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The legislative races in the Grand Forks area have gotten ugly. Incumbent state Sen. Scott Meyer, a Republican from District 18, sent his opponent threatening social media messages. Incumbent state Rep. Emily O'Brien from District 42 has been accused of not living in her district. Now Sarah Grossbauer, a Democratic-NPL candidate in District 42 -- one of O'Brien's opponents -- is dodging questions about drug use after a Republican (and former friend) leaked a photo of her allegedly using cocaine in the bathroom of a downtown Grand Forks bar.
Me and Chad Oban talked about it all on this episode of Plain Talk (full disclosure, Oban works for North Dakota United, as does Grossbauer). One complicating factor in all of this is our propensity -- and I really mean "our" because we're all guilty of this -- of being hypercritical of candidates we don't like while rationalizing the behavior of those we do.
It has to stop. We can expect more from our elected officials.
Auditor Josh Gallion also joined this episode to talk about what he's done during his two terms in office to justify voters giving him a third. Among his arguments? He's modernized the office. "We had walls of filing cabinets with paper records," he said. Now, much of that data has been digitized, and is available online.
Gallion also talked about his office's greater efforts to communicate audit information to the public, but at times that's gotten the incumbent in some hot water. His critics in the Legislature, and in local government, have accused him of sensationalizing funding. Gallion responded to those criticisms, and others related to the costs of his office's audits.
Finally, Chad and made our 2024 election predictions. How will North Dakota's statewide races shake out? Which ballot measures will be approved? Will the partisan balance in the Legislature change much? And who is going to win the national election?
You'll have to listen to find out what we think. And, after Tuesday, maybe you can make fun of us for being wrong.
Speaking of which, we have a new way for you to communicate with us. Just give us a call or text at 701-587-3141. It’s super easy—leave your message, tell us your name and where you’re from, and we might feature it on an upcoming episode.
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We live in an age of misinformation. The internet is chock full of false narratives and egregious bunkum that can seem plausible to some if for no other reason than the sheer volume of it orr, perhaps, because it confirms certain biases and attitudes the audience already has.
Recently a website called the Gateway Pundit, which was forced to print a retraction as a part of a settlement in a defamation lawsuit brought by Georgia election workers published what it purports to be a news story about the Bank of North Dakota.
Citing anonymous sources and critics, the "story" insinuates that the BND is involved in a cover-up of bad loans, bailouts, and other nefarious activities. The one on-the-record statement was given by Sen. Kent Weston, a Republican who serves in District 9.
Normally, one might think it unwise to respond to internet cranks, but we live in an era where talk radio host Alex Jones was able to convince 1 in 5 Americans that the Sandy Hook school shooting was a hoax.
These things can't be taken lightly.
BND President Don Morgan joined this episode of Plain Talk to provide factual answers. "The only part of the article that is true is they got our name right," Morgan told Chad Oban and me.
"As it kind of got picked up by some locals, we decided we want to get some facts out there," he continued.
Morgan says the bank is in strong financial shape, and it hasn't received bailouts. He also said that Sen. Weston hasn't, to his knowledge, contacted the bank about the claims made in the article.
Also on this episode, Democratic-NPL auditor candidate Tim Lamb joined to discuss his campaign.
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"Even the most extreme ends of our legislature vote the same way 60+ percent of the time," a Plain Talk listener and sitting state lawmaker texted me recently.
He was making a point about the way we talk about politics, where we emphasize our disagreements more than our agreements. "Difference in ideology is great. We need more civil debate and strengthening ideas through discourse," he said. "But the gap between left and right is much narrower than most people realize."
He's right, and the voting records bear it out. We do agree more than we disagree, what gets the heat, what draws our attention for reasons having to do with human nature (and, if we're being honest, the sort of content that drives clicks and shares and views) is our differences.
I was thinking about while recording this episode of Plain Talk, which featured Chad Oban and I moderating a debate between District 10 Sen. Ryan Braunberger, a Democrat, and challenger George Roughead, a Republican. As we covered education topics like student performance, school choice, and school lunches, and as we hit on working-class issues like child care, and as we delved into culture war issues like LGTBQ issues and book bans, these two bright, engaged, well-informed candidates spent a lot of time agreeing on what North Dakota's challenges are.
They often disagreed, sometimes sharply, on what the solutions to those problems are, but when it comes to what the job before them would be if elected to another term in the Legislature? Both men were over the target.
"I was a very good voice for my district," Braunberger told us when asked why voters should give him another term. He mentioned his work on child care and his efforts to work with Republicans. "Being one of only four Democrats in the Senate, you have to work across the aisle," he said.
Roughead, who works as a teacher, said he wants to focus on education. "The Senate doesn't have any active teachers," he said.
District 10 features one of the few competitive races in North Dakota, and that's probably because it's one of the few places with mixed partisan representation. The debate in District 10 can tell us a lot about the debates that are happening (or that would be happening if they featured competitive races) in legislative campaigns around North Dakota.
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Chad Oban and I have a lot of disagreements while hosting the Plain Talk podcast, which is what you'd expect. He's left-of-center; I'm right-of-center. Today, however, we were singing from the same choirbook.
Sen. Scott Meyer, a Republican running for re-election in Grand Forks-area District 18, who admitted to me that he got drunk and sent threatening messages to his opponent, Democratic-NPL candidate Kyle Thorson, should resign.
We each made our case for why on today's episode of Plain Talk.
Also joining us was former NDGOP chairman Perrie Schafer to discuss the work his LegeNDary Fund is doing to promote traditional, "normie" conservatism in North Dakota. "There are a certain group of people who are loud and make a lot of noise," he said. "They are not the majority."
He said he wants to bring what he calls the "80%" of reasonable North Dakota Republicans back into active engagement with the NDGOP.
"When the loud side of either party makes a lot of noise, the 80% are quiet."
Also joining us was Treasurer Thomas Beadle to respond to criticisms of the State Investment Board made by two of our previous guests, Rep. Bernie Satrom and Rep. Mitch Ostlie of Jamestown. They claim that North Dakota's Legacy Fund investments are transparent enough, and have proposed legislation to require an online database detailing where the fund's money is at.
Beadle says he supports the idea, but pointed out some limitations.
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The Legacy Fund was launched in 2010 when North Dakota voters approved a legislatively-initiated constitutional amendment to create it. Now, thanks to the share of oil tax revenues it receives, as well as the investment returns its generated, it sits with a balance of about $10.7 billion.
And it's become something of a political football. It can seem as though we are endlessly debating how the fund is invested and what we should do with the fund and its earnings.
On this episode of Plain Talk, a couple of Republican lawmakers from District 12, in the Jamestown area, talked about legislation they'd like to see passed during the 2025 session which, they feel, would help inform those debates. Because one of the biggest problems of the Legacy Fund is that we don't know how a lot of the money is invested. Rep. Mitch Ostlie, and Rep. Bernie Satrom, estimate that about $3.1 billion of the fund's investments are opaque to public scrutiny.
"Where are the dollars invested?" Rep. Ostlie asked.
Their proposal is called the Legacy Fund Transparency Act, and it's pretty simple. It would require that the State Investment Board list the Legacy Fund's investments in a public way. Perhaps on the SIB's website.
The lawmakers feel this would not only help inform debates over what we should be doing with the Legacy Fund, but also help us identify problematic investments, like when the fund was invested in Russian bonds. "We were literally funding the Russian government," Rep. Satrom said.
The lawmakers were also somewhat critical of the current members of the State Investment Board, which includes among its number elected officials like Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller, Treasurer Thomas Beadle, Rep. Glenn Bosch, and Sen. Jerry Klein.
"This has just been incredibly hands off," Rep. Satrom said.
"We were able to find out...that we were in Russian bonds," he continued at another point in the interview. "Couldn't they see? They're just trusting the experts and not having common sense."
Also on this episode, Chad Oban and I discuss what are probably the most important legislative races in the North Dakota, in Districts 10, 24, and 46, and we also talk about U.S. House candidate Trygve Hammer's recent criticisms of his opponent Julie Fedorchak.
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People who are familiar with my body of work probably aren't inclined to think of me when they have an appetite for warm, fuzzy, feel-good stories, and yet that's precisely the sort of story we began today's episode of Plain Talk with. Which is a good thing, because as we survey the political landscape, there's not a lot to feel positive about.
Joe Kolosky works for the North Dakota Department of Public Instruction. He says one of the favorite parts of his job is overseeing a program through which veterans of World War II, the Korean War, and Vietnam, can apply to receive the high school diplomas they missed out on when they shipped out to war zones.
The Legislature created the program in 2001 for WWII veterans, and expanded it to include Korea and Vietnam veterans in 2003, and since then it's issued over 300 honorary high school diplomas including, most recently, two Korean War veterans.
Koslosky says it means a lot to him that he gets to help these veterans, but more important, it means a great deal to the veterans themselves. Those who feel they or someone they know may qualify for it should contact the Department of Public Instruction. Officials only need you to fill out a one-page application, and provide a the veteran's paperwork verifying their service.
Also on this episode, Chad Oban and I discuss the recent FEC filngs in North Dakota's federal races, our thoughts on the likely outcomes of those races, and the future of the North Dakota Republican Party's dominance in electoral office.
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By the time her current term ends, Kirsten Baesler will have been the Superintendent of Public Schools in North Dakota for 12 years, having first been elected in 2012.
She's currently running against Jason Heitkamp, a distant relative of former U.S. Senator Heidi Heitkamp and a former lawmaker who served one abbreviated, two-term in the state Senate as a Republican from 2021 to 2022 (redistricting forced him to run for re-election after two years, a campaign he lost).
Heitkamp and Baesler met on this episode of Plain Talk for what has been, and perhaps will be, their only debate. Each presented sharply contrasting views of the job of superintendent, and repeatedly accused one another of lying or misleading.
For her part, Baesler championed her performance in office since 2012. "I've accomplished a lot," she said, noting that she's reduced the number of employees in her office from 101 to 82 while simultaneously maintaining the highest level of job satisfaction among state agencies. She also touted her background as an educator. She's worked as a teacher, and served in administrative and governing positions at the local level.
"A lot of people don't know who I am," Heitkamp said by way of introduction but pointed out that in addition to his legislative service, he's also served on two city councils and as a county commissioner. He also accused both the incumbent and public school educators generally of performing poorly.
"We can't afford another four years of what's happening in our state," he said.
The candidates took questions about student attendance issues, teacher recruitment and retention, vaccination rates, and classroom challenges related to mental health and education.
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On this episode of Plain Talk, Chad Oban and I spent some time talking about the column in which I outed myself as a Kamala Harris voter. Or, more accurately, I spent some time expanding on my explanation, and Chad listened.
But the more important part of this episode was our conversation with Sen. Michelle Axtman, a Republican from Bismarck who is something of a rising star in her party (she was transparent about her ambitions during our off-air conversation, saying her goal is to be elected governor one day).
Axtman is heading up a legislative tax force on the school choice issue that has drawn some heat for not being as open as it should be to the public, and some criticssay (including Chad, who works for North Dakota United) not including as wide a swath of education stakeholders as it could have.
Axtman took those questions, and answered them, but also delivered a clearer picture of just what it is they're working on.
School choice is a fraught topic because, when most people think about it, their minds turn to vouchers. They envision parents getting money to use for private school tuition. That's the part that many public school educators and their advocates don't like. They're afraid that the money will drain resources from public schools and create more profits for private schools that are, for the most part, doing pretty well.
But what Sen. Axtman describes is a program that goes far beyond that.
Yes, it would provide some money for tuition, but the framework she and her colleagues are working toward could also make money available for people with children in public schools. Money that could be used to get a tutor for a student struggling with a subject, or to pay for online lessons to help a student pursue a particular interest like coding or languages, or even to help a student with special needs -- maybe they're dealing with dyslexia or another challenge -- get some help beyond what the schools can provide.
It's a fascinating proposal, and it will be a fascinating debate in the upcoming legislative session.
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We are 31 days away from election day and, here in North Dakota, the hottest race in the state probably isn't for the U.S. Senate, or the U.S. House, or even the governor's seat. It is, arguably, Measure 4 which, if passed, would eliminate taxes on property values and order the Legislature to compensate local governments for that loss of revenue at 2024 levels.
It's such a hot issue that when Prairie Public recently hosted a debate between U.S. Senate candidates Kevin Cramer and Katrina Christiansen, they asked the candidates about Measure 4, even though that issue really has nothing to do with the federal office they're running for.
Aaron Birst joined this episode of Plain Talk to discuss Measure 4, and what's driving both the support for it and opposition to it. Aaron is the executive director of the North Dakota Association of Counties.
"The only tax people like is the one somebody else pays," he told Chad Oban and I.
Birst isn't arguing that there are no problems with local taxing and spending. "Do we need to have a conversation about how much we spend at the local level? Sure," he said, though he argued that Measure 4 just isn't the right fix.
"We can try something different. I'm just not sure we're going to find something better," he said. He also argued that passing Measure 4 could create legal and policy-making chaos that would be with North Dakota for a long time. "If this passes...we're probably going to have a decade of court cases to figure out what this means."
Also on this episode, Oban and I discuss the recently-released polling in North Dakota's statewide races, and some intrigue at the North Dakota Industrial Commission.
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Todd Reisenauer says he'd like to get elected to the North Dakota House of Representatives so that he can take Fargo-area District 46 in a new direction. He said he'd like to focus on issues like housing, healthcare, childcare, and property taxes.
What he doesn't want to do, he says, is emulate the approach taken by one of incumbents in that district, state Rep. Jim Kasper, who has been in the center of debates over social issues like book bans and issues surrounding our transgender neighbors.
"We can't have District 46 be the front lines of a culture war," Reisenauer told Chad Oban and I on this episode of Plain Talk.
The legislative races in District 46 are worth watching. The jurisdiction represents one of the few purple districts in North Dakota and has a history of mixed-partisan leadership.
Reisenauer said he admired the work done by another of the Republican incumbents in the district, outgoing Rep. Shannon Roers, who opted not to run for reeelction. He said he got interested in the race when he heard Roers was retiring, and that he wants to continue her work of making District 46 "a bipartisan, get things done kind of district."
"We're burning people out," Reisenauer said, addressing the polarized nature of politics in 2024. "I'm not an activist," he added, saying he has no interested in playing partisan politics and "selling fear."
"I don't want to be a part of that," he said, adding that he's "not afraid to say conservatives have good policy ideas, and that sometimes Demcorats overshoot."
Also on this episode, Oban and I discuss the vice presidential debate between Sen. J.D. Vance and Gov. Tim Walz, and the news of a North Dakota man, the son of a Republican legislative candidate in District 24, getting arrested for his alleged participation in the January 6 attack on Congress.
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Steve Bakken is the former mayor of Bismarck, and the chair of the committee backing Measure 5, which seeks to legalize recreational marijuana in North Dakota.
Pat Finken is a long-time advertising professional and political activist. He's a part of the coalition opposing Measure 5.
These gentleman came together on Plain Talk to make their respective cases. The contrasts in their arguments, as you might expect, were sharp.
Bakken says Measure 5 is a "very conservative" legalization that gives state officials plenty of latitude to regulate lawful use of the drug. The measure "gives all the power to the state," he said.
But Finken painted the measure as exacerbating North Dakota's existing problems with substance abuse. "The marijuana of today is not safe," he said. "It's ten times more powerful" than what Americans have may been smoking in past decades. He rejected the argument that marijuana legalization is inevitable, saying that even if North Dakota were the last state in the union without legal access for recreational use, he wouldn't mind it.
"I'm perfectly content for North Dakota to remain an island," he said.
Bakken, for his part, argued that Finken's alarmism is out of date. "That reefer madness mentality goes back to the 50s."
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Is Attorney General Drew Wrigley's office wasting money on unnecessary litigation? Is North Dakota's Republican majority in the Legislature being something less than good stewards of our fiscal resources by passing controversial bills that invite litigation?
House Minority Leader Zac Ista, who led his caucus in voting against approving attitional litigation funds for Wrigley's office at a recent meeting of the Legislature's Budget Section committee, joined this episode of Plain Talk to discuss it.
Though, given that one of the laws currently being litigated is North Dakota's restrictive ban on most abortions, that dominated the conversation, which had my co-host Chad Oban calling me "raging Rob."
Admittedly, I have been a bit feisty lately.
But abortion litigation isn't the only cost North Dakota is facing. The biggest line item for litigation costs recently is related to our state's suit against the federal government over the expenses associated with responding to the violent, protracted protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline. And aren't we prone to seeing the efficacy of any given litigation through the lens of our feelings about the policy being litigated? Isn't it natural that Democrats might not like the policy and legal priorities of a Republican majority, and a Republican attorney general?
Rep. Ista answered those questions and more.
Also on this episode, we discuss the odds of Measure 4 passing on the November ballot.
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If you read the ballot language for Measure 3 and still didn't understand just what it is the proposed constitutional amendment does, I wouldn't blame you.
I don't think that's anyone's fault. It's just a somewhat arcane topic, but that doesn't mean it's not important.
State Rep. Corey Mock joined us on this episode of Plain Talk to discuss the proposal, which would make some changes around the Legacy Fund, which these days is sporting a balance of around $11 billion.
Currently, lawmakers have the statutory authority to spend up to 15% of the principal of that fund. Mock said that was written into the original amendment that created the fund to ensure that at least some of it was available to lawmakers should some emergent situation make it necessary. But when the Legacy Fund was created, nobody expected it to grow as far and as fast as it has. Mock said the original projects for the fund expected it to cross the $1 billion threshold by like 2021.
Clearly, we're well beyond that, but the Legislature's authority to spend as much as 15% of it has resulted in some lost opportunities. The fund managers have to keep those funds liquid, because theoretically the Legislature could come calling for them. Measure 3 shrinks that from 15% to 5%.
Given that the Legacy Fund is much, much larger now than we expected when that original 15% limit was written into the constitution, lowering still leaves plenty of money available to lawmakers in an emergency, but allows the fund managers to invest more of the principal and get bigger returns.
Also on this episode, guest co-host Jamie Selzler and I discuss the state of the presidential race.
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Are the proponents of Measure 2 "elite and out of touch?" Are they "condescending" and "disrespectful" to the electorate? Or do they view North Dakota's initiated measure process -- particularly when it comes to amending the state constitution -- as flawed and needing reform?
Measure 2 is a constitutional amendment placed on the ballot by the Legislature, which would prohibit people who aren't North Dakota residents from collecting petition signatures for initiated measures. It would limit measures to a single subject. And, for constitutional measures, it would raise the signature requirement from 4% to 5% of the state's population and require that those proposals be approved through two statewide votes: once on the June primary ballot and again on the November general election ballot.
Ellie Shockley, a columnist for the Bismarck Tribune, joined this episode of Plain Talk to make the case against the proposal. It's her words that I'm quoting above. She views this proposed amendment as motivated by a desire among lawmakers to diminish the will of the people in making policy.
Sen. Janne Myrdal, a Republican from Edinburg, also joined this episode, and she argued that it's become too easy for deep-pocketed, often out-of-state interests to hire professional signature gatherers (who themselves are often not North Dakotans) to force a vote on complicated policy proposals that aren't often explained well to the voters.
This point-and-counterpoint conversation at times got heated, because it deals with some of the bedrock assumptions we make about our system of government. The political power in our republic ultimately comes from the people, but as a question of process, is legislating what are often complicated policy proposals at the ballot box where a distracted electorate, already asked to evaluate candidates for everything from weed control boards to president of the United States, really a good way to make sound policy?
The Plain Talk Podcast is the voice of North Dakota politics. To subscribe, search for the show wherever you get your podcasts, like Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube, or click here for more information.
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In November, North Dakota voters will be asked to decide the fate of Measure 4. If approved, it would amend the state constitution to prohibit taxes on property values. It would also lock in an obligation for the state legislature to replace current property tax revenues to local government with other revenues, but only at 2024 levels, with no mechanism to change that level in the future.
On this episode of Plain Talk, we had a debate about that proposal. Making the affirmative case for it is former Fargo City Commissioner Tony Gehrig. Making the case against it is Robert Harms, a former chair of the North Dakota Republican Party who also served in the administrations of former governors Ed Schafer and John Hoeven.
Former state lawmaker Rick Becker, the chair of the committee sponsoring the measure, declined to participate in the debate, saying the Plain Talk podcast is the only place where he won't speak about the proposal.
Both Harms and Gehrig agree on some key issues. They say that property taxes are a problem in North Dakota in need of a solution. They both also agree that taxing property values is problematic. As property values rise, they drive almost automatic increases in tax burdens that aren't tied to local needs.
Where they differ is the nature of the solution. Harms argues that abolishing property taxes would shift too much power over local spending to lawmakers in Bismarck. He also said that it "freezes some unfairness" in the state constitution by locking in funding for local governments at 2024 levels. A local government that made a big bond payment in 2024 would continue to be compensated for it by state taxpayers well into the future, even after the bond is paid off. A local government that kept property taxes low, on the other hand, would be punished for their conservative budgeting.
For his part, Gehrig argued that eliminating property taxes would be an economic boon to the state, drawing new investment. During his time in office, Gehrig was an outspoken opponent of policies that seek to incent economic development by easing or eliminating property tax burdens, but he used that stance as an argument for Measure 4. "If you believe those policies work, then you have to believe in Measure 4," he said.
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"The property tax is a good tax," Jared Walczak told Chad Oban and I on this episode of Plain Talk. "You may not love it, but you will not like the alternatives better."
Walczak is the state projects director for the Tax Foundation, a right-of-center think tank that focuses on -- you guessed it -- tax policy. His organization recently published an article critical of Measure 4, a constitutional amendment that would prohibit taxes on property values. Walczak has also presented his group's arguments to state lawmakers.
Walczak's argument is not that North Dakotan's shouldn't feel upset about their property taxes. "There's legitimate frustration," he said. The problem is that eliminating the property tax would produce "real economic upheaval" by shifting tax burdens from a tax that "has very little economic drag" to others, like income taxes or sales taxes, which do.
Eliminating the billions collected locally in property taxes would mean replacing those revenues with tax dollars collected state wide. "You're talking about essentially doubling your other taxes at the state level," Walczak argued.
"No one else has done this for pretty good reasons," he said, and he's not just talking about state governments in America. He said that no other country in the developed world has eliminated its property taxes.
What should North Dakota do to address the genuine public consternation over property taxes? He says state policymakers should look at caps on how much locals can raise through property taxes, coupled with some pressure relief valves that would allow the taxing jurisdictions to exceed those caps in specific circumstances, like if the voters ok the increase on the ballot.
Also on this episode, Chad and I discuss the presidential debate between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, including everything from Harris's facial expressions to Trump's blood libel attack on immigrants.
The Plain Talk Podcast is the voice of North Dakota politics. To subscribe, search for the show wherever you get your podcasts, like Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube, or click here for more information.
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North Dakota's gubernatorial race features to affable, well-liked candidates, who clearly like one another as well.
Republican Kelly Armstrong was first elected to the North Dakota Senate in 2012, and served there until the 2018 election cycle, when he campaigned successfully for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. That's where he's currently finishing out a term, while also campaigning for governor.
Democratic-NPL candidate Merrill Piepkorn has also served in the state Senate. He's been there since he was elected in 2016, and had a one-session overlap with Armstrong's service.
On this Plain Talk, the two candidates compared and contrasted with one another under questioning from me and my co-host Chad Oban. We covered everything from internet pornography (Armstrong says he'd like to see North Dakota implement an ID requirement to access it), to political accountability (Piepkorn says long-time Republican supermajorities in North Dakota have created an "environment of entitlement"), to property taxes (both candidates oppose Measure 4 on the November ballot which, if passed, would abolish taxes on property values).
To address North Dakota's chronic workforce shortages, Armstrong says "you have to concentrate on cops, teachers, and nurses." Piepkorn, meanwhile, says the state Legislature has been too-focused on the culture war, passing "bad bills that are repelling people."
Armstrong said he's "really glad North Dakota has gotten to where it's at" on mental health issues, but added that if he's "blessed to win, in eight years we will still need more work."
Piepkorn said that to address North Dakota's childcare shortages, he sees a three-pronged strategy: "help parents, help children, help businesses."
These are two candidates who, again, are likable, and like one another, but they have very different visions for how North Dakota should be governed. It was our pleasure to bring their contrasting views to you on Plain Talk.
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We all know the old saying. You don't talk about religion and politics in polite company. Only, does that advice make sense in a society like ours, where we practice self-governance?
How can we govern ourselves if we can't talk to one another about politics? And, more pertinent to this episode of Plain Talk, how do we teach our kids how to participate in discourse over challenging issues like abortion or gun control if teachers are afraid to tackle politics in the classroom?
Lindsey Galvao is a long-time educator -- the social studies curriculum specialist at GBH and a multiplatform creator for public media, and curriculum writer for the Civics Collection on PBS LearningMedia.
Ben Klutsey is the executive director of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University whose work is featured in the documentary "Undivide US."
They recently co-authored an op-ed about politics in the classroom, and joined my cohost Chad Oban and I to talk about that very conundrum.
"We disagree and that's ok," Klutsey told us. The problem, he argues, is that so many people say "we disagree and you're a threat to my existence."
Both Klutsey and Galvao say that teachers need to be unafraid to host discussions about even fraught social and political questions, but that their focus should be on listening and encouraging students to understand one another.
But how do we deal with misinformation? Kids who might have gotten the idea that the Sandy Hook school shooting didn't really happen, as right-wing talk radio host Alex Jones has claimed, or that the world is flat?
Galvao said she would encourage teachers to ask those kids, "How do you know what you know?" They should be encouraged to explore the basis for their point of view.
"We have to think about abiding by certain core principles," Klutsey said, identifying them as respect, authenticity, and curiosity. Which is to say that we need to respect those who disagree with us, represent our own views authentically, and be curious about why others disagree with us.
Though, he acknowledged, that doesn't mean making room for false information. "Facts are facts," he said, "and you have to engage on facts as an educator."
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When U.S. House candidates Julie Fedorchak (a Republican) and Trygve Hammer (a Democrat) sat down for a debate on the Plain Talk podcast with me and my co-host Chad Oban, one of the first questions I asked them was why they wanted to be elected to Congress.
Hammer, a Marine Corps veteran, said it's because less than 80 of the current 435 members of the House of Representatives have served in the military. He also said he wants to promote an atmosphere where leaders talk to one another instead of past one another.
Fedorchak wants to focus on issues like border security, "record high inflation," and energy policy.
One of the last questions I asked them was about their top priorities if elected. Hammer said a new farm bill and the national debt, as well as "talking to North Dakotans continuously" and taking his cues from the people. For her answer, Fedorchak said constituent services, arguing that, even if progress on making policy is stalled, members of Congress can still "be a force" for individual North Dakotans.
Our debate covered a myriad of issues, from campaign promises made by national candidates to eliminating taxes on tips and Social Security benefits (Fedorchak wouldn't commit to supporting either, Hammer said he supports both with some caveats), to the national debt, to civility in politics, to America's foreign policy in Ukraine and Gaza.
One area where the candidates agreed very closely was the need for a new farm bill. Both acknowledged that American agriculture has been operating under an old and badly out-of-date farm bill.
An area where the candidates disagreed sharply was on the issue of abortion. Asked about her support for a national abortion ban -- something presidential candidate Donald Trump has come out against -- Fedorchak described her position as wanting a national "gestational limit" on abortions after around 15 or 16 weeks, with exceptions for the life of the mother and rape or incest. This "would allow states within that framework to be a little stricter," she argued that it would put the United States in line with "every civilized country in the world."
Hammer said he does not support a national abortion ban and argued that even state-level bans are often "unnecessarily cruel." He pointed to the failure of a pro-life ballot measure in 2014 as evidence that North Dakotans don't want government interference in the abortion issue "at any level."
Our intent with the Plain Talk debates is to foster conversations where the candidates can compare and contrast with one another on the issues. As with our previous U.S. Senate debate between Democrat Katrina Christiansen and Republican incumbent Kevin Cramer, Hammer and Fedorchak engaged civilly, providing robust answers while disagreeing without being disagreeable.
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"This is the best job I could ever imagine," North Dakota U.S. Attorney Mac Schneider said on this episode of Plain Talk.
Schneider was appointed to that position by President Joe Biden. Later this year, when America elects a new president, he may be out of a job, depending on how the country casts its ballots. A Republican president isn't likely to keep a Democratic appointee, but if Vice President Kamala Harris wins, would Schneider want another term in the office?
He says yes. "I'm grateful for every minute I have in this job."
My co-host Chad Oban and I asked Schneider about whether his office has seen any local blowback from national politics, where the FBI and the Department of Justice have, in recent years, been accused of political bias by both Republicans and Democrats. FBI Director Christopher Wray, who has rejected demands to resign from former President Donald Trump, the man who appointed him, and who recently visited North Dakota, has frequently been at the center of interparty food fights.
Schneider says national-level drama has had little impact on federal law enforcement operations in North Dakota. "Not at all," was his reply to our question.
"In North Dakota, the FBI is, rightly so, seen as law enforcement," he said.
"I don't pick that up at all that there's any distrust of federal law enforcement here in North Dakota," he continued.
We also asked Schneider about the recent federal prosecution of former Republican state Sen. Ray Holmberg, which resulted in a guilty plea to crimes related to traveling to Europe to pay for sex with minors. Schneider was recused from the case by the Department of Justice because he, like Holmberg, served the Grand Forks community in the state Senate. "You can just about imagine how I feel," he said when asked what it was like to watch someone he worked closely with plead guilty to those crimes.
Also on this episode, Oban and I discussed school schedules, and how their complexities can make things hard for parents, and also the on-going struggles of the North Dakota High School Activities Association to deal with terrible, often bigoted behavior at sporting events.
Want to follow Plain Talk and be kept up to date on all of these debates? Click here for an archive of past shows and for information on how to subscribe, or just search for the show wherever you get your podcasts, including on YouTube.
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