4.28.2025 -- NLS -- Phil McGrane on Idaho's Election Integrity and SAVE Act

On this episode with Neal and Julie, they dive into discussions about election integrity, public trust, and political dynamics, including a conversation about Donald Trump’s influence and changes in voter laws. Idaho Secretary of State Phil McGrane joins the show to talk about Idaho’s election security efforts, the SAVE Act requiring proof of citizenship to vote, and the broader national landscape of election confidence. He also highlights Idaho's role in leading transparency initiatives, updates on campaign finance reform, and efforts to combat the influence of out-of-state money in local elections. Additionally, Phil shares his experience as a wildland firefighter and his work supporting land management and small businesses. Neal and Julie wrap up with insights on Idaho’s growing prominence as a conservative stronghold and the impact of new residents on the state's political culture. 

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Transcript

You want to show us Vyse about the time remaining in the interview? I think we have enough of an interview here, I hope. Okay. That's enough. Let's go, let's go. Let's go meet for two seconds. Okay. Thanks. I'll see you in a little while. Thanks.

Be careful.

All right. 807 on Newstalk 1079. You know, if we were to compare audio, the actualities that we share with you on a daily basis, some audio would be considered your vegetables. Like this is information that you need. And it takes some effort to ingest it to, sort of incorporate it into your awareness of what's happening in the in the news cycle.

There's other audio that's just flat out dessert or junk food or whatever that you, you and it's a dumpster fire of audio. You just can't look away. And this is the kind of thing that happens when, AOC goes on tour. These are the kinds of people that she draws out to her, her rallies. We got to stop.

And, let me play it here. Let's see. And here we go. We got to start eating babies. We don't have enough time. There's too much CO2, okay? There's too much CO2. And to limit our carbon footprint, we need to start eating the babies. And this was actually, And this went on for a few minutes. AOC clearly was, awkward.

So you have that. And then there was this. I, I think I love this. I, I really, really like this. Capitol steps, Cory Booker Hakeem Jeffries and I think for a while you had Senator Adam Schiff that was also sitting on the steps with about. It looked like maybe a couple dozen others. You know, this is off and beginning.

I will build this world from, get that I had I got it, I was, and you lost you. I'm not gonna lie, lie lie lie lie lie lie lie. And give me biggest bro from the club. Got it, I got it, I got it, I and God will build this world up. Love y'all. The lie, lie lie lie lie lie lie.

All right. This has got to win some award. Like it has to be something here. I feel you know what, though, like, I there's a little sense in me that the. Yeah. Right right, right right. I is there. So he has time to think of the next bromide devoid of any intellectual substance that he can sing to some kind of harmony that he puts together.

I think it was fairly on pitch. If I'm gonna find something, okay. To talk about, I think he was somewhat on pitch. But, you saw Hakeem Jeffries trying to mouth some words with him like it was a song everybody else knows, but he doesn't know. But he tried to act like he knew, when in reality, nobody knew.

And not even the pastor knew when he was singing it. So that was that was fun. But then you had this. We, actually, started out the morning we weren't aware of this, but we heard about it, later. Scott Pelley he, ended 60 minutes this way last night. You got to hear this in tonight's last minute, a note on Bill Owens, who until this past week was executive producer of 60 minutes.

He was our boss. Bill was with CBS news. Nearly 40 years, 26 years and 60 minutes. He covered the world covered combat, the white House. His was a quest to open minds, not close them. If you've ever worked hard for a boss because you admired him, then you understand what we've enjoyed here. Bill resigned Tuesday. It was hard on him and hard on us, but he did it for us and you.

Stories we pursued for 57 years are often controversial. Lately, the Israel Gaza war and the Trump administration bill made sure they were accurate and fair. He was tough that way. But our parent company, Paramount, is trying to complete a merger. The Trump administration must approve it. Paramount began to supervise our content in new ways. None of our stories has been blocked, but Bill felt he lost the independence that honest journalism requires.

No one here is happy about it. But in resigning, Bill proved one thing he was the right person to lead 60 minutes all along. Okay, so that was the final minute on 60 minutes. Not sure the preceding 59 minutes mattered all that much that was the one takeaway, last night. There are two things going on there listening to this.

One is the subconscious suggestion that 60 minutes is journalistically pristine. I will get to the conflict of interest with Paramount and the merger and all of that in just a moment. But this idea is is kind of a Jedi mind trick. And you have Scott Pelley with the very buttoned up and deliberate delivery that we worry about. Rob.

Right. I'm like, look, 60 minutes may have been journalistically fairly pristine a few years ago. And prior to they have made major, major missteps, most recently the 2024 election. You had the interview with Kamala Harris. The interview was completely botched, and I like the answers that she gave were just her traditional word salad. That didn't make any sense at all.

And you could tell that she was trying to find her next words all the time, and it just sort of meandered all around. And by the time it got edited and put out there, they had taken a more cogent portion of her answer, and they cut out the less cogent word salad and made it appear that the cogent part was her answer, when in reality they didn't include the entire context.

And what's interesting about this is that they've released a transcript, but they've not released the entire unedited video, which you have to ask yourself, why wouldn't you release the entire unedited video? So there was that. But then my memory started digging back, and I remember that Ron DeSantis a few years ago had a feud with 60 minutes, but I didn't remember the details.

But the internet is forever, and I did a search. And back during the pandemic, there's a grocery store chain on the East Coast and it's big in Florida called Publix. Publix donated $100,000 to Ron DeSantis campaign, and there was a partnership to get the vaccine distributed through Publix. Because they have so many locations and they reach a lot of people, tons of people go and and shop at Publix.

It was a great way to do it. So 60 minutes asked a question and presented this piece on Ron DeSantis that inferred with no fact checking whatsoever, that it was a pay to, pay to play scheme, that they were, giving Publix first dibs, so to speak, or, or using them because they had donated to Ron DeSantis campaign.

So after this story aired, you had the Democrat head of Florida's health and welfare and emergency management departments, both Democrats, saying that is absolutely not true in any way, shape or form. They, we reached out to Publix. This was not it had nothing to do with a campaign donation. The governor did not flex any kind of influence to make this happen.

CBS news and 60 minutes specifically refused to interview those key people to give the the correct context of what had happened. So here's a little bit of Ron DeSantis and, what he said at a press conference. But it seems that, Prime Minister Netanyahu is not listening. You know, this is 60 minutes. Sorry, here it is.

Here's the audio. They knew what they were doing was a lie. I knew what they were doing was a lie. Everybody here knows what they were doing is a lie. They know that. We know they're lying. And yet they continue to lie. And they lied and they lied and they lied. We offered them the information, and they declined to interview the key people, because they didn't want to let go of the narrative.

Well guess what? There's going to be consequences for that. Okay. Which, that sounds almost prophetic now, in the context of of today. So this is why now do I like a behemoth parent corporation exerting their influence on the content of a journalist like program that should operate independently? I don't like that at all. Like, I, I would struggle with that sort of flex from a corporation, determine owning content.

I get that frustration. But I will tell you it's 60 minutes owned conduct that invited it. They're the ones that, are making this merger harder. It's not because, you know, and yeah, Trump is suing them because of their malfeasance. $20 billion, which is a ridiculously large figure. Nobody thinks that it's actually going to be even close to that.

But there is pressure internally to settle with Trump because they don't want to jeopardize the merger from happening. So the interest from Paramount has nothing to do with the content itself. It has to do with the merger getting approved. They want to remove any possible obstacles. Now, I'm not defending them. I'm just telling you what the motivations are.

Here. They just want to make sure the merger happens. It's a financial interest. Move. But I think back about just recently, Lesley Stahl interviewed one of the, hostages that Hamas was keeping a Jewish man, and she gave the benefit of the doubt to Hamas. We were, you remember that? It was just like 3 or 4 weeks ago.

And she said, now, they starved you. Are you sure that maybe it's just because they didn't have food because of blockades and U.S. whatever. She didn't say all that, but that's what she's inferring that a that maybe Hamas didn't have food. She's finding reasons to make them not monsters when everyone knows. If you look at the facts, they're monsters.

They're the ones that parachuted in and killed hundreds and hundreds of innocent Israeli. I think concert goers. But for whatever reason, in the twisted, maligned brains of the left, they instantly turn hostility into victimhood. So she's trying to find something to have sympathy for Hamas, even though they were the ones that tortured and starved. This this Jewish hostage, they're corrupt.

They don't even know it. And when you have Scott Pelley and, taking the final minute at what they're putting forward is this concept that they're, they're journalistic crap doesn't stick when quite frankly, yes, yes it does. We need to, double powerful exhaust fan for them and maybe some candles, and glade spray like they. Yes, it does stink.

They've had some big time missteps in recent years. And, I think that content is making them financially liable because of their missteps. Do I think Trump could win this in a court of law? I don't know that he could. He ended up winning the race. So I don't know if you can even prove objectively the damage that you were.

And that's something you'd probably have to prove. You know, damage to your campaign or whatever. It wasn't great. It wasn't flattering. The terrible moment for, 60 minutes. And even though Trump, I think would be unlikely to prevail in a court case, I do believe that they're worried that this pending liability could jeopardize the merger. They want to make it go away.

And, that means a settlement with Trump. And that's what 60 minutes doesn't want to do. And that's why, this bill guy stepped down. It's a fascinating media development, but it's also, you know, it's interesting. There was a separate story that came out over the weekend about CNN's ratings. They just keep getting worse and worse and worse.

And I, I watch this. Here's the headline right now, Trump's approval rating for the first 100 days is lowest in 70 plus years. Everything they do and they put out, I don't know who's pulling those strings and putting that out. It seems like. And you know what? That could be a headline. But the problem is the pattern. It's not any individual lower.

Third, it's the pattern that we see that comes out. The drumbeat of Trump's bad orange man. Bad, it's that constant drumbeat that is is the reason why people are tuning out. Because, quite frankly, a lot of people like what, what Trump's doing and, they, there are ratings out there. Excuse me, pulling out for Donald Trump on immigration.

Still, even though it's been controversial and there's been an all hands on deck by the legacy media to, try and and, go after Trump. They like the deportations. They like the secure border. They like Donald Trump's adherence to the law when it comes to immigration. They like getting rid of rapists and murderers. That's, is that bizarre?

Does that bizarre to anybody that America likes getting rid of illegals, that rape and kill and steal, and, create all sorts of, of havoc? Now that that is such low hanging fruit for the Trump administration, which why wouldn't you do that? That's an that's an obvious one. And the arrest of this judge in Milwaukee, they are having protests supporting the judge in Milwaukee for helping a gang member.

So cruel, so weird. It's a 24 hour news talk 179. We'll be back. And by the way, coming up in about 40 minutes, Secretary of State Phil McGrane will spend a good portion of the 9:00 hour. We got a lot to talk with him about.

Julie playing the air keyboard. They're just feeling a little bit, like that teen angst from this song. There you go. Welcome back kid. Say 29 on Newstalk 1079. It's raining. And, I just said I. I asked Julie about taking a walk in the rain and, she reminded me how bald I am, and, basically that's what it turned into.

I said, sure, walking in the rain is fun, but I can't go. I can't do my job after it because then my hair is dripping in my eyes and you don't have hair, so thanks. It's true. I don't have any money, so I have hair. I do have hair. You just shave it off. It's just shaved off. Yeah, it's true.

I shaved my beard off a while back. You don't like it? I can tell you don't like I. This is not a secret. I've already said I like you better in a beard but it's, it's your face. I know you can do whatever you want. I yeah, I don't know you know what I felt like. I felt like the beard people tell me this isn't true, but my beard is.

It's salt and pepper. But it's more salt and pepper. Is that fair? Yeah. Yeah. And I feel like it just made me look older. And so I'm like I'm just I'm just going to shave it off because I feel like. But then other people told me you don't look older. It just makes you look more distinguished.

And it gives you, you know, more definition to your face or whatever. So I don't know, I don't I honestly could go either way. Like it doesn't. And from a maintenance standpoint, I just, I, I probably trim the beard once a week and I, I, I do shave every day to keep the line of the beard nice. Chris.

Yes. So anyway, it can be either way it I disagree that it made you look older, but you're the one that has to decide. How did it not make me look older? Because it's a very gray beard. Because men are allowed to have gray, it it doesn't do to men what it does to women. All right. And I will grow back.

We'll see you do what you want to do. All right. It's either way. The maintenance is about the same. So it doesn't really match from a, like, a time and hassle standpoint. But personal hygiene is a hassle. So. Such a pain. Such a pain. So okay, I'm going to put on deodorant and shower and we'll get back to 60 minutes in a moment.

But Julie you sent me this really this also CBS by the way, but a very awkward clip. An interview with Bill Belichick. His 24 year old girlfriend is sitting off set just a few feet away, and she's not miked up, but she's she's chiming in on on part of the interview. It's very awkward. Listen, Jordan was a constant presence during our interview.

You have Jordan right over there. Everybody in the world seems to be following this relationship. They've got an opinion about your private life. It's got nothing to do with them, but they're invested in it. How do you deal with that? Never been to worry about what everybody else thinks. Just try to do what I feel like is best for me and what's right.

How did you guys meet? Not talking about this. No, no, it's a topic she's like, no, we're not talking about this. That's like a isn't that a standard getting to know somebody's story. That's a couple asking them well how you guys meet like that's a very common pretty benign question. Well especially when their meat story is benign. They play on an airplane.

I know, so is that not true. And that's why you don't want to talk about it. Was there some sort of other. Is that the cover story. Yeah. If that's really your meet cute is. Oh. We sat next to each other on a plane and we fell in love. Okay, then. That's not weird. Yeah, that is not weird at all.

So why don't you want to talk about it? Jordan. Also, he is a sports legend. It's just it's a weird in the sports world to have a woman, no matter her age. Yeah, but it makes it worse because she's 24 and he's 75. What is he, 70? Yeah. So he's like 50 years older than her. It makes it even worse for the age difference.

But let's just pretend like there's not an age difference in the sports world. The wife is not on the edge of the interview chiming in. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. That's weird. It's almost like he's weak. He can't talk for himself. So I'm going to I'm going to jump. So she took lessons from Joe Biden. Yeah that's true.

There's a course in everything. It's online $2,500. That's true. That's true. It. She's his Jill Biden I remember in junior high one time I, I didn't start the fight, but somehow I found myself in a fight. I don't remember what happened. And my girlfriend at the time started like getting it. I'm like, this is a bad look. Like, no, I can handle this, I got it.

Yeah. And, so anyway, I, I don't even remember what happened. It the fight dissipated. But look, there's a little there's a nugget to the story that we're not talking about. Yeah. Last week, some time she was at practice at the college that Bill Belichick is coaching it. I don't even remember which college right now. Yeah. Anyway she's in these super short shorts and like pretty I would I think most men would say sexy outfit.

And then a very very long coat clear down to the ground. Looks like a, high fashion trench coat. Okay. And she's wandering around practice like she's making calls. She's stepping into the middle of action and talking and so you do that. Then he gives an interview to CBS where she's off off screen or off camera, chiming in, telling them how the interview is going to go.

This has some people concerned what's happening. I told you she took the Jill Biden online course. I know, but Bill Belichick, not Joe Biden. He doesn't have he doesn't have dementia. He's not some weak guy that can't handle a situation for himself. I mean, at least you had a, a good explanation why somebody was stepping in for Joe.

Yeah. Not that it was right. But you there was there was an explanation for this. Doesn't really have an explanation. What was the the motto, the defense or the prosecution tagline for Lori Vallow. Dale Daybell. Money, sex, power. Yeah, right. Wasn't that what it was? Yeah. I think you could transfer that to here. You probably can.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's things that we probably don't even need to say on the radio. Right. I think everyone can kind of infer. Yep. What's being left to show evidence. That's true. I think we know what what's being leveraged. Absolutely. So, doc house cozy bed. Which one do you want? Yeah. Bill. Hey, baby. Here's my question. Why does she feel that need to make court, like, want to be in the mix of that does I don't know.

Is that weird to like. Yeah, I don't know. I don't have an answer for it, but it's a when when we have two instances now I think they we're probably going to see more. I think so too. I don't think this CBS thing was a one off. How long do you think the relationship lasts? Well, he's four short years away from hitting the average age of deaths, so who knows, right.

That wasn't even going there. But okay. Yeah, you got it. That has to be factored in. So you think it's going to be as it can be tell divorce do we part. But it can also be till death do we. It could. Yeah okay. I mean ask sugar mamas why they marry sugar daddies. A lot of them is to outlive and be the one who gets the will.

I've never been a huge Patriots fan, but that's how we all came to know Bill Belichick, right? I mean, for most of us, this is the weakest I have ever seen him in. And usually he kind of gives these short answers in interviews and he's kind of grumpy, almost like a jerk. Yeah. In this he kind of just seems, like I'm kind of weak.

I am on cloud nine, blah, blah blah. This is not you. Bill. What's going on? I mean, we know what's going on. We know what's going on. Yeah. All right. Sex, power. Money. Yeah, yeah, that's that is true. Did we. Apparently Lori Vallow granted another TV interview. Did you see that? Oh, I did not see this.

Yeah, and I can't remember which channel it. It wasn't the big one, like Dateline or anything like that. It was some true crime channel. Anyway, but I, I really think people are kind of done with her. I think. I think, yeah, I think they've had. Yeah. It's just not that enticing anymore. Yeah. Your disgust level has been on full display, and people are tired of looking at the.

How many times can you rehash the horrid details of that whole. Yeah, and that whole story. All right. 839 on Newstalk 179, it's Monday. Let's take a break. Time for the news and we'll be back after this. We got to start eating babies. We don't have enough time. There's too much CO2. 843 on Newstalk 1079 well, they gave her the Kool-Aid and she drank gallons and gallons of the climate change Kool-Aid and too much CO2.

We have to eat the babies. Yeah. Can you imagine living under that sort of no doomsday stress all the time? I can't, it wouldn't be worth it. I can't, but you know what? Look at every message that the left gives to little kids in school. It's all about how horrible the world is and all the bad things that are going to happen.

Yeah, it's really sad. Yeah, well, our brains weren't built to handle that kind of information. We weren't. We weren't expected to be in fight or flight mode 100% of the time. And this girl that being in fight or flight has broken her. Yeah, that's that's true. Like they, sometimes maybe I'm simplifying things too much and I recognize that.

But I believe that at the core of leftist ideology is to tell people how helpless they are and helmet how much they need the government to be. Okay, it's kind of sad. Yes, kind of sad. All right. Welcome back to 085421079. That's the number. If you'd like to join us on the Stones Automotive Group call and text line.

And, Julie, your thoughts on the 60 minutes deal? So you and I had a more personal conversation about it before you did your monologue. We were chatting about this story before you went on, and I said, there is some things that we need to learn from this that, in general, people need to learn, which is our integrity needs to have more value, more like we shouldn't be leveraging our integrity to, to push an agenda.

If you're a journalist and the integrity has obviously been leveraged here. Yeah, but this is not the only place that that happens. People leverage integrity all the time in other parts of their life. So you can be listening today and be just so frustrated with 60 minutes. I am I think they've they've rallied to use your words really stepped in it over the last few years.

So yes, that is frustrating to me. But if I'm going to learn from it and actually bring it into my life and go, what? How can I make a difference? I think we all need to be asking ourselves, do you at any time diminish your integrity in order to accomplish an agenda? And if you do, in any aspect of your life, this is your lesson.

Don't do it. Yeah, well, yeah, that's true because you're you're selling something that is very, very difficult to to get back. In the I played the clip of Ron DeSantis. This is from 2021. And the correspondent for 60 minutes is Sharon Alfonse. She was the one that almost became obsessed with making DeSantis look bad, assuming that there was some nefarious motive for distributing the vaccine through Publix and even PolitiFact.

PolitiFact, which almost always favors the left over the right. They, they said that it it could be considered deceptively edited. The 60 minute segment omitted some of the background on why Florida partnered with Publix to distribute coronavirus vaccines it effects, Daniel Funke wrote in an examination of the controversy that omission could constitute deceptive editing, as some social media users have claimed.

The story reported by CBS is Sharon Alfonse. He was an extensive critique of how coronavirus vaccines were distributed in Florida, and highlighted how difficult it was for some people in at least one low income area to get the vaccine. Now, can I also say, let's rewind the context we had just gotten through the first four years of Trump.

Biden was reelected, and they obviously knew Biden was weak because dementia, all of that. I think you had the mainstream media thinking Trump is done. We we killed his political chances. DeSantis was the premier Republican contender to become president in 2024. At that point in time. And you have to ask yourself, was that part of the motivation to have the the hit piece after hit peace?

Because they knew DeSantis was leading Florida very well through the through the pandemic. They knew he was getting national headlines, national recognition because Florida was staying open and and you still had freedom in Florida. You still had an economy in Florida. And they knew that those headlines were doing him and his his future presidential prospects a lot of good.

And I genuinely would not be surprised if part of Sharon Alfonse, his motivation was, we've got to take some of the shine off Ron DeSantis right now. I you took the words out of my mouth like, that's exactly what I was going to say, is that we have to remember the context of the time period here, which is that Florida was doing the best handling of Covid.

Businesses were open. They have one of the oldest populations in America, yet they weren't experiencing the kind of death that extreme lockdown states like Massachusetts and New York were experiencing. So if you're if we're going to look at the time frame as context, they couldn't let him become any more of the superhero that he was turning into. So they were helping to craft this narrative that he's corrupt.

He's compromised it. Publix gave him a hundred grand, so he's rewarding them. Now it's a pay to play scheme. And the truth is, if you look into it, they were distributing vaccines through CVS and Walgreens and other other drugs. It's just that there's so many public locations that that was the fastest, most efficient way to get the vaccine to as as wide a population as possible.

And Florida was very important because their their population is more elderly than the US average. They're probably one of the oldest states, demographically, that we have in the country. So that vaccine at that time, it was very, very important to get it distributed. So they they had to they had to stop the the momentum in some way because DeSantis was having his cake and eating it, too.

They were having freedom, they were having an economy, but they also were saving people's lives, too. Yeah. I don't know how you could look at this any differently than that. I'm sure that CBS would like to explain it some other way, but that was the reality of what was going on, and they have carried forward with that agenda from here on forward.

And, I think that it was, a misrepresented misrepresentation by Pelley last night. They were trying to, make Bill Owens look like this amazing boss who has done all of these wonderful things and everything. And maybe he has. Maybe he's a great guy and you love him as a boss. I would counter your narrative with, well, didn't the actions by a few of you jeopardize his job?

Yeah. If you loved him that much. There's two options here. Either your actions jeopardize his job or he was telling you to do it. Yeah, one or the other. Yeah. So which one is it? Because what? You're. You're representing Peleus. Oh, a good guy got fired. Well, there were reasons someone own up to those reasons. Do you think?

Also, at that time, I'm trying to put myself in in the mentality of a Democrat, and whatever they did, I'm not going to say rigged or stolen because that just it goes off the rails and people check out whatever changes they made with the election. Got an an octogenarian with dementia who didn't campaign into the white House.

That gives you a lot of false bravado, like, we're going to win every election from here on out. Oh, they believed that we got the least electable guy in on the planet into the white House. We have a clear path. And so it led them to behaving in ways that they they didn't think that there was ever going to be, the universe righting itself.

The media thought, you know what? We can cover it up because we're not going to have to worry about this in the future. We can just we can gaslight, we can cover up. We can do all the things that we need to. They underestimated Donald Trump. And Donald Trump said, I'm going to win the white House back.

We are going to deploy, 100,000 attorneys across this country to be poll watchers. We are going to work on the state legislatures for them to shore up their election laws. And by the way, we have, Phil McGrane coming up. Speaking of that, in just a few minutes. And it was just this grit of restoring some integrity to our elections.

They lost, and now they are reaping the rewards of all the horrible, horrible seeds that they planted in the last five years. So they miscalculated there. And I think that since we're talking about Scott Pelley and 60 minutes in the hole by and then extending that to a broader discussion, I think it's important to understand they also miscalculated the power of the internet.

Yeah. They always thought they would be the ones in charge. Always. Yeah. The that they still have power. The depth of their power has been decreased. They are not near as powerful as they used to be. And that bothers them. You just listen to Joy Reid. Just listen to Rachel Maddow. Just listen to Brian Stelter. Don lemon, the fact that they don't have that power, oh, that irks them.

Losing Twitter was a big hit for them. Huge. And podcasting growing at the pace that it's growing. And the ability to get your your story out there in different ways. Quite honestly, I'm surprised that mainstream media hasn't jumped on this TikTok bandwagon, meaning getting rid of it. Yeah, I expected them to run full force with that because it's they're taking a hit because of TikTok.

People go to TikTok for news. They don't go to CNN. That's the reason their ratings are so low yet. Well, you're right. And they spent that capital at such a rate that it's more likely that social media will destroy legacy media, then vice versa. Yeah. Yep. And and I, I would agree with I mean, you look at Rogan's podcast, the podcast world right now, it dwarfs the the viewership of the biggest legacy media channels that we have.

Oh, that you can't even compare them. Mid level podcasts get better. Yeah, yeah. It's it's true. 854 we'll be back after this. All right. It's 859 on Newstalk 107, I, Neil Larson along with Julie Mason, and in just a few minutes, about eight minutes from now, Secretary of State Phil McGrane, talk about that. I mean, it has no substance other than it was just sheer fun.

You know? Right. But to have the opportunity and, to be there was an amazing experience. Yeah. Well, good. We'll ask you about that. All right. Stand by. We're we're going on here shortly, so that sounds good. We will keep in mind and remember that you and I have the ability and the dignity number. Right? The right. To make our own decisions and determine our own destiny.

In this hour of the Neil Larson show is brought to you by Crystal water. The difference is clear with crystal water.

Your world, your country, your communities. And you. Let's talk about it now on The Neil Larson Show with co-host Julie Mason.

And welcome back. It's our two on Newstalk 1079. Neil Larson along with Julie Mason and Julie joining us, from presumably the Capitol is, Secretary of State Phil McGrane, who, of course, serves as Idaho's secretary of state and is always good to, spend some time with us whenever we ask. And, Secretary McGrane, welcome. Good to have you with us this morning.

Thank you. Good morning. It's always great to be with you guys. Well, you mentioned we were just chatting a little bit before the show started. You were invited to join the the white House? The Saint Patty's day party. I mean, you are Phil McGrane. And so, I don't know if that had anything to do with it or not, but tell us about that experience.

I mean, you can appreciate it was one of the strangest calls that I've ever received. Being in office, right towards the end of February, early March, somebody I know, connected in to folks called me up and said, hey, exactly what you were saying. You know, they said, hey, you're a mic. And I said, yes.

And media, they said, how would you feel about celebrating Saint Patrick's Day at the white House? And sure enough, a couple weeks later, I got an invitation from President Trump to join him and the Prime Minister of Ireland for the annual Saint Patty's Day celebration. And I can tell you, I it reminded me of being like in junior high and just the level of excitement headed into the white House.

It was a gorgeous day, and a surreal experience to spend, an evening and an afternoon. One at the white House. You know, walking in. One of the first people I bumped into was RFK Jr. I said hello and shook his hand. It was, kind of a bizarre experience, but especially with everything going on, having the chance to both celebrate my Irish heritage as well as to be there with the new administration.

It showed how much things have changed and, it was a blast, to say the very least. Well, and and did you get some time with the president? Like, how much was he there at that, at that celebration? I can't imagine how surreal that would be. It was surreal. Unfortunately, I did not get to meet the president. I was there in the room with him.

As you can probably appreciate, everyone wants to see President Trump. And in particular, it was a fascinating experience because on my flight over, I flew just over for that and then right back, this was early with, in all the tariff conversation. And so as I was flying over, there was, front page Wall Street Journal article, I think The New York Times had an article about the event I was headed to, because Ireland has one of the larger trade deficits with the United States related to pharmaceuticals.

And so the articles were kind of painting out what the diplomacy would look like. And sure enough, it played out in real time. President Trump owns a golf course in Ireland, and the Prime Minister leaned into that. But it was, you know, it was really neat because it was extremely cordial. There's a traditional gift giving that they do.

And so I was in the room as they kind of went through it. And this will sound really silly, but this is my biggest takeaway, is, President Trump sounds like President Trump in real life. He was he had a speech and he was going through it. But throughout it, he kind of ad libbed, as he was introducing people.

You know, Attorney General Pam Bondi was there, and he's like, what are you doing here? You're not Irish. If you can't be part of the crowd. So it was cool just to be in the midst of that group as he's kind of doing his thing. I did get a photo with the Prime Minister, which was pretty awesome.

For someone who comes from Irish immigrants who came over during the potato famine, it was pretty surreal to be there in the white House with the president. Well, I think, next year it will be Neil Macpherson and Julie MC Mason in February. Maybe we'll try to get invited next year. I love it. I think that's great.

All right, let's, let's, shift gears into what some people think is not as fun as visiting the the white House, but is so important currently the Save act. So that stands for Safeguard American Voter eligibility. It's been passed in the House. It's stalled in the Senate. And that doesn't mean it's over in the Senate, but it's it is going to, be a law that would require documentary proof of U.S. citizenship when you're registering to vote in federal elections.

Now, people need to understand it. Can they? The white House can only enact or Congress can only enact a federal law on this. Would you tell us, is Idaho currently in alliance or in alignment with this Save act, or what would be the changes to Idaho? If this does pass, you know, one of the really neat things, and we were talking this at the break with the new administration.

I have been visiting DC more than I ever imagined I probably would be. So beyond the fun experiences, like I just shared, earlier this month, I was in DC, testifying before the House Committee on Administrate the Subcommittee on Elections. So these are the people who have led the effort on the Save act. And we were specifically invited.

Idaho was because of how well we ran the 2024 election, and most notably, is the executive order that Governor Little and I signed the Only Citizens Can Vote Act. They wanted to know about what we had done to do citizenship verification leading into the 2024 election and share some of that experience. And but I'm part of it. One of the procedural votes for the Save act happened while we were there.

We had a recess during our hearing so they could vote to get the Save act through, get it off the house for, I do know, like it's not looking promising. I was with Senator Crapo this weekend. He's one of the co-sponsors on the Senate side. It's more difficult to get these things through on the Senate. But you combine both the Save act with, President Trump issued an executive order on elections.

And I think we're making some real headway in terms of the tools to verify US citizenship. I think Idaho's efforts particularly stand out last year, where we worked with Homeland Security to do citizenship verification, in an effort to make sure that there would be no non-citizens voting in our election last year. One of the things that I, that I did here, in prior to that EO is that non-citizens couldn't vote.

And and Secretary, we've interviewed you a number of times now over the last few years as both a candidate and now the sitting secretary of state, you've always assured us that Idaho's elections are secure. And so if I'm going to ask you a hard question, it would probably be this today. Why was there even a need to do this if our elections already were secure in Idaho?

You know, I think that's a really fair question. I think the the administration and I, our elections are secure. And I think the effort that we did highlighted that, especially when you compare, if you look nationally at some of the reports, Idaho is not the only state that has been working to ensure, citizenship. We did identify non-citizens on Idaho's voter rolls.

There were, 34 individuals that were identified as non-citizens, that we've been working on. And I think to our credit, we're actively pursuing those working with the U.S. Attorney's office and with Idaho State Police. So those are still active investigations that are happening right now. It's not just a matter of making sure that they don't vote, but enforcing the laws that we have that number, though.

One, I'm happy to say that none of those people voted in either the primary or the general election last year. But also it's it's relatively small when we have 1.1 million people that are constantly moving and changing. It requires, vigilance and active work constantly to make sure that our voter rolls are is clean and up to date as possible.

This last legislative session, we ran a bill to give us more authority and tools to do not just validation for citizenship, but also just everything else, because I think this goes to the core of your question. We want to make sure that people are eligible to vote. You know, that they are 18, that they are citizens, that they live at the address.

They say they live, you know, in like eastern Idaho, making sure that there are people from Utah not trying to vote in some of our elections, especially like up in the Island Park area. It takes active work by the county clerks in our office to, to ensure that our elections not just are strong, but that they remain strong, ongoing.

All right. Okay. This is going to be a weird question. And and it might not even land in your will, House Secretary McGrane. But currently we've got the star card and and people have until, the second week in May, I believe. Two it might even be the first week to clear all of that up. Are you a proponent of the star card and does that help you?

Because people have had to go an extra step to get that driver's license. And there is more security with the the ID that they're showing in Idaho? Yes, absolutely. The star card has been a huge help in this process. Most notably just getting all the data current. I think it's worth noting all these databases, whether it's driver's license, whether it's ours, they're, you know, they've been around for a while, but it's not that long ago that we were using paper records for a lot of this information.

The star card is really what has driven driver's license information to be updated and current more than ever, including things like citizenship. IGD has worked really hard. Part of the thing to get your star card is to show your citizenship, whether you're a U.S. citizen or any other status, you know, a permanent resident or something else.

That information is recorded when you get a star card. It is worth noting for people, the star card itself does not prove citizenship. Saying a passport does, but a star card. You can be a non-citizen and get a a legal resident non-citizen and get a star card. But it is giving us more data. I think now with the Save act, there will be more conversations about how do we capture that information.

I will say Department of Homeland Security has a lot of work to do on its database regarding citizenship. And that's one of the things I was really advocating for when I was in DC, is to get federal resources so that the federal databases are playing catch up to where the state ones are relative to the star card.

So hopefully, as we lead into this and start implementing these things, I think it's a reasonable and very logical thing to say. If if you're required to show your photo ID to get on a plane or to travel, it's not unreasonable to also show that same ID when you go vote. We're talking with Secretary of State Phil McGrane.

Secretary McGrane, I want to ask you your, multiple trips that you've made back to the nation's capital. I would imagine that that's helped to give you, kind of a more of a 30,000ft view of our nation's entire election system. I know we've asked you about this in the context of, of presidential and, and midterm elections, but what have you learned in terms of nationally, nationwide, how secure our elections are and and how confident do you feel that we're getting close to where we need to be?

I think that it's a great question. And absolutely that's true. And I feel fortunate to now have more of a seat at the table. I'll actually be headed back to D.C. to meet with officials from the white House next week, specifically to talk about the executive order and some of the things that can be done. A really good example.

There is a real opportunity on photo ID, I think, even more than where the Safe act is. When you look at, what we were just talking about on photo ID, 36 states have some form of a photo ID requirement. And when you look at when you put it before voters. So this last year in November, Nevada had a constitutional amendment on photo ID, it passed overwhelming.

Just a few weeks ago, Wisconsin had an amendment on photo ID it passed overwhelming. This is something that has bipartisan support and something Congress has the opportunity to to really just level the playing field. And I think that addresses the core of your question, where it's like, how do people in Idaho have confidence about elections in every other state?

Well, if we can have these baseline standards, that goes a long way. And so we're in we're in a time where we are moving closer to that. The other area that we've been having conversations, and I think we'll continue is just sharing information between the 50 states. When people move to Idaho from California, we want to make sure not only do they register here in Idaho, but they get removed from the voter rolls in California or vice versa.

And that's one of the areas that I think, again, this accuracy and data and voter roll information is one of the biggest topics that we're all having. And hopefully with President Trump, we have a real opportunity to kind of bring some folks together to the table to make some of this stuff happen. Yeah. All right. We, previous to going on air, we were talking about the legislative session just briefly.

Is there any other legislation that happened this year that you wanted to highlight things that you maybe felt like our, our representatives and our senators did well or affected your position? Yeah, our office worked really close to Speaker Moyle during this last session. Specifically looking at transparency efforts. That's one of the big things, for us, and it hits a number of places.

You know, one of the big successes that we had, we had a resolution on the Corporate Transparency Act. I know we all talked about this, you know, prior to the session, but we had a big win by stopping federal overreach, with working with President Trump. And just I was kind of banging the drum. I think the legislature was a key partner in that.

We updated our lobbying laws, which is helpful to add more transparency about the money that's influencing our lawmakers. And just any decision makers and what they're doing that was a big success. But the one item that was left on the table right at the end of the session was campaign finance reform. We're seeing way more money in Idaho politics these days.

And we really do need to update our campaign finance laws to meet this new influx of cash, especially out of state money. So hopefully, I think Speaker Moore and I are united in wanting to continue to push that effort. Hopefully we'll get there next year. But that was one of the things that didn't quite make it across the finish line at the end.

One of the one of the issues obviously, with that is it's not just a campaign finance issue. It's kind of a First Amendment issue as well. And I think any law that gets passed is going to have to pass constitutional muster. Was that part of the hold up? And and how do you, I guess, limit the influence of out of state money in elections?

Because I can think about the the mailers that came in targeting individual legislative districts. I think about the money that came in trying to influence proposition one. You know, trying to get it passed. I mean, you're right, there was a massive amount of out of state money, and we all agree that it's a huge problem. But how do you do how do you limit that in a First Amendment friendly way?

Neil. You that was an exceptional, way of, outlining. I think that you've nailed it on the head. I there's a lots of times people wanting to to curtail things and slow down or stop speech. And I'm a big proponent of the First Amendment. I think we all should be, you know, our founding fathers fought hard to say, think bad things about King George.

And that's just part of the political arena. The big thing that it seems is permissible, and we're very mindful of, is just ensuring transparency. So it's not trying to necessarily stop the money, but being able to let the public know more easily. Where is this coming from? Who is trying to sway who? You know? Because I think there's a big difference, like hearing from people in your community than, say, hearing from somebody in Arlington, Virginia, telling you how you should vote.

And so we're just are trying to create more forums. And I think our office has worked really hard on our new campaign finance site and some of our dashboards to highlight where is this money coming from? Your your example on prop one is a perfect example where there was $5 million from out of state money that poured into the state pushing prop one.

So at times it sounded like it was a local endeavor. But when you look at that money like that's, extremely sizable in our state, but we're seeing the same thing in some of these campaigns, especially on the negative attack ads. Last cycle, there was more out of state money attacking local legislators than there was in state money.

And that's the kind of thing where we're really feeling it. And there were races that were very tight over on your side of the state, and part of that was because out-of-state money came in and it's playing a big role, and we've got to be able to update our laws to be responsive to that, because in 1970, when we passed these laws, we weren't thinking that people in Texas and in Maryland and other places were going to care so much about an Idaho legislative race, one speaking of out of state money, and I know this was an issue, in your first campaign to become secretary of state and, it it unbeknownst to

you, the Zucker box issue, there was money coming to the state not as to fund political ads, but for certain precincts to get money. Certain counties would get money. And when you looked at it, overall, it appeared that it was an effort that was more beneficial to Democrats than Republicans. And I want to make it very clear, you had no idea that accepting this money was kind of part of this larger scheme as a national strategy to get more Democrats elected it has there been any movement on preventing that kind of thing from happening, that you might become an unwilling participant in some, you know, billionaires leftist scheme to get Democrats elected?

And I might be simplifying my description of that, but but you you know what I'm asking here. Oh, yeah, I, I'm intimately familiar that that I think the way you framed it is absolutely true. We had never seen anything like it before. I think there was, some national groups that that took advantage of the situation. When we look back at the 2020 election and Covid.

Fortunately, Idaho has now passed two different laws prohibiting, private funding in our election cycle. Elections are one of these core functions of government that should be funded by public tax dollars. And I, I'm participating these conversations across the country. You know, there are some efforts right now on cybersecurity. And everyone's been quick, especially Republican states, to say, hold on.

This is one of those functions that needs to be funded, by our states. And we have these laws in place now to prevent something like Zuckerberg's from happening again. Now, I can say Idaho has that, but not all 50 states do. And it is something that we need to be vigilant and something really that we should be able to say nationally as a baseline standard.

This is just one of those core aspects of government that should be funded, by tax dollars to make sure that there isn't anybody having undue influence on our elections. Okay. Well, I was going to ask him one more thing. It's not an election heavy year. But that doesn't mean you get the year off. So why don't you let our listeners know, some things that you'll be working on where you're not paying so much attention to elections across the state, specifically?

Yeah, we obviously, the legislative session just wrapped up. We do still have elections. So, we've got 37 counties that have elections coming up here in Maine. Now, you if you're not sure if you're one of those voters, you can visit vo idaho.gov and see your sample ballot to see if you've got anything to vote on. In this case it's usually some school levies, maybe some bonds, sewer districts, a bunch of small districts.

I'm sure you guys will be watching closely as we head into November. This is the year for city election. So a number of mayors, city council member school board members will be up for election. These are, you know, it's interesting. Last year, presidential years are the big one. So it take a ton of work, but it's nice because everybody votes in those elections.

These off year elections are all the most technical ones because you have to determine do you live in the city? Do you not? So our office is still really active, in that space. But also this is our chance. We've been really focused on the transparency efforts. So with the new lobbying bill passed, we have upgrades to transparency that'll be happening for the public to see money influencing lobbyists are going to have to report more frequently, coming into this year.

So we're still plenty busy. And I will say, I think for everybody who's in government, President Trump is keeping all of us busy. So I'm going to continue interacting with the white House and we'll see what we can do to continue to improve the system nationwide as we head into 2026. All right. Secretary McGrane, how long do we have you for?

Today you got. I've got time, so. Okay. Do you guys have time? I've got time. You bet. Let's bring you back for at least another segment. We'll do that coming up right here on Newstalk 1079. It's 928. Do you miss The Neil Larson Show? Catch every episode on the Newstalk 179 app. Grab it anytime available in your App Store now.

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All right. It's 932 now on Newstalk 178, Neil Larson, along with Julie Mason. And, joining us is Idaho's secretary of state and wildland firefighter Phil McGrane. And, you're you're signing up again this year if, if needed to be called up. Tell us about that. Yeah. You know, one of the things people always associate me in my role with elections, but I also sit as one of the five members of the Idaho Land Board.

We manage 2.5 million acres of Idaho land, to help really public education. But a big issue that IDL is always working on. So Idaho Department of Lands is wildfires, ensuring that we're protecting our land. So we oversee the fire, the wildland firefighting resources for the state of Idaho and work with our federal partners. And when I took office my first year, as you to know, I went to fire school and became a type two wildland firefighter with all the other new recruits.

And just last week, I was doing my PAC test, as we were talking about on the break, to re-up my certification for this year so that I can go out and visit some of the crews on the actual fires that occur this year. Okay. So, when you say visit some of the crews, I mean, will you be wearing all the gear and have a, you know, the equipment to fight if you need to?

I mean, what does that look like? Yeah. So, you know what's really fortunate? Somebody had planted the seed when I was learning about land board issues early on. Just me being in enough physical shape. So there's physical fitness tests that you have to do as well as some training. I have all the credentials that all the other, members on the line have.

So this gives me the opportunity to go out actually into the woods and visit some of the fires, because you can't be on the fires unless you're you're trained and, has the, the certification to do so. And so I went up to, I guess that last year or the year before to one of the fires and had dinner with the fire crews and got to talk about some of the issues they're facing because there's a Land Board member.

I'm in a great position to advocate for their interest and to make sure that we're getting the resources, together and and from those experiences to being able to share kind of the Idaho perspective as we work with the federal government on fighting these fires. The we had a huge fire season last year with over a million acres burning.

And really, the state had to advocate hard to try and get some of these fires stopped because the feds are not always as responsive as we would like them to be to put these fires out. Look, there's no shame from either me or Neal if you just rub a little soot on your face before you go home, like, just give yourself a little credit.

We're all in on that. Yeah, we just think it would be cool. Like a. Hey, I did the work. We did a practice fire. I want to, I want to get out there. I always joke with people, you know, we're in pretty desperate shape. If, the secretary of state gets called in to be on the fire crew.

But I will say we have plenty of staff at Idaho Department lands that do get called up. When the fires get really bad. And you can imagine the long hours, the summer heat, the wildfires. It's. I can say it was a really valuable experience to get a better insight and perspective on what it's like to be out there.

I do have a pack that I keep in the back of my car, because you never know when you're going to have the chance to go up and, the fire season is pretty erratic around here. But I can say it means a lot to the crew to have decision makers actually come out and see firsthand what's going on.

So that has been a really cool experience as just to be able to interact with those folks and then take that back when we actually have land board meetings and are making decision. Secretary, I want to ask you about, you know, you oversee the elections, of course, but there's a lot that comes with being Secretary of state and a lot that happens in your office in terms of business filings and and those functions.

I recently had occasion to file an LLC through your office, and I was I was very pleased with how quickly it happened. And I had my LLC finalized. It seemed like within a couple of days it it was done. And, it might have been same day, I don't remember, I just remember looking in my email going, oh, it's already been been approved.

How? Well, do you think your office is functioning in, in all those other areas that you we always talk about elections, but you do a lot. And so maybe give us an update on how it's going. Yeah. I appreciate you, you acknowledging that it is interesting when I interact with the public, lots of people associated with elections.

There is a community of people who associate me with businesses because they're either business owners or they're in the banking industry, and they go, and, you know, they'll see my face because they're, updating their LLC or something else. You know, I'm really proud of the work that our office has done, especially in just upgrading the technology and the interactions.

Your example is perfect, where we want to make it as seamless as possible so that we can get out of the way of small business owners and help make sure their journey is going to be smooth and easy. This last year was a really big year for us as it relates to businesses. I think we've communicated more with small businesses this year than probably the last decade combined, because of the corporate Transparency Act and trying to keep business owners informed about what are the rules advocating for small business owners.

That's one of those things that took a tremendous amount of work over the last six months, for our office. And I will say, our business crew has worked incredibly hard to help small businesses. And that lot of that goes unseen to most of the public, unless you're directly impacted because you're a business owner, you wouldn't really know.

But that is an important part of the job. Another aspect to that people, don't see is the legislative session. Of course, I'm engaged. As we talked earlier on some of the policy topics that impact our office, but also all those bills that were passed, that whole process. Our office is the final destination. I always jokingly say I am the secretary of the state.

So one of my official duties is handing lots of the official paperwork and ministerial functions of state government. So all bills that are passed come to me. We're the ones who disseminate the laws to the public. And so right now, we're still very active in the post election or post legislative session activity, getting all the, I's dotted T's crossed so we can get the updates out this summer, with all the new laws that were passed.

So our office keeps, plenty busy and then additions, things like the landlord, board of examiners. There's a bunch of boards I sit on, that keep our office, pretty hopping. It reminds me of the scene from the office where Dwight would say, I'm the assistant manager, and I think, someone else said, no, you're the assistant to the manager, which is very, very different.

And when when you said you're not the secretary, just the secretary of state, you're the secretary of the state, which they. Yeah. That's funny. Yeah, I there's, there's plenty of funny moments that have come up along the way, but somebody's got to keep track and make sure that things are done the right way. Yeah, but you're not getting people coffee or anything like that.

You know? I'm not getting there. I think the governor has staff to get him copy. I copy, and, I got you. Yeah. Let's make sure we talk about the fact that you're going to be in Idaho Falls this Friday. At the Lincoln Day event that's being held, to, the snake River Event Center. Why don't you tell us a little bit about that?

Yeah. This Friday is the Lincoln Day dinner. I think it's a three county, Lincoln Day dinner, but Bonneville County, focused on hosting. This is the annual GOP dinner. I'm fortunate enough to been asked to come speak, and I'll be sharing, just some of the data and insights that we've gathered from our elections, especially one of the big things that people seem to always have an interest in is, all the people moving to our state.

It's true. There are a lot. Idaho is one of the fastest growing states. And what that means for our politics, tied to that is we already touched on in some of the money and getting to see the actual dollars that are coming into Idaho and what that means for us. I'm always excited when I get to go over there.

My parents are from eastern Idaho and I've got family there. So it's it's great to be in Idaho Falls. And so I encourage anybody who's interested to join us. 6 p.m. will be the dinner this Friday at the snake River Event Center. And I'm looking forward to seeing everybody there. All right. Secretary of State Phil McGrane has been our guest today.

Always great to chat with you, Secretary McGrane. We appreciate your accessibility and your hard work in your office. Thank you very much. Thank you guys. It's always a pleasure to get to chat with you guys. All right. Quick break, 940 now on Newstalk 1079. We'll be back after the news.

Thank you Secretary. We do appreciate it. Yeah, I always enjoy it. We'll catch up again maybe this fall you can travel safely. All right. Thanks. Bye bye bye. I love how zoom limits your time on it. I we had to have been getting close. We were getting close. Yeah, it was like, do you want to upgrade? And they accidentally said yes.

So I want to see how much it is. It's, It's like 16 bucks a month for workplace Pro. I think when we were talking with him during the break, he was hearing ads because I didn't. I turned on program two so he could hear the open to the show. They never tried to tell us. Yeah. And I saw that somebody in the comments said, we're hearing ads on Facebook, I mean, after the fact.

And yeah, so I'm like, he was hearing that too. So he was just talking through it. He I here's the deal. He might not have been your first choice because he ran against Dorothy Moon. And if you're that person that's fine. We had two phenomenal choices. We did. Yeah, we had two great choices. Yeah. And, I, I wish we could say that for every election.

Yeah. That's true. You know, you're our brains are so conditioned to thinking villain and hero. Villain and hero. Villain and hero. Yeah, but when it comes down to it, more elections are probably about decent person versus slightly less or more decent person. Irritating person that's decent or, you know, whatever it is. Yeah, yeah. There was I just don't feel like we had villains going on between Dorothy Moon.

I just yeah. And it's really, a shame that our brains are wired that way. Good guy, bad guy. You know, dark, light, whatever. In in situations where we clearly have the time to reframe it. Yeah. Oh, art. We're we're automatically wired that way for safety. Good guy, bad guy. Get yourself out of danger. Yeah. You have plenty of time in an election to reframe what's going on in your mind.

Yes. And that's the true lesson there is to learn when you have the ability of time. The luxury of time. Yeah. Make sure you analyze because it's very rarely good guy. Bad guy. Yeah, yeah. It's true. I think our, election advertising is a big problem. Like, that's that's because you have it painting the other person is, you know, and the other person is always engaged in fear and chaos and deceit and.

Right. Yeah. When in reality, they're probably not. Yeah. I think there are races where you have a very, very defined contrast between two candidates. But I I'll be honest with you, if Phil McGrane and Dorothy Moon are different in ways stylistically. Yeah, yeah, yeah, but they're also very similar in some key ways. They're both tireless workers. They're they're both very smart.

They're both very competent there. And I think all the important things that you'd want in a secretary of state, both had a good core of those, those traits. And in a secretary of state, both of them would have gone, well, that might be difficult to get done, but we can do it. Yeah. They're both those kind of people unlike I mean, we have other politicians that are like, that's a little too hard.

Yeah. We won't let's not address that. And that's neither one of them. You know, I will say I gained a lot of respect for Phil McGrane. And I like both him and Dorothy. When he said, yeah, I was duped during Zucker Bucks, I would not have done that had I known. And I thought that, you know what? He didn't double down on it.

He recognized that, it was people were being used in that. Yeah. So like, for me, tell me, tell me, tell me. I'm not crazy. There's a psycho in my head. I was sitting here making me feel like I'm living at 945 on Newstalk 1079. So Julie, the name Neil has Irish roots, as does the middle name Ryan.

Okay, I deserve to go to the white House Irish Party next year. Oh, okay, I'll let you have that one. March 17th is my birthday. I know we have our ticket is punched to go to the white House. You know what we should do? We should have a, for the month leading up to it. Let's, let's add the mic or the O apostrophe.

Neil Mason. Yes. Neil MC Larson and Julio Mason. Mason. Yep. Just I'm with it so we can get the invite to the white House. And you know what we know people, we know that that Governor Little's visited the white House. We know, that Phil McGrane has Steve Yates worked in the why we have connections and Senator Rich telling us he has Trump's personal number.

Yes that's true. That's true. So I'm going to put a reminder in my phone next year, mid-February, we're going to have a little marketing campaign that is overtly so that we'll get an invite to the white House. Saint Patty's Day. We better evoke the luck of the Irish to get us there in the. Absolutely. So that would have been a cool I mean, walking in and there's RFK June would have been fun.

Yeah, yeah. Good. That's fun for him. That's fun that he. And he's going back. He said. So that's it. That's even better. I there has been some things specifically I have done politics with you on air for eight years. I would say specifically in the last five years ish Idaho went, no, no, no, you're no longer going to forget that we're where we're at and pretend like we're not a state.

And don't confuse us with Iowa. Yeah, like Idaho has done some things to really put themselves on the map. Yeah. And we need to keep going with that. I, I agree, I think through deliberate efforts and through some situational things, it turns out people move here and they like it. Yes. Shocking much. Come on. Much to the chagrin of some people.

Like they're like, oh, we're getting more people. Like housing's out of control. You know, it has some drawbacks to it. But I will say, this is the best kept secret in the country for quite, quite a long time. Yes. And it's it's not so secret anymore. And along with people moving here and understanding Idaho, part of the reason they're coming is because we've had some big wins in Idaho politics.

Yeah, over the last five ish years. And that also helps people. They're like, I want to be part of this kind of state. Yeah, yeah, I would agree. And I remember maybe five years ago this time frame that you're talking about, remember the fears leading up to it that the Democrats were slowly overtaking Idaho and we're going to become Oregon or Washington?

I think there's a concern there. I'm not going to say that those concerns are without merit. However, I will temper it by saying I have been pleasantly surprised at the quality of people moving here from out of state in terms of political ideology. And they're they're conservatives. There's a reason why they wanted to get out of there of their state.

That was becoming unlivable, whether it's taxes or crime or whatever. They wanted to get out and they've come here and they truly have an appreciation for the the lifestyle that we have here. And I, I don't think I expected that. I thought, oh, there's a flood of people coming here because our, our property is cheaper, lands, cheaper, lots of outdoor stuff, and they're just going to turn us into that.

I think there is still that element, but I don't think that it it's as bad as we it's not a tidal wave of that. Yeah. I would also say probably a couple times a month or so, people get really brave as they're driving through and they call the show, they're like, hey, I'm on my way through Idaho.

I'm okay. And that speaks to me that, there are people who drive through here absolutely knowing it's a conservative state. And if they if they surf the radio waves, they're going to find us. They know that. Yeah. That's it's not that we were doing anything to advertise to those people as they were driving. They know that they're in Idaho.

And if I just look for two minutes on the dial, I'm going to find it. Yes. And that speaks great for Idaho. They people understand what they're getting when they come here. I mean, how could a show like us not exist in a state like Idaho? Is that what you're saying? No, we. It should be a show that exists.

Like that is what I'm saying. Yeah, yeah. No. It's true. You're right, you're right. (208) 542-1079. Well, Julie, let's talk about your protein intake, shall we? Sure. Mine's pretty high. Are you getting enough? Yeah. Do you need another steak, though? I will always fill my freezer with steaks. Always. I, it was cold yesterday, but I can see our barbecue grill right outside our kitchen window.

It's right up against the deck. And I looked at it longingly yesterday, and I thought, it is time to fire that baby up again, because I've grilled probably 3 or 4 times so far this year. It needs to be a more frequent, liaison with my barbecue grill. There was like a dream sequence with the romantic music playing in the background, and then Neil having fond memories of flipping a steak or a burger or dog on the grill.

Yeah, here we go. Let's make that happen. In real life. That wasn't the music that was playing anyway. Yeah. You want to get your dogs, get your ribs, get your steaks, get your steak. You know what? Take steaks, make steak. We've done steak bites so many times with our steak from Grand Peaks primates. It is it is great.

Yep. Prime meats.com bell. That website so awesome. It it has all of your your needs are on there. You can look at individual, cuts of of beef and pork or you can go to their packages. There's also precooked meals that you just warm up in the crock pot. Some seaweed. Options. Everything is available there.

Or give them a call. They're friends of ours. They should be friends of yours again. That's g p Prime meats.com, 952. We'll come back. We'll have our wrap up segment after this on Newstalk 179.

Okay. New Pope will happen probably somewhere between the fifth and the 10th. Well that's the time frame we're looking at. They're moving quick then. They're holding I think meetings today is the beginning portion of how this whole thing works. There's multiple steps to the conclave, but yeah. Are they doing the smoke in them? Well, they will on the last day.

Yeah, I know, I don't mean today, I just yeah, yeah, yeah. Someone was talking to me other day and they kept referring to it as a concave. And it's slightly on. Correct. Because I didn't want to be that person on leave.

I'm like, should I tell you so that they don't sound silly in front of somebody else? That's I don't want to make them feel silly in front of me talking about a mirror or not a place. You know what? You know what I would do if I ran a hospital? Whenever a baby was born, I would send up either blue smoke or pink smoke would not be cool.

That would be like, put off like a smoke bomb at the off the roof of the hospital. And, well, I don't know, because there's people out there that will complain because I do know a local hospital used to play the lullaby chimes when a baby was born. Yeah. And they had people complain that my loved one is dying on fifth floor, and you're you're playing lullaby chimes.

Okay. So. Well, they could they could play taps to like. I'm just kidding. Yeah, I, I guess I can get that. That's. Yeah. So they put a stop to, they put a stop to it. You think smoke would be the same? I don't know, at least it's not. Don't. It's like a little dangly. So it's clean.

You've been touching a board that everybody else has been touching. Okay.

I don't know what's on there. It's. It's true.

I don't know, maybe smoke would be better because you can't. It's only a sight thing. It's not on us. And it's people driving by. Yeah, yeah, there is a, regional hospital that has, a couple of billboards out front that are digital, and they'll put pictures up of babies and stuff. Oh, nice. I wonder how many babies are born at the local hospitals.

I don't know, 3 or 4 a day, maybe. Well, if you follow statistics, September is the the month that the most babies are born. Okay. And, like November, December are lower amounts. Okay. I don't some of that some of that is people behavior driven meaning not the conception people. You're more isolated in the winter. So September babies make sense.

September babies makes sense. But also doctors really push away from certain holidays and Thanksgiving and Christmas are those holidays. So when you don't have babies born on the holidays, then it lessens. Like it changes. Like when you're looking at what day are the most babies born on December 25th is now one of the lowest because they're not going to start people on that day or whatever.

That's true. Yeah, yeah. But if you're looking at behaviors of people conceiving, of course you're going to have a lot of babies in September. Wasn't there a boom after the, all the the pandemic and the lockdowns? Yeah.

957 on Newstalk 1079I should probably have this conversation with Julie off the air, but do we have anybody tomorrow? Not tomorrow. We should have both senators this week. So on Wednesday, Senator Crapo, on Thursday, Senator Risch okay. And, you're saying we may have, the Pope process happening next week? Yeah, first week of May. They have to do these meetings.

They're estimating the conclave to be probably like May 7th, but if they're having mass disagreement with each other, that actually won't happen. But who knows? We'll see. Aren't we kind of expecting that? Like, there are factions within the. Yeah, within the Cardinal. About half of them really want a continuation of the liberal Pope. And there's another half that are wanting to get back to the strong Catholic roots.

Okay. We don't need another liberal pope. Yeah. That's fine. You know, let's get back to that was a fun experiment. We're like it's it's you know, it's it's funny because I kind of feel like there's an inner Catholic, but like, I, I mean, I grew up Pope John Paul was a very, very visible pope, beloved figure, very conservative.

I mean, he was so visible in high profile. He was also a political figure fit right in with Reagan and Thatcher. So anyway, have a wonderful Monday. Julie and I will be back tomorrow.