Run for Working People (And Not For Data Centers)

WEBVTT

1
00:00:00.120 --> 00:00:08.100
[upbeat music] Today, we're gonna talk about data centers.

2
00:00:08.360 --> 00:00:22.300
Now, I know these things are a, a hot topic amid everything else: the heat, water, prices, lack of homes, lack of childcare, you name it. But we do need to speak out about them. So who is

3
00:00:23.360 --> 00:00:34.330
the most qualified here to speak about, and when necessary, against these just enormous data centers that are affecting the heat, the water, the prices, the lack of homes, and more?

4
00:00:35.440 --> 00:00:47.240
It's a good question, and today I have a very special guest for you to hear from. Everybody across the country and across the world want more examples of fight and progress you can actually see and touch and feel.

5
00:00:47.400 --> 00:00:57.000
And in this second batch of conversations, in partnership with our best friends at Run for Something, we're gonna give you exactly what you asked for. So not every conversation will be the same.

6
00:00:57.040 --> 00:01:05.540
Some, like today, will feature a single guest, and others might feature two. But all of them are sourced from the Run for Something pipeline and graduating classes.

7
00:01:05.600 --> 00:01:10.260
These are truly our next generation of leaders, and just in time.

8
00:01:10.300 --> 00:01:20.480
Today, we're gonna talk to an awesome candidate who is running for their town council, who is hellbent on attacking and helping people understand a huge issue in their own hometown.

9
00:01:20.520 --> 00:01:24.440
And listen, for all you know, that could be the same issue in yours soon enough.

10
00:01:24.500 --> 00:01:40.300
So you and I are gonna find out together what they're working on and why, where they've made progress, where they have struggled in their candidacy, and how their exact tactics and strategies might be transferable to other schools or towns or cities like yours around this fine country.

11
00:01:40.380 --> 00:01:48.000
So if these conversations inspire you, you can do two, three things today, because it is not just these candidates' job to save us.

12
00:01:48.440 --> 00:01:56.540
We have to recruit and then elect them, and then hold their feet to the fire and reelect them should they deserve it. So after you listen to this, it's your turn.

13
00:01:56.580 --> 00:02:02.900
Number one, find out what office you or some other amazing young person you love can run for at runforwhat.net.

14
00:02:02.940 --> 00:02:14.020
And two, find and support incredible candidates endorsed by Run for Something and other amazing organizations we trust at whatcanido.earth, like the shirt says. And of course, please share these conversations.

15
00:02:15.020 --> 00:02:25.920
You guys said you needed this stuff. We need it. I need it. You need it. Many, many more people do as well, so please share it with someone who gets it. That's awesome. Let's go talk to Jackie.

16
00:02:26.180 --> 00:02:35.609
Jackie McGuire, welcome to the show. I see, now I see you have a keyboard in the background. Now I have questions about that, too. This is all very exciting. Yeah. This is my, this is my music studio.

17
00:02:35.630 --> 00:02:46.360
Oh, yeah, you got a... Oh, shit, you got a whole thing going on. All right. At any given moment you had to pick up one, are you, are you scratching? Are you hitting the keys, guitars? What are we doing?

18
00:02:46.480 --> 00:02:56.640
I am the least embarrassing on the bass. [laughs] What a great answer. I love that. Bass is awesome. Yeah. Yeah, it's hard to mess up bass.

19
00:02:56.960 --> 00:03:09.800
I also, though, this, this DJ controller is a DJ controller and a drum machine and a sample pad, so it's, like, all these different toys in one, so also very fun to play with. Have you heard of the- I grew up singing.

20
00:03:10.440 --> 00:03:20.780
Oh, that's exciting. I won't make you do it. Fair. But that's really exciting. That's for another show. Have you heard of, I'm really excited that this is already completely off the rails, the Orchid?

21
00:03:20.840 --> 00:03:34.720
I got one of these things from Telepathic Instruments. No. What is it? It's pretty cool. It's, like, a super dorky advanced core generating synthesizer designed to help musicians of all levels find what's on their mind.

22
00:03:35.100 --> 00:03:40.280
We have one. It's super fun to carry around the house and mess around with. My kids are- That's awesome...

23
00:03:40.310 --> 00:03:52.790
11, 12, and 13 and all really getting into music, and my version of telling them they can't have phones is to just buy them musical instruments, so. Mine are 11, about to turn 13, and 14, so it sounds like- Oh, shit...

24
00:03:52.800 --> 00:03:58.459
we were making the same bad decisions- All right. Yeah. Yeah... at the same time. [laughs] Perfect. Perfect. I don't know.

25
00:03:58.560 --> 00:04:08.530
I mean, you know, there's, I think, worse decisions that can be made these days, but yeah, that's- Yeah... that's my version of fighting the fight is, "Here's a drum set," so. Yeah. Um. Yeah. All right.

26
00:04:08.549 --> 00:04:13.840
Let's- Same with ours. We, we already covered the this is not gonna be the summer of electronics, so- Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm...

27
00:04:14.060 --> 00:04:24.490
took them to race go-karts yesterday, and they're all set up with arts and crafts projects and music stuff and, yeah, my- Are you guys already out of school? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Wow.

28
00:04:24.560 --> 00:04:35.040
Arizona gets out of school the week before Memorial Day, which is crazy for me- Oh, shit... 'cause I grew up on the East Coast, and on the East Coast- Yeah... we didn't get out of school until the end of June. Mm-hmm.

29
00:04:35.100 --> 00:04:45.820
But here it's, yeah, it's early. 'Cause it gets so hot here that the schools don't wanna pay, pay air conditioning bills. [laughs] No, I get it. I get it. Yeah, we've got one, two, just about two and a half weeks left.

30
00:04:46.060 --> 00:04:57.480
Same thing. It's gonna get warm. I get it. Well, that's exciting. Well, best of luck with all the arts and crafts and such. I get the same thing. I wrote a, for winter break, my kids, I wrote a unsolicited

31
00:04:58.500 --> 00:05:09.070
code of rules about the screens for the break, and they were like, "What is your deal, man? Why- [laughs]... why, why does it have to be this way?" I was like, "I don't know what to tell you. Sorry. Enjoy your- Yeah...

32
00:05:09.070 --> 00:05:21.240
your crafts." Yeah. Anyways, all right, let's talk about this. You're, speaking of screens, you're, you're, you are running for office in a, in a very screen connected, chaotic moment.

33
00:05:21.420 --> 00:05:32.340
I'm in Virginia, which is the data center capital of the world, apparently. Super fun for everybody. Yeah. Dominion's about to get bought by NextEra. The whole thing is completely complete chaos.

34
00:05:32.380 --> 00:05:40.700
So you're in Arizona, though, where it's already pretty warm, and you're trying to do the thing. Tell us about yourself and the office you're running for. Yeah. So I'm Jackie McGuire.

35
00:05:41.040 --> 00:05:56.580
I, my, my day job is as a research analyst for cybersecurity AI, and then I picked up data centers. It's kind of been a, a really interesting journey. I never had ambitions to run for public office before.

36
00:05:56.880 --> 00:06:08.640
I think I've made comments to my partner before about, "Oh, you know, i- if more people like us ran for office, the world would be a better place, but nobody wants to run for office 'cause it's such a painful process."

37
00:06:09.312 --> 00:06:19.632
And then the end of last year, they started doing the, the scheduling public hearings on the data center project here, and I found out the size of the data center project here.

38
00:06:19.682 --> 00:06:30.102
And so ours is two buildings that are each going to be between 550 and 750 megawatts, so a total of up to 1.5 gigawatts.

39
00:06:30.242 --> 00:06:44.522
And to put that in context, we're this little tiny town of 60,000 people just north of Tucson, and 1.5 gigawatts is two-thirds of what the entire Tucson metropolitan area uses. So- Yeah, it's like the death star...

40
00:06:44.522 --> 00:06:46.412
we have a... Yeah.

41
00:06:46.572 --> 00:06:57.952
And then, you know, I, I went to South Tucson a week and a half ago to be a subject matter expert at one of their town council meetings, and I told them, I was like, "You know, the average consumer space heater is 1,000 watts."

42
00:06:58.452 --> 00:07:07.762
Mm. So this is literally going to be the equivalent of putting somewhere between 1 and 1.5 million space heaters into two buildings and just running them.

43
00:07:07.792 --> 00:07:18.812
And, you know, the first law of thermodynamics says you can't create or destroy energy, you can only transfer it, and so every watt of power that goes into that building is turned into heat. Mm.

44
00:07:18.952 --> 00:07:26.312
And they do all these crazy things to try to deal with the heat to keep the building, you know, below 115 degrees so that the chips don't melt.

45
00:07:26.432 --> 00:07:34.432
But realistically, when you live in a climate where it's already 113, 115 degrees, that's crazy. Mm. And so we're just start...

46
00:07:35.012 --> 00:07:47.732
And my biggest issue here is some people I've talked to have this concept that data centers are what power your smartphone, and they're what make Google Docs work, and they... And that's regular cloud computing.

47
00:07:47.812 --> 00:07:56.452
That is not... You know, we've been doing regular cloud computing and regular what we call low-density data centers for years. This is just an entirely different animal.

48
00:07:56.932 --> 00:08:07.922
And between the density of the technology, and you know, how many GPUs you're fitting in a rack, and the size of the projects, I don't wanna be a guinea pig for a science experiment.

49
00:08:08.152 --> 00:08:21.072
I don't want my town to be a guinea pig for a science experiment. And the real issue that I see here is I spent 15 years on Wall Street before I decided to become a data scientist, and this is not a technology play.

50
00:08:21.162 --> 00:08:34.052
This is a real estate play. This is a whole bunch of private equity companies buying up as much land as they can and starting as many data center projects as they can because free money is easy to come by right now.

51
00:08:34.372 --> 00:08:45.702
So this is kind of what I saw coming down the road starting probably 18, 24 months ago, is these large hyperscale data centers, the companies behind them stopped wanting to own them.

52
00:08:46.272 --> 00:09:04.482
So rather than building their own hyperscale data centers, they're setting up these private equity shell companies with pri- in conjunction with private equity companies, and then it doesn't show up as debt on the public company's balance sheet because they just made an equity investment in a private equity company.

53
00:09:04.872 --> 00:09:19.532
Then the private equity company takes on somewhere between 125 and 150% in basically mortgages of what it's actually gonna cost to build the data center, saying, "Oh, but when it's finished, AI is gonna be so in demand that it's gonna be worth more."

54
00:09:19.552 --> 00:09:30.181
And so this is kind of like the worst parts of the dot-com bubble and the financial crisis, and I was a stockbroker during the financial crisis, so I have a little bit of PTSD from that. [laughs] Mm.

55
00:09:30.192 --> 00:09:41.692
But it's those two things combined, right? And what we're seeing is that these companies are being very predatory, and they look for small towns like ours. They look for towns that make...

56
00:09:41.792 --> 00:09:52.012
Most of our tax base comes from construction tax and retail tax. We have a utility tax as well. Our utilities are cheap. Land is cheap. And so they just...

57
00:09:52.132 --> 00:10:01.572
And it's this kind of divide and conquer strategy where they're going after all of these little small towns where the governments really don't know enough to protect themselves. And so- That's so key... I started...

58
00:10:02.652 --> 00:10:03.401
Yeah. And I...

59
00:10:03.592 --> 00:10:15.512
This is, I think you see this over and over and over, and then many times they have the government sign an, a nondisclosure agreement, so the government can't actually go out and seek help because they're now bound to secrecy.

60
00:10:15.972 --> 00:10:27.312
And you know, it's funny 'cause our vice mayor, who I'll be open is not my favorite person in the world, basically made a statement on social media last week that I showed up two years too late.

61
00:10:28.252 --> 00:10:37.632
Because a couple, [laughs] a couple weeks before the first planning and zoning meeting, I started sending emails to the government saying, "Hey, I used to work in finance.

62
00:10:37.812 --> 00:10:43.632
I really don't think you understand who this private equity company is. They're bleeding cash. Their shareholders are trying to sue them.

63
00:10:44.052 --> 00:10:52.312
This is not a good company, and this isn't a tech company building their own data center. This is a private equity company building out space they hope to lease out."

64
00:10:53.032 --> 00:11:18.112
And the reason that's terrible is because if you started going bankrupt, and you owned some houses and leased some other houses, you would probably start breaking leases before you would start selling houses, and that's exactly what's gonna happen with all of this leased data center space is if Quantum computing, and I'm not gonna go down that rabbit hole 'cause I can opine on Quantum computing forever, but basically all computers are programmed in ones and zeros.

65
00:11:18.172 --> 00:11:25.982
So a computer has to make a decision, one or zero, right? Quantum computers, their qubits can be a one and a zero. Mm-hmm.

66
00:11:25.982 --> 00:11:44.672
And so that is going to fundamentally transform data science and AI as we know it, and when that happens, you won't need these massive data centers because you'll be able to do the same number of calculations it takes racks and racks and racks of ones and zeros to do on a little wafer that can say, "What if it's a one and a zero?"

67
00:11:45.162 --> 00:11:46.972
Mm. And it can do much different simulations.

68
00:11:47.012 --> 00:11:56.972
And so within the next several years, we're gonna be there, and if we build all these stupid data centers between now and then, most of them are gonna be obsolete by the [laughs] time they're finished. Mm.

69
00:11:57.052 --> 00:12:06.092
And yeah, and so I just started showing up saying, "Hey, if you wanna benefit from the data center boom, open a welding school. Open a cybersecurity school.

70
00:12:06.152 --> 00:12:18.002
Open a trade school that can service these data centers, but we don't need to sell out to data centers." Mm-hmm. That's 600 acres of land, and to put it in context, 600 acres is the size of Disneyland.

71
00:12:18.464 --> 00:12:28.244
And I don't mean the park Disneyland, I mean the entire thing. Yeah. Like all the hotels, all the parking lots, California Adventure, the whole Disneyland.

72
00:12:28.734 --> 00:12:39.264
That's the size that this development is gonna be, and it's just crazy. And so they basically ignored me when I started emailing them. I showed up at meetings, and then I had this video go viral.

73
00:12:39.334 --> 00:12:49.964
So I didn't actually post this video myself. There's a coalition here called No Desert Data Centers that's kind of try- 'cause we have the same developer trying to build another data center 25 miles away in South Tucson.

74
00:12:50.024 --> 00:12:59.204
So, so yeah. And this video went viral of me basically speaking about the issues with this project, and I was kind of coerced into running.

75
00:12:59.334 --> 00:13:04.904
[laughs] I shouldn't say coerced, but people started approaching me saying, "Hey- It's okay. This is a safe space. Yeah.

76
00:13:04.944 --> 00:13:17.924
There are four town council seats and a mayor s- a mayor seat open in this election, and one of the t- one of the biggest issues we have in politics is finding qualified people to run for office. Yeah.

77
00:13:18.644 --> 00:13:27.744
You were told, "Congrats on your, on your video and all your years of expertise. You're, you're now qualified for one of these four seats." Yeah. How did you get hooked up with our pals at Run for Something?

78
00:13:27.804 --> 00:13:36.844
Was that when you... W- did, did they kind of suss you out, or did you go, "Okay, if I'm gonna do this, I need the scaffolding to, to, to do this," right?

79
00:13:37.724 --> 00:13:49.484
Yeah, no, we're really lucky in Arizona in that the, the culmination of all of the different societal issues we're seeing, whether it be data centers, we also have a detention facility that is going into our town.

80
00:13:49.824 --> 00:13:59.864
Awesome. So we are kind of the epitome of the- Mm-hmm... small town being exploited by special interests, right? Mm-hmm. And so there are a lot of other young candidates also running for office.

81
00:13:59.894 --> 00:14:11.524
And so I have some people that help with kind of operations and logistics for the campaign, and they had mentioned Run for Something, and they were like, "Hey, we don't wanna ask you how old you are, but you seem younger than most of our candidates."

82
00:14:11.984 --> 00:14:23.644
[laughs] If you could just give me a date range, that would be great. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, they were like- That's outstanding... "Were you born in 1985 or earlier?" [laughs] And I was like, "Well, not or earlier, but..."

83
00:14:23.874 --> 00:14:31.584
[laughs] Yeah, yeah, yeah. You, if you stop right there, that's outstanding. That makes me so happy. It's amazing. Yeah, man. Yeah. Then once they get their hands on you, it's a, it's a real...

84
00:14:31.624 --> 00:14:36.964
They, they don't mess around. And now you got a T-shirt and everything, which is amazing, by the way. What has

85
00:14:38.104 --> 00:14:51.384
been the response from that video to signing up to run, to, you know, again, like you said, it's already getting hot there. Everybody's dealing with water issues there.

86
00:14:51.444 --> 00:15:06.484
We got the, you know, everything from the Colorado River issues. I was in Los Angeles for a long time. You know, it's, like you said, all, all, all of the things. Yeah. How has your, 60,000 you said, person town been

87
00:15:07.584 --> 00:15:18.434
activated in any way behind your campaign, behind this issue, among the myriad of other things going on? Yeah, so politics in our town are kinda dirty. I'm not gonna lie.

88
00:15:18.684 --> 00:15:26.364
And it- what is crazy is that because this town has not even been an incorporated town for 50 years yet. Next year is actually our 50th anniversary.

89
00:15:26.424 --> 00:15:40.544
So our town wasn't incorporated until 1977, and it has been owned and run by the same four wealthy families for basically the entire time the town has existed. Mm. One of those families is our current mayor.

90
00:15:41.124 --> 00:15:50.644
And so one of my hesitations with running is that, you can probably tell, I have pink and purple hair. I am covered in tattoos. Let me get those in there. Mm-hmm. Do it.

91
00:15:50.664 --> 00:15:59.464
So when people started trying to recruit me to run, I was like, first of all, I'm definitely not a politician. I'm very unfiltered. It's just kind of the...

92
00:15:59.544 --> 00:16:08.324
I live at this nexus of autism and ADHD, where I'm very honest and unfiltered, and our town skews older. So we have a lot of retired people here.

93
00:16:08.364 --> 00:16:17.724
And so I just asked people when they were asking me to run, I was like, what... How are people gonna respond to me? [laughs] Like- Mm. Have we met? I'm not gonna- Right... change me. Right. I'm not gonna change my hair.

94
00:16:18.384 --> 00:16:29.204
And what's been really fascinating is that not only have I had insane amounts of support, but from both sides of the aisle. Mm.

95
00:16:29.424 --> 00:16:40.864
And I actually, I went canvassing with a reporter a couple days ago, 'cause they're working on a story about our town and me running and all of this, and we intentionally knocked on pretty conservative doors.

96
00:16:41.404 --> 00:16:52.714
And what you will find is that people hate data centers for all kinds of reasons- Mm... whether it's, you know, not in my backyard, whether it's... There's this whole don't California my Arizona thing. Mm-hmm.

97
00:16:52.774 --> 00:17:00.404
And what's funny is that some people interpret building data centers here as doing that, right? 'Cause they're basically serving these billionaires in Silicon Valley.

98
00:17:00.504 --> 00:17:07.144
I am, I am of the opinion that neither political party right now is really serving working people.

99
00:17:07.204 --> 00:17:16.164
Unfortunately, they've both been overtaken by wealthy individuals, companies, structures, just for different reasons, right?

100
00:17:16.674 --> 00:17:25.744
And so one of the things that really frustrated me about Democrats, and I've been a registered Democrat for a long time, was that we lost the working class.

101
00:17:26.384 --> 00:17:38.424
You know, we used to be the party of unions, of working people, of the everyman, and all of a sudden Democrats got very intellectual, got very kind of, like, somewhat condescending.

102
00:17:38.484 --> 00:17:47.424
You know, I think there was this tone during 2024 that was very much, "Oh my God, how could anybody vote for that guy?" And that's... You're never gonna reach people with that attitude, right?

103
00:17:47.434 --> 00:17:56.474
And so I tend to be somebody who, I'm very curious. So if somebody says they believe something, I'll get stuck at somebody's door when I'm canvassing for like- Mm-hmm... 20 minutes, 'cause I just really- Mm...

104
00:17:56.504 --> 00:18:05.854
wanna dissect how they feel about the world. And so the response has been really great. And even with the detention facility, what I have found is that, you know,

105
00:18:06.944 --> 00:18:15.714
if you can ask people to, right now set aside immigration politics, right? 'Cause when I'm talking to more conservative voters, we're probably not gonna agree there. Sure.

106
00:18:15.724 --> 00:18:26.840
But the point of town council is to decide, do we want a detention facility in our town? And more broadly, do we want a private prison at all in our town? Mm-hmm. And if I can...

107
00:18:26.980 --> 00:18:35.780
And usually when people are reasonable, you can get them to set aside the politics of it and talk about the actual data. 'Cause I'm a data scientist, right? I love data.

108
00:18:35.910 --> 00:18:46.920
And if you start explaining to them, you know, private prisons in general are more expensive, they cost the state more money, they're less effective, it's easier to get drugs in a private prison than it is to get them on the street.

109
00:18:47.200 --> 00:18:53.380
They are not in the bill- business of rehabilitating people, they're in the business of keeping people incarcerated because that's how they make their money.

110
00:18:53.880 --> 00:19:04.039
And once I start talking to voters about that, they're like, "Oh yeah, I don't want a private prison in my town no matter what it's for." So, you know, I became a financial advisor right before the financial crisis.

111
00:19:04.240 --> 00:19:14.360
I became a stockbroker in 2025. I was only 20. I applied for the wrong job. [laughs] I had no idea what I was doing. But I kind of had to talk people off ledges, you know?

112
00:19:14.460 --> 00:19:25.540
Like, people are watching their 401[k] drop 60%, and you have to figure out what is important to them and how to use that to help explain the world and help them make better choices.

113
00:19:25.969 --> 00:19:33.120
And I feel like politics is very similar, in that, you know, you have to talk to people about what is important in your life.

114
00:19:33.660 --> 00:19:42.800
Because social media algorithms are programmed to show you the most extreme soundbites of the most extreme opinions of the most extreme ends of the political spectrum.

115
00:19:42.860 --> 00:19:51.070
You know, we have this, in tech we say enragement is engagement, and so basically any time you open your phone, it's gonna piss you off. Mm. That's what it does. Yep.

116
00:19:51.070 --> 00:19:56.710
'Cause the more pissed off you get, the more time you'll spend on the internet arguing with your neighbors, people you don't know.

117
00:19:57.300 --> 00:20:12.420
So yeah, I mean, I think I've been surprised at how much people that I would think would not inherently support someone that looks like I do, that thinks like I do, but it seems like people really crave authenticity right now.

118
00:20:13.520 --> 00:20:25.100
And- Yeah, there's not a lot of that out there. And I... Yeah. Yeah. And so I think the fact that I'm unfiltered, the fact that I, I'm not one to let someone spread misinformation and not say something about it.

119
00:20:25.140 --> 00:20:33.850
And so one of the things that I hear as I, you know, I knock on doors and people already know who I am, which is bizarre, by the way. If you've never experienced this- Mm...

120
00:20:33.880 --> 00:20:38.480
it's, it's, it's weird when people know you and you don't know them. Yeah. It's great, but yeah.

121
00:20:38.500 --> 00:20:48.940
But no, I think a lot, one of the things I hear about me a lot is, "Oh, this is Jackie, and [laughs] she doesn't suffer fools." [laughs] Like... Great. Put it on a fucking poster, man. You- That's where we are...

122
00:20:48.980 --> 00:20:58.780
Well, I got talked out of our last town council meeting because our mayor was like, "Oh, we visited a bunch of data centers up in Phoenix, and they're not loud at all." And I was like, "Those are 25 megawatts.

123
00:20:59.200 --> 00:21:06.700
You're trying to build one here that's 1,500 megawatts." And so I'm yelling out from the audience, and you're not allowed to do that at our town council meetings. Mm-hmm.

124
00:21:06.740 --> 00:21:15.700
So South Tucson was so refreshing 'cause I went down to South Tucson, and it's a back and forth between the audience and the council. Mm. They open it up for questions. They wanna have...

125
00:21:15.780 --> 00:21:26.280
Ours, they set aside 30 minutes at the beginning of the meeting- Oh, yeah... which means only 10 people get to speak at any meeting, and if you start talking, they've started bringing in half a dozen, 10 cops.

126
00:21:26.760 --> 00:21:33.980
They will literally have the police pull you out of the town council meeting. You can say anything. And that's how most of the places are. It's, that's it, you know? It's like three minutes.

127
00:21:34.020 --> 00:21:40.660
It sounds like you guys get three minutes. That's an extravagance. Yeah. [laughs] In a lot of places it's one to two, and you're just like, "What the fuck are we doing here, man?" Yeah. Yeah.

128
00:21:40.800 --> 00:21:53.240
No, the question time model, as it were, is, is helpful for sure. What are your, besides getting elected in a unique town, of which I get it. Again, I'm in Colonial Williamsburg.

129
00:21:53.280 --> 00:22:04.540
We've got a very, you know, wealthy and, and really collaborative and thoughtful university t- 10 yards that way. You know, what is effectively an open air museum here. It's very old. It's complicated.

130
00:22:04.580 --> 00:22:12.600
We don't have a lot of property taxes at all because it's basically the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, The College of William & Mary, and a bunch of 400-year-old churches.

131
00:22:12.640 --> 00:22:19.490
So when you're like, "Where do we get the funding for fucking bike lanes?" The answer is, like, "There isn't any." So, you know- Yeah...

132
00:22:19.540 --> 00:22:27.749
it's, you have to know what you're dealing with, and it sounds like you really know your town and what you're dealing with, which is, which is really helpful. You know, context is really helpful. Yeah.

133
00:22:27.760 --> 00:22:39.430
There's transferrable strategies and maybe tactics from, from city to city and town to town, municipalities, and, and obviously we have 50 different states and, and all that, and territories.

134
00:22:39.520 --> 00:22:53.860
But what do you feel are sort of the known known obstacles over the next year or so of actually trying to not just be the party of no, as they say, for this particular data center, 'cause more will come- Yeah...

135
00:22:53.880 --> 00:23:02.840
but to actually representing, like you said, those, those 60,000 folks in a way that- Mm-hmm... they feel, "Great, she's unfiltered for me now." Yeah. "That's what I was looking for."

136
00:23:03.640 --> 00:23:16.180
Yeah, I think it's continuing to talk, and I think, you know, we're 60,000 people in the incorporated town. One of the issues that we have here is that we have a massive unincorporated area. Mm.

137
00:23:16.190 --> 00:23:26.470
And those people are directly impacted by all of the decisions that the town makes- Sure... but they don't get to vote. Mm-hmm. They don't get a say. And so- American taxation without representation. Yeah.

138
00:23:26.540 --> 00:23:29.340
It's what we do best. Yeah. Yeah. And so you know what?

139
00:23:29.480 --> 00:23:39.080
I used to be one of those residents, so I have, I live in a house that's in a subdivision now so that my kids could, you know, get to school, 'cause it was taking me 20 minutes each way to drive them to the bus and back.

140
00:23:39.580 --> 00:23:50.800
But, you know, my unincor- my ranch, I have 40 acres that's out in unincorporated Pinal County, which is the next county north, and our town also covers two different counties, which is also great.

141
00:23:51.300 --> 00:24:03.510
So yeah, I mean, I think, I think it's to continue to have conversations. So I'm big on office hours. I'm gonna actually, I'm, starting next week I'm gonna start having office hours myself as a candidate, so- Mm...

142
00:24:03.520 --> 00:24:17.640
you know, people can actually come, ask questions, meet me. Our mayor, our incumbent mayor, he did not collect a single signature on his own nomination petitions. He was not out canvassing. He was not out knocking doors.

143
00:24:18.270 --> 00:24:27.140
And that's, that's the real issue, is that I think one of the issues we have in our government specifically is that our government is not representative of the people.

144
00:24:27.784 --> 00:24:31.744
And, you know, nationally, statewide, you could say that just about anywhere.

145
00:24:31.864 --> 00:24:43.723
You know, when you have a government that skews over 60, extremely white, extremely wealthy, the just like the ability to understand the struggles of everyday people is just nonexistent.

146
00:24:43.784 --> 00:24:54.854
I mean, you know, we have a stock market that's gone up, you know, 30% in the last year and a half, but 87% of Americans don't own stocks. And, you know, the stock market is not the economy.

147
00:24:54.984 --> 00:25:01.924
In our town, like very few people here own stocks. Mm-hmm. They're struggling with $5 gas. They're struggling with $8 eggs. They're, you know...

148
00:25:02.024 --> 00:25:16.864
So I think I have the benefit of the fact that I was homeless when I was 19. Mm. I grew up very, very poor. I grew up in the Payless sneakers that left the marks on the gym floors. And so I still, I still remember.

149
00:25:16.924 --> 00:25:18.784
I still, you know, I see people.

150
00:25:19.214 --> 00:25:33.304
And that, I think that's the other thing is that, you know, if we try to dissect the Donald Trump phenomena, and I think that rather than being condescending about how anybody could vote for that guy, I totally understand why people voted for that guy.

151
00:25:33.424 --> 00:25:51.244
Because when you can't pay your bills, and you're being told the reason you can't pay your bills, the reason that life is so hard for you, is because Democrats and Republicans just can't get along, and it's broken, and it's gonna stay broken, and there's nothing you can do about it, and somebody comes in and they're like, "Well, why don't we burn it all to the ground?"

152
00:25:51.884 --> 00:25:59.604
Quite frankly, that's pretty compelling. [laughs] You know, and I think, I think one thing he does is he makes people feel seen.

153
00:25:59.704 --> 00:26:08.564
And whether that's authentic or not, whether he actually understands their struggles, and obviously, you know, my opinion is he probably doesn't, it doesn't matter.

154
00:26:09.204 --> 00:26:19.634
If you make people feel seen, and you say, "Hey, I see that, you know, the middle class has basically been destroyed over the last 40, 50 years." Mm-hmm.

155
00:26:19.764 --> 00:26:32.854
That, you know, wage inflation has not kept up with price inflation. We shouldn't... [laughs] Having a country where there are 950 billionaires is not sustainable. It just isn't. You know, it's...

156
00:26:33.164 --> 00:26:45.904
A- and so I think continuing to talk to people, and, you know, I had this great experience several months ago. I was driving home from California. I had driven out to Vegas for something, and I was... Or Vegas, actually.

157
00:26:45.944 --> 00:26:56.984
And I was coming back, and there's one road that goes through these mountains in Arizona when you're about an hour from Phoenix, and there was a crash, and the whole road got shut down for four and a half hours.

158
00:26:57.064 --> 00:27:05.474
And we were just stuck. So everybody got out of their cars, and we started talking to each other. And it's beautiful. It's dark. It's 12 o'clock, you know, midnight. Mm-hmm.

159
00:27:05.544 --> 00:27:14.414
The stars are all visible 'cause there's not a city- Oh, yeah... for, you know, 50 miles in either direction. I start talking to this truck driver behind me, and we have this two-hour long conversation.

160
00:27:14.484 --> 00:27:23.304
At the end of it, he said, "You know, I don't agree with 90% of anything you just said, but this was such a nice conversation to have."

161
00:27:24.024 --> 00:27:34.613
And I said, "You know, I feel like that's America right now, is we all went into our houses- Mm... because we couldn't breathe on each other during COVID, and nobody came back out." Yeah. Yeah. No, I'm- We stopped-...

162
00:27:34.644 --> 00:27:39.464
I'm with you. It's like you- We stopped talking to each other. We don't share reality.

163
00:27:39.984 --> 00:27:55.564
Everybody can curate through their phone the exact version of reality that they want, that will tell them exactly what they believe, the way they believe it, nothing to ever question your beliefs in a neutral way, where you're not just arguing with other people on the internet.

164
00:27:55.584 --> 00:28:03.423
And most of which has very little to do with the things your town council can represent you on or, or affect in, in any way, 95%- Yeah... of which is up there.

165
00:28:03.784 --> 00:28:14.724
And that's why I love this idea of, you know, the way you, you seem to be canvassing, which is asking people, w- what do you care about? What's affecting you? That is one of my favorite parts of knocking on doors.

166
00:28:14.804 --> 00:28:23.494
I always tell people, "Actually, you're not the one that should be doing most of the talking." It's, you know, just tell, tell them who you are so they feel safe, and then- Yeah...

167
00:28:23.524 --> 00:28:40.884
you'd be amazed at what people will tell you about, about what's affecting them right now on a Saturday morning or an evening or whatever it is, because that's the times we're in, and that's how you're gonna really understand how to represent folks if you're lucky enough to get elected.

168
00:28:40.924 --> 00:28:53.034
So our elections are also... One of the biggest issues that I've run up against is our elections are in July. Mm. So we have w- Arizona does their local, lo- well, Marana does its local elections during the primary.

169
00:28:53.624 --> 00:29:03.484
And that's so that if one of the seats doesn't get a majority, it goes to runoff, which almost- Mm... never happens. But it's a mid-cycle election. It's during the primaries.

170
00:29:04.004 --> 00:29:13.764
And people don't really know what town council does. So... And I am one of those people, or I was until- Sure... you know, six months ago. And then- Sure...

171
00:29:13.804 --> 00:29:23.464
you know, we spend a lot of time arguing over state and national politics when town council, local politics is what directly affects your life- Mm-hmm... like zoning- Mm-hmm...

172
00:29:23.774 --> 00:29:34.704
and planning and, you know, like, funding and, you know, infrastructure. And so... And that's the other thing is we hear the same... I hear the same three things at every door I knock on, like, without fail.

173
00:29:34.864 --> 00:29:45.624
And it's nothing that you would f- You know, the first one is we hate the data center. Mm. The second one is urban sprawl because our tax base here is concentrated in construction tax. Mm.

174
00:29:45.704 --> 00:29:57.904
W- to your point earlier about how are we gonna build another bike lane, our answer is to build another car wash. The... We have, we have so many freaking car washes in this town, and nobody knows why.

175
00:29:57.924 --> 00:30:06.524
And it's become- Right... like, the running joke of the town is, like, how many car washes do you actually need? 'Cause there's one on every corner in a state that has no water. Mm-hmm.

176
00:30:06.684 --> 00:30:14.784
And it's because without the impact fees, without the construction, constant construction, we don't have a tax base. Sure.

177
00:30:14.854 --> 00:30:29.144
And the really unfortunate thing and risky thing about that is that when we have the economic pullback that we all know is coming, construction tax, construction stops when the economy gets bad, and retail spending stops.

178
00:30:29.304 --> 00:30:35.840
So we are screwed. Mm-hmm. Like, very screwed. You know who's not going to the car wash? Everybody. Yeah, exactly.

179
00:30:36.000 --> 00:30:47.660
So, so yeah, I think we, you know, we're at a point in this town where talking to people, they're like the urban sprawl, 'cause we've built probably 5,000 new houses in the last 10 years here. Mm-hmm.

180
00:30:47.720 --> 00:30:58.120
But we didn't invest in jobs for those people. Right. We don't have a college or university satellite campus in our town. Like you said, a welding school or apprentice training, any of that stuff. Yep. None of that here.

181
00:30:58.230 --> 00:31:05.360
And what's, what's crazy about that is that we actually do have a high school that has a decent trades program. There's just nowhere to go from there. That is...

182
00:31:05.400 --> 00:31:12.470
It's like it is one of our greatest missed opportunities that is both hyper-local and, and national, is just like- Yeah...

183
00:31:12.500 --> 00:31:22.700
truly giving these folks nowhere to go in general, but, but these are people who are interested and want to do this. And by the way, [laughs] those are, like, better jobs, no, no question. You know, they're- Yeah...

184
00:31:22.940 --> 00:31:26.090
they're not going anywhere. Like welding- So t- yeah. I mean, well, they're-...

185
00:31:26.090 --> 00:31:33.840
is one of the most in-demand skilled trades right now because every rack that goes into a data center, all the components have to be welded into that rack. Sure.

186
00:31:33.900 --> 00:31:40.599
And there just are not enough welders here right now, and so some of that work is being done outside the country, you know? And I- Mm-hmm...

187
00:31:40.620 --> 00:31:49.250
and that's what I was trying to tell the town is I was like, "You could benefit from the AI boom without subjecting yourself- In a totally different way... to the AI bust." Yeah. Yeah. 100%.

188
00:31:49.500 --> 00:31:54.240
You, you could train a, a million new electricians and become the hub for that because, like, there... I...

189
00:31:54.700 --> 00:32:03.040
There isn't a single electrician I've spoke to who isn't, "I am booked every day forever," because there's nobody. Yeah. It's crazy. Yep. All right.

190
00:32:03.100 --> 00:32:14.140
Give me an example of one really, like, measurably positive outcome that comes from your election in the first year or so, something you can actually feel, something you can actually control.

191
00:32:14.940 --> 00:32:27.760
So two years ago, when unbeknownst to us, the town council started thinking about writing or thinking about approving data centers in the town, they wrote this ordinance, and it was basically to create...

192
00:32:27.940 --> 00:32:34.400
They w- they positioned it as we were so forward-thinking, and, like, other towns don't even have data center ordinances.

193
00:32:34.520 --> 00:32:48.820
And it's 10 pages long, and it spends more time talking about what the data center buildings should look like than actually regulating how they operate and mitigating risk and harm to the town.

194
00:32:48.920 --> 00:33:00.590
So one of the first priorities that I have is I hope we can stop the data center project. Mm-hmm. I really do. I think it's a horrible idea for our town. If we can, I would love to.

195
00:33:01.960 --> 00:33:12.630
Being realistic, that that may not be an opportunity, and I'm still... I sued the town over it 'cause we collected almost 3,000 signatures to refer it to the ballot for the zoning. Mm-hmm.

196
00:33:12.630 --> 00:33:17.160
And the town threw the signatures out on a technicality, so I sued the town for throwing the signatures out.

197
00:33:17.340 --> 00:33:28.600
If we can't, between this and the detention facility, I think we need stronger ordinances that actually mitigate harm. So that 10-page ordinance needs to be about 100 pages long.

198
00:33:29.040 --> 00:33:33.389
It needs to quantify and qualify what an emergency is. It needs to measure...

199
00:33:33.510 --> 00:33:42.109
'Cause our, our ordinance only measures audible sound, and what we're finding out is that audible sound is not the issue with these data centers. It's infrasound, which is this- Mm-hmm...

200
00:33:42.180 --> 00:33:48.820
very low frequency sound that you can't hear, but you can feel it. Mm-hmm. And it's not a decibel issue. It's a tonal issue.

201
00:33:49.020 --> 00:34:04.100
And so I think bringing in partners from University of Arizona, which is just down the road in Tucson, from other local community colleges, from think tanks, from engineering firms, to do an actual [laughs]

202
00:34:04.160 --> 00:34:07.760
fully researched assessment based on hyperscale data centers.

203
00:34:07.810 --> 00:34:17.120
'Cause the other issue is that they went and visited a bunch of regular low-density data centers, so it's kind of like saying, "Well, based on this, [laughs] how this Toyota Camry runs-" Mm-hmm...

204
00:34:17.240 --> 00:34:26.870
"I wrote an ordinance for how this aircraft carrier's gonna operate." [laughs] Right. You know? It's like- Right... it's... I... They just... And it's hard. It's just so disingenuous. Scale is hard. Totally. Yeah.

205
00:34:26.900 --> 00:34:36.040
Like scale, scale is a very hard thing to understand. And so yeah, I think one of my first priorities is to put, to amend the ordinance here to actually mitigate harm.

206
00:34:36.100 --> 00:34:50.130
And then another priority is immediately starting to meet with the unincorporated residents in town, because that has been one of the most frustrating things for them and myself, is everything this town does impacts them,

207
00:34:51.060 --> 00:35:00.710
but starting probably about 20 years ago, according to longtime residents, the town just stopped wanting to hear anything they had to say. And that's not sustainable because rural communities- Mm...

208
00:35:00.820 --> 00:35:12.930
are more sensitive to environmental change because they more directly depend on natural resources. So I have a well out at my ranch. Mm. I am seriously concerned about groundwater. Sure.

209
00:35:12.980 --> 00:35:24.320
And what's crazy here, too, is that I live in a subdivision that's got hundreds and hundreds of houses in it. This entire subdivision is on one giant well, and I don't know how many people actually know that here.

210
00:35:24.360 --> 00:35:38.740
So yeah, I think starting to actually listen to people, establishing regular office hours to make sure that we're getting feedback, and continuing to talk to people who disagree with me. Like I, I want to talk. I...

211
00:35:39.060 --> 00:35:47.020
It's great to be in a room full of Democrats who all will think I'm wonderful and agree with me and think everything I say is brilliant.

212
00:35:47.160 --> 00:36:00.020
I get a lot more constructive ideas from being in a room full of people who don't agree with me. Yeah. And it's not easy, and it's not always fun, but it's important to show up and to actually care.

213
00:36:00.480 --> 00:36:08.440
Do you wanna get elected, or do you not wanna get elected? We categorically don't en- endorse any specific party, person, company, whatever.

214
00:36:08.480 --> 00:36:19.340
We really took to note after 2024 this great little quote by Representative AOC, "We can't just be right. We have to be effective." And, and- Yeah...

215
00:36:19.380 --> 00:36:26.940
that is pretty broadly and specifically applicable to a lot of towns and states and issues. And

216
00:36:28.080 --> 00:36:36.960
it's great to be an idealist and hear people say, "Fuck yeah," and it's another one to be like, "Yeah, but you don't have the votes to-" Yeah... "to do that." I appreciate that. I really do.

217
00:36:37.080 --> 00:36:51.619
Where can the people find you and, and support your campaign? Yeah, so voteforjackie, F-O-R, and then Jackie, like it's on my shirt- Mm-hmm, mm-hmm... by the way- Love it... um,.com is my campaign website.

218
00:36:51.660 --> 00:37:01.739
Formorana.com- Okay... is the website for myself, and I'm running as part of a group of four candidates. So- Nice... we're all first-time candidates.

219
00:37:01.980 --> 00:37:17.040
Look, I think, especially thinking about Run for Something, one of the most important things that we all could be doing right now is finding and supporting better candidates for public office. It's not easy to run.

220
00:37:17.620 --> 00:37:31.660
It's not cheap. If you're gonna do it right, it's not cheap. I work in tech, so I, I make a decent amount of money now, and taking the last six months off to do this has cost a fortune.

221
00:37:32.100 --> 00:37:44.620
And so I think the more we can do to find qualified candidates, to enable them to run, to raise money for them, to donate to their campaigns, we need younger people running for office.

222
00:37:44.940 --> 00:37:57.100
If you, if you need to know why we need younger people running for office, go watch the hearing where Congress questioned the CEO of TikTok. It is one of the most- Yeah, it's, it's rough...

223
00:37:57.160 --> 00:38:07.540
horrific examples of people making laws that they don't understand. And, and it... We had the same thing happen at our planning and zoning commission when we were saying, "Hey, you...

224
00:38:07.660 --> 00:38:19.790
This ordinance says they can only run their generators in times of emergency, but you don't actually say what constitutes an emergency," and their lawyer just stood up and said, "Not getting enough power from the grid is an emergency."

225
00:38:19.840 --> 00:38:25.300
Our grid can't provide that power right now. They're gonna be running on generators for at least the first couple years.

226
00:38:25.620 --> 00:38:34.060
And one of the planning and zoning guys, who was old enough to be my father or grandfather, did this. "Y'all got one of these, don't you?"

227
00:38:34.740 --> 00:38:46.540
And he holds up his phone, and he says, "Those generators don't come on, your phone doesn't work." And literally everybody in the audience under 75 yelled, "That's not how that works."

228
00:38:47.020 --> 00:39:01.760
[laughs] And so I mean, we really... We have people- Mm... in power who are making laws that they will not be alive to realize the impact of. Yeah. And don't get me wrong, with age comes wisdom.

229
00:39:01.820 --> 00:39:10.520
There are plenty of people out there who are 80 who can keep up with me cognitively, energy-wise, know more than I do. That is absolutely a thing.

230
00:39:10.580 --> 00:39:17.869
There are also just a lot of people who end up running for office after they retire 'cause they don't have a lot better to do. Mm-hmm.

231
00:39:17.950 --> 00:39:29.500
And so when a government is not representative of the people, when there aren't people in government who understand STEM, like we need more scientists. We need more engineers. We need more teachers.

232
00:39:29.600 --> 00:39:41.070
We need people in government who actually understand the things that they're regulating, and we really, especially in smaller communities like ours, we don't have that. And so- Sure...

233
00:39:41.160 --> 00:39:52.510
all I would love to do is encourage more candidates who are qualified to run for office. I try to take positives away from what's happened politically the last several years, right?

234
00:39:52.540 --> 00:40:01.680
And I think one thing the Donald Trump phenomena tells us is that people aren't voting for the person. Some of them are. People are voting for the policies.

235
00:40:02.660 --> 00:40:07.300
And I met a Black family from the South Side of Chicago who lives in our town now,

236
00:40:08.240 --> 00:40:20.020
Trump voters, and what the dad said to me that really resonated with me is he said, "I voted for the dude 'cause even if some of the stuff he says is crazy, he's at least gonna try to do it.

237
00:40:20.780 --> 00:40:29.620
And at least he's somebody who will do what he says he's gonna do." And I think if you can get past your initial reaction to that- Mm-hmm...

238
00:40:29.670 --> 00:40:46.340
to thinking about it, what that means for me is that as a purple and pink haired, tattooed, younger woman, people are not responding to how I look. Some of them think I'm cool, but they're responding to what I'm saying.

239
00:40:46.470 --> 00:40:55.220
Mm. They're responding to me understanding the issues that impact their everyday lives and being able to talk to them on their level about the things they care about. Sure.

240
00:40:55.240 --> 00:41:09.810
And so maybe we've gotten past the point in politics where everybody expects you to be a perfect, you know, upper middle class, white, married Christian. There used to be this whole litmus test for becoming- Oh, yeah...

241
00:41:09.810 --> 00:41:15.289
a political candidate, and if you didn't check off all of these boxes, don't even consider it. Mm-hmm.

242
00:41:15.400 --> 00:41:24.420
And I think we've gotten past that, and I think that it's safer for candidates who are not mainstream to run than they think. So

243
00:41:25.380 --> 00:41:31.700
if, if you're out there, if you want to run, if you want somebody to commiserate with about how fun it is [laughs] like...

244
00:41:31.900 --> 00:41:43.220
[laughs] Yeah, I think we really, we need to be asking ourselves where to find better candidates because having to choose between two different dog turds and decide which one smells the least bad has- Mm-hmm...

245
00:41:43.230 --> 00:41:52.310
been my experience voting for years, and I hate it. Yeah. And now that's where we are. But, but- [laughs]... yeah, I, I really appreciate that perspective.

246
00:41:52.620 --> 00:42:05.020
If you wanna find somewhere to run, go to runforwhat.net I believe is... You can drop in your address and see what offices are available. But also Jackie and, and candidates like her are, are actually everywhere.

247
00:42:05.260 --> 00:42:12.140
I always tell Amanda my, my favorite email, which is not a phrase I use lightly, is the one she sends every week.

248
00:42:12.180 --> 00:42:20.060
It's just good news about incredible candidates just like you all over the country, and you're just like, "This is amazing. These people are doing the thing." Thank you so much for your time.

249
00:42:20.360 --> 00:42:25.260
Really, really, really appreciate it. Please keep it up. Again, you're not trying to be a Luddite about this.

250
00:42:25.270 --> 00:42:34.810
You're trying to say, "I have informed perspective, and I'm, I'm willing to say things that other folks aren't," and maybe we need to do a little more of that. So thank you, Jackie. Yeah.

251
00:42:34.810 --> 00:42:46.000
Well, thank you for the opportunity and for having me. That's it. You can check us out at our new site and new URL at themostimportantquestion.show. That's themostimportantquestion.show.

252
00:42:46.400 --> 00:42:58.570
You can check out our very quickly growing YouTube at Important Not Important. Please subscribe and like and all that stuff. And of course, you can follow us on the socials @importantnotimportant on Instagram and TikTok.

253
00:42:58.780 --> 00:43:03.370
You can buy our merch at shop.importantnotimportant.com. We've got great stuff.

254
00:43:03.500 --> 00:43:14.590
And of course, almost everything we make is free to you, not to us, so you can support that by joining the membership and get some bonus episodes too at importantmembership.com. Thanks.