6/16/25 Refineries, Rails, and Reality Checks: An Economic Update with Congressman Vince Fong

The Moneywise Radio Show and Podcast Monday, June 16th BE MONEYWISE. Moneywise Wealth Management I "The Moneywise Guys" podcast call: 661-847-1000 text in anytime: 661-396-1000 website: www. MoneywiseGuys.com facebook: Moneywise_Wealth_Management Guest: Congressman, Vince Fong website: https://fong.house.gov/

• 0:00Speaker 00

  From the Garo Ellis padded radio room off Stockdale Highway, here is Money Wise. Call or text into the show 24/7 at 396-1000.

• 0:39Speaker 00

  Here is Money Wise.

• 0:40Speaker 01

  Money, money, money, money. Welcome to the Money Wise Show. We are live from the Garo Ellis padded radio room off Stockdale Highway on ESPN Bakersfield, 1230 AM, 101.1 FM, and always streaming at MoneyWiseGuys.com. You can call or text into the show 24 hours a day at 661-396-1000. Today, we're your hosts. I'm Sharad Wade.

• 1:02Speaker 00

  Sammy Abiyawi.

• 1:03Speaker 01

  Sammy, great seeing you.

• 1:04Speaker 00

  Same here, man. Looking forward to the show.

• 1:06Speaker 01

  We've got a really good show ahead of us. We will be joined here shortly by our local congressman and representative from the 20th District of California, Representative or Congressman Vince Fong will be joining us. Really excited for that. He's been doing a lot of work here in the Valley and a lot of orders and things that we're dealing with here on a Valley perspective. So, we're really, really excited to have him on. Talked about what's going on economically and in the markets. Should be really great. So, you're not going to want to miss that. But before we get to our guest, let's talk about some of the headlines.

• 1:45Speaker 01

  And Sammy, right off the bat, well, Friday, first of all, markets were struggling on Friday, mostly because of the conflict that's happening between Iran and Israel. And of course, that spooks the world markets, especially in oil. And it spooks the markets in terms of trade and the Strait of Hormuz and all of the things that can be affected between these two countries and how it could escalate. But, man, we have short-term memories because today it just shrugged off all of that bad news. And most major indices ended up close to 1%. And my guess is that because...

• 2:26Speaker 01

  We are seeing headlines that give some hope between a potential Israel and Iran conflict and maybe, maybe the

• 2:35Speaker 00

  De-escalation?

• 2:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, maybe there could be some de-escalation or hope of de-escalation. Uh, you know, that which would, you know, benefit the world, not just the stock market.

• 2:46Speaker 00

  I agree, I agree. I mean, there's, the world is just big enough for everybody to live on. And I hope, and I wish, just people understand that.

• 2:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:54Speaker 00

  Especially powers.

• 2:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 2:57Speaker 00

  It's, it's, it's, it's, it's sad to see and, and, and not just for the markets, but it's just for people that actually live in that area and that region of the world. It is not easy to see missiles flying over your head.

• 3:08Speaker 01

  Duh.

• 3:09Speaker 00

  I don't know if you've seen these videos.

• 3:11Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 3:11Speaker 00

  Of people partying in Lebanon and just things are going back and forth.

• 3:15Speaker 01

  Oh, it's terrifying.

• 3:16Speaker 00

  It's just terrifying.

• 3:17Speaker 01

  And, and, and, you know, some of the videos are of residential areas getting struck, you know, or apartment buildings and the, the people filming them are not far away. And I just, I just think, you know, we have families. I just can't imagine

• 3:33Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 3:34Speaker 01

  being there with your family thinking helpless, that you don't have any way of protecting yourself.

• 3:38Speaker 00

  That's true.

• 3:39Speaker 01

  And all of a sudden you could just be

• 3:40Speaker 00

  Now, now, now you'll think that Bakersfield is so far away from this and we are. However, I know people that have families in Israel and I know people that have families in Iran. I just can't imagine how they feel.

• 3:52Speaker 01

  Right.

• 3:53Speaker 00

  Right now.

• 3:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:54Speaker 00

  About, you know, the fear that they are experiencing about their families and what they could be going through.

• 4:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, no, you, you, you're, you have some fortune being from Morocco.

• 4:04Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 4:05Speaker 01

  A peaceful country.

• 4:06Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 4:06Speaker 01

  Has not been involved in, in, that we know of outside conflicts. It's, it's, you know, remained fairly peaceful

• 4:13Speaker 00

  Mm-hmm.

• 4:13Speaker 01

  for probably most of your lifetime.

• 4:15Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 4:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, and so, you know, there's, same with us, you know, here in, in the US, we've been, we've been very fortunate to have, you know, attacks right on our land against us. And the economic impacts are just, we, I don't think we could overstate how difficult it would be for any country because They'll take the dollar, for example, the dollar is the world's currency because we have a stable government.

• 4:41Speaker 00

  That's right.

• 4:41Speaker 01

  And because we have a, uh, the ability to, to protect ourselves without fear of, you know, being eradicated or being invaded and, and, and so.

• 4:52Speaker 00

  And for the most part is what you said earlier, the market kind of like adjusts on its own. We have a free market. Right? And, and that's what I think the rest of the world sometimes lacks is the market adjusts on its own, its own for the most part. Now we still have the Federal Reserve, we have government and we have executive branch and what have you, but for the most part. Like you said, Friday, we had this, you know, fear in the market.

• 5:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 5:18Speaker 00

  But now we bounced back.

• 5:20Speaker 01

  Yep. Yeah. And, and we saw it in oil prices as well. Of course, when, when this hit or last, end of last week, oil, you know, ticked up. Obviously traders, oil traders thinking, well, this could be bad. And so let's, let's buy and it just drove up the price. And today we saw it kind of come back down to a normal level, about seventy-three dollars a barrel for, for WTI. Uh, so, you know, it's, what's interesting is the markets are, are very, the, the markets are going to oftentimes, um, you know, trade on the rumor and, um, and so they're, uh, you know, what do you call it? I got leading indicator in many cases, but

• 6:02Speaker 01

  you know, that is, that is based off of, you know, minute by minute news that can come out. And so it can be, it can be, it can be viewed from the outside as if it's, you know, just random ups and downs, but really it's, it is generally file, following a long-term trend, which is always, which has been up since the most stock market was created hundred and two, couple of hundred years ago. And so, and it's been up, the trend has been up despite all of the world wars and despite all of the world conflicts because at the end of the day, fundamentally what the stock market is, is just a market where people can buy and sell their, their percentage of ownership in a company that is participating in the pool.

• 6:45Speaker 01

  That's a publicly traded company, so they're willing to, to, to get into the, the same rules as the other companies that are in that pool. And, uh, you know, theoretically, they should be abiding by those rules. And so it gives everybody the opportunity to participate.

• 6:59Speaker 00

  Yes, to participate. I love that.

• 7:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:01Speaker 00

  Yeah, I love that. I mean, if, if, if you have the ability to. Take a couple of dollars, even though you you might not be making a lot, you still wanna and you have the ability to be part and participate in that.

• 7:13Speaker 01

  Right.

• 7:14Speaker 00

  Which is great.

• 7:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's fantastic. And some of the greatest investors on the planet have talked about when they've been asked, like Warren Buffett, for example, when he's been asked by just a random individual at a conference, how should I invest? They almost always say, just invest in the broad market.

• 7:30Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 7:30Speaker 01

  You know, there are there are ways that you can have a broad exposure to the broad US equity market, whether it's through an exchange traded fund or a mutual fund. But there are ways that you can sort of, you know, go in and you can ride those ups and downs without, you know, needing to get cute or try to come up with some sort of trading strategy.

• 7:51Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 7:52Speaker 01

  You can buy and you can hold and time in the market is so much more important than timing the market. So with that, Sammy, we've got an interesting week ahead of us because on Wednesday, the Fed is going to federal chairman Jerome Powell will come out and talk about interest rates and what they're going to do. Looks like no change likely, right, Sammy? You're not expecting any?

• 8:16Speaker 00

  I'm not. Given the economic data that I'm seeing, I am not expecting. Now, there's a lot of pressure on Powell to reduce rates. There's no if or buts about that. There's everybody is, you know, especially our president, reduce, reduce, reduce the rates because he connotate that to jet fuel thrown at the economy.

• 8:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:36Speaker 00

  However, when you look at our unemployment rate, our inflation, which is the mandate of the Federal Reserve, you talked about that before, you said, those are the two things. That's the mandate of the Federal Reserve is to control.

• 8:50Speaker 01

  Prices?

• 8:51Speaker 00

  Well, the unemployment, inflation.

• 8:53Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 8:54Speaker 00

  And and monitor unemployment.

• 8:56Speaker 01

  That's it.

• 8:57Speaker 00

  And the data states that we don't need to make any moves right now.

• 9:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:03Speaker 00

  However, I don't know. I mean, could the pressure get to him and political pressure? That's not what he was actually voted in for.

• 9:11Speaker 01

  Right.

• 9:12Speaker 00

  But that's remained to be seen.

• 9:14Speaker 01

  Right.

• 9:14Speaker 00

  Wednesday, you said?

• 9:15Speaker 01

  Wednesday. Yeah.

• 9:16Speaker 00

  I'm, I'm, I'm gonna say no change.

• 9:19Speaker 01

  Yeah. Markets are all baking in basically no change. I think across the board analysts are expecting no change by the Fed. I'd be really surprised if there is. Well, great. Sammy, we're gonna do our first break. Now we come back, we're really excited to have join the show Representative Vince Fong. He is the Congressman for California's 20th Congressional District. Not gonna miss this great interview. We'll be right back.

• 9:43Speaker 02

  Are you an employee with a company-sponsored retirement plan? Do you fully understand how you're invested and whether or not you are maximizing your retirement plan's options? For more information on a free assessment, contact MoneyWise's 401(k) Specialist, Justin Leland, at 661-847-1000. That's 661-847-1000.

• 10:05Speaker 01

  Welcome back. We're MoneyWise. Thanks so much for tuning in. So excited to have our guest on with us now, Vince Fong, Congressman Vince Fong. He is currently representing California's 20th Congressional District, and we've got him right here with us at the MoneyWise studio. Vince, thanks for being on the show.

• 10:23Speaker 03

  Thanks for having me.

• 10:24Speaker 01

  It's, uh, so first of all, get a little housekeeping out of the way. You're from here. You're from Bakersfield.

• 10:29Speaker 03

  Born and raised.

• 10:30Speaker 01

  You went to West High.

• 10:31Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 10:31Speaker 01

  Is that correct?

• 10:32Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 10:32Speaker 01

  You're just a little bit younger me than me, just by three or four years. I went to BHS.

• 10:38Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 10:38Speaker 01

  So my question to you is, when you were at West High, were they still rivals with BHS?

• 10:44Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 10:44Speaker 01

  Like in sports and that?

• 10:45Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 10:45Speaker 01

  It was still happening?

• 10:46Speaker 03

  Class of 97. Yeah, there was, there was a couple of rival games.

• 10:49Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. So I'm, I'm class of 93 at BHS. So I know when I was in high school, it was, West was like the school to play. This is all before we had like...

• 10:59Speaker 00

  Stockdale.

• 11:00Speaker 01

  Stockdale and Liberty and Centennial.

• 11:03Speaker 03

  They were just around. They had Stockdale just.

• 11:05Speaker 01

  When you were there.

• 11:06Speaker 03

  And I was there.

• 11:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. See, they weren't around when I was there. So we, we had, we still had the true rival, the true old school, high school rivalry.

• 11:13Speaker 03

  That's right. We should have bring that back.

• 11:15Speaker 01

  We should. We should. Go Vikings.

• 11:17Speaker 03

  That's right.

• 11:18Speaker 01

  I, I just said that as a driller, but I'm gonna get in trouble. No, we really appreciate you coming. You've got to be incredibly busy, uh, obviously being a congressman in Washington and representing the 20th District of California. You've been in now over a, just over a year?

• 11:34Speaker 03

  Yes, yes. I celebrated my one year congressional anniversary, I think a couple of weeks ago.

• 11:38Speaker 01

  So, how's it going?

• 11:40Speaker 03

  Uh, it's a hectic time. I mean, you know, just when you think things can't get busier, it does. With, with what's going around, uh, across the, the country, trying to deal with this reconciliation package with the, the tax rates and then the border and then of course our military investments and things like that. And then you see what's going on around the world.

• 11:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:58Speaker 03

  It puts everything in, in, in, I guess, added perspective in terms of just what we're doing and how much we have to act with a sense of urgency. There's just, there's just so much going on.

• 12:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. You came in at a really interesting time because you also had, there was also a, a change of the presidency, it's a, the national election. And so, a lot, I'm sure.

• 12:17Speaker 03

  Yeah, I was, I was like, yeah, I got elected in May of last year and then of course sworn in after Memorial Day, uh, recess, uh, last year. And then, uh, and then that was, yeah, that was under the previous administration. And then now, starting in January, we've been, we've been under the Trump administration and his cadence is, I mean, he wants to move faster and faster on so many things.

• 12:39Speaker 01

  Well, one thing that had to get moved on very quickly was the, um, expiration of the Tax Cut and Jobs Act. That was going to expire. It would expire at the end of this year. And so I know for our listeners, we were getting a lot of concerns and questions about, well, what's going to happen to our taxes? You know, if this expires, we were going to see it sunset and a lot of things were going to change. The House has kind of done its job. Um, but what, what can you talk about sort of your experience with, with, uh?

• 13:09Speaker 03

  Yeah, well, I mean, that's the thing that I guess everyone's kind of focused on, except for it's not getting a lot of attention in the kind of the broader mainstream media. But we do have a tax cliff that is going to happen at the end of this year. And so, part of the reconciliation process, and that's a fancy term in terms of just the budget processing in DC, where we have to reconcile our expenditures or the revenue. But the part of the reconciliation process of the one big beautiful bill, as the president refers to, is this making the tax cuts and jobs act permanent, and keeping the corporate tax rate low, keeping the tax rates where they are, extending the permanent debt tax relief, extending the small business deduction, the immediate expensing.

• 13:53Speaker 03

  I mean, everything that goes into it, the energy tax credits, there's a lot of controversy and a lot of debate going on with that, the opportunity zones. So, all of these provisions that are going to go into this tax reform piece is a part of this bill that's moving through. We moved through the House our version. The Senate is now releasing details, so there's going to be a lot of focus on that.

• 14:20Speaker 01

  Changes, potentially.

• 14:21Speaker 03

  And then I think the Senate, of course, is going to make some changes, and then we're going to have to come together and haggle it out. So, we're at halftime, and then I think the Senate's going to come in, I think today and tomorrow, I think they're supposed to release their version of the tax relief package. And then we're going to see kind of where we align and where we don't align, and then try to figure that out.

• 14:44Speaker 01

  So, this is interesting, because this is your first time going through a big bill like this that really is going to affect almost everybody's taxes. But it's not your first time to the rodeo. You worked with Bill Thomas, right, for a period of time, and then with Kevin McCarthy?

• 15:01Speaker 03

  Yep.

• 15:02Speaker 01

  So, there had to have been some times during there where you at least had some exposure to the process.

• 15:05Speaker 03

  Oh, sure. I mean, when Congressman Thomas was chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, that was when they did the last, well, there was a huge tax cut package that came through with George W. Bush. And then, you know, when Kevin was in office, a lot of extensions and trying to prevent expirations of different tax provisions. And then I wasn't with him when he became a speaker, but as someone who served in the state legislature, you know, we go through our budget fights constantly. And I think that we're having one right now in Sacramento. But that's the interesting thing right now is that a lot of people try to silo it off, like where the federal government does one thing, and the state government does its other

• 15:46Speaker 03

  thing. They're tied together. My hope is that there's more partnership than acrimony. But what we do on the federal side has big impacts in the state and vice versa.

• 15:57Speaker 01

  Well, yeah, I mean, California is by far the largest contributor to the federal tax base by twice as much as our next competitor, which would be maybe New York or Texas. And we contribute a lot in taxes. So, you know, it's great for us to have some representation.

• 16:15Speaker 03

  Yeah, no, I mean, people don't realize if we don't act and extend the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, I mean, you're going to see over 100,000 families in our community that's going to see, you know, their child tax credit cut in half. We're going to have over 400,000 taxpayers that will be affected by the tax increases. You know, 41,000 small businesses are affected. So this is a significant piece of legislation that we got to get right because it's all designed to try to ensure stability in our tax code so that businesses can invest. But also, we want to generate more economic activity. That's the key to dealing with

• 16:57Speaker 03

  our debt and deficit is, you know, growing the economy, creating more GDP.

• 17:02Speaker 01

  Yes, that's right. In fact, we got a listener question, Sammy, that I think is appropriate.

• 17:07Speaker 00

  Yes, we do. Yeah. This came just today. When you guys have time, and if you are aware, can you break down the proposed budget that is supposed to help small businesses? What can we expect when it comes to incentives? Linda and Randy Gibbs. Thank you for the question.

• 17:22Speaker 03

  Well, I mean, there's a lot in this tax relief package that's supposed to spur, you know... Economic investment and incentives in general. So certainly, we're going to keep the tax rates low. We want to allow for immediate expensing for small businesses. There's tax credits for advanced manufacturing to spur more domestic manufacturing of the things that we need to make our economy go. There's immediate expensing for equipment that helps our farmers and ranchers as well. Providing tax relief for those who in agricultural space who want to pass on their businesses from generation to generation. We make permanent.

• 18:03Speaker 01

  Estate tax.

• 18:04Speaker 03

  Estate tax relief.

• 18:05Speaker 01

  Estate tax.

• 18:06Speaker 03

  There's opportunity zones that I think that we want to get renewed that will spur more investments in our downtown centers as well as throughout our community. Those are some of the other things I'm trying to think. But keeping the tax rate low, that's going to be critical for our small businesses because a lot of small businesses, the small business owners, they pay their taxes through as personal income, not as a corporation.

• 18:34Speaker 01

  Correct. Yeah. And many of our businesses in town are related either to oil or ag. So let's talk about ag first because I know that you've had some involvement with, which I was new to some of the work that you've done with the Lake Success Enlargement Project. Maybe you can kind of share with us or with our listeners kind of your take on what's happening with water and ag.

• 18:59Speaker 03

  Well, there's a lot going on in the water space. But certainly, we're trying to increase water storage. We were successful in getting the Lake Success, the dam, to be raised 10 feet, which doesn't sound like a lot, but that creates 28,000 new acre feet of new water storage, which we don't talk acre feet a lot, but that's equivalent to 9.1 billion gallons of water. So we were able to raise the dam. We were able to create an emergency spillway. So that water now is available for those in the Tulare Basin. We have two state water projects. We have two water projects. We have the State system and the federal system. So, you know, science reservoir is important.

• 19:44Speaker 03

  We're trying to get that done in the north. We want, we have a lot of conveyance facilities that we're trying to get enhanced. We've got some subsidence issues. So building more canals throughout our system. So we have a very complex way of getting water from the north to the south, and a lot of people don't realize that. So, so infrastructure in itself, water storage and more canals, that's important. But then also just aligning the, the way we pump water. So, you know, many people may remember the storms we got a couple of months ago. But when we get that water, we want to make sure it flows when we get it. And that's our challenge with based on restrictions and different mandates. Sometimes the state and or the federal government, they don't move the water when we have it. And so that's

• 20:27Speaker 03

  when you get these, these, these water fights. So aligning the systems, coordinating the state and federal systems, that's what the president called on them to do when he was first sworn into office. He issued an executive order saying, hey, look, you know, we need to align our systems. We can't have the state system and the federal system working opposite of each other. And so moving more water when we have it and storing it, that's, I mean, that's the basics of what we're trying to get done.

• 20:53Speaker 01

  Yeah. Again, we're joined by Congressman Vince Fong from the congressional 20th district, congressional district. Congressman Fong, the, you were in Sacramento before you were in Washington. And I know the general, the general feeling among us in, in Kern County is that Sacramento doesn't understand us. We feel, we kind of feel like we're outcasts a little bit. I think a lot of it has to do with the industries that we have here. But can you give us any sense of hope for what we're facing in terms of our, our oil and ag sectors?

• 21:32Speaker 03

  Yeah. Well, so oil and ag, that's our bread and butter. We add the aerospace industry that's off, that's at the East Kern, I guess, area, the Alamo Valley. I mean, those are the three key industries that make things go. As we talked about water, we're, we're building infrastructure. We want to streamline. We want to, we want to get water flowing. On the oil and energy side, I mean, Look, we have to invest in domestic energy production. I mean, this administration is probably the most pro-energy administration that we'll ever see in our lifetime because they just want more production, stable, affordable energy. Because, look, we have our own homes and businesses that we got to power, but if we're right and we got to be dominant in AI and commercial space and quantum, all these new emerging technologies, right?

• 22:15Speaker 03

  I mean, the key choke point in getting all of those technologies to mature is can we power them? Can we actually have a baseload power to keep them going constantly, 24/7? So that's why we're so focused on energy as a country because, look, China has become very anti-West. They're our biggest adversary and they're investing to scale a lot of these new technologies because they want to dominate in that space just as much as we do and we got to get there first. Now, this ties to, will California be part of that mix? And that's the ultimate, like, trillion-dollar question, right? Because we, in our community, we have a role to play.

• 23:00Speaker 03

  We're the energy production capital of California. We are 70% of the state's oil and gas. We're 60% of the state's renewable energy. There is no energy goal that can be met without us. Right. So we have to be part of the conversation. So all the streamlining that we're doing on the federal side, you know, we got to get the state to streamline CEQA. We have the Bureau of Land Management that's now going to be the lead agency. They've made this announcement a couple of weeks ago. Now we can begin to do mineral exploration on federal lands. That will be huge for us. There's talk now of some activity in the state of California just because after the big announcement with Phillips 66 and Valero. Yeah, that's one thing I want to talk about. The two refineries announcing their closure, the average person says, okay, well, why

• 23:45Speaker 03

  should I be concerned about two refineries closing? Well, that's 20% of refining capacity going, being eliminated overnight. Right. I mean, this is like one year, 20%. Right. So we're looking at fuel shortages, we're looking at gas spikes making us more vulnerable to what goes on overseas. I mean, when we talked about that, that was before what happened with Israel and Iran, right? Now, I mean, we're now at the, California is at the whim of what happens on the global market. So we have to have our stable supply. So now I think there is kind of awakening in Sacramento saying, okay, well, we probably do need to be more responsible in our energy production. So I hope that they'll, you know, they'll approve the EIR and do a lot of things

• 24:30Speaker 03

  that will get these permits going because we got to ensure that our refining capacity stays where they are and expand it, hopefully. We also have to provide them with domestic oil and gas because, you know, why should our refineries get gasoline or get oil from foreign countries? We should get it from us.

• 24:49Speaker 00

  Right.

• 24:50Speaker 03

  And then, and then we need to build the infrastructure, the pipelines and, and the key infrastructure to get the oil from point A to point B. That's what, if we do that correctly, then we'll have a more stable supply and the prices will stabilize.

• 25:02Speaker 00

  Now, I was just going to follow up on the 20% reduction, potential reduction in oil or gas production from these two refineries. And my, I guess I'm going to go to what Sherrod said earlier. Is there hope that these two refiners don't close? Is there talks, are there talks between, I don't know if you're aware of any?

• 25:21Speaker 03

  There are, there are conversations that, you know, the governor has, has called on the California Energy Commission to, to figure this out. And of course, look, we warned about the dangers of a lot of these policy decisions and, and what would happen. You know, how does a company that is, that you want to invest in, in refining capacity? A new refinery in the United States is probably close to a billion dollars.

• 25:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 25:48Speaker 03

  So if you're, if you're an investor and you need, and you realize that you've got to invest a billion dollars to build a new refining, a new refinery, or to expand an existing refinery, why would you invest when the regulatory climate is so difficult? Or you've got a state government that doesn't want you around, right? So why would you do that? And so this is the challenge. This is why the, when we talk about the business climate, this is a real world like conversation and consequence of like when, when the state of California says, we want to eliminate oil and gas and it may, and it's not feasible. Well, that also triggers an economic reaction.

• 26:22Speaker 01

  Right.

• 26:22Speaker 03

  Like if I'm, if I'm a company like Valero or Phillips, right? I'm going to move my resources to a state that actually wants me there.

• 26:30Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 26:31Speaker 03

  And, and, and the, the danger of this is that not only does it impact California, and of course I'm a Californian and we want to make sure that California has a stable gasoline supply. But now it affects other states because gas, because Arizona and Nevada, they get their gasoline from us too. So now you've got a ripple effect. Now what's going on in California impacts the, the drivers in Arizona and Nevada. So we've got to get this straightened out because we, we're going to see not only economic consequences, but national security ones too, because look, we have military installations that also get our jet fuel from our refineries.

• 27:06Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. It, it, it's a, it's a major concern of ours is the, the drying up of capital that's available to invest in oil wells, anything that's, that's carbon fuel related, which I, I believe that, you know, it's just, it's such a divisive issue and it shouldn't be.

• 27:26Speaker 03

  It shouldn't be.

• 27:27Speaker 01

  It's something that affects all of us and we have reasonable ways forward to.

• 27:31Speaker 03

  You, you look at the, you look at the inflation numbers, the CPI numbers that came out a week, a week and a half ago, right? Inflation is stabilized and is, is trending downward, but why is that happening? Well, you talk to any economist and any, and, and most business leaders, the reason why the inflation is stabilized is because energy costs are going down. Now in California, we don't have that dynamic because we have, we're, we have, we're energy, we're an energy island.

• 27:56Speaker 01

  Right.

• 27:57Speaker 03

  So. While we're increasing production in gasoline and we're increasing production in oil and natural gas across the country, it's stalling out at the Californian border.

• 28:08Speaker 01

  Right.

• 28:08Speaker 03

  So our affordability crisis in our state is very real. And so this is why if we get the state of California to actually partner with us, we can begin to actually bend the cost curve, get the, get energy prices down, get gasoline prices down, which in turn with, well, you know, how do you, how do products and, and, and things get from, from point A to point B, they're trucked, they're, they're, they're good to rail. I mean, so when energy and gasoline costs go up, it makes everything more expensive.

• 28:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:36Speaker 03

  So that's why the president is so focused on energy, because that's the key component to reducing the cost of living in, in, across the country.

• 28:43Speaker 01

  Well, I know in California, here at least in, in the central valley, like we, we've been shouting this for a while, especially since money has dried up in that sector over five years ago. It's been, we've been shouting this because what, what I foresee happening, the only thing that really could change that is if there's more, a broader percentage of the general population across California is also upset about it. And what would get them upset about it would be nine, $10 a gallon gas.

• 29:12Speaker 03

  And you're, and you're seeing.

• 29:13Speaker 01

  Quickly.

• 29:14Speaker 03

  Yeah, you're, and you're seeing that awakening now.

• 29:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:16Speaker 03

  I mean, you.

• 29:16Speaker 01

  We're five bucks or so.

• 29:18Speaker 03

  You look at the analysis by CARB and by the California Energy Commission, I mean, their own analysis says that if we are in the current, on the current trajectory, if we do nothing and the refining capacity goes down, we are going to look at six, seven, eight, nine dollar per gallon prices for gasoline, and that's not sustainable. I mean, that's, it, it would be a shock to our economy, in addition to the fact that we're more, now more dependent on foreign countries.

• 29:45Speaker 00

  And we're not competitive at that point, to your point again. I mean, businesses need low cost of energy to operate.

• 29:50Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 29:51Speaker 00

  And if, if we're paying $10 a gallon on either fuels, whatever, gas or, or diesel, this just makes it a lot more difficult.

• 30:00Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 30:01Speaker 00

  To run a business.

• 30:02Speaker 03

  You, you talk to any resident in our community, any, any small business, you'll s- Number one cost is gonna be uh uh energy and then it's it's uh then it's regulatory costs and then if you talk to a family it's gonna be like food groceries.

• 30:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:18Speaker 03

  Right and and so so when we talk about an affordability crisis in our state, I mean it's it's electricity bills, it's gasoline and it's food.

• 30:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:25Speaker 03

  I mean that's what's that's what that is what's uh causing people's budgets to get strained.

• 30:30Speaker 01

  Yeah, again, we're joined by Vince Fong, he's a congressman representing us at for the congressional 20th congressional district. Congressman Fong, you've been outspoken against the high-speed rail or at least the management of what's going on with the high-speed rail. You know, I I think that, you know, I I come from a place where I feel like I've had really very good experiences using rail in other countries. It seems like very nice and and easy. I wish that this is a project for me that I always wished that it would work, that it would, you know, would come in on budget and on time. But obviously, as we all know, as time goes on, it's become more and more of feeling like like it's just a running joke now here locally.

• 31:15Speaker 03

  Yep.

• 31:16Speaker 01

  We're you you you just, you know, it's synonymous with never gonna happen.

• 31:19Speaker 03

  Mm-hmm.

• 31:19Speaker 01

  And yet, it's happening. And so we're we're living in these two worlds where no, they're going forward, like there's you drive up the 99, you'll see them working on it. There's there's thousands of workers, there's there's infrastructure going in, but...

• 31:31Speaker 03

  Well, it's it's stalling out. I mean, look, the the the California High-Speed Rail Authority has been plagued with mismanagement. And, you know, they've been using unrealistic wireship numbers, you know, because of of their structural flaws, you know, it's cost delays and it just it's just not functioning. You're correct. If you go to if you look at other countries, that the reason why and and even those countries, they're subsidized.

• 31:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:56Speaker 03

  But what makes them function relatively better than clearly what we have is that it connects major urban centers to major urban centers, million people to a million people.

• 32:06Speaker 01

  Is it Merced major?

• 32:07Speaker 03

  I mean, so so it's look, it's people people always say refer to like Bakersfield to Merced, right?

• 32:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:13Speaker 03

  It doesn't even get to Bakersfield right now.

• 32:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:15Speaker 03

  It it stops short outside of a field in Shafter and it stops at it goes to an orchard outside of Merced.

• 32:21Speaker 01

  Right.

• 32:21Speaker 03

  So to say it's Bakersfield, Merced is even a stretch. And and that cost to that segment is $33 billion. Right, this whole, that was supposed to be the cost of the whole system to be finished from LA to San Francisco by 2020. We're now at 2025 with a cost of 33 billion for the Central Valley system, which isn't feasible or functional. And then the whole system from LA to San Francisco is 128 billion dollars. So if we were going to invest 128 billion dollars as a state, right? And we went to the local Starbucks and said, okay, like, I'm gonna, I'm gonna put 128 billion dollars for us to allocate, but what would you want those resources to be invested in?

• 33:05Speaker 03

  I would venture that it's schools, it's roads, it's hospitals.

• 33:08Speaker 01

  It's water.

• 33:09Speaker 03

  Public safety, it's water, it's preventing catastrophic wildfires. I mean, you could list a whole host of things and none, and high-speed rail would never be part of that mix. Now, we're gonna, I think Secretary Duffy, the Transportation Secretary, he's gonna pull back the 4 billion dollars that's, that I think is currently slated to go, but just because it's gonna get lost in the black hole that it's currently in. But the state of California is gonna spend a billion dollars every single year. So if you look at Governor Newsom's current budget, he puts in a billion dollars every single year forever into the future until this thing gets done. Now, let's, let's put, let's put a billion dollars for us to discuss as a state. And all of us would say, okay, California is in a, is in a, in a world of hurt, right?

• 33:53Speaker 03

  So you, wouldn't you put a billion dollars into our hospitals, into our schools, into, into a whole host of things, water storage? Right, that would be a better use of, of a billion dollars than, than, than what we got now.

• 34:04Speaker 01

  But we're, but we're now to the point where we have potentially a lot of sunk costs. And so, you know, I'm always an advocate of being aware of the sunk cost fallacy, you know, which is, you know, you, you've got to cut your losses at some point, but like, what do we do with those losses?

• 34:21Speaker 03

  So I, I put a lot of thought into this. And, and my, my argument would be, okay, if you have a stranded asset from, from Shafter, outside of Shafter and outside of Merced, what do you do with it? Right? I would say that you, you would ditch the passenger idea and you would make it a high-speed cargo. And actually- Make our supply chain function a little better. So you put industrial, we would put an inland port outside of Fresno. You would expand the Visalia Industrial Park. You would expand the shaft intermodal. You put chassis there, you'd move containers up and down. So if you had 300 or 400 containers going up and down the valley through high-speed cargo, then you actually have a usable asset where it would be making money.

• 34:59Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 35:00Speaker 03

  Right?

• 35:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 35:00Speaker 03

  And then, and at that point, you've got an additional way for the railroads to get, and the rail folks to get cargo up and down the state. That would be a better use. Now, you'd try to make up the money, but you mean you.

• 35:16Speaker 01

  It's gonna take years.

• 35:17Speaker 03

  It's gonna take years.

• 35:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 35:18Speaker 03

  But that would be a better use of the asset because you're gonna have a stranded asset. And what are you gonna do with it? If they keep pouring billions and billions of dollars into this passenger fallacy that to try to stop every other, every 15 minutes, right? You're never gonna get high speed.

• 35:35Speaker 01

  No, exactly.

• 35:35Speaker 03

  You're never gonna get high speed. I've ridden the Amtrak from Bakersfield to Sacramento. You're stopping every, you're stopping every 15 miles.

• 35:42Speaker 01

  You cannot achieve the 300 mile per hour.

• 35:45Speaker 03

  And you're not gonna, and look, you're not gonna reduce carbon. You're not gonna take any cars off the road. You're not, at least my proposal, you would take trucks off the road. And you would actually, and you would have a functional, you know, a functional asset.

• 35:57Speaker 01

  So they're not, are they taking that into consideration?

• 36:00Speaker 03

  I don't think so. I mean, they're too rigid in what they're trying to do. But like, I've talked to some folks and said, look, you know, take my advice from what it is. Like, I think that that's a better alternative than what you've got now. You probably wouldn't have to spend $33 billion.

• 36:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 36:15Speaker 03

  Right? You could, you would spend significantly less. And then at least we have something to use in the valley. But at this current rate, if they're gonna keep going down this path, then let's just scrap the whole thing and then save the money. And then, and then let the, and let the private rail folks use it, use the alignment.

• 36:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, I wish there was more of understanding of what the alternatives would be. Because I know for me personally, it's just hard to think like, oh, my gosh, we're gonna cut our losses after all these billions of dollars and we're not gonna have anything. We're just gonna have like a.

• 36:45Speaker 03

  And that's a better way, but like you look at, you look at the, you look at the executive orders that the president has signed on transportation and aviation, you look at what Secretary Duffey has, he's, they're going to streamline the testing of EV like planes and drones and, and the way that we get around, so you know, the way that transportation is going to be affected, I mean, we might not be riding trains, you know, 20, 30 years from now.

• 37:11Speaker 01

  Hovercraft?

• 37:13Speaker 03

  We're going to be flying over the, we're going to fly over the valley.

• 37:15Speaker 01

  Yeah, baby. Now we're talking.

• 37:17Speaker 03

  And they're, and they're testing a lot of technologies. They want to, they want to use them during the Olympics, right? So they want to be able to call your own Uber of EV taxis and fly over LA, which you know is going to be way better instead of getting around LA during that time.

• 37:32Speaker 01

  There's the answer, robots, flying robots.

• 37:35Speaker 03

  So if that's the technology that we're, that we're going to try to advance in the next 20, 30 years, well, then why are we still focused on like old fashioned rail?

• 37:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, great, great to just leapfrog the leading technology that's out there right now to transport mass population and to have some, you know, flying robots would be fantastic.

• 37:53Speaker 03

  And rail is still using technology too, but again, for the cargo side, that makes sense.

• 37:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 37:58Speaker 03

  That's what, I mean, they, let them do what they do best and improve our supply chain.

• 38:02Speaker 01

  Yeah. Again, we're joined by Vince Fong. Congressman Fong, recently in the news has been the skim act, which you are one of the authors, is that correct?

• 38:13Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 38:14Speaker 01

  So this was also new to me, and I'm sure a lot of our listeners wouldn't be aware of this, but essentially EBT system is run off of essentially debit cards that people are issued. So this is people that are on Medi-Cal, it's kind of the, it's taking place of the food stamp program.

• 38:29Speaker 03

  It's CalFresh, yeah.

• 38:30Speaker 01

  CalFresh, so you know, generally it's supposed to be used for those who don't have the funds to be able to pay for their food. But because it's on these debit cards, it sounds like what's happening is people are being essentially the skim, being skimmed and their cards are being cloned and then they're just, their money's basically being used by some crooks using their money. Does that simplify it?

• 38:52Speaker 03

  Yeah, I mean, this is a bill I introduced. I'm the lead and Congressman Valdejo, Congressman Young Kim from Orange County, and then Congressman Addison McDowell from North Carolina, they're co-sponsors this with me. But this is a growing problem, not only in our community, but across California and across the United States. People don't realize, so in the last seven months, Kern County alone, $2 million of EBT benefits were stolen from vulnerable families. That's crazy. That need benefits. If you look at from 2021 to today, $439 million stolen in California alone. So you, and people think, okay, these are, they're just criminals, right? They're just people that just steal. No, these are organized, like international crime rings.

• 39:37Speaker 03

  That are stealing these credit cards, and they're cloning them, and they're using them to steal benefits. So we, and so not only are they preying on vulnerable communities and vulnerable families, but then it costs the state of California and the federal government twice. Because we still have to make the families whole. Right. So now you have Romanian, you know, gang members that have stolen, which is true. I mean, you look at, if you look, if you talk to the district attorney, the last big scandal that happened in, where they stole these $2 million, it's tied to Romania, to Romanian illegal immigrants. Wow. That took the money, and now the money is overseas. But we still have to pay the families to take care of them and give them the benefits of the need.

• 40:21Speaker 03

  So the government's paying twice. Right.

• 40:25Speaker 00

  It's almost a billion, it's a billion dollars.

• 40:26Speaker 03

  It's a billion dollars. That we're losing. So, so this is why, and so this is why it's important, we have, so we call for the US Attorney General to improve coordination with state and local law enforcement to go after these organized crime rings. We increase the penalties on those who scam or use equipment to steal people's debit cards. And then we also try to do some best practices, so that if New York is doing something good, or if Arizona's done something well, that we're not recreating the wheel, we're trying to incentivize and share information. So, you know, I'm A huge advocate and fan of the use of blockchain technology for these very purposes.

• 41:10Speaker 03

  So like if if another state says, okay, we're using blockchain to prevent fraud because we know it's more difficult to hack, right, why not allow us to learn from those states?

• 41:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 41:20Speaker 03

  And say, okay, if they're doing it, like, we should do it, too. So so we're trying to increase penalties to deter the behavior. When we catch them, we put them in jail, and then we're trying to at least incentivize states to improve their systems.

• 41:32Speaker 01

  That's great. I mean, it's it financial fraud is still a major, major problem among individuals, not just those on EBT, but it's happens all the time.

• 41:41Speaker 03

  You look at you look at during the pandemic.

• 41:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 41:43Speaker 03

  That I mean, you had you had those who were trying to get unemployment benefits, and you had billions of dollars being stolen. And again, it wasn't these like people sitting in a garage next door to your house. It's it's literally like from Russia, from from Eastern Europe, from

• 41:57Speaker 00

  Organized crime.

• 41:58Speaker 03

  Yeah, from China, you know?

• 41:59Speaker 01

  Yeah. Since you've been a member of Congress in in DC, has there been anything that's been? What's been the most surprising thing that you've learned?

• 42:09Speaker 03

  That's a good question. Uh, you know, I think the the the cadence, the pace of everything is a lot faster. I mean, have come coming from the state of California, uh, you know, it's it was a good training ground, right? Because you're dealing with such a massive economy and so many different issues. And California kind of dabbles a little bit into the international global

• 42:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 42:30Speaker 03

  affairs in in terms of what's going on around the world. But to be in DC now with in the majority, I never served in the majority until now. Right? So even with the small majority, so, you know, now what's going on around the working with the president, working with the Senate. I mean, I remember walking to the Oval Office for the first time and like in the president's there, and he he wants to talk about, you know, water and wildfires and all the things going on in California. I mean, it's like

• 42:56Speaker 01

  It's another level, right? Basically, you can walk into the White House.

• 43:00Speaker 03

  It's a surreal experience. I mean, and if there's a problem, I call the White House and say, I've got this, you know, we can we work, can we work out something and try to figure this out? And I mean, I will use this example. I was in the state legislature for seven and a half years. I met I met the governor of California probably two or three times in my seven years. In my first month in office in January, I met the president four times.

• 43:25Speaker 03

  I mean, just put that perspective in terms of how that, how that, how that works.

• 43:30Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, it, it, you know, this is another kind of superficial question, but we oftentimes, us as voters will get inundated with some, some drive, doesn't matter what it is, but it's always write your congressman, write, write your congressman, and here's a letter, you can even, we've been writing it for you, you just need to sign it, either stick it in the mail or email it. So my question, this is a long way about it, but my question is, how, how does, how does your, an office like yours filter through sometimes thousands of letters that come through? What's the process?

• 44:07Speaker 03

  Yeah, I get, I get a report from my, for every single issue that comes through, email, mail, social media, and so people think, okay, you don't, you don't read what, what we sent to you. No, we do, we do. And I mean, I, I mean, I get, I get a report and I read it over and so I know.

• 44:22Speaker 01

  What the issues are.

• 44:23Speaker 03

  I know the issues and what people, you know, the, the challenge right now is like, you know, for us, our issues are so large. You know, a lot of people, you know, want to demonize people and, and for me, I've always viewed myself as like I'm a problem solver. You know, whether people agree with me or not, I'll listen to them and try to take their ideas. And sometimes I'll agree with them and sometimes I won't. But they gotta be constructive comments. If, if they want to just call me names and do what, and whatever, they're entitled to do that. They have first amendment rights to do that. And, and I have no problem with, with, with all of that. They can get on social media and they can call me every name in the book. But when it comes to solving a problem, whether it's the solvency of, of, of Medicaid, whether it's trying to deal with what's going on

• 45:07Speaker 03

  around the world, improving our military, building more water storage, how do we build more roads, how do we better allocate our, our taxpayer resources? I'm open to every idea that's out there. But if your only way is, if your only solution is, don't do anything and you're a bad person. Well, that doesn't work in your, it doesn't work in my household. I mean, it doesn't work in yours. I mean, so it doesn't, we're all human beings. And I think that that is what we're trying to, there's a lot of good people on both sides of the aisle. I have a lot of friends of mine that I worked in Sacramento with and I worked now in DC. Who are, who are all elected to represent their communities in their own way. And I try to respect that. They're duly elected by their community and they're going to fight for what they believe in. And I'm going to fight for mine.

• 45:49Speaker 03

  And we're going to try to find a way to find some solutions.

• 45:53Speaker 01

  Now, you have to come from a legacy that Kevin, I know Kevin McCarthy's office was known for being very responsive to just citizen issues. You know, somebody's got an issue with social security.

• 46:04Speaker 00

  He's predecessor to you.

• 46:05Speaker 01

  And his predecessor, yeah. Bill, Bill Thomas was the same way. You know, like you've got a problem with, we've had clients who've had problems either with the IRS or with social security.

• 46:14Speaker 00

  Out of my own experience with him, my wife used to intern for, for the former congressman, not McCarthy, but Bill Thomas. And I had an immigration issue when I first was going through my immigration status. And she wrote him a letter. And he was giving me an update on my immigration status almost every week through his office. I'm not kidding. This, this, this is a true story. Me, personally, it happened to me. My wife wrote the letter, he remembered who she was and he wrote to her every week, giving her an update.

• 46:39Speaker 03

  That's probably the most important thing that we do. I mean, the, the, the staff I have and the work that we do, just with anyone that has any issues with, with a federal agency, social security, Medicare, trying to get a visa or trying to, I mean, we, we, we're getting calls now. We, we've got constituents that are in Israel.

• 46:57Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 46:58Speaker 03

  And, and they, and they're trying to find a way back home. Now, there's a, that's a little bit more difficult situation right now. But we, you know, we're working with the embassy to try to figure out if, if there, if there are ways to get them home. But, I mean, so, yeah, there's, there, if you've, if, if anyone out there listening, if they've got any issues with the federal government in terms of their benefits, the military benefits or VA benefits or, or social security or anything else. And they, and they're, they're hitting a roadblock. I mean, feel free to call my office. And we'll we'll definitely try to help.

• 47:26Speaker 01

  It it's it gives me hope that there's still way for if some letter on the rights on the right stationary or coming from the right email can get grease the wheels, you know?

• 47:37Speaker 00

  It does, it does.

• 47:38Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah. No, we we encourage everyone to reach out to us. I mean, they've got an opinion. They've got a thought. I mean, look, we want we want to hear from them. Sometimes I'll agree with them. Sometimes I won't. But this is part of this is part of the process. And look, I'm elected to represent our community, whether they agree with me or not. And I want to hear their opinion.

• 47:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 47:56Speaker 00

  Congressman got me my flag that's in my office. It was flown on Capitol Hill.

• 48:00Speaker 01

  Oh, nice.

• 48:01Speaker 00

  Yeah, under my family name.

• 48:02Speaker 01

  Oh, that's cool. It's great. Another great service.

• 48:04Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 48:05Speaker 01

  Uh, and and it's always it's always nice to visit. My son lives in Washington DC. Um, but it's always nice to visit. And if, you know, if you have time, certainly.

• 48:14Speaker 03

  We we offered we offered tours of of the Capitol. Um, you know, we we do offer flags that were flown on top of the US Capitol. So a lot of times people want to celebrate different milestones. Um, and so, you know, we we provide that too. So, um, yeah, there's a there's a lot of things that that we do, uh, just in our congressional office on a day to day level, um, that is separate from just the the the policymaking process. So.

• 48:39Speaker 00

  We talked a lot about a lot of types of capitals, water, infrastructure, human capital is very important to me. So is what are some of the things that your office and the federal government are doing or contemplating doing for us to just make our people more attractive to manufacturers and and just employers in general?

• 49:00Speaker 03

  So so workforce, the workforce challenges that we have, not only in it within our community, but across the country, is that's that's an issue that comes up a lot now, right? I mean, after the pandemic, everyone's like, okay, we got to increase productivity. We got to find people. We need, I mean, for our community, you know, we need, you know, we're trying to create pathways into multiple careers because we we no one from the outside is going to come in and save us, right? So we need more doctors, we need more nurses, we need more pharmacists, we need more engineers. I mean, we need, we need a lot of things, welders. I mean, so from from a from a trade side. So how do we, working with with with Cal State Bakersfield? Uh, working with Fresno State, working with our community colleges. I mean, like, we're trying to get them like, look, we need to build better partnerships

• 49:43Speaker 03

  uh, with, with private sector industries and say, okay, what do we need? Cause it's not like a, a company now or a small business has two years to wait for someone to come in and like, hey, I need a welder or I need, I need a, I need an engineer and I'm gonna wait for that long. Maybe we need to look at different types of apprenticeship programs or different things, different ways to say, hey, can we, can we get these kids in, in real time? Get them a certificate, get them into the workforce and address a need right away. So that's gonna be an ongoing uh, thing. And then of course, AI is gonna be part of that conversation too. I think AI is gonna be uh, the great multiplier in terms of productivity. But we gotta make sure that our region isn't, isn't lost in the AI revolution.

• 50:24Speaker 03

  So we gotta make sure that we are teaching AI to our kids, we're developing that curriculum. I had legislation and we're, we're working on, on reintroducing it. But to actually um, create uh, eight centers of excellence and community colleges to teach AI to students across the country. We want one right here in the Central Valley. Um, cause I think that's gonna be the key, uh, you know, when it comes to advanced manufacturing. I mean, robotics and AI are gonna be part of that mix.

• 50:49Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 50:49Speaker 03

  But AI is going to impact every single industry, both on the agricultural side, when it comes to precision farming, when it comes to manufacturing and robotics, when it comes to medicine, I mean, the, the, the sky's the limit. But we gotta be ready for that. Um, and, and again, our adversaries like China specifically is investing heavily in AI right now and they wanna overtake us economically and they're gonna try to use AI to do that. So we have to now um, take that very seriously.

• 51:16Speaker 00

  And we saw that with just their version of chat GPT, how cheap it was for them to develop.

• 51:21Speaker 03

  Sure. Now, they probably took it from us. They probably, they probably, you know, copied it from us.

• 51:25Speaker 00

  Right.

• 51:26Speaker 03

  So that's the thing that we gotta be concerned about. And look, I mean. China has become very adversarial to America and we need to take that threat very seriously. And so for us as a country, that's the one unifying thing right now. If you want to talk about what unifies us in DC is that, hey, we gotta win. America has got to win the next generation, the next century, and China is trying to threaten us on that.

• 51:51Speaker 01

  At a minimum, we should at least be viewing China as a competitor. Even if you wanted to call them an evil competitor, whatever, but they are a competitor on the world market. And they have the ability to be much more nimble within their economy than we can. They can make, obviously, authoritarian decisions and boom, it's done. Here, we've got to be proactive.

• 52:13Speaker 03

  One of the biggest issues that we're trying to deal with right now is our supply chain resiliency. I mean, you guys, you probably all talk to all the local businesses here. I mean, I use this historical example, and I think it's true today. Imagine us during the Cold War. Would we ever allow the Soviet Union to make 70 to 80% of our things that we need to function as an economy? We would say absolutely not. America's got to lead. Well, fast forward to today. We are in a great powers competition with China, and they do make 70 to 80% of the things that we need, whether it's critical minerals, computing, pharmaceuticals, medicine. So we have to figure out now how to bring all of that back, that manufacturing to either the United States or to countries that actually like us.

• 52:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 52:52Speaker 03

  And I think that's, and you see that playing out now in a lot of conversations, whether it's on trade, in manufacturing, and other things. That's like, it's not reported very well in the media, but that's what we're trying to do.

• 53:04Speaker 00

  That's why I need to take the congressman to Morocco, so he can develop some relationships there.

• 53:08Speaker 01

  There you go.

• 53:09Speaker 00

  It's a friendly country.

• 53:10Speaker 01

  Have you been to Morocco before?

• 53:11Speaker 03

  For one day, when I went to Spain.

• 53:13Speaker 01

  Hey, that counts. That counts. He was there. He's been on the soil. Hey, thank you so much Congressman Fong for taking the time out of your busy schedule, coming on the Money Wise Show. Very informative.

• 53:25Speaker 00

  Fair.

• 53:25Speaker 01

  We blew right through the commercials, covered so much territory. Really appreciate the work that you're doing.

• 53:30Speaker 03

  Thanks for having me.

• 53:30Speaker 01

  And thanks for being here and representing Bakersfield. I want to remind all of our listeners, if you missed this or any of our previous shows, you can find us wherever you subscribe to your podcasts. In the meantime, remember these three things: be smart, be safe, and always...

• 53:44Speaker 03

  Be Money Wise.