Jonathan Bush

Joining me now with a cup of coffee in his hand. I heard you were quitting that, by the way. I'm moderating. Moderating. You're not low energy anything, I've been told. Jonathan Bush, nice enough to join me this morning. Of course, a Republican candidate in the primary for governor in 2006. Seeking your votes. I seek your votes. I look forward to earning your vote. Indeed, you do. So we've got a lot of campaign now in the rearview mirror, but a little bit ahead of you. You said 50 days, right? Is what we got left? I think it's 50 days, 51, June 9th, carry the one at a Saturday. Indeed. But it's every day. is 20% more of a day than the day before. Yep. So it's like exponential. It really is. Yeah, I mean, we were out there getting signatures in January, you know, and you're running for what? When? Who are you again? Yeah. And now, you know, you walk into a room and they're like, you know, caffeine, ha, ha, you know, and they know basically what you're saying. And most importantly, they're there. You know, we had... A couple events yesterday. One yesterday in West Gray, 150 people for a state rep, a race. And the day before, we had two events. Oh, no, one in Cape yesterday, another 50. My house. Rockland, another event, 60. These are... So you're barnstorming. Small numbers, but they're huge compared to the first six months of the campaign. Huge. Indeed. So tell me a little bit about where you stand today. Obviously, I covered a little bit of that straw poll the GOP did. But I've also been cautioning people as they look at those types of things that they're all meaningless because ultimately, the end of the day, the voting on election day is the one that matters. Right. There has been one poll that I know of that is an actual poll, not a... opportunity to email a link to your team to get your team to click, which is a perfectly fine game to play in politics. I mean, as long as you are clear what it is, was in February. You know, that was the last poll that I've seen that had like a statistical sample. And the problem with that was, of course, that nobody, as the poll said, 70% of people hadn't made it. Yeah, they hadn't really met people who consider them. Among the 30% of people who know what they're going to do in February and a primary in June. You know, you saw the ranks. Well, since then, a lot of stuff's happened. I mean, you guys have started some higher profile debates, which is nice. Yes, yes. The commercials are being run. The meetings with the 50 people across the state every, you know, one by one, the barnstorming. And you pick them up, yeah, 50 at a time in Maine, you know, it's only 100,000 votes probably. So how do you feel about where you stand right now? I feel really good. I feel really good. Obviously with, as a bush, there's a, you know, wait a minute, is this the lamb that's going to follow the lion? Some. entitled little dweeb that, you know, comes from another era? Or is this, and, you know, and then I started, look, I'm a veteran, I'm an entrepreneur. I created 5, 950 jobs in Maine. I've had my own path, and it's been a main path. And invariably, when I get in front of people, or when I get my message in front of people, they go, oh, okay, that.

In fact, a lot of them say, Jesus, damn it, there's so many candidates. I was hoping to just write you off because you're a Bush. And then you find out that you're actually a, you know, you're someone who sort of fits the day. And so I've got to process you too. And that's been great because in the end, I do think voters in Maine right now do want an outsider. I don't think in this incestuous ball of Augusta noise, we need another lobbyist involved. And the other thing is, I think a competent CEO, when you've got that much bloat, you know, took our biennial budget from basically $6 billion to $12 billion, there is a major reengineering project necessary. And so somebody who hasn't done any corporate reengineering and is going to start thinking about it or planning it or seeking advisors to do it. next January is a bad idea. Somebody who's already done it, has it in muscle memory, is what we need. You know, since last I spoke with you, and again, we're speaking with Jonathan Bush now. The end of the legislative session has happened. They did another budget. As if the last ones were bad enough, I didn't really think I would be hating the next budget this much, but here we are. The only thing you can say about this legislature and this budget is if you're a Republican trying to convince... Unenrolled Mainers that this is the time to vote against the Democrats. Yeah. This is the best set of laws. They are giving you ammunition. They are giving you candy, but like the fire truck on the 4th of July, just throwing candy out, taking us from the fifth highest tax load state in the country to the third. Beaten only by California, which has Silicon Valley, and New York, which has Wall Street. Then Maine, which is the fifth poorest state in the country. Nobody. chases the American dream away like the Democrats in Augusta, just suffocating. And while it's tragic, it's a great thing to have to point to at election time. Yeah, to run against, that's for sure. I mean, you know, the thing that was surprising to me about it, although I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised in retrospect, but the idea of actually raising taxes in an election year, it's not something you usually see them do. The only thing better than raising more juicy and just. crazy making than raising taxes, raising a tax on election here, is raising it so that you can then give them out as checks. with your signature on them. Yeah. As, as Queen Janet has done here. This is, I would, I've done. Well, isn't that one worse, though, because she's rating the rainy day fund for that part of it? It's just astonishing. That's what I mean. I mean, it's, it's, it's a developing country, you know, it's the, it's the junta sends out refrigerators to the poor on election, makes them all vote, and then, you know, takes the money and runs. It's literally stuff you see in the developing world. And when we're acting that way in Maine, which is why I'm running for governor. I'm running for governor because I think we should stop accepting the conceit that we have to be a third world country in Maine. It's just, it's just crap.

You know, the pitch that they make on that tax is, of course, that it's only on the ridge. It's a millionaire's tax. Yes. So, you know, it's something that's going to serve the little guy. But is it 2,654 people left that are technically millionaires as they leave in droves? Massachusetts did this. They lost $10 billion of annual gross income from the state. That $10 billion a year. marched out of the state. But you also have to remember it's not. And so three things. One, millionaires can move. So don't laugh. And then, you know, don't try to screw them too hard. They'll move. Those that are left. And remember how many tens of thousands of millionaires come here for 179 days already that we're not bringing in. They go back to Florida for enough days that their house in Maine doesn't count as their home because we tax the crap out of them. But more importantly, every business you see, every single business you see, every landscaper, every plumber, every electrical electrician, every electrical, every single one of those people is hoping someday they sell their business. For 30 years of work, they sell it for maybe a million dollars, two million dollars, three million dollars. Those businesses all are going to get that tax. They're casting it as all of the Elon Musk's. And I'm like, we ain't got any Elon Musk's. We got 137,000 businesses in Maine, one for every eight people. It's us. They are we. There is no they in Maine. And so that idea, that conceit that I'm going to get you money from someone else who doesn't deserve it and give it to you is just. Isn't it also a dangerous little genie to let out of the bottle too? Oh, of course. If you go back in time... Well, we just saw on text day, 3%... of all taxes paid by 50% of Americans. Well, beyond that, though, I mean, I'm thinking back to several years ago when they did the 3% surcharge idea, which was at like, I think, $200 or $250,000 of income. Clearly, they want it to be lower. There's getting the foot in the door with this million, and then it's going to be $750,000, and then it's going to be $750,000, and then it's going to be $250 and then goes down and down. Kind of a camel's nose in the tent syndrome that I see in Democratic policies, where they, you know, they expand Medicaid. So now they're price fixing. That drives private practices out of business, drives more and more money to a smaller number of people that they can then get a chokehold on. And little by little, they're creating socialized medicine. They've literally, by suffocating the free market that would hold prices down, by chasing the free market out of business, they're creating... The need for them to come in, it's like Vladimir Putin bombing the school and then coming in and declaring martial law. You know, they're declaring a need. They're making an emergency for them to step in and socialized medicine. Same thing with schools. You know, capping the charter schools.

adding more and more to the mission. Oh, you don't have your, you know, left-handed autistic dyslexic program. You need to have that. You don't have enough holidays. Adding and adding and adding so that nobody can possibly be a school except the state. adding more and more money, slowly crowding out of free market of education, free choice, free values. This is a program. It's a playbook to suffocate our freedom. It also happens to suffocate our economy. Jonathan Bush joining us, and we appreciate him spending some time with us in studio here today. I wonder your perception of how. connected in the voters' minds, all of these things that are happening in Maine right now that are not so good, like the education results going down, the cost of energy going up, the health care situation crumbling taxes. Number of businesses declining. Exactly, right? How much? Zero percent GDP growth? How much do they connect that to the Democrats being in total control for eight years in the state? Because what I'm thinking about here, just let me lay in the plane really quick. You have a midterm effect for Donald Trump being the president of the United States. He just won. It's always not great for Republicans when that happens. Obviously reverse if it's the Democrats. You know, if Kamala Harris had won, you guys would be doing a layup right now, right? So you got to deal with that. And then here in Maine, though, you have this eight years of them being in control of everything with absolutely no one. Right. having any input other than the Democrats in Janet Mills. And everything has gone pretty poorly. Accomplishing basically a full stop to our economic growth. How much does that make sense to the voter? I think that's going to be the race. That's one of the reasons why I want Republicans to vote for me. I think you need to think about the general. You need somebody who's got real chops on economic growth. who's demonstrated the ability to grow. I mean, I brought 950 jobs to mid-coast Maine to what was the second poorest county in the state Waldo. And then during those years, it grew it four times. Incoming Waldo grew it four times the rest of the state. That's the playbook that we need to show to the unenrolls and to the reasonable Democrats to win the general. We've got the... unrest that we need. 51% of Maynors were polled or believe the state is on their old. The ancient Gallup question, right track, wrong direction. We're 51% wrong direction. Their mayors are ready for a change. What we've got to do is bring someone who's a credible economic turnaround person to the game. If they feel like they're going to lose on other things, they might hang in, though certainly the Democrats, but the unenrolls that we're sort of shooting for to win. We don't win without the unenrolleds. And we probably don't win if we don't show up, fellow Republicans, please show up. Indeed. What do you make of Janet Mills, I don't know?

Guess what? It still doesn't work. It still concentrates poverty. That's our issue now. Healthcare, our issue for the first time. This is going to be a big election if we mind our P's and Q's and stay on that economy. So that gets to the question of you versus your opponents. I mean, it's a crowded field. You bet. And you're trying to break out, obviously. And you've already sort of touched on a little bit about your difference with some of the other candidates. You don't have to name names or anything like that. But when you're looking around at the other options people have. Yeah. Why, I know you believe you're the best one, because that's why you're running, right? Yeah. So why? Like, what is the difference maker for you? Yeah. Because, you know, you make a pitch on like a CEO. Yeah. There are other CEOs. Let's do, there are other outsiders. Tell me why you? Let's do, let's do what type of player do we need and then why are you the player? Yeah. I think the type of player we need is somebody who is an outsider to Augusta, as we just described, even people who agree on things because of their, as Hayek would say, they're. patron client networks, their relationships, they're so sucked in. So it's got to be an outsider to Augusta. And then if you look at the bureaucratic bloat, the expansion, it's got to be a competent executive. It's got to be someone who runs large organizations well, who cuts fat in their old brain, not how would, like reading up on YouTube, you know, how do you cut fat? It's got to be someone who does it instinctively. So that, you know, that takes the lobbyists and the, uh, and the other lobbyists out. But then you're down to some CEOs. And then I think the next question is chops for the job. You know, first of all, have you created jobs in Maine? Do you know what's that's like? Do you know how to do that or will you be doing it for the first time? I'm the only candidate running that's created 900 jobs in Maine. One of the other candidates was created, you know, under 100, but a great effort so far. I think that's another cut. If you have not actually grown Maine's economy and you don't know what that's like and you haven't had the faith in Maine to do that in the past, I think that's a cut. So now you're down to how are you with bureaucracy? How are you with helping small businesses survive bureaucracy? What have you done? Well, my company, Athena Health, the vast majority of the surviving small businesses in health care today are on AthenaNet. And they will tell you that that is why they survive. So I know what it's like to help small businesses survive. And finally, like, I have done restructurings. I have gone into messy organizations and cut fat. It will not be something I'm learning to do or planning to do. It is something I'll be executing on J1. And those things are only true of me right now on either side of the aisle. You know, we have a couple minutes left here, so not too much time. But one other thing that I definitely have for a priority for my vote at least is somebody who... I definitely want your vote. Well, thank you. I want somebody who... feels like they have the personality of somebody that wants to turn the tables over, if that makes sense. Yeah. Are you mad enough? Are you, are you? But also recognizes that that much changes. Yeah. Are you, right? There was a word of, I had, I've been working on our, I guess, Oxford County chairman and a key part of our campaign, someone I really respect in Maine politics, Lisa Kime. You know, she was like, I'd.

I can't believe with your CEO lifestyle. I took me a while to believe that you were ripped enough, that you knew the pain that we were in to be able to act, to lose friends over it. And I was thrilled when she came on board because I think it means that she sees it. And when I get in a room with people, I can make that case. But you're right. From a distance, somebody who hasn't, you know, had a hard scrabble. I have not had a hard scrabble life. I've taken my life and made it useful with every ounce of my existence. But when I got a chance to get around Maine and see that Belfast was the only Belfast with the only town of that size with all the store windows full, You know, I began to be, first I was dismayed, and then as I studied it, I became angry. And I think you're right, you need someone. And that's why we need an outsider, by the way. Because you need to be angry enough to keep going. You need to fire a lot of people in rapid succession. And if you haven't fired people before, you know, it ain't easy. But if you know deep enough in your DNA that it's necessary, necessary for the survival of others, but also necessary for those people who are living in wasteful jobs to get out and get into better ones, you can do it quickly and well. Give me the website right as we get out of it. www.johnathanbush.org. Thanks for having me, man.