Governor Dunleavy on His Partnership With President Trump and How It’s Benefiting Alaska

- Well, my favorite governor, Governor Denleyby, welcome to the show, super excited to have you on. You've been on a bunch, but it's always a pleasure chatting with you. - Yeah, it's great to be here, John. Thanks, and thanks for what you do. - This would be fun. You just did your eighth state of this state address. Tell me what it was like kind of prepping for it. And you know, it's probably a little bit nostalgic. You know, your last one's sad and happy at the same time. Talk to me a little bit about what you went through prepping for the last state of the state. - Well, I think, I just want to say, I think some of my opponents are happy, but no, it was, you know, it is somewhat significant when you figure that were the second to term Republican governor on what's 50 years, right? That's kind of interesting for Alaska. Tony knows was the last two-time governor and that was back in the recent early 2000s. But we, in prepping for it, you know, it was interesting because this is the last so you want to be able to look back over your seven years. We still have one year left, and I'll probably do a end of the term addressed to the public, won't be a state of state, but sometime like in the fall before the elections are completed. But you want to look back and you want to say, hey, what did you do anything? Did you accomplish anything? And this is why talking to you is really important because we all know that the mainstream media, especially here in Alaska, you know, they don't, how do I word this? You don't always hear what's happening, okay? Usually they want to present a situation where it's either gloom and doom or the world's falling apart. But that's so far from what reality is under our administration. And so in preparing for this, we had to ask, we had to go back and we had all of our commissioners and our division directors and our state agencies and we went back and we said, okay, what we're making list of all the things that have happened under this administration. Talk about all of the indicators of success that have happened under this administration. We talked about some things, for example, when we talk about crime, we've had success in crime. The issue is though our crime rates were so high, historic, we in Alaska, that when you make a big dent in that, you still have high crime rates, but it's going in the right direction. So in preparing for it, long story short, John, you ask all of our people to start putting together lists, references, all the data information you need to kind of lay out a number of the good things that we have done. Now, we couldn't do it all last night because I mean, that was a long speech, even for me, let alone people listening to it. But what we are going to do is we're going to be putting out what is essentially a pamphlet that talks about the different departments, the visions. And what was accomplished? What has improved during this time? Because we want to also set forth not just a roadmap for future successes, but to really counter sometimes the narrative that a mainstream media likes to say likes to do. - Yeah. - You know, I was, I've had a former governor Eric Grayton's on a couple of times, handful of times him and I've become friends. - Is he Missouri, correct? - Yeah, former governor Missouri. And he made kind of an assessment or kind of what he thought of your governing the state of Alaska. And I agree with his assessment. And tell me, tell me if you think that this, how this sounds is that you kind of been a governor that hasn't created a bunch of random laws or random bills or you've been the guy that is not going to just create a bunch of new things to create new things. You've been the less government guy, almost since day one. And I think that that's, I think it speaks to what Alaskans like. We're independent. We're kind of libertarian and you haven't gone out there and just kind of created a bunch of nonsense to create a bunch of nonsense. Has that kind of been part of your mantra since day one? Just, I mean, 'cause you can get caught up in just creating thousands of bills if you want to have busy work. And that's never been your motto. - I think that's a fair assessment. I'll kind of round it out a little bit, but I would say that, you know, I was a senator, so I had a feel for politics down here in June. I feel for the legislative side of things. But there were things that were lacking in Alaska from my perspective. And so when I came in here, if you look at it, I can send you. It was a, it was a 2017 article by one of the reporters here in Juneau. And it kind of laid out candidate done ladies perspective of what he's running on. And there were four topics that I wanted to run on. And that was diversifying the economy, getting investment to diversify the economy, lowering the crime rates, making sure we had a budget that works, and education, improving educational outcomes. It was important to do that because when you, you have to be able to articulate to the people of Alaska a mission, and that's what we did, and we stuck with that mission all the way through. And so when it comes to the budget, for example, an ICER report, you know, the Institute of Social and Economic Research by the University of Alaska, would show that during my time in office, we kept the budget growth to less than 1%. Prior to my time in office, historically, the budget growth is over 6% per year. So that Delta, that Delta saved the people of Alaska literally several billion dollars by doing that. Wasn't easy, you know that, right? I mean, the first year we had a $1.6 billion deficit. There are things that people want to me to ignore, like the PFD on the books is law, the way it is, et cetera, et cetera. But long story short, it is, from our perspective, we wanted to deal with what an executive is supposed to do with crime, making places a safe place, trying to improve our educational system. I've had a deal with 80 some disasters, almost one a month. - Yeah, so many. - Landslides, fires, floods, high foods, earthquakes, just the nature of the beast. And so I would say opening up Alaska for more of a diversified economy, that's why we do the energy, the energy, a conference that we have every year. We were incredibly fortunate to have President Trump really opened up the federal side of things for Alaska and did an executive order for itself. Long story short, I would say that I was less interested in the glitz and the performances that a lot of times you do as a governor and more interested to try to make things work right, work better and lay out a future in which Alaska can grow. So, I like that. - Let's talk a little bit about your relationship with Trump, 'cause I think that's, you know, when I talk to just normal everyday folks here on the Kenai Peninsula around Alaska, I think one of the things that is very special about Alaska and you as governors, you have a very unique relationship with Trump and I think it's been positive for Alaska. Talk to me a little bit about that as his second term, he's kind of gone, you know, 120 miles an hour for Alaska. His first speech talked about Alaska. I mean, he had stuff in there about Alaska. You've done, he's done probably more for Alaska than most presidents have done. So, talk to me a little bit about that relationship and how it's been such a positive thing for Alaska. - Well, you know, it's interesting. So, I was actually in the Senate when he was first elected and I remember when he was running, and I remember, you know, people doing what they are doing today and that was kind of a treating his candidacy as somewhat of a joke, a Hollywood, whatever, et cetera. And I remember saying to myself that the only way you're gonna fix America is if you get somebody from outside the system so that when they come in and they see all these things happen, they ask the questions, why is this happening? Why are we doing this? What's fascinating about President Trump is go back five, 10, 20, 30 years, 40 years and you'll see Fox shows he's been on as a young man and he is saying the same thing then as he is now. Why are we doing the business for the world? Why are we paying for everything around the world? Why aren't we taking care of our own people inside the United States, all of that stuff, which means he as well, as I mentioned earlier, myself, he was consistent on what his dues were. And what's fascinating about him is when I did run for governor, he endorsed me. We didn't really know each other. He got an idea of what my profile was now. He was president for two years when I ran. So I only had two years of Trump won, four years of Biden. This is one, four year one of Trump two. We're going in the year two of Trump two in my last year. So four years, but split with President Biden. So like anybody, when the President of the United States endorses you, that's a great thing. And I'm a little different maybe than some politicians because it wasn't like, okay, you got an endorsement. Great, now you just ignore the guy, or you disrespect the guy, but the relationship grew because he really took an interest in Alaska as well. And I say to this date, and some day I'll ask the President, what is it about Alaska that you really, really like? Because even in the first term, he was doing things for Alaska. He was doing anbar. He was opening up the Tongues National Forest. And even for the people in little tiny King Cole, he wanted to help them with a role. It's truly wildlife preference down there because they live in a place that's fraught with bad weather. They've lost a lot of people from their village are from playing crashes. They just want to have a road to get the cold bay, which has a 10,000 foot runway. And you can never understand what that didn't happen. And even when he was out of office, when Biden was office, and I would see him, he had a fundraiser for me at Bedminster, New Jersey, it was a place. He'd say, how are those people doing a King Cole role? And I would say to myself, it's fascinating that the man that was President, and I was hoping would be President again, still cares about Alaska. So I got a call from him when he decided to run again. And he said, Mike, I'm going to run again. And I said, hey, Mr. President, whatever I can do. You know, whatever I can do. So I was one of the first governors to endorse the President way before the election, going into his second election. And I've gotten, you know, fundraisers, et cetera, et cetera. And then he put together a video for Alaska. We're the only state he put it together to actual a video for Alaska, it is campaign. And he talks about all the things he was going to do for Alaska in his video. So he gets elected, and then he's sworn in, I never forget he got elected. You're not sworn into like the 20th or 20th, January 20th, first state of office. He's elected, and I get a call on January 1st, from Doug Burgham, who was, he was, it was going to be the President's Secretary of Interior, and Doug's a great guy, great pick, it was phenomenal. Doug calls me up and says, hey, the President wants us to start working on Alaska. This is January, this is New Year's Day. You want to work on Alaska. So Doug and I spoke for 45 minutes. And then on this first day in office, one of the first actions he takes, is he puts an executive order up for the state of Alaska, only state to get one. Then in his address to Congress about a month and a half later, he mentions Alaska again and the gas line. So I would say this, we're blessed to have a President like President Trump that views Alaska favorably tremendously across the board. And I appreciate anyone that looks out for our state, especially a President, especially what we had to go through the four years of the Biden administration. And so from my perspective, my relationship with President Trump, I've had my family on Air Force One in Anchorage, Alaska. Nobody's around, there's no press around. Niceest guy in the world of my kids and my wife. Just the nicest guy, he wasn't putting on a show. I've been in the White House with him several times since he's back in office. Same guy. I mean, he's unfiltered. He's his own person, but I am just very grateful for a positive relationship with the President. Not just because it's paying dividends to Alaska, but there's no reason for him to put all this time into a state with a population of 740,000. There's really no political upside, or there's no downside to ignore us, like other presidents have. So it's a special view of Alaska. And I appreciate that. He's always treated me, I think decently. I do the same with him. And so for me, it's been great. - That's awesome. I think it's been very helpful for Alaska. I think specifically for the LNG project, let's talk a little bit about that. It could be one of the biggest projects in the entire world, right? Like $45 billion or more. I think, you know, this is my personal opinion that that's going to, if we can order pipe and get a shovel on the ground to break ground, that's going to be the thing that you're going to be remembered by, which I think is really awesome. I think that's a big kudos, something to be proud of, to be remembered by the governor that saw this thing. Through the finish line, many governors have come before you to do a lot of the work to get it to where it's at. Some have been more detrimental than others, but you could see this thing through, which I think is really awesome. Talk to me a bit, a little bit about where we're at and what this means for the state of Alaska. - Yeah, so this is a very, very interesting project and a lot of it goes back to the moment we were producing oil at Pearl Bay. 'Cause when we started to produce oil at Pearl Bay, we started to recycle the gas, the ancillary gas it was coming with it, putting it back in the reservoir. So we over the years knew how much gas we had 'cause we were recycling it all the time. So we didn't have to go explore for the gas. You knew how much gas we had. Over time, there's a lot of things that have come together here last few years to be honest and to be fair. But over time, gas sometimes is last 30 years, going back 30 years, the gas in many respects was incredibly low cost. It was not a huge upside. You know, somewhat of an interesting note when we bring it up is it was Alaska that pioneered LMG export in the world. We set up the first plant to send gas for cooking it 'cause there was too much gas there for the oil. There was too much gas. So they wanted to get it out of there. We fertilized our plant was set up down there in the K-9. The liqueur fraction of the export plant was set up to send gas to Japan. We did that for 50 years. In '69, we were the first and wanted to set up a continuous shipment somewhere. Algeria started up a plant in '64 but it was intermittent going to Europe. The gas back and forth that we do a line down through Canada but the price was never there. The demand really wasn't there yet. All of these things weren't there. What really kicked it in the gear, I'm gonna start was when, in my opinion, when Sean Parnell is governor, put four or two bills to enabling gas bills that we voted on 2012 that created AGDC and created the impetus and the push to get gas for Alaska. And so AGDC was founded, started to do some work with Exxon and others and Sean or Governor Parnell was defeated by Governor Walker. Governor Walker comes in, takes a different approach to the thing but we didn't get our permits until 2020 under President Trump and that's significant. People gotta remember that. President Trump under 2020 was under him that we got all the permits for this thing. So we ended up with all the permits, all the rightaways, know the gas and then gas starts to become more and more valuable as the main stay, the fuel you can come to rely on. So demand starts to pick up and you got things happening with the Russian crane warrant. Really starts to pick up. And then you get the data farm in cryptocurrency world and it really starts to pick up. And then President Trump becomes interested because of the geopolitics and the national security and our base and our Asian allies. It really starts to pick up but we still have a private sector lead until Glen Farm came on the scene. We went down the Houston, Frank Richards and I give Frank tremendous credit. He has kept AGDC going and his work with outfits such as Glen Farm. We went down to Houston, Texas to explain the project and we explained that it was three phases and we explained to them that we needed gas soon because you don't remember two years ago we had two real long stretches of very cold weather in South Central Alaska which really put a strain on what's left of our gas and cooking. Anyway, long story short, Glen Farm listened to us and I don't forget Brendan who is up here yesterday with his entire team at the state of the state. Sadduck starts to take notes 'cause they'd done work in South America on gas and he became interested because he thought there was a route to do it in three phases with the pipe first. So they pursued that March of last year and the ambassadors, residents in Japan 'cause we're over there talking to the Japanese and the Asians. It's on the AGDC side of contract with them handing over the lead to it 'cause they were getting pretty certain this could work. They did their due diligence all summer long on the cost of the pipe. They've concluded that it can work. They've signed numerous contracts with outfits. They're now in the FID process. They hope to finish this up very shortly. They hope to announce gas sales agreements with the majors on the slope and I think in the next couple weeks you're gonna see a series of announcements that people will save themselves. We got a gas line. - How important was it for you to find a private entity as opposed to having the government run it? Because I think that was, at least from the outside perspective, Walker was the, let's have the government do it guy. You were the, wait, we need to have the private sector do this, how much unraveling of Walker's plan did you have to do to get kind of your private plan to work? - Well, we almost, the AGDC almost folded up shop when I first came in because there was no money to finish out the study. So we went to the majors and again, I think we're blessed to have a huge oil sector and I think we're blessed to have some, I think amazing companies working on the slope. But those majors put for 10 million dollars collectively to finish out the studies. So remember, I got in here in 2019, to finish out the studies, et cetera. And then in 2020, a president Trump, we get all the permits. So a private, a private led anything, a private led anything is better in my opinion because it will stress test everything much better than government. So that's why we've gone through this process to stress test this. If this was just, if this was just government led, it'd be a different ball game. Now, make no mistake about it. Alaska's isolation, it's low population, it's population spread out. Makes it difficult in some ways to have mega projects unless there's a huge private sector behind it. But again, it was, was Glenfarn. And we thought we were going to, we were having others look at as well. There was big office like Enbridge and other looking at it. But Glenfarn, their, their return rate model is different. The way that view things is different. They're a little smaller, more nimble. Things have changed in the industry, meaning things are moduleized more. Technology makes things a little better. And so, long story short, private sector will stress test it better. That's what's happened under Glenfarn. If stress test this, they believe it works. And that's why we're moving ahead. Really, that's, that's the ideal situation. Will there be some, will there be some long guarantees for the federal government? Maybe, but that'll be good. That just lowers the cost. But I think a private sector approach is probably the best way to go. - Yeah, I mean, it's vastly different than, you know, what I think Walker was headed towards, which was, let's have the government be in charge of this project. And I think that you've also been the guy that is not going to talk about stuff and tell it's done. You're not going to just throw out a bunch of fluffy press releases and get people excited about it. And so, you're kind of, what I'm hearing from you for kind of the first time is like very, very excited that this project has some legs and traction that it might cross the finish line of starting before your term is done, is that fair to say? - I would say, I would call it restrained excitement, meaning I'll take it. - I am hoping and hoping and hoping and as we get closer and closer and closer and it's still happening and happening. I told people when the contracts are all signed and the pipe is ordered and then I see it on the ground. I stand there and take a picture of it on the ground that I'll say, we got it. I'm feeling really good about where it's going. It's moving in the direction it should, getting all these contracts to Tuesday. I don't know if I mentioned this, but Tuesday was President Trump's one year anniversary in office. So he did a press conference on what he's accomplished in one year. And I gotta tell you, it's sometimes it feels like President Trump was there for eight years. This is only one year with all this stuff happening. But in his press conference, he brought up the gas line again and said we've got Japanese, some Korean investment. Gas line is still a big deal for him. So it's still moving, it's not going backwards or it's not stalled, it's moving forward. So. - Do you think this saves Alaska's economy for the next 20 years or longer? They're Alaska's interesting, I'll answer the question because there have been certain benchmarks that are pretty clear and pre-star in Alaska's history. Unlike other states in which the economy grew constantly over time and diversify like California, fourth largest economy in the world, right? It could be its own country. It's got everything there from energy to technology, to pharmaceuticals, you name it, it's all there. Alaska's a different ballgame. So benchmarks in Alaska would be, I'm not going to go back before World War II, but benchmarks in Alaska started with hook and lid, down a keen eye, oil and gas there, liquid fraction plant, like I said, exporting gas to Japan, the fertilizer plant, one of the biggest in the Pacific, I think it was the biggest in the Pacific, sending fertilizer all over the world. That made the keen eye the hub of commerce, the hub of the resource development. And then, of course, Prudel Bay is discovered and they start doing workup in Prudel Bay. That was significant and transformational. Without Prudel Bay, we would not have the state we have today. There's no doubt about it. We would not have the state we have today. So when we go to the gas line, what does that really mean? Gas is not as lucrative as oil, but what gas can do for Alaska is, it can lower the price of energy in-house tremendously. It can stabilize the fuel source. You can bring up data farms, you can bring up all kinds of technology. Alaska could be the center of data transformation by having fiber from Europe, fiber from Asia, fiber from North America, convert your Alaska. I would say it would be next to the Trans-Alaska oil pipeline, the most transformative project we've had in generations. - I love it. So let's shift gears a little bit and talk about public safety. I think that's one of the main things you ran on when you first ran, we kind of had the crappy After Effects of SB 91 or 81 or whatever that was. - Now you came in 91 and you came in and kind of surgically went after how to fix that. You were a Republican governor that got endorsed by the public safety unions, which is sometimes a common thing, sometimes not. The people in public safety thought you were the guy that was gonna be able to get this done. Talk to me a little bit about what it's been like the last seven and a half years. - Well, when it comes to public safety, obviously we've driven down rates tremendously across the board and we have to, the primary function of government, especially an executive, you know, an executive in America is really a descendant of kings that go back thousands of years. And the purpose of the king, I'm just saying that their job was to protect their people. Their job was to eliminate chaos, protect their people from being harmed, protect their people from being preyed upon by others. And so when you flash forward to where we are today, we have a very high crime rate in Alaska. It's still high, we're gonna drive it down. We talked about our partnership with Anchorage, which is very, very important. A lot of people thought that most of our crime was, you know, coming out of rural Alaska and we still have crime all over Alaska. But what we found out and I have to get the mayor credit in Attorney General Steve Cox, we took apart why crime, why we were still around 48 and 46 of the nation were with the worst crime. When we took out Anchorage, set it aside, we're actually 13th best in the nation crime. - Wow. - 13th best. And what that tells you, and it's bad and good news, bad news is Anchorage's crime rate is three times higher than the national average. - Anchorage has got to get their crap together. - That's what that means. - Good news is we know where the crime rate is high, which is Anchorage, and we know what we can do to effectuate that, to effect that and drive that down. Attorney General sees that. I see that. This is the mayor's credit. She sees that and that's exactly what we're doing. And we're gonna attack crime in a three phase approach. One is we're gonna be looking at retail theft and nuisance crimes and oftentimes associated with people on the streets, stop that you see. And then drug interdiction is gonna be huge, driving that down. And we're fortunate there too because a lot of our drugs come into Anchorage because that's the largest city. That's kind of the delivery point. And then before the spring gets rolling, we will also be in the phase three, which is working on assault, sexual assaults murders. And so it's not that we need to put, or it's not that we need to ask the legislature for a lot more resource, it's that we need to coordinate across jurisdictional lines. And that's what we're doing out our conversations with Anchorage, who patrols what, who takes what crime, who prosecutes what crime, how do we use technology on theft, how do we use technology and dogs on drugs, how do we use the post office and the airports to work with us so that we can deal with that stuff. And I would say this, John, I said in my 2019 speech that if you're a criminal, you better get out of Alaska 'cause we're coming after you. I could tell you right now, if you're a criminal in Anchorage, we're coming after you. We're coming after you, the city's coming after you. There will probably be federal resources that are coming after you. My goal is before I'm out of this done with this, is that we've put into place across the state and in our big city, Anchorage, approaches to crime that will demonstrably, everyone will see it, everyone will feel it, that it is becoming a much safer city. So that's one of the last, I think, very important things that I'll do and hand that off to the next governor. And so it sounds like there's gonna be a strategic join effort that's gonna happen that maybe hasn't been approached this way before, this is a new thing. - Yeah, yeah it is. Because people just come to the recognition that there's a lot of bad stuff happening in Anchorage, and it doesn't have to be that way. There could be a lot of good stuff happening in Anchorage. And I would say officials statewide, civil wide, and even with our federal partners, we're gonna join hands, join arms, and work on this. - Yeah, I think in your state of the state, you had mentioned that the majority of fentanyl overdoses in the whole state are happening in Anchorage and probably other drug stuff as well. - What jury of all your crimes are? - Yeah. - And not because, because not just because it's the largest city with a large population, but even then, the crime rates are outsized. Now, I will say this, because it's important, crime started to go down in Anchorage here over the last couple years as well. So I think it's through our efforts at the state, but it's also the efforts in Anchorage itself. They're working on crime. What we wanna do is get it down steeper with the collaborative approach that we wanna take with them. Because almost all of us go to Anchorage, right? It's Alaska's city. It's the big city for Alaska. And we want everyone to be safe. We want tourists to be safe. So yeah, I mean, we're excited about this. I think, like I said, I think the criminals, the criminals should view this in some respects as some of our foreign adversaries viewed Trump's approach. In other words, we are gonna be coming after you. We're telegraphing that now. We're not just saying that. And we are going to make a difference, just like we did in the state. Anchorage wants to make a difference. We wanna make a difference. The feds wanna make a difference. So we're coming. We're gonna make a difference. And Mayor LaFrance is on board with this. - Yes, yeah. And it's not because Mayor LaFrance had a knuckle debt. We had our, you know, we put our knuckles on her, whatever. We just had a conversation. We said, look, we're looking at the research. Here's what we're finding. If Anchorage was not in the mix, the efforts that we made at the state would not have as a 46 or whatever it is. 46, I think, a 47. We'd be 13th best in the country. So we know where the issues are. You wanna work with us to fix it. She said, yes. Yeah, we wanna fix the crime issues in Anchorage. We wanna fix those now as well. So that's why we have a collaborative effort going on there. - That's awesome. So let's shift gears here a little bit and talk about education. I know that's something that's really important to you. You were a teacher superintendent school board president. It's something near and dear to your heart. You know, oftentimes when Alaska gets placed on these lists, you know, that one of them, you know, always puts us almost dead last for educational outcomes. What do you think is the main cause of that? And what are some of your things you're excited about that are kind of maybe down the pipeline or things you've accomplished? - Well, what do I think the main cause of poor educational outcomes is? - Yeah, we're dead last in those polls, you know, or whatever. - Yeah, I would say, I would say special interests to be perfectly honest with you. And I've said, I've said, I've said NEA Alaska, I think has to bear a lot of the credit for this. So why do I say that? Because, you know, it's kind of like, maybe this is a poor analogy, and I'll probably get in trouble for this, but it's kind of like having a hospital situation where you need a lot of money. We need money. We've got to put money in hospitals. Yes, we understand it. But we expect that money to translate into better health outcomes. - Okay. - So yeah, I've been a teacher, a principal superintendent. I would say that the teacher's union has a very effective campaign where they get inside people's heads and they say, "Look, if you don't support more money than you'd hate children." - Yeah. - If you don't support more money than you hate teachers. Okay, I have children. I went to public school. I'm a teacher. You know, that's a lot of belonging to be perfectly honest with you. But it's effective for some down here in Juneau. And so long story short is, you put more money in it. Don't get me wrong, you need to put money in education. That is a primary responsibility of state to have a great educational approach. But I'll say this, every time there was a policy brought forward even going back decades that changed the policy and potentially the educational outcomes, it was fought by special interests. So years ago, and I always give Lauren Lehman credit for this meeting as a legislator and others at that time in the '90s, we opened up one of the most liberal homeschool laws in the country. A lot of our people homeschool. Then in the '90s, public homeschooling led by Galena, Galena School District, opened up the public homeschooling sphere. A lot of people have gone into that. Now 20 some thousand kids are in that program alone. We estimate thousands are in homeschooling not associated with the state. Then we reformed our charter school laws. We put charter school laws into place. What happened then? And these were all fought. I was a superintendent back there. I would go to meetings. Same meetings, a lot of the special interests are going to now. And I would sit there and I would hear some of my fellow superintendents saying we got to work to stop this stuff from happening. And I would say, why? Why do we have to work? Well, because they're going to take our kids, I said, you got it all wrong. Nobody's going to take your kids. Your kids are going to leave unless you create an environment for them and you're a school district, which they want to stay. So charter schools were put in the place. Well, how are they doing? One of the only studies measuring outcomes by a Harvard study and Harvard's not considered-- We're like the best in the US, right? Some like that. Number one, charter school system in the nation. And then finally, our kids weren't reading well. Our reading scores were not good. So what do you do? Do you try and fix the reading scores? Do you hope they get better? I'm the type of guy that says, if you're in a public policy position like a governor or legislator, you're duty, you're moral obligation. You're moral imperative is to fix something to help people, especially kids. So credit where creditors do, a bipartisan bill was passed called the READS Act. By self, et cetera, baggage worked on the READS Act. What's happening now? Our reading scores are going up dramatically for our kindergartens, our first graders, et cetera. You knew it would if we put our focus on outcomes. And finally, we've got a couple of bills in that we still think if they're active upon, it's looking tough, because I'm telling you, the special interest have a hammer lock and some of these people down here. But I would say that we could have helped teachers in a recruitment retention study, your bonus-- And some of your bonus bills. You're talking about bonus. And I want to make sure-- I hope teachers are watching this, because-- and this is why, John, I appreciate what you're doing. So I'm going to say something. Our teacher recruitment retention bonus program was to measure how effective bonuses would be. And it would have been a three-year program. In school districts like Anchorage, every classroom teacher would have gotten $5,000. In more rural school districts than Anchorage, they would have gotten $10,000. And for really remote, high turnover school districts, they would have gotten $15,000. This would have cost about $65 million a year. So if you are a teacher in Anchorage and you are a classroom teacher, and that's where a lot of our turnover is, you would have made $15,000 up three years. If you were in one of those mid-level districts, you would have made $30,000. If you were in a remote district where the turnover is high, you would have made $45,000. Now, we have a tribal compacting for education built in for tribes, for some of our kids that are not performing well because the system is not working well for them. We try to get that bill heard this summer, and we want to hear. We have an opportunity now to help that happen and make that happen. Just a couple of tweaks, John, in education, a couple of tweaks in fighting crime. I think the story of Alaska would be just a couple of tweaks and we could do tremendous things. Yeah, I think one of the bright chatting starts in education is the charter schools. And I think also this dichotomy of like, if you're conservative, you don't have to hate schools. I think there's tons of conservatives all over Alaska that they want to have their kids in public schools. They want their teachers to be good teachers. And that's an okay thing. And I think the special interest groups, I think, want to pit each other against each other, conservatives versus the school districts. And it doesn't have to be that way necessarily. I'm not a big fan of the NEA either at all. What's that been like for you? Because you get to see the, in the hallways, all the special interest groups, you know, like a politician is like a NASCAR where they got all the stickers on them, right? You're kind of stickerless. You don't really care about special interest groups. At least that's how I've seen it. Like, you pretty much told them to pound sand all of them pretty much. How's that been for you? Well, it's been liberating. It's been, I mean, you kind of nailed it, right? There's a lot of special interest that don't care for me and understandably so. They have a job. Their job is to make sure their special interest and the objectives of the special interest take precedence sometimes at the exclusion of others and what's best for Alaska. So what I got in, no, there's not been a lot of special interest grace my office or grace the halls. And I don't say that, you know, with bravado, it's just you either have a mission when you run for governor, John. You need to have a mission, whether it's driving down crime, bringing in investment, helping education. But if you don't have a mission, the special interests are gonna have the mission for you. And if you don't do your research, the special interests will sound like they're smarter than you and that what they're saying is better for Alaska. But in the end, you know, I've got a govern for all of Alaska. I can't, the special interests don't need me to govern for them. They already got their robust teams to lobby and do things down here in Juno. So I would say that, if you're ever gonna run for office, I hope not you personally, but anyone that wants to run for office, and I say they do so for the right reason. What I mean by that is you do so because you want to change outcomes for large groups of people, especially those that aren't represented by special interests, especially the mothers, the fathers, the kids. You just want to live, go to work, not get assaulted, have good roads, decent educational program. That's who you should be governing for, that's who you should be legislating for. - So you got, I think, seven months or so left in your term. Most people would just kind of sit and write it out. You don't look like the sit and write it out kind of guy. Are you gonna be fighting tooth and nail to the last day? - As a matter of fact, as time goes on, things become more compressed. You've got to do more in that compression and then compress time, whether it's the gas line, whether it is, make sure, and more, and if you are, Tongas, and all of these other things get online with the executive order with President Trump. You got to make sure that you get all the things in place to drive down crime across the state of Alaska, including Anchorage. We're introducing a bill, it should be shortly, if it wasn't today. We found out that we were over capitalizing our unemployment insurance by a large sum of money. An unemployment insurance is a, it's a fund and it's a system that's shared responsibly between the federal government and the state and it has to do with unemployment insurance taxes and that sort of thing. But we found out that it was over capitalized. Well, that was in a way terrific and very opportune because we have to train up more workers across the board for all these projects that we're getting ready for. So we've introduced a bill that we want the legislature to consider. I think this is one bill, all the legislature can get around. Basically, what it will do is we'll help through unemployment insurance stream of collected revenue to be able to train as many Alaska as as possible in many of these blue collar trainings, including the training teachers up and I've done right can provide the daycare for these people as they're getting trained up. So we have a, despite our fiscal issues right now, we have a way of method by which we can train up people. And so the legislature will consider that bill. We need workers now. We need blue collar workers now. And I don't know, I'm just excited about a number of things that can happen. And even when I'm gone, at least there's a couple, there's some footprints that can lead to success that hopefully the next governors and legislature can follow. So governor, my next question to you is on the state of the state, you mentioned fiscal plans and sales tax and those kinds of things, talked to me a little bit about what that means for you and for Alaska in general. I know that we've kind of brushed on the LNG project, you know, potentially saving Alaska, but that's not going to happen tomorrow. So what are your thoughts? - We have, when we look at our fiscal projections, we have about five years that are going to be difficult with the price of oil down in the 60s and they end up going into the 50s according to some. Some predictions. If that happens, it's going to be very difficult for us to meet our obligations. So we have a couple of choices at that happens. We have to significantly reduce the size overall size of government. We will have to eliminate the PFD most likely. We probably won't be able to do capital projects. We probably won't be able to do major maintenance of a number of facilities and infrastructure projects we have. A very difficult time for five years. After five years, 2032, all of the projections have a ramp up on the new oil that's happening on this low. As a matter of fact, the DNR Commissioner John Crowley reported, I think it was today, maybe yesterday, that on the high side, we may be looking at 960,000 barrels here by the early 20s, which is significant. That's almost a million. Low side, 600,000 barrels. So currently, we're at 487, 495. So regardless of the optimistic versus the low, you're looking at new oil coming online. That's going to help with our physicals. You get the gas line going. It's around the same time for export, 203831. You're going to get money out of the gas sales. And then our permanent fund itself will continue to grow and spin off more revenue for the state. So all those three are going to come together. It's going to make things a lot better. What we're saying is over the next five years, why don't we take a look at an approach that is a plan with a couple of components and not just a tax and spend plan? Because I'm not interested in a tax and spend plan. So what we're proposing is that we hold spending to 1%. We mentioned earlier that we have held spending to slightly under 1% for years I've been in office. That we continue to hold spending at 1% over the next five years, which is a conservative approach to things for many people to say. At starting in 203231, we actually eliminate our corporate income tax so that we can join the ranks of Texas, Wyoming, South Dakota. So we can invite more investment up here into the state of Alaska. That we ask oil to help out when I say a little bit. They just need to help out a little bit with about $130 million over this five years. Again, we're looking at the numbers, keeping everything low. And then, especially if we want outsiders to help look at a seasonal sales tax, especially for activity that takes place in the summer, looking at, and they all sunset, by the way, if we were to adopt this. So keep our, and I'll talk about the permanent fund in just a moment, keep our spending low, eliminated corporate income tax. Look at the sales tax, the capture of income in the summer from outsiders. There's a little bit of ask from oil. It's when I say a little, it's not a huge change at all. And it's temporary. All these things are temporary. They all expire in 2032. It's all for this five years. So the question is, do people want to ponder that? And I know it seems not unconventional for someone like myself. But if people want to ponder that, there may be a way to have a plan but all the components would have to be part of the plan. If it's just tax and spend, I have no interest. Going to the permanent fund, you know, I've been a big fan of the dividend because I believe it should go to the people for the people of Alaska to decide how it's going to spend, be spent. But we would also be looking at a constitutional amendment that protects the permanent fund and the dividend. And so, what are the chances of this plan being adopted? I'm not going to bet my pension on it. However, it is a pathway to stability. And that's one of the things that I wanted to say. We've had a number of investors talk to us. They're looking at Alaska. They're just concerned that our fiscal issues are so volatile because we follow oil. Under my administration, we have that oil is high as $120 a barrel and is lowest three. And so, the concern on some of the investors is, what's it going to look like over the next five years? Because if we want to come up with a big data farm, a big gas plant, a big this, are you going to be able to cover your obligations with the current process that you have? And they're not so short. Anyway, long story short, it's a plan with multi-components that we believe can keep spending now. Protect the permanent fund for five years. Ask outsiders to help out with some revenue piece. And then when 2032 happens, everything disappears. We got new oil, new gas from the fund growing out in the stormway. And I think we're going to be in great shape at that point. Awesome. Well, I appreciate you taking an hour with me. Really enjoyed chatting with you. Do you have any last minute thoughts here before we head off? I moved up here in '83 because I was excited about the outdoors. It was beautiful. The outdoors part of it exceeded my dreams. I lived in rural Alaska for 20 years. Some of the best years of my life. And when I look at Alaska now, I truly do see it as the state with more upside than other states. So we'll go and I really appreciate you and your time. Welcome back any time. I hope you have a great rest of your day. Thank you. See you.