Bill Meyer Show Podcast - Sponsored by Clouser Drilling www.ClouserDrilling.com - 05-05-26_TUESDAY_6AM

Episode Date: May 5, 2026

Morning news, the GOP pillow fight on KOIN tv, Asante in trouble, the ONA apparently can not COUNT. Bryan Riley from National Taxpayers Union says the president can do THIS to really get more cars built here...

This hour of the Bill Meyer Show podcast is proudly sponsored by Klausur drilling. They've been leading the way in Southern Oregon well drilling for more than 50 years. Find out more about them at Klausurrilling.com. Now more with Bill Meyer. You got a pebble in your shoe. Go ahead and check in. 770563-770 KMED. Pebble in your shoe Tuesday.

Forget when we started that, but I always kind of liked the name. You know, it's like that old, oh, grasshopper, have a pebble in your shoe, right? Well, it's that kind of day. And, you know, one pebble in my shoe this morning is how difficult it is when the Republican candidates for governor end up having a debate. And we're told, that's okay. All right, go ahead. Just find it online. You know, we don't have to have things on satellite or on your television set anymore.

Find it online. Okay. So yesterday, yeah, there was another Republican pillow fight, a pillow fight rather. Yep, another Republican candidate pillow fight this time on Coin Six TV. And they called it a debate. And I said, okay, so it's on Coin Six in Portland. Okay, great. So I go over to Coin Six.

Coin Six, the television website, first off, you would think that if you're having the debate and it's taking over your channel, that you would have like one click, one click, watch debate here. Oh, no. Here, download this app for your Apple Firest. No, your Apple TV, and then do this for your Amazon Firestick and download this app for this and that and the other. No, just, how about just a click on the website? Debate here. No, no, no, no. Well, I guess maybe it's because it's a liberal Portland TV station and they didn't really want to advertise it too much. Yeah, we're doing it. It's kind of a sympathy lovemaking, a set. with the Republicans will let them come in here and do their thing. And we'll pretend that we're going to be fair and balanced about it. I mean, they did okay. Did okay.

But finally, after doing some search for a number of minutes, I just said, okay, Coin Six live stream, just the live stream for live events. And then it pops up on a search and I was able to go to it. I don't know why they couldn't make it easy and just put that on Coin Six's website. Maybe they didn't really want you to watch the Republican candidates. I don't know. Truth be told, it wasn't a debate, though. I was thinking, are we actually going to have a debate?

For once, I wanted to see a debate. I wanted to see somebody call out Drazen on her crap, and Drazen called out Dudley on his crap, and Ed Deal call out everybody on their crap, whatever. I just wanted to see them throw some punches. Not a punch. Not a figure. My gosh, we're just all friends here. We may have a little bit of a minor disagreement or so, but which one of us is better?

I don't know. We're just all friends. I might be exaggerating a little bit on that. But I finally got into it like at 715 to 720. It started at 7.50, supposedly. But at 7.15 and 720, I was finally able to find a link and got and watched the rest of it. And it ended at 8 o'clock. It wasn't all that different from what happened up in Northern Oregon a couple of weeks ago, which was also not a debate.

It's like question and answer. And they would just change the order of who answers the questions. I don't know how that ends up being a debate. Debate to me was always like you answer and you also respond to what other people said on the stage too and call them out. I scratched out a few notes and see. And of course they had to make a big deal about would you accept an endorsement from President Trump, right? and a deal says he's not seeking any presidential endorsements.

Dudley said he would declare an emergency when he becomes governor and he would accept an endorsement. Drazen, would you support another walkout? She'll work with Democrats and avoid that. Bethel would support a walkout if we had to encourage it and she would. Dudley, as governor, there would not be a walkout as he would come into office with a mandate.

Good for you, Chris. and Ed Deal said there wouldn't be a need for a walkout. It would be like an earthquake being elected as governor, and I'd be working across the aisle, like being in the legislature, you know, that kind of thing. Let's see. On the state budget, like I said, these are just notes I scratched out, okay? Dresen said, lots of fat, more on schools. We're paying more for schools, getting less Oregon Department of Education,

burdensome Oregon Health Authority, too big. That's the biggest agency wants to cut OHA. I'm good with that. Bethel says the big problem with all our big state agencies is that it diminishes our local control, undermining our local health authority, OHA especially. Dudley says super audits the first day that he is in office. He's an outsider. And OHA is bigger than the Center for Medicare for Medicare services in the federal government.

Why we have that? It's actually an interesting point. Ed Deal proposing 10% budget cuts. says the state budget is doubled in 10 years, 100% detailed performance in every agency audit is what he's looking to do. Let's see. Vote by mail, they talked about vote by mail. Ed Deal says, yeah, I want voter ID, proof of citizenship, not calling to eliminate vote by mail. All right.

Drazen says wants to move to in-person, keeping the option open for absentees. Bethel says she signed an initiative petition to repeal vote by mail firmly believes that the organ is reactive. on this. And Dudley was saying, we need to restore that lost confidence. So I'm sorry, these are just notes. I'm just scratching out. Oh, abortion. Yeah, this is a good one. Now Bethel, who's had two of them, apparently, she's admitted this, said that I believe the abortion is overreach, should not allow abortion up to birth. Okay, Drason says doesn't agree with abortion up to birth. Deal says he's pro-life. Governor Kotech is extreme, celebrates abortion. He'd like to celebrate a adoption and Dudley says he's pro-life.

Now, that was amazing for Dudley to say that he's pro-life because he told the Willamette Week last year in a video. It's on their website, as a matter of fact, that he's pro-choice. So I guess he's having it both ways. So I don't know. But you see, if it were a debate, if it were a true debate, Ed Deal or Christine Drazen or even Beth will come on and say, hey, what about that Willamette Week interview that you did? Were you lying then or are you lying?

or have you evolved? Now, it's okay. Maybe you've changed your mind, you know, over time. All right. The economy. In the pillow fight, Drazen says she'd be laser-focused on the economy, collaborative rather than competitive. Bethel says, I'm a small business owner. I have a plumbing business, right? Wants to rebuild business Oregon. Dudley says Oregon has gone from unfriendly to adversarial, and he says he will not outsource being the chief prosperity officer. he will be the chief prosperity officer. He wants to stop the cat tax. I think they all want to do that, really.

And as far as Ed Deal, I'm sorry, I had a phone call. It came right when Ed Deal was on the stream. It was my brother saying, hey, I'm going to be staying with you tomorrow, not Wednesday. And then Linda and I going into a mild panic because we've got to get the house ready. Yeah.

All right. So once I get done with the mild panic call from my brother, let's see. When it comes to education, Ed wants more accountability and testing, disciplining classrooms. Teachers' union wouldn't support getting... Oh, he wants to support getting rid of social, emotional learning. Absolutely. It's nonsense. Dudley wants to declare a state of emergency and education. Drazen and Bethel, pretty much same sort of thing. Ed Deal wants to go after sanctuary cities. Okay, that it just got to the point. I think I fell asleep. I think I fell asleep. So that That's a few of the notes from last night's Republican pillow fight.

It's 20 minutes after six. There's other news going on here, too. We'll talk about that here just a minute. You've got to comment on anything there since it is pebble in your shoe Tuesday. So my big pebble, why is it so hard to watch the gosh darn Republican candidate debates? Hmm? Hmm. Yeah. Don't Portland, Southern Oregon. What works for Portland politicians doesn't work here, and I won't let them force it on us.

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Speaking of that, I just heard that Dwayne. Yonker had. That would have been great having Dwayne Yonker up on stage. Now, I know he and Ed Deal are actually pretty good buddies. But I would imagine that if Dwayne Yonker had been on the gubernatorial candidate deal, because, you know, he's a junkyard dog, right?

Dwayne would be like a, uh, you'd be looking for a baseball bat. Okay, something needs to be struck. Love you, Dwayne. Something need, you know, these candidates all need bopped on the head just lightly. All right. you need something other than a pillow fight.

I guess it's too late. The ballots are already out there. You got Suzanne here. Hello, Suzanne. Good morning. And how are you this fine day, huh? Welcome. Well, I'm very fine.

Thank you for asking. I wanted to share something about mules that... Oh, yesterday, because I was talking about... We were talking about mules on the... on the Dr. Powers' history segment there because it was like the lost Frenchman's mind and I guess the guy was on his mule getting away from the Indians chasing him, right? Yes, and the mule didn't stumble, thank goodness.

Yeah, yeah. Mr. Kit Carson, who was a big-time hero and the history buffs for the West, he had to go to Washington three times, and three times he rode forth and back on a meal. On a mule. Okay. See, I normally think of that kind of travel as going on a horse would be better and faster. But am I wrong about that?

Meals are stronger. Oh. Tougher and don't need as much coaxing to do the wrong thing. Well, you know, the thing is, that's what people were writing me about mules and they said that you can't make mules do stupid things like maybe a horse to the same extent. Is that true? Limited knowledge, yes. Okay. Did you ever ride a mule going to school back in the day?

No, I only rode my bicycle. I wanted to have a big four foot. It was a tail of the main, but not to be. All right. Well, it is great hearing you this morning, and thank you very much for the call, Suzanne. You be well. You're welcome. Have a great day, sir.

You too. Now, say she called something positive there on Pebble in Your Shoe Tuesday. All right. So there we go. Now, the other news this morning, which I find very interesting, and I must say, I woke up this morning as I'm going through, and I ended up downloading last night that Asante memo, the Asante memo that Tom, is it Gessel or Gessel?

I think I'm going to say it's Gessel. Tom Gessel is the president and CEO of Asante. And, of course, runs RRMC. Of course, they're shutting down the Ashland Hospital and folding it in, kind of making it a care center, but not the birth center anymore. And then, of course, Three Rivers, you know, running that.

And so I download the letter and I'm reading it last night here. And, you know, essentially, the hospital's losing money and they're losing money big time. And the Oregon Nurses Association ends up responding to it. And I feel like I'm...

Well, I mean, Oregon Nurses Association I think it's in the process of destroying Providence. And I think they want to... They need to destroy Asante, too. I think that's part of it because, well, let me just read what Tom says. He's the president and the CEO. He's the guy, you know, in charge of Asante.

And they've lost about $16 million just the first half of this year. And they're on track to lose $50 million in 2027. And so they're talking about cutting 300 workers. And they're going to try to cut people who aren't clinicians or people who aren't actually providing the medical care. So they're going to be leaning things there. And so what is driving this rapid change? This is the second page of the five-page letter that he released to everybody yesterday. He says, first, our number of patients covered by private insurance, mostly those with employer-provided health insurance, are at the lowest percentage in our history. Just over 14% of all the patients

so far in 2026. And it's declining, multi-year of decline. Now, remember, one of the complaints of private health care coverage, like what I have through my employer, is that we're having to pay a lot more because everybody else is paying a lot less. Yeah. If you have private health care through work, you're getting screwed to make up for the fact that Medicare and Oregon Health Plan doesn't pay. Yeah. In fact, that's what the CEO says.

75% of our patients in growing are covered by Medicare and Medicaid. That's the Oregon Health Plan and other government programs. And Medicare and Medicaid pay less than our cost to provide patient care. Now, note that Oregon Health Care and Medicare pay Asante and, frankly, Providence, less than what it costs to provide the care. Now, in my world, that's a kind of statement. Now, he's saying that. And the simple truth, he says, we don't negotiate rates with the government rather than actual inflation.

Those with employer-sponsored insurance have historically covered the shortfall that government programs don't cover. In Southern Oregon, that math's no longer working. Second, almost half of our combined losses this year are in Ashland as unsustainable, inpatient and obstetrical services are scheduled to consolidate to RRMC in May. That's why they're shutting this down. And, of course, people are passing a peach pit over that, as you well know in the Ashland area. And the current state and future outlooks are tough. We could pretend otherwise wait or hope for the best with crossed fingers, but unfortunately,

those tactics will not help get the job done. So the action plan is to start working on some layoffs here. All right, that's, you know, part of it. Like I said, it's five pages, and you can find that to, or else I'll send it to you if you want. So shortly thereafter, the Oregon Nurses Association sends me a press release. ONA statement in response to Asante's CEO messages on job cuts. The Oregon Nurses Association says, Asante executives are once again cutting caregivers and looking for someone else to blame.

Let's be clear about what's actually happening. Asante executives chose to fire 400 southern Oregonians in 2024. They chose to shut down Ashland Hospital's family birth center and inpatient care. They chose to push out dozens of experienced doctors and neonatologists. How are you pronounced that? But the specialists who care for premature babies. And now they're proposing to fire hundreds more caregivers across southern Oregon. These are not forced decisions as Assante executives are responsible for their actions,

blaming frontline caregivers who save lives in staffing standards that keep patients safe. It's just plain wrong. It's egregious for Asante executives to rack up nearly a million dollars in fines for failing to follow a staffing law designed to keep patients safe. Of course, that also means hiring more ONA union members. You see, that's the part they don't mention. But most employee unions are run by Rekalza trillion children, rather, who don't know how to count.

And I would dare say that Oregon Nurses Association does not know how to count. And that Asante exists for one reason and one reason only, and that is to hire more unionized workers. I think that's what's going on. And I'm sorry to be so irritated about the ONA. But here it is they're talking about Asante executives chose to fire 400 southern Oregonians. They chose to shut down Ashland Hospital's family birth center in inpatient care.

Okay. Why did they shut it down? O-A, Oregon Nurses Association, that apparently nurses who never went to math, to math school, to mathematics, or at least their union members, union management that never went to math school, they closed it down or shutting it down

because more than half of the losses are coming from just that place. In other words, it's losing money. Losing money. money. Hello, Oregon Nurses Association. Do you know what losing money means? That means that it's not there. Oregon Nurses Association, Asante is running out of other people's money. The state doesn't pay enough. The federal government doesn't pay enough. And there are fewer and fewer private insurance people who are paying your salaries. So what would you do?

Oregon Nurses Association? You want to go to work for free and deliver babies in Ashland? Okay, well, maybe talk to... Maybe talk to Asante. You want to deliver it for free or cut your rate in half? I'm sure your members would be happy to do that. Gosh, it just drives me nuts when people can't count. It just... Anyway, I'll stop now. All right. We'll catch up on the news, and I'll try to put on my news hat and be relatively... And try not to be... irritated about it all. And then we'll continue with some other news here, too. We'll get off this for a little bit. This is the Bill Meyer's show on KMED and KBXG. The food banks are running out of food again. So this month at Kelly's Automotive Service

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Tental that's events, changing lives, one smile at a time. KMED News, here's what's going on. Asante's president and CEO sent a letter to employees and medical staff yesterday in the news, not good. The corporation running RRMC

and Three Rivers Hospital is losing money and the problem appears to be getting worse. Asante lost 12 million bucks just in March and 16 million for the first half of the year and could be 50 million in the whole next year. Asante looking at layoffs for 300 workers. The problem, higher costs, inflation, lower reimbursements from Medicare and Oregon Health Plan patients, too. The letter notes only

14% of patients are on private insurance, the lowest ever. Meanwhile, the Oregon Nurses Association Union releases its own letter blasting the proposed Asante cuts. The union statement saying, Asante executives chose to fire 400 Southern Oregonians in 2024. They chose to shut down Ashland hospitals, family birth center, and inpatient care, and they chose to push out dozens of experienced doctors. The union didn't note in their statement how to pay for the increased costs that pushed Asante to cut the staff. Also Monday, a number of SOU students are out on the streets protesting program cuts to the university proposed by Deloitte, SOUs consultant. RV Times reports that tomorrow the Save Southern Oregon University Coalition is convening a

public forum from 6 to 9 p.m. at the Medford Library Main Meeting Room. Everyone's invited to weigh in on the issues there. And Sunday's thunderstorms touched off an unusual fire. Ashland Fire and Rescue responded to reports of lightning hitting a home and burned a hole right through the roof. Fire crews investigated put the fire out, minimal damage, and no one was home at the time. Bill Meyer, KMED News. I'm Taylor Riggs, and this is the Fox Business Report. Crude oil prices have moderated after closing at a multi-year high yesterday on developments in the Iran conflict, the U.S. says Iran's actions since the ceasefire, including firing on commercial vessels and seizing two ships, don't rise to the level of restarting the war. Microsoft, Google,

and XAI will give the U.S. government early access to new artificial intelligence models to allow checks for national security risks. The U.S. government's center for AI standards and innovation says the technology will be evaluated before its release to the public. Crypto Exchange, Coinbase, says it will cut about 14% of its workforce about 700 people. CEO Brian Armstrong says artificial intelligence is bringing a profound shift in how companies operate. That's your Fox Business Report. I'm Jenny Koseldah, invested in you.

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Go to shift gears. I was too irritated talking about the Asante situation and then the Orrata. and Nurses Association Response. I'll get back to that and get upset again in just a moment and two. All right. Brian Riley joins me right now. He's the director of the National Taxpayer Union's Free Trade Initiative. Brian, good to have you back.

Morning. How you doing, sir? Good morning. Thanks for having me on. Doing just fine. Yeah. All right. You are the pallet cleanser this morning.

I was talking about unions and everything else here just a moment ago. Let's talk about tariffs now. And it's kind of interesting what happened with President Trump and the Liberation Day tariffs and people signed agreements and now things are all switching around and getting all crunchy or squishy, depending on what it is. And I just wanted to get your take on what's going on because President Trump ended up cutting tariffs on imported scotch whiskey and honor of King Charles, who after he was here for a state visit.

But now he's increased European Union automakers tariffs here because I guess the president wants more cars made here. He needs to make that clear. There's nothing wrong with wanting more of these cars made here. But didn't they already cut a deal of some other sort? And I'm just trying to figure out what's going on because it's up and down. And one of the biggest challenges for any industries is that things have to be a bit predictable. I was wondering if you could weigh in with what's the latest here. Right.

Well, everything you said is exactly correct and up-to-date as of three minutes ago. However, it could have changed since we got on the line this morning. Okay. You've got to pay attention to this stuff. And it makes it hard, doesn't it? If you're in business or if you're a farmer trying to figure out what the plants and where to source your inputs, a lot of small businesses will tell me, look, I don't even care what the syrup is. Just tell me what it's going to be so I can plan ahead.

So with respect to the auto tariffs, a couple things happened last week. The big news, as you mentioned, was that President Trump said, look, I know we've got this agreement that says we're going to put a 15% tariff. on EU cars. I'm actually going to bump it to 25%. And there wasn't a real clear explanation of why. Well, I thought it was that. He said that people weren't moving fast enough to make cars here. I think that was one of the reasons given.

Was that not, am I not right about that? You're exactly right. But there's always a question in my mind of so that the new tariffs have not gone into effect yet. It's any time this week he could announce, you know, we're going to. going to delay the tariff because we're going to have more negotiations or the EU has taken some steps to help me out in the Middle East conflict or digital, a lot of different things unrelated to autos that he could use to say, look, okay, we're not going to do that.

Yeah. Well, the challenge with being so mercurial about this, though, is that, you know, people are, I would imagine if you're a multinational corporation, you're not going to make decisions to move here unless you know what the deal and the rules are. Isn't that really what we're talking about? That's the criticism of all this, I would imagine. Right. And even a lot of the trade deals that he's negotiated, they're not signed into law by Congress, and they could be disregarded by the next administration. They don't have the permanence that a lot of other trade bills historically have had. So some if you're a foreign investor, in many cases, to say, well, let's just wait it out. The other concern is that while the Trump administration tells foreign investors,

come here, you won't pay any tariffs. Well, guess what? If you come here to produce, you're still paying tariffs. If you want to build BMWs in South Carolina, you've got to pay tariffs on the parts you bring in. If you are on the board and GM just came out with earnings reports last week, about the hundreds of millions of dollars they're paying for steel and aluminum and copper because of tariffs. So you produce here. You're going to have to pay tariffs, and that's not a good way to.

to boost manufacturing, in my opinion. Okay, now, Brian, I didn't realize. So, all right, we have the foreign market. I want to make sure I understand this correctly because I didn't know this. So you're a foreign car manufacturer. You want to build your factory in America. And frankly, I'm glad President Trump's trying to get people to move these plants here. That's great.

So you move your plan to America, but if you want to bring in parts, then you get the big tariffs on those parts, which is kind of like, well, what's the big advantage to doing that other than maybe a slightly lower tariff on the overall finished vehicle? Or am I wrong? How does that actually work? No, that's that's that you're exactly right. It just drives up the cost of producing here. In some cases, you might be able to get rebates if you re-export those cars to Europe, but not necessarily. There's one rate if you're bringing in parts from Europe. There's a different rate if you're bringing in parts from Canada or Mexico, which typically

would still be zero in most cases if you can prove that they're actually North American parts you're bringing in. There's a different rate of this from, you know, Japan. We don't want any parts from China. So those production facilities, a lot of them have been relocated to places like Vietnam. So now we're putting care of some Vietnam. So it just depends on where you bring the parks in. It depends on what day it is when you bring them in.

But certainly it's not just the parks. It's the raw materials that go into the steel, to go into the cars like steel that are affecting. We can talk about carmakers, but you can talk about farmers and ranchers who need tractors. You can talk about construction workers who need steel. It really hurts those blue-collar workers in many industries. You know, from what I understand, it's not that we're complaining or like the National Taxpayers' Union is complaining about tariffs in general, but the fact is if you're going to pick something, pick with it and stick with the deal. Is that really what you're saying and not just all of a sudden, well, you're not going fast enough

and now we're going to change this and make it more expensive? Is that where you're really coming from or is there a deeper question here? There's a deeper question. Thank you for asking. So our main concern is the uncertainty. It makes it hard, as you've already explained, so I won't rehash that. The tariffs are just taxes. They drive up costs.

And if you put a 15% 25% tax on imported cars from Europe, those cars are going to cost more. And it's Americans who will pay for the cost. You put more tax on toys from China. The cost of toys is going to go up. And we've seen that. Every study that has looked at those tariffs has said the impact trickles down to Americans who wind up paying the price. And so the earlier bid tariffs that President Trump put in, last year were thrown out by the Supreme Court earlier this year.

So the companies that brought those goods in, most of them should be eligible to get refunds for those tariffs. But a lot of times it's going to be able to track that down to the final consumer who bought the goods. Yeah, I was wondering about that. I was wondering at that, Brian, because, you know, as an example, I know that Costco, for example, ended up going to court and they want the tariff money back, right? And I'm thinking, all right, Costco, are you going to pay all of the customers back that actually ended up paying the tariffs? Or you just going to put them on your bottom line, right? These are the questions.

I think people are still asking. Exactly. And some companies have said that's exactly what we're going to do. But others, you know, how can Costco identify every 12 cents somebody saved or is owed in tariff refunds? Even if they wanted to, could they even do it? Well, they do track everything that you purchase when you have a Costco membership. absolutely everything is on your permanent record there, Brian. I don't know if you knew that.

They can find it if they had to. But they probably don't want to find it. That's a very good point. That's a very good point. And it's one thing we'll talk about Costco or Walmart. But if you already talk about Annie's dress shop in downtown Main Street, that's a whole other can of worms in terms of their ability to even qualify for the tariff and get the paperwork right and then figure out, okay, now what do we do at this?

Yeah. You put out a statement, you yourself, by the way, I'm talking with Brian Riley. He's the director of National Taxpayers Union Free Trade Initiative. You put out a statement that the best thing for President Trump to do if he really wants more auto production in the United States is to remove tariffs on the raw materials. Is that kind of what you're getting at? And what would that be? What would that look like?

Well, the big ones are on steel and aluminum, and every time there's a quarterly earnings report from the big manufacturers, whether they're U.S.-based or Japanese-based or European-based, is that those tariffs are costing the money or losing employment in auto manufacturing. Some of it may be due to tariffs. Some of it might be because companies are more efficient and a whole lot of reasons can go into why employment is going down. But certainly the tariffs on those raw materials aren't helping. And then you identified the other big reason, which should be made clear, which is all the uncertainty. And if you're a business, are you going to invest a lot of money today, not knowing what the cost of your inputs is going to be, or maybe it makes sense just to hold off and wait? And the other thing is that you've seen companies do whenever big tariffs go off, they start importing like crazy before the tariffs go back on.

So we'll see a surge of imports. Then we'll put tariffs on and the numbers will reverse. Yeah. It's just wild, up and down swings, which is not really a good way to do business. It's not good for Americans either. Well, isn't one of the challenges for the Trump administration here, though, if they were to remove the or even lower the tariffs on imported steel and aluminum? right didn't weren't there specific deals and carve-outs done to well as a benefit to the steel and aluminum industry here and there would probably be huge pushback if something like that were to

happen because I know there was the merger of the of U.S. steel what's the name of the company that ended up merging it with Nippon steel yeah from and fell to it to invest here there would be push back from the steel and aluminum producers but every industry that uses steel aluminum would be happy. Most of Trump's supporters, my opinion, is that they support Trump more so than a particular policy. If he was to come out and say, look, we've got an affordability problem. We're going to roll back these tariffs in order to make it easier for companies to produce here. I think they would be on board with that. But aside from his supporters, if you look at all the polls nationwide, support for trade is high or higher than it's been in my lifetime. And I've been

around for a while. And the number one concern that Americans have is not unfair trade or foreigners ripping us off. It's the cost of living in the United States. And, you know, you add in the impact of the Middle East conflict to the tariffs and everything else. Going into elections in November, I think that's what people are going to be looking at it. So it's not, to me, a pro-Trump or anti-Trump thing. It's what's good for the country. He'd make an argument that politically he'd be a lot better off as well if he said, look, we're going to give people a break from the tariffs in order to promote affordability. I'm not going to predict that's ever going to happen. Oh, yeah, no, I understand. I understand that, Brian. Is there a, so are you then saying that

the number of people working in the steel and aluminum producing industries are probably smaller or larger than the people that are working in the American industries that are using the aluminum and steel to manufacture, whether it's cars or tractors or girders or whatever. I mean, if you were to evaluate it, where are more of the workers in this? There's no comparison. The number of workers who work in steel using industries outweigh the number who work in steel producing industries, and the same goes for aluminum. So it would help workers more than would hurt them.

but you'd have a small number of workers in those industries that would be harmed, and there might be a reason for the government to try and figure out some way to take care of those workers that are harmed. And for the most part, let's keep in mind also, I'm not talking about a handout to China. Most of this deal, and certainly the aluminum that we import comes from countries like China and Mexico and our allies. So this is not a national security issue, in my opinion. The Trump administration says it is. I don't view imports from Canada as a national security threat, at least not today, who knows about in the future the way things have been going.

So I think it's important to differentiate between legitimate national security reasons for these tariffs versus just, hey, I've got a political idea that this is the right thing to do to protect this particular group. But it's just the government picking winners and losers. I'm going to help the steelworkers. that's going to hurt the steel-using workers. And hopefully maybe they don't even understand the people who have to pay more for steel. Maybe that's kind of hidden from them so they don't recognize. Yeah, because if we're paying more for steel, though,

that still ultimately makes American goods that we would like to export, same with aluminum too, more expensive. So, okay, yeah. And if we import less, that means our trading partners have fewer dollars to speak. and non-U.S. exports as well. So it's not just that we lose the imports, we lose export markets. So all these trade deals that the Trump administration is negotiating, and there are some good things in the trade deals.

They're not reciprocal, but by that I mean that our tariffs remain higher than our trading partners' tariffs in these deals. That leaves them with less ability to sell to us, which means they have less ability to buy from us, if that makes any sense. Okay, so the takeaway from this is that you're not. not a pro-Trump or an anti-Trump thing, but it's just that if the president really wants those vehicles and other items made here, you have to reduce the input costs. And that means the steel and aluminum must be as reasonably priced as possible, because that's the majority

of what we're talking about. And that's exactly, that's exactly what happened roughly from 1994 to a couple of years ago. You look at U.S. auto production in real turns after adjusting for inflation, the value went up. significantly. The number of cars didn't necessarily go up because we have better cars that last longer and cost more. But in terms of the value of production, it's been an industry that's thriving. And in part because of investment from those European and Japanese and Korean companies and because of the trade agreement we have with Canada and Mexico, which is really benefited that particular industry. I was talking with our automotive journalist guest, Eric Peters, and we

talk about, you know, cars every week here. And he was telling me about how the big challenge is going on right now is that the foreign car manufacturers are saying, well, you're going to put higher tariffs on us. We are not going to give you our lower priced vehicles any longer, you know, the ones that are most affordable. And then you have the American manufacturers that are than saying, we're not going to make those small cars because we don't make a lot of money on them, right? And so the interrelationsness of one interference creates another interoperance. interference creates another reaction. That's kind of what you've been describing here this morning. And that's what happens in a lot of these industries. The lower cost goods wind up getting

a higher increase. Or in this case, like they said, well, we're just not going to produce those for the U.S. market anymore. And that helps hurt the lower income Americans the most. when we have high tariffs on things like clothing, toys, those tariffs significantly harm lower income families, more than higher income families. They don't care if they have to pay an extra 15%. I shouldn't say they don't care, but they're not going to be affected by having to pay an extra 15% for a pair of T-shirts or jeans. But if you're a single parent and you're back to school time and you're trying to get your kid ready to go back to school and each other. It all adds up. It all adds up, is what you're saying, is ultimately.

It all adds up to a situation. It may nickel and dime you, but it all adds up at the end of the day. And it's lower poorer households, typically, in addition to the auto example, which you just totally hit the nail on the head. It's poorer Americans that are harmed, and nobody wants to see that. Yeah. And then you're only left with $50, $60, $70,000 vehicles on the lot that, well, of course, that would end up selling a whole lot of used cars from the sounds of it, Brian.

Where can people read more about this over at National Taxpayers' Union? Do you have a special section of this? But like I said, it's interesting to say, hey, you know, really look at the steel and aluminum. That's the linchpin of manufacturing here. But go ahead. Tell us where to go with this. Right. MTEU.org and you can see there's a section there for our trade policy which goes into this and and some of the other areas that we work on.

And we've supported a lot of Trump administration initiatives and a lot of congressional initiatives over the last year. But we've disagreed with them or we think they're on the wrong track. And trade policy is one where I think that falls into that latter category. And we can do a lot better. and most staffers and members of Congress that I have a chance to talk to off the record, they will agree. And they're not happy about the tariffs, but maybe if you're a Democrat, you're happy to push back. But if you're a Republican, it's not an environment where there's a lot of people willing to step up and take on the president. Yeah, kind of tough to come out and do that.

It's politically risky, you know, these days. Everybody knows that. All right. Just it's interesting times. We're threading the needle, so to speak, here, Brian. Thanks for the talk, and I appreciate you sharing your thoughts on this trade issue, okay? So much. Be well.

Thanks for addressing it. It's an important issue and appreciate the chance to be on. And when things change in a day or two, feel free to call me back. You keep us in the room, Brian. Thanks for the call, okay? Be well. Thank you. Brian Riley, Director of National Taxpayer Union's Free Trade Initiative.

It is 656 on KMED and KBXG. When it comes time to build your dream home, your top of the hill masterpiece with style, luxury, and fantastic views, you have a partner with Hughes Lumber. When you want the best lumber, siding, panels, and other building materials, you have a partner with Hughes Lumber. However, if your new construction is far less than a mansion, an addition, a garage, or simply an expert room addition, you also have a partner with Hughes Lumber. So remember, bigger small, Hughes Lumber does it all on Cradlelake Highway in Medford or online at hueslumber.com. This is Bill Meyer, and if you want to save money on your cell phone plan like Linda and I did, we cut our bill in half with Cherise at No Wires Now. That's right, Bill. Come on down to our showroom or call me today.

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Give Bill a call at 541-770-5633. That's 720 KMED. Shade before 7 o'clock. This is KMED and KMED HD-1. Eagle Point, Medford, KBXG, Grants Pass. Oliva Herrera will join me. And she is like a dog with a bone. I'm talking about like a dog,

R. Got a bone when it comes to what's going on. at Three River School District, and they have this series of town hall meetings. There was a town hall meeting yesterday at Hidden Valley High School. And then I think it's Wednesday. There's going to be another one. It's a Wednesday or Thursday. I'll talk with her about this in about 10, 12 minutes, because this has to do with the school-based

health centers, and the new contract is being signed. And when you actually read the contract, it looks more like, all right, well, you would have to then provide at least two free birth controls to the high school kids. Two forms of birth control, you'd have to do this. And then there were social media. And I think that the Daily Courier, in my opinion, sort of distorted the issue a little bit. And I don't know, maybe it's sort of the just maybe telling the whole story saying that, well, you know, there were social media posts that were spreading disinformation,

disinformation about, no, no, a school-based health. centers would not provide abortions and things like that and transgender care and gender affirming care and all the rest of it. And that's absolutely true. They would not be providing it. No, you don't go to the school nurse and then the nurse gives you an abortion, but I assure you who the school nurse then the school health base center would end up showing where to go get. It would certainly help, help you make the appointment to plan parenthood or whatever the case might be and cut that kid out. All right, you know, that's what's going on, or all of a sudden you're a boy and you think you can be a girl or a girl are you going to be a boy?

And no, we're not going to do any kind of mental health treatment for your warped mind. Instead, we're going to find a way to get you in there at gender affirming care, and then don't tell your parents, too, on top of that. Oh, you're 15? Excellent. You know, another transgender for the progressive Frankenstein labs here in the state of Oregon. Okay, you know, it's kind of what's going on. That's really what's going on behind the scenes, because the contract, you read the contracts,

and the contracts, you know, you'd have to direct them. there. They wouldn't provide it. They would just be the gatekeeper. Maybe, I guess. That's how I'm interpreting it. I'll talk with Aleva about that here in the next few minutes. Hi, good morning, KMED. Who's this? Welcome. Morning, Bill, Tom here. Tom, how you doing? You want to talk about that Asante memo or something else, huh? What you were just talking about, you know, that costs money to have all this transgender care and so forth. Oh, but it's money well spent in Progressive Oregon, Tom. Don't remember. That's some of the best investment in our children's future, the transgender care.

I'm being sarcastic, you know. That's what Pam Marsh told me. I called her on it and about taxpayer money going to transgender care, and she says, oh, well, we're simply providing health care for children. That's her response to it. You know, if you went back just a few years here, Tom, and you went back to the school nurses of the 1970s, 80s, 90s, 2000s, even, to a certain extent. And what's the first thing they would say is that I want to change my gender. First thing they would do is probably assign you a psychiatrist, wouldn't they?

Of course. Way back to then, but... Yeah, I know. And, oh, out, you're going through a phase. It's okay. And usually, most of the kids work through it okay. It really is, you know, that way. But, oh, no, no, no. We have to put you through Frankenstein's OHSU laboratory of fake sexual organs. And that's That's what we have to do. That's the best use of taxpayer funds. Yikes. Yeah, I think anyone with any common sense realizes that children are not capable.

They don't have the equipment between their ears to make life-changing decisions like that until they're matured. So basically this whole delivery of transgender surgery children is abuse. It's childhood abuse. It's abusing children, but it's sanctified by the state. Speaking of which, I wanted to talk a little bit about the health care that you're talking about relating to that. You know, I heard someone say about a couple of weeks ago, he said that, and I've said this before, but he says the average number of regulations for hospitals across the United States is about 300. And Oregon has about 1,400, more than three, four times what is required across the country.

And no one's talking about it, but I want to know how much our transgender care and sanctuary state. all this care is being mandated by our run amok Salem government up there. You know, Tom Gessel, the president and CEO of Asante in that memo, he talked about how only 14% of the patients actually have private insurance, which actually pays the freight for the 86% who don't. He didn't note how much illegal alien care does. I guess that would be impolite to mention how much that costs. That's the gorilla in the living room that everyone's tiptoeing around.

I should say the gorilla in the emergency room that everyone's tiptoeing around. Nurses aren't talking about the doctors. No one is really coming out, just explaining real clearly why Ashland Hospital was cut down and, you know, cut out. Well, to Gessels, his letter yesterday to everybody that half of the corporate losses, in Asante were coming from Ashland. And ONA is upset about this, but how did they expect that, you know, if it's not paying for itself, it's not paying for itself. Or am I wrong, you know, about that if it's not able to make a buck?

Yeah, well, of course, it can't make a buck because of all the mandates. There are hospitals that be enforced to deliver care to people who, as you say, below cost. So they cannot cover themselves. also government is the Salem government and federal government basically driving the hospitals out of existence with all their mandates. Boy, everybody's being turned into Mom Dani, right? Yeah, exactly. Yeah, Mondani Healthcare.

Yeah, maybe that's why to start calling it. Tom, I appreciate the insight, you being involved in that system for sure. Thanks for the call. I always appreciate hearing from you, Tom. Hi, good morning, KMED. Who's this? Welcome. Hey, Bill.

It's well, Samin. Steve, give me a quick take here on news. Then I got to talk a little bit of the trouble up in the Three River School District, see what's going on there. Okay, well, but the discussion you just had about tariffs is way more complicated than even that because the Chinese government controls everything, and they have two currencies. When we buy something from China, we're paying 10% less than we would if we manufactured it here because of the way the currencies are treated. Yeah, they have a different yuan that's used in the trade and another yuan that is internal, right?

Not only that, but everything is controlled by the government. So, you know, their labor costs, there's no such thing as unions there. And the other end of it is, you know, the United Steelworkers unions were all happy with, you know, the tariffs because they got to keep their contracts. So it's just not fair to say that we should just go ahead and buy this stuff from China. The cost is literally what are the input costs and what's the profit margin to produce steel in China and what is it to produce steel in the United States. Now, would you agree with what Brian was talking about from NTU that, you know,

if you really want more manufacturing here, you do have to reduce the input costs? though of steel and aluminum. Does that make sense? Yes. And your own input costs, you know, the Oregon Nurses Association, the Steelworkers' Union, all of those people continue to force the price to go up.

So it's not as simple as well we should just buy stuff from China. It would reduce the input cost. It would. But it is not an apple to apples comparison. All right. And on that I'll take it away. And thank you so

much here, Steve. I always appreciate. Thoughtful callers always appreciate that whenever, okay? We'll have you back as always. We'll catch up on Fox News here in just a moment, and then the Three Rivers Health System, school-based health care. What's going on there? What are people saying in the meetings? I'll talk with Oliva Herrera in about eight, nine minutes. An intelligent solution saves you money. This is Randall at Advanced Air. Save up to an additional one.