[Music]

We're here on the Celsius Galway in

Sabine Pass uh just outside of Bowmont,

Texas with the Secretary of the

Interior, Doug Bergam. The crew is

giving us a tour. This is an amazing

export facility, the largest in the

United States, second largest in the

world. We're going to talk with the

secretary in a minute about American

energy independence and the role that

this company, this facility, and this

process plays. So excited to have the

conversation with the secretary.

[Music]

[Applause]

[Music]

What' you think? Well, I he was

fantastic, but to be on a brand new ship

like this is pretty special. I mean,

like brand spanking like this is the

first cargo it's taking. This is like

this is like not even out of the

showroom. Brand new. Yeah. I mean, look

at that. Those are spotless. Yeah, this

was definitely coordinated for you. I

have a suspicion. But it's beautiful. I

think they coordinated for you. They

heard you were coming, Doug. They were

saying in 2008, this facility was

basically bankrupt. Yes. And this has

been a development project since about

2012 and it went from practically

nothing to the largest LNG exporter in

the world in 13 years. In 13 years. And

prior to that, when it was originally

built, because this is before the

amazing miracle of the of the whole

shale revolution in our country, right?

without that this was being built as a

LG import facility. That was the

original thing. We're going to have to

import LG to America. Now LG is the

number two dollar export on the alltime

list for the country. It's the second

most highest dollar value we export. We

went from from being like, oh, we're

going to run out of oil and gas to today

uh we're energy independent on a net

basis and we're on our path towards

becoming energy dominant. I'm going all

in. All right, besties. I think that was

another epic discussion. People love the

interviews. I could hear him talk for

hours. Absolutely. We crushed your

questions in a minute. We are giving

people ground truth data to underwrite

your own opinion. What do you guys

think? That was fun. That was great.

Welcome to the all-in interview here

today with Secretary Doug Bergam, the

55th Secretary of the Interior of the

United States of America. We are here in

beautiful Sabine Pass in Louisiana today

at the Shener LNG facility. It's been an

amazing tour this afternoon. It's a

little bit windy, but it's still a

beautiful afternoon. Thanks for joining

me today, Doug. David, it's great to be

with you. Thank you for coming down and

uh seeing this amazing facility. So, we

just took a great tour here. Why were

you here today? And what are we checking

out? Well, I think President Trump, one

of his core goals, if we talk about

energy dominance, which is beyond energy

independence, it's not just a a slogan.

It's really about how do we have the

power to power AI in America? How do we

power the remanufacturing in America?

And then how do we sell energy to our

friends and allies so that they don't

have to buy it from our adversaries. And

what what we you and I had a chance to

see today is the largest LG export

facility in America, the second largest

in the world. Yeah. I was struck. I

didn't really realize how quickly this

facility grew up just about a dozen

years ago. There was nothing really

going on here. And now it's the second

largest export facility of methane in

the world. And methane is seeing a a

massive resurgence around the world

because it has a lower carbon footprint.

There's demand. It's transportable. So

there's a lot of reasons why there's a

massive growing market for for liqufied

natural gas or methane. Absolutely. And

part of the amazing energy

transformation that I think is not fully

appreciated by most Americans is when

this plant began uh in the early 2000s,

it was meant to be an LNG import

facility. America was running out of oil

and gas and they said, "Wait, we got to

be ready to start importing it just to

meet our needs." Well, along comes the

shale gas revolution again driven by

technology. That technology of

horizontal drilling, that ability to,

you know, fractionate rock uh and get

oil and gas out of places that people

thought was just impossible that we

would ever be retrieving uh that those

resources from those from those hard

rock shale locations. And so then this

thing after the financial crisis turned

around and began its life as an export

facility and now as you say the only one

larger in the world is in the Middle

East. So I I want to go back a little

bit and how you ended up in the seat,

how you ended up um not just being the

secretary of the interior but you're

also the chair of the National Energy

Dominance Council. I really want to talk

about the importance I talk about on the

podcast a lot about the importance of

growing energy production in this

country. But you're a tech entrepreneur

who is from North Dakota, became

governor of the state, and I'd love for

you to just do your highlights, how you

ended up there, what you did with

respect to energy, um, and also how that

translated into a surplus of jobs and

economic prosperity for that state. It's

been quite a journey. uh you know

starting out in a town of 300 people in

North Dakota with all gravel streets and

no computers uh to end up having an

opportunity to uh to be part of a

software startup you know grow that

business take it public have a great run

as a public company get acquired in an

all stock deal by Microsoft stayed there

for seven years uh you know helping grow

Microsoft from 40,000 people to to

90,000 people and there was 2,000 of us

at great plains when we got acquired

there was 1,200 in Fargo 400 rest in

North America, 400 rest of the world, we

become a this improbable global software

company uh coming from the from the

great plains. And then when I left

Microsoft to uh uh presumably spend more

time with kids, retire uh that was an

epic fail. Ended up in uh two more

startups within six months. Uh was

involved in three more software IPOs and

dozens of other uh businesses and I mean

software businesses. And then uh in 2016

at a time when we were having an energy

collapse in prices uh there was an open

seat for governor and I threw my hat in

the ring and uh we were uh down at 6910

in the polls in January. The primary was

in June. Uh Katherine was who became the

first lady was like, "Oh, we've got a

great life. Let's why would we why would

we get into politics? Why would we get

into that?" And I assured her that we

had no chance of winning and she didn't

have to ever worry about being first

lady. but this would be fun for six

months to create some competition. But

we ended up winning that primary and and

then went on uh got it was a good year

for outsiders. So we took office the uh

about in North Dakota you start middle

of December. So about 36 days ahead of

President Trump we were sworn in had

four amazing years uh working with

President Trump as a governor. There was

a win behind our back and then second

term uh we got reelected by the largest

margin in the country of any race. But

then that was I was serving as a

governor under the Biden administration

and in a state where we'd become we're

rapidly becoming a very ris resourcerich

state. Uh we had climbed to being the

number two oil producer in the country.

Uh we had you know tremendous coal

resources, incredible agriculture

resources and in ranching and the Biden

administration really was having a war

on on on whether it was timber grazing,

oil and gas, coal, critical minerals. I

mean anything that had to do with

extraction uh there was a regulatory

battle going on and and I and I would

have to say that a part of me uh not

just became frustrated I became very

concerned about the future of the

country and that led to you know jumping

at the national level and saying hey

we've got to have a policy uh because if

we don't if we don't have energy

security we're not going to have

national security and that's what really

uh drove the to sort of this us sitting

here right now today. So, you ran for

president. You ran for the Republican

nomination against President Trump and

others. And then, um, obviously,

President Trump got that nomination. Did

you keep in touch with him after that?

And how did you kind of work with his

staff and his office as he was moving

his campaign forward? Well, we were we

were in touch uh because we you know we

knew each other as a governor would know

a president, but I was never really

running against President Trump. And I

think the record shows that I was really

running against these horrifically

dangerous uh and uh you know unsound,

unsafe uh policies of the Biden

administration, which are almost, you

know, too numerous to enumerate. When I

left office last December 15th, just

December 15th of of 2024, uh, as

governor, I was involved in 30 lawsuits

against the Biden administration. You

know, many of them including against the

agency the the agency that the bureaus

that I'm now leading uh because the

regulatory regime was such that it

wasn't about regulating oil and gas. It

was about eliminating oil and gas from

America. and and and if there was some

sort of false god around climate

ideology that they were that was being

chased, it was like, "Oh, if we stop the

supply coming from the US, we're going

to somehow save the planet." But there

was no reduction of demand. The demand

was just being filled by by, you know,

Iran, Venezuela, Russia, and they and

they were funding wars against us. So, I

mean, I thought it was closest thing to

insanity that I'd ever seen. And so when

uh when we when we dropped out uh very

quickly uh I was the first of any of the

other candidates to endorse President

Trump uh and uh and then spent last year

campaigning for him. Yeah. And then

there was, can I say this, some rumors

that you might have been in the running

for vice president, but you obviously

stayed close with the the president and

and his staff and found your way into

this role. How did that process go for

you? How did you end up in this role

that you're Well, I it's a I love what

I'm doing and I love the role. Uh

because of course as a western uh

western governor uh we have all the

things that interior has as governor of

North Dakota which is a jam-packed fun

job. Uh you've got you're chairman of

the land board and just being governor.

Well then meant you know dealing with

land and minerals and all the leasing

and all the issues with the energy

industry. You're also the uh head of the

water commission. Uh interior has the

bureau of reclamation which is the

second largest hydroelect electric

producer in the country and manages you

know the miracle of irrigation that the

Roosevelt came up with. We wouldn't have

agriculture in Arizona or California

without that. Uh and then Bureau of

Indian Affairs is part of Interior. Uh

and that's a uh something I had a lot of

experience with and all the challenges

that we face in terms of healthcare and

education on the tribal areas. So across

the whole realm of

interior everything that I had in North

Dakota is part of my job today except

one thing uh and that's offshore oil

production because uh North Dakota as

you would know is the center of North

America. So if you're afraid of sharks,

you should move to North Dakota because

it literally is the furthest place in

North America from any ocean. So we had

no offshore, but uh today earlier today,

I had a chance to get on my first

offshore platform and and uh and see uh

the innovation and entrepreneurship

there that's uh again now providing

about 16% of the uh oil for the America.

So I mean let's talk about the energy

problem, the energy opportunity. Before

we do, I think 50% of the potential

audience of this

conversation cue out and say this is

evil. There's good and there's bad. This

is bad. Exploitation of natural

resources. Extraction of natural

resources damages the planet, ruins the

environment, puts carbon in the

atmosphere, drives climate change. and

they won't listen to any conversation

about the pragmatism of energy security

and the importance energy plays in

prosperity. Taking people out of

poverty, raising them up, raising living

standards and giving access to things

around the world that every individual

wants, which is more prosperity. And one

statistic I always quote is that if you

go back 500 plus years, you can see and

there's all these studies that have

tried to understand energy production

versus GDP, which translates to

prosperity per capita. And there's a

linear relationship. The more energy

that's produced, the higher the GDP per

capita. And that's what we see around

the world in developing markets today.

So I guess maybe you could just take a

moment to talk to those folks. Share a

little bit about your perspective of the

relationship between taking care of the

environment and the planet and the

importance of energy demand and energy

security before we get into the things

that are going on. Well, I I think

you're uh you're spot on. I mean, human

flourishing depends on on everyone. And

I think if you're talking about access

for everyone, uh you just take a look. I

mean, we have we could have as many as

800 million people on the planet uh you

know, shy of a billion uh that don't

have access to electricity and they they

need more energy. Now, with AI coming,

the demand for power is going to go up.

Uh the demand for advanced

manufacturing. So, we're not in any kind

of energy transition. We're in an area

where we need energy addition. And if we

want human flourishing, if we want to

reach our planet's fullest potential and

if we want to take care of our

environment, which you we can do all

these things at the same time, that even

that requires uh requires energy. I

mean, if you if you if you're worried

about, you know, water sources, well,

desalination, which we can do, requires

a lot of energy. Uh you know,

transportation of goods requires energy.

Uh so whether you know it's the the

clothes on your back, the food on your

table, the the transportation drive,

there's an energy component to all of

that. and electrifying stuff doesn't

change. It just changes the source of

the we still need to create the

electricity. So I feel like that if

anybody is concerned about the

environment, they should want to have it

every ounce of a liquid fuel and every

electron produced in the United States

because if you compare us to any other

any other country, we produce it

cleaner, safer, smarter, and healthier

than anyone else. that I learned in

North Dakota over those eight years as

governor where we were always on the top

of the list of, you know, cleanest

water, cleanest air, best soil health,

all of these things that we were able to

achieve. And we were going up the charts

in terms of energy production. These

things go hand in hand. They're not it's

not either or. It's it's a plus when you

can do both. And we were just talking to

this crew on board uh the ship we just

visited. They're on their way to Taiwan

and they go to Japan. And so if we can

produce liquid methane in this country

with a lower carbon footprint, then that

methane might be produced elsewhere,

which is the case. We use we have

cleaner methods for production. And that

demand exists regardless of whether or

not the United States produces it. It's

important that the United States take

advantage of the opportunity to produce

it cleaner, more safely, and with a

lower footprint and and build economic

prosperity for us as exporters. Yes,

absolutely. I mean, so the the the net

formula that you've just described is

the more energy that's produced in the

United States, the better it is for the

globe and the better it is for American

prosperity. And I would say it's not

just for the globe environmentally. It's

also for for peace. It's not just

prosperity at home, but literally the

two the two proxy wars that we've been

involved in with Russia after Russia

invaded Ukraine and after uh you know

Iran funding 24 different terror groups,

they were funding those wars against us

with their oil and gas sales. And so if

if we can replace their customers with

US sources, they have less revenue. They

have less funding literally to fund

terrorism. So it is prosperity at home,

peace abroad, it's nothing short of

that. So let's talk about the energy

demand equation. The US is forecasted to

increase its electricity production

capacity from 1 to 2 terowatt by 2040 15

years from now. During that same period

of time, China is going to go from 3 to

8 terowatt. And that China forecast, by

the way, excludes any of the Gen 4

nuclear reactors, the new hydroelectric

facilities, and the new thorium, or if

that ever scales that they're

considering rolling out in addition to

what they've already planned to roll

out. So, in the next 15 years, China is

adding five Americas. Yes. In

electricity, production capacity. And if

everything gets automated, factories are

automated, AI becomes the great

accelerant of the global economy, China

is hugely advantaged relative to where

we sit today. What do we need to do

about it? Well, this is the if you were

to ask me what's the thing that keeps me

awake at night. Uh this is this is the

issue and it's so thrilling and

refreshing that you understand the

scale, the magnitude and the importance

of this uh the AI arms race which is

really driven by access to electricity.

And China last year brought on 94 and a

half gigawatts of coal powered

electricity. One gawatt is Denver. So

they brought on 94 Denvers just last

year. That's more than all we have today

for all of California and all of New

York is less than 94. So they added a

New York and a California worth of

electricity last year just from coal.

They're still getting 60% of their base

load from coal. And people people may

they stop listening when they hear the

word coal. But coal from an electricity

standpoint, thermal coal uh is fantastic

base load. uh it has, you know, all the

characteristics to allow you to maintain

amperage and voltage to keep a system

going. And I think we just saw in Spain,

you know, they were celebrating on April

12th of this past month that they'd shut

down their last coal plant. And then a

week after that, they were celebrating

the fact that they had their first day

of 100% renewables on their system. And

then the next week, uh they were global

news story because people were trapped

in subways. Uh all airline flights

canled. uh hospitals were panicking with

a lack of power uh because they had a uh

you know a rolling blackout and grid

failure because it just defies physics.

You can't run an electrical grid with

just intermittent power. You cannot run

with something that is based in

intermittent is the definition of solar

or wind because the sun doesn't shine at

night uh and the wind doesn't blow every

day and you can have have it and so we

in America we became dangerously close

to that right now. We've got parts of

our country that are at risk for those

same kind of of what I'll call the Biden

brownouts and blackouts to happen

because we overs subsidized the

intermittent and we overregulated uh all

of the base load in an idea to quote

save the planet and all we're doing is

potentially putting our own country at

risk. So it was regulatory action that's

been taken and I've got to imagine it's

not just the Biden administration. This

has to go back cuz this is in 35 years

in this country, we only

added6 terowatts of electricity

production capacity to the grid. What's

gone on in this country that's made it

so hard for us to operate more

efficiently in terms of adding new

energy capacity to the grid? Is it

regulatory only or are there capital,

social and other reasons that this has

become a challenge for us? Well, the the

regulatory uh attack was a whole of

government. So, it did attack the

formation of capital. I mean, you you

came up with regulatory rules that made

it impossible for for base load power uh

from fossil fuels even, you know, get a

permit. Well, if you can't get a permit,

then you can't get access to capital.

You can't get access to insurance. Uh

and then you had, you know, protest and

social media and everybody going online

saying, "Oh, we've got to exit from all

this." And this same phenomena happened

in Germany. Uh it's I think it's very

clear right now that a lot of that a lot

of what I call the social mediadriven uh

concerns were part of you know scops

operations from places like Russia. I

mean it was Russia's great advantage to

get Germany to shut down nuclear to shut

down all their coal production and hey

we have a solution just buy all your

natural gas from us. So Germany spent a

half a trillion dollars$500 billion

dollars on the quote air quotes

transition to to green energy. They were

transitioning to wind and solar. H half

a trillion, $500 billion. They today

produce 20% less electricity. And that

electricity cost three times as much as

it did before they began the transition.

And now we have the the war, you know,

with Russia inventing Ukraine. What are

they doing? They were scrambling to try

to reopen coal plants. They were

scrambling to try to get back in the

nuclear game. They were saying, "Wow, we

overshot the mark. We went too far." Uh

again, highly subsidizing uh

intermittent sources. And so it it's

like I think part of the awakening that

is occurring right now is that if the

the greatest existential threat to the

planet and to America is not one degree

of climate change in the year 2100

because guess what innovation will solve

will solve any challenges that we have

with climate change with innovation and

we won't have innovation without

electricity and actually losing the AI

arms race to China uh is the real

threat. I do agree with you. I'll be

declarative on this because a lot of

people ask me I started a company called

the climate corporation. We talked a lot

about climate change. I believe deeply

in a lot of this climate science, but I

also believe more deeply that innovation

will solve a lot of the challenges that

may arise. And there's a whole series of

solutions that are developing. And we

can talk a little bit about some of

those longerterm solutions that

ultimately yield to unlimited free

scalable energy production. And when

that happens, you know, all bets are

off. No. And some of that could and we

have line of sight to that. Yeah. And

some of that could be coming in the next

decade. It doesn't help us today cuz

today uh we've got to shore it up. And I

think one thing that you know having

spent 30 years in tech, we never used

more than 1% of the nation's electrical

production and it was because uh

computers were getting more tech. Yeah.

Tech the tech industry. Tech industry.

We used 1% and no one paid any attention

and the tech industry didn't pay any

attention to power generation because

they didn't have to because PCs got more

efficient, software got more efficient

and then America was rich. we everyone

was buying appliances that were more

efficient. So there was wasn't ever

really a demand curve on electricity.

But then today with AI, the demand curve

is just flying in the face. And when I

was at at uh Sarah Week, which is the

biggest uh energy conclave, uh when I

was speaking to the group, I said

there's something different here this

year. And what's different is the five

biggest tech companies in America showed

up at that conference with $300 billion

dollar of capex. you know, the big ones

have got 75 billion 75 billion a piece,

you know, for the top ones on that

chart. And and I'll reflect back to not

that long ago, a couple decades ago, I

was a corporate officer at Microsoft for

seven years. I never went to a capex

meeting, right? Somebody said, "Well,

weren't you invited?" I said, "No, there

were no capex meetings." You know, we

hired salespeople and software

developers, and if we needed an office

in Singapore or Munich, we rented it,

leased it, and so there was no capex.

And now they showed up at that

conference and I had to speak to all the

executives and said, "Look, these guys

aren't here trying to sell you software.

They're your biggest customers. They

need power and they will do anything."

And the regulated uh power providers and

some in the industry have just have

never seen a demand curve. So, it's like

a collision between high-tech and the

power generation in America. And and

coming from that, we've got to figure

out a way to break through this. We just

got back from DC. There was this hill

and valley forum this week. Every single

speech, every single talk, every

conversation in the hallways was all

about the energy demand coming from AI.

I don't think the public realizes, I

don't think the broad business community

realizes how energy hungry AI is and how

this is going to ramp up like no one's

ever seen in history. And by the way, we

haven't yet seen the ramp up of robotics

and automation. There's going to be a

breakthrough in the next year or two

that's going to unleash this additional

demand curve. We're going to have a

100red million robots in the United

States that are all electrified. They

all got to get charged up. That power

has got to come from somewhere. So,

this feels like a massive challenge for

America, like going to the moon,

fighting World War II in Europe, a

Manhattan Project style set of solutions

are needed to address this. What is this

council that you're leading, the

National Energy Dominance Council,

doing? What are kind of the top three

things that you think unlock the energy

potential in the United States and meet

the demand curve that's kind of tidal

waving its way across this country right

now? Well, I'd say that the the good

news is that we have a president of the

United States that understands this.

Yeah. And that's why on day one in

office, he declared an energy emergency.

some folks that aren't familiar with

what you've just described, uh, this

awareness that we've we're facing a

crisis, uh, were, you know, questioning

whether we had an energy emergency, but

as you've just described, we have a huge

one relative to our grid, grid

stability. We don't have enough power to

win the AI arms race. And AI arms race

means without that, we lose the defense

battle because it's not just robotics in

manufacturing. you know, if we're going

to have a golden dome, if we're going to

have any, you know, ability to defend

ourselves from hypersonics or, you know,

protect our fleet uh around the ocean,

not to have them all wiped out in the

first hour of a conflict, we have to

have AI uh both targeting and a defense

standpoint. So, you can't separate

defense from AI anymore either. So, this

is it's mission critical. So, with that

with that energy emergency, then we have

to pull out all stops. So, back to NE

DC. Uh, which by the way, for those that

are easy to remember, it's like AC/DC.

It's NEC. And then we could even have a

little lightning bolt in the logo. I

don't know if you're going to get there,

Doug, but but you know, t-shirt have

t-shirts with I actually might make that

t-shirt for you. I'll I mean, I think

it's You guys sell swag on this podcast.

I think that's going to be the new one.

Uh, new bestseller. Anyway, with with

the You could sell that swag. You know,

we could fund a new energy program.

Yeah, we go with with the but with our

We're not a organization. We're like a

small tiger team and think of it more

like a governor's economic development

super super team. President Trump is

asking us to find things that are

critical to the infrastructure where

they're running into roadblocks and then

help them. I want to say white glove

concier service. Help them get the

permit, help them get started. The

capital is there. It's often a

regulatory thing that's stopping uh you

know like natural gas getting into New

England. We've got I mean we're never

going to build an AI data center in New

York or in New England if the price of

natural gas is three times higher than

it is in Pennsylvania. And yet they're

still campaigning on, hey, we blocked

this natural gas pipeline. You know, I

mean, everybody in Pennsylvania loves

that because they'll get all the data

centers, they'll get all the advanced

manufacturing. I mean, we've got, you

know, in Arizona, you've got, you know,

the TSMC plant coming there that's going

to require enormous amounts of power. uh

people want to put data centers there

and yet you know their utility is just

shutting down a coal plant and it's like

okay how are you going to power this

stuff and so one of the goals we have is

don't shut down any more base load

preserve what we have uh and help you

know get other get new sources of power

permitted does that include nuclear some

of the reactor shutdowns that are

planned yeah we got to keep everything

going and we got to go fast on the small

modular nuclear and but again that's

really kind of in the 2030s so there

that's that's in our next it's it's in

important uh but it's a little less

urgent. We need to fasttrack all that

stuff long term. That's where the

solutions will likely lie. But in

between now 2025 and 2030 uh a lot of

it's going to come back to LG because

that the fastest thing we can get online

uh for more electricity generation is uh

LG power plants. LG power plants. So

that's number one. I mean, just to frame

things up for folks, you know, you

mentioned the city of Denver utilizes

about a 1 gawatt of of electricity, a

standard Gen 2 scaled nuclear reactor

facilities producing about a gigawatt.

And these small modular reactors, these

SMRs as they're called that China now

has demonstrated 5 megawatts. They can

be small, they can be located in an

office complex or in a downtown area of

a city. And they're designed to have

redundant systems for safety and not

having meltdowns and so on. talk a

little bit about the opportunity for

nuclear. You know, you're seeing the

2030s. Meanwhile, China's got several

hundred that they're in construction on.

There's clearly technology available

today. Uranium is not hard to get. We

have a lot of it. Thorium is not hard to

get. We have an incredible amount of

thorium. Those are the two fuel sources.

Why can't we move faster with nuclear?

What's the hold back? And why is the US

so different than China in being able to

scale up nuclear? A big difference is

again back to the regulatory

environment. I mean the the regulatory

environment on nuclear uh has been so

burdensome uh in terms of adding to the

cost and the time frame and bring it on

that and then when that cost was put

onto a utility and then utility felt

they had to put that back on the rate on

the on their on the uh the rate payers

their consumer customers uh there was in

some ways a revolt and it wasn't safety

related. It was like oh you want nuclear

but now my electricity is going to cost

twice as much. I'm not for that. So we

have to be able to get that regulatory

regime down and allow them to go faster.

And of course on the SMRs once that

design gets approved we should be able

to have essentially like a manufacturing

where we've we've we regulate the design

the design is proven and prove out. As

long as the manufacturing plant is

producing that same design then we don't

have to do this stick built show up you

know you work for a week the inspector

shows up oh this is off by you know one

millimeter you got to redo it. I mean

some of that is where you end up with

doubling of co I mean you can't I mean

some of the projects that have just been

completed you know that took you know

close to two decades on nuclear and then

had double the cost and double the time

you know that's that's not economically

sustainable. So part of it is we've got

to streamline the process, but these

smaller amounts, they can be daisy

chained. They could be great solutions.

And then the other piece which you love

about having the small moducer is we can

spend money on power generation as

opposed to money on transmission because

transmission is also it's really hard to

build a transmission line in this

country because whether it's a linear

infrastructure which includes natural

gas pipelines CO2 pipelines oil and gas

pipelines or transmission lines those

become the focal point for protests

because if they have any nexus an 1100

mile long pipeline could have one mile

that touches federal ground. That is

where the protest is going to occur. So,

going back to your deregulatory action,

can you do that in the seat that you're

in? Who can take that deregulatory

action? Do you need Congress to get

involved? I I've got a great partner,

Chris Wright, uh, incredibly talented,

arguably uh, the most qualified

Secretary of Energy we've ever had

leading that effort because the

Department of Energy has got most of the

responsibility related to nuclear

because they also are in charge of our

nuclear stockpile. I mean for the

military I mean DOE has got direct

defense responsibilities and and as part

of that uh they we've also got the 15

national labs and there's been great

work that's happening in Los Alamos and

Scandia. I mean uh you know you go

around the whole country and we've got

an incredibly talented group of people

and and research dollars have been

flowing but we've got to get some of

that commercialized and out to the

public. So but again you think of it

literally as a Manhattan project. These

were the these were the places where we

did the Manhattan project. when you

think of Los Alamos and others. So,

we've got to mobilize these government

agencies to help us on the current the

current crisis we're facing, which is

this energy emergency. We should talk to

Chris Wright. Um, yes, you should. And

then what's your what's your point of

view on the timeline for the SMRs? Do

you think it's 2035, 2030 when you have

that approved design and you stamp them

out? Is it 2040 or is it still Well, the

fun thing when we the fun thing when we

meet with all of these uh people in the

nuclear industry, if you were doing this

5 years ago, you'd have been talking to

regulated utilities. Today you can talk

to venture funded venture funded

startups and there's at least 10 that

are out there today uh that are chasing

new designs. There's people that are

changing chasing not just vision but

fusion and so all of that is exciting.

Uh and if you think about our think of

us having an air base in Alaska I mean

think of being able to daisy chain some

SMRs there and not having to build

transmission. I mean the applications

for the military purposes and for other

and then if you have distributed it's

harder for the enemy to knock out your

power source because it's not all

sitting in one spot. Do you think

America has a risk tolerance problem? My

view is we've gotten so wealthy and

comfortable and we have such prosperity

in this nation just like what happened

in Europe. You eventually say I don't

want to take any risk anymore and

everything gets regulated to the point

that you don't want to have any damage

or hurt or downside. Like this is the

whole thing with self-driving cars. Elon

just put out a tweet saying he's seeing

one car crash every 5 million miles or

something on self-driving versus 1

million miles when there's not

self-driving on. So it's a safer

technology, but the focal point is if

it's new technology and it causes any

harm or any loss, it's worse versus

looking at the calculus of the whole.

Have we lost that ability as a country?

And how do we grade leadership to

rethink a risk-taking America again?

Well, I don't know if we've lost it or

it's just the enumery of being selective

about what industry or what form of

transportation because on the automobile

side again, we'll track this year

between 38 and 40,000 deaths on highways

in America. Half of those are because of

impaired driving either from people

texting or or uh you know impaired drug

or alcohol use. And and apparently

everybody's okay with that because you

know we lose a 100red people a day and

there's never a story about it. I mean

more than 100 people a day, but you know

if you lose 70 you lose 70 people in the

first first airline crash in 12 years in

America and we're still talking about it

3 months later because because that

somehow that is news and and people

dying on highways is not and and in a

nuclear it's the same thing. Uh I I

actually checked on this because of

course we've had no n deaths from

anything related to nuclear power in our

country. Uh yeah, in the in since

inception, but the the best I can find

on the federal safety statistics is

there's about 37 people that have died

from getting angry at vending machines

and then pounding on them and then they

tip over and fall on them literally and

they and they crush them. Where do you

find that? Yeah, you just go

go search online, but it's it's out

there thing. But I mean it's like so so

it's like if you're if you're afraid of

nuclear, you know, then take a wide

birth. If you see a vending machine,

steer clear of it. And or the same

thing. I mean, I when I was uh when I

was, you know, campaigning for President

Trump and I said I was pro- nuclear and

someone said, "Well, would you know, oh,

really? But would you live near one?

Would you raise your family near one?"

And I said, "Well, I would." And they

said, "Well, how can you say that?" I

said, "Well, I raised them on a farm in

North Dakota and our farm was near a

road." And they said, "What do you mean

a road?" I said, "Well, there's it's

more risky than a nuclear power plant."

Yeah. It's like way more. I said when

the kids were out, if they were out on

a, you know, going to going to a dance

at high school on Friday night, I was

worried about them, not on the road, not

not about anything else. Okay. So, the

the the the crisis that we're in from

energy is not the only crisis America

faced. We're facing a a debt and deficit

crisis um that's going to challenge this

nation in ways we've never been

challenged before. 38 trillion of debt,

$6.75 trillion budget, $2 trillion

deficit. The numbers are staggering.

It's frightening. There's a lot of

economic studies that show you can't tax

more than 18% of GDP or else you lose

GDP. We're at that

point. You've talked a lot about

America's balance sheet as a way to

unlock opportunity to grow GDP and grow

our way out of this deficit debt

problem. Talk a little bit about what

you mean when you say America's balance

sheet and what does that entail. Well,

first of all, I love David the way

you're framing it. And I would just add,

you know, that two trillion dollar

deficit means that in the last year of

the Biden administration, 2,000 billion

2,000 billion more was spent than came

in. And and coming in, we have other

ways to bring money in other than taxes.

And how is that possible? Well, it's

because of America's balance sheet. Our

balance sheet isn't just the financial

assets. It includes the fact that just

within Interior alone, there's 500

million acres of surface land. within

throw in US forest service add another

200 million that's like nearly a third

of US land yes and then we have uh 700

million acres of subsurface sometimes

connect continuous and some

discontinuous but we own all these

minerals that are underground uh then

there's about uh you know between 2 and

a half and three billion acres of

offshore that contain critical minerals

and oil and gas minerals all of that is

under the federal purview if interior

was a standalone company it would have

the largest balance sheet in the world

by so far. I mean, you know, Saudi A

Ramco wouldn't even come close. And then

you'd say, okay, well, if that's if you

have this this, we all know about the $

38 trillion in debt. It gets, you know,

hammered all the time. It's used in

campaign things. But I was uh, you know,

even at the Hill and Valley conference

this week, I

without asking the audience, okay, how

many, you know, how many know the 38

trillion? Everybody, how many of you

know what our balance sheet on the asset

side is? Well, nobody knows because none

of the senators know because we haven't

calculated, but we're working in the

Trump administration to try to come up

with that number. And in and one

estimate this week is we think just on a

just on public land alone, there may be

8 trillion dollars of coal resources.

And I know coal is sometimes, you know,

it's a dirty word. It is. But, you know,

it's uh we need to also remember that if

we're going to have steel in this

country and we need and we all agree we

have need to have a steel industry. We

need to have for defense. We need to

have it for advanced manufacturing. We

also need to have a shipping industry

that comes back to our country. You need

steel for that. Well, guess what you

make steel out of? Well, part of it you

make it out of you need you need coke.

And coke comes from a certain kind of

metallurgical coal. So, if we kill the

coal industry, you can't have a steel

industry unless we're going to have

somebody ship metallurgical coal to us.

In the coal resources around our

country, the coal is also filled up with

the critical and rare earth minerals uh

that we need to go in this battle with

China. Particularly now with China just

in weeks ago putting on export controls

on a number of minerals that we need for

doing things like you know batteries

that we need for electric motors for

whether it's cars or home drills or or

you know rockets missiles. I mean the

the the the magnets that are at risk now

because we became so dependent on China.

So when you take a look at the the this

balance sheet you know we need it for

defense, we need it for national

security. But theore Roosevelt who was

be instrumental in putting away these

hundreds of millions of acres in the

original intention that said this was

there for the benefit and use of the

American people. And it al he also said

very explicitly that that conservation

meant meant you know sustainable use not

just preservation because we saw what

happened you know following the uh the

the extremism that that landed around

the spotted owl which is oh we've got to

stop not just the harvesting of certain

old growth timber and it killed the

timber industry in America and when we

killed it back in the 1990s uh then and

it has never come back. And now what's

happening 30 years later because those

timber companies that would get a lease

from the federal government, they would

have the responsibility for going in and

thinning and cleaning and responsibly

managing that and they would send a

check to the federal government. We'd

have revenue instead of revenue today,

we have expense. We burn more board feet

of lumber in this country every year

right now than we are harvesting because

because of the wildfire because of

uncontrolled wildfires. And then the

uncontrolled wildfires are some of our

biggest emitters, you know, in terms of

CO2. You burn a tree, it releases the

carbon. So again, the folks that wanted

to, you know, reduce emissions, save the

planet, you know, help the wildlife,

we're actually doing the opposite of

that. So we have to get back in the

business of of, you know, grazing our

lands, managing our forest, developing

our our our resources and our critical

minerals, getting back. We have to mine

again in this country. Mining can't be,

you know, if we want to be a strong

country, we've got to do that. Uh, and

of course oil and gas. You do all of

those things that I just named. All of

those involve selling a lease to a

private company. They send a check and

then they develop the resource and then

they send us a royalty. The little

company that I just met with this

morning out on the platform on the Gulf

of America in its inception. This is a

company with 450 people. They have sent

1.2 billion dollars to the US Treasury

over the life of their company. You

know, show me a tech company that's done

that. I mean, impossible for a lease to

access that resource. Well, the the

lease and and they they lease it up

front. So, they write a check up front

to have the to have the opportunity to

take the risk. They take all the risk.

They build the platform. They hire the

people. They do the seismic. They figure

it out. And if they hit a dry hole, it's

all on them. Taxpayer nothing. But if

they score, then they pay us a royalty.

And what do we use that for? We use it

for, you know, we use it for paying down

the deficit and the debt. We also use it

for coastal restoration. You know, along

this beautiful Gulf Coast, you do

coastal restoration. With that, the

dollars go back to the states. the

largest funer of coastal restoration in

this country is the oil and gas industry

uh you know here in the Gulf. So again

the it's you know if like I said if you

if you've driven on an in on an

interstate highway in your life or if

you've gone to a public school you

should send a thank you note to the the

natural resource industries because they

were helping to pay for that. But what's

happened if I if there's a hundred

trillion dollars on the balance sheet,

just say that. And and now and you're a

finance, tech, venture guy, you could

say, "Okay, we'll we'll allow uh the

federal government to be the worst. You

guys can have a 1% return on your

natural assets. That would be $1

trillion." Okay, last year, Interior

brought in 22 billion. So, so we're off

we're off by a factor of 50 from having

bad performance on getting a return on

investment for the American people. I

guess you know the assets only count if

you can access them, utilize them,

monetize them. We all know from a

finance perspective there's goodwill

that could sit on an asset line and

doesn't mean anything at the end of the

day. If you can't monetize it, it's not

worth much. So, how do you think about

the target you're going after? Is it a

trillion? And then when do you develop

and deliver a plan to the American

people that says, "Guys, here's our

target. Here's when we're going to get

there." Do you think about it that way?

We don't have a target yet because we

don't even know what the base unused

resources. I mean, we're trying to get

our hands around, you know, what what is

our timber worth? What is our, you know,

oil and gas? And that goes back to the

core mission of the US Geologic Survey.

Its original core mission was to map.

So, when we say it's, you know, it's

it's map, baby, map. uh because then

that can tell you, you know, where

you're supposed to mine, baby mine,

where you're supposed to drill, baby

drill. But getting back to the mapping

and working with the private sector,

who's outstripped, who's outstripped. I

mean, ground penetrating radar, uh, is,

you know, a new advancement, uh, that's,

you know, more accurate than seismic and

less intrusive. And we need to really

understand what America's balance sheet

is. And some of that's going to take

some work for us to get out there and

really survey it. And, and then when we

have that, that's public domain. publish

that information and that'll help the

private sector steer where they should

put their resources to help develop

this. Let's talk about mining. The

United States used to mine. You and I

had a dinner a couple weeks ago. You

gave me a statistic which I hadn't heard

before, which is we only graduate 200

people in degrees in mining today. Why

did we stop mining? Why did we stop

developing our own natural resources and

shift to a model where we're buying

dependent and now have critical supply

chain dependencies? What happened in the

United States? Well, I think there was

there was some, you know, our country

was a powerful and great minor and it

was when you think back to, you know,

even the early 1900s, you think about

where we were, you know, what we were

doing in gold and silver and then, you

know, through World War II, uh, and even

up into the 1980s, we were still very

strong as a mining country and a mining

industry. And then and then uh there

were some environmental issues that

environmental awareness you had some

super fund sites and and it just became

you know one of the focal points of the

attack of of uh of hey then it sort of

was all a sudden all mining was bad as

opposed to one operator in one location

uh that you know maybe wasn't maintained

right and so then I think whether it was

young people choosing careers or whether

it was press whatever but then the

regulatory environment piled on in a

heavy way to the point that you know

it's just amazing one of the resolution

copper. We're just in the process now of

issuing them a permit. It's taken about

three months here in the Trump

administration. They started this

process over 29 years ago. Wow. I mean,

this is this is this has gone three

decade long saga to open up a copper

mine. And guess what? We need copper

more than we've ever needed before. I

mean, it's it's part of, you know, every

electric motor. It's a part of all of

the advanced stuff that we're building.

And and so, I mean, it's thrilling that

we're going to open a copper mine in

America. And then some of the mines that

have barely hung on uh but are still

going whether it's gold or silver uh or

others uranium in some cases uh along

with that mining process there are

critical minerals that are adjacent. I

mean we can add a critical minerals

refining because it's not just that we

aren't mining those raw materials. China

has got the corner on the refining not

just mine to refine. So when they're in

they're in the you know the the Congo in

Africa pulling out those those those

those rich research rich minerals

they're bringing those back to China.

We've got examples of companies in

America that were mining in America but

there was no process. They were sending

it to China and China was doing the

refining. Well now we're in a we're

literally in a in a in a war around

these critical minerals which we need

for defense. Uh and and we don't have a

stockpile. So part of what we're

concerned with right now and said you

know how do we get capital flowing back

to mining? How do we start building

stockpiles in America the way we have

the strategic petroleum reserve across

the top 20 most important critical

minerals? And then how do we derisk it,

you know, if someone's going to get into

mining? And do we need uh like a

sovereign risk insurance, but not

because you're working overseas because

you're working here because the next

administration may use an EO to wipe out

your mine. Uh, and so again, giving

giving the capital providers the

confidence that if somehow they're

regulated out of business, they'll get

compensated through an insurance

program. And what about in your role

administering the EPA, looking out for

environmental standards, protecting our

environment, protecting our communities,

there were toxic super fund sites.

What's the thinking from your point of

view on making sure that we're doing

this in a clean way and how important

that is in this calculus? Well, Lee

Zeldon, uh, our EPA administrator is is

also a key part of the energy dominance

council, as is about half of the

cabinet. I mean, we've got, you know,

Howard Lutnik, Scott Bessant, uh, Brook

Rollins, you know, from a with US forest

everything. There's literally about half

the cabinet. Uh, transportation, Sean

Duffy's on there. Uh, everybody's, you

know, part of this team of trying to

solve this larger complex thing. But I

would say that the one thing we forget

about when we often there's these

national discussions which is that every

state also has a regulatory environment.

And in my time as governor, one thing I

learned was that there was I had I never

met a bureaucrat from DC that cared more

about the land, the water, the soil

health or the air in our state than the

people that lived there and the people

that worked for our own DEEQ. And so

when people say, "Oh, you know, we're

reducing headcount at the EPA. The

world's going to fall apart." No, we

have two issues with regulation. One is

is the overreach which is you have

people going beyond the law on their

original charter and regulating things

you know regulate when they're supposed

to be regulating water and I need and a

water permit should be about turbidity

and temperature and is the fish in this

area going to be affected as opposed to

oh oh we're not giving this permit

because we're worried about climate

change is because the thing in your pipe

is natural gas. I mean that's a real

example. That's how Cuomo knocked out a

a permit that was, you know, way beyond

what the law said. I mean, if there was

an issue with how the company was

crossing a water course, like 38,000

other LG crossings of of water courses

in America, if there's a real problem,

then tell them that and they'll

horizontally direct drill it 50 feet

below the bottom of the river. It'll

never touch the river and give them a

permit. Instead, they'd be like, "No,

you know, there's no permit because

we're concerned about climate change."

That's overreach. But the overlap that

occurs every day is that the federal

government infrastructure is overlapping

with the states. And there isn't a need

to do both of those things. And and you

might, you know, go to path for, you

know, two years, three years and get

your federal permit and then find out,

oh, that a state like New York is is not

going to provide it. Or you might get a

a permit in six months in a in a state

that's that can efficiently do

permitting and get all the work done and

take care of everything and then find

out that the federal government's going

to sit on it for an entire presidential

term because they're ideologically

opposed. When we do that to ourselves,

then we have no chance against a country

like China that is focused on on on an

outcome which is they're going to

achieve prosperity. they're going to

achieve uh all of their environmental

goals by having the power to have all

the solutions as opposed to uh the uh

the environment we have now which

restricts that that innovation.

President Trump's uh just finished his

100 days in office. Are you glad you

took the job? What's been most

surprising for you since you've been in

the role? Well, I'm I'm having a blast.

Uh and I'm thrilled to be in this

position where we can have an impact.

you know, you get up every day and it's

a little bit like the old uh, you know,

World War II uh, you know, Marines in

the Pacific would say, you know, the

bad, you know, we're in a foxhole. The

bad we're in a foxhole, we're on a

beach. The bad news is, uh, you know,

we're surrounded. The good news is we

can attack in any direction. And and so

every day you can get up and go make a

difference in in people's lives. And and

that's and for anybody that's in tech or

anybody that's listening, you know, that

poo poos public service, they ought to

really think about the fact, I mean, we

need people that are, as Teddy Roosevelt

said, that are willing to get in the

arena because in these jobs, uh, that

are, you know, really purposeful, you

can make a difference for a lot of

people thing. But what's surprising

about the job was I I knew that the from

a tech standpoint because I lived

through it eight years in North Dakota

where where where state government

wasn't up to speed on just basic

technology and basic business systems

and all the things that that uh that

that reduce productivity and create uh I

say agony for state or federal

employees. I mean, we we asked them to

do mind-numbing and soul sucking work

for like 20% of their time because we

haven't given them the basic tools that

everybody in the private sector has had.

And so, it's not like that anybody's bad

a bad people, but you could get rid of

20% of this of the quote work by just

bringing in the tools that are there. I

mean, you could have 20% less people,

then the people would have a more

meaningful, more purposeful job, more

productive. Yeah. All of those things.

And so, what I thought was it can't be

worse than it was in North Dakota. And

then I got into the at least in the

department of interior and uh we are we

are further behind. I mean we're going

to you know this is a the land of you

know decommissioning main mainframes and

then we could just you know take them

straight to the Smithsonian to the 1980s

exhibit. I had dinner with a couple CIOS

CTOs that are that have now been put in

the government and um the stories are

incredible. Totally echo what you what

you're saying. Secretary Bergam, thank

you for this opportunity to join you

here on this beautiful day. I really

appreciate the work you're doing. It's

fantastic to hear that there's someone

in the administration with your

perspective, your experience doing this

work. And so I just want to say thank

you. And David, I want to return that. I

want to thank you and all your

compatriots at Allin because uh you're

you're really uh allowing an opportunity

for America to have a dialogue that goes

deeper than the sound bite. Yeah. And I

I think that all of you may

underestimate the impact that Allin has

had. Uh I know that uh that it's a

you're influencing policy. You're you're

you know helping people understand the

complexity and both the opportunities

and the threats of big things that

really matter to all Americans. And so

and and thank you for being so well

informed and thanks for coming all the

way down here to Louisiana to share this

beautiful day on the coast. Thanks.

Thank you.

[Music]

I'm going all in.