Senators John Fetterman and Dave McCormick: Bipartisanship, Money in DC, Datacenters, Graham Platner

It's one of the most important states in this presidential race.

[MUSIC PLAYING] Both of Pennsylvania senators, Democrat, John, a federal man in the Republican Day McCormick voted in favor of the bill. In this situation, we both agree that shutting our government down is wrong for our commonwealth and for our nation.

So we're looking for ways to find common ground and when we disagree, we disagree. But when we disagree, we agree. Our votes are about country over party at this point. Well, we're trying to set a good example

because we have lots of disagreements. But we trust each other. We like one another. And we look for ways to work together. [MUSIC PLAYING]

“I thought the best way to kick this off was to actually”

give both of you a few moments to just say what's on your mind.

And so I think in the rules of parliamentary decorum, Senator Federer has a senior sitting senator from Pennsylvania. Maybe you can start. I'm proud to call Senator McCormick a good friend. And our things are very more polarized.

And now I refuse to engage in the kinds of extremism. And we're going to fight together for Pennsylvania and for our nation right now. And we're going to continue to have conversations like this, whether in Pennsylvania or here across.

So we have to find a better way forward through a lot of the circumstances. Yeah, I think one of the benefits of being in a place like Pennsylvania is that the voters expect us really to find ways to work together. And if you put this moment in perspective,

I think it's probably the most consequential moment in all of our lifetimes. And in fact, I think it might be the most consequential moment in human kind, which is a big statement. So much change is happening.

It's artificial intelligence, of course. But it's really how that's affecting everything. Life sciences, defense, energy. It's a moment of enormous change. And that change creates a lot of anxiety

that lends itself to polarization and extremes. And so if there was ever a time where it's more important to find ways to work together, it's now. And so we've found ways to work together on everything

from energy policy, to fentanyl, the fentanyl crisis, to anti-Semitism in Pennsylvania and across the country, to drone technology. And these are issues that are of such consequence that you can't get there by just being with your team.

“You have to be able to find common ground.”

And we've really looked for ways to do that. I think he could confirm. Pennsylvania keeps you honest now. And now, I'd like to remind everybody that we are the only two people in our respective cycles

that flipped seats. That's really, both parties want that. We want to flip seats. It's like, well, we've done that, because I think we've rejected the extreme kinds of views.

And now, it's better to work together for Pennsylvania, or for our country, for right now. And AI is really, really important. And we'll sometimes we'll put me at odds where the direction that the Democratic Party

seems to be moving in that now. So now, more at Torium for data centers. For me, that's a China first kinds of policy for that. I'm going to continue to push back that. I'm not going to describe that as a scourge.

I'm going to describe that as an incredible new opportunity.

And now, my friend, he organized an incredible symposium in Western Pennsylvania that brought AI together in energy. And that's two parts of things Pennsylvania really brings to that table in this very, very important conversation.

“I think that we're at this point now, where”

is it fair to say it as goes Pennsylvania as goes the rest of the country in the sense that if you can find common ground in the state on these very thorny issues, maybe the rest of the country can find ground, and the vice versa is also true.

If you guys can't find resolution, what are the odds at California and West Virginia making it up? Find resolution. So what is it like, day in the life in the US Senate, trying to find these compromises?

Because from our perspective, outside in a lot of the time, it just seems like nothing is happening. Dave? Yeah, I think if you step back, I know we look very similar, but we have many similar backgrounds in the sense

we both grew up in rural Pennsylvania. And had similar childhoods and John went into public service. I left, went to West Point, went to the military, but we both came back from those rural backgrounds.

is 19 electoral boats.

And that it's a microcosm of the country.

You have these two big urban centers, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, which are mostly Democrats. You have these rural areas that are mostly red, mostly Republican. And you got to build a coalition across those to win.

So ironically, a lot of the same people that voted for a center of federal and voted for me, and voted for President Trump.

“And that's the coalition you have to build.”

And in particular, it is a working family's coalition. So the thing that's ironic is that even though all the national unions would have endorsed Kamala Harris and Bob Casey, my opponent, the rank and file, two thirds of the rank and file, the electricians, the pipe fitters, the steam fitters,

voted for me, same with him. They voted for him.

So we actually, even though we have a lot of differences

in our parties, we have come together around that coalition. And that coalition includes a very significant Latino turnout, a very significant African-American turnout, the highest African-American turnout in 2024 in the last 30 years. And so that coalition, I think, is up for grabs.

Who wins that coalition of Pennsylvania and who wins it in the country? I think we'll dictate the future to a large degree in 2028 and beyond. And so that's what we're working on together, because we're trying to build that coalition

to do good things together in Pennsylvania. The Senate is at an all-time low in terms of approval rating. We have the lowest approval rating of a president in history. After Biden, who was extremely low-rated, you guys can't control the debt.

The American populace, believe we'd be in a golden age right now. They're not seeing it, inflation is soaring. The president seems to be running a muck. Has no check in the house. And you guys are responsible.

Tell us what you really think. You know what I mean? Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln. Well, and $40 trillion in debt and you're spending more than ever.

“So the American people, I think, are extremely frustrated”

with both parties. It's great to see you guys come together. But what are you going to do to bring back some balance between the branches of the government? Because this does not seem to be going in the right direction

for anybody but the people in this room, which is to say the top 10% of our society. Well, for me, if you were a French inflation is soaring, well, just recently, that's primarily driven by energy prices right now.

Now, why are those energy prices high? Well, because the president decided to hold Iran accountable. And now, I'm the only Democrat that actually agrees with that. That was not a radical idea for a Democrats. Every single person running for a president

as a Democrat said, we must never allow Iran

to acquire a nuclear bomb. And now, we have the opportunity to hold them accountable. Why? That's why I continue to vote. And against these war powers act now too.

So for inflation, yes, now, absolutely. No one thinks $5 a gallon is great. But if you allow Iran to become nuclear, that's going to seem quaint, if $5 a gallon, holding it out too.

So what's driving this economic conversation overall right now?

“So for me, I think what's most important now”

turn everything as a partisan thing. And that's the danger where if we despise Trump, more than we are concerned about Iran becoming a nuclear power, that will have profound implications for not just in that region, but all us for a global stage.

Right now, that's the difficulty moving forward now. I've said this in the podcast for all in. Who's the leader's party? I'm like, that's TDS, 100%. You know, our party is defined by the opposition

of whatever he comes out for. I've said Trump comes out for ice cream and lazy Sundays. We're going to hate that shit. And we're going to vote it down. Now, we all have a bandwidth and we all have a platform.

You know, I feel like you have to discriminate. I don't care about the ballroom. If you want to build it, sure, great. I was there for the White House course by an adenter. And I saw how dangerous that was for our leadership.

But I don't care about the reflecting pool. But now we can't stop talking about all this other kind of shit. So we can really focus on things that's more important. When now, it's become all just distracted by the small, small ballgame.

I mean, like, your, you guys are going to be forced

to confront the filibuster, which is this critical bulwark

that sort of leaves some sort of attempt at finding common ground out there. But there's a lot of pressure to end it.

“I think Senator Fetterman, you said you'd”

be supportive of ending the filibuster. Is that where we're going to just total tribalism? Let's talk about the filibuster. Let's talk about that. The entire Democratic Party, including myself,

we were so wrong about the filibuster. In my cycle in 2020, every single Democrat identified, we have to eliminate the filibuster. Seems like it makes sense. Now, and thank God, I think, we had people that stood there,

whether it's Senator Manschen or Senator Cinema. History has vindicated there was them to do that thing. And now, Democrats, we all wanted to get rid of it in 2022, and 2025, we f***** love it. And now, it now, it reforces people to work together with both sides.

Now, if you turn the Senate into a smaller version of the House and majority, now, that would have profound, profound implications

for now, so now, someone that'd be the first person to announce,

hey, I was so wrong about that. That's one of the kinds of Hill I would die on now to defend the filibuster, how important it is to the Senate, but also set it for the minority rights, whoever that happens to be in that time,

“that's what's so critical what the filibuster is”

to governance here. Well, I would say, first of all, Congress, but lots of institutions right now have very low public approval, very low trust. That's a huge problem.

It's across all areas to church, public officials, business, in many cases, so we've got to rebuild trust in our institutions. And one of the ways you do that to your own personal conduct. So one of the things we can do is try to set the example. If you look at my voting and his voting,

I'm an unapologetic conservative.

I vote as a conservative.

At the same time, that doesn't mean you can't work together. So we look for every opportunity for bipartisan legislation. So I've got more bipartisan legislation than anybody. We've collaborated on dozens of things together

because you can do both. And the filibuster, I mean, it is frustrating as a business person. I was in business for 25 years. So frustrating, the pace of how slowly things move.

But I do think it creates the requirement, the impetus, to get things done. And I would disagree with you.

“I think a lot of big things have been done.”

I look at, if you look at the energy agenda, we can't win the AI race without energy. And we made huge progress energy. I'm hoping we're going to get permitting reform, which would be the biggest economic lever

we could possibly get done over the next six months or the next two and a half years. We've closed the border. We've stopped the flow of fat. Now we had 4,000 people who died in Pennsylvania

in the last year of the Biden administration. It's 1600. This year it's down 60%. Those same statistics nationally. And then there's huge intractable problems

like the debt and the deficit, which are existential, that we're not dealing with. And that's not a product so much of the filibuster, not the filibuster. That's a product of the polarization of our country

and both sides taking advantage of anybody willing to look at a problem in a hard way. - My question was though about the bottom half of the country in the K-shaped economy and how it's not working and you guys

are phenomenally unpopular with that group of Americans. So is there a way to make a total of well-concentration? - Yeah, well-concentration. The bottom half is not happy with-- - No, no, it's a huge problem.

And I don't think I listened carefully last night. I just want to tell you, that is a huge problem that's growing. That median income in Pennsylvania is 52,000 dollars a year. When you guys say AI or AI, I mean, these folks, they've been down this road once before.

When a bunch of smart rich people said we got the answer, it's called globalization. And what happened to my hometown is there was a mill of 2,000 people that got gutted. It's not 100 people.

So there's enormous anxiety, but it's because there's no path to getting ahead. And everybody in this room, the last 10 years has been the greatest 10 years in the history of humanity for those who have assets.

- So do you have a plan? - Yeah, well, there's got to be a number of plans. Well, do you have a plan? Because it's not just going to be me, it's going to be us. Because right now, I am a beneficiary of capitalism.

I have been wildly fortunate because of capitalism. But we are going to lose capitalism unless we find a combination of ways to address it. So what are the ways? The University of America counts as a perfect way, right?

The school choice provision in the working family's tax

cadet, $1,700, everybody in this room can give $1,700 every year. Billions of dollars that are going to go into a school choice for making sure everybody has equality of opportunity. If you don't do that at maximum scale,

and this moment leaves the majority of Americans behind, we're not going to be able to get anything done. - Fed more money on programs. - Yes, spend more money, but not spend more money, spend more money in giving people opportunity.

So the reason those two accounts are great, it takes it out of the government. It circumvents the government. It's based on incentives and choice by people that have wealth. It's sort of Andrew Carnegie brought to present day,

take that wealth, put it in the hands of those who will benefit

from it, but it's your choice. It's not decked up dictated by the government. I think that's going to have to be part of the answer. Does anyone in Congress subscribe to the notion that I think is rooted in, you know, empiricism that the more we spend,

the harder it is for people to have economic mobility? And I think that there's a simplified notion that government have to play a role in driving people's progress.

“And the truth is, the more government intervenes in markets,”

the more inefficient and the more expensive those markets get. And therefore, the more inaccessible wealth and value creation is for any individual. And the freer the market, the less the government intervenes, the less the government is spending,

less the government is buying. The better things get for people generally speaking. And it seems to me every time I visit DC, I leave profoundly unhappy because I meet with people in Congress. And this is a notion that seems to be diametrically opposed

to their viewpoints that everything is about doing more for people, government needs to do more on both sides of the aisle. Versus if the government did less, things would get more affordable, things would get more accessible and people would have greater economic mobility.

Well, I mean, you know, talk about the government. Now, we had not just won, we had two shutdowns. Both were historic in terms of their length. Now, we couldn't just agree on very basic things. And now, we've shut the government down collectively

for over 120 days or whatever now. So then that's one of the things as a Democrat or a few to engage in that thing. If that's a core responsibility as a senator, keep our government open.

And for the love of God, find a way to agree enough to keep things open and put things in risk and make our country less safe. You know, I'm proud to be a capitalist. And our capitalism is the one system that has proven

to raise life's standard of humans across the globe. You know, and now people in my party, and now we're having bad ideas refused to die. And now we're talking about socialism and communist right now.

We have candidates now, I am a communist, these things. And it's like, that seems interesting. You know, what's your point now? Talk to anyone that's had to live under those kinds of regime. Now, they're all absolute capitalists right now.

And that's absolutely the fact that the market will have fixed a lot of these kinds of problems. And I'm not terrified by AI. Am I concerned about it? 100% right now.

And with the mythos and other concerns about mass hacking and a weaponizing in that way, that's coming. And now I think that should belong to America. We know that America should build that chassis.

“And now that's why, if we turn my party into war,”

AI is the scourge or the cancer, I refuse to reject that because it's got to transform the world. Now, it can come from us or it can come from China who side are you're going to be in? And a lot of the people that oppose that.

Now, a lot of that opposition is funded by a lot of these groups that are aligned with CCP. So that's part of the danger we're in now. So that's the dangerous time right now. And Democrats now, my party, the problems are billionaires.

But we love the billionaires that fund our kinds of views and our views in that too. The target people, people call out pesos or whatever. Like you don't do that. Don't call out private citizens identify them in the problem.

They are creating jobs.

If you've never created a job, don't criticize.

People that have really changed our economy for the better, honestly.

“Why is Graham Platten are doing so well in the polls?”

This is a candidate that has a literal Nazi tattoo on his chest. Yeah, I know. What his history tells us comes next if he wins.

Well, when I was a kid, if someone had a Nazi tattoo,

you probably could call them a Nazi sympathizer. And someone now, and now, just yesterday, we discovered that he was sexting with up to a dozen women, and now Democrats now is something to say, well, what's the big problem?

You know, they're constantly just ignoring a lot of these things. And now, this is a guy that just a couple of years ago, described an American soldier in a firefight with a Taliban. "Dumb motherfucker that doesn't deserve to live."

That's his words. Who does that, who lurks on there? And he's really a tough guy behind a keyboard. And I can't explain other than that. It's a backlash to how partisan things are.

Someone like that should have been in this race right now. So here we are.

A guy that was sexting up to a dozen women.

He's getting a swallow on.

“And now we're kind of just, oh, what's the big deal?”

Why not confront that and just then call that out? And that's the danger, if now, these kinds of views. Could you imagine, can you imagine if either one of us described an American soldier as a dumb motherfucker that deserves to live?

Or he described our army as absolute trash, absolute trash. And that's a viable candidate now. And that's a bizarre place to live right now, as a Democrat. And if he wins, what does that tell us about where we're headed? Well, look at what's happening there is.

I mean, there's problems on both parties. But certainly what you've seen on the left is two things. I think it's indisputable. One is a migration to these terrible ideas of socialism

and Marxism and so forth.

When addition to that, this really rise of anti-Semitism and hatred and the tell here of how pervasive it is is the people who are now campaigning in Maine, Chuck Schumer. These are mainstream Democrats that have now lurched so far to the left.

And I think this is going to be, if those candidates win, and that becomes validation of the viability of that stream of thinking in the Democratic Party, I think it's horribly unhealthy for America.

“Ironically, the best thing we want if we're Republicans”

is a strong Democratic Party that keeps us honest and keeps us in check with good ideas. And that's not happening. And as I said, we have problems on both sides. But I think that lurched the left is really frightening,

a frightening thing. Oh, and then let's say, and you just brought up Israel. So that's a profound betrayal for my party on Israel and not to. The people that are winning a lot of these elections,

one of their signature view is anti-anti-Israel and borderline just raw anti-Semitism and from a lot of these candidates, now too. And that's exactly where we are. And now that has isolated me in the party

and just calling that what that is. I mean, that's dangerous. And that's where one of the things that we happen to agree on. That's the right side of history for me and that's-- I mean, maybe one of the best things

that can happen is Shapiro continues to do well on Pennsylvania.

“Irrespective of which party you align with,”

a prominent Jew winning in Pennsylvania running that state well is a very good sign, actually, for the rest of the country that there is common ground in that anti-Semitism is much more in check than the perception that we had also on.

- I think Josh is fantastic. - Yeah, and he has a lot of disagreements about us maybe going into this war and maybe being egged into doing it. And by the way, Fetterman, if you're looking or freeberg,

if you're looking for the source of why people feel comfortable saying these terrible things, you can look no further than Trump and what he said about McCain being a war hero. That started this, actually, this rhetoric.

And everybody wants to one up it. He said he's not a war hero and he got captured. That's where this started. Sachs? - Oh, please.

You're trying to blame Trump for the fact that a Democratic candidate in Maine has a swastika type of threat. - No, the rhetoric, no, the rhetoric. - Okay, all right.

- We started with Trump. - We're in TBS land. - And he needs to go down. - We're in TBS land, but fortunately, we're not interviewing you, Jake Al.

Let me ask, Senator Fetterman a question. - So I appreciate your common sense views on AI, on capitalism, on all the things we're talking about.

appreciate it, and I think you're very popular there.

“But I'm curious, do you ever get worried”

that you might get primary to the Democratic Party when you come up because, I mean, the Bernie Sanders wing is powerful. They have a lot of activists. They're very noisy.

I mean, do you ever, I mean, I appreciate your Maverick streak and your independence, but do you, how do you think about that risk? - Well, a seed or a job is not,

I'm always gonna be, I'm gonna be honest,

and I'm always gonna have, you know, my votes or my opinions are gonna be what happened to believe is true, you know, it's not a seed worth trying to maintain if I'm gonna lie or to pretend that things aren't absolutely true.

Yeah, absolutely. I'm gonna be primary to there are some Democrats that are angry at me. If they're angry at me for supporting Israel, yeah, they have added.

If they're angry at me, that I think it's wrong to shut down the government, that's fine. If they're angry at me because I refuse to call him and not see her a fascist or a piece of shit. I'll never do that, you can hold me in that too.

“But what's really strange in the truth is,”

somebody that votes like a 93% of Democratic line. And if I changed my party, there was a lot of policy and trick that I'm gonna change the party

and I'm never going to do that.

And if I did, I could announce right now, I am changing it right now. My votes aren't gonna change, my views, excuse me. I wouldn't vote any differently. I think so happen to believe.

And if Democrats run me out of the party, they will be attacking a committed Democrat that votes your line 93% of the time because we're in a unique time right now that I think things are more important than trying to,

I know what pace the bills is a Democrat now. Literally, campaigns are based on (beep) Trump, literally, in their campaign commercials, yes. And in their emails and outrage, you know, it's constant rage, I refuse to engage in that.

And I'm gonna be an example of what I think's entirely appropriate. And a lot of the conversations are driven by people that represent very, you know, safe, loose dates.

“Now, that's why Pennsylvania keeps people honest here.”

And people are gonna remember in 28, oh yeah. Oh, I wanna be bipartisan, I wanna get along. You know, like people don't believe you. And I think they remember what they've said and how people behave.

So that's where I'm at. So, yeah, I could be primary, but what's more important to be the truthful, what I think's our important values and remind people that the things we used to believe in, you know, I remember, I think.

- I wanna just move to just domestic policy and economics for a second.

Maybe you said this incredible story in the green room,

which maybe you can start off with, which is the quantum of people that reach out to you every week to mostly complain about various companies. But just use that as an insight. Maybe to talk about AI because that's a huge part

of your state. It's also a huge part of the American economy. And maybe compare it to what happened with scale and oil because there's a lot of commonalities. I think it's quite interesting.

Guys, I don't know if he gets the same amount. But on an average week, we have 14 million people in Pennsylvania almost. On an average week, I'll get something like 100,000 outreaches to me, letters, emails, phone calls,

and across different issues. And you can almost see when the activists are mobilizing groups to come in and make the case on certain things. And I do a call every two weeks

to sort of an open mic where you get about 10,000 people that show up. And the number of data center calls, data centers have become a much bigger and pervasive thing. And just to put this perspective, David was there.

Dean and I hosted an energy and innovation summit in Pennsylvania last July. We had $92 billion of investment committed. We had the energy CEOs, the AI CEOs, big investors, global investors.

We had a center of federal income, governor Spirocane, the president came, the cabinet came, and it was amazing. And by the way, that's what you need. Winning is a team sport, and winning an AI is a team sport.

And you need all those players at the table. And so it was a real success. And since then, there's been enormous investments made in Pennsylvania. I visited one just the other week home or city.

4.4 gigawatts, a power from a coal plant that's being transitioned to natural gas.

A gigawatts going back on the grid to hopefully

bring down energy prices.

“So this is happening across Pennsylvania,”

but the opposition is growing. And it's very, any organic part to this. Because it's very hard to understand what's happening when you have these kind of dark forces, dark pools. That's funny.

I can't do it. Is there a legitimate, like, I don't want to have this in my backyard for a while. There's enormous misinformation. And I think that misinformation is largely being driven

by China and outside forces. And then there's just legitimate, not understanding, not knowing. And we need to do a much better job of making sure that the outlines of what these data centers mean to communities is clear.

And frankly, there needs to be a much clearer covenant of what it means. If you're going to have a data center to community, you're a township supervisor. Here's what you know.

They're going to bring more energy. They're going to use. They're going to protect their water with closed loop. They're going to get this much to the tax base. They're going to build schools or infrastructure

where they're going to build--

“Isn't that first part the only thing that matters”

in people's minds? I just don't want my energy to go up. No. Because as soon as you get through that, they move to the next thing which is water.

And then the schools are going to be crowded. And there's-- so the schools are going to be crowded. Yeah, they don't. They're going to be new jobs. No, because we knew people.

And they're not making the connection to the tax base. The roads are going to be crowded. So there's a whole comprehensive case that needs to be made. And what Chamoff was making the point-- we went through this before, John and I,

what both lived through this with fracking. Huge campaign against, huge misinformation, lack of understanding. And 15 years later, I'd say there's pretty broad base support.

Yeah, well, no, yeah. There's unlimited money. I mean, you know, they-- someone finds some b-roll kind of a comment

and they put 10 million dollars behind it

and they can turn you into the most extreme kinds of things. Ironically, you know, originally, people try to convince people that I'm a socialist. And now people are like, now I'm mega. Or whatever.

I'm like, no, I'm just-- I haven't changed my views. My views are the same. And I would tell people energy is national security. Look at what's happening in Europe and other parts.

Now, if you don't have energy security, then your national security is in danger. Now, AI is coming. And what he's done, he created this amazing symposium to remind people that, you know, we need both.

We need energy and Pennsylvania produces a lot of that. And now, also, AI is coming. Otherwise, we'd still be using this spinny Jenny or whatever that's called. So why do we talk about data centers?

Because people forces are describing them as a sturdier, cancer that's going to bankrupt you or destroy your community. Now, why do we have that right now? Because this is something that's going to transform our society. The, you know, absolutely, there could be a downside.

But overall, it's going to be much more productive. And that's going to create new opportunities. Now, I refuse to become a part of Luddites. And now that's, you know, like, honest. If I had to vote now, claim that that's all cancer.

It's danger. And it's all downside. Then I'd be lying.

“And that's why I'm saying, Republican or Democrat.”

Now, that's a fact. These things are very, very important. And that's why I'm good at this. Can I just double click on this thing when you compare it to Shale? So in Shale, I'm going to assume that when Shale was escalating in importance,

the pushback were from corporate interests that would have economically lost out. That's what I'm guessing. I'm sure environmentalists, environmentalists, environmentalists. But it seems like an AI we're dealing with foreign state actors. Yep.

Is that fair? Is that, is it as reductively simple as that? Well, if you go to those two parts, one was that the campaign of misinformation and the other is a lack of understanding. There's much more of a campaign of misinformation from outside forces this time around.

But what happened in the, you know, in the case of Shale, methane destroys the water table. You know, don't want these in our backyards. What happened, of course, was these enormous royalties for the farmers. Where the fourth largest natural gas reserves in the world, if we were a country, Pennsylvania would be number four.

This is the economic engine for our state.

Our state is the second largest engine producer in the country.

So this unlocks everything for Pennsylvania. And as those jobs started to be created, so you saw the economic benefit, the misinformation about the methane and the water table became clear slowly and much too long 15 years later we're now in a place where about 80% of people would have support fracking.

right? Is that right? Yeah. Okay.

So now, you know, my party is driving for a moratorium for data centers.

I mean, do you think China doesn't love that? You know?

“Again, that's why they're the parts behind the little sum of their driving this view.”

You want to give that race to China. It's coming. It's the choice. Do you want America to build that chassis or do you want the Chinese to do that? You know?

Like, yeah, data centers can make some things with some sort of-- For that, John, what you said earlier, which is it starts with TDS and then it goes with give China AI. Well, I wouldn't say this, vote me out. If you think it's okay to give China a benefit to win the AI race, vote me out.

You know? And, you know, but it's like, so your favorite person in the audience is my wife is glad. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, no. Exactly.

Exactly. It's exactly the way I see it. I mean, it's exactly the way I see it as well. So, we have great bipartisan agreement here. So, Dave, I was at your summit last year, the energy and innovation summit, where you

announced $90 billion of new investments.

The thing I was struck by was how broad-based the representation was at that summit. You only had software companies, you had hardware companies, you had manufacturing, you had robotics, you had energy, nuclear fracking, and then, most interestingly, is that you had the trades there. And that's when a light bulb went on for me, that, oh, this is a blue collar boom because

this is a construction boom and blue collar workers are really going to benefit and the trades were represented there, spoke to that. And since then, we've had hundreds of thousands of new jobs, construction jobs created and 25 to 30 percent wage increases for construction workers.

“And so, I'm curious, does that help make the cause more popular in Pennsylvania?”

Are those trades or the unions still on board with this or have the politics that changed at all over the past year? It's a great question, and it's been extraordinary. So, just in the last 15, 16 months, and this is easy to relate it by the way. It's not just energy projects and data centers, it's U.S. steel and a next-generation

male, it's Eli Lilly building a new plan, it's Hanwan, the Philadelphia shipyard. But they're coming in part because of the data centers and the energy projects. And so, I've spent a lot of time with the trades lately. The most secure job in Pennsylvania right now is a secure welder. I mean, is a seasoned welder and an electrician.

And honestly, these folks are coming out, they're getting the training, they're in their late teens, early 20s, they're making more than a hundred grand a year in these sites, and they can't build, they can't hire a quick enough. They can't find enough people to meet the demand. The data centers may have looked closely that there's one coming in Burwick, Pennsylvania,

right next to where I went to high school. The way to think about it is there's four buckets of economic activity that comes, jobs that come. There's of course the deals that come with them, but there's the thousands of jobs to build the data centers and the energy that goes side by side.

So these are five, 10,000 folks on the site. Then there's the hundreds of people to run the data centers. Again, of course, every three to four years, the hardware and everything in the data centers gets upgraded, which brings in hundreds, sometimes thousands of jobs. There's the energy that's going side by side.

Then there's the restaurants, the hotels. I met with the trucking association, they guess that it's about two logistics jobs for every one job in a data center. These things are economic engines. So once you get that covenant straight, people are willing to make the decision.

And if a township supervisor or a county commissioner, no senator is going to tell them to do this. This has to come from the ground up in terms of making the decision. But once they decide to do that, it's a huge engine for their communities.

“If they decide not to do it, my point is, okay, where's your plan?”

What is the plan? In Pennsylvania, we've been losing people for 20 years. We can't get our kids to stay. This is like a rebirth.

It's amazing what's happening.

But we got to break through the misinformation. A rebirth. Do you have a final question? Well, I mean, I think on this point, why do you think it's so difficult for the Democrats to embrace the facts on the ground?

Because you have an empirical story to share about job creation, value creation, and there's no empiricism on the other side that there's job displacement or job loss, and the white collar jobs, which is generally part of the plan. Two things. And the notion of AI broadly is getting munched with the notion of data centers in a narrow

Data centers are of course, or an enormous component of this.

“But those two things are on the other side.”

Second, I don't think it's just Democrats. I mean, we have American first movement is now in the foresh way, exactly aligned. We have the far left and the far right, converging on an anti-game. We even have some besties who occasionally buy into the jobs up on the list. No, no.

I'm job these places, but I'll never misrepresent these acts.

I will call you out every time. I just believe they'll be jobless. You can also use the word job mobility. What? I'll let finish my sentence, please.

No. I'm speaking. Jobless placement is occurring, and that new jobs need to be created to fill that in.

“I think that's the blind spot of the people who have Trump dedication syndrome is that”

they will never actually do anything that would modestly criticize the president, and that's

part of the challenge. I want to have a lot. Just about the amount of money being donated by special interest, do we need to get money out of politics? Because that seems to be the root of a lot of these problems is that billionaires can give

50 million, $100 million, $200 million, whether it's sorrows or friends of ours. It feels like there's way too much money in politics. Is that have to change for this type of issue around data centers, et cetera, and special interest? And how do we, can we ever get there?

“Well, I would say of the five things that I would do to fix America right now, that”

wouldn't be in the top five, but yes, conceptually I'll let you get money out of politics.

My race was $500 million.

We raised $200 million on my side, $300 million on the opposition side, we couldn't keep up. I was record before in '22. We raised $300 million. My race was $300 million. That's point.

Wait until 26. Wait until 28. This is going to look like quaint, and that's the thing. Collective, we need to get money out or this group needs to be donated a lot more to move. Yes, forget it.

Get rid of the primary process, too. Now, open to other people, and now these primaries, they identify the extreme kinds of views and put out someone, and that's part of it now, too. Collectively, $300 million were spent to destroy our reputations. Think what $300 million could do for Pennsylvania or for people.

That was spent to destroy reputations. So you're terrible, and I'm terrible, that's the absurdity of the American politics. On that note, I actually want to say both of you are incredibly rational and reasonable and incredible Americans. So I just want to thank you.

Senator Setterman, I'm a former, very much recognized guy. (upbeat music)