Money Rehab with Nicole Lapin - Campaign Financing, OnlyFans and Healthcare with Alexandra Hunt

Episode Date: July 13, 2022

Is the current political landscape driving you so crazy that you want to run for office? If so, you need to know what you’re getting into. Today, Nicole talks to Alexandra Hunt— who ran to be the Democratic nominee for a congressional seat in Pennsylvania this year.  Alexandra describes the challenges of running against an incumbent, how she used OnlyFans to fundraise and how to fix a broken healthcare system. You can learn more about Alexandra here: https://linktr.ee/thealexandrahunt  

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Find a co-host at Airbnb.com slash host. Hey guys, are you ready for some money rehab? Wall Street has been completely upended by an unlikely player, GameStop. Are you ready for some money rehab? Wasting our time. I will take a check with an old school truck. You recognize her from anchoring on CNN, CNBC, and Bloomberg. The only financial expert you don't need a dictionary to understand. Nicole Lappin. Is the current political landscape driving you so crazy that you want to run for office? If so, you need to know what you're getting into.

That's why today I'm talking to Alexandra Hunt, who ran to be the Democratic nominee for a congressional seat in Pennsylvania this year and caught national attention for her buzzy elect hoes campaign merch. Of course, some traditional voters couldn't get past her edgy slogans, but if they could, they would see a thoughtful platform with plans to make health care more accessible and equitable for Pennsylvanians. In May 2022, the incumbent Dwight Evans secured the slot as the Democratic nominee for the congressional seat Alexandra was running for. This loss, though, begs the question, how much do campaign finances actually contribute to the outcome of elections? Let's ask Alexandra. Well, Alexandra, welcome to

Money Rehab. Thank you for having me. Good to be here. You are fresh off a run for congressional seat in Pennsylvania. I'd like to start with the political issues that were central to your platform, specifically health care. You've written a lot about how you've seen what it's like to try and survive without adequate health care. And I'm coming off a night in the ER with my fiance. So I've seen that up close and personal most recently. Can you talk a little bit more about that? So I've done a lot of work in healthcare. I've worked specifically in oncology or cancer. And what a lot of people don't realize is how little our insurance actually, even if you have insurance, how little our insurance actually, like even if you have insurance, how little it actually covers,

especially if you have a chronic illness. We also have in Philadelphia, in PA3 where I ran, we have healthcare deserts or we had a hospital close and that really hurt our community because you have people who are dying on the way to the hospital who could live if we weren't having for-profit hospitals closed in an area. And then on top of that, you have people who die or suffer at home because they don't want to pay for the ambulance ride to get the care that they need.

to pay for the ambulance ride to get the care that they need. And so they're not seeking that care, or they're going undiagnosed for an extended period of time to the point where intervention is too late to save their life. I would be remiss to not ask you about the overturning of Roe v. Wade. We can't talk about healthcare, I suppose, without talking about reproductive healthcare. We can't talk about health care, I suppose, without talking about reproductive health care. What's been your response to the court's decision? It's definitely hurt more than I was anticipating. I mean, we knew it was coming. And then the day that they did overturn that decision, it was still a lot of grief.

And I had an abortion when I was 18. I'm also a survivor. And I know what it's like to lose the choice over your body and to feel helpless in that manner. And having an abortion, even with it being legal and making the best possible choice that I could for myself, making the best possible choice that I could for myself, it was still stigmatized. And that made it very lonely and isolating. And now with the Supreme Court's decision, it's going to be even more isolating, even more lonely, and that's going to lead to more harm for young women or young pregnant people. I mean, they don't have to be young, but pregnant people seeking abortions. Yeah. I mean, something we have in common is the fact that we've both spoken out about this hard, but ultimately responsible decision to have an abortion. I did an episode about that in the wake of everything in Texas a few months ago. If you feel comfortable, can you tell us a little bit more about why you think that was the right decision for you? Oh, yeah. I was 18. And I was in my first semester

of college. I had no money. I was barely an adult. And I was on birth control and found out that I was pregnant. I did have a partner at the time that turned into a long-term partner, but we had just started dating. And as much as I want children in my future, it was not the right timing. I probably would have had to drop out of college and simply focus on providing for myself and a baby. And it would have changed my life completely. By having an abortion, I was able to complete college. I went on to get two more master's degrees and I ran for Congress. And so that trajectory wouldn't have come with me at 28 running for Congress with two degrees, two master's degrees under my belt

if I had had a baby at 18. Not only did Fox News harp on your abortion story, but they also focused a lot of attention toward the time in college where you worked many jobs as a stripper, one of them, to put yourself through school and, as you mentioned, get master's degrees, ultimately run for Congress at 28. How much do you think that negative press coverage affected your campaign? I mean, people who worked on our campaign said that they've never seen such horrendous attacks for a candidate. I mean, I'm an everyday person.

And before this, people didn't know who I was. And before this, people didn't know who I was. And it just brought in so much hate and so much just anger towards the fact that I was openly threats there were a lot of threats made um and yeah it but on the other hand it did draw in other attention and a lot of people decided to share their own story and their own experience working as a stripper or in the porn industry in college and also the stigma that they faced because of that. And so it did help build a movement of people who care about each other and who care about destigmatizing this work. But it also with every movement, there's a counter movement. With every revolution, there's a counter revolution so you got both the both ends of the stick yeah with every action there's a reaction and it sounds like i mean i'm not putting words in your

mouth you tell me did it balance out did some of that vitriol balance out with the women working hard to make ends meet and putting themselves through college or did it hurt more than you expected i mean i think a lot of people look at politicians or political hopefuls and say that you can dissociate from that. But were you able to? Yeah, you kind of go numb to it. The first time hearing the remarks, it's hard. And for me, the thing that hurt the most was I was pushed out of my coaching job.

And that I was told that basically, I wasn't a good role model for the young girls that I was coaching. And that's something that's important to me is being a good role model for my players. So that really hurt. Um, and once they had done like the worst thing that they could, uh, and that I felt would hurt the most. The rest of it, I was pretty numb at that point. And there wasn't other things that they could take from me. Hold on to your wallets, boys and girls. Money Rehab will be right back.

I love hosting on Airbnb. It's a great way to bring in some extra cash. But I totally get it that it might sound overwhelming to start or even too complicated if, say, you want to put your summer home in Maine on Airbnb, but you live full time in San Francisco and you can't go to Maine every time you need to change sheets for your guests or something like that. If thoughts like these have been holding you back, I have great news for you. Airbnb has launched a co-host network, which is a network of high quality local co-hosts with Airbnb experience that can take care of your home and your guests. Co-hosts can do what you don't

have time for, like managing your reservations, messaging your guests, giving support at the property, or even create your listing for you. I always want to line up a reservation for my house when I'm traveling for work, but sometimes I just don't get around to it because getting ready to travel always feels like a scramble, so I don't end up making time to make my house look guest-friendly. I guess that's the best way to put it. But I'm matching with a co-host, so I can still make that extra cash while also making it easy on myself. Find a co-host at Airbnb.com slash host. Now for some more money rehab. So we are money rehab. We love to follow the money trail of all stories.

How much can a congressional campaign cost? Teach us. Well, it depends. Are you a grassroots campaign or are you taking money from are you taking dark money from corporations? If if so, or are you rich? If so, or are you rich? So those are the three options. Grassroots, rich, campaign, corporate, dark money, as you call it.

And so dark money, rich people, their campaigns cost millions of dollars. For grassroots, if you raise half a million, if you raise $300,000, $400,000, that you're doing pretty well. We raised, oh, I don't know the exact amount, but somewhere between $700,000 to $800,000. And that made us a really big threat. And where did that money come from? Grassroots fundraising. It was all individual donors. And then towards the end, I did a little bit of self-funding through my own small business called OnlyFans. And how much did you contribute? I think it ended up being $35,000. And where does the money go? Can you tell us some of the biggest expenses of running a campaign? So mailers are really expensive. In my district, in PA3, it's very politically active, and a lot of people come out and vote, even though it's a small percentage of the registered Democrats, which is another issue that we can talk about, but our apathy, but PA3 is still very politically

active. So we had a high wind number and with a high wind number, you have to contact a lot of people. And so mailers are very expensive. I had a very big staff, which for most first time candidates, congressional campaigns, they don't have that big a staff there's the infrastructure of your your fundraising program that you have to pay for staff's expensive mailers expensive literature is expensive election day was very expensive um that and then we had an office had to pay rent we had a lot of snacks for people and things like that. And it that that's it goes into reaching people and texting people and calling people and trying to get voters to come vote for you. Name recognition. You said election day was really expensive. Why specifically

election day? We we tried to staff it as much as possible. So we got everyone lunch and we had people out at different polling locations with our palm cards and handing things out to voters. So we tried to have a really big presence on election day. And we were very successful in that regard because we lost, but it was really the vote by mail that hurt us the most. Why was that? So we ran against an incumbent and when that happens, the machine backs the incumbent and sends home a lot of voter guides and voter guides kind of give a who to vote for, for what seat. Voter guides kind of give a who to vote for, for what seat.

And we were not being mentioned in the voter guides. And so when you sit down at your kitchen table to vote by mail, you pull up your voter guide that you got from the Democratic Party. And you usually vote if you're if you're just a regular, you know, moderate Democrat, you just check off whatever they've suggested to you. And that's where it hurt us. Yeah, because sometimes you don't know, like, who's running for comptroller or whatever. That makes sense. Over how long was that money spent? So 700 grand over a year before the campaign or how much leading up to Election Day? It was a year and three months.

Are you going to try again? I'm thinking about it. What do you think the most challenging part of the campaign was? Fundraising? For me, the most difficult part was the evolution of being Alexandra Hunt, you know, an everyday person who loves soccer and public health and is passionate about community care to being the candidate, the former stripper, and having that sort of recognition. losing people along that journey that I didn't anticipate losing and then kind of just adjusting to all of that as an everyday person was probably the hardest part for me. What's the part that you're most proud of from the campaign? What our mission was, was to pull people in from the shadows, people who have been marginalized and stigmatized for whatever reason that they might face in their life and that they could help empower them, that they could have a voice, that they need to get involved and that there are people like them or who can relate to them who are ready to fight with them. And I think that I'm super proud that we were able to pull in that group of people who are pretty disenfranchised and make them hopeful. If someone's listening to this and they have aspirations for running for Congress,

whether they're in their 20s or otherwise, what advice would you give them? Pick a different, choose a different job. Um, I would say tough, toughen up, get, get your, go, go find your thick skin, um, because it's hard and it really sucks the life out of you. Make sure that you have folks around you who are going to support you, but who know you and can kind of keep you on track when the going gets tough. Don't underestimate how hard it is to fundraise because it's really, really, really hard. Um, and good for you for, for putting yourself out there like that. It it's, it's hard to run and it's hard to stay on the campaign trail. And what I learned on this campaign trail was I, I saw other candidates dropping out, um, trail was I saw other candidates dropping out because they couldn't take the stress. And so it's hard. If you do decide to do it, know that it's hard and try to be as mentally prepared as

possible. And on the first part of the advice you gave, you said, you know, get thick skin. If somebody is going through this and there's, you know's a skeleton that comes up or something from their past, would you advise to own it? Just fully embrace who you are. Absolutely. Absolutely. Lean into it. Own it. The shame is used against us and it's used to oppress us. It's used to silence us. It's used to push us into the shadows. And so if you can take a breath and push that shame to the side and be like, yep, I, you know, whatever it was that, that is part of my story.

I think it, it really makes you stronger. Um, and also have like a gatekeeper to filter out those nasty comments. You don't have to be exposed to them all the time. It's like a campaign person. Yeah, we'll have to wait and see if you go after this seat again, it sounds like but what else is next for you? So I can't as I said, I've worked a lot in oncology. So I'm looking to get back into that area. I still have my OnlyFans and I am running an interesting OnlyFans page. Tell me more. use OnlyFans to kind of be like a lobbying base where I draw in people. So I recently pulled my OnlyFans and how do they like to get involved? How do they like to be active? And their biggest choice was donating. So I've been using my OnlyFans to fundraise for different causes. There's a striking group of strippers out in LA who are trying to unionize.

And so we fundraise for them a bit and raise a couple of thousand dollars for them. And then now we're raising for abortion funds. And it's just, it's kind of uncharted territory of if you can draw in people through OnlyFans and then potentially make them politically active to kind of lobby about what you care about and have the finances to OnlyFans. And I think it's a fascinating platform. It sounds like the donation is kind of like off use, or I don't know what you would say, of what is traditionally available on the platform. So how are you navigating within the functionality of what OnlyFans allows people to do? On your page, you can specifically do a fundraiser. And so I'll put a fundraiser for a certain amount and then people can donate to your campaign. Or I'll post like on my main page that the PPV, the pay-per-view is going to be towards this fund or whatever we're fundraising for. But typically the fundraisers are used to like, you know, I need to pay for a house or whatever. You're kind of innovating and using this for actual fundraising, campaign fundraising.

I'm assuming you're the only one doing that. Yeah, I think I might be the only one doing that. But I'm also using it to support myself because I haven't currently gotten a new job yet. So it's doing a little bit of both. It's a hybrid. For today's tip, you can take straight to the bank. If you don't have the bandwidth for a whole political campaign or the extra cash to donate, don't count yourself out. You can still make a difference. One of my key takeaways from my conversation with Alexandra was how important fundraising is and how vital it is to have volunteers to help in that effort. As we creep closer to a key election year, keep in mind that investing your time in your preferred candidate can have a huge ROI.

Money Rehab is a production of iHeartRadio. I'm your host, Nicole Lappin. Our producers are Morgan Lavoie and Mike Coscarelli. Executive producers are Nikki Etor and Will Pearson. Our mascots are Penny and Mimsy. Huge thanks to OG Money Rehab team Michelle Lanz for her development work, Catherine Law for her production and writing magic, and Brandon Dickert for his editing, engineering, and sound design. And as always,

thanks to you for finally investing in yourself so that you can get it together and get it all.