?

  So now, but I've given up all my influence at that point, which is not good.

• 2:02:21Jocko Willink?

  There's a scene in Band of Brothers, Dick Winters, who gets ordered to do reconnaissance. It's the end of the war and he goes, I don't really think that's a good idea. The Colonel says, shut up and do it. He goes, okay. He goes and does it. They get a guy killed. They come back the next night. The Colonel says, I want you to do another recon tomorrow night. And Dick Winters says, I don't think that's a good idea. The war's almost over. We lost a guy yesterday. And he goes, shut up and do it. And he says, Roger that, sir. And they go to a basement and they drink wine. What'd you see on the recon? We didn't see anything. Okay, good. You know, he, he went along with it, but he still had some control. And this is just a hard thing and it's, it's interesting to hear your perspective of,

• 2:03:06Jocko Willink?

  you know, at some point you make a stand and that's where you decided to make a stand and obviously you lose some influence after you did that. You lost some, you know, I don't know if how many invites you got to those dinners after you did that. It's probably not a high number. So you give up some influence, but at the same time, you're, you're, you're holding the line on what you believe in. And at some point, you've got to do that. I mean, at some point you go, look, Tulsi, I don't care. You want me to do this mission? It's a bad idea. We shouldn't do it. And if you gotta fire me, fire me. And maybe that's me just trying to send you a message. Maybe you say, oh geez, Jaco's really serious. I must really have a bad, I must really have a bad perspective of what I'm trying to get this guy to do because he's never said no to me and now he's saying no to me.

• 2:03:48Jocko Willink?

  All right, Jaco, tell me your reasons again. And now we can have a conversation. Tough, tough. Those are tough things for leaders to do.

• 2:03:57Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. And then there, if you,

• 2:04:03Tulsi Gabbard?

  I would say this is especially true in politics, but I think it's probably applicable across the board is if you know.

• 2:04:12Tulsi Gabbard?

  What you are trying to accomplish ultimately, what's the greater goal? And your goal is not about self-preservation. If your goal is not selfishly motivated, but instead, you know, how can I serve this greater purpose that you're obviously there to do? Then you're able to more unemotionally and clearly assess, okay, here, I've got three different options here. Here's where this one leads, here's where that one leads, here's where that one leads. And assess, okay, you know, what, really ultimately, what is going to help me get, help get me closer to that thing that I'm trying to accomplish?

• 2:04:55Tulsi Gabbard?

  And I've gone through many, many iterations of this as I've made different decisions that had very serious political consequences and that especially the big ones were very often the unpopular decision that people were kind of scratched their head like, what is wrong with her? Like, she's going and doing things that nobody does. She's going and saying things that nobody will say. Is she crazy or just stupid or what? But if you take a step back, you know, really, who am I accountable to? And what is my purpose?

• 2:05:38Tulsi Gabbard?

  If my purpose is to be a part of the, to seek the approval of the elite in Washington, then I would have made completely different decisions, completely, from the get-go. And I would have done very different things. But if my accountability is to, and it is and has been, to the people who elected me to serve, if my accountability is to our brothers and sisters in uniform, both of those who continue to serve, those who've laid down the uniform and those who have paid the ultimate price. Then I'm making my decisions through a different lens and a different context than

• 2:06:21Tulsi Gabbard?

  folks are used to in Washington. And it's not to say like, hey, I'm just going gangbusters and I'm gonna go run through a frickin' brick wall, no matter what the consequence. It is being clear eyed about, okay, here are the potential ramifications to this. And sometimes they are known and sometimes they are an unknown factor. But ultimately, these major decision points that I have come across, do the right thing. If you don't know and you're not sure and all of these like ultimately, do the right thing because it's the right thing. And even as you may get, you know,

• 2:07:04Tulsi Gabbard?

  the, you know, the political fire or the negative consequences or these other things, like ultimately, whether it takes a little time or it takes a long time, doing the right thing is always the right thing. And I'm, you know, I'm able to know that wherever my path goes, I've done my best to make that best decision when faced with hard right, easy wrong.

• 2:07:29Jocko Willink?

  The, I used to tell my guys, if you're doing the right things for the right reasons, we will win in the end.

• 2:07:37Tulsi Gabbard?

  Exactly.

• 2:07:38Jocko Willink?

  So if we're doing the right things for the right reasons, we'll win in the end. Now, what's interesting about this is, you know, you, on certain occasions, to some extent, you didn't play the game, right? And as you just said, you know, you played the game sometimes and you did what you had to do and formed those relationships. And then sometimes you didn't play the game. And this is what's interesting and that this is where the future is unknown. Where does that lead? If you were doing the right things for the right reasons, which you were, ultimately you'll win in the long run. I don't know what that looks like yet, right? At some point, I know, it's like a big gamble, right? Because we could paint an entirely different picture of Tulsi that went to Washington,

• 2:08:19Jocko Willink?

  played the game, said the right things, voted the right votes, nodded the head, and you'd be in a different spot than you are right now. You'd be, you could potentially, I mean, from your trajectory, when you look at you in 2012, is that when you showed up, 2012? When you showed up in 2012, your trajectory was steep. And like you said, you checked various boxes that needed to be checked. And if you would have played the game that whole time, you could be in a position, you know, you could be president right now. You could be president right now, having conformed to what you were being told to do. Now, we don't know where this actually ends up, right? Because it's 2020. We don't know where this ends up.

• 2:09:01Jocko Willink?

  Maybe people will be listening to this in 2039 or whatever, and they'll be going, oh yeah, Jaco called it. Jaco called it. You do the right things for the right reasons, and look at how it turned out. That could potentially happen, but of course, you know, a bunch of other things happen too. But it's something that we have to struggle with as leaders. But if, I still believe this, and I tell people this all the time. If you're doing the right things for the right reasons, you're going to win in the end. In the end, you are going to win. It might take years. It might take, I guess it could take decades when you're talking about these types of decisions. But the other component of this is, which I think in my, just from sitting here, looking

• 2:09:43Jocko Willink?

  at you as you're talking about this, you every day have to look yourself in the mirror. Yep. And at a certain point, you say, mm-hmm, I'm not gonna do that. And again, look, I always tell people, play the long game, think strategic. I tell people, I would say when people ask me, oh, I've got some situation at work, and my boss told me to do this. All the time, I'd give the advice, play the game. Oh, Tulsi wants me to do this paperwork, and she's been yelling at me to do it, and it doesn't make any sense for me to do this paperwork. I tell, yeah, do the paperwork, play the game. Build a good relationship with Tulsi, so you can actually talk to her in the future and explain why that paperwork doesn't make sense. Right. Play the game.

• 2:10:27Jocko Willink?

  Until you get to a point where you gotta look at yourself in the mirror, and you can't. And then you're not doing the right thing, and you're not doing it for the right reasons, and you gotta make a different decision. Yeah.

• 2:10:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, I, I, um, that, that's exactly right. And in order to do that, it's, it's being able to have not lost your foundation and your groundedness so that you have the ability to be introspective and to know what actually matters versus the things that, that, that don't really matter, which help you determine, you know, which battles am I going to pick to fight? And also, um, what, what, what is winning? How do you define winning? Is it, is it a specific title? Or is it a specific position? Or, um, when you say, do the right

• 2:11:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  things for the right reasons, and at some point in time, sooner or later, you're gonna win. For me, in my case, that, that's, that is 100% true. I think what, um, may, maybe is not obvious to people is, winning is not becoming President of the United States. Winning is not becoming a United States Senator, or a member of Congress, or an ambassador, or whatever. Pick, pick the job.

• 2:11:57Jocko Willink?

  Pick the crappy job.

• 2:12:01Tulsi Gabbard?

  You, you have a different perspective than most people in Washington who live their lives from college to try to strategically plan their lives to get these jobs.

• 2:12:12Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, except for the fact that, you know, winning, you know, look, if you're the President, you have a massive, you have the most amount of influence that you could possibly have. I, I used to tell that to these young SEAL officers. It's like, oh, you're gonna kiss ass to get promoted. Well, if you kiss ass, quote, "to get promoted," guess what? You can take better care of your troops, which is why you're here. Right? That's why we're here. To, to take care of our team, be able to accomplish the mission. So, sometimes it's like, oh, there, those are, those are aligned. Winning, when I'm a platoon commander, instead of a E5 in a platoon, I have more influence over that situation. So, I can Do a better job of the mission. I can do a better job attacking the enemy and I can do a better job of taking care of the guys that work for me.

• 2:12:55Jocko Willink?

  That's all good. And you know what? I had to sit through some meetings. I had to nod my head and I had to support my whatever commanding officer or my master chief when they told me to do something that didn't make quite make sense, but I did it. Why? Not so I could get promoted. That's the big difference. Not so I could get promoted. And I never did. It was as you know, for me, it was such a, it made my career so much easier because I never was worried about getting promoted. I never cared if I got promoted. And it actually helped. It helped because I was doing the right things for the right reasons. And my bosses would look at me and say like, yeah, this guy cares about the guys and he wants to get the mission done. Let's get him promoted.

• 2:13:29Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 2:13:30Jocko Willink?

  I wasn't doing it to get promoted. It's just gonna happen if you're doing the right things for the right reasons. So there's a weird dichotomy there. No, winning isn't necessarily getting promoted or becoming the president or whatever the case may be. But if you're looking to have the most amount of influence to take care of your people and your troops and your country and your nation, that's a really good spot to be in.

• 2:13:49Tulsi Gabbard?

  And that, that, the order of that, I think is the most important thing because too often in politics, people get so attached to the position or the title. And their, their entire identity is wrapped around that, whether they have it or it is their ambition to achieve that position or title. That they forget that the real goal is being in a position of impact and influence where you can serve and make that positive impact. And that's where for me, even from when I ran for state house, through the different political positions that I've had, like I had no issue and no qualms about walking away from what was beginning, what was the beginning of some would say would be an illustrious political career as, as a 21 year old elected to the state house.

• 2:14:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  When it came for that decision point, are you gonna stay? Are you gonna go? I went because I wasn't losing anything. And like people, oh, you're gonna give up this political career. You've only just begun. I'm not giving up anything. I am only choosing at this point to serve in a different way. And I think that's where when we look at When I've thought about, okay, well, you know, winning, winning is being in that position of impact and influence and, and maybe at some point it does take that form of, you know, serving in elected office in a high position where I can execute on that, or maybe it takes a different form or a different shape, you know, for the time being, or for, for whatever

• 2:15:15Tulsi Gabbard?

  it is, it's staying, the order of that, staying focused, okay, this is the goal and the position and the platform that I may have at a different point in time to accomplish that goal doesn't change the goal.

• 2:15:28Jocko Willink?

  Did you underestimate the power of the swamp?

• 2:15:38Tulsi Gabbard?

  Maybe a little bit.

• 2:15:42Tulsi Gabbard?

  But I think even, yeah, I would say, yeah, I mean, the, the power of the political infrastructure and the party system and how much money, you know, there are limits, like, if I'm, well, if, when I ran for president, ran for congress, there are limits, like, if you wanted to make a political contribution to me, you know, the limit changes every election, but let's say it's $2,000, that's all you can give.

• 2:16:13Tulsi Gabbard?

  There's no, there's no real limit to what you can give to either political party. So if you wanted to write a $2 million check, you could do that, no problem. And so if you look at the, the balance of power, that gives the political parties a heck of a lot of power to, to leverage over a specific candidate or a specific incumbent and to use as, use in the power plays that are used. So that, that was something that, that I came into and I think was, was unexpected.

• 2:16:48Jocko Willink?

  So just to clarify this, I can give $2,000 to Tulsi for congress,

• 2:16:53Tulsi Gabbard?

  Right.

• 2:16:53Jocko Willink?

  but I can give $2 million to the Democratic National

• 2:16:57Tulsi Gabbard?

  Or 200 million.

• 2:16:59Jocko Willink?

  Or whatever.

• 2:17:00Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yep.

• 2:17:01Jocko Willink?

  And therefore the party has that money.

• 2:17:04Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yes.

• 2:17:05Jocko Willink?

  And now they can dole it out to the people that are

• 2:17:09Tulsi Gabbard?

  Playing ball.

• 2:17:09Jocko Willink?

  with the program that are playing the game.

• 2:17:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yep.

• 2:17:12Jocko Willink?

  And it's a little surprising to you, it was a little surprising

• 2:17:16Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 2:17:16Jocko Willink?

  that how much control they had.

• 2:17:19Tulsi Gabbard?

  And and seeing it play out, literally on the House floor when votes are votes are happening or about to happen. It's like, hey, where is this member of Congress? I heard he or she is thinking of voting with Republicans. We need to find him and talk to him and get him in line.

• 2:17:44Jocko Willink?

  And they say.

• 2:17:45Tulsi Gabbard?

  And there are actual jobs. Like, I don't, have you seen House of Cards? The, yeah, you're, you're fine. Don't, don't worry about it. But, but it's featured in this show, House of Cards, the, the, um, the main character, he kind of starts out, he's a member of Congress and he is, uh, the whip. And the, the position is literally called the whip. And, um, that's their job is they whip votes. And so if somebody's, you know.

• 2:18:13Jocko Willink?

  So I go to you and I say, hey, Tulsi, I know you're kind of wavering on this vote, but it looks like you got a tough race coming up there in Hawaii. Could use some extra TV advertisement. Don't you think?

• 2:18:24Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 2:18:25Jocko Willink?

  It's like that, like for real. That's, that's how it is.

• 2:18:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 2:18:28Jocko Willink?

  Kind of, or that's how it works.

• 2:18:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  Um, it takes different, sometimes it can be very direct like that. Uh, I, I, this is, so this is something that, that,

• 2:18:39Tulsi Gabbard?

  I have not personally directly been the target of.

• 2:18:43Jocko Willink?

  Cause they knew.

• 2:18:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  Partially because I, I got elected without any help from the Democratic Party locally or nationally.

• 2:18:54Tulsi Gabbard?

  There, there was no fundraising help. There was no, hey, we're going to push, you know, it, it was a primary election and, and generally they don't get involved in primary elections. It's not, it's not a rule that's always followed, but in my case it was. And because it's such a strong democratic state, generally they'll use their resources to help Democrats get elected or reelected in swing districts or Republican districts if they're like, ah, Tulsi, you're good. Like, we don't got to worry about you. In my case, then, that also means there's no leverage from them. But I have friends who I've served with who are in those positions where, you know, a reelection in a congressional race, like, they've got to raise 10 million, 20 million bucks, which is, you know, in my race, I think I raised, I raised about, I don't know, a little

• 2:19:39Tulsi Gabbard?

  over a million dollars.

• 2:19:42Tulsi Gabbard?

  So for them, there is a lot of leverage, and it's used, it's certainly used to, to try to get you, as a member of Congress, to do what, what is best for the party, rather than what you believe is the right thing to do based on your conscience and based on how you feel you can best serve.

• 2:20:00Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, you're constituents. What's the percentage that they're able to wield that sledgehammer effectively? Like, how much control?

• 2:20:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  I mean, it's, it's pervasive. And so that, that's one example is, hey, you've got, you're, you're always, you've got a tough reelection, or, or a tough race, or a tough challenge, or whatever. That's one approach, and the other approach is people who are interested in climbing the, the ladder. And so you will either have a cherry opportunity placed before you, or maybe you won't. Have that opportunity presented, or it'll be taken away. So, you know, it's, it's kind of like, you know, they'll look at, okay, what does this person want? And what do they need? And how can we use that as a motivator to try to get them to do what we want them to do?

• 2:20:53Tulsi Gabbard?

  And so this is the imbalance that needs to be corrected in our political system, where this idea of, hey, anybody can go and run for Congress, and I know that my member of Congress is always going to go and act in my best interest as a voter, has unfortunately become so twisted into this thing that is about one party versus the other party, and it's always about the next election, and how they can battle, and who is going to win, rather than...

• 2:21:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  How do we work together and actually solve problems and pass meaningful legislation? And I, you know, again, early on, you know, there were, there were some Republicans, Obamacare, right? Hugely divisive issue politically that's been weaponized by both sides, issue of healthcare. And there were some republic, we found like, hey, here are some easy fixes. This was, this was, I was elected in 2012, Obamacare was passed in 2010. And so, you know, there were some Democrats and Republicans, we started to say, hey, let's, let's figure out what we can do together. Like, we're, this is, we're here in Congress, this is why we are here.

• 2:21:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  And there were some easy, kind of very simple, common sense corrections that we could make through legislation to this bill that are no brainers, like not, not controversial at all.

• 2:22:13Jocko Willink?

  Common sense, no brainers.

• 2:22:14Tulsi Gabbard?

  Exactly.

• 2:22:14Jocko Willink?

  Okay, sounds good. Good setup, I like it. And how'd that work out?

• 2:22:18Tulsi Gabbard?

  It turns out that both party leadership indirectly expressed opposition to this idea and what we were talking about doing on the Democratic side, because it would require that they would have to admit that the bill had some flaws that needed fixing. And on the Republican side, opposed to it, because if you fix Obamacare, then what do you run against? What do you criticize the other side for if you actually fix it in a way that it, it helps people? And if people start to like it, then you can't raise money off of it and you can't weaponize it for political purposes.

• 2:23:02Tulsi Gabbard?

  And that's, that, that was 2013. And unfortunately, here we are in 2021, and it has only...

• 2:23:14Tulsi Gabbard?

  Progressively escalated and gotten far worse, far divisive, to the point where as we sit here today, you have the Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi referring to Republicans as quote unquote "the enemy within." The enemy within. And the implications of that, like the actual legitimate implications of that were as... When you make that statement, that you do not trust people from the opposing party broadly, she's not saying, "Hey, this one person I feel is a threat to our security and needs to be reported to law enforcement." That's a different story. If that, if that were the case, we have systems within our government to do that. If you think a member of Congress poses a security threat to their colleagues, report

• 2:23:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  it to law enforcement. Do it. But to throw this out in a public setting, I think it was in a press conference, she said that, that they are the enemy within, and other Democrats saying, "I don't feel safe around my Republican colleagues." What you're saying is that if any member, and any Democrat goes and tries to have a conversation with, or reach out to, or work with a Republican, they are working with the enemy. They are collaborating with the enemy. They are now traitors to who? To the country? To Democrats? Where does that then lead?

• 2:24:39Tulsi Gabbard?

  And how is there any possibility of healing and unifying and reaching out to get past the inflammatory divisive state that we're in?

• 2:24:57Jocko Willink?

  Okay. So we got that going for us. It seems like, I didn't track every move that you made, but certainly one of the, if not, at least from what I know, the biggest kind of move that you made that was outside the system is when you went against Hillary in 2016 for, for president. Is that, is that, was that the straw that broke the camel's back?

• 2:25:35Tulsi Gabbard?

  It was a big one. That was a big one.

• 2:25:39Tulsi Gabbard?

  Um, yeah, and that was one of those, that was one of those big decision points that I had. Where I couldn't, I couldn't map out what the actual consequences to that decision would be.

• 2:25:56Jocko Willink?

  So you knew.

• 2:25:57Tulsi Gabbard?

  I knew, I, I knew, no, I, I knew, I obviously knew it was, it was a serious decision that would have serious implications, but exactly what those implications would be.

• 2:26:08Tulsi Gabbard?

  I, I didn't, I didn't know.

• 2:26:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  I had different political advisors and people who, you know, who knew Washington and who knew me, giving me very serious warning and just saying, look Tulsi, this could be the end of the political road for you, potentially.

• 2:26:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  So just know that before you make this decision. And just, just to back up a little bit, why, the backstory that led to my making that decision was, I was still Vice Chair of the DNC at that point. And as an officer of the DNC, the rules say you have to be neutral in a primary election, that the DNC's role is to make sure that the primary election process is executed in a fair, in a fair way, so that voters have the opportunity to make their decision on who they would like to be the Democratic nominee to become the President of the United States. And so that was my, like, okay, I'm gonna make sure that I fulfill that responsibility and make sure that our democratic process works in, in this primary.

• 2:27:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  And I had, I had no plans to get involved in the race at all. And there were, you know, there were a number of, you know, this wasn't the reason why I ultimately made the decision, but there were a number of issues that started to

• 2:27:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  present themselves in seeing that the Chair of the DNC at that time was making unilateral decisions about how the primary process would work. That made it very clear that it would not be fair or neutral. And that those, the, the process decisions that were being made would favor Hillary Clinton over any other candidate. And I and other officers of the DNC expressed privately and then.

• 2:27:57Tulsi Gabbard?

  Our concerns and opposition, A to the fact that like, hey, like, we're officers of the DNC. You're asking us to attach our names to a decision that you as the chair made, but we had absolutely no discussion or input to it whatsoever, and I'm not comfortable doing that. And then when seeing there was no, it was kind of like, okay, no, like, I don't care. I don't care. The decision's been made and that's it. And then airing some of those concerns publicly for the purpose of trying to bring some accountability and transparency to the process. And just two, just two examples. One was limiting the initial decision that the chairman made or the chairwoman made was there would only be six debates in the primary election. And to me, that was ridiculous.

• 2:28:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  Like, there had never been so few debates ever. And why, why that number of debates mattered was because of the second decision that was made, which was if any candidate participated in a non-DNC sanctioned debate or forum, they would be banned from participating in any future DNC debate. So you'd be punished for actually seeking out opportunities to talk to voters. Both of those decisions seemed pretty undemocratic to me. While we're standing here saying, hey, we want, we want high voter turnout. We want people to engage in the process. We want people to engage with the candidates, but we're only going to allow six debates. And if they do any debate or forum that's not one of our six,

• 2:29:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  then they won't be able to come and play with us at all.

• 2:29:30Jocko Willink?

  Because Hillary had such good name recognition. Every one of these debates would be an opportunity for someone else to get more name recognition.

• 2:29:37Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, and challenge her track record. I mean, actually, God forbid, have a real dialogue and conversation and a compare and contrast for voters on each of, you know, I mean, obviously Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton were kind of the two primary candidates, but there were a few others who were still running at that time. Martin O'Malley was one. He was the governor of Maryland.

• 2:29:57Tulsi Gabbard?

  And so that was kind of already happening, but ultimately, as this process started to begin, I saw how, even in these limited debate settings, how little attention was being focused by the Democratic Party, as well as their corporate media partners, on foreign policy, and on the qualifications that voters may look for in a commander in chief, and what that responsibility meant. It was just not, it was, you know, they were talking about a bunch of other things, most, most things that, to me, like superficial political drama

• 2:30:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  and theater, like not issues that really mattered a whole lot. When you look at the implications on people's everyday lives, but as a soldier, obviously, for me, like, this is the most, well, it's not just as a soldier, the most important responsibility that any president has is to serve as commander in chief. You know, our Constitution, very clear, like, I can have all the economic positions I want, and positions on education, and positions on healthcare, as president, I can't do anything of great impact- Directly. -without working with Congress. And that's, I mean, that's, it's the check and balance that our founders had in mind for us, which is a good thing. But there's only

• 2:31:22Tulsi Gabbard?

  one commander in chief. And it ultimately drove me to resign as vice chair of the DNC, and endorse Bernie Sanders over Hillary Clinton, because I saw a huge gap and difference, contrast, between the two of them, and in Hillary Clinton's very interventionist, kind of warhawk, war monger track record, both as secretary of state and as a US senator, versus Bernie Sanders, who, through his time in service, had proven to have more of a

• 2:32:05Tulsi Gabbard?

  non-interventionist, leaning and be a little bit more critical and questioning of-

• 2:32:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  Any rush to war. And I, you know, on a whole host of other issues, I didn't, you know, Bernie and I agree or disagree on a number of other issues, but this was the singular issue that I made my decision on. To resign as vice chair of the DNC and endorse Bernie Sanders so that I would have a platform to start to push, to be a voice to push this question and to challenge the media and to bring to voters, here's the differences between the two major candidates in this primary. You get to decide what kind of commander in chief you want.

• 2:32:50Tulsi Gabbard?

  And so that was, you know, I announced that decision on Sunday show, Meet the Press, there in Washington, went to the studio, didn't tell them really what I was there to announce. It was, you know, I intentionally kept this to myself, very, very close hold, knowing how incestuous the relationships are between politicians and the media and attempts to try to undermine my ability to deliver my message for myself. And so there are probably like two people in my life who knew what I was gonna do.

• 2:33:33Tulsi Gabbard?

  Went, live television, Sunday morning, shared my decision and why. And then, you know, my phone started ringing off the hook. Literally, I'm in the car, rolling away from the studio. But, but the most stark response I got was, and they ranged from like, Tulsi, that was a brave and righteous decision to like, yeah, exactly. And that's what it was. That was Sunday. And then I think it was either Monday or Tuesday, we had votes and went back into session in Congress and, and both Democrats and Republican colleagues of mine were kind of coming up

• 2:34:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  and patting me on the back and saying that like, nice knowing you, have a good afterlife. And even, even some Democrats who, who had like endorsed Obama over Hillary in 2008 early, like from the beginning and who shared like, hey, like, I I made that decision and I was on the Clinton shit list for years before I was able to dig myself out of it. And Tulsi, don't you know that she's gonna win and you're gonna be on the list and that there is a list and what that means in a practical way is you don't get your bill signed into law, you don't get funding for the things that you

• 2:34:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  need or that your constituents need in your district and that your efforts, the reason why you were here and the efforts that you are putting forward will be will be blocked. And so you're rendering yourself ineffective because she will be president. And that was that was the Washington response, basically, you're politically dead.

• 2:35:21Jocko Willink?

  You you knew that, though, right?

• 2:35:26Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 2:35:27Jocko Willink?

  To that level?

• 2:35:28Tulsi Gabbard?

  I I knew I I was like, I chuckled as people told me this. I was there was nothing there was nothing that I heard the morning after that did that surprised me. I knew that the range-

• 2:35:38Jocko Willink?

  Did you kind of feel like a badass when you walked into Congress on Monday?

• 2:35:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  I don't not badass-

• 2:35:45Jocko Willink?

  Or did you feel like an idiot?

• 2:35:46Tulsi Gabbard?

  No, neither, neither. I was I was I was amused at like the hushed air.

• 2:35:54Jocko Willink?

  For real, right?

• 2:35:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, for real. Yeah, no joke. And like the sideways glances like, is it okay to go and talk to her now or not? And like, I don't want to be, you know, like, thought to be, I don't know, part of whatever she's doing. Like, I don't know. Like, there's all these different things.

• 2:36:13Jocko Willink?

  And how about the fact that now, like, whoever told you, hey, now all the things you're gonna try to do are gonna get squashed. You're not gonna be able to make any progress here. That's a real thing. And so, again, going back to this strategic decision making, if you're trying to take care of your constituents and you make the worst enemy that you can have in DC, that's not good.

• 2:36:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  Well, what ended up happening, obviously, is she did not win the election. And some of those very same people who remain good friends of mine, who were being honest with me then, saying, "You're politically finished," then came back to me later and said, "Well, turns out, you saw something that nobody else saw at that time." So, you know, kudos to you for standing up for your principles and what you believe in, and listening to both your heart, but also recognizing where people in the country are, rather than listening to the echo chamber within Washington.

• 2:37:26Tulsi Gabbard?

  And, yeah.

• 2:37:30Jocko Willink?

  So, at that point, you got a little clout back.

• 2:37:33Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, yeah. But it's all in the eye of the beholder, really. I mean, there's unquestionable that a lot of the challenges that I faced as I was running for president can be traced back to that original sin.

• 2:37:55Tulsi Gabbard?

  And just how deep, you know, yeah, there were certainly ramifications, but also, it was, I mean, I had the opportunity to raise the issues that I ran for Congress to raise, and to bring them to the forefront, and to get conversations starting about, you know, the issues of war and peace, and when is it right to send our troops into battle? And what questions should we be asking as leaders in this country before we make that decision? And recognize, like, I'm not a pacifist, I'm not a peacenik. I care and have dedicated my adult life to that service, to protecting our national security, the safety of the American people.

• 2:38:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  I am just pushing to make sure that we have leaders in this country who recognize the seriousness of...

• 2:38:49Tulsi Gabbard?

  Of, of life and death, of war and peace, and when war may be actually necessary and warranted, and knowing that our troops have volunteered to go, knowing that that may mean a sacrificing of their own lives and all of the sacrifices that our loved ones and families make, and don't think twice about it. That's what we sign up for, to serve our country.

• 2:39:17Tulsi Gabbard?

  But also knowing that sometimes the tougher decision to make is to not go to war. The harder decision may be recognizing that even as there may be a problem that, that we want to solve in the world, that sometimes it requires more strength and courage to recognize, A, it's a problem we can't solve. B, it, trying to do so would not serve our national security interests or the, or the interests of, of the American people. And therefore recognizing that the right answer may be to, to not do anything.

• 2:40:00Jocko Willink?

  So, so really, that's the other part of the strategic move is strategically, it's going to make you harder and it's going to make your job harder in some respects after you execute this move on, on Hillary. But at the same time, it's going to bring these important issues to light. So strategically, it, there's an advantage and a disadvantage.

• 2:40:21Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yes.

• 2:40:21Jocko Willink?

  And you weighed him out and said, you know what? If I don't bring these subjects to light, no one is going to do it.

• 2:40:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  I could not, I could not, I was not okay with sitting on the sidelines and watch this. Every presidential election is important. There's not a single one, every, every election, like this is the most important election of our lifetimes. Every single one is important. And I could not live with myself if I had chosen to sit on the sidelines and let this whole thing play out without doing my very best to insert these most important questions and issues and contrasting of records into the dialogue and conversation

• 2:41:09Tulsi Gabbard?

  so that voters would have the ability to make the best informed decision possible.

• 2:41:17Jocko Willink?

  So then you decide you're gonna run. When is that? That's what? When do you figure that out? When do you figure out? When do you say to yourself, you know what? I need to run for president?

• 2:41:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  The

• 2:41:33Tulsi Gabbard?

  the event that triggered

• 2:41:39Tulsi Gabbard?

  the event that ultimately led to my making that decision was the, uh, happened in January of 2018. And it was, I'm sure you remember this echo, but it was um, when on a Saturday morning, we got a text alert sent out to every cellphone in the state. Civil defense alarms sounding saying, missile incoming to Hawaii. Seek immediate shelter. This is not a drill.

• 2:42:15Tulsi Gabbard?

  And the aftermath of that, where immediately we're thinking, like, I've, I've been working the issue related to North Korea for a very long time. For obvious reasons, and North Korea is continuing to develop their nuclear capabilities. They're developing their intercontinental ballistic missile range capabilities, miniaturized nuclear warheads that, that not only could reach Hawaii, but could reach a significant portion of the mainland at that time in 2018. Now, they have continued to develop that and they can reach anywhere in the country. But this is the scenario that's playing out. Get this message. North Korea is, is sending, uh, you know, a, a nuclear missile to us, which means we have

• 2:43:01Tulsi Gabbard?

  15 minutes, uh, to live.

• 2:43:06Tulsi Gabbard?

  I, I was in DC when this happened.

• 2:43:10Tulsi Gabbard?

  You know, all of my loved ones, my family, everyone, uh, is, is in Hawaii and

• 2:43:18Tulsi Gabbard?

  What happened there was absolutely terrifying where,

• 2:43:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  you know, there was a video that came out after, it was an iPhone video that,

• 2:43:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  this father took as he lowered his little eight-year-old girl, I think she was about eight years old, down a manhole, telling her that this is the only place you'll be safe. And with the camera saying like, "If I don't make it, you know, at least I want you to be okay."

• 2:43:52Tulsi Gabbard?

  There were countless, countless stories of people that I heard from after this event happened about, about what they went through. And, you know, there was a guy who he had like, he had one of his kids that was in town, another kid that was on the west side of the island in YNI, and he was somewhere in the middle and in that moment got that message trying to decide, which, "Am I gonna drive to town or drive to YNI? Which of my kids am I gonna try to get to to spend those last minutes of my life with?"

• 2:44:28Tulsi Gabbard?

  You know, mothers going in the bathtub, like, "Seek immediate shelter." Everyone's like, "Where do I go?" Friend of mine, he's got like a ton of kids, I don't know, six or seven kids, he just started driving to the mountains, like, "I just gotta go find a cave somewhere." And, but, but there was no shelter.

• 2:44:46Tulsi Gabbard?

  There's no shelter. And so you got this fancy alert system and like, "Okay, it's blasting out, seek immediate shelter." There is, there is no shelter. What, what ended up happening in those minutes that followed for me as soon as I got that notification on my phone, I'm in DC, I, like, "Holy shit, what is happening? I need to figure out what's happening." And so I just started like going through, "Okay, I know that I can probably try to reach Endo Paycom, like, Command Cell." I don't have, they don't bring cell phones in the building, so that's a problem. I ended up, the first person I called was our State Agent in General, who I knew if something was happening, he was gonna be at that Civil Defense Command,

• 2:45:28Tulsi Gabbard?

  and he would obviously know. And so I called him and I said, "What's going on?" He, he's also my boss in the National Guard.

• 2:45:38Tulsi Gabbard?

  So, you know, dual-hatted there, but I called him and I said, "What's going on?" And very quickly, he said, "It's a false alarm." I said, "I'm gonna put this out publicly. You're telling me this is a false alarm." And he said, "Somebody pushed the wrong button. False alarm." "So there's no missile coming in. No missile coming in." So I immediately hung up with him, typed out a tweet in big block letters, "This is a false alarm. I have confirmed with authorities. There is no missile incoming." And that tweet was the first public notification that went out

• 2:46:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  that let people know what was going on. But, you know, I was on the phone constantly. I was calling news stations, radio stations, you know, people were calling me. And I just, literally, I was just like, "False alarm, click. False alarm, click." Just trying to let people know what was going on. And there's a whole other, you know, like incompetence thing. Like, there was no official notification to the public coming from the state government until 38 minutes after that initial alert was sent out. And that was a whole other issue. But the thing that led me ultimately to make that decision, like to start thinking about, "I need to run for president," is because of what everyone went through and realizing. You can have this fancy alert system, and I'm sure the governor and other people are all bunkered down somewhere, safe.

• 2:47:04Tulsi Gabbard?

  But there's no safety or shelter for anyone else. And ultimately, the fact that people... The fact that this is a real threat that exists, and there are others that politicians have created or escalated through political rhetoric of heightening tensions with nuclear armed countries, of spurring a nuclear arms race, and knowing, like, okay, you know, I'm sure there's probably some mechanism or system in place to protect them and their families,

• 2:47:49Tulsi Gabbard?

  but what about everybody else in the country? People who, I mean, look, nuclear war ends in utter, complete destruction of the world ultimately. And...

• 2:48:05Tulsi Gabbard?

  Having gone through what we went through, I wanted to be in a position to do two things. By running for president, I could raise this issue and bring it to the forefront because nobody was talking about it. Maybe there was a day of CNN coverage or whatever on what happened in Hawaii, but then it was completely dropped and forgotten. There was no like, "Hold on a second. So wait, North Korea has these capabilities. They're continually increasing. This threat is real. There is no shelter. Like if we get attacked, then it's game over. What's being done about this by the leaders?" And none of that happened at all.

• 2:48:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  Even in the aftermath of something that was terrifying and in such a real way. And so to be able to address these issues and the existential threat that we face that comes from that continued advancement towards the brink of nuclear war that we're on, and if elected, to be in a position as commander in chief to begin to walk us back away from that brink and to actually do something about it, to deescalate these tensions, to actually work through the kinds of negotiations and treaties that previous presidents like

• 2:49:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  Reagan and JFK did, when they recognized the seriousness of what happens when you are in a Cold War and when you have nuclear armed countries who either intentionally or accidentally can spark a nuclear war that would result in the end of humanity on this planet. And that was the driver for me to make that decision to run. And unfortunately, I very quickly found out that...

• 2:49:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  Neither the media nor the politicians were interested in talking about it or anything that really mattered. That it was, it was about who's saying bad things about who, uh, which candidate is, um, you know, who looks cool, who's likeable, who's, all of these superficial things. But whether it was on the debate stage, when I raised these issues, or in interviews with reporters, one-on-one, or, I mean, I talked about, I talked, obviously talked about these

• 2:50:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  issues every day, multiple times a day, town hall meetings that reporters covered, or, or were present for, at least with the intent to cover what happened. There was no interest in, in, in talking about this specific issue about the existential threat of nuclear war, and what, how we got here, and where we need to go to prevent it, uh, what to speak of, of, of other issues. And then that was, that was the most frustrating, um, that was the most frustrating thing about, about running for president, was the realization that even as a candidate for President of the United States, um, the ability to bring such an issue as serious as this to the American

• 2:51:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  people was so easily squashed by, uh, the corporate entertainment media and, um, the politicians who benefit from them.

• 2:51:37Jocko Willink?

  Corporate entertainment media.

• 2:51:39Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 2:51:39Jocko Willink?

  That's, that's a good name for the news.

• 2:51:43Tulsi Gabbard?

  It's, it's more accurate than the news.

• 2:51:45Jocko Willink?

  Certainly is. So you said you realized very quickly that...

• 2:51:51Jocko Willink?

  That no one wanted to hear about this stuff.

• 2:51:52Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 2:51:53Jocko Willink?

  Like when you say very quickly, how long did it take? Before you looked around and said, wait a second. Cause I remember hearing about you, I mean, maybe it was on Rogan.

• 2:52:05Jocko Willink?

  I, I, I forget, but I remember thinking, oh, you know, that's cool. I, I, and it seemed to me, wow, what a, I said, wow, what a, what a viable candidate. That's interesting. And I remember seeing some polling and you were at like 2%. And I said, oh, that's kind of weird. That's not a very big number at all. I was kind of surprised. And then maybe that was early on, but at some point I, you know, you were on Rogan again, or I saw you in a debate or something. And I, and I remember thinking, oh, I'm going to check that out again. She's got to be at 30 or 40% now. Because I, the people that I know are kind of talking about her. And I'd look and you'd be at 2%. And I was kind of, it was very strange to me that you couldn't get you, you weren't getting any traction.

• 2:52:48Jocko Willink?

  Was that weird to you? Cause I mean, you did the whole Hawaii thing where you were at 2% and then you went to 20 and then you won by 22. And here you are at 2%, you're like, ah, no factor. I got this, been here, done that.

• 2:52:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 2:53:02Jocko Willink?

  At what point did you say, oh damn, this is a little harder than I thought it was going to be? And was that the same realization as, oh, the, the media doesn't, the media and the news and the entertainment networks don't care about this stuff the way I do?

• 2:53:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  There, there were different signs of that. The first of which started on the very day that I announced, officially announced my candidacy. As in, build the event, go up on the stage, deliver the speech, announcing my candidacy and why. And I, I talked about the very thing that we talked about as, as.

• 2:53:44Jocko Willink?

  Where did you do that event?

• 2:53:45Tulsi Gabbard?

  In Hawaii.

• 2:53:47Jocko Willink?

  What was it? What, where?

• 2:53:48Tulsi Gabbard?

  Outside. Uh, yeah, it was, it was outside at, uh, in, in Waikiki. And, uh,

• 2:53:58Tulsi Gabbard?

  You know, there were local and national media cameras there to cover it. And, uh, you know, a bunch of supporters and people came out while I was giving the speech. NBC News put out an article, uh, basically making the accusation that I am, I am somehow a favorite of the Russians or being helped by the Russians. They're talking, they're saying nice things. I, it, it, you know, it was, the article was so vague and baseless and lacking in any kind of evidence to back up the claim that they were making that

• 2:54:38Tulsi Gabbard?

  it was just, it was just so out there. And, and I, I knew that they were doing an article because they had called and asked for a comment like a few days prior. And had said, you know, without knowing the extent of like the, the completeness of the article, but they said, hey, you know, what, I, what do you think about this? And, um, and, and they had said, okay, yeah, we're going to publish the article probably sometime next week, maybe Wednesday or Thursday. And I think, I think that my announcement was on a Saturday. Whatever day it was, they changed their schedule, uh, for when they were going to publish the article so that it came out on the day that they knew I'd be announcing my candidacy.

• 2:55:18Jocko Willink?

  And, and their thing is like, the Russians like Tulsi? That's the, that's the general.

• 2:55:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  And, you know, like Russian bots or like, you know, Russian state sponsored media or the thing was, is, you know, I think they, they, um, said, oh, you know, there are a lot of, uh, articles that are proving that the Russians like her, something like that. But when you actually go and, and look at, look at the articles they're citing, it's, it's

• 2:55:46Tulsi Gabbard?

  not accurate, first of all. And second of all, it lacks the context of like, hey, um,

• 2:55:54Tulsi Gabbard?

  they're actually just reporting that she's announced that she's running for president. Or, uh, lacks the context of, well, when Hillary and Obama ran against each other in 2008.

• 2:56:06Tulsi Gabbard?

  The Russian media reported much more favorably for Obama than Hillary. And so they chose a narrative and chose to launch it on day one of my candidacy. That Tulsi would be the Russian asset or the favorite of the Russians and planted that seed on day one. You know, cited, oh, you know, she's gotten donations from her campaign from people who favor Russia. And, you know, one happened to be like an Ivy League professor and specializes in foreign policy and has talked about nuclear war for decades. And, you know, one was a woman who was trying to promote, you know, diplomacy

• 2:56:49Tulsi Gabbard?

  and actually building relationships between, like at a grassroots level, between American educators and Russian educators or business owners or whatever. I mean, it was just a, it was preposterous and very transparent, a transparent signal and move on day one. So that, you ask, when did it start? That's when it started. And then, of course, it continued to progress and escalate. And I started to see both on the debate stage as the debate started to begin, as well as, you know, you and I talked earlier, when you know, you know, when you're going in to do an interview, like a media hit, it's probably going to be four to five minutes long. And, you know, you go in there knowing what you want to talk about,

• 2:57:34Tulsi Gabbard?

  regardless of the question that they ask you, because, you know, you got like, you know, two sentences.

• 2:57:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  Exactly. And so this, this was why I was running for president. And so I took every opportunity to raise it on every platform possible. And there were no follow-ups. There was, there was no like, oh, hey, like, let's dig deeper into this issue, which is clearly very serious. No, none of that. It was like, well, you know, what do you think about this candidate? What do you think about Trump? Or what do you think about this? Like superficial drama.

• 2:58:06Tulsi Gabbard?

  And a conscious choice away from actually talking about what mattered most and it, you know, Hillary Clinton weighed in on the thing when, when she said that, I forget the exact words, but basically the Russians have chosen their candidate and without saying my name said it was me. And that was then covered by the media incessantly.

• 2:58:32Jocko Willink?

  Which is like crazy.

• 2:58:34Tulsi Gabbard?

  It is. It is. And it was a signal in and of itself. Like, why would, why would the former Secretary of State, former presidential candidate, former US Senator, former First Lady, go out of her way to place the target on me?

• 2:58:51Jocko Willink?

  And why can't the Russian bots do better than 2% traction in the polls? I mean, if the Russian bots are so freaking powerful, why can't they run up your numbers a little bit for?

• 2:59:02Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. Yeah, not, not so much. But it, it eventually got to the point where, not like the, the coverage that I got ended up largely being negative attempts to smear my candidacy or question my patriotism and my loyalties.

• 2:59:21Jocko Willink?

  So, out of the gate, I mean, is this, is this a grand conspiracy where they're like, oh yeah, Tulsi, she went against Hillary in 2016. Get ready. We're putting her down.

• 2:59:32Tulsi Gabbard?

  It certainly appeared that way.

• 2:59:34Jocko Willink?

  And on top of that, hey, Tulsi, she's, we can't control her. This isn't going to work. We don't want someone that we can't control. Put her down.

• 2:59:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  It certainly appeared that way. Because that was, if you look at the outcome, it was the outcome that, that I think they were looking for.

• 3:00:00Tulsi Gabbard?

  And again, it started from the beginning. It ended up with a total, total media blackout by the end of it. Um, polling standards changed to make it so that, uh, you know, it's like, okay, here the day they say, hey, you got to poll at a certain level in order to qualify for the debate and then qualify for the next debate. And, you know, the polling standards often shifted based on, uh,

• 3:00:22Jocko Willink?

  Where you were.

• 3:00:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  Right. Like, that's, that's a little convenient to, to change it right when I start inching up in the polls a little bit more. But it also just points to like the, the catch 22 that exists where in America, we'd like to believe that anybody can run for president. Anybody can run for office and that it's up to the candidate to go and make your case to voters and voters actually get to decide. Well, in these presidential races, so early on, you can have very well-known candidates that everybody in the country's heard of, and you can have lesser-known candidates that most people have like no knowledge of whatsoever. Well, they start running these polls so early on that, uh, show a lesser-known candidate

• 3:01:08Tulsi Gabbard?

  like myself at 1% or 2%, whereas the better-known candidates are polling much higher and then make the determination, well, Tulsi Gabbard's not a viable candidate because she's only polling at 2%. And so we're not going to really cover her very much because we don't deem her as a viable candidate. And by we, I mean the media and, and the political party. Uh, and so as a lesser-known candidate, then you're not covered as much as the better-known candidate. So you don't have the opportunity to get better known. And, and so it's this, you know,

• 3:01:38Jocko Willink?

  Self-fulfilling prophecy.

• 3:01:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 3:01:41Jocko Willink?

  Of we know who this person is, so we're going to keep covering that person.

• 3:01:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  And it allows them to, um, it allows them to decide who, who they want voters to be exposed to and, uh, who they don't believe deserves that kind of opportunity to be in front of voters. And so it's kind of a pre-selection, a pre-primary selection before, before any vote is cast. You have these very powerful people.

• 3:02:12Tulsi Gabbard?

  Within the party and within the media who who make those decisions about who gets to be heard and and who doesn't. And that that was what we experienced and it was it was such an incredible this was the thing I underestimated the most that I thought, hey, I can run for president and I can bring these ideas forward and yeah, I'm at a disadvantage because I'm not as well known as some of these other guys, but as long as I have the platform to be able to reach people, all I gotta do is like I all I gotta do is do my best and trust that voters will make will make the decision. I underestimated how very quickly and in a sustained way the

• 3:02:53Tulsi Gabbard?

  media, the decisions were made to to not even allow that platform to exist, which left me in a pretty like a pretty helpless place. You know, I was, yeah, I can livestream my town hall on social media and I did. I can reach it. Maybe a few more thousand people in addition to the thousand who were sitting in the room. But when you look at the numbers in the country, it, you know, when when they choose to not cover you and not allow you that platform,

• 3:03:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  then, you know, it's it's not only not only was I not able to to raise the issues and address the issues that that are not just important to me, but important to our country. But also, the the smear attempts and the negative coverage left me in a very helpless and and vulnerable position where I couldn't fight back. I did not have, you know, did not have the means, even if I were a billionaire, which I'm not, and I had a very, very, very skinny budget. Our campaign was pretty much fueled by volunteers and I love them so much,

• 3:04:04Tulsi Gabbard?

  people who really believed and and set aside school or jobs or life and when worked their hearts out to help me get my message out. But even if I were a well-funded candidate or a self-funded candidate, a billionaire, that I could go out and purchase ads and I could go out and create buy my own platform, essentially. If the media makes a decision to either not cover you or or to smear you and undermine, therefore undermine whatever it is you're saying and doing, it's it's

• 3:04:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  It's difficult, if not impossible, to beat. And, and I think this is so important to talk about because it is a charade of the democracy that we believe exists in this country, and it's certainly a charade of the democracy that our founders set out for us in this incredible imbalance of power and influence that's in the hands of a very few who don't have the best interests of the country at heart.

• 3:05:17Jocko Willink?

  So we also got that going for us.

• 3:05:19Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. And, and just to illustrate that, I mean, this guy who was the CEO of CBS, this is, I think, probably the most stark and direct example. Les Moonves is his name. And he, this was, this was, um, yeah, I mean, this, this was in 20, this was in 2016, that he said something along the lines of, "Trump may be bad for the country, but he's good for business. The money is rolling in. Keep it up, Donald Trump. Keep it up." And his very direct statement illustrates everything that's wrong because it shows

• 3:06:01Tulsi Gabbard?

  that this corporate entertainment media, it's about the money, it's about the profits, it's about the rating, with no regard whatsoever for what the consequence is for the country and for voters and for our future. And that is something very serious that we, as people in this country, need to understand, be aware of, so that we can start to bring about kind of the cultural and societal shifts

• 3:06:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  that will ultimately result in, um, in change and in making it so that, you know, the, these few powerful people don't get to usurp our democracy and our voices being the voices that matter most in determining who we want to serve as leaders in our country.

• 3:07:06Jocko Willink?

  So with that, you see Donald Trump getting the, you know, getting the nod from the Republicans, which many, many, many Republicans did not want

• 3:07:17Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 3:07:17Jocko Willink?

  him to be the candidate at all. Never Trumpers. And, and so that was a real thing. They, there was a lot of people that, a lot of Republicans that did not want.

• 3:07:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  The Republican Party was not into him for much of the primary.

• 3:07:31Jocko Willink?

  Exactly. Like, he was totally, and actually somebody, when we were on Rogan's together, and I said something like, wow, you got really hammered more than an obscene anyone. And someone in the YouTube comments said, hey, idiot, what about Donald Trump? And I was like, that's a good point. They hated him, apparently as much as they hated you in the Democratic Party. How is it that he was able to pull it off? Does it, does the, is the Republican Party less controlling than the Democratic Party?

• 3:08:03Tulsi Gabbard?

  I don't know the answer to that specific question, but how was he able to pull it off? He was very famous and he had influence.

• 3:08:14Tulsi Gabbard?

  They couldn't black him out. They couldn't ignore him. And they were making a shit ton of money off of him because with Donald Trump brought eyeballs to their screens. Whether it was Fox News, who was initially, I think, maybe cynical or even critical of him, and then shifted to like full bore pro-Trump. Or if it was CNN and MSNBC who were, I think initially kind of like, how is this even happening to full bore anti-Trump?

• 3:08:48Tulsi Gabbard?

  Regardless, in, in all of these scenarios and from the Democratic Party's perspective and the Republican Party's perspective, with Trump came money.

• 3:09:00Tulsi Gabbard?

  Democrats get to be the anti-Trump party and motivate a lot of people to give money to beat Trump. Or people who supported Trump and members of Congress or whatever. And Republicans got to raise a lot of money off of, hey, look, they're trying to attack us and they're trying to undermine what's going on and we need your money and we need your help to be able to, you know, defend the party and defend the work or whatever it is. So that...

• 3:09:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  How, I think that's what ultimately ended up, I mean, gave Trump a lot of exposure. And yeah, some of it, or maybe a lot of it was negative. But you look at how much the public hates politicians and how much they distrust and hate the media. You know, you can kind of see how generally people who are frustrated and dissatisfied with the powerful elite, whether they be in politics or the media, would look at a guy, and I have friends like this, like, they didn't really agree with anything that Trump was saying. They're like, finally, somebody is giving the middle finger to the media and telling them to, you know, shut up, or whatever it was.

• 3:10:16Tulsi Gabbard?

  Trump had influence. And he was very well-known and could not be ignored.

• 3:10:28Jocko Willink?

  So at some point, does somebody come in, does somebody come from the outside that's not as brash and not as offensive as Trump? And would that not be a pretty, would that not be easier? Or was it because he's so brash and because he's so freaking quotable, right? Good or bad. You know, he's just gonna run, they're gonna put, they're gonna put his quotes up all day long. If somebody comes along that's from the outside, but that is actually less brash and more calm and more rational, do they say, okay? It seems like that would be the perfect candidate right now. Someone from the outside that can actually roll in and say, look, this system is totally screwed up.

• 3:11:13Jocko Willink?

  We're gonna, like, the idea of draining the swamp was a great quote. That's got so many legs, or so much legs. And, you know, of course, it didn't really happen. When you look at his administration, it was like, oh, more people from the swamp.

• 3:11:28Tulsi Gabbard?

  More lobby, yeah, exactly.

• 3:11:29Jocko Willink?

  Right. But, but when someone does this in a more... From a better, from a better, like, from a better position. It seems like, this is what I'm getting at. Because I was gonna ask you, well, at some point, does it reach a tipping point? It seems like the tipping point's there. It just, someone needs to step in and say, okay, we are gonna actually drain out this swamp. We're gonna actually get rid of this. These lobbyists are gonna get, you know, controls put on them. We're gonna, we're gonna do things that's gonna move this in the right direction. It seems like, as you said, Americans, a lot of Americans are looking at the political system going, "You gotta be kidding me." And look, you telling me stories earlier today, before we hit record. It's sickening.

• 3:12:09Tulsi Gabbard?

  It is sickening.

• 3:12:10Jocko Willink?

  It's sickening. And so, as that word gets out, it seems like America's ready to go, you know what? We're done with this shit over here. And, and Trump was like the first guy that said, "Hey, I'll, I'll help you out." And so, everyone went, "Cool, sounds good. You go raise hell," basically. If someone that says, "Yep, we're gonna fix it, we're gonna change it. I'm for change, I'm gonna make things..." It seems like we are ripe for that. I was gonna, that's what I'm saying. I was going to ask you, will we reach a tipping point? It seems like we're already there. Trump was the guy that got elected based on saying, "Hey, we're gonna drain the swamp." People voted for him to go and do that. Like you said, people that you, that you knew that didn't agree with any of his politics, but he was changed, he was different, he was gonna throw it in the face of the system. That's what we were ready for.

• 3:12:56Jocko Willink?

  And it just so happens that the guy that threw it in the face of the system also threw it in the face of everybody that was around him. I mean, just like a grenade going off. It's just that people are getting hit. And there's no direction to it. So it seems like we're actually ready for that. What's it gonna take to actually get someone there that's gonna run, that's gonna, that, that's, that, that the truth will come out, doing the right things for the right reasons is gonna win in the end?

• 3:13:22Tulsi Gabbard?

  Someone who has the...

• 3:13:28Tulsi Gabbard?

  Resources and ammunition capable of going to battle with the existing political infrastructure and the corporate entertainment media.

• 3:13:39Tulsi Gabbard?

  That, that's, that's the matchup because I agree, you know, there are, there are more people who identify as independents in the country today than there are who people who identify as either Democrats or Republicans. Really? Yes. Factually? Factually. Echo Charles, are we good to use that word?

• 3:13:58Jocko Willink?

  Yes, sir.

• 3:13:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  Thanks. That's factually true. We can, we can look up, I mean, I've, I've seen a variety, and this has been trending in this direction for quite some time. This is not a new phenomenon, but the numbers are consistently trending towards, and, and maybe some, some of it's generational that, that, you know, the millennial generation did not come up identifying like my daddy was a Democrat, my granddaddy was a Democrat, I gotta be a Democrat. I think there's, there's less, far less of that in, in the millennial, in post millennial generation. So I think that's part of it. People are looking more at issues than party. I think part of it is, is people recognizing and being disillusioned with, with both political parties as not looking out for their best interest, that it's more about the party than the people.

• 3:14:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  So I think there's a number of, of reasons for this, but it is a fact that it's over 40% of the country identify themselves as independent and therefore lesser numbers who identify as, as one party or another. So are the people ready for a, a strong leader who will come in and speak to what's in the best interest of the country rather than what's in the best interest of one party or another? I, I would say yes, without a doubt. So then the next question is how, what is necessary to execute on that?

• 3:15:18Tulsi Gabbard?

  What is necessary is, is first of all, recognizing, you know, where's the opposition coming from? The opposition will come from the people who are benefiting off the status quo. And that is the existing two-party system and the, the, um, the, the, the entertainment media that, that is in bed with them. And it's not impossible, it's not insurmountable, but it's a pretty serious obstacle and you gotta be ready to go to battle with some of the most powerful people. And, uh, so.

• 3:15:57Tulsi Gabbard?

  It would take a lot. It would take a lot.

• 3:16:01Jocko Willink?

  And the third party thing is, what do you think? Is that, is that dead on arrival?

• 3:16:06Tulsi Gabbard?

  Not dead on arrival, not impossible, very difficult because I think it was, it was back and I forget, I think it was the first time that Ross Perot ran for president, uh, was also when Bill Clinton was running for president. And I think George H W, if I'm not mistaken.

• 3:16:25Jocko Willink?

  I think you're right.

• 3:16:26Tulsi Gabbard?

  At, at a certain point, well, early on though, early on, at a certain point, Ross Perot was polling higher than Bill Clinton. And I, I believe George Bush as well. And that, like, they're like, what is going, like, how is this possible? And had he continued his campaign, at a certain point, Ross Perot dropped out of the race and then jumped back in a little bit later. And he took a big hit for that. I don't know, people probably like, want like, do you not know what you want? Or like, what, what are you doing, buddy? Um, but there are political pundits who say that if he had continued on,

• 3:17:07Tulsi Gabbard?

  he, you know, who knows? He, he may have become president or he may have posed a more serious threat in the end than he did. Ultimately, his numbers took a dive after he re-entered the race and he ended up kind of just being the perennial third party guy who stole votes, right? But it was after that election year that the rules started to change in making it, uh, with, with agreement from both the Democrat and Republican Party that made it much more difficult for a third party candidate to get ballot access, just to get their names on the ballot, um, to be included in debates.

• 3:17:50Tulsi Gabbard?

  Just the basic infrastructure of a candidacy, um, changed to the point where, and it's still, it still exists today, that the, the bar is much higher for a third party candidate to, to be heard and to be on the ballot than it is for, uh, candidates who run under one party or, or another. So that, that, that just, again, not impossible, but from a practical perspective as well as from a, an exposure perspective.

• 3:18:24Tulsi Gabbard?

  It's a much, much, much heavier lift that again requires a certain strategy and a hell of a lot of resources to be able to accomplish that.

• 3:18:36Jocko Willink?

  So how long, how long were you in the race for total?

• 3:18:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  Um, I think I announced in February of 2019 and I withdrew from the race. I think in March, February, or March of, I think it was March of

• 3:18:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  2020. It was, it was after COVID had kind of already started. I was back in Hawaii. COVID had started to take a pretty firm hold. Maybe it was even later than that. And it just, it got to the point where like we're on lockdown at home in Hawaii. Congress had shut down and I knew that the most effective use of my time at like the, the outcome of the primary seemed somewhat inevitable at that point. And the most effective use of my time would be to focus on how I could best help with, with the response on of COVID in Hawaii. And, you know, I was calling, trying to get like N95 masks and just trying to help, help with that local response in Hawaii.

• 3:19:43Jocko Willink?

  So you, so you, what is that called? Dropping out of the race? Is that what it's called? Is there some official word for it?

• 3:19:48Tulsi Gabbard?

  No, withdrew my candidacy.

• 3:19:50Jocko Willink?

  Withdrew your candidacy. So you withdrew.

• 3:19:53Tulsi Gabbard?

  Suspending. That's the word they use. Suspending your candidacy.

• 3:19:57Jocko Willink?

  And did you feel like?

• 3:20:01Jocko Willink?

  What the hell just happened? Did you feel like wasted time? Did you feel like, man? Cause I, again, I remember looking at you in the polls and you know, you might've gotten to three percent or four percent. I could, I, I was really surprised. I was really surprised, you know, that you just didn't get the kind of traction again, as, as Joe said, you're like such a kind of ideal candidate from. Like a box checking, you're a veteran, you're a woman, you've been, you've got experience, you've got combat deployments, you're whatever, not a white person. You got these things that people are looking for.

• 3:20:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  Hoppa.

• 3:20:45Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, you're hoppa, right? So you, so you got those things and it just seemed like, oh, okay. It'll be interesting to watch this. She's going to climb right up this thing and, and you never really made that progress.

• 3:20:58Jocko Willink?

  Does that surprise you?

• 3:21:02Tulsi Gabbard?

  I mean, in hindsight, no.

• 3:21:04Jocko Willink?

  Cause you, cause you see you were, you messed with the machine.

• 3:21:07Tulsi Gabbard?

  At that moment, like going through it. It surprised me that I didn't even have the opportunity to earn it. To earn the support, to get that exposure.

• 3:21:19Jocko Willink?

  I remember you telling me at some point, you were like the number one most Googled name after the first debate, after the second debate. What you, you didn't make the third debate for whatever reason.

• 3:21:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, I don't remember which, you know, I think there was, there was.

• 3:21:32Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, there was a gap at some point where I didn't make one, but then I made the, the next. I don't remember exactly what, but. In those first, in those first debates, um, I was the most searched candidate of the night. After each of those debates, which was the whole point. You know, hey, I can go on this stage, the national stage, and the first debate, I think had over 20 million viewers. And this is the opportunity to introduce myself to the American people.

• 3:21:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  In the hopes that they might say, hmm, she looks interesting. I want to know more. I want to learn more. And that being starting to kind of crack open the door to be able to. Make an impact there.

• 3:22:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  I think one of the other, in addition to all the things that we talked about, about how. That opportunity really ultimately did not exist and, and it started with that first debate. You know, in advance, we had set up our, our Google Ads account so that when people. Went on Google and said, hey, who is Tulsi Gabbard? Then, you know, our links would pop up and they would then go to my website and they could look at, click issue X, Y, or Z. What do you care about? Bio background, et cetera.

• 3:22:43Tulsi Gabbard?

  That was the hope that that would be, I would be the most Googled candidate and that we therefore were ready for it.

• 3:22:51Tulsi Gabbard?

  Google shut down our Google Ads account with no reason whatsoever at all given.

• 3:22:57Jocko Willink?

  During the first debate.

• 3:22:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  It was not actually during the debate, it was afterward. But it was during that, it was during that window of time that was the golden opportunity to capture and it was a limited window. And they, they just like, your, your account is suspended, no explanation, no, here's what you gotta do to fix it or get it, you know, whatever, released and, uh, and to this day, we've never gotten, you know, it was suspended for a certain period of time and then it was reinstated and it was not for lack of us trying to reach anybody who would answer us and tell us why and what we could do to fix it immediately.

• 3:23:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  So, you know, I mean, there's, I filed a lawsuit against Google for that, um, because of, because of the, the impact obviously that it had on me, but also, but really the bigger issue that I, I wanted to raise by filing this lawsuit was you've got this massive big tech company who has the power to, um, interfere in the public square of our democracy. And, you know, who knows, still to this day, like, was it some guy sitting at a computer who was like, man, fuck Tulsi Gabbard, I'm gonna punch this button and show her what's up or like, who knows, I don't know what happened, but it happened.

• 3:24:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  And if it can happen to a sitting member of Congress who's running for the highest office in the land, it could happen to anybody running for office, anybody who's speaking out, anybody being critical of whether it's big tech or, or government policy, like whatever the motive, um, this is the power that they have in their hands, that's incredibly dangerous in undermining the, the, the kind of core pillars of, of our democracy, of, of having a marketplace of free ideas and voters who can, you know, um, get the information they need and ultimately make the decision that they want to make.

• 3:25:03Jocko Willink?

  Are they allowed to?

• 3:25:06Jocko Willink?

  Are they allowed to mess with like Google AdWords from a political perspective? So in other words, if I was running against you and I bought the AdWords Tulsi Gabbard and brought it to a freaking Russian newspaper article about how they're your favorite. So when I Google Tulsi Gabbard, I click on the first article that comes up, it shows me that you're a Russian plant.

• 3:25:29Jocko Willink?

  Can I do that in the political realm? Because look, they do it with like I, you know, I, I have a bunch of companies and sell a bunch of stuff and you type in Jaco, you know, the other companies pay for that word for Jaco protein and it brings to their site.

• 3:25:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  Right.

• 3:25:45Jocko Willink?

  So if I was a billionaire and you were running against me, I could be like, oh, cool. I'll just buy Tulsi Gabbard. Who is Tulsi Gabbard? What is Tulsi Gabbard? Where's Tulsi Gabbard come from? And I'll just buy all those things and send them all to Tulsi Gabbard's from Russia, whatever else I'm going to do. Is that legal in the polit-? I know it's legal in the, in the free market because they do it all the time. Is it legal on the political side too?

• 3:26:05Tulsi Gabbard?

  As far as I know, I, I am not, I have not come across any kind of.

• 3:26:12Jocko Willink?

  Like legislation against AdWords in Google?

• 3:26:16Tulsi Gabbard?

  There, there are, there are no laws or rules in place from a government perspective that, that limit what these big tech monopolies can do with their algorithms.

• 3:26:33Tulsi Gabbard?

  And that's part of the whole issue here when we talk about big tech, the monopolies, the power that they have to either promote or push forward certain voices or people or ideas and silence others. And they can do so while being completely legally immune from any kind of accountability through our legal system.

• 3:27:00Jocko Willink?

  Because they're private companies.

• 3:27:01Tulsi Gabbard?

  Well, because, yep, because they're private companies, but this section 230 provision that exists with, within the law that was, was put in place to encourage innovation on the internet, uh, early, you know, decades ago.

• 3:27:18Tulsi Gabbard?

  When they passed that law. It that gave them this legal immunity. It said that they can, um, they can remove content that they deem to be objectionable.

• 3:27:33Tulsi Gabbard?

  Without any definition of what that is, first of all.

• 3:27:36Jocko Willink?

  Whatever they want it to be.

• 3:27:37Tulsi Gabbard?

  Whatever they want it to be. And then it says, whether or not it is protected by the constitution.

• 3:27:46Jocko Willink?

  Dang.

• 3:27:48Tulsi Gabbard?

  How?

• 3:27:51Tulsi Gabbard?

  I don't know who wrote that part of it.

• 3:27:54Jocko Willink?

  Probably the same bastard that clicked delete on your freaking account for six hours.

• 3:28:00Tulsi Gabbard?

  But to have something in there that says, you internet, you know, service provider company, you can decide what speech you deem or content objectionable or not. Whether or not it is protected by our constitution. This is the problem that needs to be fixed within our laws today as it relates to big tech. And it's a relatively, there's a lot of, I, I've and I've looked at this a lot while I was in Congress and then after for obvious reasons. And, you know, there, there's a lot of different proposals and different ways to kind of bite this apple. But the most simple and direct way would be to take out that objectionable content, just take those words out. And instead, um,

• 3:28:46Tulsi Gabbard?

  you know, uh, you can say unless it is, unless it, you know, you, you can remove content unless it is protected under the first amendment. And there's legal precedents in place through various Supreme Court rulings that provide very clear kind of guardrails towards what kind of speech is protected versus what is not. And that way, if, if we make this legislative change, it would alleviate the kind of pressure that these big tech companies are under right now, coming from the left and the right. Because then they can just say, look. These are the guardrails. This is speech that's protected and it's gonna remain on the internet.

• 3:29:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  And speech that's not protected, then it's up to us to make that decision to, to, uh, to remove it. That, that's, that's the, that's the best answer that I have come across on how to, um, address this. Rather than allowing this, you know, I mean, now we have like, okay, well, we're gonna cancel anything that's disinformation. We're gonna cancel anything that's misinformation. We're gonna, you know, cancel anything that, um, we don't like. Or, you know, I mean, it's, it's getting worse and worse. And unfortunately, the direction that I'm seeing from Democrats in Congress is not towards, hey, how do we protect free speech? But instead, it's, um, we need big tech to do more to shut people up who are saying

• 3:30:14Tulsi Gabbard?

  things that, uh, we deem to be misinformation or disinformation. Or that could mislead people into believing a certain thing or seeing a certain view. And it's, it's, it is, you know, the, the fact that this is happening and people don't see the danger of, okay, you're in power today. You got Kevin McCarthy, who's the head of the Republicans in the House, saying, I bet my house on the fact that Republicans will regain the majority in 2022. What are you gonna do when the tables turn? And then you've got the other guys in power saying, yeah, you know what? We don't want Democrats to be misleading people on the internet.

• 3:30:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  So we're gonna tweak the language a little bit and make sure that big tech silences those voices and pushes. Like, it's, it's so simple and clear how dangerous of a position that we are in. And that when you, when you threaten the First Amendment, like freedom of speech, a free press, like freedom of religion, um...

• 3:31:24Tulsi Gabbard?

  Once you undermine that, what do we have in America? We don't, we don't have. We don't have the country, we don't have our country.

• 3:31:35Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, we did, um, we did a podcast and we recorded it before Christmas, but we did it on nineteen, the book nineteen eighty-four.

• 3:31:42Tulsi Gabbard?

  I listened to that.

• 3:31:43Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, and it was really weird because we just, you know, it was just something that I was like, oh, seeing things that are going on and I, and I, you know, read that book many, many years ago. And I remembered this one part of it was about the language and the importance of language and the, therefore the importance of free speech. And we recorded it and then like it was Christmas time and that, that podcast came out. January sixth. And it was kinda crazy that it came out on that day. It just, we had recorded it a month prior.

• 3:32:10Tulsi Gabbard?

  And you had scheduled it for that day?

• 3:32:12Jocko Willink?

  It was just, that's when it's coming out. So it came out January sixth, then nineteen eighty-four was trending. And then the, the tag, the hashtag nineteen eighty-four, some, some hashtag nineteen eighty-four actually got shut down on Twitter. It was, it was all, it wasn't, it wasn't because of that podcast, but it was just very coincidental that all that was happening at the same time. But the point of doing that podcast, and this is exactly aligned with what you're saying. You have to allow people to communicate with each other. And, you know, saying, if you, if, if you say something to me that's misleading, I can't just, it's what I started off with. I just don't say, shut up, you're not allowed to talk. I say, okay, well, actually, Tulsi, let me show you some other information that might change your mind a little bit.

• 3:32:57Jocko Willink?

  Cause by the way, when I just tell you to shut up, I don't move your opinion at all. In fact, there's a really good chance that I'm just gonna make you even stronger on that opinion. And that's what's happening in the country right now, which is freaking nasty. And, and you, and, and actually that, again, interestingly, as all this was happening, we, we had, had, I talked to Echo, I was like, listen, man. I don't know what's gonna happen in the world and I don't know what's gonna happen. And look, we don't, we're not on here making any, uh, inflammatory statements. We're usually talking about history. I said, and that's cool. We'll, that's what we're gonna do. But at some point, people are starting to change history. And I said, I don't know what's gonna even happen with the platforms that we're on.

• 3:33:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 3:33:40Jocko Willink?

  Like, these platforms could change the way they do business. And we started our own platform just to make sure that we have someplace to, someplace to go in the event that things take a turn for the worse. And there's a bunch of other things that could happen. I mean, you could have some of these free platforms say, all right, we're gonna start charging money and start inserting ads into the middle of, you know, here's Jaco talking about a, a battle in World War II, and it's heavy and crazy and emotional. Someone's gonna insert an ad in there. Like, I don't want that. I don't want people to have to put up with that. So I don't know. Or do we just get someone to say, look, hey, Jaco, you talked about this part of history,

• 3:34:22Jocko Willink?

  which, you know, we don't really like. We think it's misinformation and pull it down. That's, that's, that's a reality. That could happen.

• 3:34:29Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 3:34:30Jocko Willink?

  So we have to be, that's why we made, we made the, the Jaco Underground, just because of that.

• 3:34:37Tulsi Gabbard?

  Ah, so that's the platform that you guys created?

• 3:34:39Jocko Willink?

  It's the platform, JacoUnderground.com, and it's just a backup. And, and look, some people are like, oh, you want money? I was like, no, we don't want your money.

• 3:34:46Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 3:34:47Jocko Willink?

  That's not what it's about. But to not have a contingency plan is ignorant. And so, and again, all that, what's funny about all this is I had talked to Echo about it. He was kind of, I said, hey, can you build something, figure this out? And he, you know, working and figuring it out. And eventually he goes, yeah, you know, I got it.

• 3:35:04Tulsi Gabbard?

  And this was before the end of 2020?

• 3:35:06Jocko Willink?

  This is before the end of 2020. It was a, let's have a contingency plan in case something happened.

• 3:35:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  Right.

• 3:35:12Jocko Willink?

  And then I said, you know what? This is getting squirrely. It's getting squirrely. Let's launch the contingency plan, you know, next month. Just to have, just to get it out there so people know what it is in case something happens. And sure enough, January 6th, it was like, boom. We had, it was so coincidental, but it was very, it was like, and I remember texting Echo, like, well, I guess this is why we had a contingency plan. And then thank God it launched today, because who knows where it's gonna be in six months? I don't know. I don't know. It's crazy.

• 3:35:46Tulsi Gabbard?

  I remember listening to that night. So I don't, I have not listened to like, I have friends of mine who have listened to your podcast from number one. And then

• 3:35:57Jocko Willink?

  Those people are my friends, too.

• 3:35:58Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. But, but like in, in sequence, like chronologically and like, um, a buddy of mine got to the, the, I think it was episode 99 is Musashi.

• 3:36:09Jocko Willink?

  100.

• 3:36:10Tulsi Gabbard?

  100. Well, he couldn't get past 99 because he didn't finish reading the book. And I'm like, hey, Jaco just did this new show on, and I can't do it because I can't listen to 100 until I read the book. So

• 3:36:21Jocko Willink?

  Check.

• 3:36:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 3:36:23Speaker 02

  Spoiled.

• 3:36:24Tulsi Gabbard?

  I, so I'm not one of those people. I'll, I'll jump around.

• 3:36:27Jocko Willink?

  You've missed episodes. Echo is disappointed.

• 3:36:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  I'll jump around like, okay, what am I in the mood like? What am I in the mood for?

• 3:36:34Jocko Willink?

  Wait, am I in the mood for dark, depressing war? Am I in the mood for human atrocity? Where am I at?

• 3:36:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  And I'll tell you a funny story about that in a second, but, um, I went straight for that 1984. And I don't remember what actual day it was. It was not January 6th, but it was in, in the days after. And I, I wondered then it, when you had recorded that because it was literally addressing everything that we were seeing play out right, right before us, as, as far as the warning signs and the dangers of this is where, this is where you end up. Uh, once you allow for this kind of control and once we as people accept it.

• 3:37:20Jocko Willink?

  Yes.

• 3:37:23Tulsi Gabbard?

  But little sidetrack funny story, and I'll show you the video after. Cause it'll, it'll take me a minute to dig it up, but it won't surprise you to know that on the presidential campaign trail, sleep was hard to come by for me. And for two reasons. One was just a factor of time in the day, but also it was tough for me to, um, tough for me to turn, turn everything off. And actually just get like, I'm not even talking about hours. I'm just talking about just some, a good, a slice of good quality rest and sleep.

• 3:38:01Tulsi Gabbard?

  We were in New Hampshire in the middle of winter and there was a rare opportunity where I got to take a nap. And we'd like rented a like an Airbnb or something like that. And so I took a nap. And my husband took a video of me taking a nap. Because he walked in the room and I'm I'm lying there and I'm asleep and I'm all bundled up under the covers. And I got my phone sitting on my um on the top of the covers. And I was listening to Jocko podcast with a guy from the French Foreign Legion.

• 3:38:36Tulsi Gabbard?

  And I'll show you the video because I am dead asleep. And my husband came in and he has the camera going, picks up my phone, looks at and and the reason I I remember this is because this was on February 11th. February 11th, 2020. And it just so happened that it popped up on my phone on February 11th of this year. As like the memory thing or whatever. And I was debating sending it to you and I told my husband, I was like, Oh, he doesn't get the wrong idea and think I'm like bored to death of this podcast. And he's like, no, what it showed was like I was able to completely tune out the noise of of what was going on in my mind of the day to day and and be able to

• 3:39:21Tulsi Gabbard?

  kind of be transported to a different conversation and topic and and all this other stuff. But it was a great podcast that I did end up finishing.

• 3:39:32Tulsi Gabbard?

  But you gave me the gift of some really good sleep as well.

• 3:39:35Jocko Willink?

  The soothing, the soothing voice of Jaco talking about war. Can send anyone to sleep.

• 3:39:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  I don't know what that says about me.

• 3:39:47Tulsi Gabbard?

  Anyhow.

• 3:39:49Jocko Willink?

  I remember when when you dropped out of the race and you you um.

• 3:39:55Jocko Willink?

  Endorsed Biden.

• 3:39:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 3:39:56Jocko Willink?

  And I remember thinking, because again, I didn't know a lot of these things that you're telling me right now. I knew them kind of, but I still, I still had a some sort of naive sense in my heart that it can't be that bad. And I texted you and I said like, hey, are you going to get the VP nod? Is this, because I was, I was kind of surprised you endorsed Biden. I was like, well, you know what? Oh, I said, oh, I know what's happening. She's playing the game. She's going to endorse Biden. Biden's going to get her as the VP. It's on. And you were like, you like laugh, you like, however you laugh and text, you were like, hey, hey, bro, you're a little bit, uh, you're a little bit lost there. I didn't get nothing from these people. I was like, oh, okay. That's how, huh?

• 3:40:37Tulsi Gabbard?

  Pretty much, pretty much.

• 3:40:40Jocko Willink?

  And then, so, so then you wrapped up your, your career. Well, you wrapped up this portion of your career as a politician in, in, that was it. Went out to DC for the last congressional session.

• 3:40:54Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 3:40:56Jocko Willink?

  Packed up your locker.

• 3:40:57Tulsi Gabbard?

  January 2nd was my last official day. We had to pack up the office before Thanksgiving. So, uh, no kidding, you know, we are, there were obviously votes going into December. There was, uh, you know, government's going to shut down if we don't pass a new appropriations bill and kind of the unfortunate usual thing that happens at the end of every year. But yeah, I was working out of my car, like parked in front of the Capitol. I had my computer and it's COVID, so you know, votes consist of, um, seven different groups of members of Congress. I was group two. It's by alphabetical order where you're only allowed to have a certain number of people on the floor at any given time. They decontaminate the whole floor between every vote.

• 3:41:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  And so when your group is called, you go in, cast your vote, and then you leave. And so that was like, I parked my, votes are called, sometimes they last for, you know, an hour or two hours or whatever. And if you've got four votes in a series, then you're doing this running in and out, you know, four times in that series. And so, yeah, I was, you know, office, office shut down before Thanksgiving, had to turn in everything so that they could, um, transition and start to bring in other members of Congress. And I should mention now that, that, um, I made the decision not to run for reelection to my House seat in October of.

• 3:42:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  2019, when it got to the point where I had to make a decision where I would either continue my candidacy, or I would suspend my presidential campaign and focus on running for reelection in Hawaii. And I couldn't do both. Legally, I could have, but just the constraints of time and the tyranny of distance, it was not, I would end up doing a crappy job at both. So that was the decision I made. I let folks in. And I wanted people in Hawaii to know that, you know, they were not some kind of fallback plan for me if this national thing didn't work out, and that they would have the opportunity and the time to decide who they would want, you know, to work for them, and other candidates

• 3:43:05Tulsi Gabbard?

  who were going to run. So, and that was a decision I never looked back on, or regretted in any way. But as a result of that, yeah, so, things started quickly in having to shut down in DC, but January 2nd was the actual final day.

• 3:43:24Jocko Willink?

  Were you heading home kind of stoked that it was over? Or were you heading home kind of bummed out that it was over?

• 3:43:33Tulsi Gabbard?

  Mixed feelings, really, mixed feelings. Again, I made that decision without regret, and so it wasn't any surprise that this was going to happen at this point in time. But, I mean, I remember landing at Dulles Airport, and on that last trip, and as I was driving into DC, like, I'm not going to make this drive again, as a member of Congress, at least. And even as screwed up as things are, and as frustrating as things are, and have progressively gotten, it never takes away the awesomeness of that privilege of being

• 3:44:15Tulsi Gabbard?

  able to serve in that way. And, you know, there are grooves. Have you been inside the state cap, the Capitol before, the US Capitol?

• 3:44:25Jocko Willink?

  No.

• 3:44:26Tulsi Gabbard?

  When you go inside, there are, you know...

• 3:44:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  Marble steps that take you up to the the the actual entrance to the house floors on the second floor and then the visitors' galleries on the third floor. When you walk those steps, there are there are deeply worn grooves where countless other leaders from our nation's history have walked those very steps. And the the um it's an amazing thing to to never forget those who have come before us, those who will come after, and how special of a privilege it is that the people of Hawaii allowed me that privilege to to do my best to serve them for the eight years that I was there.

• 3:45:15Tulsi Gabbard?

  And that was that was, you know, yeah, I there's so much of the political drama and and just the theatrics and the all of the stuff that you just kind of got to endure in order to try to do the work that you're trying to do. And and and I I've always hated all that stuff and had no, no problem at all leaving that uh that behind. But I think the the the mixed feelings and emotions part just came from um just that, that reflecting on the time that I've had there and and honestly wishing that there there are a lot of areas and things that I wish I could have done more on, that I could have, you know, um legislation that I wished had been able to advance farther or it's

• 3:45:58Tulsi Gabbard?

  just different things, you know, assessing kind of what I was able to do, what I wished I was able to do and um but but leaving with the sense of of peace uh in my heart in in knowing that, you know, I I did my best and excited about how I can find uh how I will find a way to continue to serve.

• 3:46:27Jocko Willink?

  So you get back home to Hawaii and I know when I came back from my last deployment to Iraq, I had, um, I was home for, I was home for like a month and one day I just like woke up on a Saturday and I kind of felt like this weird weight.

• 3:46:48Jocko Willink?

  I, I felt good, right? I felt good and I felt like the weight was gone and I was kind of thinking about, what, what, why do I feel so good right now? And I realized, oh,

• 3:46:59Jocko Willink?

  it's because I'm not worried about one of my guys getting wounded or killed right now because we're home from deployment. And it took me about a month for that to go away because it's just your instinct. Every time, every time you wake up, you, you're thinking about what's happening. Is, is everyone okay? You're thinking about that all the time and I never noticed it when I was on deployment because that's just how it was. It was just, you know, you just wake up and that's what you're thinking and it's real. Well, after a month of waking up and oh no, it's not, you don't have to worry about that. Oh, oh no, you don't have to worry about that. And eventually one day I woke up and said, why do I feel so? Oh, it's because I'm not worried about that thing I've been worried about for so long. When you got home, I mean, the, how long did it take for that to wear off? The pressure, the, the constantly thinking about all this crap that's going on and what you need to do

• 3:47:42Jocko Willink?

  and where you need to move and what's the next maneuver and who's mad at you and who's happy with you and all this other crap. How long did it take you for, for you like, oh, I hope I, oh, wait, do I have wax for my surfboard right now?

• 3:47:55Jocko Willink?

  How long did that take?

• 3:47:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  Not very long.

• 3:47:58Jocko Willink?

  You were able to get over it quick.

• 3:47:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  I was ready, man. It, but it also, you know, I mean, just this whole COVID situation also, um, you know, I, I had been home a lot more than I normally would have been and working from home and having virtual committee hearings and, and a lot of other stuff that was just, it was a strange lead up to where the contrast wasn't so different. But it was, it was odd for me, like it started, August is when our primary elections are in Hawaii. And I remember waking up on primary election day, which is Saturday in Hawaii. And I was like, oh my gosh, I'm, don't have to go sign waving at six o'clock in the morning.

• 3:48:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  Um, I can, I can go surfing. Like this is a weird feeling.

• 3:48:47Tulsi Gabbard?

  Because I had held elected office for the previous 10 years. I'd been on a ballot every single election for the previous 10 years. And so that was, that was strange. That was a really weird thing. That was, felt unnatural to me. And then, and then, you know, similarly with, with the general election. But yeah, I was, um, I, I had no issue with that transition and, and yeah, went on to, to take full advantage of, of being home and knowing that, well, really, a lot of it

• 3:49:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  was being able to regain control over how I spent my time and have, to, to no longer have those very immediate political factors playing into decisions that I'm making and just to, just to be, for the first time in a long time, not have, not being constantly jet lagged. That was something I didn't realize took such a toll for eight years. I'm going back and forth two or three times a month between Hawaii and DC, five or six hours difference every time. Plane rides are long, but that was not, whatever, I can, it's a

• 3:50:10Tulsi Gabbard?

  plane ride. But, you know, like, like I can actually like get a schedule happening and stick with it and not be up at 2 o'clock in the morning because it's 8 in DC and then, you know, go to sleep at 6 because it's midnight. Like it's just, you know, it was just, just basic, like, simple life things. Like, I, I like to cook. Like, I could act like, hey, like, I'm, like, I can go grocery shopping and cooking and not have to worry, like, is the food gonna rot by the time I have to leave and then come back? It's just, like, simple little things. It was, it's, it's nice.

• 3:50:43Jocko Willink?

  So let's get into what you're settling into now. The dust is settled and you're able to buy groceries, cook them before they rot, you're able to surf, train, get on a schedule, but obviously that's not what you're gonna do for the rest of your life. What else is going on? What else you got going on in the world?

• 3:51:05Tulsi Gabbard?

  So I am, uh, so I'm still serving in the Army Reserves. I have, I moved from the National Guard to the Reserves and, uh, transitioned my branch to Civil Affairs.

• 3:51:18Jocko Willink?

  Awesome.

• 3:51:19Tulsi Gabbard?

  Which, um, is often called kind of the, the Warrior Diplomat Service. And, um,

• 3:51:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  yeah, it's, it's fantastic. I, I'm, it's, it's been a great move and one that's focused on building relationships. And, uh, it's kind of, kind of right up my, something I've been interested for a really long time that, that I never pursued because it doesn't exist within the National Guard for obvious reasons. It's the National Guard, focus is domestic mission first. Um, but Civil Affairs is 98% of Civil Affairs forces in the United States Army live within the Army Reserves. There's the remaining, whatever, 2% is, um, basically lives on, on Fort Bragg as part of the, the unconventional, um, special forces community.

• 3:52:10Tulsi Gabbard?

  And so, uh, yeah, I, I'm appreciating the training, the experience, and also some of the missions that, that I've already been able to serve on there. Um, I, as, as kind of a direct result of everything that we talked about with my experience with the, the mainstream media and, um, being filtered into, you know, uh, or limited to soundbites, um, their unwillingness to go in depth or even really cover any real issues, serious issues, and just the caricatures that they, they create. Um, I am launching my own show where I will have the opportunity

• 3:52:50Tulsi Gabbard?

  to, um, really speak, uh, directly to people in an unfiltered way and an unlimited way. Both, both about a lot of, you know, some of these issues that we've talked about and, and have conversations with people who can shed light and bring their expertise or experience on them. Um, but also just be able to

• 3:53:12Tulsi Gabbard?

  Have a platform where I can take some of those experiences that I've had and I'm sure you've had the same because I've seen it in the military, I've seen it in politics, where whether it's traveling to different parts of the country or traveling to different parts of the world, there's so much more that we have in common as people than is often focused on or that we even, we may realize. And so I look forward to being able to have that platform. My show is called This Is Tulsi Gabbard, just because it is

• 3:53:48Tulsi Gabbard?

  just me. And use that as an opportunity to be able to fill that gap or to provide what the mainstream media and the corporate media is not offering to people. And that I've found, there is, there's a lot of hunger for that, for real conversation, whether it's with people you agree with, or to have a dialogue. You know, I want to be able to have people on my show who represent different views on an issue, and who are interested in having a respectful conversation about it. And why do you hold one view? Why do you hold the other view? Where is there common ground? Where is there irretractable differences?

• 3:54:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  Where do you draw the line? And I think being able to provide this platform, I hope, will result in more people thinking like, hey, maybe I can start talking to my neighbor who voted for the other guy or the other party, and we haven't really talked for like a year because of it, but maybe we should just like, start the conversation and see where it goes, and that it's okay. And that we in America should be encouraging civil discourse and dialogue, and encouraging, when we talk about, well, we have to protect freedom of speech, what does that mean? Well, you know, and how do you do it? Like, let's

• 3:55:13Tulsi Gabbard?

  start with speaking, sharing our ideas, and not, as you started this whole, our conversation today, not in a way that says, I'm right, you're wrong, I have to be heard, you don't get to be heard. But in a way that, that we don't see now, where if you believe in something, you hold a view that you feel is important and strong, and communicate that. Also recognize that not everyone may share that view for whatever reason. Maybe they have a different background, a different experience and one that you may not have. And that the more we can encourage this kind of exchange, the stronger we are as a society.

• 3:55:58Tulsi Gabbard?

  And we don't lose by having great platforms for people to share them. And that's the biggest difference between what we are seeing today versus what I believe our founders envisioned for us. Where somehow we've come to a place where the powerful people in this country think that it's really a sign of insecurity. Where if those who hold different views are allowed to air them, then somehow you'll lose.

• 3:56:34Tulsi Gabbard?

  Which means, maybe you're not confident that what you're offering is going to quote unquote win or convince people that it is a superior idea.

• 3:56:45Jocko Willink?

  Yep. And it's so, it plays out leadership strategy and tactics. I talk about this, you know, if you, if I'm in charge and Tulsi, you say, "Hey, Jaco, I don't think we should do it like that." And my response is, "Shut up and do what I told you to do." I don't look strong.

• 3:56:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  No.

• 3:57:00Jocko Willink?

  I look weak.

• 3:57:00Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 3:57:01Jocko Willink?

  I look weak. If I say, "Well Tulsi, how do you think we should do it?" And I listen to your idea and I incorporate some of your idea into the overall plan because you were able to convince me because you had a different perspective than I did. You'll see, you'll look at me and think, "Oh, I really like working with, working for Jaco. I really like working with Jaco because he's listening to what I'm saying." And all of a sudden, we're coming up with actual better solutions, by the way. It's not like it's, "Oh, I'm doing this to appease, to appease Tulsi right now, so she'll, you know, work harder for me." No, she's actually got a presentation to me that actually makes more sense and we're going to use it.

• 3:57:34Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 3:57:34Jocko Willink?

  So we're trying to get somewhere. So this is a podcast, your new, your new show?

• 3:57:38Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, it'll be, you know, available on all the podcast platforms.

• 3:57:41Jocko Willink?

  When's it coming out?

• 3:57:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  We're also doing video. So I talked to you some time ago and asked some questions about how you launch a podcast and such. And one of the things you told me about was consistency is key. Both of you.

• 3:57:59Jocko Willink?

  That's Echo Charles's advice. I just echoed Echo Charles's advice on that one.

• 3:58:04Tulsi Gabbard?

  Well, the message was received. And so what I'm doing is so soon within the next few weeks, but I'm recording a number of shows to have in the bank to make sure that, you know, hey, I gotta go away to training for a couple of weeks that we're not gonna, we're not gonna skip a beat.

• 3:58:22Jocko Willink?

  So. How long is the show? Have you recorded some already?

• 3:58:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  I have, yeah. You know, there are no real time limit, but right now they're about, I don't know, like hour and a half ish.

• 3:58:31Jocko Willink?

  You're not going Jaco Psycho four hours?

• 3:58:36Tulsi Gabbard?

  I'm not opposed to it, but no, no, no rules, no rules. And I think that's, that's the cool thing about it.

• 3:58:42Jocko Willink?

  So is that the main focus of your efforts right now?

• 3:58:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  Right now it is, yeah.

• 3:58:45Jocko Willink?

  You're gonna launch this show and?

• 3:58:47Tulsi Gabbard?

  I think probably by the, by the end of this month is what I'm aiming for.

• 3:58:51Jocko Willink?

  Awesome. So where can people find you?

• 3:58:54Tulsi Gabbard?

  People can find me at Tulsi Gabbard on all the social media platforms and also on my website, tulsi gabbard dot com. There's, there's a few different things that I'm looking to do there, updates and information. And I've moved it away from what it was traditionally, which is a political campaign website and really focusing more on how we can build communities and conversation in our, in our society. I don't care if you're Democrat, Republican, Independent. I don't care if you voted for Trump or voted for Hillary or whatever.

• 3:59:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  None, none of that should matter as we come together to, to rebuild bridges focused on how we collectively as Americans can work together for the future of our country.

• 3:59:50Jocko Willink?

  Legit.

• 3:59:53Jocko Willink?

  Echo Charles.

• 3:59:55Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 3:59:56Jocko Willink?

  Um, that seems like a good place to wrap this, this session. I don't know. Maybe this a good place to wrap up this session.

• 4:00:03Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 4:00:04Jocko Willink?

  Tulsi's obviously been charging hard for, well, since you were 16 years old as a water woman. Which again, we will be, we'll be scouring the internet for that. She's been on the path, Echo Charles. And I'm thinking we should be on the path too. What, what, what suggestions do you have?

• 4:00:23Speaker 02

  Hey, when you go to the grocery store, do people like stop you a lot still?

• 4:00:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  In Hawaii, definitely.

• 4:00:28Jocko Willink?

  Hell yeah, they do.

• 4:00:29Speaker 02

  At Foodland.

• 4:00:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  Which is interesting, cause.

• 4:00:31Jocko Willink?

  And they say, I know you, you're water woman.

• 4:00:36Tulsi Gabbard?

  I don't know where those kids are now.

• 4:00:40Jocko Willink?

  Hey Billy, how you doing? I remember you. Where's your cape?

• 4:00:45Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, exactly. It's still there. It's the same damn cape.

• 4:00:51Speaker 02

  Yeah, on, on Kauai, like when you'd see the mayor, like at wherever, you know, Star Market.

• 4:00:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  For sure.

• 4:00:57Speaker 02

  Um, yeah, you'd always stop and be like, hey, you know, so I would imagine if someone had like some thing, you know, some thing they want to address, they, they wouldn't hesitate to stop because you're right there.

• 4:01:06Tulsi Gabbard?

  It happened most recently, um, I was out surfing the reef near the Mokulua Islands and the east side of Oahu. And the, the surf there only goes off, like it's only really good when there's no wind and there's swell, obviously. And it's, it's a long, it's, it's like three quarters of a mile paddle from shore out there. Uh, but it happened most recently there, like usually it's like someone will paddle up and be like, where do I know you from? And then, and then like one, I was, and then it eventually like, oh yeah, hi, I'm Tulsa. Oh my God, that's what I thought. And then word in the lineup travels pretty quickly. And the last time I was just a couple of weeks ago, the waves were really, they stayed out for four hours and, um, people just like, hey, Tulsi.

• 4:01:51Tulsi Gabbard?

  Guys on stand up boards looking down at me on my surfboard and talking stories like, oh, what this, whatever. It's so, it's, it's cool. I like it.

• 4:01:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, I would imagine so. You go to Sandy Beach?

• 4:02:03Tulsi Gabbard?

  Um, I have been. I I generally stay away. I I don't wanna threaten like my life by body surfing at Sandy's Shorebreak.

• 4:02:13Speaker 02

  Alright, cool.

• 4:02:14Tulsi Gabbard?

  Do you?

• 4:02:15Speaker 02

  Uh, yeah, that was our, that was our spot.

• 4:02:17Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:02:18Speaker 02

  Sandy Beach, yeah, for sure.

• 4:02:20Jocko Willink?

  Back in the day.

• 4:02:21Speaker 02

  Back in the day.

• 4:02:24Speaker 02

  Alright, how are we staying on the path? Okay, alright, alright, we working out, we surfing.

• 4:02:28Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:02:28Speaker 02

  Snowboarding, some of us, some of us.

• 4:02:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  Are you a snowboarder?

• 4:02:32Jocko Willink?

  I ski, snowboard, but Echo Charles has recently become highly engaged in snowboard shredding.

• 4:02:38Tulsi Gabbard?

  Ooh, I like it.

• 4:02:40Speaker 02

  It's true, it's true. But we are working out and training.

• 4:02:43Tulsi Gabbard?

  Mm hmm.

• 4:02:44Speaker 02

  For various things, so.

• 4:02:47Jocko Willink?

  I was pretty stoked when you were running and you put like, um, uh, whatever, videos of you doing squats.

• 4:02:52Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:02:52Jocko Willink?

  And I'm like, come on, girl, can we get a couple percentage points of increase on just doing burpees? I was giving credit. I was like, hey, I kind of, I'm leaning in your direction just seeing you do burpees. It's all good.

• 4:03:07Speaker 02

  In the polls?

• 4:03:07Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, in the polls, people were watching that saying, oh, there's Tulsi doing burpees. Hey, let's at least throw a dog a bone, right? Come on.

• 4:03:16Tulsi Gabbard?

  Let me earn it with some burpees.

• 4:03:18Jocko Willink?

  Freaking ridiculous.

• 4:03:19Speaker 02

  Yeah, I didn't really see much, uh, burpees by Joe Biden or any of those people.

• 4:03:25Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, I didn't see Joe Biden doing any burpees.

• 4:03:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  No, nobody else, nobody really else kind of got on the the fitness kick.

• 4:03:32Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, crazy.

• 4:03:34Speaker 02

  All good. Nonetheless, we're gonna stay on the path over here. So through the path, we may need supplementation. I would suggest supplementation. Don't worry, Jacquez.

• 4:03:42Tulsi Gabbard?

  I believe in that.

• 4:03:43Speaker 02

  It's true. Yeah, true story. Hundred percent. So here you go. You got joints that need attention sometimes, especially when we get older.

• 4:03:50Tulsi Gabbard?

  Mm hmm.

• 4:03:52Speaker 02

  We're not getting younger.

• 4:03:53Tulsi Gabbard?

  Is this the collective we?

• 4:03:54Speaker 02

  As far, as far as we go.

• 4:03:56Jocko Willink?

  Cause I know I'm not.

• 4:03:57Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 4:03:58Jocko Willink?

  I vote against it.

• 4:03:59Speaker 02

  Stay in the same age. I get it. But for those of us who are, you know, we wanna get something that helps in the routine supplementation for joints, protein, brain, body, all this stuff. So what have we got? Joint warfare, joints, krill oil, joints, discipline and discipline go.

• 4:04:18Speaker 02

  Brain and body.

• 4:04:20Jocko Willink?

  How's that Discipline Go going?

• 4:04:21Tulsi Gabbard?

  This, this is good. I, I, this is the first time I'm trying the, the Discipline Go Jaco Palmer. Drink. Very good.

• 4:04:28Jocko Willink?

  Tasty.

• 4:04:29Tulsi Gabbard?

  Very good.

• 4:04:30Jocko Willink?

  No sugar in that.

• 4:04:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:04:32Jocko Willink?

  It's sweet with monk fruit.

• 4:04:33Tulsi Gabbard?

  Ah, see, I use monk fruit like in my protein shakes and stuff like that.

• 4:04:37Jocko Willink?

  You know what's up?

• 4:04:38Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, man.

• 4:04:38Speaker 02

  Too sweet to it?

• 4:04:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  To sweeten it, yeah. Cause you, you get, you get, you get the good, natural, like healthy sweetener without like the carbs of like maple syrup, for example.

• 4:04:49Jocko Willink?

  Guess who just made the, the clip of the week? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's my girl Tulsi.

• 4:04:57Tulsi Gabbard?

  Which, which maple syrup is my, my go, like I, I would only eat pancakes to have maple syrup, really. But, you know, I can't.

• 4:05:05Jocko Willink?

  Did you get any maple syrup from Pete up in, up in Maine?

• 4:05:07Tulsi Gabbard?

  No. Pete, come on, man.

• 4:05:10Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, he's out there and he used to do it himself, but now, you know, it's just like friends and, and it's real maple syrup. You can go out there and get the tree where the trees are running.

• 4:05:21Tulsi Gabbard?

  That was, and sorry Echo, I'm messing with your jam here, man, but.

• 4:05:24Jocko Willink?

  It's your jam too.

• 4:05:26Tulsi Gabbard?

  One of the coolest experiences, well, there were many, but one of the coolest was when I stopped in Freedom, New Hampshire, and went to a sugar shack. Met with the three generations of family who have passed down from, you know, father to child. And got to see the whole thing. We went up to the trees, saw the taps, came down, saw the whole process. And then of course, like sampled the goods. I'm like maple syrup is it ever since I've been a kid, like those little maple leaf candies?

• 4:05:59Jocko Willink?

  Oh, you're just nuts.

• 4:06:00Tulsi Gabbard?

  Done, finished.

• 4:06:02Jocko Willink?

  I was up in Maine talking to Pete and he's like a sugar addict. He obviously can't eat it, that's why. But he, he was saying he would take little, um, a pencil box, you know, the pencil box you had when you were a little kid? He would fill that with sugar cubes and hide it underneath his bed. And at night when he'd go to bed, he'd put like a little crack addict.

• 4:06:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  That's that's next level, man.

• 4:06:26Jocko Willink?

  I'm like, bro, what is wrong with you?

• 4:06:29Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 4:06:29Jocko Willink?

  And then he started like going into a different realm mentally. And he goes, he goes, bro, if you ever tried, have you ever eaten a sugar cube? He's talking to me about, yeah.

• 4:06:38Speaker 02

  Like crazy. You were, when were you, you were talking about that, right? On like, um, a thing.

• 4:06:43Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, one of the origin videos came out, showed me talking about that.

• 4:06:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, so it did sound crazy, the way you were talking about, but then I remember, like, we didn't just buy sugar cubes, but every once in a while, like, you'd get the little pack, right, with all the sugar cubes and it, and I'd eat those too. They're like little candies.

• 4:07:00Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 4:07:00Speaker 02

  But it's like pure, it's like mainlining the sugar. It's kind of good. I didn't hide them under my bed, nothing like this.

• 4:07:07Jocko Willink?

  Stealing those things from your own family. And putting it in your, it's like a little psycho, right?

• 4:07:13Speaker 02

  That's different, yeah.

• 4:07:14Jocko Willink?

  Well, monk fruit, no sugar.

• 4:07:16Tulsi Gabbard?

  Exactly.

• 4:07:17Jocko Willink?

  It's not sugar.

• 4:07:17Tulsi Gabbard?

  Monk fruit is good stuff.

• 4:07:18Jocko Willink?

  It's natural. And by the way, we went the distance and I held out long. The other thing that's cool about this drink is, which was really hard to do, is the way that you make it stay good on the shelf is it has to, you have to preserve it somehow. And what companies normally do is they just add chemicals to it.

• 4:07:36Tulsi Gabbard?

  Right.

• 4:07:36Jocko Willink?

  And they're called preservatives. We've all heard of that, right?

• 4:07:38Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 4:07:39Jocko Willink?

  Well, instead of using preservatives, which I didn't want to do, it's, it's pasteurized. So it's like cooked, so there's no, but there's no chemicals in it. But it cost us a ton of money to get it going. And it took us an extra, almost, took us over six months to get this all set up. But then we did it and now you can drink this and your kids can drink it.

• 4:07:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  That's huge.

• 4:08:00Jocko Willink?

  My own kids can drink my drink.

• 4:08:02Tulsi Gabbard?

  It's, it's something that my, my mom always encouraged us and it's like a habit I got into from a young age. She's like, just read the ingredients before you buy it. And if you don't understand half of the things that are on the ingredients, then, you know, think twice about, you know, putting it in your body.

• 4:08:20Jocko Willink?

  Let me ask you if you understand these ingredients. Filtered, carbonated water, natural flavor, citric acid, monk fruit.

• 4:08:29Jocko Willink?

  That's the ingredient list.

• 4:08:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  Done.

• 4:08:32Jocko Willink?

  And it has the vitamin B6 and B12. Like it's got the other positive things, but the actual, the, the food ingredients, that's it.

• 4:08:39Tulsi Gabbard?

  That's incredible. And more people are becoming conscious of this these days though. Really? I mean, more people are becoming aware and whether it's because of health, like diabetes and or whatever else. But I think there's just an increased level of awareness of like, hey, and, and even more so with COVID, like I, I really should be healthy. I should strengthen my immune system and I should know what I'm consuming.

• 4:09:02Jocko Willink?

  I felt so bad. The last time you visited. So whatever, three months ago, something like that, you came by, we didn't have time to record. I didn't have time to record or whatever, but you just came by to hang out a little bit. And whatever. Two days later I called you up and said, hey, how you, or I sent you a text, hey, how you doing? You're like, fine. I'm like, got something to tell you. You're like, what? I'm like, I got COVID and so does Echo Charles. I felt so bad. I had to make, luckily I only saw like 10 people in that time period of whatever that week was where I knew I had, well, I had been tested positive for COVID. Texted Echo. He's like, yeah, I can't smell anything. I was like, this is a bummer dude.

• 4:09:49Jocko Willink?

  I felt bad about that, but um.

• 4:09:51Tulsi Gabbard?

  It happens unfortunately.

• 4:09:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  I'm just gonna knock on wood right now that.

• 4:09:59Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, but um, yeah, so there you go.

• 4:10:03Speaker 02

  Yeah. You talk about the immunity thing. So coming to find out Jaco has that covered as well. As far as supplementation goes, vitamin D3 helps with immunity and a special supplement called Cold War.

• 4:10:16Jocko Willink?

  It was, again, this was crazy, right? Like, so I, before COVID, I traveled all the time on planes, on, you know, all the time. And you know, the nightmare of that and you're breathing in everyone's stuff. And so I said, you know what? I'm gonna make, you know, a good immunity booster with a bunch of vitamin C and just things that, and so I made it and cool. And we, and it was selling good and whatever. But then COVID hit and the tooth, and I also made vitamin D, already made it. This isn't like, oh, it's, it's COVID. It was already in the system. It was already, it was already live because I always, I take vitamin D. And boom, as soon as COVID hit, it was like we could, we had to just, we, we sold out almost immediately. And then we just had to ramp it up. But luckily we had already had the formulas built. So that stuff is awesome. Cold War and then, and the vitamin D three.

• 4:11:01Speaker 02

  It's true.

• 4:11:02Jocko Willink?

  All good for you.

• 4:11:03Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, I mean, I'm a, I'm a supplement taker, just in, in general, but I was not taking vitamin D. Prior to COVID, nor was I really aware of how important uh it was until I started to learn and, and read more and see especially related to COVID. How most Americans are deficient.

• 4:11:22Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 4:11:22Tulsi Gabbard?

  Like vast majority of Americans are deficient in vitamin D and especially people who have any kind of, you know, colored tone to their skin even more so um are found to be deficient in vitamin D. So, uh, I am now a daily consumer.

• 4:11:39Jocko Willink?

  Well, vitamin D.

• 4:11:41Speaker 02

  Yeah, I learned that when we had our daughter where everything, you know, you read for best development, all this stuff. Vitamin D was always popping up with everything. Oh, yeah. Vitamin, vitamin, vitamin D. It's true. But yeah, so yeah, got some, get some vitamin D. Also, don't forget about milk. This is extra protein in the form of a dessert.

• 4:12:00Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 4:12:00Speaker 02

  By the way.

• 4:12:01Jocko Willink?

  Sometimes it's just dessert that has protein in it.

• 4:12:03Speaker 02

  Straight up, straight up. Yeah. Especially if you get your little formula down, like some people, they just go milk, milk, milk, almond milk, whatever. Cool. Good. But some of us, we, we have a perfectly tuned formula.

• 4:12:15Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:12:16Speaker 02

  Half a spoon of peanut butter. One scoop mint chocolate, one scoop peanut butter chocolate, one banana.

• 4:12:24Jocko Willink?

  Damn.

• 4:12:24Tulsi Gabbard?

  Wow.

• 4:12:25Speaker 02

  Give milk or two percent milk. Boom. That's the formula in my household.

• 4:12:29Jocko Willink?

  I randomly tried almond milk with peanut butter milk. Bro.

• 4:12:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, legitimate.

• 4:12:37Jocko Willink?

  What is up? That's a freaking milkshake.

• 4:12:40Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 4:12:41Jocko Willink?

  That's a milkshake.

• 4:12:42Speaker 02

  So the, I added a banana like reluctantly. Like I was like, okay banana, cause sometimes banana can jam up your whole flavor profile.

• 4:12:49Tulsi Gabbard?

  Let, let me ask you this. Are they frozen or fresh?

• 4:12:53Speaker 02

  Both, whatever, cause okay, and then.

• 4:12:55Tulsi Gabbard?

  Cause the result is a little bit different.

• 4:12:57Speaker 02

  It's possible, I'm not that advanced to tell the difference and here dude, here's why I know about the frozen banana. When a banana is starting to get uh rotten, a little bit, pass ripe, the kind of brown is taking over. You can peel it and freeze it.

• 4:13:09Tulsi Gabbard?

  That's what I do.

• 4:13:10Speaker 02

  Yes, I didn't know that. Sarah told me that. So it's like, cool. Sure enough, she has two of them frozen inside, cause I needed a banana. So I put the frozen one in, I was like, man, this works perfect.

• 4:13:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah, they get creamier when they're frozen.

• 4:13:23Jocko Willink?

  Interesting. Check this out.

• 4:13:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  That's my jam. Mine is similar to you.

• 4:13:27Jocko Willink?

  We had to, we had to wait over four hours for you to finally drop this knowledge.

• 4:13:33Tulsi Gabbard?

  The secrets. I'm a bit of a foodie.

• 4:13:37Speaker 02

  Okay, good.

• 4:13:38Tulsi Gabbard?

  We, we grew up, my mom used to make ice cream at home from frozen bananas. And just like literally put them through the champion juicer, freeze them, put them through the champion juicer. Maybe add a little bit of like whatever, something to kind of like put it up to the next level. But like you have like homemade soft serve immediately. So the frozen bananas I vouch for, I, I'm waiting for the plant-based milk.

• 4:14:01Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 4:14:02Tulsi Gabbard?

  To come out. I don't know if I talked to you or Pete about that, but.

• 4:14:04Jocko Willink?

  You may have talked to both of us or one of us.

• 4:14:07Tulsi Gabbard?

  But that's, that's what I do is for, for um after my workouts every day, my first meal, that's my first meal is a shake. I'd kind of fast until after that. But I, I do the, the protein powder, the almond milk, the peanut butter, just a healthy, healthy solid dollop of peanut butter.

• 4:14:24Jocko Willink?

  Someone's going stir it up.

• 4:14:26Tulsi Gabbard?

  Got the frozen banana and then I throw in, I throw in some chia seeds, some pumpkin seeds and flax seeds.

• 4:14:36Jocko Willink?

  Bro, you guys make me feel like amateurs over here.

• 4:14:41Jocko Willink?

  I go, I go milk, milk, done, mix it.

• 4:14:47Speaker 02

  It's true.

• 4:14:47Tulsi Gabbard?

  It's a hearty shake, but then I'm like, I'm good, like I'm good until like, you know, I have like an early dinner.

• 4:14:52Speaker 02

  That's it. Yeah, yeah, that's kind of the good thing. You can use it for many different reasons, you know? You can do like a meal replacement or just a supplementation for the protein. Or dessert.

• 4:15:10Jocko Willink?

  If I had the technical capabilities, I would put that in slow motion. You said, you said protein and flexed, double flexed your biceps.

• 4:15:17Speaker 02

  It happened automatically.

• 4:15:18Jocko Willink?

  Tulsi witnessed it. I witnessed it. It's, it's, it's serious, bro.

• 4:15:22Speaker 02

  Ingrained. Anyway, we can get these things at many places. You're gonna be on the lookout for any of these places. You can get all this stuff at first Wawa.

• 4:15:32Jocko Willink?

  Mm hmm.

• 4:15:33Speaker 02

  East Coast. Wawa's only on the East Coast though, right?

• 4:15:35Jocko Willink?

  Yes.

• 4:15:35Speaker 02

  Okay, Wawa, um, at originmaine.com.

• 4:15:40Jocko Willink?

  Jacofuel.com.

• 4:15:41Speaker 02

  Jacofuel.com. Kind of the same, what do you call it? Trajectory.

• 4:15:46Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 4:15:46Speaker 02

  Goal.

• 4:15:46Jocko Willink?

  Vitamin shop.

• 4:15:47Speaker 02

  Talking about and the vitamin shop. Yes, sir.

• 4:15:49Jocko Willink?

  By the way, this is important, actually.

• 4:15:53Jocko Willink?

  Cause shipping is a problem, right? Financially. It can cost a lot of money to ship something.

• 4:15:58Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 4:15:59Jocko Willink?

  Here's the deal. If you subscribe to any of these items, shipping's free.

• 4:16:04Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 4:16:04Jocko Willink?

  So we're trying to, look, there's, we're talking about tech companies. There's obviously some big tech companies out there that are hard to compete with. In fact, we, you can't beat them, join them. We join them, it's fine. You can get the stuff there. Because it's free shipping, you know, it's like a, it's like sort of a, that's a primary reason why people might order from this particular place, which is cool. We're down and we appreciate it. Hundred percent. It's fine. But if you wanted to just go straight to the source, but you didn't want to spend money on shipping, we got you covered. It took us a while to figure out how we could balance it. If you subscribe, shipping's free on whatever you order. So that's.

• 4:16:41Speaker 02

  Kind of huge when you're talking about.

• 4:16:44Jocko Willink?

  It's very huge.

• 4:16:46Speaker 02

  Drinks and protein and supplements and.

• 4:16:49Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, true. And echo, no offense to Echo. Sometimes he's not quite the pinnacle of organization when it comes.

• 4:16:59Speaker 02

  I'm doing the best I can.

• 4:17:01Tulsi Gabbard?

  This is so diplomatic, I love it.

• 4:17:03Jocko Willink?

  Look, I did. Look, I prefaced it by saying no offense, so therefore you can't be offended.

• 4:17:09Speaker 02

  Yeah. Hey, I'm doing the best I can over here. I'm out of malt, by the way.

• 4:17:12Jocko Willink?

  There you go. Why aren't you subscribed?

• 4:17:15Speaker 02

  Well.

• 4:17:15Jocko Willink?

  Got issues.

• 4:17:16Speaker 02

  Yeah, got issues. Nonetheless.

• 4:17:18Jocko Willink?

  Over there flexing your biceps with no malt.

• 4:17:20Speaker 02

  Nonetheless, hey, look, this is where how and where we can get all these things. Also, way to stay on the path, do jiu-jitsu or martial arts. Martial arts is good for you. It's good for your mind, body.

• 4:17:33Jocko Willink?

  I'm glad you're being diplomatic now.

• 4:17:35Speaker 02

  Well.

• 4:17:35Jocko Willink?

  He's being diplomatic and like including being all inclusive of all martial arts.

• 4:17:39Tulsi Gabbard?

  I appreciate that gesture.

• 4:17:40Jocko Willink?

  He's never said anything like that before, ever. We talk about doing martial arts, we're talking about jiu-jitsu over here on our side.

• 4:17:47Tulsi Gabbard?

  I get it.

• 4:17:47Jocko Willink?

  That's what we're talking about.

• 4:17:48Speaker 02

  You are correct.

• 4:17:49Jocko Willink?

  But go ahead, continue, Mr. Diplomatic.

• 4:17:51Tulsi Gabbard?

  Thank you.

• 4:17:52Jocko Willink?

  You've improved his diplomacy already today, just hanging out with you. He's got aloha.

• 4:17:56Speaker 02

  That's true.

• 4:17:56Jocko Willink?

  Normally, this guy has no aloha for other martial arts.

• 4:17:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  Wow, it's like that.

• 4:18:01Jocko Willink?

  You're here.

• 4:18:02Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 4:18:02Jocko Willink?

  Everything's cool.

• 4:18:03Speaker 02

  Well, either way, whatever martial arts we're doing. Say do that stuff. In the event of you doing jiu-jitsu, you're gonna need a gi and or rash guard. Get those as well from Origin.

• 4:18:15Jocko Willink?

  How much jiu-jitsu have you trained?

• 4:18:17Tulsi Gabbard?

  A little bit, not a lot. I mean, the most, the most, if you could, I guess within the family would be army combatives.

• 4:18:25Jocko Willink?

  Okay, it's legit.

• 4:18:26Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:18:27Jocko Willink?

  The army combatives is a great program, developed by jiu-jitsu guys.

• 4:18:31Tulsi Gabbard?

  Exactly. I, I, early on, I guess the martial art that I trained the most in was Brazilian capoeira.

• 4:18:39Jocko Willink?

  Oh, that's right.

• 4:18:41Tulsi Gabbard?

  It makes me laugh every time I hear you pronouncing English words with a Brazilian Portuguese accent.

• 4:18:47Tulsi Gabbard?

  I was like, yeah, I know what that's about.

• 4:18:48Jocko Willink?

  Although I talked, I said earlier, starting off this program, that I'm very, look, I just say what I say. When it comes to, you know, Brazilian Portuguese words, like if you're gonna talk to me about, oh, you train capoeira. I'm coming at you.

• 4:19:03Tulsi Gabbard?

  Like a pro.

• 4:19:04Jocko Willink?

  That's what we do over on that.

• 4:19:05Tulsi Gabbard?

  Well, and because of that, I took summer classes in Brazilian Portuguese in Hawaii, like, uh, like trying to learn the language. I was, I was getting fully immersed in the culture and, and started to do a lot of, a lot of my friends who did capoeira also did jiu jitsu and met a lot. There's a huge Brazilian community in Hawaii because of surfing and obviously most of them do either capoeira and jiu jitsu as well. And, uh, but I just, I was kind of, um, consumed. I, I was training like six hours a day in capoeira and that was, that was, I was starting to teach and I was doing a bunch of stuff there. Um, but yeah, so, so the most time I spent doing any kind of grappling was, was army combatives, which was fun.

• 4:19:44Jocko Willink?

  Well, it's cool. Cause now you're going to be on the journey of jiu jitsu. We're going to get you a.

• 4:19:48Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. I want, I really, I, I, I want to learn and, and I'm a big mixed martial arts fan. I have been for a long time and.

• 4:19:57Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. You went up and trained with Duke Rufus, right?

• 4:19:58Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah. That was an incredible surprise that I was not expecting, but, uh, he was there to train, um, Jung Wai Lee.

• 4:20:06Jocko Willink?

  Mm hmm.

• 4:20:07Tulsi Gabbard?

  And she was passing through doing a publicity thing. So I got to meet her and spar. I use that word very generously. She's like, come at me, like kick me, punch, like do something like, I don't know. But it was like, like getting to hit some pads with Duke was fricking incredible.

• 4:20:26Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 4:20:26Tulsi Gabbard?

  And, uh, yeah, it was awesome.

• 4:20:27Jocko Willink?

  I've cornered a bunch of fighters at UFC and, and whenever Duke Rufus was there, he's just like such an awesome guy. Super cool, super nice.

• 4:20:38Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:20:38Jocko Willink?

  Super, I mean, obviously he's a great trainer and everything, but I just remember thinking this guy's just freaking rad.

• 4:20:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:20:44Jocko Willink?

  Just cool.

• 4:20:45Tulsi Gabbard?

  Totally. And he makes, you know, like he made us feel just great. And, um, but what I was going to say is the thing that I've always appreciated most, most about mixed martial arts is, you know, yeah, there are guys who are stronger in boxing or striking or whatever, but this, the strategery that goes into fighters who have a very strong ground game, when you really watch it is I've just incredible. And that, that's what I've, I've loved most about, uh, the sport is the strategic thinking that goes into like, all right, I'm going to do this and set you up for where I'm going to put you in, you know, six moves later or.

• 4:21:21Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah.

• 4:21:21Tulsi Gabbard?

  Whatever. So yeah, I'm now, now that I'm a little bit more free, um, I, I really do. I've been telling my husband this. I wanna, I wanna learn.

• 4:21:29Jocko Willink?

  We have connections in the Hawaiian Islands. Speaking of gees, jujitsu gees and jeans and boots, you went to the factory in Maine, right?

• 4:21:38Tulsi Gabbard?

  I did. I visited the Origin factory in Maine and to say I was stoked is an understatement. And we made a little social media video, video about it and, and you know, got some footage of Pete showing us around and talking about what they do. Brought the local media with us and local media did a story on, on, uh, on Origin. But my husband will tell you in the car ride leaving, I was so fricking stoked. It was, it was completely unexpected because I've, I've had the privilege of going and visiting a number of, you know, local businesses and shops. But the thing that really like struck home for me, like in a, in a visceral way, was yeah, awesome products, but the spirit,

• 4:22:26Tulsi Gabbard?

  the spirit of Origin came through loud and clear, not just because Pete's good at talking about it, but because of what I experienced in the people who work there. And, um, the sense of pride and the sense of, of ownership of the thing that says right there, we get to do this. And, and how deeply you all have built the foundation of this American business in the fabric of America. And that like, I was like, I left there and I'm like, I told Pete, I was like, um, like where do I sign up?

• 4:23:06Tulsi Gabbard?

  Like, how do I, how do I join this? Because this is fricking amazing. And I talked about it and, and just shared that. That's why I wanted to share, um, that video and just the experience of being able to go and visit. And it was not on the way, like Farmington, Maine is on the way to nowhere else I was going.

• 4:23:26Tulsi Gabbard?

  And it was literally like I called an audible on my team and I'm like, "Yeah, we're in Maine and I'm gonna take a two-hour like detour to go and visit because the story of that you guys are sharing of Origin Maine is the story that needs to inspire America, especially now, in what we can do, what we can do here at home and that, yes, this is about supporting a local business, it's about supporting America and American jobs, but it goes so much deeper than that, that yeah, of course, there are challenges and there is adversity and, you know, foreign trade and like all of these other things,

• 4:24:09Tulsi Gabbard?

  but just like, um, you know, Pete talks about how he started right in his frickin backyard, built a factory, because there wasn't one, where there's a will, there's a way and when you're rooted in this, um, foundation of not just, "Hey, how can we make a bunch of money?" But how do, how do you use business as a means to serve and have a positive impact in your community, in the lives of the people who work there, in the customers who know, like, "Hey, I'm not just buying a product that's cool, I'm supporting a mission that's much greater than any one of us as individuals and will have a much longer lasting impact."

• 4:24:55Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, if you were to take what you just said, if you were to, if you and I were to look at each other and say, "Hey, let's make a business and let's make, you know, let's make clothes, let's make apparel, let's make shoes and let's make money." The last thing we would do to make money is try and build a factory in America.

• 4:25:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  Correct.

• 4:25:11Jocko Willink?

  And source everything from America.

• 4:25:13Tulsi Gabbard?

  Which is sad, but true.

• 4:25:15Jocko Willink?

  It is absolutely sad and there's company upon company upon company that their primary goal is to make money. That's their primary goal. It's not to make a quality product. It's not to be innovative with their products. It's not to rebuild their community. It's not to put money back into the community. It's not to, not to bring manufacturing back to America. That's, that's not even on their radar. Those are our primary goals. Now, in order to do that, we, do we have to make money? Yes, absolutely, and we will. But that's not why we're doing it. If we just wanted to make money, we wouldn't be, there would be no factory. It'd be, it'd be a sweatshop.

• 4:25:51Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:25:52Jocko Willink?

  Overseas, that's what it would be. We're not gonna do that, we're never gonna do that.

• 4:25:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  And you'd be no different than most of the others. That, that, you know, and, and it would, it, you wouldn't be you. Origin wouldn't be Origin then.

• 4:26:05Jocko Willink?

  Absolutely. And to be quite frank with you, money could not drive me or inspire me or motivate me. One, one hundredth the amount that it does to know that there's people in that town.

• 4:26:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yes.

• 4:26:25Jocko Willink?

  That are working, that are, have a career now. You know, we're taking millennials and teaching them a, a, a skill that was, oh, was so close to being lost. You saw them.

• 4:26:37Tulsi Gabbard?

  I did.

• 4:26:37Jocko Willink?

  Millennials that, there are skills that were, I mean, our, our, our guy Lenny just died, but before he died, he was able to pass on his knowledge. That can be passed on, could save, it's there.

• 4:26:49Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:26:50Jocko Willink?

  We're, we're there. And it's, yeah, also, I was so stoked, you know, you and I were texting back and forth. And I think I was trying to get you a pair of boots. I was like, hey, we'll get you some boots.

• 4:26:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  And you did.

• 4:26:59Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, we had somebody deliver you boots, but for you to go up there was, I was so stoked that you could go up there and you could see it. And, and you know, it's, it's very cool to like, I'll hear Joe Rogan talking about Origin. And even though he's not been there, like, he knows. It's, it's very cool. And it, when I saw, when I heard him talking about Origin, and he was just talking about it with some, someone else that was, was on his show. When I heard him talking about it so passionately, I realized this is, people get it. You don't just, you, look, it's awesome when you go there. And obviously, when you go there, it's visceral when you go there. But even if you don't go there, you know, you know that some, that pair of jeans that you're wearing.

• 4:27:43Jocko Willink?

  Those are, those are American made.

• 4:27:46Tulsi Gabbard?

  The hands that harvested the cotton, processed it, every step, that's the amazing thing is, and I, you know, some of my, some of my friends in the military, especially when they got their stimulus checks, they're like, I'm gonna make a choice with this money and I'm gonna go shopping at Origin because, cool stuff, but I'm supporting America with these dollars. And that, that's the difference and that's the impact. And, and I, I, I loved sharing the story of my experience there to help inspire others who may aspire to do something similar, but feel like the obstacles are too great.

• 4:28:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  But, but, and whether it's business or whatever, I mean, the, the point is the, the motivation and the spirit of getting back to, not planning this, but getting back to our origins of who we are as a country of entrepreneurs and innovators and people who are bringing different ideas to, to, um, and the pride, the pride, uh, that goes, that goes along with that.

• 4:28:54Jocko Willink?

  Origin USA.

• 4:28:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:28:57Jocko Willink?

  OriginUSA.com. If you want to get any stuff from there, it's made by Americans for Americans.

• 4:29:03Speaker 02

  It's true. Also, let me point your attention to JacoStore.com. This is where you can represent.

• 4:29:10Tulsi Gabbard?

  There you go.

• 4:29:10Speaker 02

  While you're on the path.

• 4:29:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  There you go.

• 4:29:12Speaker 02

  So yeah, we have some stuff, some stuff that we have is from Origin. We got rash guards on there. Um, also we have hoodies and shirts and you know, discipline equals freedom, this kind of stuff. I'm saying.

• 4:29:22Tulsi Gabbard?

  Jaco seems to get uncomfortable when you start talking about him.

• 4:29:26Speaker 02

  Is it that obvious?

• 4:29:27Tulsi Gabbard?

  It is that obvious. There's a visible shift here.

• 4:29:30Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 4:29:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  In energy.

• 4:29:31Speaker 02

  What's funny is, is kind of like a complimentary relationship because like my comfort increases when his discomfort increases. You see what I'm saying? So it's like, cool. That's why you can kind of sense some pride when I talk about the store.

• 4:29:45Tulsi Gabbard?

  Gotcha.

• 4:29:46Speaker 02

  Jaco Store, by the way. Anyway, yes, discipline equals freedom, shirts, hoodies, rash guards, uh, some hats on there. Some new stuff on there, new design coming out soon.

• 4:29:56Jocko Willink?

  Oh, really?

• 4:29:56Speaker 02

  I'll let you know.

• 4:29:57Jocko Willink?

  These are all things that happen decentralized command.

• 4:30:00Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 4:30:00Tulsi Gabbard?

  Hey.

• 4:30:01Jocko Willink?

  Like I'm not over there pointing the finger and making things happen. That's Echo Charles in his own little world.

• 4:30:06Speaker 02

  Well. It's our world.

• 4:30:10Speaker 02

  We have a subscription situation as well. If you want like a new type of design, kinda um.

• 4:30:15Jocko Willink?

  Is that where the, is that where the Run DMC t-shirt just came from?

• 4:30:19Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 4:30:19Jocko Willink?

  That's legit.

• 4:30:21Tulsi Gabbard?

  So do you approve these before they're done?

• 4:30:23Jocko Willink?

  Sometimes, sometimes. There is a level of decentralized command, but I also, some people in the organization will say occasionally need to get put in check.

• 4:30:36Jocko Willink?

  So there is sometimes, but occasionally these things slip by. Like he just made a Run DMC t-shirt, but it says discipline, but it's DSC PLN.

• 4:30:47Tulsi Gabbard?

  Gotcha.

• 4:30:48Jocko Willink?

  But it looks like the old school Run DMC t-shirt. So it's freaking legit.

• 4:30:52Speaker 02

  I thought so too. There's also ones like the element, you know, the periodic table?

• 4:30:57Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:30:57Speaker 02

  The element.

• 4:30:57Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:30:58Speaker 02

  So it's element D and it has all the, the atomic weight, 234.

• 4:31:02Tulsi Gabbard?

  Nice.

• 4:31:03Speaker 02

  Layers. Anyway, these are kinda offshoot designs, but they're cool, relevant, and there's layers.

• 4:31:08Jocko Willink?

  Oh, here's the thing that's jacked up. Now I just realized. If you wanted that Run DMC discipline shirt, you can only get it.

• 4:31:15Tulsi Gabbard?

  If you subscribe.

• 4:31:16Jocko Willink?

  If you're a subscriber to the Shirt Locker.

• 4:31:19Speaker 02

  Shirt Locker.

• 4:31:19Jocko Willink?

  The Shirt Locker of Echo Charles.

• 4:31:22Speaker 02

  It's true. Yeah. Once they're gone, they're gone.

• 4:31:24Jocko Willink?

  That's a bummer.

• 4:31:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  So limited, limited.

• 4:31:26Jocko Willink?

  That's kind of a bummer.

• 4:31:27Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 4:31:28Jocko Willink?

  And by the way, it seems like one person at this table does not have a subscription to this.

• 4:31:34Speaker 02

  What's funny is I for real have a subscription to it.

• 4:31:36Jocko Willink?

  I for real don't.

• 4:31:38Speaker 02

  Oh, you don't. Dang. Brutal. Brutal.

• 4:31:40Tulsi Gabbard?

  I thought you were calling me out by not calling me out.

• 4:31:42Jocko Willink?

  That's what I thought too. Okay, there's two people that don't have a subscription, apparently.

• 4:31:47Speaker 02

  Dang, that makes two of us, I guess, from one of us, whichever. Either way, maybe I have some extra. Oh, I'll hook you guys up.

• 4:31:54Tulsi Gabbard?

  Oh man, that'd be great.

• 4:31:56Speaker 02

  Is that cool?

• 4:31:56Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that'd be very nice. If you could hook me up with my own stuff.

• 4:32:02Jocko Willink?

  Uh, speaking of subscriptions, subscribe to this podcast. Whatever you subscribe to podcasts. Also, we have Jaco Unraveling, which we're about to record somewhere this week. Awesome. Grounded Podcast, Warrior Kid Podcast. And by the way, you also have another podcast to subscribe to, which is called This is Tulsi Gabbard.

• 4:32:21Tulsi Gabbard?

  This is Tulsi Gabbard. It's actually up already. So I posted a trailer. You can, you go and subscribe and follow now so that you can know when we drop the first episode and follow on once.

• 4:32:37Jocko Willink?

  You can also join us at the underground. Jaco Underground.com, which I already mentioned. So I'm not going to go into a big explanation, but gotta have a contingency plan. Don't want to be, don't want to be feeling the chains of control.

• 4:32:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:32:56Jocko Willink?

  From anyone. Not sponsors, not tech companies, no one. We're, so we gotta go underground. Yep. Jaco Underground.com. If you want to help us out there. It costs $8.18 a month.

• 4:33:15Jocko Willink?

  Which is, got layers to it.

• 4:33:17Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yes, sir.

• 4:33:17Jocko Willink?

  We'll talk about that offline. And look, we're not, if you can't afford that, for whatever reason, you're running into some tough times right now. There's COVID, whatever, and you can't afford it, order or email [email protected] and we can get that taken care of. We have a YouTube channel, which has a lot of videos on it. The good ones, I'm the assistant director on. The rest of them, it's Echo Solo. You have a YouTube channel too.

• 4:33:47Tulsi Gabbard?

  We do. Yep. Tulsi Gabbard.

• 4:33:49Jocko Willink?

  You post?

• 4:33:50Tulsi Gabbard?

  I post all kinds of stuff. We'll be posting, we'll be posting the, the podcast on there as well. But also just, you know, different things that are happening. I often record short videos, kind of weighing in on maybe issues of the day or news or different things that are coming forward. And more often than not, bring a different perspective than one you're getting in the news. So yeah, I post those across YouTube and across social media at Tulsi Gabbard.

• 4:34:22Jocko Willink?

  Psychological Warfare is an album. Did you know that I was an artist, Tulsi?

• 4:34:28Tulsi Gabbard?

  I did not.

• 4:34:29Jocko Willink?

  I'm an artist, a recording artist. So if you want to get my album, and it's the artist is Jaco, and the album is called Psychological Warfare, and there's a bunch of tracks on there that you can listen to whenever you need them.

• 4:34:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  Is the wake up track one of them?

• 4:34:46Jocko Willink?

  The wake up track is one.

• 4:34:50Jocko Willink?

  Apparently so is the sleep track.

• 4:34:53Tulsi Gabbard?

  You should add one. You should add one on there.

• 4:34:55Jocko Willink?

  Just me talking about murder. Sleep, sweet dreams. Uh, flipside canvas, flipsidecanvas.com Dakota Meyer, my brother. He makes all kinds of cool stuff. Again, American made stuff that that is the highest quality, puts all kinds of stuff that you can hang on your wall to remind you of the path. Got a bunch of books.

• 4:35:20Jocko Willink?

  I got a book called Final Spin, which is a novel not out yet, comes out in September.

• 4:35:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  Been tracking that.

• 4:35:26Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it's pretty crazy. I just got the final, or I just did the final edits. It's freaking.

• 4:35:36Jocko Willink?

  I was, my daughter, my oldest daughter read it. I was like, how can you review this? And so she read it. And you know, your kids are always like, gonna be harsh critics or whatever. And my, I said, oh, you know, she got done reading it. So, oh, you know, how was it? How did you like it? And so she starts going, you know, I like this and I like that. And then she, she got to a point and she started to, because it's, it's an emotional situation. She started to cry.

• 4:36:00Tulsi Gabbard?

  Oh, my gosh.

• 4:36:00Jocko Willink?

  This is not while she, this was

• 4:36:02Tulsi Gabbard?

  after.

• 4:36:02Jocko Willink?

  A day after she read it. She started crying and she was like, and, and then I was kind of like, oh, I go, I guess that's a good touch. And she was like, it's just that, that part's so, and I was like, okay. So it's very interesting. So not that this is, it's just not a sob story, but it's a

• 4:36:20Tulsi Gabbard?

  You would want to write a book that moves people.

• 4:36:22Jocko Willink?

  He, well, I mean, yeah, I guess, I guess if it's not gonna have any impact, or if it's gonna have an impact, that's a good thing to make people think.

• 4:36:30Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:36:31Jocko Willink?

  And it's a, it's, it's definitely, even as I read it, and I've read it now a hundred times because I have to edit it. You know, there's some parts where I'm reading it and it's definitely.

• 4:36:42Jocko Willink?

  It's it's heavy. It's heavy and it's got some really funny parts too. A lot of the dialogue is really funny because I, you know, it's reflective of kind of the dialogue that I have with people, even though it's not about me. Or is it?

• 4:36:55Tulsi Gabbard?

  Open to interpretation.

• 4:36:58Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it's sort of an alternative.

• 4:37:02Jocko Willink?

  Anyways, the book is called Final Spin. And you can preorder it right now. If you want to get a first edition. If you want to get a first edition. Order it now. And look, thi- this is going to be kind of a big deal to get the first edition of the first novel. You know what I'm saying?

• 4:37:17Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 4:37:18Jocko Willink?

  Am I overhyping that?

• 4:37:19Tulsi Gabbard?

  Is is the second in the works?

• 4:37:22Jocko Willink?

  This this book will have no follow on.

• 4:37:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  Okay.

• 4:37:26Jocko Willink?

  For various reasons.

• 4:37:29Tulsi Gabbard?

  It concludes.

• 4:37:30Jocko Willink?

  It does conclude. It is called Final Spin. It is not like first spin. So it is called Final Spin, but also I. It's it is. It is. Complete.

• 4:37:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  Sure.

• 4:37:45Jocko Willink?

  In my mind, it's complete. And so I don't want to carry the story on.

• 4:37:50Tulsi Gabbard?

  But you have more novels in you.

• 4:37:51Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah. Maybe I got fourteen novels that I thought of during the last half an hour.

• 4:37:58Tulsi Gabbard?

  Awesome.

• 4:37:59Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's unfortunate for me. It's always just, people say, oh, I don't know what to write about. I'm like, God, I wish I had that problem. So that's that. Final Spin. Preorder it. Leadership Strategy and Tactics Field Manual, The Code, The Evaluation, The Protocol, Discipline Equals Freedom Field Manual. Way the Warrior Kid Four. Field Manual, that's out. Way the Warrior Kid One, Two, and Three. Mikey and the Dragons. I was listening to. I was listening to Jordan Peterson.

• 4:38:29Jocko Willink?

  Yesterday. And and he was just going off about the dragons, which is

• 4:38:34Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 4:38:34Jocko Willink?

  A lot of what he does. And interestingly enough, I was like, hmm. Sounds like this book called Mikey and the Dragons. So check that one out. About Face.

• 4:38:47Jocko Willink?

  By David Hackworth. There's a foreword by me and Tulsi, you've

• 4:38:52Tulsi Gabbard?

  I just got it in the mail a couple of days before I left Hawaii and I have read your foreword.

• 4:38:58Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 4:38:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  And I'm just starting.

• 4:39:00Jocko Willink?

  What's the impression?

• 4:39:00Tulsi Gabbard?

  Just starting the book. How incredibly impactful this book and this man has been on your life as a person. But the thing that really like spoke to me was how this was kind of your go to reference to help guide you through difficult leadership, choices, decisions, challenges that you face in some of the most difficult environments, i.e. being in at war and and that you've never met the man. And that was that came through very clear kind of your gratitude to him in having this

• 4:39:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  this book that provided you with that place where you could find the answers that you couldn't find anywhere else or help you see things in a different way that you wouldn't have seen otherwise through his experiences and how he handled things or his perspective. And then the maybe the most important thing was that all of that came from the foremost concern being care for your guys, his soldiers, your SEALs, soldiers who you were people who you were responsible for. And I thought that was a really cool thing for me to come at that. I've only heard you talk about it, but to come at this book, and I'm really looking forward

• 4:40:28Tulsi Gabbard?

  to continue to read it, but to see that bridge in time and that that and conflicts and wars between a guy who served in Vietnam and was a leader of soldiers in Vietnam to you and the experience that you had as a leader, serving in Iraq, and how there was such

• 4:40:48Tulsi Gabbard?

  powerful connection between two different leaders and two different wars and different places and different times. That that's not something I've really heard of before.

• 4:41:02Jocko Willink?

  It's weird cuz I, as I read that book, have you ever seen the movie, I think it's called The Thirteenth Warrior? Have you heard of this movie?

• 4:41:10Speaker 02

  Tom Cruise?

• 4:41:11Jocko Willink?

  No. So anyways, it's based on, it's based on a book by Michael Crichton. And I can't remember the name of the book that it's based upon, but it's about this Arabic um, person who gets somehow mixed up in with the Vikings. And there's a great scene and the Arabic guy is played by some famous actor. God, I can't think of it. Echo Charles, I really wish you could help me.

• 4:41:44Jocko Willink?

  But they show, they do this scene where he's learning to speak Norwegian or whatever, Old Norse, whatever language you're speaking. And the way that they cut it up, they're speaking Norwegian and then every once in a while, an English word pops in. Which would have been an Arabic movie, or Arabic word, but it's a, it's a, it's an English speaking movie. So every once in a while, an, uh, an English word will pop in. So it's a, mother, mother, tree. And so, and he starts picking up, and it's probably a two minute scene where by the end, all the words are in English. The reason I'm telling you this is cuz as you were, as you were talking about the book about face,

• 4:42:26Jocko Willink?

  I feel like each time I read it, like a little, cuz it's not a book about leadership. And you know, you mentioned leadership, it's not a book about leadership, it's a, it's a book about a guy's life. But it's like, as each time I read it, a little leadership thing would come through. And then a little bit more, and then a little bit more, and eventually the whole thing, I realized this whole thing is just about leadership. And it's about how to take care of your troops and do the mission. And it's, it's, I just had that thought as you were, as you were describing the correlations between what he lived through and what I lived through, which by the way, just for the record, not even close. And he was, he was in Korea and Vietnam, he's the, he had three distinguished service crosses.

• 4:43:08Jocko Willink?

  Nine silvers, I mean, just totally different, but good book to check out.

• 4:43:14Tulsi Gabbard?

  The, the closest thing that I can relate to in my time in the military is you mentioned Band of Brothers earlier and I was a brand new, maybe I was an E3 or an E4 by that point, but I picked up the book, Band of Brothers, before ever watching the, the mini-series. I don't even know if it was made at that time yet, but I was brand new in the National Guard. I started reading the book just as we were about to go and do an annual training at Fort Indian Town Gap in Pennsylvania. And I'm reading the book, I like can't put it down. We go there, we're there for 10 days or two weeks or whatever it was, on the plane going back to Hawaii and I finished the book and at the end of the book,

• 4:43:55Tulsi Gabbard?

  it says Dick Winters currently resides in Fort Indian Town Gap, Pennsylvania, where he lives with his wife. And I'm just like, why didn't I finish this two days earlier? I would have definitely gone and knocked on this man and he was still alive at the time. That was, but, but I've, you know, gone on and watched, I mean, I've watched this year. I don't even know how many times I've watched it. In OCS, we had to write essays on different episodes from a leadership perspective, leadership lessons, good and bad, and really analyzed each episode of that. And, and so that, that's one, and that's the only kind of closest thing I can relate to, we're going back and looking

• 4:44:37Tulsi Gabbard?

  at him and his leadership. And I always forget the guy's name, but the guy Ross in Friends.

• 4:44:43Jocko Willink?

  Sorbell.

• 4:44:43Tulsi Gabbard?

  Thank you. His, his flawed leadership, I would say, and the lessons learned from that. And, and as a specialist then, and then a brand new lieutenant, I, I, I have often gone back to those leadership lessons, including the ones of, you know, some of the, oh gosh, I'm forgetting the name now, some of the enlisted characters. And one that was played by Donnie Wahlberg,

• 4:45:11Tulsi Gabbard?

  one of the main E6s. And, and that was, I had a chance to meet Donnie Wahlberg at a veterans event and like, I don't, I don't really care about celebrities in general, but I saw he was there. I'm like, I need to go speak to this person about Band of Brothers. And it was, it was really cool. And he's a huge, huge, huge supporter of veterans.

• 4:45:30Jocko Willink?

  I was on um a show called Billions.

• 4:45:33Tulsi Gabbard?

  You were?

• 4:45:34Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, and the the one of the main characters in Billions, a guy named Axelrod.

• 4:45:39Tulsi Gabbard?

  Uh, yeah.

• 4:45:40Jocko Willink?

  Is all he also played Dick Winters.

• 4:45:42Tulsi Gabbard?

  He is forever Dick Winters in my mind. I don't care. Like, he was in Homeland too, like, whatever. You're Dick Winters.

• 4:45:48Jocko Willink?

  But we, you know, he, we were sitting around and talking and and he said something along the lines of like, oh, you know, I was in something called Band of Brothers. I'm like, yeah, I kind of know that. I'm well aware of that. And so we talked a bunch about it. It was it was interesting because

• 4:46:05Jocko Willink?

  in those, I'd never done any like Hollywood things before. Echo Charles likes to throw that at me. Yeah, he likes to throw that at me. Well, when you do it, you film the same thing ten times, if not more. So like, there's a scene where we're waking a guy up in bed. And there's me and Axe and Wags. Have you watched Billions before?

• 4:46:32Tulsi Gabbard?

  I've only seen one or two. I didn't really.

• 4:46:35Jocko Willink?

  It's a freaking fantastic show. So me, Axe, Wags, three characters. And so we're waking a guy up.

• 4:46:41Jocko Willink?

  And the first time we film it is like

• 4:46:45Jocko Willink?

  they're filming all three of us and we deliver the lines and then you stop. And then they reset up all the cameras and then they do it again, but they're just filming me. And then they reset up the cameras and they do it again. They're just filming Wags and then they refilm it again. They they're just filming Axe and they and then they refilm it again. They're just filming the girl in bed. Then they refilm it again and then they do it from behind us and they do it. So it ends up, you end up doing this thing

• 4:47:07Jocko Willink?

  ten times, fifteen times, twenty. And by the way, if someone messes up, doing it again. So I was talking to him and I said, how in God's name did you film like a battle scene?

• 4:47:18Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:47:19Jocko Willink?

  How the hell did you do that? And he he said, it's totally different because there's basically guys running around with cameras and they do it one freaking time and they just have to get it right. And they're running through it because explosions are going off and like a building is going to get destroyed and it's only going to get one take.

• 4:47:35Tulsi Gabbard?

  Yeah.

• 4:47:36Jocko Willink?

  So that was pretty interesting.

• 4:47:38Tulsi Gabbard?

  No pressure, right? As an actor, not only because of that, just the the logistics of it, but like the history and what you're doing and who you're representing. Like, my gosh, I can't, I can't imagine.

• 4:47:52Jocko Willink?

  He um, so if someone messes up.

• 4:47:57Jocko Willink?

  The director comes in like talks to him, right?

• 4:48:00Speaker 02

  Just reprimanded.

• 4:48:01Jocko Willink?

  Like I'm serious. So if someone, maybe he doesn't mess up, but maybe he's not putting the right, right stank on it, right? You know what I'm saying? Like you're too much or too little. You know, you're being too emotional. And so it happened. I didn't really, I didn't know any of this.

• 4:48:16Tulsi Gabbard?

  Were you playing a military person yourself?

• 4:48:20Jocko Willink?

  I, I had a real stretch of a role. I played me.

• 4:48:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  Okay. All right.

• 4:48:26Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. So I played me and I was whatever, trying to, I was trying to help a guy win a smoker's fight, a boxing match. And we're training him.

• 4:48:36Jocko Willink?

  But if you mess up, or you don't put enough, or you put a little too much or whatever, the, the director, actually the first, the assistant director is going to come and give you a little nudge in the right direction. Hey, you know, don't be so loud. You know, you're too emotional. This isn't supposed to be funny or whatever, something like that. And so this actually happened to me. I don't know if I'm supposed to talk about stuff like this. Maybe it's off limits, but

• 4:48:58Tulsi Gabbard?

  It's done. It's fine.

• 4:48:59Jocko Willink?

  It happened to one of the other actors. We were doing, it's just me and one other actor in a scene. And we do it. And I'm just doing what I do. So honestly, it's pretty, if I have to get talked to, it's a problem because I'm just me and myself, right? So I'm doing what I'm doing. And the, the assistant director comes down first and is like, hey, you know, I want to back that down a little bit. Not talking to me, but talking to the other guy. And, and he's like, well, are we going to do it again? He's like, yeah, we're going to do it again, which is kind of a big deal. Like, it's not, it's not a small thing, right? We're actually, because I remember saying, wait, are we going to have to shoot this again? He goes, yeah, we're going to shoot it again. So it's kind of, ooh. So I realized that this was kind of a thing. If you, and then if you continue to mess up,

• 4:49:41Jocko Willink?

  then it's not just the assistant director. It's the director is going to come down and try and give you, you know, whatever. What do they give you? What do they give you? The motivation? This is the problem. And so I'm watching this going, dude, I don't want none of this. And so I remember one time, uh,

• 4:49:59Jocko Willink?

  so now it's me, Axe and Wags, and they're the main guys. And these guys, and I didn't know anything about anything, right? But this is a very popular show and it's an incredibly well-written show. The, the writers, I know the writers now and they're just so good. And you understand, so anyways, they're

• 4:50:18Jocko Willink?

  We do a take, right? Hollywood. We do a take. And like, you can hear, you can hear like radios, like you can hear some and you, so now all, you realize someone messed up, right? And then they come walking up and, uh, and he comes walking up, you can, he's behind us to direct me, pulls one of the other guys aside, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I was like, and I said to Ax, I was like, bro, I thought he was coming for me.

• 4:50:46Jocko Willink?

  We all think that.

• 4:50:49Tulsi Gabbard?

  You're not alone. Even the pros don't like, uh,

• 4:50:54Tulsi Gabbard?

  get the talking too.

• 4:50:55Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. So there you go. Um, other books, Extreme Ownership, first book I wrote, wrote about leadership and then the dichotomy of leadership. Echelon Front Leadership Consultancy, we solve problems through leadership. Go to echelonfront.com if you want us to come to your company and help. We had EF Online, it's an online leadership training platform to get your whole organization aligned, not just aligned towards a common goal, but more important aligned in how they are going to lead. Go to EFonline.com for that. We got the muster. 2021, a bunch of different dates. We're going to be coming around the country. Check extremeownership.com if you want to come to one of those. They've all sold out. Every time we've done one, these are going to sell out too.

• 4:51:39Jocko Willink?

  So check it early. We've got EF Battlefield, which is, we've done one so far, we're doing another one.

• 4:51:47Jocko Willink?

  We go out and we walk the grounds of the battlefield at Gettysburg. Yeah. And you, we sit there, we talk through the decisions that were made. We talk about General Lee and Long Street and AP Hill and, and Stewart and Mead and Hancock and Reynolds and, and Joshua Chamberlain from Maine. We, we talk through their personalities, decisions that got made, egos that got involved, hesitation, being overly aggressive, not being aggressive enough. We talk through all so many lessons to learn, and this is a little tiny group of people. There's 35 people that we bring to this event.

• 4:52:28Jocko Willink?

  It's all day long. Um, me, the rest of the echelon, or quite a few of the echelon front instructors walk in the battlefield. We do dinner, we're going to do a Q and A. It's We will answer whatever questions you have and we will all learn about these lessons. So if you want to go to that, go to go to ashonfront.com/events to check that out. Did you take a note there?

• 4:52:50Tulsi Gabbard?

  I did. Highly, highly recommend. I've had the opportunity to do that a few times. One of which while I was, we went, we went to the battlefield of Chickamauga when I was in OCS and we did that as a class.

• 4:53:07Jocko Willink?

  So good.

• 4:53:08Tulsi Gabbard?

  Incredible. Bringing history to life and making it relevant, especially from a leadership perspective that applies whether you're in the military or not. But something I found out pretty cool, in the last year or so, I was asked to be on this show on PBS called Finding Your Roots. And it's a show that features different people. In my episode, they also had Paul Ryan and Marco Rubio, but you know, like Oprah, they had different people on and, and they dig into your genealogy and find stories about your roots, where you come from, who you come from.

• 4:53:44Tulsi Gabbard?

  And I found out that one of my ancestors on my mother's side of the family was 39, 40 years old when he volunteered to serve in the Union Army. And that he, it was, and they had the documentation there of one of those battlefields where he fought that I had been to previously and visited and walked through. And it was the most like, it was the most incredible thing on, on many levels to see

• 4:54:25Tulsi Gabbard?

  like this guy gave up his life to go and, and fight for what he believed in. And that I had generations later, not only physically walked through that battlefield where he was, but also chose a similar path with my life. And so it was just, it was, it was, and I've gone back to Gettysburg a few times since. And every single time I go, it's an incredibly powerful experience, incredibly powerful. And to go to the place where of course Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address.

• 4:55:05Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Yeah, it's when, when we, because we basically, we spend the two days walking and then we, we, when we wrap it up and you kind of, now you clearly know and you've seen the low ground, the high ground, the trees, the buildings, and you're walking where thousands of men were killed. Yeah.

• 4:55:28Jocko Willink?

  It's, it, it's just, it's just unbelievable. It's an unbelievable event. It's an unbelievable place and it's an incredible way to learn and solidify those. So that's EF, echelonfront.com/events if you want to go. Um, it's in April. So, and if you want to help service members, active and retired, their families, Gold Star families, then check out Mark Lee's mom. She's got a, in, in a charity organization, Mama Lee. If you want to donate or you want to get involved, go to AmericasMightyWarriors.org. And if you want more of my imposing interrogations,

• 4:56:11Jocko Willink?

  or you want more of Echo's quiet questions.

• 4:56:15Tulsi Gabbard?

  And pop culture commentary.

• 4:56:17Jocko Willink?

  Pop culture commentary. I just, so whenever I'm giving Echo a hard time, if it's a pretty good one, then he'll say to me like, you're happy with yourself, aren't you? You're really enjoying yourself, aren't you? You really enjoyed yourself, aren't you? You think you're good, don't you? And I, that's how I know I'm kind of getting there. And as I got, as when we got here today, as I got out of the car, I was, I was responding to Twitter or Instagram and I had just made a comment and I got out of the car and said, hey, you know how sometimes you say that to me? Cause someone had said, the, the last woman that was on Holly McKay, someone had said, oh,

• 4:56:58Jocko Willink?

  did she, does she stay for the support section? Meaning what we've dragged you into for the past freaking hour just about. And I said, uh, no, she was able to withstand, you know, ISIS interrogations, but she couldn't hang with Echo Charles and the support. So there you go.

• 4:57:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, he's very, very happy with that one. I could sense the pride in the tone of the comment.

• 4:57:25Jocko Willink?

  There you go. Admittedly so. Guilty. Uh, if you want more of us, you can't, you then, then you can find us on the internet web. And, and that's including Tulsi's way, Tulsi as well, at Tulsi Gabbard. Echo is at Echo Charles and I am at Jocko Willink. Echo Charles, you got anything else?

• 4:57:43Speaker 02

  Are you running for president again, ever, or even possibly, do you think?

• 4:57:47Tulsi Gabbard?

  I don't know. I'm not thinking about it at all.

• 4:57:51Speaker 02

  If you did, would you ask about aliens? Remember how, who, someone asked about aliens, right?

• 4:57:56Tulsi Gabbard?

  I think so.

• 4:57:57Speaker 02

  I think it was like Clinton or something.

• 4:57:59Tulsi Gabbard?

  Um, it's not on the top of my list.

• 4:58:01Speaker 02

  I understand.

• 4:58:02Tulsi Gabbard?

  Put it that way.

• 4:58:04Speaker 02

  There you go.

• 4:58:05Jocko Willink?

  Did I say something about Echo's questions earlier?

• 4:58:09Tulsi Gabbard?

  He saved, he saved the best for last.

• 4:58:12Speaker 02

  What's funny is when I first met you or whatever, I was like, I don't think I ever met anyone that ran for president before. So then, you know, you kind of think like, what would I ask? And then for some reason.

• 4:58:21Tulsi Gabbard?

  This is it.

• 4:58:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, this is the moment. Yeah. All the rest of the stuff is like, mm, okay, whatever. But, you know.

• 4:58:28Tulsi Gabbard?

  Oh, man. Gotcha.

• 4:58:30Speaker 02

  I have nothing else, but thank you.

• 4:58:32Jocko Willink?

  Awesome. Tulsi, any, any closing thoughts?

• 4:58:35Tulsi Gabbard?

  I, um, it's great to be here and we've covered a lot and there's a lot more to come.

• 4:58:42Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Awesome. Well, um, obviously thanks for coming on. I know we tried to make this happen for a little bit and glad you could kind of finally get on here and, and thanks for your service in the United States government, of course, but also obviously thanks for your service as a soldier, as a leader. Thanks for putting your life on hold and your life at risk to defend the freedoms and the way of life that we hold sacred. And the same goes to the rest of the military personnel out there around the world.

• 4:59:20Jocko Willink?

  On those forgotten barricades on the front lines of freedom, thank you for defending us. And to our police and law enforcement and firefighters and paramedics and EMTs and dispatchers and correctional officers and border patrol and secret service and all the first responders, thank you for defending us as well here at home. And to everyone else out there. Well, for one thing, ask yourself, is today the day? Is today the day? And live your life thinking that today could be the day.

• 5:00:02Jocko Willink?

  And that means remember some of that aloha spirit that Tulsi talks about. Treat people with aloha, treat them with respect and compassion and try and help out other people. And you do that, you do all those things by first putting your own ego in check. Listen more than you talk. Praise more than you punish. Stand up for what you believe in while respecting other people's beliefs too. And remember, always remember

• 5:00:46Jocko Willink?

  that we are stronger together. And until next time, this is Tulsi and Echo and Jaco. Out.