The Ricochet Podcast - CPAC #17: Kansas Governor Sam Brownback

Episode Date: February 28, 2015

Jim Geraghty interviews Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback about how he survived as an alleged “dead man walking” in last year’s reelection campaign, what he’s done as governor that’s made Democrats furious, the difficulties of working with the Obama administration, and whether he misses life as a presidential candidate. Source

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Terms apply. Bet responsibly. 18plusgamblingcare.ie This is Jim Garrity for the National Review podcast sponsored by Ricochet. I am joined by Kansas Governor Sam Brownback. And there are a lot of questions I wanted to ask you. But the first one is,

I remember reading the press September, October, getting into November. You were supposed to be a dead man walking at that point. And you look very healthy. You know, you were supposed to be retired Governor Brownback at this CPAC. So what happened? How did you go from being utterly doomed and, you know, the vultures circling around you to a reelected second term governor in Kansas? Well, I really question a lot of the polling anymore,

and I also refer to myself as the Lazarus candidate. Excellent, I agree. I'm just back from the dead. The vast left-wing conspiracy really came after me, and so when they saw polls that didn't look so good, they really pumped those up. And I think this is going to be their narrative. Yes, Republicans had a good cycle, but look,

here's somebody that really implemented their plan, and he didn't make it. Well, I did make it, and I made it because our folks showed up, and they really pushed. We had a million personal phone calls made by individuals. We had folks pushing in their neighborhoods, and the conservative individuals came out and pushed and combined intervention on top of it. That's why I'm back. I made one by about four points overall, and we're moving on forward with the agenda. Now, for those of the people who are outside Kansas or may not have been the full story, may remember you from your 2008 presidential campaign,

one of the reasons that you were such a target to the left was that you had implemented, I would say, unsparing conservative governance, undiluted and serious reforms that if you had lost your seat, your governorship for that, they'd be able to say, aha, see, these aren't popular. And if it can't work in Kansas, by golly, where could it work? So can you talk a bit about what you had done that had generated, dare I say, even a Scott Walker level of rage and fury in your political opponents? I'd just been a nice guy. Oh, really? Yeah, yeah of rage and fury in your political opponents. Just being a nice guy. Oh, really? Yeah, that's what it was.

That tends to really drive them nuts. You know, I think the big one for the teachers in particular is the state removed the mandate for teacher tenure at K-12. So local school districts can do it, but once that was pulled out, and the public supports that. They don't want teacher tenure. It's a 60%er with the public, but we pulled that out. Once they did that, it really led to a big rage. We went and lowered our taxes, lowered our income taxes. We're moving from income taxes to consumption-based taxes.

We went to zero taxes on small business. That was something a lot of people didn't like. We did judicial reform. The selection process was dominated by the Bar Association for the Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court. We changed it for the Court of Appeals and working on that for the Supreme Court. I signed 10 pro-life bills and got another one coming my way. I've signed pro-Second Amendment bills. So, you know, we kind of, we did a lot of things.

And we've really changed to say we want to be the best state in America to raise a family, grow a small business, and we're well on our way. But when you do all of those things, you do accumulate some people that are, that are irritated about what you did. One of the things since 2008 conservatives have been telling themselves is this idea that, well, we lost the presidency, but we have a lot of governorships, and they're able to implement a conservative agenda at the state level and make their states a better place. It seems like the Obama administration is making that a little bit harder. They're kind of a fly in the ointment in terms of their ability, whether it's fights with

Louisiana or other places. Has the Obama administration kind of stuck their finger in the eye of your administration, things like that? Or have you managed to stay below their radar screen in terms of what you're doing? Well, I'm not below the radar screen. And they have been aggressive on pushing back wherever they can, and in some subtle ways and some overt ways. So they've not been a good one to work with. The most difficult thing I find that they're doing, two things really, is Obamacare, because that has just a direct hit on us. I think we had a $40 million bill, tax bill, to Kansas off of Obamacare.

That never needs to be rechecked before I'm saying it firm, but we got a big bill for Obamacare in the state of Kansas. But it's overall the slow recovery out of the recession. And that's the thing that's just really pulled us down. So we put a lot of tax policies in place for the right things to do, but you're still part of a bigger economy in the United States. And if that bigger economy isn't really being more robust, it's harder to do things at the state level. And that's the thing that I think they've really hurt a lot of states over.

So you just came to CPAC today. So you may have seen probably about half the presidential, potential presidential field speaking today. Any thoughts on that so far as a former presidential candidate? Do you look at some of these guys and say, oh, they have no idea what they're in for? The Holiday Inn in Des Moines, you know, when the toilet's not working and there's no hot water. Do you look at that and you say, I pity those poor souls? Do you look at that and feel a certain envy for what they're about to dive into?

I know almost everybody in that field. I think I do know everybody in the field. I'm impressed with the field. I think this is an outstanding Republican presidential candidate field. It has broad diversity of thought and geography and presentation.

I'm impressed with the field. Having been through a portion of it before, I look at a number of them and I do go, wow, this is a long haul. And I didn't make it that far in the system, but it's just, this is a tough, long, difficult process. But I wish them all well. And it is an outstanding Republican presidential field. I think there are a number of them that could make really quite good presidents. Are you particularly close to any of them, or are you interacting in RGA meetings or NGA meetings? Yeah, I'm close with a number of the people.

Have they started twisting your arm yet? A little. You know, reaching out. And I appreciate it. I appreciate talking with them. But, you know, really, and you guys see this, it's not a national race. It's, you know, Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, trying to get some more play in there before South Carolina.

And the old saying is everybody enters in Iowa and there are three tickets out, maybe four. So there are going to be a lot of people staying in Iowa. Iowa is a good venting ground, really, I think, because they're very serious about how they take it. And you don't need very – the table stakes aren't high to get in. You can get in and do this on a pretty much retail basis to get to get a launch so money doesn't dominate the whole thing at the outset so i i think it's going to be a an exciting presidential cycle on our side of the other side as you hear the buzz uh starting up do you ever look at that and say ah i should go for

it again i haven't or you're like no i've i, I've been on that roller coaster ride, and I'm done, and you're happy with what you're doing? Well, I'm happy with what I'm doing. And also, I think you change America by changing states. As all this here in Washington, Ronald Reagan tried to change welfare reform. He didn't get it done. It wasn't until Wisconsin and Michigan did it that you could migrate the concept to Washington, and we did it when I first came into Congress. So my thought is that the best way to change America, to get it going back to me, the old American model,

faith, family, and freedom, moving forward as the country was designed to be, is to do it at a state level. Improve your concept. And that's what we're doing in Kansas, and so I really feel like we're a big part of moving the state back towards what we were designed to be. I mean, the nation were designed to be.

I mean, the nation was designed to be like. Governor Brumback, thanks very much for your time. My pleasure. Ricochet. Join the conversation.