confirmation hearing on the nomination of lori cvez to be labor secretary. she served as a u.s. representative for oregon state district from 2023 until janry of this year. and on c-span two at 8:30 ama discussion on health care policy from politico tt will feature several prominentigures in the sector. the senate returns at 10:00 ame eastern. lawmers will continue work on the republicans 2025 buet resolution and debate more president trump's cabinet nominees. and over on c-span three at 10: 15 am, the senate judiciary committee wl be holding a hearing to discuss online chd safety and the role artificial intelligence is playing and exploitation. these events also stream live on the free c-span out video app and online at c-span.org.

former new hampshire governor chris sununu discussed limiting government influence, checks and balances and d.e.i. at an event hosted by george washington university. this runs an hour and a half. this is the series, as was mentioned, about democracy and discourse and thanks to them for making it possible. i have been a journalist and front-line observer in washington for a long time, longer than i'd like to admit, and i have never seen anything

like the moment we are going through. a nonstop news cycle that can't possibly keep up with the nonstop news. a president and administration that have made no secret of what they intended to do. right, they talked about it, disruption, it minute -- elimination of the administrative state and they talked about retribution. big change is needed and there are polls that showed that part of the people on both sides, conservatives and liberals, believe that the country is not going in the right direction and needs big change. but the question is to what and what about the shock waves that it's causing, so we will talk a lot about that. we will also talk about what it means for american democracy and our sense of ourselves as a nation. we are polarized, divided, for sure. it makes what we're doing here at the university and in this conversation even more important. to come together, to listen, respectfully. to learn and to lean in.

and to think about where we are and where we are going. in her book, high conflicts, amanda ripley says hi conflict -- conflict is a mode of thinking. these are her words, of thinking and feeling that leads to anger, hate and an us versus them mentality. she says we address that, not by getting out of conflict, but by embracing the conflict because she says that's what makes us better and pushes each other to challenge each other and to grow by having the hard conversations driven by curiosity. so that's what we will do here. i want to, before i introduce the governor, offer thanks to the siegel's for making this possible and to the many people on the ground who made this evening possible. sarah morrissette, alex ashley, and our production and communication team. jack, hannah, jane, ebony and david. super thanks to you all.

so, we have been talking for a long time about, there's a lot of change going on in washington, we should have a republican join us and talk about it. turns out a lot don't want to come out and talk about it. why would that be? but our guest tonight did and does and he's here willingly. the 82nd governor of new hampshire, elected to four terms. he has a bachelors in civil and environmental engineering from m.i.t.. when he came out of school he did a stint at nyu at the tisch school of the arts. i want to ask him about that, what happened there. he started his career as an environmental engineer working in wastewater treatment, plants, landfills, cleaning up contaminated soil and water. comes from a political family, i covered his dad when he was white house chief of staff. his brother was senator. ladies and gentlemen, please welcome former commander -- former governor chris sununu.

are we off to a good start? quick thank you for the intro is always the easiest. this is great. i can't see anything. i assume there's people out there. can we turn on the house lights? quex i want you to see how many students are in the audience. good turnout of students. we will hear from them a little bit later. we will talk about lots of things. how did that thing go with anderson cooper? you don't have to quote him. they've got a new name for you. like sanderson and i get along great. that was the irony. i don't think he actually meant to be rude to me. he got casual. his anderson cooper. he wasn't mad at all. he just kinda forgot the camera was on. it's like you and your buddies talking and it's like, come on man, don't be a -- i think we are live, anderson. it was fine. >> i do want to welcome our

c-span audience and i would share what was said if it worked for a family program. >> they are a nonprofit, so we have to keep it clean. >> i want to start with a video. sarah and alex went out and talked to some students. these are school then public affairs students. which is journalism and public communication, which is what we do here. we asked for a sense of our moment in politics and we will talk about that and many other things. so list take a look at that. >> i'm trying not to feed into the doom or-ism, but i would say i don't think it looks too good. there's a lot of division, a lot of anxiety. people are really upset and very frustrated with what's going on with the current administration. >> the republican party has american values that hard and then to let it descend into what it is now as trumpism, is unlike what the gop is. i just want to know why we are

letting it happen. >> i'm feeling more nervous being in this stage of my life and location. >> there's an underlying understanding and mutual agreement that people are working and living in the same country. i think it's kind of a path people have to take on to explore the right methods to get there. but i think the destination is the same. >> for now, time will tell and we will have to wait and see what happens or how things are actually going to go now that these new policies and new executive orders have been enacted. >> what you heard is a sampling, not scientific but what nicole said is interesting. a lot of division, a lot of anxiety, and concern about how divided. why? >> one of the things that have perspective on is, unfortunately -- i'm not that old, i'm only 50, i act like i'm 25.

point being, 1980's, 1990's, early to thousands, it wasn't like this. democrats and republicans could get along. there's the famous reagan examples of hashing it out. my father was at the white house and him and kennedy would go out at left and right but at the end of the day they found a way to move forward together. since about -- let's call it 2008-2 thousand 10 for a variety of reasons, both sides are completely at fault in social media new technology is how we communicate. this generation is all they see, unfortunately. i'm the eternal optimist. i always believe in a system in the best in it until it's proven not to be a complete failure. i don't blame one side or the other, both sides, the republicans are going to destroy democracy, the democrats are killing the constitution, all that stuff. those are just dog whistles for i don't agree with you and the other side is evil. i'm not putting the blame on trump or anything like that, but

the democrats -- let me back up. we talk a lot about the republican party, to address without young woman said. how could you let this happen? no one person is letting anything happen. i worked really hard to get nikki haley elected, it didn't work out so well. but at the end of the day the party is defined by one individual. the democrat party is not defined by one individual. he's a leader in the voice of the party. -- as was the democrat party defined -- when someone is the president you don't

>> we can disagree on that a little bit. the argument i have is if you think trump is a problem, fine. trump is trump. there's no trump liked. there's no trump 2.0 coming in. i've always argued the democrat party has a much bigger dna problem. i think generationally there's a gap between what the upcoming generation sees as the progressive values and socialism versus what we call the old school democrat party, which is a little more of the traditional. republicans have the same thing but we are not defined -- trump is trump, we are not defined by him. i am not saying it goes back to the way it was. but who is going to be running for president in four years? it might be j.d. vance, desantis. it might be some governors. prof. sesno: might it be you? mr. sununu: no, i need to make some money. in all seriousness, i think both parties have problems in different ways. social media and how we consume information is at the heart of a lot of this. i think people talk about empathy but they don't practice it.

the reason i get re-instilled with optimism because i don't live in this, excuse me, godforsaken city. this place is a bubble unto itself. i was governor of a state where you are constantly held accountable, where you believe in local control. one of the reasons i actually like what is happening with what trump is doing, it is a decentralizing of government. that is empowering to more citizens. if you do that, if we can champion that instead of just looking at washington, d.c., people clearly have more faith in the system. the more you localize the process -- the more faith you will build. prof. sesno: anybody in the room from new hampshire? anybody in the room been to new hampshire? mr. sununu: don't worry, you will all be retiring there. prof. sesno: here is what i want to ask you about the division.

there is a johns hopkins poll that was done before the election and they found there was a very disturbing response that something like nearly half of americans think the opposing side was evil. not just an adversary, but people. that is a big change. mr. sununu: hugely problematic. prof. sesno: why have we so demonized the other, and what is it that people like you, people who have a podium can do, if anything? because maybe you can't now. mr. sununu: a couple things. if you want to know why we polarized, at the heart of it i believe is social media. prof. sesno: at the heart of it? mr. sununu: yes. prof. sesno: it is also what we are communicating. mr. sununu: the fact be can say anything and he goes out to the whole world and it is not verified or checked. usually when people post things on social media at 98% of it is happening nationally as opposed to locally. again, when you are doing it you don't have to look somebody in the eye and have an actual discussion.

with all the vitriol you want and there is no accountability to it. i have always argued my generation was smart enough to invent social media but we did not have the maturity to understand how to handle it. this generation does. i believe in this generation. i don't believe in the politics all the time, but this generation has grown up with that. they are going to learn the problems with it and how to handle it. prof. sesno: the cat is out of the bag, right? mr. sununu: it is not going back in. prof. sesno: is there a way to come back from people -- viewing people who disagree with us as evil? is this not baked into what we are? mr. sununu: it is baked into the conversation but this generation will have a better understanding to have a healthy sense of cynicism when they hear that kind of stuff. prof. sesno: i want to ask you about bipartisanship, endangered species. i started my career, my journalism career in the neighboring state of vermont.

vermont and new hampshire are wonderful examples of jeffersonian democracy. you still go out. you could stop the governor on the street. you can have a conversation with your neighbor. when there was journalism, it was about you reporting on, about, from, to the neighbors. that's it. how did you make that happen? did you make that happen? mr. sununu: a couple things. new hampshire, live free or die. prof. sesno: that is the motto, in case you don't know. mr. sununu: it is more than four cool words on a license plate. at the heart of it,, it is about limited taxes local government, local control. limited government, if anything. prof. sesno: for those who don't know, in new hampshire, this goes back to when i was there decades ago, there is no state sales tax and no state income tax. one of the few states with no broad-based tax.

mr. sununu: the reason we get away with that is the only tax you pay as a citizen's property tax. we have pretty high property tax. it stinks. but as a governor and state legislature we have no control , over your property taxes. zero. you do. you go to a town meeting every year and you decide what the curriculum will be in your classrooms. what the teacher contracts will be. i cannot do that. only you can do that as a parent and citizen. we have state government as well of course but we keep it so localized, what happens? people get empowered. you go to the town meeting. my brother is a selectman in the town. you want to see the fights i have with my brother? you understand where the dollars are going, what is happening with your taxes, you get much more engaged in new hampshire are -- i would argue than anywhere in america because of the civics of it. when you have an argument at town meeting, you are usually arguing with your neighbor or

your brother. the next day, your kids are at the bus stop together. so you can have those arguments and you learn how to walk away. you don't make it personal. just make it about a difference of opinion and at the end of the day you get along. and that if i may at the core is why we hold the first in the nation primary. people say what gives you the right? we do it better than anyone else. we have the most educated voters in the country and such high demands of accountability. we don't care what your name is or how much money you have. you have to earn it on the street. prof. sesno: and dixville notch. how many voters? mr. sununu: we have six. but the best thing you can do is power and transparency. prof. sesno: to come back to the bipartisanship, i think it's an example of the miracle budget that you call this. you had bipartisan support for some dramatic things including

some big things. mr. sununu: school choice, tax cuts, raise for state employees. we have 1.4 million people in new hampshire and 400 state reps. the third largest parliamentary body behind british parliament, u.s. congress and the state of new hampshire. prof. sesno: and it's a little state. population of -- mr. sununu: one point 4 million. by definition it is the greatest representative body of government on the planet. you know how much they get paid? $100 a year. it is truly a volunteer government. so what does that mean? you never know who is going to win. he or she who knocks on the in most doors and connects with people and talks about what they want to do in their community gets elected. it is not about the money. . my last term, i had the split of all splits. 201 republicans, 199 democrats. at the same time kevin mccarthy, who was a friend, he had a 10 vote swing.

my speaker got elected on the first vote. at the end of the day, people said you will never get anything done, complete gridlock. by the way, depending on attendance, if a few republicans don't show up, democrats control the day for the house votes. so people said it will be complete gridlock and you will never get anything done. let me cut to the end of the story. i got my balanced-budget past. by the way, all states have balanced-budget amendment, we have to pass balanced budgets unlike washington. my budget was passed unanimously on the first vote in the house of representatives. prof. sesno: how did that get done? mr. sununu: i talked to them. i will do a little bit of the politics of it. i knew what the democrats wanted. i could not give it to them. i disagreed with a lot of them. but i find that when you can just give a little.

the democrats wanted a little over here and there, things that were minor issues for republicans. i wanted big things like my big tax cuts. i wanted expansion of school choice. if you give a little, you can get a lot. not only did i give them a small thing, i give them credit. i went to the unions and i gave them, not a raise, but a change in the rule that allowed for more flexibility. then i went to the democrats and said thank you for getting this done. i would not have even seen this issue. but we all came together and found a way and got it done. they were so happy. i not only got it down for them, but i gave them credit. while we disagreed on a lot of big issues, at the end of the day we were able to work enough into the budget that we were all able to come together. people didn't like it but at the end of the day, we had a unanimous vote.

i am very proud of that. because i wanted to show washington, don't tell me it is gridlock. don't tell me you cannot get something done. when someone says we can't get it done, you are just saying you don't have the political will and courage to do what you need to do to either push back on your own party, work with people on the other side. it doesn't mean you compromise your principles as a conservative, you understand there are bigger issues sometimes. as a governor, you have to think globally. i got my legislature to think globally as a state. as opposed to just a singular singular district. prof. sesno: let's now travel from your state new hampshire to washington. where you said you have to give a little. now i have a chief executive who is executive ordering a lot and giving nothing. it is likely fast and furious. banning birthright citizenship, blowing up usaid, firing inspectors general, booting the president and board of the kennedy center, granting pardons for violent criminals.

mr. sununu: let's not get into pardons, both parties are problematic. prof. sesno: i am not done. doge, elon musk with access to files, sensitive data, pulling research contracts that have already been signed, firing federal workers. he is not giving anything. mr. sununu: you have not explained why the other side doesn't like that. didn't you say we have to get 12% of the employees? prof. sesno: you just explain how you got bipartisan support, by engaging the other side. if you republican criticizes trump, they are in trouble. never mind a democrat. he does not talk to them. mr. sununu: a couple things. the process to talk to democrats is when it all comes to congress. most of this -- prof. sesno: congress, what's that? seriously. this is a conversation we are going to have about whether there is a congress at this point and what role they had in checks and balances. mr. sununu: most of this will have to go through congress. he is telling doge, doge technically doesn't have much power at the end of the day

other than to say we are going through the executive orders and saying we are going to review and realign it agencies are going to disappear. they are going to bring all these recommendations to congress. we can take any of these agencies plus a whole lot more. they are all going to be completely put under the microscope and say you need to come back and justify why you need to exist. justify what the value is for america. and congress will have to do most of the actual heavy lifting. what is it, a couple vote margin in congress? they are going to have to give a little to get a lot. i don't know whether that can or will happen but that will be the process, no question about it. even trump has said that, we know we are going to have to work with congress. prof. sesno: do you offer any advice to this president about the damage that is done in the short term with a mad dash through the executive orders? there is food that is not being delivered to hungry people waiting and die. mr. sununu: i love and hate it at the same time.

i love that he is fundamentally doing it. this is why. let's deal with congress. this is congress's job. asking departments to be accountable to themselves. they have done nothing. and i'm not talking nothing for the past couple years. republicans and have been democrats equally buffoons for 20-plus years. i would go back to 1998 since the last balanced-budget. they complete derelict of duty and have not done their job. trump is saying you had 25 years, that's it. now i'm going to bring in a group and we are going to go hard and fast and bring a lot of recommendations, we are going to do everything under the sun that people have talked about but have not had the courage to do, and bring it to congress. but we're doing this because you haven't and i would argue the

reason this is happening is because congress did nothing for 25 years. there would not be a need to do this. not only are they finding efficiency, the amount of fraud and corruption is staggering. prof. sesno: how do you know that? how do you know that? mr. sununu: you think there is not? prof. sesno: i am sure there is fraud and corruption. i know there is inefficiency. but the process that is happening here, and as a journalist, i have covered this through the years, when your father was white house chief of staff. by the way you mentioned the balanced-budget they had, the reason they did is because george h.w. bush, who said read my lips no new taxes, raised taxes. which you may be why he lost reelection. it was so they would be a balanced-budget down the line. that was a process. that was a negotiation, somebody giving and getting. mr. sununu: that's -- you are right. i am not here to apologize for elon and trump. i will say this.

let me back up. let's do a thought experiment. what if they came out and said i am giving six months and we are going to tear this apart and in six months, we will come out and give you a report, and they did not say anything for six months, there would be very little criticism. they would say they are working on something. to their credit, they are going hard and fast and talking about what they are doing literally every step of the way, which opens them up for massive criticism, some of it rightly so. even elon the other day said we are going to make mistakes. we are going to break some eggs. but there's a lot of eggs to be broken. prof. sesno: what is the rightly so criticism? you said criticism, rightly so. what is it? mr. sununu: i think they are being too abrupt. when they get rid of usaid -- by the way, they didn't get rid of it. they said we will review it,

maybe some programs will go. they should have said something like this. x billions of dollars go to usaid, we think we can reallocate $5 million to $7 million back to fighting firefighters and disasters. we are going to re-appropriately mishandled dollars back to america and we are going to figure out where those agencies or sub departments need to be restructured. as opposed to saying we are getting rid of this and this and this. it is not too fast but it is too hard. i don't mind getting rid of the employees though. prof. sesno: let's talk about that. can we have the house lights for a minute? i want to ask the audience a question. students in the room, could you raise hands again? how many of you -- you are here at washington, d.c., how many of you are considering some -- or were considering some form of public service for a career?

you did that too as governor. are they wrong? mr. sununu: no. why would i think they are wrong? prof. sesno: i told you we -- mr. sununu: public service doesn't mean you have to be in this city. the most valuable public service you can do is local. what has more impact in your life, president trump or a local school board? at the school board every day of the week because they control what happens to your kids. what has more impact in your life, president trump or a local nonprofit? that is helping the poor, helping the needy and those who need extra help? prof. sesno: you are posing a question and that's very good because we actually talk to a student who addressed this. re: bautista. -- arianna bautista. i think she is in the room. we talked to her earlier about the people part and what is going on, both the research and working for the federal government. take a look at what she said. >> i have heard the fear, i have

seen the fear and my friends currently doing research. my roommate is doing research on environmental policy. the administration just decided to come out of the paris climate agreement. so it is a very troubling time and very disappointing. as a federal employee, i have worked my entire life to serve my country, and seeing how people like me are now being completely disregarded for the work that we do, which is extremely valuable, it is really disheartening and sickening. prof. sesno: thank you. [cheers and applause] talk to her for a minute. wait a minute. let me set this up. roommate who is doing research. and there's a big feeling of, we don't need the research. dismissing scientists. and people working for the federal government who are being

told they are cheats and fraudsters and not needed. mr. sununu: a couple things. we can talk about the environmental part first. i am an environmental engineer and i did that for years. the paris climate agreement, i think it's nonsense. there is no enforceability. there is no standards by any country. it's an unenforceable document costing the country massive amounts of money. i would argue the united states does a phenomenal job and we keep making huge investments in terms of being responsible with carbon emissions and we will get there. other countries that signed on to that agreement like china are putting up 50 coal factories a year with no accountability. prof. sesno: they are also racing ahead with electric vehicles, battery technology, and renewables. mr. sununu: but they are an environmental disaster. a disaster. compared to this country, not even close. people are saying this is completely unfair. we are doing our best, and it is no enforceability so we will move on.

on the employee side, i say this. it is not that the work is devalued in terms of what a lot of the employees are doing. i could pick out a lot of things that i would say, it's interesting but is it worth a dollar? this gets back to the heart of what i am all about which is fiscal responsibility. we owe $36 trillion. does the government owe $36 trillion? no. you owe $36 trillion. you owe that money. for every dollar that goes to pay down that $36 trillion that is hours you worked away from your family, the sacrifice and blood sweat and tears you put into the system. it is a real number. this is not an imaginary number. you could pay a hundred dollars a second for 30,000 years -- no, 11,000 years, and that gets to how much we owe.

it is not that you are not valued. there are only so many dollars in the till because congress has screwed this up for 25 years. they let us go into such debt. it puts our entire economy in such a weak position. we have to make tough choices and prioritize. that project, that organization, that agency, the financial consumer protection bill, let's use that. that was created after 2000 eight. completely duplicative. accountable to nobody. the fbi see or the sec or -- fdic or the sec or the credit union association, they have a lot of these rules and stuff in place and they can do a lot of the work this bureau currently does. they are the judge, jury and execution by the way. they are not accountable to congress or anybody, they just make the rules up as they got. . we can save a lot of the money and move on. doesn't mean the work those individuals are doing is not

valued, but if it's duplicative or we can have a better use of that dollar, you have to make tough decisions. nobody in washington wants to make tough decisions. it is not easy, it is painful. but you owe this money. prof. sesno: it's also people. i looked this up -- i looked this up. congressional research service lists 10,887 federal government employees, workers in new hampshire district one. ans 8049 and district two. are you ok if half of them are fired? mr. sununu: yes, absolutely. the government is not here to keep you employed. let me back up. prof. sesno: but if the government is not here to keep you employed, when you are employed, you expect some process, some transparency. you just get your head lopped off? i have laid people off. we had a process. we had a process. is there a process here? mr. sununu: if there's no money

-- in new hampshire, i cannot just keep borrowing money. because i have to have a balanced budget. when the revenues don't come in or things don't match, i have to let people go. the city and our federal government has gotten away with we don't have to let anybody go. but you really do. unfortunately it is coming to a head at the same time. prof. sesno: what about people like darianny there? what about people like her and others who don't feel valued, don't feel respected because of the language that says all of you are worthless? mr. sununu: that is where again, the process is too hard. i don't mind speed. but that's where my hope, and this is what i think will happen. i might be proven completely wrong. i will be the first to admit it. my hope is this. we are only 30 days in. as of four days ago, doge is starting to put out the receipts and proof of what they are doing. we can go back and forth and see it. maybe will agree on it or not. in about five or six months, my

guess is they will have a report to congress, the first of many probably and say, here is our first phase report. here is the backup and the information. the reason i got into the argument with anderson cooper he was like, where is the proof? whoa whoa whoa. give these guys credit for telling you what they are doing. they will provide the proof and if they don't they should be held accountable. i get it, these are individuals and jobs and families. i totally get it. at the end of the day a couple things. we have a strong economy. you don't do it because people can find another job. it does not mean they are not valued. congress is going to have to make tough decisions about who stays and who goes, something they have not been willing to do. it is the perfect storm of problems where a lot of people all at once are going to lose their job. that is the real answer here. we should be decentralizing washington. people complain about the department of education. i think it is great that we might get rid of it. and i am a governor.

i believe strongly in education. but someone has yet to explain to me what is the value add for the department of education? prof. sesno: to look across the country and say there is a quality of access, that people with disabilities are being -- mr. sununu: you think governors don't do that? prof. sesno: i think they do it very unevenly. what is available in states is all over the place. mr. sununu: and it should be. new hampshire is not california or mississippi or new york. i will use an extreme example. gavin newsom and i don't see eye-to-eye on a lot but i would argue he knows what california needs for education and the needs and where the value is more than anybody in washington, d.c. as does kathy hochul in new york. prof. sesno: isn't there a sense that the federal department of education is running things when in fact it isn't? what is it, 7% of funds that go to local school districts? mr. sununu: so why do they have 5000 employees? prof. sesno: right. school districts will be run by

school districts. mr. sununu: so what does washington add to that equation? prof. sesno: washington adds to that equation some degree of equity -- i know that is a word we are not supposed to use now -- and some degree of oversight. mr. sununu: oversight? it's too much. it is so much oversight -- prof. sesno: his title ix -- mr. sununu: went washington has offered me additional grants for special education which we need desperately come every state now needs more money for special ed. it is such a higher cost now. every state needs more money for special ed. the hurdles and barriers it took for me to get that money, the red tape designed by washington made it so all the districts kept saying it won't work, don't even bring us this money because we have to send it back because we don't meet this weird standard set up by some congressman in arizona or whatever. my argument is this. every state knows what they need. if you want to send us the money, great, but let states that no that are on the ground that no with the needs are.

i would never tell maura healey in massachusetts what massachusetts needs. i can show by example what might be working new hampshire and all that but she knows. prof. sesno: let me read a short bit from a story today about schools in local control. the education department, the trump education department, warned schools that they risk losing federal funding if they continue to take race into account when making scholarship or hiring decisions, or so much as not to race in every aspect of student, academic and campus life. let's say you are a school and you have a large group of young students from ethiopia. you have a community there. and you need to hire an ethiopian person to teach those kids speak that language, have , someone there who looks like them. now you can't do that? now this education department is saying they are going to pull this funding. mr. sununu: that's not what they are saying. prof. sesno: it sounds like what they are saying. mr. sununu: the supreme court

ruled on this that you cannot separate opportunity within education by race. prof. sesno: what they are saying is you may not take race into consideration at all. when hiring. in a case like this lewiston, , maine -- mr. sununu: in that case, they wouldn't take race, they take language. prof. sesno: maybe they do take race. what if they do? what if you have a very diverse group of students and you have a lot of black students in you say we need to have some people here who look like them and can talk to them and relate. that is now not allowed? mr. sununu: they are saying it has to be on merit. and the supreme court is saying that. prof. sesno: but aren't you talking about local control? shouldn't the principal in a community make that decision for themselves? mr. sununu: i would argue a private institution can but a public institution is held to a completely different standard. prof. sesno: but you just talked about how there should be local control. why isn't this an example? people can say we want this

diversity. mr. sununu: the argument is is reverse racism. i am not making that argument. i am just telling you there is a clear argument of why that was overturned in the u.s. supreme court. they did not there wait because just because. i do not want to get a raised the supreme court said public's cannot do that other department of education is saying don't do that. prof. sesno: by the way, it is not just public institutions, according to what we are hearing is the trump administration any institution taking any federal money and that can include private universities. gov. sununu: you have to forgive me. i don't know the law they are using exactly to reference it. that is likely the basis of it. prof. sesno: have we overdone it with this conversation about dei? you signed a bill where you embraced diversity and inclusion and walk away from that later. we are a very diverse society. why should we embrace that and explain that to people who are

in more diverse environments than they have ever been? gov. sununu: when i created my dei commission it worked great. we found that we had police departments that came to us and said when there is a crime it has something to do with race, they didn't have any training, they had no experience. so we created this commission that would hire folks to go out and talk about the issues, how to be sensitive to certain things, and it worked really well. we got that out there and it performed its duty. there is no question that dei as it is defined in 2024 is completely different. prof. sesno: how so? mr. sununu: it has become a political whistle. there is no question about that. that if you don't have this, then you are canceled, then you are excluded, then you cannot be part of our system. you have to have it. it is the opposite of what you are talking about. you have to have it or you don't

get funding. college and universities get scored on it now where they -- or they don't get certain funding. that is not right. prof. sesno: if we are going to talk about cancel culture, we have a cancel culture now like we have never had where people are being fired, funded as being restricted, agencies are being shut down, whole boards are being thrown out. we talked about cancel culture before. we are canceling people and firing people now. gov. sununu: two separate things. prof. sesno: how so? gov. sununu: cancel culture as we talk about it as wokism, it is all based on i am by what you say, i don't agree with what you say i'm going to cancel it. what you are talking about is we don't have the money or the dollars in these efforts and we can do it another way. those are two very separate things as opposed to i'm offended by your language, so now i'm going to cancel you. prof. sesno: except now we have you have criticized me you are , fired. they are certainly being fired. go to the fbi and doj they are

being investigated and being fired because they did their jobs before to investigate. this is what is so interesting. gov. sununu: theoretically, i don't know these individual cases. theoretically they are saying you introduce politics in an operation that needs to be apolitical, therefore you have not done your job. in not -- i'm not saying i agree with it. i don't mind them looking at it. on both sides, there was a lot of -- the famous couple, the man and woman that were having an affair that were caught with their texts back and forth in the biting doj had to get rid of . it works on both sides. you should read that out completely. -- route that out completely. prof. sesno: if you were going over to have coffee or whatever beverage with president trump right now to talk about dei --

mr. sununu: what am i going to say about that? prof. sesno: that is what i was going to ask you. [laughter] the example you gave in the reason you signed the bill is a great example. where there is a police force dealing with a racial issue where they do not understand it. we need to train just like we need to train the workforce. people are coming up with different experiences. at they are working with a much more diverse set of people. yet we are banning even the words dei across government. what is the proper calibration? gov. sununu: the proper calibration is if a local state or government wants do something on dei, they want to set up a commission have at it. , great, that's fine. the federal government has every right to say we are not going to measure you on that and we're not going to fund you on that and we are not going to cancel you on that. prof. sesno: but that is exactly what they are doing. you received federal funding -- mr. sununu: this is not just their opinion, this is the supreme court saying in education you cannot do that. prof. sesno: no. that is a different thing.

that is at the level of hiring. i have talked to private corporations who have said we are dropping the terms dei and we are not even going to use the words. mr. sununu: that is their choice. prof. sesno: that is not their choice because they feel federal contracts are in jeopardy. mr. sununu: you think companies are dropping dei programs because they will lose federal grants? prof. sesno: absolutely. gov. sununu: i would argue that is their choice. has anyone said if you keep dei you are canceled and you cannot work for the government? that has never been said. prof. sesno: there is no dei in the government anymore, so it is not an issue. mr. sununu: if disney wants a dei program, they can. no one has said if you had a dei program, you are not going have to a contract with the government. as somebody said that? prof. sesno: it is certainly out there. i have talked to senior executives in government, who -- and come to the universities by the way. there are dei programs at universities so that

universities can accommodate the diverse populations, students, faculty, staff, and others they have got in a way that builds a sense of community. mr. sununu: again, i'm not apologizing for this administration. i am just saying if folks want to do something at a local level i'm a big believer that they , should be able to. if the federal government does not want to fund that, they have every right to say we are not funding into that. should people be excluded? no. i don't believe that. i would challenge to say who has said if you have a dei program, you can't be a contractor. prof. sesno: another topic for you to offer your advice to the president on. this is kind of interesting. because i'm really interested in this. this is on climate change. the federal government as we heard, is walking away from some research, from the paris climate accords. whatever you think of that. but also telling people to go through their language in , government agencies and remove references to some of these

things. there are pages that are now down from noaa and other agencies where they do this research. i went to the new hampshire department of environmental sciences homepage and i read. it says research indicates the concentration of greenhouse gases, particularly carbon dioxide, has seen unprecedented increase primarily due to the combustion of fossil fuels and urbanization of natural areas. adding more heat trapping gases to the atmosphere is causing global temperatures to increase, causing changes to the earth's climactic system, resulting in more variable and extreme weather conditions. that is on your website. mr. sununu: yeah. that was done by a unh study. prof. sesno: right. gov. sununu: i don't agree with it but yeah. prof. sesno: you have not taken it off your website. sununu: because i disagree with it, it should not be on the government website? because somebody disagrees? come on. prof. sesno: but you see what is happening at noaa and these places where research is being

done. so again, you are having a conversation with the president. what should the federal government doing and saying about climate change? mr. sununu: very little. look, just generally speaking, the climate is changing. it is not the end of the world. it is not the catastrophe folks have made it out to be. look, i spent my career doing this. this is what i did. i was the environmental engineer, i went to m.i.t. believe me. [indiscernible] -- let's take a step back. in 1986, when al gore went the floor of the u.s. senate and said based on information in the early 2000, half of florida will be underwater. we spent trillions based on that nonsense. numeral how much -- vino how much the coastline of florida has changed? very little. how much has the sea level risen? prof. sesno: not feet. half the state isn't under. mr. sununu: 2.5 millimeters per year. prof. sesno: ok. gov. sununu: my point is if you

have officials arguing we should spend billions of dollars when we haven't lost any coastline over 40 years, al gore says population increase will make the earth barren by 2010. it is not true. prof. sesno: if you have a home of the wildfires now and try to buy homeowners or flood insurance, you can barely afford it. gov. sununu: only in california. prof. sesno: in a lot of seaside communities. mr. sununu: i have a coastline. everyone in the houses in new hampshire has insurance. prof. sesno: you are not in the bullseye. go to florida. prices have gone up. mr. sununu: you think the coastline is eroding in florida faster than new hampshire? i could go through planetary science with you but it goes up and down at the same levels. prof. sesno: insurance companies actuaries have calculated the risk and they are charging you for it. they are price gouging. gov. sununu: what you agree that the message driven by an extreme left on glenna change in the 80's, 90's and 2000, a lot of it has not come to fruition? prof. sesno: you would have to

tell me what message you are talking about. gov. sununu: when al gore said half of florida will be underwater. prof. sesno: it has happened great extreme weather has increased, droughts, wildfire and heat have hit new records, extinctions are taking place in record numbers. our ice loss is dramatic. gov. sununu: i would argue the extreme weather peace. prof. sesno: you what? gov. sununu: florida had more hurricanes in the last 10 years than the previous 50. prof. sesno: what is the price tag on the extreme weather we have had? the wildfires that have had california. mr. sununu: you want to argue price tag versus climate change? prof. sesno: what i am saying is there is attributional science that connects these things. gov. sununu: the trillions this planet has meant i would argue has made things better but not so much better at the cost of all the important things we should have been prioritizing. prof. sesno: we don't need to get into an argument. the question really is --

gov. sununu: it is the fear mongering. prof. sesno: the fear mongering is wrong and the left has driven some of that. the environmental movement, many of them say we need to reframe this. what i am asking is where do we go now? because this administration, the president has said this is a hoax. this is a drill, baby, drill administration. mr. sununu: climate is not a hoax. but wait -- the green new deal is a disaster. a $10 trillion disaster. prof. sesno: what is the green new deal? i don't even know what that is. gov. sununu: funding places that go bankrupt within a couple years. the giant solar project in arizona that was funded 10 years ago that has been completely shut down because the economic stonework. in new hampshire, i love the idea of offshore wind. i went gangbusters on designing and planning for offshore wind which i think would be great. guess what? the cost doesn't make sense, therefore we will not do it because it raises energy prices. the majority of green new deal and climate change type

initiatives you see it on your energy bill. who gets energy bills? most of us can pay. but an elderly couple can't. -- on a fixed income can't. when their energy bill goes from one under 20 to $170 it becomes almost unpayable. why is it that when i bring hydropower down from canada, if the hydro plants are too big it is not considered renewable and they don't get renewable energy credits. does that make sense to anybody? don't tell me they are not gaming this system with massively high prices. i was an environmental consultant. you know how much money environmental consultants make doing these studies, these extended studies? i'm not going to call it a scam. but it is insanely expensive. the government pays, your grandparents do. folks from low income families have to pay it on their energy bill. you always have to say we will address climate change, but let's do it through the lens of the ratepayer, those that have to pay that bill. that's it. there is give and take on all

this and the cost is a very serious issue when you have a country that is 36 trillion in debt. prof. sesno: i want to go on to other things but i want to say this before we move on, yes, the cost is an issue and yes the country is in debt but let's think about how much money, taxpayer money over the years has gone to fossil fuel companies to let them drill and support their businesses and depreciate the amount of money they put in. but when you talk about government money wasted, and government money going in. let's say something else. if we are going to transition to another energy infrastructure, it's going to take massive amounts of time, money and investment and innovation. that's happening and it's very exciting. some of it is owned by china right now because the chinese government is investing like crazy in solar panels, battery technology. mr. sununu: coal plants, 50 coal plants per year. prof. sesno: ok but that's not what i'm talking about, i'm talking about the future. how competitive america will be.

mr. sununu: you think china cares about the environment of future of the planet? putting up 50 coal plants per year? seriously, guys. prof. sesno: we could and we should do this again and just talk about this. but i want to go to congress and the republican party. in the world of checks and balances, what role should congress have in your view? mr. sununu: a huge role. the role of congress and that -- the presidency and the judicial branch are really key. a former president said this to me once and it was spot on. i said the same thing. what are we gonna do, leaders, the next president, it's all about money and gerrymandering and all this stuff, and he said gov, chill out. he was chewing a dried cigar. he said assholes come and go but america's institutions are strong.

and he is right. prof. sesno: are you talking about anybody in particular? [laughter] mr. sununu: i am, he had a thick texas accent. he said this is the only country in the free world where our parliament, congress if you will, is elected completely separate from the executive. remember, in those countries, parliament picks the prime minister. we don't. we keep our present completely separate from the legislative branch. we are one of the only places that does that. for the purpose of checks and balances. we keep our judicial completely separate. you folks get nominated or not nominated on politics of course , that happens all the time on both sides, that's why the pendulum goes back and forth. but the fact we have the checks and balances that virtually no other country has. don't forget the institutions are strong. i'm gonna go way back, bear with me. we went through a civil war that for this country apart. but congress, the presidency, the judicial branch, federalism where the states have the ultimate say, it stood strong.

we went through world war i and world war ii. we went through the civil rights movements where we saw america's greatest leaders literally assassinated in front of our eyes. think about that. jfk, rfk, martin luther king junior. people said the american experiment is over and we had a right to panic. we stood strong and came back from it. we went through 9/11, a pandemic. the institutions fundamentally are there and sound. i would argue we have other things that are infecting those institutions. i think we need campaign-finance reform, term limits, i think we should probably not vote for anybody who agrees with those things. gerrymandering is hard to put back in the bottle but it's a fundamental problem within congress. but at its core, sometimes democrats run congress, sometimes republicans. sometimes democrats run senate, sometimes republicans. it is a really good thing, guys.

it means at the end of the day we swing back and forth, you have to earn it. to get something done, you have to cross the aisle. i think we've lost a little of that the last 10 years but are -- our institutions are very sound, very strong and will carry the day alternately. -- ultimately. we will go through some pain like now. paying off $36 trillion in debt is going to be really hard. there's no easy way to do it but you cannot ignore it. these buffoons have ignored it and you should all be really angry about that. you want to dislike trump, i don't care, you want to dislike elon musk, i don't care. i am not apologizing for them, they are interesting odd people, frankly. we were talking earlier, if barack obama was doing what trump is doing. let's say he brought in george soros not elon musk. republicans would be like oh my , god, what is he doing? prof. sesno: why as a republican are you not saying why is he doing that with elon musk?

gov. sununu: i would be right in saying i'm trying to take the personality out of it. i'm trying to look at the purpose of what they are doing. they are not doing it because they don't like democrats. i think democrats would say we've got to cut something. they today put out that between where obama had a great speech in the beginning of his first term were he said we are going to get rid of departments and be efficient and finally get this thing under control because our finances are out of control. prof. sesno: bill clinton said the era of big government is over. gov. sununu: they all talked a good game, they have the right idea, these are smart people, but they didn't have the right pieces in place to fulfill it. people are upset but somebody has got to pay. this is all about just dollars and cents. don't get emotional. it's hard not to, because we all take it personal in some ways. there will be massive programs in my own state of new answer, -- new hampshire, massive layoffs, but at the end of the day if we don't get finances under control, that's how the experiment ends. not because of congress and the presidency but because we ignore

the cost of all this. and eventually, how much did we pay in interest this year? prof. sesno: gosh around 36 trillion? mr. sununu: in interest. our budget is about $6.5 trillion and one trillion of that is just interest. in seven or eight years that goes to $1.8 trillion in interest. for nothing. can you imagine what we could find with medicare and medicaid and all of these other programs if we had just been smarter with our 20 years ago? dollarsthat is fundamentally what these guys are doing. they are saying we have got to get our fiscal house in order. were in a few years, or eight years, social security goes bankrupt. medicare the same time goes bankrupt. the interest rate goes to 1.8 trillion. our spending is still rising year-over-year. $36 trillion in total debt goes to $42 trillion in total debt

and this is a massive car crash of finances. they are trying to get some control over it. they are trying to do it hard and fast and they are saying congress you better get your act together, we will give you ideas and we hope you act on them. i know it is not pleasant. and by the way, why doesn't this happen in the states? we all have to live by balanced budgets. prof. sesno: i want to ask another question of the audience. the students in the room, how many of you think you may not have social security when you retire? mr. sununu: that sucks. that sucks. that's awful. should have social security when you retire. prof. sesno: which means there have to be very hard decisions. one of them was made by your dad and the president. they said we will not raise taxes, but we needed to. there will be surprises. we are running down on time and i want to get to some audience questions. but i do want to ask about the republican party in the changes in the republican party and where it stands.

this administration has turned republican orthodoxy on its head. mr. sununu: traditional, yeah. i am a catholic reagan republican so i get frustrated. ,prof. sesno: trade, tariffs, reagan talked about immigration in glowing terms. in his farewell speech. it is even in the room? we talked to him earlier, he's a political science major and is vice president of student government here. and he had an observation about people changing their positions. -- let's roll that video. [video clip] >> how they juggle changing position so quickly. with usaid we saw a lot of republicans especially in the senate that last year had been tweeting about how the program was and how this year it is fraudulent and full of scams and is disrupting the taxpayer's

dollar. [video clip] prof. sesno: usaid or anything else, what about what it means to be republican? mr. sununu: those are two separate questions. usaid, a lot of folks don't know what it really did. they saw some key programs that are beneficial and are great and will likely stay in the department of state and they are tweeting how wonderful it is. they are opening their eyes to the programs they didn't realize were in there. there's so much spending that if we went to the list you would be like i don't think we need to do that, that and that. there are a lot of things we do internationally on health. i think a lot of that will come back into play. they put the ebola money and aid s money back into africa and things like that. get out the vote, $26 million in somalia, we can fund that but maybe not the highest and best use. a lot of folks are saying we didn't realize this was in there because it was a quasi-government agency that didn't have to report every line item. i wouldn't call that a changing of position, i think they are aware some things need to be realigned.

the question on the republican party and changing positions. let's understand donald trump is a lifelong democrat, he was until he was a republican. prof. sesno: once upon a time pro-choice. gov. sununu: i'm a pro-choice republican and now he's a pro-life republican, go figure. i will never explain why people change their positions. i'm a big believer you have to be true to your values and i don't mind if people change a position just explain it. ,i have changed my position on various things. nothing too major. maybe i wanted this and cut back , or i had an idea and realize it will affect local communities in a negative way i didn't see, so i will pull back. it is not so much changing a position but maybe we have to be more measured about how we go about it and more strategic. i'm not gonna justify congress, i can justify, you want to talk changing positions, how about a democrat party that in 2009 where hillary clinton stood up and rightly said, if you are illegal and you commit a crime

, you are out of this country? never would have said defund the police. never would've said some of these extreme things and 15 years later they're talking about defunding the police, open borders, everyone gets to stay. don't say the republicans are somehow guilty of changing positions, when the democrats -- i would argue this. someone came to me in the media and said, governor, why do you think the country has gone more conservative to let trump win? guy's, the country is not more conservative. the country is right where it has always been. trump won the race to be sure and delete, but it was more of a loss by the democrats, right? there are working-class americans that were lifelong democrats that said we are done with this party, we are done. being told you are forced and you are not doing anything. i you trump was going to win six months ago. it wasn't because i hoped, it's because i saw two key numbers that no one wanted to talk about. he was definitely going to get more african-american voters and

more latino voters than any republican in history. prof. sesno: doubled his african american vote and latino voters 47%. gov. sununu: game over. if you do that and translate to places like atlanta, philadelphia, detroit, you saw where the swing states were going to go. the mainstream media didn't want to look at that. i kept saying guys don't look at the national poll numbers, it doesn't mean anything, look at the subtext. the subtext of a conversation is working-class americans said to the democrat party we are not more conservative, we are the same families hard-working americans, but you left us. ,i would strongly argue and i think the proof is this election, the democrat party changed their philosophy far more than republicans. trump is trump, i get it, but in terms of a party and where are they now? the democrat party will fix itself. it will figure out who their leader is and what their priorities are. they are not getting there

quickly i'll tell you that. why are trump's numbers going up? because americans say we might not like the guy, his approach, his approach how he talks, but damnit finally somebody in washington is finally doing something. prof. sesno: one correction, 538 shows these numbers fairly stable at about 49% approval. the number that has gone up is the disapproval number. aggregate polling up about three or four points over three weeks. gov. sununu: i am reporting what cnn said, which was that he had the highest net positive approval, this was maybe 10 days ago. maybe it has changed since then but i'm telling you his numbers are strong. prof. sesno: i am not going to pick nits, because the numbers are very stable. for now. mr. sununu: if six month ago you so what trump was going to do in his first month would you believe he had such strong approval? prof. sesno: there was an interesting piece in the wall street journal, they talked to swing voters and some are very

much still with trump. there were a couple of people who said if i had known he would do this, i would have voted for harris. this is worth watching over the next three to six months. it could be a dynamic situation. i want to go to audience questions. some came in, you can raise your hand. we will get a microphone to you. i actually have a question from our president. the gw president who cannot be here. she said you have universities that have been in the spot of bash during the debates over higher education, as a governor, what are the greatest benefits to having strong research universities in your state? gov. sununu: whether it is in my state or in boston? prof. sesno: as the governor of your state. mr. sununu: theoretically a lot of the research that comes out of universities, other businesses will tie in. we did a lot of research about regenerative medicine

. manchester, new hampshire is the heart of that right now in america. we are building a factory to literally grow hearts, lungs and all these amazing things, it's so cool. that comes out of being near the research. doing the r&d and that sort of thing. prof. sesno: research money that comes from where? mr. sununu: the federal government, private sector. prof. sesno: so maybe if you're talking to trump, you can talk about that, too. mr. sununu: the nih stuff? this is where i think trump has missed the mark. he did not message this right. i will take half a step back. when we sign a contract with somebody to do a federal contract, the contract says you can take 8 to 12% for overhead and profit. it's a limit to make sure no contractor in america can bilk the system. theoretically it limits milking the system. the nih grants, for everyone million dollars that goes in on average, only half a million gets put to the r&d and the other half-million goes to overhead and salary. what they have said is you can

have the nih grants, but only 15% like other government contracts should go to overhead and salaries. should 850,000 go to r&d? that's what it should be, is not -- it is not designed to keep your staff employed. it is designed to go into research and develop it for new medicine and technology. prof. sesno: you have to keep the lights on and buy the microscopes. gov. sununu: and 15% is enough. prof. sesno: says who? mr. sununu: all the other contractors with the federal government that take the same amount. why should universities get 50% went to white with a government contract gets -- deloitte with a government contract gets 9%? prof. sesno: deloitte doesn't run laboratories. mr. sununu: they have employees and lights to keep on. prof. sesno: do they have laboratories to the extent that the research is being done -- mr. sununu: $850,000 goes to laboratories, it doesn't go to the salaries. some of it does. 15% does, but it is still more generous than the average government contract.

all the nih change is saying is you have to put money to research, not staff. prof. sesno: the move to 15% turned off the lights and made this research not possible. is that the outcome we should want because we are a fiscal hawk? mr. sununu: if the move to 15% as that result, and we will see if it does, congress can come back and revisit the rules but the nih has thrown out the federal government rules and said we are going to play by our own rules and universities can spend as they want on staff. you can't. then should we let everybody spend 50% on overhead? why are universities treated differently? that is all they are saying. everybody has to play by the same rules. you want to change rules, go to congress and change rules. i have no problem with that. maybe 20% or 30% if that is what it takes. there is a process to do that. not arbitrarily. prof. sesno: arbitrarily this decision came arbitrarily,

perhaps it had been better. gov. sununu: it is not arbitrary, everybody plays by the same rules. prof. sesno: it is arbitrary, some contracts are negotiated at different levels. to go one day after it was signed has stopped some of this research. gov. sununu: 50% is defined in the rules. we are saying you have to play by the same rules as your buddy else. prof. sesno: after funding grants have been approved, so it is breaking the contract. gov. sununu: i agree with that. if funding grants have been approved they have to go forward, i have no problem, but understand the goal is to put money in research, not staff and why would anyone complain about that? the university might not like it because they can hire more staff but let's put into research. that will actually make this country better and heal people. prof. sesno: they would argue we could invite people to do this. but is the staff necessary to support the research. mr. sununu: universities are using students for half of their staff. right? are they paying students the giant salaries the deloittes of

the world have to pay? i would argue universities have cheaper staff. then everybody else. and they are crying about it. play by the same rules as ever ybody else. maybe they should pay students as much as they pay the experts at a government contractor. prof. sesno: that will keep tuition down. mr. sununu: don't get started with that. universities have abused you guys in terms of tuition the past 25 years. why has tuition gone up at three times the rate of inflation since 2000? no one has ever asked that question and got a straight answer. i know exactly why it is. the government took over the loan process. everyone was able to get a loan, so there was no incentive for universities to keep numbers down because everyone was, get -- was getting money. they kept building and building. who gets screwed? you guys. why does this university go up three times the inflation rate of any business in america, explain that. ask your president.

i am a dad with kids ready to go to college, i am pissed about it. prof. sesno: it does stink. what people pay does not cover the cost of what the education and the institution cost to run. gov. sununu: i would argue -- i don't know about gw -- but at unh we said we are going to cut out the fat and try to restructure our university staff contracts and that sort of thing and make sure we are getting what we pay for. if we have to cut some basket weaving classes we will do it. prof. sesno: come on now. mr. sununu: i don't think there are basket weavers in here, maybe there are. god bless it. i will make sure we aligned our degrees with the workforce need as opposed to just what the university wanted to do to make the process more efficient. my eight years as governor, unh, frozen tuition for eight years. frozen tuition. prof. sesno: in-state or everybody? mr. sununu: for everybody. i don't know if you guys can say

the same thing, it's hard. had to make some tough decisions. at the end of the day you and your families have to pay. 278.12, that's what we had to pay me and my wife and we got lucky compared to you guys. you guys will be paying these student loans forever. it is wrong. when they say they will get rid of your student loan, that just makes the cost of the universities go higher. there is no incentive for universities to drop the amount if they think the federal government is going to pay your loans off. i think it is nuts. my biggest argument is this, you guys should be mad and i don't know why you're not mad. i am mad as a parent. your parents should be mad, you should demand and ask these questions. i don't mean to throw gw under the bus. i was in new york last weekend, touring nyu with my daughter, it is well over $100,000 a year.

it was $22,000 a year 20 years ago and it's gone up of four times. according to inflation it should've only got up to 45 or $50,000. prof. sesno: inflation does not measure the cost of running an institution like this. same thing with health care. mr. sununu: why should this be different than a dairy queen or business? a prof. sesno: they are not doing what dairy queen does, which is to make ice cream? gov. sununu: but they have costs like you do. prof. sesno: no they don't. gov. sununu: yes they do. that's the point. economics. prof. sesno: let's go to other questions on the floor. do we have a microphone someplace? stand up please and introduce yourself and we are running a little over. mr. sununu: i will stay as long as you want, i'm having a great time. prof. sesno: we won't do that to people in the audience. >> hello governor i'm from your , state, from sunapee, and i'm curious to know why you disagree a lot about government funding for certain local projects.

to what extent should state government or federal government pay into local communities to stimulate economic growth? for example, in my community in sunapee we have a boat ramp that's been broken for years and years. our select board has failed to fix it. linda tanner in concord and your budget has failed to fix it, the state government has failed to fix it. to what extent does the buck stop and we stop the bleeding? gov. sununu: that is so funny. i literally know the boat ramp you are talking about. i will disagree on one thing. we put all money into fixing it, the locals couldn't decide how to do it. some locals wanted a boat ramp here, some wanted to rebuild the one here, some didn't want this one because of the smelt issue. they thought it would affect the smelt, so the environmentalists got involved. the funding was there. in fact we did a grant program. i will make of a number, about

52 cities and towns took advantage of a local grant program to rebuild boat ramps. sunapee just couldn't get their act together. i'm not blaming them but there is a local battle issue going on there. a lot of folks didn't want that boat ramp because they didn't want tourists from the outside coming in. if they rebuild it, the public has to have access. rich guys on the lake, there is a lot of them in sunapee by the way, they didn't want the public to have access. i'm all for giving grants but the locals have to figure out how to do it. in that example, there were others, i'm not throwing sunapee under the bus -- it's funny you come from sunapee, it's a great town but they can never quite , figure it out. i did a program where we invested in local theaters, we rebuild all the local theaters during covid because we were basically open when everyone else shut down. we had good guidelines and rules. we invested our dollars back into business and cities and towns. it's a hugely important effort. that's kind of my key argument to what's happening in washington now. federalism guys.

washington is not in charge of the government, the states are. 50 states are. they should have the final say. if the government wants to give grants and opportunity, great, give it to california and let california do what they want . environmental, infrastructure, education, whatever. give it to new hampshire. it wasn't designed to be everybody is the same. this isn't a democracy, it's a republic. democracy is the act of voting , but we live in a republic where states and local should have more control, the control should decrease as you go higher up the ladder, not increase. that's why new hampshire is successful. i had republicans try to pass a bill especially after covid, that said if local school boards xyz, the state will tell them they cannot do that. tearing apart local local school boards. i said we are not doing that. local control is paramount. that's when parents get involved. as soon as the state takes over control of something and tells you that you are doing it wrong

that's where the system breaks , down. the best thing you can do is let locals fail. what i mean is it's like your kids. you learn by making mistakes, not by your parents "fixing" everything their way. that's how you become better and stronger and have checks and balances work. sometimes if a local district did something, who knows best for what's in that local school? the governor or the parents and teachers? they know and they are the voters. give them the control. sometimes it will work and sometimes it will not, but they will figure it out. if something doesn't work they will change and they can change faster at the local level. i am all for grants and pushing the cash down and letting them have control. some will do great, some will not. up here you have to have certain rules and regulations at the state level but new hampshire is fundamentally different from all 50 states. vermont is a little bit the same. not much. politically it's very different.

it's ok to let locals make mistakes because that's where empowerment is. the key to all this is letting the individual have the control . government is not here to solve your problems. but to create opportunity. prof. sesno: one of the interesting arguments around this is when you have local control you can end up with very unequal outcomes. mr. sununu: that's ok. prof. sesno: it may be ok unless you live in a state and say i am a low income person. gov. sununu: you go to a town meeting and change the funding scheme. vote on your taxes in the curriculum at school. prof. sesno: it's an interesting philosophical conversation about what responsibility society has to address inequality. states rights obviously was the argument that propelled slavery for years.

mr. sununu: slavery was around before states rights, states rights cap did around -- kept it around. that's what you are saying. prof. sesno: we now have a patchwork of access to reproductive care based on states decisions. you can end up creating very unequal outcomes. mr. sununu: that's ok, sometimes unequal is ok. there is fundamental human rights, slavery and the sort of thing. government is the primary source for health and safety. beyond that to question why government is involved. you should question why bigger government is involved and what it to be held at a local level. prof. sesno: let's get to another question. one from here and then back to the audience. we have an interesting one from lyle greenfield, an author, he wrote a book called uniting the states of america. a self-care plan for a wounded nation. i know lyle and he said i have some questions for the governor and i said fire away. he made reference to the last guest we had, which was governor

spencer cox of utah. lyle asks, healthy conflict for a better policy wrote, there is an exhaustive majority of americans who are discouraged by the ugliness of politics today, the divisiveness undermines our success as a nation and hurts our relationships, we have -- we do not all have to agree on every issue but we have to find a way to disagree better. what lyle asked is have you seen any difference in the way your colleagues interact with each other? or the elected congress? mr. sununu: i wouldn't say i've seen a difference since it was put in place but all 50 governors pretty much get along. we are not like congress. i call kathy hochul and ask her for ideas. i bump into any number of governors. jb pritzker and i disagree on everything. we can be pretty tough, there is

no doubt about that. but during covid we were banging ideas back and forth and he had good ideas. governors actually work together very well. we disagree better all the time. the more local, i know you're probably tired of hearing me say it, but the more local you keep the decisions, the better along everybody gets. because i've got to fight those issues with my neighbor. i fight on the issue, not the personality. the more you go national, it becomes personality driven. i don't like trump or elon musk and therefore i don't like what they are doing. i don't like barack obama, i don't like george soros, don't like what they are doing. that's the problem. you got to have the courage and empathy to take the personality out of the situation and say at the core what are we fundamentally getting? i think obama did really good things. biden was a super nice guy. i think he was a very sweet guy. horrible president. but a very sweet guy. i worked very hard to separate that out. i think at a local level we do

it. everyone wants to talk about national politics but that is where there is no sense of accountability to that. prof. sesno: let's go to another question on the floor. sarah, i will let you find somebody we didn't get to before. >> one of the questions is, you keep talking about separating the person and what they believe . when you look back to january 6 and those type of things that people believe in, like pro-choice or pro-life, how can you separate those actions from the actual person? because i think about people who are so gung ho and supportive of january 6, i can't associate myself with them. mr. sununu: that's ok. >> but you talk about separating that. how do you separate that from the person? prof. sesno: before you answer that, sarah, for the next question let's tee up ethan

fitzgerald's question that we have on tape. gov. sununu: let'sgov. sununu: use january 6 as an example. it was a terrible day. the president had a lot to do in inciting that and it was awful. i'm not talking about the personalities involved, it was wrong and bad and a mistake. it was completely inappropriate. on that one, just focus on the issue. maybe i'm different because i'm a governor. i have a responsibility to 220 cities and towns, all of the -- 1.4 million people whether they voted for me or not. i try to say i don't know your situation or your family's background, i don't know your business's problem. that is why i keep going back to i am not here to solve your problems but what i can do is create as many doors of opportunity as possible. find the door that that's faced -- live free or die. find the door that best fits you. when government says i'm going to be one-size-fits-all and education is a great example, you have to fit in this box, and

for 98% of the kids it's fine. for 2% it could be a disaster. so let those families have a little flexibility. i am using that example of always focusing on the issue and appreciating. i do it in the opposite. i'm not trying to say i'm not going to consider your personality, i'm trying to say i know nothing about your story , and it could be tragic, it could have twists and turns, i don't know why you believe -- sometimes when i get in a political argument and i am not buying it, i will say tell me more, i am not there yet. keep talking. tomorrow i know about your background, now i have an empathetic understanding of ok, i see why this person is so passionate about xyz. i respect it. i disagree with it in terms of may policy and what to do but it is hard. and by the way i am a very flawed human being. in case you can't tell. i'm sure you all believe that after this hour, i'm not perfect , but i really try hard to enter these conversations with an

empathetic ear. if we all do that generally the rising tide floats all boats. prof. sesno: let's take one last question. then we will wrap this up. ethan fitzgerald is in the room, right? where are you? there you are. let's listen. [video clip] >> i welcome disagreements, i friends all the time. have disagreements with my whether it is personal interactions or policy. i think it's natural and part of life and i think how you respond is important. i always try to listen and see the core issue because normally when you bring in names, whether it is donald trump or joe biden, kamala harris, when you stick to those names, and those bigger ideas, then it is hard to have a conversation. but if you are like let's actually have a conversation about what is going wrong in the economy you focus on those, i've , when you focus on those, i've seen in my conversations you can make progress. mr. sununu: you've got it. the only problem is he's a political science degree. prof. sesno: he is also president of the student government association.

watch this space. leave us with a roadmap. leave us with your sense of how we navigate what is an incredibly difficult time. gov. sununu: i will change that a little. how many political science degrees? how many want to going to public service? that's awesome. here's the roadmap. i could talk globally but i want to talk specifically. the best public servants are those who don't run for office right away. you have to have real-world experience. i mean that very sincerely. work for a nonprofit, get a job, learn soft skills. the soft skills of learning office politics, as insane as it can drive you, is really important for the bigger issues of how to build approach teams approach challenges, learn , how to lose, because you will lose a lot in public service. you will not get what you want. you will be a social worker fighting hard for an abused kid and the judge sent them back

with an abusive dad and he will drive you crazy -- i've seen it so many times. it will break your heart. but if you give up at that point because you haven't built soft skills in life, it's really important to get a real job, in some form, don't just jump into politics. i think i do the political thing pretty well. because i was an environmental engineer and i ran a business and i had 800 employees. my job was to make sure every one of my employees could bring home a paycheck. i ran a ski resort for a while. when god doesn't give you snow and you have 800 employees depending on the paycheck but no one came to ski, you are screwed. prof. sesno: back to climate change. [laughter] prof. sesno: 150 inches of snow this year, so don't give me that. you learn those type of struggles are important to be the best you can be when it comes to being in public service. public service is wonderful but it is not a career. it is service.

i have seen a lot of folks in public service burned out too hard, too fast. i did it a little bit to my family, it's brutal on families. especially if you are in elected office. it's noble, you should all do it. it's wonderful but there is a path and a strategy to be long-term successful. if you do that, a couple things happen. the most polarizing individuals sometimes just jump into politics without really understanding what it's about or what the bigger picture is. that's the best roadmap i want to leave people with in terms of getting along, disagreeing better, all those issues. it's about making sure your personal path is the path you want and you're setting yourself up for long-term success i -- and if we do that i believe collectively we can get there. it does not mean you will agree. i'm not trying to convince anybody of anything other than to have a strong cynicism of government. i'm from the government and i'm saying you should not buy what we are selling. and i mean that sincerely.

that's why democracy is not eroding, it's so freaking strong. because you have the final say. ultimately the voters have the final say every time. you might not get what you want to. the other side might win, but the voters have the final say every time and that is to titian in itself, it might be as polarizing as it's ever been before, it's as strong as it's ever been because the number of people that vote keep going out. -- going up. we didn't get to talk about participating in primaries. the more in primaries nevertheless extremists you will have. -- primaries, the less extremists you will have. don't get discouraged. prof. sesno: is your definition of long-term success you want to run for president? mr. sununu: no. i did my eight years. prof. sesno: are you done with politics? mr. sununu: probably. i will do the media thing, i am aspiring to be frank senso

someday. prof. sesno: i am sorry to hear that. gov. sununu: i will probably do the media thing to scratch the political itch. i don't have to be the guy in charge. i worked with the biden administration and the trump administration. why because it was with my , states interest to do so. i called the balls and strikes like i saw them. sometimes people disagree, that is ok. prof. sesno: i want to thank you for your time, if you have a question i'm sorry we couldn't get more on the floor. but this has been fascinating. i think it's been interesting. let me tell you what. it is hard to get a republican to come and speak publicly. mr. sununu: i see why. [laughter] i'm just kidding. [applause] prof. sesno: thank you very much and thanks to all of you. prof. sesno: if you have a question and want to talk to the governor, he is here, if not, have a great evening. [captioning performed by the

national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] >> wednesday lawyers and child safety experts testify on ways to strengthen online safety protections for children. watch the senate judiciary committee hearing live at 10:15 a.m. eastern on c-span3. also, on c-span now our free mobile video app, or online at c-span.org. ♪ >> saturdays, watch "american history tv"'s 10 week series first 100 days, we will explore the early months of presidential administrations with historians, authors and through the c-span archives. we will learn how events impacted presidential terms and the nation up to the present day. saturday the first 100 days of franklin roosevelt's presidency.

at the height of the great depression, roosevelt defeated herbert hoover in a landslide. in his inauguration speech, he said the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. he called a special session of congress to tackle the economic crisis. it was franklin roosevelt who later coined the phrase "first 100 days." watch first 100 days saturday at 7 p.m. eastern on "american history tv" on c-span2. >> democracy, it isn't just an idea, it's a process. a process shaped five leaders elected to the highest offices and entrusted to a select few with guarding his principles. where debates unfold, decisions are made and the nation's course is charted. this is your government at work. this is