Get Used to It: Ep. 160, "Voices of Our Lives: John Pérez, Part 2"

(typewriter tapping) (upbeat music) - Hi, welcome to "Get Used To It." I'm Sheila Kuehl, and as always all be guiding you through this fascinating show. And today we have a very special guest John Perez, who is the speaker of the California Assembly. Welcome John. - Thank you for having me. - Well, it's always a pleasure to have you, and this is sort of like John Perez's life part two, because I think the last time we talked, I think you were just elected to the assembly. - I think so. - So first of all, congratulations, it's quite historic. Are you the first gay person chosen to head a legislative body? - I'm the first gay person elected to be speaker, Allan Spear was President of the Senate in Minnesota, but that's a more ceremonial post than it is the actual leader of the body. - Well, it's quite extraordinary. And how about a gay person of color? - Yep, that I'm definitely the first. - Definitely the first. Well, let me ask you your experience sort of getting to be here. I mean, it's very unusual to elect a freshman to be speaker. And one of the reasons the assembly does it is because they'd like you to have a nice long run as speaker, but here you were sort of barely finding the stairwells for being at the assembly. What was it like that first year being in the assembly, being a gay man of color, being new and then suddenly people were talking about you as speaker? - I mean, the odd part is because the term limits everybody's new to a certain degree. And as you know, I spent years dealing with the building long before I ever served. So in very odd ways, I had more institutional memory than some of the members, even in their last term, just because of the years of working with legislators before I got there. And quite frankly, I was very lucky because my predecessor speaker, Karen Bass immediately tapped me to be the chair of the Democratic Caucus the day that I got sworn in, in the assembly. So my first year wasn't the typical first year. We had really good legislative experience and a really bad budget experience. We had to close about $60 billion of deficit in the course of my first year in office. That was two budget years, but one calendar year, made the focus of everything we did the economy and the budget. And that really informed my view of what my role as a speaker as well. - I remember those caucus meetings. I mean, I think a lot of people think that when we say the meeting of the Democratic Caucus, it's they think of it being off campus and political, but in the California assembly, every week, the Democratic Caucus will meet and talk about actual bills or the budget. And since we're fortunate to have pretty sizable caucus in California, must be kind of a free for all. - It is a free for all. As the chair, it was my job to bring order. And quite frankly, we had very orderly discussion, but they were vibrant discussions. (Sheila laughing) Especially when you're looking at making those kinds of choices. - Sure. So what was the budget experience like for you? It looked painful from the outside. - It was painful, it was absolutely painful. You had this reality of the global economic crisis and the fact that our structure in California amplifies the highs and lows. And so what was a bad year economically was a horrible year in terms of budgets. So we had to vote on devastating cuts that nobody ever thought they'd have to be a party to. And we also had to vote on some short term tax increases, that weren't exactly people's ideal either. The preference would've been to smooth some of that out to create longer term stability. But we have this rare situation in California that in order to get a budget, you require a 2/3 vote. Situation that only exists in three states, California, Arkansas, and Rhode Island. We're not a whole lot like either of those two states in our size or in our complexity. And so that made the budget process all that much more frustrating. - Well, it also takes 2/3 vote to raise a tax, but it only takes a majority vote to lower one. - Correct. - So it's kind of a ratchet effect really for the budget, because you might have a fee like we used to since 19, I don't know, '41 or something where we used to pay 1% of the value of our car or 2%, and nobody even noticed anymore. And then when that went away, you can't get it back. - Correct. And that was originally a short term reduction that people assumed would be a reduction for all time. And when that got ratcheted back, there was a kind of violent reaction- - Right, and it was an automatic to come back after a couple of years, but I think it led even to the recall of our former governor. People thought he was imposing a tax. So it's not an easy job, but let's say at the moment we're talking about, you're not speaker yet. Karen Bass who looks like she's going to Congress is still speaker. And what was your experience in committees and kind of finding your way around the building and with other people? - It was a great experience. I was very lucky, I got very good committee assignments. I was on the Business and Professions Committee that regulates just about every industry, you can imagine. I was on the water Parks and Wildlife committee in the year that we negotiated the largest water bond in the history of the State of California. Something that was really the result of 20 years worth of work, coming together in one legislative year. I was on the transportation committee in a year that we were talking about implementing the work to do high speed rail. So I had very good committees. And I was on the appropriations committee, which- - [Sheila] Always a very good committee. - Always a very good committee, a different experience when you have no money to appropriate. (Sheila laughing) - True. But something happened in that first year, because as I remember you were talking about running for the state Senate, because that seat was gonna open up this year in 2010. - It made sense to me, the Senate district I live in was coming open. That allowed me to extend my time in office. So instead of serving out six years in the assembly, I would've done two years in the assembly, gone over to the Senate, where I'd have an opportunity to serve eight years. Giving me a total of 10 years potential in office, which in California's a long time, you're one of the rarities that got to serve the full 14 allowable under law. And so that was really my plan. My plan was to go over to the Senate to be able to serve as the legislator, as we worked out of the recession. And then the last couple of years in office would be in a time when we were back under more normal economic circumstances. And then you could actually deal with the whole range of legislation, not overly limited by the immediacy of an economic crisis. And that's what I intended to do. My colleagues had a different point of view and they started- - [Sheila] Your colleagues in the assembly? - My colleagues in the assembly. And so they started an effort to draft me, to run for speaker. There had been several candidates, some of whom had been at it for a couple of years. And handful of my colleagues, primarily my women colleagues, began lobbying me and kind of trying to encourage me to run for speaker. I kept saying no. And over a period of time, they built a critical mass that all but forced me into the race. - Well, it's interesting when that happens. I mean, I think it'd be hard for you to say, "Well, they must have seen my leadership potential "or whatever," but from the outside, even looking, it was clear even before you were elected, that people were thinking, "John is very smart, strategic in a way "that is not opportunistic." I mean, real strategy. Like how do we get from here to there. So I can see why they would do that. But it must have been difficult, especially for the people who had been working at it for a while. - Right, it was. And quite frankly, I think in the end people's assessment of skills is one thing, the other is the evaluation that in a term limited environment, there is a value to creating stability. And so there was an attraction to having me serve a speaker because I'd have the opportunity to serve four, four and a half, even five years as speaker, that I'd be able to be speaker through the entirety of the next governor's term of office. So it would put the Assembly on a more equal footing with the executive branch, and a more equal footing with the Senate. And it's really important to have the right balance of power between the Assembly and the Senate and the executive branch to make sure that we get the right combinations of legislation and the right combinations of approaches to issues like our immediate economic crisis. - Did you sense from anybody that there was a problem with them about your sexual orientation? - Oh, absolutely. It was after it became clear that there was a critical mass to support me, there were some that used that as an impediment to try to force other people not to vote for me. There were some that went to Democratic members from tough districts saying, "You really don't wanna go "campaign for reelection in your district, "if you voted for the gay guy for speaker." There was an effort to get the Republicans involved in blocking me for that reason. And in the end, after I got the unanimous vote of the democratic caucus, and we went to the floor, usually once the majority party chooses who their nominee is for speaker, there's a little bit of a kumbaya process. Both parties come together and they vote on the speaker. That had been that case for 12 years. And this time for the first time in 12 years, the Republicans decided to put up their own candidate, knowing that he could only get 29 votes, but because none of them were prepared to vote for me. - Not one. - Not one. But this isn't unusual. I mean, you know that in the last 15 years until this year, there hadn't been a single Republican vote in the California legislature for any pro gay legislation. - Even the slightest, I know. - Even the most basic issues of non-discrimination. That's beginning to change. - On the Republican side? - Yeah, so this past month we brought up a resolution calling on the Congress and the president to overturn, Don't Ask, Don't Tell. And a couple of Republicans had come to me and talked about how torn they were. And by the time we went up to take the vote, I presided. And as you know, the speaker, doesn't usually preside, the speaker Pro tem, more often than not presides. The speaker tends to preside on a couple of key issues, but really is working the overall body more than presiding. I wanted to preside over this issue because I thought it was important to have the speaker presiding on this issue. And we had two Republicans who not only spoke for, but voted in favor of vote for turning Don't Ask Don't Tell. One of them, a Marine who served in both Afghanistan and Iraq. And so when the bill or the resolution then went back to the Senate, we had a Senate Republican speak in favor of it as well. He had just come out. So it was a slightly different dynamic over there. - Slightly different, right. - But in the assembly, it was two straight Republicans. One of whom was a Marine. - Well, I'll tell you, it is interesting, the way this issue often gives people pause, though they usually fall back on sort of what they were gonna do anyway. In 1996, Pete Knight brought his bill to bar gay marriage. For the first time in California law to write in that it has to be a man and a woman. And every time anything about gay stuff came up on the floor, a bill, there would be a three hour debate. So different from all the other debates, you could hear a pin drop. And people would be talking from their gut. I mean, both sides of the aisle in those days. And after the vote, all the Republicans voted in favor of Pete Knight's bill and quite a number of Democrats, in those days, I spoke about our families. There's a picture in the "LA Times" of me wiping tears away, which I was ashamed of at the time, but I think I'm not now. But after that was over, one of the Republicans, about half an hour later, came over to me with a present and a card, and wrote, "I think I voted wrong. "From now on, I'll be with you." Which he never was. But people are moved by our presence. Have you found this? Because now you're in leadership and that's even stronger. - I found it my first year in office. It would be interesting, anytime, any issue coming up round gay issues would come up, in the middle of the debate, invariably, a handful of Republican members would come over and wanna chat with me and pre apologize for the vote they were about to take. And then the vote would go down, and another handful would come over and apologize after about the fact that they had to vote the way that they did, not because they wanted to, but because they felt that that's what their district would expect of them and punish them if they didn't. And it was always frustrating to me because I think I know about the gay or lesbian relative in every Republican legislator's family, because they've all come and told me about that. And then they vote against that person's interest and apologize to me. And my standard answer is, "I'm not the one you should be apologizing to. "You should be apologizing to people that are in your life, "who you're voting against." What we've seen is the vitriol has turned down, a little bit last year, and it's very different now that I'm speaker. We didn't have a single vitriolic speech against the resolution to overturn Don't Ask Don't Tell. And were shocked by it. Not a single vitriolic speech. And the only speech that sort of was against it was an equivocal speech by a retired Marine Colonel who talked about the need to end, Don't Ask Don't Tell, but wasn't sure that legislating the resolution was the right approach, very different debate. And quite frankly, part of it is how much we moved forward as a community. Part of it's how much the broader discussion has moved forward nationally. And part of it is not wanting to have an argument you don't need to have with a speaker. - Yes, well, that is a reason why too. It's a very wonderful thing. That you're in leadership, not just your own personal qualities. And the reason why we talk a little bit more on this show about issues related to our sexual orientation and what it can mean. One of the things I think people don't realize about serving in these elected bodies, especially one as small, even though there's 80 of us in the assembly, because there's over 400 people in the Congress, you really hear, you really engage and you really talk. And every day you're dealing with some issue that is life and death for somebody, and it really causes you to identify for yourself who you are and what you stand for. You put your mic up to make a speech, and it's not just all posturing on a lot of these issues because this is about poverty, this is about hunger, this is about education, this is about whether people can catch a bus in the morning. And it's quite extraordinary. And that's what I found in the debates on the gay bills as well. Though it's not the most important thing in the long run that we did on the floor. But especially the Anti-discrimination and the Domestic Partnership Registry Bills. - I remember when you had AB 101, the Dignity For All Students Bill, that added sexual orientation to the non-discrimination section of the Education Code, simple concept. Just say that in our education system, we believe kids ought to be protected from all forms of discrimination, including discrimination based on their real or perceived sexual orientation. What a simple concept. Who would think that schools should be an acceptable place to discriminate against kids? Simple concept, yet the vitriol in that debate.. I have a picture in my office of one of your then colleagues, standing up and speaking against that, Dick Floyd, who was cigar smoking curmudgeonly guy who lifted his mic, and this was the year that Jerry Falwell said that Tinky Winky was gay. And Dick Floyd reached into his desk, pulls out a Tinky Winky doll and starts talking about how preposterous their point of view was, and how important it was to pass your legislation. And it was one of the more meaningful speeches I had seen somebody give. And it wasn't coming from somebody that you would normally expect to make that speech. - [Sheila] Oh a curmudgeon? - From that day forward, I've had that picture up in my office. - But here's the thing, there are a number of pictures of that day and in one of them, there are two women sitting in the public part behind Dick who was in the last row, his lesbian daughter and her partner. And that is the other thing, John, I think about being somewhere. Yeah, I was the first one. And then when, Carole Migden and then a few more and a few more, but it was still, people would think, "Gee, I don't think I've ever talked to a lesbian before." It just makes a difference, they have to rethink. Have you found the same thing? - Oh, absolutely. I mean, the funny thing is when I got elected, I was the first gay man from Southern California to serve the legislature, first openly gay person of color. One of only two in the assembly. And the number of times I had to keep coming out to my Republican colleagues was shocking, even though I'd made press and was in everybody else's writeups. And having to have that coming out discussion over and over and over again with the colleagues, and the sincerely naive questions that would get asked that weren't mean-spirited by any means, but it was the first time for some of these people to have a frank conversation was very interesting. - It is very interesting. And of course, now they can no longer say, "Gee, I never met one." 'Cause there we are. So since you've been speaker has that... Let's talk about in the assembly and then let's talk about sort of the larger world. Have you seen even more of a difference in terms of acceptance, or I wanna talk about your larger agenda, but I'm just thinking about... 'Cause it's just you and Tom Ammiano now. Except. - Although that's changing. - Well talk about that. - Well, so in 2008, the last remaining gay members of the assembly were termed out. One went to the Senate one left office, 'cause there wasn't any place to go. So on the outgoing side, there were zero gay members returning. Tom Ammiano from San Francisco and I both got elected and came in , two openly gay members, one gay man, one lesbian in the Senate. - [Sheila] Right, Mark Leno and Christine Kehoe. - Mark Leno and Chris Kehoe, small world. I mean just very, very small group of us. And so going into this year, there were some opportunities to elect folks and to expand the number of LGBT folks. As a result of this Tuesday's elections, we now have three new incoming legislators who are likely to come in. They're Democrats in very, very safe Democratic seats. It would be unprecedented for any of 'em not to win in November, but they still have to get elected in November. We've got Ricardo Lara here in Los Angeles area. - Another man of color. - Another man of color. We have Tony Atkins- - San Diego. - Lesbian from San Diego. And then we have Rich Gordon, a county supervisor in the Bay area. All three coming in. So we'll go from two- - And all out. - All out. We'll go from two to five openly gay or lesbian members of the assembly. We definitely have Chris and Mark. We have a Republican Senator who's termed out who just came out. And we have the potential of electing another Senator, John Liard. He was termed outta the assembly and will be running in a special election. But moving from two to five in the assembly, historic, there are 51 Democrats, so with five openly gay or lesbian members. That means that basically 10% of the Democratic caucus for the first time ever will be LGBT. - The right percentage. - We think so. - We think, of course. Or it could be more. - Although more could be good. - Yes, more would be good. Let's talk about Ricardo. Because it's interesting. There's this sort of mythology, which we talked about the other day that communities of color are so much more homophobic, that this is a double problem as it were. And yet Southern California's gay men who were elected are both Latino. - Right, both Latino from overwhelmingly Latino working class communities. My district is 86% Latino, it's overwhelmingly working class, it's one of the most working class. - Right it includes downtown, right? - Downtown LA, the East side of LA, Little Tokyo, South LA. It is a hard working, working class district. And people told me, you can never elect a gay person there. And there was a lot of projection, and there were those in the gay community who didn't wanna get involved in my race because they said we don't believe in getting involved in competitive races in that part of town. And therefore didn't invest anything in terms of money or effort to get me elected. And I was overwhelmingly elected, both in my primary and then in my general, by 86% of the vote. Ricardo had a little less of that than I did, partially because, one, we proved them wrong two years ago. And people kind of learned from some of those mistakes. But there wasn't the same investment in his campaign that there should have been either. He was heavily, heavily campaigned against. Hundreds of thousands of dollars of independent expenditures. Some which I find incredibly offensive, to use the tagline, "He's not on our team." - Really, meaning he's gay and you should know it. - That's kind of how I read it. - Oh, it sounds like. - So to mail in time and time again, these pieces that said he's not on our team, and then not have the organized LGBT community respond, was a little disheartening for me. But Ricardo was overwhelmingly elected. He got one and a half times as many votes as his closest competitor. And he's gonna do great going into November. - And he had worked for the- - Previous speaker. - Previous and the previous? - No, he worked for my predecessor as speaker, and he worked for previous assembly member in his area as well. - Right, Marco Firebaugh. - Marco Firebaugh. - Who passed away. - Correct. - So well, it's very interesting. - Yeah, we had a couple of chances to pick up that- - That we didn't get? - That we didn't get. In the 53rd, in the South Bay area, we had an openly gay mayor of a city, Mitch Ward running, but we also had a wonderful straight ally, running, who had been engaged in a lot of- - Who did win the primary. - Who did win the primary. But there had been an opportunity to pick up that seat. And then in the Napa Valley area, we had a city council member, Mike Wilson. - Who just lost by a few hundred votes. - Very narrow loss. So there was a possibility for greater success. And there will be in the future. - Well let's talk then of what that means in terms of the bigger picture, because I guess Martin Luther king talked about, the arc toward justice and the way history- - "The arc of history is long, "but it bends towards justice." - Exactly. See, I knew you'd know what the right words were. It seems to me that that's kind of what's happening. Now, I'm a bit of an optimist. I think that, like Anne Frank, I think people are good. And that when they're faced with having to make these decisions about whether to be prejudiced or not, if they had never thought about it before and now they think about it, many, many of them decide that just doesn't suit them. - That's absolutely right. Now, the second half of the quote. It was, "The arc of history is long, "but it bends towards justice. "We are inextricably linked in a fabric of mutuality." And so the second half of that means that we have to be involved in each other's lives. That our progress is dependent on us being involved in the fights for other people's progress as well. And so I think if you look at the places in which we've been successful, it's been because of that mutuality of action. You look at the people historically and you started it. But every openly gay lesbian person who served in the legislature has been involved much more broadly than just the LGBT community. And it's all of that coming together that gave them the skill sets, and quite frankly, the support to get elected and be an effective legislator. When you came in, in '94, you were that lesbian assembly woman from Santa Monica. When you left... And this is one of the things that's meaningful to me, after you left, there was a competition between legislators, as part of a contest with YMCA. So legislative family feud where, we're asking each other a bunch of questions. - Right, I remember that. - And one of the questions, the year after you left was "Which former legislator do you miss the most?" And the top three answers. Number three, was John Laird, openly gay member from Central Coast. Number two was George Plush, a straight man from Southern California, who was the Republican leader. Number one was Sheila Kuehl. (Sheila laughing) So two out of the three most missed legislators, were you and John. And it wasn't because you were gay or lesbian, it's because of the relationships you had built and the legislation that you had moved forward. - Well, I also found... Two things occurred to me, as you were speaking. One of them is the intersections represented by people in a way, like you and me. Because lesbians are after all women, and many were engaged in the women's community, working on women's issues. And when we came out, there was a big struggle in the women's community about whether to purge all the lesbians from the women's stuff, because they didn't want the real world to think they were all lesbians, kind of like what happened in women's basketball. But there was also this feeling like, well, my God, they're running half of all of the organizations, they've been there forever, maybe we oughta think about their issues too. And the same thing I think has happened... Though I can't speak for communities of color. Where coming out and being in that intersection became the thing that opened up the discussion for those communities, and can lead to intersection. - It's funny, as you were telling the story, I was thinking back actually to Martin King, Martin Luther King for a second. And you listened to some of the greatest speeches, and the speech that's most recalled is the "I Have A Dream" speech at the March on Washington. But who were the leaders of the march? He was the great speaker, but one of the best organizers who really laid the foundation for march was Bayard Rustin- - A gay man. - Who was gay. Gay African American, who was one of the foundational leaders of the March on Washington. And people came to Dr. King and asked him to distance himself from Bayard Rustin, and he never did. And if you look at some of the great photos of that speech over his shoulder, over Dr. King's shoulder in the middle of that speech, is Bayard Rustin. This openly gay man who was a central figure in organizing one of the seminal acts of the civil rights movement. - I think there's also, I don't know exactly how to put it, but let's say low expectations about likability. Because when you say. When John Laird and I left and people say, "Well, we missed them the most." And of course, John had a wicked sense of humor, no question about it. And I might have been a close second or first who knows. And in a way it's sort of like smiling and tap dancing, so you won't get hit when you're a kid. But I think there was, certainly when I came in and nobody even knew what gay people were like, theoretically, this low expectation about whether they would like you or not. Because there was a front page, "Los Angeles Times" story, after I was sworn in and been there a month or so, and the subject matter was Republicans like Sheila Kuehl. Front page story in the "LA Times." What does that tell you? It's news. And so I'm not saying, we don't have to work harder like everybody else, but I think there's also this feeling like, you know, I like him. Because there must have been some Democrats who thought, "Well, I don't know about him being speaker." - There were some, but I don't think it was because I was gay. And it's interesting, I got a lot of press. I mean, every article introducing me as a potential speaker, and then when I got elected, in the first sentence was gay. And that was true of electronic media coverage as well. And it was interesting to see the public response. Generally, very positive. Like everybody, I got hate mail. More of our hate mail though, the majority of my hate mail is based on being Mexican, not based on being gay. And the most vitriolic hate mail I get is race based. I haven't gotten any really vitriolic hate mail based on being gay. So it tells you how far we've come on one front and how far we have to go on another. - Well it's the immigrant population is in the middle of the griddle and it's Latino immigrants that are really the focus of people's vitriol now. I mean the biggest issues of the day, really, at least in the Western part of the United States, really have to do with that. So let's talk a little bit about the larger world and the impact, beyond issues of being gay, and I wanna come back later to our issues kind of in the budget. But what are the main things that you are focusing on? Let's say, we'll talk about the budget in a minute. But just from your heart, what would you like to- - Well, I don't think you can disconnect the budget for my heart. The single biggest challenge facing us is the degree of unemployment in the state of California. 12.3% of the population is unemployed, 2.3 million people without work. In some parts of the Central Valley, the unemployment rate is as high as 40%, because the combination of a global economic meltdown, the mortgage crisis, and a multi-year drought, devastating certain communities. So you can't not focus on that. That also reinforces our budget crisis. It creates the circumstances under which we find ourselves. - 'Cause we're also heavily dependent on income tax. - Correct, and in a way that even as the economy recovers, it takes us two years to appreciate that recovery because the ability to write down the losses a couple of years after the loss. So that is where my heart is. If we have a bad budget solution, we devastate social services at a time when people need the most. When you look at the budget that the governor has proposed, not only is it devastating to services that people need in the hour of greatest need, it also, his budget, moves between 380 and 430,000 people into unemployment. It takes us from 2.3 million people unemployed to 2.7 million people. It takes us from being the state with the third worst unemployment in the country to being on par with Michigan, as the worst unemployment in the country. You cannot rebuild from an economic crisis, when you move hundreds of thousands of people into unemployment. You also can't expand rights at a time of economic crisis. There has never been a significant expansion of rights for any group, in an economic downturn. The greatest growth in rights and equality protections have always come during times of economic boom. So on a variety of levels, the economic crisis and the unemployment challenge is our number one challenge today. - Well, people say to me, "What are they gonna do?" They say two things to me, "Aren't you glad you're no longer there?" Which I would have to say, no and yes. I don't miss the anxiety, but I kind of miss the, you don't have to wonder what the meaning of your life is when you wake up in the morning, it's presented to you every minute. But what are they gonna do? - Well, I threw out the governor's proposal for the budget entirely. It's based on a bad premise. It's based on a premise that the responsible thing to do is to walk away from people in a moment of need. And it's based on a premise that it's okay to leave federal assistance on the table when you could otherwise draw it down. And so I crafted a complete different vision of the budget and we call it the California Jobs Budget. And what we do is we borrow from a revenue stream that we already have, to create a jobs fund, and we finance that borrowing by taxing oil, that's extracted from the ground in California. We're the only major oil producing state that doesn't do that. So this would put us on par with Texas and Alaska and Wyoming. - Alaska, signed by then Governor Palin? - Absolutely. - Right. - All states that are oil producers like us. So it just takes us on par with them. And then it takes that money and invests it in jobs. It pays back local government for money that the state owes them. It pays back schools for the money that the state owes them. It increases our education funding by over $3 billion. It decreases our long term debt, and it sets aside a billion dollars for private sector, job creation. So my budget, instead of moving people into unemployment, protects the jobs for those people whose jobs were in jeopardy under the governor's proposal, and actually grows private sector employment in the current year, by 30,000, but lays the foundation for longer term expansion. It also draws down five and a half billion dollars more, of federal money than the governors does. And when you're trying to grow your economy, having money circulate in that economy is a very rational and productive thing to do. - In the two thirds budget vote environment, however, that means that you have to get a few members from across the aisle, to agree with you. For which in the past they've been severely punished. And of course the governor has the choke hold on the budget because if he doesn't sign it, he doesn't sign it. And he already said, I don't care if it goes till November. Which is easy for him to say, because he doesn't have to wait for a check to come in the mail. And I'm not talking about legislators, I'm talking about poor people. - Real people. - Yeah. - First of all, I think that that's a posturing statement by the governor, I don't think that's his honest position. Second of all, we've structured in a way that Republicans don't have to take any tough votes in my budget. The only thing they have to do is vote to adopt the budget itself. Everything else can be done by simple majority. Republicans haven't traditionally been punished for voting for a budget, they've been punished for voting for taxes. We've structured this in such a way, where we don't require Republican votes for the tax. So it makes it easier to do. - So, you're protecting all your members- - I'm protecting all my members. - The way a speaker is supposed to. - Exactly. Second, this is a revenue that broadly makes sense, that people are generally supportive of, and that doesn't have any direct impact on the average Californian. 'Cause I'm not trying to pass broad based taxes that people have a hard time absorbing in this economic crisis. Additionally, the governor's already proposed an all severance tax himself in the past. He just never structured it the way that I'm structuring it to do jobs protection and job creation as the underpinning of why you do it. But we've already this year done a couple of things. We've done a green manufacturing tax credit. We've repurposed some of our gas tax money, for transportation, construction and transit operation. We've done things to stabilize the housing market. All of which helped stabilize our economy, all of which we did on bipartisan votes. And I've worked very hard to create the environment whereby Republicans have a greater role in both the decisions we make and the responsibility for being part of those decisions. - Are there particular issues in the budget that the LGBT community should be aware of or is aware of? I know that HIV aids funding in the past has always been a little at risk. - It has always been a little at risk. My budget proposal creates some certainty and protections there. Quite frankly, a lot of the governor's proposal does this year as well. So that's not the area. There are some issues around social services funding. I had legislation last year, for example, that expanded competition for funding for domestic violence shelters that serve LGBT folk. There are some small issues like that, there aren't any broad based issues that are disproportionately impacting the LGBT community. But one of the things that we don't talk about as community a lot, is poverty within the LGBT community. There's this popular mythology that we are a wealthy community, and we're not. We run the gamut like everybody else. We have wealthy LGBT folks, we have middle class LGBT folks, and we've got poor LGBT folks struggling to get by. And one of the things that we'd only often talk about it as well, when we look at poverty services, lesbians are twice as likely to live in poverty than straight women are. So making sure that we protect the social safety net for those in poverty, ends up having a little bit of a disproportionate benefit to the LGBT community. - Well, that has always been sort of the hidden truth. I think whenever you want to demonize a community, you find any way you can possibly to do it. And one of the ways has been to talk about them as extremely privileged. You know, I represented the west side of LA, which is thought of as uniformly rich. And it's very rich in many places, but not everywhere, including all those people living in their cars in the Malibu Hills, that come fleeing out when there's a fire. So I think it has been really a hidden thing. And do you think you could really, with the budget, impact the turnaround from the recession? - I think we can. If you pass a budget that gives you immediate budgetary relief, but moves people into unemployment, there are huge out year consequences. It makes the recession deeper and harder to get out of. If instead you can actually secure people's employment, that creates a better situation. One of the challenges in terms of getting people to spend money and to stimulate the economy, is what degree of certainty they have about ongoing employment. So stabilizing makes that benefit. Second of all, the fact that we actually do this private sector economic stimulus has a benefit, a huge benefit. Third, because we pay back local government, local government actually does more economic stimulus and should, than the state does. So we put local governments in a better position to do the economic stimulus that's necessary. Lastly, we fund education in a way that is incredibly important for our long term economic stability. We have billions of dollars more for K-12 education, than the governor's budget does. We also fund higher education at the same level he does, but I pay down half of the fee increases that the governor's proposing, to make sure that higher education is attainable for middle class families. - When you say pay down, you mean it would be less costly for students. - Correct. - And their families - The governor's proposing, a 10% and 15% increase for students at UC and the Cal State University systems, respectively, my budget gives them enough money to offset half of that, so we don't create the same economic pressures on middle class families that are struggling to put their kids through school. The last thing we do is we invest money in community colleges, over a hundred million dollars. So that as you have people who are in unemployment, you create funding necessary at community colleges, for those folks to get training and retraining, to get into the new jobs that will get us out of this. I believe that our future in California is particularly dependent on our ability to capture jobs in green tech, biotech, nano tech. Those are all good quality jobs, but we need to create the economic environment where they can thrive here. - Well, let's talk about the future, since you brought the word up. Kind of been, in the time we have left, looking at two things. one is, what do you hope will be the legacy of your leadership? I can't just say your legacy, 'cause as you know, t's all a team thing. - Absolutely. - But you have four and a half, maybe even five years as speaker. What would you hope would be your legacy when you leave and after those years? - I think the single biggest is actually what we're talking about, making sure that we collectively were part of stabilizing the economy in a critical moment for our state's history, and put us back on track for expansion instead of retraction. This is a state that historically had funded infrastructure and education like nobody else. And over the last 30 years, we've consistently moved in the wrong direction. Through this crisis. We have to ask ourselves tough questions. And I think we could rebuild ourselves as a state that is visionary again about investing in things that make sense for our broader economic prosperity. And so this budget is a piece of that, but it also informs the way in which we look at our opportunities to create ongoing opportunity, education and real focused job creation. - It's really not rocket science. - It's not. - In terms of the success, because there's no such thing as the success of a state, it's really about the people who live in the state, and whether they can be successful or not. When I went to UCLA about 1400 years ago, it cost me $58 a semester, because the state paid almost all of the cost. There was nothing but student fees, that's what they were, it wasn't even tuition. And given that my family had no money, that was the complete opening of the door for me. And I think it has been for so many. - It was for me. - [Sheila] Tell me about it. - You went to UCLA 1400 years ago, so I went to to UC Berkeley, I don't know, 700 years ago. (Sheila laughing) It created opportunities for me that I would never have had otherwise. So one of the great things about being speaker of the assembly is in addition to being speaker of the assembly, you are also a regent for the University of California system, and you're a trustee of the California State University system. And so I got to go back to regents meetings this time as a regent. Meetings I hadn't been to in 20 years, and a group of students came in protesting the fee increases that were being proposed. And I said, the last time I was in this room- - I was you. - Was 20 years ago, and I was you, and I still agree with you. And that's what informed, making sure that our budget spoke to that , and made sure that we didn't make short-sided decisions. One of the challenges in a crisis is you can make short-term decisions that are rational and deal with the immediacy of the problem, but undermine your long term opportunity. And we've gotta be very careful not to do that. - I think people are looking at that in what they call the oil spill, which is, I mean, an oil spill is like something that falls off a high chair. I mean, this is so damaging, but it had to do with short term decisions that led to long term disaster. And it's the same in anything. - It also had to do with the fact that we have been taught wrongly, that the way to spur the economy and to support business growth, is to not have regulation. When the real answer is having smart regulation. And so here we have a situation in the Gulf that was more likely to occur, because of the lack of appropriate safeguards. And you see, after this, a willingness to have conversations about regulation. You see, after certain airline crashes, a willingness to have conversations about regulation, but then when you start turning that into legislation and trying to pass it, immediately, the opponents say, you're gonna kill the economy. You're gonna kill job creation. - Well, that's 'cause they sell us this bill of good, about the trickle down effect, if you- - Well, they also think that the invisible hand is a real thing, and shouldn't any- - And hardly anyone believes that anymore. I mean that's market fundamentalism, I think is what the term that George Soros used to call it. - I'm not a big fan of fundamentalism of any sort. - I can see why. But actually, I don't know that we've been taught so much as we've been kind of, it's been tried to be hammered into our head, that if you remove regulation, then there will be a great spur of creativity and jobs, and that's against all the evidence. Because it really serves really the aggregation of wealth. You know, we all lost money in the last couple of years, everybody from top to bottom. But I read in the paper the other day that there are more millionaires now than there were two years ago, in the country, and that a greater amount of the wealth of the country as a whole is aggregated than ever before. And that was pretty much for those millionaires. So it's really not the wealthy who really sacrifice in these times. - Well, and that's part of the challenge with what we did in the budget before. Who were we asking to sacrifice? We were asking the people with the fewest resources to make the greatest sacrifices. I had a flashback to a great speech that Jesse Jackson did in 1988, where he talked about ham and egg justice. He said, "At the surface, it sounds fair, "but the chicken only has to drop an egg, "and the hog has to drop a leg." And so on the surface, things can look fair, but there is an absolute disparity in terms of where the impact is. - Well, let me talk about the future in sort of from another angle, which has to do with our community. It seems as though we've made enormous strides. - We have. - People are voting for us. People are talking about our marriages as though it's no big deal. People are talking about the military and really understanding, as you said, even across the aisle, one person- - Two. - Two people saying, well, this doesn't make sense. What do you see in terms of the future for our community? - I mean, I think you're gonna see this continued expansion. It's the power of people coming out and having frank conversations with each other about who they are, so that it's harder to demonize us when you know us. I think you had a quote, something about "discrimination, demonizing, "the truly fabulous." Was that your quote back in the day? - To Jim Brulte. - Yeah, the Republican leader of the assembly at the time. But there is that power. We are having enforcing conversations to be heard that were never heard before. And once you personalize this, once people start identifying with real people, as opposed to some amorphous boogeyman, it really does create a very different reality. Now that's as a community as a whole. For individuals, it's still a very individual situation. People still have to come out on an individual basis. They still have to struggle with all the demons in their own personal lives and their own problems. I have a nephew who struggled to come out, even though I'm his uncle and he has an older gay brother, but for him it was still a hurdle, and he had to deal with those issues on a personal level. And so we should never find ourselves in a place where we are so comfortable with the progress we've made as a community or individually that we've failed to understand the challenges affecting individual members of the community. - Do you have peers? One of the things that I found wonderful in the assembly was that suddenly I had people who were exactly on an equal level with me, with whom I could have the most frank discussions. But in the old days, when we used to sing in elementary school, we used to talk about the cheese standing alone. Does it feel lonely or do you have peers? - Sometimes. You don't, I mean, you have peers, but as a member of the assembly, I had 80 peers, as much as you said, we were all there together. As the speaker, I have to make certain decisions that impact everybody. And I can't necessarily be an equal peer with everybody because I have to make certain decisions for the group. It's not my preference. My preference is to empower the assembly as a whole, as much as possible, but there are those moments. So my peer is the president Pro tem of the state Senate, but it's only one, and it's very different to have one peer at that level than to have a big group. But there's a good safety net of folks that are helpful. And quite frankly, a lot of the former speakers have offered to be very helpful. - Yeah, I went on a trip, just a vacation with my sister several years ago to Alaska. And when we were in Anchorage, we rode by or walked by the legislatures building in Anchorage, which is where all the Anchorage legislators had their offices. And so I thought, well, I'll just drop in. I was the speaker Pro tem of the assembly at the time, and maybe I could catch somebody to talk to. So I walked in and the speaker of their gathering, their assembly, was there. So I asked if I could visit with him. And so we were having sort of a visiting fireman's discussion, about how it was very similar. And he turned to me and he said, "Could I ask you a question though? "Do you guys allow your dumb members to chair committees?" (both laughing) - I don't wanna ask what your answer was. - I said, "Yes, of course." Because I thought, "Well, it would be funny to say no," like we were discriminating against people. And if I said, yes- - True discerning. - I'd probably indicate that maybe there are some dumb people. But, I thought it was so funny because it was kind of like a similar kind of issue. And not really that you may have had to face that, I'm sure they're all geniuses in the assembly now, but- - All, but two, I won't tell you which two. - I won't tell you which two, right? - But it is funny. I've picked up the phone a few times, and talked to speakers of other states, usually to place a bet on a game. - Oh yes, of course. - But you do get into some great conversations. - And are you in touch with any of your gay colleagues in other legislatures or- - No, not really. I mean, occasionally you'll run into to somebody, somewhere, but not in any regular basis. I mean, it's a pretty all encompassing job. It's hard to even take time to just come up for air sometimes. - So not much of a personal life at the moment. - Not much. We're by all accounts, still the eighth largest economy in the world. We were sixth larges, when we had a Democratic governor. - So in the five minutes remaining, let me just ask you sort of about your hope kind of for your life. You're a very young man. I mean, compared to me. So then you're speaker for a while and then you're not. And people say, "Oh, they're always looking for the next job." But of course, with term limits, and no retirement paid, you have to kind of think about it. What would you see as five great things that you would think that you would love to do in your life? - Well, usually people just say what's next. And I always say, I don't know. But you gimme a choice of five, it's kind of tough. - Okay, tell me- - So I mean, one option is obviously to see if there's an open congressional seat and serve in Congress. My staff tells me I could run for statewide office in California, I'm still not sure that that's possible. I think getting elected within a district was historic and quite frankly, a stretch, and applying that statewide, I don't think is as much of an option. Quite frankly, I'm very happy at the end of my time to go back to do some of the work I did before, organizing in the labor movement, giving voice to workers who didn't have a voice. That's always a very appealing place to go back to. If money weren't an issue, I'd love to go back and get a graduate degree and teach. But I don't know that money's never an issue. - No, money's always an issue and you don't always have it. - Right, so those are some of the things that are out there. - So John, what's been the best thing that's happened to you since you've been speaker? I understand being speaker is the best thing, but- - The best thing or the coolest thing? - The coolest thing. - Well, the coolest thing was getting invited to the White House for a state dinner, second state dinner of the Obama administration. They invited me back, go to the White House, take a date, which is an interesting place to take a date to a state dinner. And in the car on the way to the White House, my office texted me and said, "Do you know where you're sitting?" And I stupidly said, "I think we're sitting in the East room." And they said, "No, no, no, within the room, "where are you sitting?" I said, "I don't know." And they said, "You're sitting at the president's table." - Wow. - And I didn't believe them. And I checked online at "The Huffington Post" and sure enough, there was a sitting chart, and I was seated one person away from the president. And got to spend an amazing evening of substantive, but casual conversation with the president on a whole array of issues. And then when it was done, went down to a little private performance and got to dance at the White House, and have a chat with the Supreme Court justice, and that's a pretty cool thing that doesn't happen every day. - Well, you deserve it as well as about a hundred more cool things. And I wanna thank you very, very much for spending the time with us and having this frank talk. I know that all the people watching and probably another million who aren't watching yet, wish you a lot of luck and goodwill being speaker of the California Assembly. And I wanna say to you, thanks for being with us. And if you have any dreams that you would like to fulfill, get used to it. (upbeat music)