Mia Love on Immigration and the Border Crisis
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Welcome to Broken Potholes with your hosts Sam Stone and Chuck Warren. We have a great program for this week. Former Utah Congresswoman Mia Love is going to be joining us momentarily.

Great. Mia Love, if you're not aware, was a former Utah congresswoman, the first black Republican congresswoman to the U.S. House of Representatives. She's also a former mayor and city council, which, as you know, Sam and I like talking local politics because it basically runs our lives in a lot of ways. So she has a storybook story. Storybook story. We're going to have her share that with us today. And currently she's also now a CNN commentator. And welcome, Mia Love.

Hello, Chuck and Sam. How are you? I'm doing so good. Mia, before we get started here, I want to go and talk about how the Love family came to the United States from Haiti. What was the situation there?

Tell us a little bit about your story, because it really is a story that speaks to a lot of people in America. It's an immigrant story. It's an immigrant story. It's an American story. It is. Yeah. So my name is very French. My maiden name, that's Bordeaux. So my mom and my dad, my mom's Mary Bordeaux.

Lourdes Bordeaux, and my dad is Jean-Maxime Bordeaux. And they grew up in very, very impoverished Haiti. As a matter of fact, if anybody doesn't know about Haiti, it was a little tiny island, which is the first that actually gained its independence from slavery against the French.

And Haiti has this wonderful story, but with that story comes this darkness of not being able to set up a system where they were governed themselves. So if you think about Haiti, it's really important to understand the history so that you can understand where I came from and how I ended up with the beliefs that I have. Haiti wasn't...

It was the first country to gain its independence, but it came through a lot of bloodshed. And when you've got people who have been enslaved and have been stripped of their name, their identity, and have been pretty much just...

less than nothing, right? They're treated as property and disposable property. It's very hard once all of a sudden you're left on your own, the French leave, and you're there to govern yourself. And, you know, that independence...

may be an inspiring story, but it also came with a lot of heartache, which made Haiti end up with one dictator after another. Whenever they put somebody in office, all of a sudden that person took control and it became very corrupt. So my parents grew up under the Duvaliers, Papa Doc and then Baby Doc, and they saw firsthand what it was like when government

controlled everything and people had no say in anything they did. Papa and baby Doc Duvalier, for a lot of people who maybe aren't familiar with the history, are two of the most murderous, awful dictators in recent world history. Haiti is a country that has pretty significant natural beauty. It's a gorgeous country. I have a friend who goes there and builds houses every year with his church group.

But they are it is the most impoverished country essentially in the Western Hemisphere and has been that way. So what brought your family to New York? What's what's the story?

So the story is my mom and dad, of course, grew up in very impoverished and fearful of the president called the Toto Makuts. These are people who were worked for the president. And that's it. They had no law that applied to them. They could do whatever they wanted to. And so.

There's a story where my dad talks about being 14 and going to a movie theater. And when he walked out with his friends, he saw a bunch of people running in one direction. And so he ran also. You didn't ask questions. Then you just took off. And when he turned around, he looked and he saw that there was one person that was chasing this mob full of people.

And that person had a blue beret, the typical blue beret that they had become so familiar with, blue uniform, black boots. And that was the Totoma Coot, who was incredibly drunk. And they knew that if they got a hold of you, they could do whatever they wanted to. They've been known to, like, just terrorize and kill. When you talk about that murderous history, it's from the...

those people from that group called the Tonto Makut. And so he hid in a little drainage pipe and didn't really leave until the next morning. And when he went home, he said to me, in recounting this story to me, he said, you should have seen the look on my mother's face. He's

He said at that time, if a child didn't come home at night, they weren't coming home. And he says, when I saw that look on my mom's face, I knew that there was no way I was going to have, I was going to have children and, and bring,

bring them up here. I never wanted to have that same look that my mom had on her face. And so at that point, at the age of 14, he knew he was going to do everything he can to go to that country he heard of, the land of the free, the land of opportunity, America. And he ended up doing it, left my mom, left my brother and my sister, actually, for over five years, and

got his citizenship and his first vote was for Ronald Reagan because he's like, look, any president that says people have to be bigger than government, that local and governments that are closest to people are the most effective, that's what I'm going to do because he came from a dictatorship and said, I'm not going back.

Yeah. So you come, you're in the United States, you end up moving to Utah. We'll skip some of those particulars. But, you know, there's this great scene in the movie Dave, which I've asked the girls here to watch. It's a movie about a man who's accidentally put in president. And I remember him talking to Ben Kingsley, who was his vice president. He said, so how'd you get into politics?

And Ben talked about he was mad about something. And his wife said, well, you just need to run for city council. I have never forgotten that dialogue. I was a shoe salesman. Right. Your story is the same when you ran for city council for Saratoga. So tell everybody how you got involved in politics, which led to next being mayor, the next being in Congress. It all started with a local complaint. Right.

It was a local complaint. We had these little bugs that just no one was taking care of them. They're called midges. They're not harmful, but they're incredibly invasive. And they would swarm you and your house would be covered with them. And the local governments really weren't paying attention to us because we were right on the border in the outskirts. And I remember the council members saying, well, they really should be annexed into the other city anyway. And of course, that's

That angered us. We all got together as a neighborhood, and they all decided that I was the one that needed to run. I don't know what would give them that wild idea that I needed to do it, but...

I did, and guess what? We got that thing taken care of. They all of a sudden had to pay attention to what we were doing, and that led into, of course, what I believe is running a government like you run a home. Saratoga Springs was living mainly on...

impact these where they would charge people home one-time fees for the road and one-time speed for all of these other things that that what was running the city and i said to my couple what happened when the housing market crashes and i told the council members in the mayor that at the time they're like oh no

Housing market's not going to crash. It's going to be great. I don't think you can't do that. I mean, you're running a city on one-time revenues, and you're using it for ongoing expenditures. That doesn't make any sense. We have a city here in Arizona that does the same thing, but they found out the answer is to put up...

10 million automated traffic cameras and they just ticket drivers enough to pay for them. I mean, it's not rocket science. I'm sitting there going, guys, it doesn't take this much experience. One-time revenues pay for one-time expenditures. Ongoing revenues have to come in with ongoing expenditures.

We have to build a tax base. We have to be able to make sure that people, if they need resources, it would be nice if they were able to spend those resources in the areas that they live in so it would go back into the city. Mia, as someone who works in local government, let me just say, the folks in your government there, the bureaucrats, the employees, they hated you, didn't they?

It's just, for what? I mean, it's crazy. I'm sitting down, I'm like, don't you all live here? Don't you all live here? Like, you want the city to be run responsibly. And I had three rules that I lived by. Is it affordable? Is it sustainable? And is it my job? And if it wasn't yes to all of those things, then I wouldn't vote for it.

I mean, and that was just my philosophy as a mayor, as a city council member. And then, obviously, I was asked to run for mayor because we were able to, during the actual downfall that happened, where everybody was surprised that the housing market created this downfall.

deficit for our little city, I was able to put everything on track, not just for the next four to five years, but for the next 40 to 50 years. And they said, well, we don't want to go

go through that again. So let's see if we can get Mia to run for mayor. And then that's, it just keeps, people keep getting me into this political mess. I mean, it's not like I asked for, it's not what I said I wanted to do when I grow up, but. If you want to run for Phoenix mayor, I'd love to end the discussion we're having now about handing out reparations. I'm pretty sure that falls under number three, not our job.

Not our job, right. It's not affordable, not sustainable, not our job, then we shouldn't be doing it. Mia, which job did you enjoy the most, Congress or mayor or city council? Oh, well, that's a hard question. Obviously, when you're in a city, all of the things that you do, what I loved about it more than anything is the fact that in the 10 years that I worked in the city, not one issue was a Republican or Democrat issue. They were all city issues.

Yeah, so it was just that I love that. There were things that I hated about it. I mean, I would go to Walmart and everybody would approach me with pictures and different things, or I'd go to church and everybody would approach me. It's not like that was different as a member of Congress, but in Congress you thought it's just there is... I love the fact that I was able to be part of something good, but I hated the...

politics from the DCCC and all of the other things that make it very difficult for good people to stay in Washington. A mayor similar, like years ago I had a pizza restaurant and it was like a mile from my house. It was the worst mistake I ever made in this sense.

If there were no napkins in the holder, people would call the house because it was neighbors going. And so I imagine that's the same way as a mayor, right? They see you as like, well, hell, she's here. I might as well bring it up. I mean, I've got this picture, you know, this dog's defecating on my lawn or this person's hedges are wrong. And I'm sure everything you're supposed to handle. So, you know, actually, I can connect to that. We had an incident this year when Mayor Gallego actually closed the hiking trails at the start of the pandemic last year now. But...

Somebody actually went out and posted her cell phone number and all the trail heads. The only time the only time I've ever felt bad for our uber liberal mayor is I'm sure she was getting pounded starting about four in the morning with a million phone calls from angry text messages or whatever. Yeah, no. So that would be the problem, Mayor, because you're your friend and they know you and your town was small.

Mia, we're going to take a break and we'll be right back and we're going to talk some policy here. This is Broken Potholes. Sam Stone, Chuck Warren, and of course, the lovely Congress, former Congresswoman Mia Love. It's the new year and time for a new you. You've thought about running for political office, but don't know where to start.

Before you start any planning, you need to secure your name online with a yourname.vote web domain. This means your constituents will know they are learning about the real you when they surf the web. Secure your domain from godaddy.com today. The 2020 political field was intense, so don't get left behind in 2021.

If you're running for political office, the first thing on your to-do list needs to be securing your name on the web with a yourname.vote web domain from godaddy.com. Get yours now.

Welcome back to Broken Potholes. I am Chuck Warren with my co-host Sam Stone. And today we have with us Mia Love, former congresswoman from the state of Utah and a CNN contributor, which is, I'm sure, a wonderful experience. Let's talk about the immigration border problem we've got right now.

So what do you think needs to be done? And as a person whose family immigrated here for reasons, for safety, for a better life, to pursue the American dream, what is going through the mindset of these families who are just picking up their families or the parents just sending their kids to the border? What is going through their minds? So that's a two-part question. But let's first start about what do you think is going on? What is Biden doing wrong? What's he doing right? And go from there.

Okay, so it's obviously a multi-pronged issue. And the biggest issue that we have in the United States is that there is a fix. There's not this silver bullet that's going to make everything perfect. I mean, I think people need to understand that. We need immigration policies that are good,

that are enforceable and that will make things better, right? Will protect first and foremost American citizens and also create this environment where our economy can grow. We, the problem that we have is nobody really is really interested in immigration

immigration policy because it's purely what government does. It's not about policies. It's not about people. It's about power. And if you get a Republican group, for instance, that, um,

or Congress that fixes immigration, then that's a voter block that they no longer have. That is a group of... It's a problem, and when you solve a problem, no one needs you for that problem any longer. And that is the biggest hurdle to good immigration policy being implemented,

and executed through the administration. The other problem is the administration has way too much power. There's no balance of powers there. And they tend to do things that another president can undo, and certainly things that are not stable or sustainable. So it's a multi-pronged issue. The fix is there. The want to really actually fix the problem is not.

Mia, you bring up a great point because I have talked about this before about immigration, but also about things like LGBTQ issues where you have a billion dollar lobby that essentially won.

And then now you see kind of a lot of craziness coming out of them because they have to justify their continued existence. If you solve the border, these groups can't justify their existence, whether it's Numbers USA on the right or any of the numerous leftist organizations that are pushing this. The minute you fix these things, their budgets are at risk. There's no reason for anyone to give money to them anymore. Their budgets and jobs.

Budget and jobs. And like I said, it's unfortunate because these are things that are good that this fix affects what is happening in terms of our national security. It also helps when it comes to the economy. And now I have some really, I think...

What I would call very reasonable. Of course, I think my my my policies are very reasonable, but I have some very reasonable and I think palatable fixes for immigration. And what are some of those? Can can you give us some examples?

So we always talk about, I'll give you this, a lot of people don't talk about this, right? But we always talk about getting highly skilled immigrants here and making sure we don't ship them off to compete against us. There is the need for that, but there's also a need for those who are not, who don't have those skills that we always think

think that is desirable. For instance, my mom has worked in a nursing home ever since she immigrated in the United States. It's an incredibly compassionate position that she has, and she was able to become a nurse through that entire thing. I mean, literally in her elderly age, got her nursing degree, but she's taken care of our elderly ever since she has moved to the United States. These are people that pay directly

into our entitlement system, Social Security, Medicare, right? Where you've got the highly skilled that are being educated, and it takes them years before they're actually able to pay into our systems that are bankrupt.

So these are little things that people don't think about that, look, we need a diversity of skills. People aren't going to stop getting old. We need those people there. We need hospitality. We need agriculture. We need all of it. So we need a diverse group of immigrants coming into the United States. From here in Phoenix right now, all of the construction trades are desperate for people who can swing a hammer or carry a load of

anything that you can do in those areas, they're ready to hire and pay really good wages. We don't have the people. No, we don't. We don't. And they keep stealing them from each other. Right. Exactly. Trying to like steal them from each other. It doesn't make any sense. Those are things that are good for our economy.

And, you know, we've got obviously the Flores Amendment on the border where it says that children are releasable. A lot of people don't know about the Flores Amendment, but that is one of the major issues where you see that people are being separated at the borders because when there is an investigation going on, the facilities, one, they're not allowed to hold the

the children who are deemed releasable. And two, those facilities aren't, they're not conducive to having young children there. So we had a Flores Amendment fix in one of the bills that we had put forward in the House of Representatives that would, first of all, put a little bit more money at the border so that we would have

facilities for families. There was also verifications and testing. I did a lot of work on human child sex trafficking, which a lot of that happens at the border also. There's an ugly truth of what's going on at the border that you can't just sit there and say, hey, we're going to make everybody feel good. We're going to just let everybody in and it's just going to be great. It's so much more complicated than that. And frankly, I think that the current administration is not showing that

the reality of what's going on at the border and the fact that we are actually putting children in harm's way. Mia, I have to ask this question because it's very frustrating living here in Arizona. You see this. Do people in Washington understand that nobody, nobody crosses that border anymore without paying off a cartel? Do they get that? I think, I,

I think they get it. But I think that perception is reality. And so I think that there's a reason why I don't know if anybody saw the press conference, the first press conference that Biden held where he says, well, I'm not going to show you what's going on at the border.

He doesn't really I don't think he really wants the American people to see. I think that that was a big mistake. I think he should show people what's going on at the border. And then if he's really if he's got some fixes to try and change them, then they'll see a difference. You know, they'll see what's actually what he's actually doing. But the fact that he's saying, I'm not going to show you until we actually have some things that we've implemented. I sit there and think to myself, OK, OK.

We know how bad it is. Is it worse than what we're actually being told or what we're actually seeing? And my guess is, yes, it is. But there's no doubt because right now we have several hundred and I think a couple thousand actually total of these migrant crossers who are being relocated here to Phoenix. They're being put up in hotels. The government is paying an average of five hundred and thirty three dollars per day per person to maintain these folks for the next three months. Yeah.

And that's not a plan. I mean, that is just throwing cash. It's not a plan. That's the problem. It's not a plan. Look, we can be compassionate, and I think we should. We should understand how desperate it is. The fact that my mother, and this is something that is incredibly dear to my heart. Mia, we're going to take the break, and we'll be right back when we want you to finish that story, please. This is Broken Potholes with Chuck Warren, Sam Stone, and former Congresswoman Mia Love, a CNN contributor. We'll be right back.

It's the new year and time for the new you. You've thought about running for political office, but don't know where to start. Before you start any planning, you need to secure your name online with a yourname.vote web domain. This means your constituents will know they are learning about the real you when they surf the web. Secure your domain from godaddy.com today.

The political field is all about reputation, so don't let someone squash yours online. Secure your name and political future with a yourname.vote web address from godaddy.com. Your political career depends on it. Welcome back to Broken Potholes with your co-host Sam Stone. Chuck Warren on the line with us today. Fantastic interview with Mia Love, former congresswoman from the state of Utah.

Mia, you were talking about—let's continue the story you were talking about before we took our break. Yeah. So I was talking about the fact that this is so incredibly near and dear to my heart, because my mom can still—

She has a hard time talking about the fact that she had to leave her children, mainly my brother and my sister, in Haiti for five years. When she was getting on the plane, my sister was two, my brother was four. He cried and said, Daddy got on that big white bird and never came back, and now you're going on the big white bird and never coming. She can't even talk about it because she, in essence, had to give up

and put her children in the hands of somebody else. Now, can you imagine the desperation of a mother putting a note in the pocket of her child and sending them to walk all

all the way to the border, not knowing what will happen to them, and with the hopes and beliefs that, okay, at least this president says that they're not going to turn them away, right? You just have to understand the desperation and the situation that we have here. And to turn around again and not have a fix, just putting people up in hotels, it's not sustainable. It's not a fix. It's not...

We have to have a plan. It's not compassionate. It's not compassionate what we're doing. It's not even compassionate. These folks are coming here, and I like to ask this a lot for my dear, dear real conservative friends. They shouldn't be coming. They're criminals. And I like to put back to them, okay, you're in their shoes. These are the various situations. What are you doing?

And, you know, 99 of 100 times they say, I would do the same thing. No doubt. So when we go and do what we're doing now, this is not compassion. We're not giving these people hope. We're putting their life on hold, right? And then we're making them political pawns on both sides. So this is nothing compassionate by not having a plan to help them grow, progress, grow.

take care of their families. That's not progress. It's a pretty nice paid vacation for 90 days, but then what happens in 90 days? Well, in 90 days of anxiety, yes, you're fine, but what happens after 90 days? They don't know because we sure in the hell don't know what we're going to do with them after 90 days. Nobody does.

Yeah, it's really it's it's frustrating. Now, if we had a policy where we actually had an immigration plan. So think if you are to become if you want to immigrate into the United States, there are only a few ways that you can actually do it. Right. You can it could be through asylum.

It could be through a refugee program, a humanitarian, or you can get married. Now think about this. How many government will get more of what it incentivizes, which is why we have this, you know, we have, you know, the K-1 visa. We have all of these other visas that are being taken advantage of because there's no way for people to actually immigrate legally into the country without going through one of those outlets.

And so, you know, there is this, I'm a constitutional conservative, whatever, you know, to me, my conservative policies aren't based on whether I support, you know, the former president or not. It's the policies that I believe in that make me a constitutional conservative. And Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution says that Congress, not the

not the White House. Congress is to create a uniform rule of naturalization, a rule in which everybody can live by that they can become naturalized through. And there are ways, again, that we can do it. And we're not going to save everybody from everything, but at least we would, one, make sure that the American people are okay first and create a way in for people to come through legally.

You know, Mia, one of the things that we had in the past that, frankly, I don't think a lot of people outside the Southwest realized how well it worked in the 70s was called the Bracero Program, which was a temporary worker program for people from Latin America, primarily Mexico, to be able to come here, work in construction, work in agricultural jobs for a time period of years, and then be able to return home.

I get people on the left saying, well, this is racist. You're letting them in to take advantage of their labor. You're kicking them out. I get people on the right saying, oh, they're just here taking American jobs. But the fact is we need people for those jobs. We don't have enough people right now for those jobs. And those are political answers. Yeah. All political. I've talked to the people from those who were involved in that program, whose parents were involved in that program and people who are workers now. And they say, that's what I want.

I don't want to, they don't all want to become American, but they'd like an opportunity to work and go home. Yeah. And, and, you know, when my dad came to this country, what he said was, I don't need any, I don't need the government to give me anything, but the opportunity to be able to use my hands and provide for my family. I just want to be able to work and feed my kids. That's it. That's all I'm asking for. Well,

And it's a reality what most people want. Yeah. And that's the reality what most people want. I mean, it's like I saw a poll years ago that really stuck out in my mind probably four or five years ago where it said 68 percent of Americans have no desire to own or manage a business. They simply want a good job. They want a house. They want some disposable income. So they take a vacation. And, you know, that's what that's what that's what they strive for. I think when it comes to immigration, frankly, American liberals are projecting their willingness and their desire to be taken care of sitting at home on the couch and

on a bunch of hard work of people who'd like to come here and make a living. We're going to take a quick break. This is Broken Potholes with our guest today, former Congresswoman Mia Love. You can find us at brokenpotholes.vote or our podcast on Spotify and Apple. We'll be right back. The 2020 political field was intense, so don't get left behind in 2021. If you're running for political office, the first thing on your to-do list needs to be securing your name on the web with a yourname.vote domain from GoDaddy.

Get yours now. Welcome back to Broken Potholes with your hosts Sam Stone and Chuck Warren. On the line with us today, former Congresswoman Mia Love of Utah.

And Mia, we were just talking about immigration, but that brings up something else that is overriding our culture right now, which is this woke culture, which seems to change every day. The rules change. It's a moving goalpost. Yeah. You can never achieve wokeness. Football analogy for our female listeners out there, but it's a moving goalpost right now. Yeah, it is. Yeah. And it's kind of tearing this country apart. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, I am looking at some of the things that have been happening in particular with Bachelorette and The Bachelor. I have been incredibly frustrated because we've created this environment where we are digging up people's past and

and looking at what they've done in the past, and really making, creating this environment that says, I think, that people cannot evolve from their childhood. Frankly, let's just remember, our brains, especially boys, sorry guys, but their brains aren't fully developed until the age of 25. I keep telling my son, I'm just getting him...

I'm just trying to get him to 25. That gives me hope for my son. I have many speeding tickets to verify this theory.

But it does create this environment where, one, they say they want to talk about it, but people are afraid to talk about it because they're afraid of saying the wrong thing. Two, it creates this environment where it devours instead of empowers. I always say this. It's like the world wants to devour people instead of empowering them. I do not want my children, who are of mixed race, are incredibly confused. They feel like they have to pick a side where, frankly, they should be proud of...

both sides of their culture, they should be able to say, look, I want to be able to have a conversation where I am not seen for the color of my skin, but I'm seen as an individual. I want to get back to what Martin Luther King believed in, judging people on the contents of their character, not the color of their skin. And so when I hear...

this young man who I felt was this really strong man on The Bachelor to being, I think, someone who was victimized instead of empowered where he says, you don't see my blackness. Well, I sat there and I said, don't we want to get to a point where we see people as individuals and we treat them like individuals? That's how I've always wanted to be treated. And the other thing also, if somebody has a problem with me,

If somebody doesn't like me because of the color of my skin or because of my gender, that's their problem. It's not my problem to fix. That's their flaw. It's not my flaw. And so, you know, I am doing everything I can to make sure that my children are proud.

of who they are, they're comfortable in their skin, and that they work hard in school and in anything that they do so that people judge them based on their contribution to society, based on how they treat others. Mia, I have always said racism and hatred grow in the dark.

And what woke culture is doing is driving those people into the dark where their racism and hatred is growing instead of exposing it, discussing it, and dissecting it the way we were supposed to do, the way Martin Luther King and all those great leaders taught us to. But I want to move on to one more thing before we let you off the line. Thank you so much. You, when you were in Congress, were a big advocate for families. And you have obviously your own family very important to you. You have promoted family first policies.

But one of the things I see at the city level is we have all these programs, all this money that goes to various welfare recipients and low income families. It is not those programs are literally designed to tear families apart, to prevent the formation of families, to keep people from gathering strength in numbers.

Yeah. It's terrible.

They were more concerned about the issue than solving the issue. They want to keep that because if there are people that are in need, then they can always be the ones that are like, hey, there are people that are in need and I need to be able to be the one to help them. There's a lot of people making a lot of money. Right. So there's well over trillions of dollars that are actually being spent on poverty programs that if you actually gave that money to people,

you literally just took it and divvied it up to families of four making under $50,000. We would get, be able to get everybody out of that from that poverty.

The problem is you've got bricks, mortars, and most of the money goes to people that are administrating, administering the programs, right? And even on a local level. So they're creating a situation where you cannot gain. It's creating more generational poverty than it actually is. So there are times where there's situational poverty and generational poverty. And the fix is just to throw money at it. And it actually makes both of them worse.

Yeah. No, it does not. It not only makes them worse, it entrenches them. I don't think people realize how messed up the system is, how inefficient it is. You have all these these government social workers. People don't realize they're making really good salaries, usually 70 to 100 and 100 thousand dollars plus in pay up front. And then your cost as a taxpayer, you got to just take that upfront figure and double it.

Pensions, benefits. So if you have an army of $150,000, $200,000 people administering these programs, you're never going to get anywhere because you're never even getting the money to the people who need it. You're never getting the money to the people who need it. And so you've got this, again, situation where you, every program, I've always said this, every program implemented by government should be meant to keep people

Poverty, temporary, not tolerable. Every program that we have is trying to make it so that people can just barely tolerate it, right? And it's not meant to get people out of those so that they can become contributing members of society. And so when you've got all of these people who claim that they're going to help these families, they're actually...

keeping them where they are and then using that for political gain, it's really, it's disgusting. And it's not good for what I believe is American exceptionalism. It's not good for what I believe is the family to be able to help each other and then end up helping other people out. It creates this environment where more and more and more people become impoverished.

Mia, thank you so much. We really appreciate having you on the show today. I think those are incredible points. I think it's important people realize these things need to change, fundamentally need to change if we're going to move this country forward. And so I thank you for talking about that and for all the work you've done for the people in Utah and across this country. My pleasure. Thank you for having me. Thank you.

Chuck, great conversation. Absolutely. We need more reasonable people like that in politics. We seem to be missing a lot of it now.

Let's go to our sunshine moment here for the day. I think this will be a wonderful opportunity here. And today we have the wonderful Kylie with us. The irrepressible. Let's keep the title. The irrepressible Kylie Kipper. Kylie Kipper today. Well, thank you for having me back. So today's sunshine moment is about a children's charity called, oh. Oh, we got music. Oh, there it is. We got it going. We got it going. Okay.

It's a children's charity called I Care for Kids. That's E-Y-E, Care for Kids. And they're

They provide professional eye exams and glasses for children in low-income communities at no cost to these families. And 100% of their donations go to these children. So it's not a government-run program. Exactly. So something many people may not know is 10 million children in the United States need vision services. 80% of their learning, or of learning in a child's early years, come through their eyes. So if they can't see, they're not learning. So what percentage of kids have... 80, or...

25% of kids 12 and under have vision issues. Oh my gosh. That's a lot. That's a surprising number. I would never guess that many. And then 91% of first graders who are struggling with reading, it's because of their vision. And that's just something we kind of don't even like.

No, you don't go and look into it. Well, you think you're young. Your eyes are good. Right. When you're older, you have to say, well, you're old. Right. You know, but when you're young, you're under your first grade. Who thinks her kid has vision problems? Well, let me add this in there as a grade schooler who ended up getting glasses midway through grade school. As a kid, you're like, no, I have no, no, no. I am not wearing those. That is not me. I do not need those.

You're old, though, now. You are old. Back now, they have cool glasses. Anyway, continue. They have cool glasses, but they also provide contacts for those kids that are playing sports. Who are vain, like Sam. Exactly. Hey, look, I think you've got to go with the major league model. Charlie Sheen, you wear the big blocky glasses with the skull and crossbones in the middle. You own it. It's your brand. It's your brand. So they have locations in Utah, Arizona, Nevada, and New Jersey. And they also have mobile clinics that travel to these places.

low-income areas that aren't able to access there. - Where can people go to make a donation for that? - You can make a donation at I-E-Y-E, careforkids.org. And to put into perspective, if you give a $100 donation, that provides eye exams and glasses for three children.

And so far, since the organization has began in 2001, they've helped more than 300,000 children receive eye exams, glasses, screenings, any of that kind of stuff. Okay. So this is an amazing program, Kylie. I mean, thank you for bringing this to us today. No doubt. I mean, this is something that's absolutely critical. You see how well done this is because...

Because it's not a government program. Yes. If the government was doing this, that cost per kid would be three or four times that amount minimum.

But instead, the private sector steps up and it works. It does work. It does work. And their goal for the future is to have a location in every major city and then to have a mobile clinic in every state that's able to travel to these areas. So folks, go online, icareforkids.org. Get on there. Give them a few bucks. I'm going to go on after this show and give them a few bucks because I think this is an amazing program. It's a wonderful program. And I just had no idea that it was that high of a percentage of kids that have vision problems.

You know, going back to our conversation with Mia Love today, I was in Washington when she had her swearing-in, so we had a reception after. And I'll never forget, she had her family there, and her parents included. And to this day, I can still picture it. And I wonder this day, just the thoughts watching her parents tear up as she's sworn in and thinking, you know, back in 1976, we fled.

The mother, I left notes in my kids' pockets. I mean, they left their children behind to create a better world for them. And they did not speak English. You did not go into that. They did not speak English here. So they had to teach themselves, go to New York. He was a janitor at night, did a night shift, graveyard. That's how he provided for that family. And I'll just never forget being there in that Capitol and that reception, watching the parents just teary-eyed looking on that family.

Their youngest daughter was elected to the U.S. Congress. Well, and you know what? And tell those people the American dream's not real. That's exactly what I was about to say. Tell me the American dream's not real when you can have Haitian immigrants who come over here with nothing, no money in their pocket, no language skills, no nothing. And in one generation, their daughter is a U.S. congresswoman.

And city, previously a city council person because of the bugs. City mayor? Because of bugs, and bugs are horrible. So, yeah, it's just, and I do that. So when I hear those things, people say the American Dream said, no, it's not dead. But her family showed it. They pulled themselves up by their bootstraps. They made sacrifices.

And now she's created this generation and Mia's kids are all going to college and they're all being successful. And, you know, I mean, that's what sacrifice is about. People don't seem to get that anymore. You know what, Chuck, though? I think realistically what it is and you hit on it, it's the sacrifice. It's the work. The American dream is there for the people who are willing to work for the American dream.

But we've got this idea in our culture somehow that you should have the American dream handed to you. You should be a millionaire Twitter, Instagram influencer who's friends with Paris Hilton and the Kardashians. That's the lifestyle kids are envisioning instead of,

I'm going to work all night as a janitor. My wife's going to work as a home health care aide. We're going to do everything we can. We're going to make ourselves successful. By grit, they stayed together. They did it as a family. It's a remarkable story. She's a remarkable life. And that's one thing that concerns me. Success isn't glamorous. No, it's not. It's not. And what concerns me right now is the amount of naysayers on the right and left

that say the American dream's not true. That's absolutely unequivocally a lie.

And it doesn't matter how much Joe Biden messes things up with his silliness. You know, American dream is still alive and well. And you're not. I was talking the other day to a taxi driver and he was just he was making that point. You know, Americans, you know, he goes like, you're never going to tame Americans. They're entrepreneur. They're individualistic. I don't think we have had anyone on this program who has been in the beneficiary of generational wealth. Broken potholes is bringing you the truth. You can succeed in this country.

It just takes work. You got to fill the pothole. Visit us at brokenpotholes.vote or find us on your local podcast. Thanks, gang.