Okay, we are here in Washington DC in

front of the White House having spent

the afternoon with our friend David

Saxs, our friend Elon Musk and others.

We are here to learn about the debt, the

deficit, what's going on in DC. And we

have an incredible interview lined up

with Scott Bessant, Treasury Secretary

of the United States. It was amazing and

it's been an amazing afternoon and we're

really looking forward to it. It was

amazing. Well, this is the pre the intro

to the video. It will be amazing.

It's not the pre. Let's just What the

We're going to pretend it's the pre. It

was amazing. It It will be incredible.

It was incredible. But how cool is the

White House? And here's a bell. I'm

pretty sure I'm pretty sure the bell I

cannot even describe to you the day we

had running around. It's incredible.

Running around room to room in the White

House. One of the best days of my life.

It was one of the best days of my life.

It was incredible. Incredible. I think

this bell is probably pretty important.

Can you guys get a shot of this bell? I

don't know what it is, but it's really

important. Yeah. The White House, the

people to a one super kind, super open,

super curious. I mean, did you felt it?

I You felt accepted. Yeah, I felt But I

got free soda. They have a soda machine

where you can make any Coca-Cola flavor

you want in the White House. It was

pretty cool. I took some uh hummus. I

wrapped it on Creeper's face. I punched

him in. It was a cool afternoon. And uh

this is what is this? The east wing of

the White House. And we took a walk from

the west wing all the way over to the

east wing to the portico. And then we we

snuck in. Well, we didn't sneak in. We

walked in. And then we're walking around

the east wing. We went to all of the

private rooms. I got great photos. We'll

we'll we'll slice him into this video.

And then some secret service dude comes

up and he's like, "What are you guys

What are you doing here? This is the

residence of the president. You have to

get the out." He's like, "You need to go

downstairs now." So, we got kicked the

[ __ ] out. But it was an incredible um

incredible tour. Super great. Yeah.

Anyway, we're excited for this interview

with Scott Bess and hope you enjoy it.

All right, besties. I think that was

another epic discussion. People love the

interviews. I could hear him talk for

hours. Absolutely. We crush 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. Pal

Well, today's a really important day.

We're joined by the 79th Secretary of

the Treasury, Scott Bessant. And this is

an opportunity that we wanted to take as

part of a longer form way of explaining

to people not just how the economy works

but in a little bit more detail where

are we in this moment in time where are

we with deficits, tariffs, the budget,

economic, monetary, fiscal policy. How

do we make sure that we all understand

the plan to make America great again? So

Scott, thank you for joining us. Good.

Thanks for having me. I actually want to

start with let's go back in the way back

machine. So, South Carolina, your father

was a real estate developer. Tell us

where the passion for finance came from.

Uh, well, um, I don't know where finance

in particular came from. As you

mentioned, my dad was a real estate

developer and he he was kind of boom bus

kind of uh, guy. So, I think that's

where my passion for risk management

came from. But uh I I was I was very

fortunate. Went to Yale. Wasn't sure

what I wanted to do. N 1980 when I got

there. Probably you all can imagine

this, but uh there used to be these

things called punch cards and we just

gone the Yale computer system just gone

from punch cards to screens. I was going

to think of being a computer science

major, maybe a journalist because people

actually used to read newspapers. So

punch cards and newspapers from the way

back machine. Uh, and I

um I I got an

internship at just for an individual and

he taught me the investment business

really well. And I And who was that? His

name is Jim Rogers. He's famous. He was

George Soros's first partner. Uh he uh

had just completed an around the world

motorcycle trip and written a book

called Investment Biker, right? and fa

fascinating guy and um I did the

investment business and I thought this

is really what I like because it's

quantitative so I get to use my

quantitative skills but you're also

constructing a narrative um and it's

also like human emotions and you were

trading equities bonds everything

currencies uh well I started out with

equities and I I did that for several

years and then I actually ended up at

Soros Fund Management. I worked for a

fellow who's my mentor, Stan Draen

Miller, who's incredible, but I I think

he's on he's more than 40 years now.

Never a down year. And you know, when

you're sitting next to him, I think,

what am I doing all day and notorious

for going allin several times in his

career? All in all, all in. And uh only

when he's he's right. Yes. Well, I but

he he is the best at changing his mind.

That's right. Of anyone I've ever seen.

So, Duck has that famous adage, invest

then investigate. Well, he he has

several and and I'm trying to get him to

write a book because he has so many of

these great things. Uh maybe you will

press him. Um but invest investigate. It

takes courage to be a pig. Right. Right.

So uh and then I I was hooked on markets

because again it was everything. It was

quantitative, it was qualitative and

it's real time. You get real- time

feedback all the time. And you you're

could have a long-term view, but then

you're trying to gauge the short term

against that. And you know, I I loved

it. And uh for 35 years I've got into I

did what's called macro investing. So uh

eventually I was trading currencies,

bonds,

commodities, the equities, uh some

credit and I got to travel around the

world meeting leaders and trying to

figure out what the next move was in

policy. I think this is important

because I've spoken with folks who um

trade in macro and a big part of the the

role of being a macro investor, macro

trader, is really knowing where central

bank action is going to be, really

knowing how government bonds are going

to move and spending time with

economists, not just central, but around

the world and learning a little bit

about how capital is flowing all over

the world. Is that kind of the right way

to describe that role of being a macro

investor just for folks? Yeah, you know,

it's it's a lot of it's a lot of that.

There's another great macro investor

called Bruce Ker and he had this saying

that he said, you know, I succeeded

because I could imagine a different

future and believe it could happen. So

the key is to believe it could happen

and then manage the risk. So you know

could you imagine like what would happen

if the iron curtain came down? What

would happen? I mean you all do it as

venture capitalists but like you know

how could the world live in a different

state. Okay. Well let's hold that idea

and double click for us to 92. It's

probably one of the most famous moments

where the broader world at large metro

trading. And this is really where you

and Duck and Soros basically broke the

back of the Bank of England. And it's

really an interesting window into

assessing all of these things. So can

you give us the conditions on the ground

at that moment and what new reality you

saw for England? And then it would be

great from there we'll contrast and

compare to America today. Good. So uh it

it's a great historical example and it

also kind of brings in three dimensions.

So I I was the analyst,

Stan was the portfolio manager and then

in a way George was the risk manager.

Okay. So I I was running the the UK

office. I was on the ground in the UK

and I I had this light bulb go off and

you know I thought kind of the fulcrum

thought or like my differentiated view

was that the UK had just had a big

housing boom and UK mortgages at that

time they didn't have long-term

mortgages. They were all floating rates.

So if the Bank of England raised rates

on a Wednesday the your mortgage went up

on a Friday. Yeah. uh the UK had hooked

into something called the exchange rate

mechanism. They had to balance versus

the Deutsch mark. They had to stay

within a band. Um I noticed that if they

raise or I thought if they raised rates

to try to stay in the band and protect

the currency, it would be unsustainable

because British homeowners would get

bankrupted. Uh Stan's great uh feat of

analysis was figuring out that gosh the

these bands set up this incredible

asymmetric bet

because I can push them up against one

side of the band and their mandate is

just to push me back to the other side

so we just lose two and a half%.

And um you know Stan tells this great

story of

like telling George Soros, oh well you

know here's what I want to do and he

says he told him and George says well

how much do you want to do? And he said

probably 100% of the fund and he said

Soros gave him this really sour look and

he thought that he had said something

wrong why wouldn't you do three times

that deal? So uh but anyway it was um we

pushed them against the the ban. the

Bank of England, the British government

uh had to buy this unlimited amount of

pounds and they started raising interest

rates and this was September of

1992 and uh you know

eventually they just weren't able to

sustain the the pressure from the high

rates and came out and then the

asymmetric riskreward was we made about

20 something% in a day. Yeah. Right. And

back to what was really Stan's genius is

I don't know if either of you play back

gammon but in back gammon there's the

move after the move and so Stan we'd

made all that money and we were kind of

euphoric okay now what because there's

going to be the trade after the trade so

we made that much in a day but then it

was actually the trade after the trade

and this isn't well publicized I think

we made another 20%

during the rest of the year. Wow. So in

that moment, what you're really

observing is that the real economy is

somewhat dislocated, maybe meaningfully

dislocated from the financial economy in

your operating. And I think you've said

this now many times and you've basically

used the terminology the main street

wall street dichotomy.

How do you observe the moment in 2025,

the maybe what rhymes with the early 90s

or other periods where you've been

trading actively? Well, look, I I I

think it goes back

to something that's unsustainable is

unsustainable. And um one of the reasons

I'm sitting here now is uh about 18

months ago, I went to see President

Trump. I'd known the Trump family for 30

years. I'd never known the president

that well, but to tell him that I want

to get involved in the campaign because

I was so alarmed with what the Biden

administration was doing with the defic

debt and deficit,

endless stimulus, endless spending,

endless spending, but endless spending

when we were in like solid economic

territory or not in a war. First time,

first time ever. And I I thought it was

very cynical because I I actually

thought, well, we're going to spend

spend spend and then there'll be no

choice but to raise taxes. So you'd go

into this equilibrium that you could

just never get out of and you become

kind of a European style social social

democracy, you know, the malaise. And

you know, I I also think that we're very

cynical on immigration, right? Because

if you take kind of the stated number 12

million, the president's number 22

million. I don't know what the truth is.

Kind of lean toward the president. But

it was, oh, we're going to let all these

people cross the border. You can't ever

make them. Problem's too big to make

them go home. But I like to stay in my

finance lane. So the finance lane was

we're going to just go to the point of

no return and kind of inflict these

the progressive financial values on the

country. There'll be no way out. Very

meaningful wage suppression in that

period and you had an equity market that

was incredibly well bid just because the

money supply was just always there.

Well, it was always there and you had

these distributional aspects because

back to your question, Wall Street

versus Main Street that it was driving

me crazy when Vice President Harris

said, "I'm going to fight for the middle

class." And she'd eviscerated the middle

class or or these policies,

inadvertent, intentional, had

eviscerated the middle class and really

the bottom 50%. So you we're we're in

this uh because purchasing power goes

down, inflation went up. Well, per if

you didn't have assets, right? So, uh

that's really important. I think people

don't understand this that if you had

stocks, if you had assets, your assets

inflated. Y but if you didn't, the cost

of everything inflated, but you didn't

have the ability to purchase because

your wages don't go up. Yeah. And they

not not only

did inflation go up, but if you look uh

Jason Trinard has this thing I think he

calls it the everyman index and um so

CPI went up about 22 during the period

but the everyman index was up over 30

35%. Because the the bottom 25% the

bottom 50% of wage earners have have a

different basket than we do and it

inflated much faster% used car prices

around car insurance car insurance rent

groceries and you like not not only is

it unfair but it's just unstable and

great civil civil issues societal issues

and so yes but sorry as you guys got

into looking at this I and I remembering

and talking about this in the

summer of 23 I think it was or 23. Yeah.

And what was the point of view on what

should have been done at that point in

time and then how much farther did it

go? How much longer did it last? Well, I

I think what happened the the Democrats

will tell you that the big spending

bills were needed for rescue. Yeah. And

I would say in March of 21, the economy

didn't need rescue, was already in

recovery, right? So these were rescue

size packages. And even Larry Summers, I

remember there was a great debate

between Larry Summers and Paul Krugman.

And Summers I think said, "Look, this is

at least 900 billion, a trillion, too

much." And the Federal Reserve was ve

summer of 23 22 Federal Reserve was very

slow off the mark and you know we we

ended up and you know again imagine top

10% has assets stock market is flying

you're in the bottom 50% you have no

assets but you have debt. Yes. So you

credit cards are up u mortgages

impossible to buy a house. house prices

had gone through the roof due to COVID.

So, it really did like end the American

dream and but we we've been suffering

these distributional effects. Scott,

what what is the American dream today?

Do you think? Uh look, I I think the

American dream is what it what it's

always been. But after World War II, I

think 90% of American families uh the

the children made more than the parents.

Now, now I think it's 50/50, but you

know, it's to to own a home. It's

financial security. It's to uh some some

level of comfort. It's purpose in your

work. It's the to be able to support

your family. Uh to be able to have

choices to not have to work two two

jobs. I I made a remark at the Economic

Club of New York last week, two weeks

ago and Mike Pence decided he was going

to troll me and because I said the

American dream is not built on cheap

goods, right? And he said, "Well, yes,

it is." And you know, I I just say,

"Vice President Pence, this let them eat

flat screens economic policy that

doesn't is isn't what people want. They

we they don't want the bobbles from

China. It's like the old they want

progression. People want progression. I

I mean I remember reading um there's a

uh I think Jonathan height had some work

on this a long time ago where happiness

is measured by your change in net worth

or income per year. It doesn't matter

what your absolute levels are by all

these

socioeconomic kind of surveys that they

do. That feeling like you're having some

progression in life is what folks are

looking for. And I wonder whether

solving for that, we created a system,

and I I I'd love your point out your

your your read on this, that we said

everyone should own a home. That's the

American dream. And in order to do that,

people put most of their net worth into

a home. 60% I think of middle class net

worth is tied up in their in a single

asset. And then in order to get them to

feel like they're progressing, we've

created a system of loans and a system

of kind of economic and fiscal policy

that ultimately drives the value of the

home up every year. Now we're kind of in

an unsustainable housing bubble. Can

most people can't even afford to buy a

home. What did we get wrong there? And

how does that affect what the American

dream should look like going forward?

Well, I I think a lot of it is scarcity

because what what you're talking about

is like out in San

Francisco, super tight zoning laws. So

there there's scarcity for home. If if

you think like Ivy League education, all

of a sudden you gave all these people

access to Ivy League educations. You

brought in international students, but

the the number of degrees awarded at

Harvard, Dale, Princeton probably hasn't

changed very much since the 1950s. So

you you created just this demand for

scarce things which leads to this

anxiety. Um, but you you you

also created, I think, a sense of

hopelessness through cuz if you're I

can't access I will never get I will

never be able to pay down my student

loan. I will never be able to afford a

home. I can never see my income growing

to give me access there. Yeah. A and um

so is that is that a dereg solution? Is

that the Well, I think the first the

first part of it is it's a data problem

because in order for the government I

mean the one thing that struck me about

I think this Trump 2.0 administration is

I think you have a better beat on the

fact that this data is not as reliable

as other administrations would say they

were in order to do whatever it is they

wanted to do anyway. So it's sort of

like let me just find the data that

justifies what my action is. Um, and

part of why you can't, I think, tell

this story is, do you trust the GDP

numbers? Do you trust non-farm payrolls?

Do you think these are reliable enough

for you to act on behalf of the United

States? No. Look, that they're subject

to big revisions o over time. And I

thought one of the big mistakes the

Biden administration made, and thank

goodness they made it, was they refused

to they went with the numbers, not what

the American people were feeling. They

said, "No, it's a vibe session and you

really don't understand how good you

have it. This has happened. This has

happened." When when in

reality, I was on Meet the Press

yesterday and there's something that

said, "Well, the American people don't

believe Donald Trump's doing enough on

the economy." And I told the host, I

said, "You know, the one thing I'm not

going to answer is that they don't know

what they're talking about. I have to

have respect for how they feel and then

we need to go back and look at what is

causing this anxiety. So you that's what

that's what we're going to do. So let's

peel the onion back. What do you think

is causing this anxiety? Where are the

levers that maybe the federal government

can control in releasing some of the

pressure? And what are more market

functions that just need to clear up

some of these dis Well, look, I I think

there we we're we're trying to do three

things. And I I think you may have

talked about it last week week before

the the three legs on the stool. Three

legs in the stool. And and from from the

outside that you intuited that very

well. I I would do just a little

refinement on that. That's what I was

going to ask you. Yeah. just tell me

where I was right and wrong. But the you

were adjacent to everything. Okay. So,

uh on on one uh we are trying to bring

down this massive federal debt, cut the

spending and but in a controlled way

because you can't do it all at once. I I

don't like to repeat private

conversations with the president, but

I'll repeat this one because I think

it's very the it really illustrates

where his head was at. First time I went

to SE into seam saw him at Mara Largo

and walk in the door and said, "Scott,

how are we going to get these debt and

deficits down without causing a

recession?" Fantastic. And that's

exactly where we are now. How are we

going to get the debt and deficits down,

not cause a recession? And I said, "Sir,

um, when you win, you didn't get us

here. We're going to set a goal by 2028.

We want to get back to the long-term

average. We're going to deflate it

slowly. And long-term average being

about 3% deficit to GDP. About three

three and a half% deficit to GDP. And

you know, like I keep saying the US, we

don't have a revenue problem. We have a

spending problem because we are

averaging right about 18% revenue. And

I'm talking about federal government.

Federal government only. We're at about

18%.

and Biden administration blew it out

blew the spending out to 25. Normally

it's about 21 21 and a half. We have the

2% inflation nominal GDP it take real

GDP is 18. So we get nominal GDP 3.8 and

it all works out. Yeah. And it was very

I had uh one of the heads of one of the

Singapore sovereign wealth funds here

last week. Guess what Singapore spends

the in terms of spending to GDP deficit

3%. Uh they they have no deficit but

they they spend 18%. 18% 18%. And he

said you know he said we have a lot in

common with the Trump administration. We

like small government. We don't like

immigration, illegal immigration, and we

like personal safety, which I thought

was very interesting. Sorry. So, let me

just um understand. So, deflating

government spending is key, but the big

challenge has been that we have now

accumulated 30 some odd trillion dollars

nearly of

debt. And the interest on that debt has

started to grow. We now have to pay $1.2

trillion in interest payments per year.

So that starts to consume more of the

spending budget that we have at the

federal level, which means we can spend

less on the rest of the federal

government's programs, meaning you have

to cut a lot more than you otherwise

would have, which is what makes it so

difficult and so painful. Is it

realistic that you can get Congress to

act in the way that Congress needs to

act to get to the level that we need to

get to given the high interest payments

and the high debt level that we have?

Yeah. and w with this Republican

Congress. Uh, and look, I I I'm I'm not

sure what a deficit hawk is, but I I

think I I would qualify as one. And, uh,

a lot of the Republicans, I actually

have to coax him, you can't do this all

at once. I I was with the one of the

congressional budget committees two

weeks ago, and, you know, they really

want to cut this fast. And I said, you

do realize every 300 billion we cut is

about a percent of GDP. So you you could

so we we are trying to land the plane,

right? Uh well,

and the plan uh because that that's

really what I'd like to talk about

today. I think there are three plans

here, but plan one, we're going to

delever the government via the spending.

uh we are also going to shed excess

labor from the government. So on that

side and then on the other side we're

going we're going to deregulate the

financial system. The regulated

financial systems really been what I

call a regulatory corset for a long time

and as we deregulate that then the

private sector can relever. So

government deleveraging, private sector

releveraging and the employment or

the folks who lost their government jobs

will be picked up by the more

productive. But this sorry this is

really important and I think this is the

most critical thing. I'm really glad we

got the chance to talk today because I

hear so much about the conversation on

any one of these topics independent of

the others and there's a relationship

between them that I think is critical to

understand on how this administration is

aiming to drive an economic recovery

that is not inflationary is sustainable

and also will allow people to have the

American dream in a way that they can't

have access to today. Yeah. And the so

part of fixing the affordability crisis

is what can and we we come back and talk

about it if you want, but what where can

we get prices down? You know, like e

eggs are easy or but the the other side

of getting prices

down is getting real wages up. So on

getting real wages for working people

up, it goes back to the main street

versus Wall Street. And the the second

plan is to the reorder the international

trading system and bring manufacturing

jobs back to the US and you have

reinvigorate the the middle class

because again through tariffs well to to

use

tariffs that we're needed to bring other

countries uh into line and to create an

economic incentive to onshore for some

industries and some supply chains. Well,

so there there's tariffs. Then I think

there are three other things we can do

which are the centerpiece of the

administration. We can have the low and

predictable taxes. We can substantially

uh slash regulations because regulations

are the equivalent of that'll drive

investment dollars, private investment

dollars and predictability in

regulations. Uh and then uh cheap

energy, right? And sorry, what what is

the relationship between the tax cuts

and um the getting to 3% three and a

half% deficit as a percent of GDP,

especially because the CR unfortunately

gave folks a get out of jail free card

because we kept the you know $2 trillion

cap for the next alone. Uh yes. Uh, but

you got to have we we I I I been in this

building. I think this is my seventh

week. President Trump been back at the

White House for eight weeks. So, you

actually do need time. Yeah. So, what a

lot of people who weren't happy about

the CR, but shutting down the government

wouldn't have been productive either

politically or economically. So, sorry.

Does does um tax cuts get made up with

tariffs or does tax cuts get made up

with cutting government spending? Well,

tax cuts will so tax cuts and

deregulation will uh change the growth

traje

uh if trend line has been 1.8 eight. If

you can move the growth to three or

above, right, then you really change

their trajectory and if you can um keep

expenses flat or do the unthinkable and

cut expenses, then you can really So

this is important. So sorry, government

revenue as a percent of GDP can go lower

if you have lower expenses and a faster

growing economy. Yes, I think that's

like really important for folks to

understand that relationship. And so in

isolation, tax cuts might reduce

revenue, but when done with reduced

government spending and deregulation and

a reordered international trade model,

you theoretically will accelerate

economic growth in this country,

increase government revenue overall,

even with a lower tax rate. That's kind

of a theory, right? And and you know,

I'll I'll tell you, shame on me. I I was

in the investment business 35 years. I I

talk very confidently that CBO scoring

says this and it turns out I I didn't

know you know what about CBO scoring.

Like when you're on this side of the

wall, you realize how crazy it is. It's

crazy. So So just quite a gameable

system. It's a Yeah, it it's very

gameable. And one of the most gameable

parts of it is in normal CBO scoring

that so we we're calling we're saying

that we want to renew the tax cuts,

right?

We're actually just renewing the current

tax regime, right? That but somehow a

after they

expire then they go back to the old

rate. Spending never changes like

spending never has to get renewed. And I

think when when I look and think about a

mental model and how does systems work,

how do they break down? One of the

things that has caused this spending

bulge is this idea that you never had to

rescore spending. Oh, it's nuts. And the

incentive model is when you have a

constituency that you represent as an

elected representative that's earning

from that spending, they're telling you,

"If you want to get reelected, make sure

my earnings stay and get me more." And

then every year you've got a set of

elected representatives whose, you know,

primary objective in a democratic system

is to go in and get more money for their

constituents. How do we solve that

fundamental problem? How do you think

about that? Well, you got to deal with a

second. Do you actually think that

that's true? Do you think that most

politicians are here to just get money

for their Good question. Yeah. Yeah. I

mean, it's it's OPM. It's other people's

money, but they Danny DeVito had that

movie. Yeah. But but you you would

regard that as being a good politician.

Like you brought home the bacon for for

your district. Yeah. That because

the the CR a lot of people didn't like

it. But one of the things that a lot of

people didn't like there were no

earmarks in it. Like how dare they?

Totally. The Christmas tree bill that

kind of shows up at the 11th hour where

everyone gets a little bit. Yeah. Can

you talk about So we talked about this

deregulation as this one very important

lever, right? So how do we add 50 100

basis points of growth back in? We're

going to do it through

deregulation. How do you undo the

financial corset as you said? What are

the what are the sort of three or four

big ideas that you'd like to affect?

Yep. So um we are

reexamining all all the bank regulations

and why why are they there? Why why do

banks have to I can't remember it's five

or 7% to hold treasury bills. What are

the regulations? Why do I I had a whole

group of community bankers or small

banks here last week? And why do they

have to hold the same amount of capital

that JP Morgan and Wells Fargo and City

hold when they don't have the

complexity? They don't have why do the

regulators one one of these small

bankers said, "Well, you know, Bank

America does it this way." Well, Bank

America has a trillion dollars in

deposits. Yeah, this was

$183 million. Yeah, but when you look at

the regulatory overhang of some of these

things, Basel 1, Basel 2, you have all

of these frameworks and then as a

result, all these organizations that are

running around trying to help you

administer this complexity, all it does

is just lower economic activity in the

end. Well, and and but it's I know you

all talk about incentives a lot. Back to

incentives. What's a regul regulator's

incentive just to keep like keep

tightening the corset? They don't care

about growth. They they don't care about

the uh common sense. Turn off turn off

every risk. It's their job. If you had

to create a metric then to say, okay,

here's how we're going to measure this

undoing of the financial corset. Is it

sort of the lending velocity by private

lenders so that the private releveraging

can occur? Is that a good way to think

about or is rates a way to think about

it? Well, it it doesn't have to be

rates, but if if we do all the things I

was just talking about, if we

deregulate, if we have cheap energy, the

I if we shed excess labor from the

government, if we get government

spending down, then rates inflation

should come down, rates should come

down. Yeah. Uh but the on the question

of how are we going to measure it? I I

don't have any problem with private

credit. Yeah. Like I I actually think

it's exciting the dynamic. It's dynamic.

It meets the business where it is. Yeah.

I agree. And the the strength of the US

financial system is the depth and now

the breadth. But you you could see that

what's

happened that so much lending is being

pushed outside the regulated banking

system. That tells you it's

overregulated. Yeah. Right.

So now um once we so one test will be

how has bank lending especially small

regional small banks community banks

that come undone and you these small

banks the small banks and community

banks they're 70% of a loans they're 40%

of small business loans and that that's

one of the reasons Main Street's been

stifled. So can you talk about then how

you will work with the Fed in sort

of the change of all of this financial

you need to and do you need to work with

Congress too to make these changes and

also just generally maybe your thoughts

on just the Fed in this process of

helper foe like where where do they

stand? Well the the

Fed I 100% support the Fed's autonomy in

monetary policy. Yeah. I don't agree

with it all the time, but right that

how it is. It's how it is. It's how it

is. And um so and and I've said I won't

comment on perspective policy. I can

talk about their mistakes in the past

which have been numerous. But I I think

like like with with with any system as

as it expands beyond sort of the core uh

I I actually think that some of the

things they've done in regulation some

of the things they've done kind of

climate and DEI some of the things may

maybe even non-standard monetary policy

uh threatens their independence and I

want them to stay strong robust and

independent on monetary policy on

regulation. I I think that they have

they have been much too harsh on

especially the smaller smaller banks,

medium banks. U so there are three main

bank regulators. There's the Fed off

office of control of the currency OC and

the

FDIC and then there other regulators the

SEC CFTC but the banking regulators at

the federal level are those three. here

at Treasury, we have something called

FSOC and financial stability oversight

council and um I chair that and via that

the president's working group uh which

is another convening mechanism that I I

plan to just keep pushing for you know

safe sound and smart deregulation like

why are we doing this why are we doing

that and you again that there's a

capital charge to banks for buying

treasury bills. Totally. So I I actually

think there's a chance that if we take

it's it's called the supplementary

leverage ratio. If we take that away,

it's it becomes a binding constraint on

banks. We might actually pull Treasury

bill yields down by 30 to 70 basis

points.

Every basis point is a billion dollars a

year. Can we talk about that for a

second? So

I think and I' I've said this for a year

probably, but the one of the biggest

mistakes that I think Janet Yellen

affected was this continued issuance of

money on the short end of the curve to

finance these deficits which gives you

you inherit an incredibly difficult

challenge. I think over the next nine

months I think there's like nine or 10

trillion that has to get refinanced. Do

you want to talk about that?

Yeah. Look, I I I thought that it that

when rates were low, you're supposed to

term out rates. Exactly. And in instead

the the Treasury for the past few years

has pulled rates in. And I think part of

that was to keep rates lower that they

they changed the issuance schedule when

rates move back up towards 5%. I I um

have maintained that policy, but I'm

maintaining it because let's go back to

David's

question of when when are you going when

are we going to see the results from

this the getting the government spending

under control and I don't think the

markets recognize it yet. Yeah. Like

like you know again if we do they don't

they're not sure what to believe. I

mean, we hear this commentary a lot like

what do you really what we people

there's just a lot of uncertainty.

There's a big spectrum of opinions

there. Yeah. Like like the the central

value tendency, you're right. The

central value tendency like what's the

center of it because the the range of

outcomes is so so broad and you know

like we know we know there's a problem

there. We know there's waste, fraud, and

abuse. Quantify it. Quantify it. So I I

think as we are more able to quantify

it, we will get credit for it. So let me

go back. So outside of waste, fraud and

abuse as it's termed, I want to go back

to the question I asked earlier. How

much do does this administration need

Congress to act to get to 3 to 3 12%

deficit to GDP? And how what's your read

on the Congress and how willing and able

they are to take the action that's

needed here? Yeah, I I I think there are

a lot of headlines especially after the

CR about the Democrats being in disarray

and media like media likes to write

about disarray.

I I think the under or untold story here

is Republicans have for a change

actually been very disciplined that and

I think a lot of

that President Trump is kind of

shephering the party, shephering the

movement because imagine he said, "Oh,

that Mike Johnson will never get

reconciliation instructions out of he's

got such a slim majority." Well, he did

it. He did it. Yeah. That he'll never be

able to pass a clean CR. He did it. He

did it. So, let's see what happens with

the budget. So, we need Congress to be

our partners on the budget. They're very

engaged, the House and the Senate, that

everybody recognizes that if we don't

get this done, it's going to be the

biggest, it's past fail. It's the

biggest tax hike in history. Where does

Doge come in?

Well,

Doge, that's the the cost cutting and

it's the first time we've really ever

had business people looking at it. The

this Clinton Gore Commission that we

hear a lot of like or hear a lot about.

I I think it was a bunch of business

school professors and but here you've

got real CEOs. You got Lutnik, you got

Bergam, you got Elon. I mean, this

cabinet is stock full of experienced

operators that can go in and identify

where there's an opportunity for saving

the taxpayers money and still getting

the results. Well, it's that and we we

had this crypto council meeting the

other day and I was sitting as looking

it was myself, Secretary Lutnik, and

Kelly Laughler. Everybody was a market

person. like forget business like we and

but with Doge

that I am

completely aligned with what Elon's

doing and everyone says, "Well, do you

have to do it so fast? You have to do

it." I I like I said, I've only been in

in this business for 7 weeks. I've only

been in DC for 8 weeks. But the thing I

can tell you is if you don't move fast,

the vested interest will weigh you down.

like the the the quicksand will come up

or the claws get the claw. Yeah.

Everybody's got lobbyists. Everybody's

got I mean, think about it. Within a 10

10 mile radius of here, 25% of the GDP

of the US pulsates through here.

Pulsates every day. Yeah. And everybody

wants to just skim a little. I I said to

uh e Elon and we were in a meeting and I

said, "You know, people are mad at you

cuz you're moving their cheese." And he

goes, "It's not their cheese. It's the

American people's cheese." 100%. Every

dollar spent goes into someone's pocket

and that person's going to fight tooth

and nail to get that dollar to keep

flowing into their pocket. And it's a

it's a it's a very like there is no

winning in Elon's role. There's every

single time he takes action there are

people that are going to come after him

that are going to come after the

administration. There's no situ and and

obviously gets recast reclassified in

the media as being something different

but there's nothing but downside as you

make these changes to individual

organizations that participate and then

it takes a while for the flow of that

money to find its way or those

individuals to find their way back into

the productive private economy. That's

where I think there's a big gap and a

big challenge in the perception of the

actions that are going on with the

changes right now is everyone sees the

cuts, but they don't see the benefits.

And that's nine months, 12 months, 15

months down the road. And that's a

really hard thing to reconcile for most.

Yeah. And I I'd say there are a couple

of things, too, is one like everyone's

hearing cuts and they think they're

government services. That's right.

That's right. And they're not. I I keep

saying it's the Department of Government

efficiency, not government extinction,

not government elimination. And can we

make it run much better with fewer

people with fewer costs? And you I don't

want to demonize any of these federal

employees cuz I tell you in this

building, I've been so impressed with

the quality of the the people. I I would

have hired them in my private firm. They

are great public servants. I need you to

stay for the weekend. and I need a

25page memo in 72 hours that super high

quality. I I actually think what when

when all this is done

there there will have been two big

savings. One will been on these

contractors. Sure. Which totally we were

just talking about this. We were with

Elon just now with an incredible stat.

He said I'm not going to name the firm

so that I don't want to but he said this

one organization gets 98% of their

revenue from it was in the newspaper so

we can say it. It's booze Allen.

We were talking about this and then but

then we were going through the numbers

on the other firms and it's just the

whole thing. What kind of risk

management is that by the way? Yeah.

Yeah, but but it tells you

that that they didn't manage the risk.

That's right. Tells you how entrenched

they believe they were and how good it

is for them. And how good it is. You're

absolutely right. And and the way the

way the grift works, you can only have

six-month contracts, but there are

people who have had 40 six-month

contracts. Incredible. Like they've been

in situ for 20 years. Incredible. And

it's this whole I'm so happy there is

transparency and visibility into this.

If for nothing else the administration

providing this level of insight and data

I think is so important for taxpayers

and individuals in this country to see

to recognize and importantly to

understand just how much of this grift

is going on. It's frightening and I'm

glad that it's like being addressed and

and the American people can see if they

want it. So this is what I was going to

ask you. Let's just say that some

somehow the Borg slows this whole thing

down. You know what people say is that

the conventionalism well then the only

place to look will be things like

entitlements.

Good question. Yeah. Do you do you think

that that's true?

Well, I I

I think that now that the cat's out of

the bag that the American people are are

not going to stay with this is that you

may maybe again here may maybe in the

Northeast Corridor um there's some push

back, but when I've seen the polling

data and the rest of the country does

not want this to stop and this

administration's not gonna stop. Yeah.

the courts, they're trying to throw sand

in the gears with the courts and how

some judge can say, "Oh, all these

workers have to come back in." And but I

I also think we've moved really quickly

now. I think when we start putting out

some of the ane anecdotes and the the

messages and talk about what's

happening, like I I'll talk about it. I

I'll be talking about it soon, but there

there's one very large department that

everybody deals with on April 15th that

their help desk is fully staffed 24/7,

365 days a year. They have the same

number of people on Christmas Eve as

they have on April 14th. Wow. This is

this this, by the way, is something that

I've seen being a lightning rod.

Theoretically, every dollar you spend on

the IRS, you get $3 back or whatever it

is. That's not necessarily true. Like I

just want to be clear that there's you

can still get all your tax revenue at

the federal level, but you don't need to

waste. Well, look, I I mean I'd be the

ultimate chump if I said, "Oh, we're

going to cut spending." Yeah. But I also

cut revenues with with the IRS, which

Treasury controls. My my three goals are

very simple. Revenue enhancement,

privacy, and customer service. Totally.

You know, there's a there's a body of

knowledge that says if we just fed in,

and by the way, four or five of these

companies can do this. Now, if we just

fed in this entire federal tax code into

these AI models, what you can give to

Americans is a very guaranteed, resolute

ability to file taxes with the assurance

that there is no waste, fraud, and

abuse. And now all of a sudden, you take

this incredible weight off of people's

shoulders. Um you know sometimes it is

said that you get audited for almost

political reasons. It seems like you

know uh people that not almost we have a

big we we we had a big announcement on

Tuesday and we brought in the 200 Biden

whistleblowers who they uh have a lot to

say about who gets audited, who doesn't.

They're going to be sitting in this

building working on IRS the matters and

understanding exactly how these audits

get triggered, how these political witch

hunts happen and trying to the change

the ethos of the building. And again,

99% of the people at the IRS are good

people. It's just like all these other

agencies where they're they're bad

folks. But to your point, this is where

technology can create um very reliable

guard rails for the American citizen

where it's like, okay, well, if this

model says I owe $1,000 in tax, this is

it. I'm not trying to change anything.

I've fed it all the software first and

you just know. Let me go back to

entitlements.

Um I talked last week on our podcast

about social security. Mhm. Social

Security has a $2.7 trillion balance,

which is just a basically a Treasury

bond that's owed that they can't trade

out of. Should Social Security have

invested in the S&P or invested in

equities? And why don't we turn Social

Security into a sovereign wealth fund

and invest it for the benefit of all

Americans going forward? Yeah, I I I

think there there's the optimal, then

there's the

possible. George W. Bush tried to

privatize social security and you I I

saw your your numbers listened to your

numbers going way back 1971 1971 and

with 15 16 trillion that we'd have I I

don't know what the numbers are since W

tried it. Yeah, they'd be substantial.

We we wouldn't be thinking about a

problem in a few years. But I think now

you got to play the hand you're dealt. I

think we are dealt the social security

uh hand. And I think maybe we could

re-engineer it if we could create the

sovereign wealth fund and have that on

the other side. There are a lot of

philanthropists who are looking at baby

bonds. So if you can create a some kind

of an investment account for newborns

then that would run on a parallel track

to social security. So that would be

compounding. The other thing would be a

safety net. Yeah. But it's still sitting

in treasuries on the other side. Y and

that's where there's an opportunity not

just to drive up returns but participate

in the American economy and give all

Americans today the ability to know that

they have some participation in the

American economy rather than having

their retirement funds being sitting as

a loan to the federal government for

spending which I think could be a big

dramatic change. I don't know if they

need to be independent but I I I would I

think it's a it's a real opportunity for

us. Are you are you excited by the idea

of the sovereign wealth fund? I I am and

I'm excited by the idea like this is

pres President Trump. Everything he does

isn't in a straight line, but I

guarantee he has a destination in mind.

And the idea that he's going to be the

first president in generations who is

going to he wants to create assets for

the American people, not just debt.

Yeah. Yeah. So he wants to take the debt

down. And then this idea of assets,

there was a lot of talk about this

economic deal we're going to do with

Ukraine. That would have gone in the

sovereign wealth fund, right? Yeah.

Government has big stake

in Fanny May and Freddy Mack. Yeah. When

it comes out of conservatorship, where

does that go? Where where does that go?

As you mentioned, Doug Doug

Bergam did great work when he was

governor of North Dakota. North Dakota

has the equivalent of two state

sovereign wealth funds and for I don't

know are they 7 8 900,000 people. I

think they had $25 billion, right? And

Alaska permanent the Alaska permanent

but all all that's from the natural

resource money going in. So to the

extent we

start the other day when the sovereign

wealth fund was announced, President

Trump surprised me in the oval and said,

"Could you make a few remarks?" And I

said, "Well, we're we're going to we're

going to mo we're going to mobilize the

asset side of the balance sheet." And

all the gold books said he's going to re

he's going to revalue the gold. I I can

say today we're not revaling the gold,

but what we are going to do is Doug

Bergam at Interior, every other

department head is looking for the

assets that we can mobilize. So if if we

have energy leases, federal government

own back to the housing shortage.

Federal government owns a lot of land in

downtown urban areas. Can we or in

suburban adjacent things in in Nevada

and Utah, can we use that land? Yeah. Do

you see a wave of privatizations as a

way to sort of both pay down the

deficits and debts and also just to

that? That's important to me. Like why

put in a sovereign wealth fund versus

pay down the debt? Help help kind of do

the finance math for us on Oh, could you

think you get a higher return, right?

Well, anything anything that beats our

current return, our current interest

rate. Yeah. I mean, not not that I'm

keeping score, not that I watch it

closely, but the 10-year Treasury today

is 428. 428. Yeah. So, um, it's

responding well. Can can we can can we

do better Yeah. than four can we do

better than 428? And I think with this

group and this cabinet and if we can put

in right right now, we're working on the

the study group for the sovereign wealth

fund and we want to do best practices.

We're talking to people around the

world. We're talking to investment

people. Uh we're talking to uh a lot of

the other big sovereign uh funds and

we're going to do best practices and we

want this to be a legacy event. Totally.

Dan Lo made this comment that the

Australian superanuation they've got 30

managers and they have as much in their

on their balance sheet today in their

fund than Social Security does about $3

trillion and they have 7% of our

population. Yeah. No, it's incredible.

It's incredible. It's incredible. And I

was with one of the Middle Eastern funds

and you know, I said something about oil

revenue. We haven't had an an injection

into the fund in 20 years. Why was this

such a miss for America? What happened

in the United States? Was that we took

every excess dollar we had and we

invested it in the future? We bought in

we built infrastructure. What happened

that kept us out of this model where

others were so successful and clearly

have now gotten ahead of us and their

their people have a greater kind of

safety net than we do. Yeah. I I I think

it it was just this idea of it it was

supposed to be a safety net, not some

kind of prosperity ramp.

The old age and survivors disability

insurance fund. That's what it's called,

right? Under social security. you uh

you've mentioned cheap energy as a

critical part of this holistic program I

think three times now. Where do we make

mistakes in that path where energy gets

out of control? What what do we need to

do to make sure that energy actually the

the incremental cost of the electron

basically goes to zero? Well, I I think

the biggest challenge we're having right

now is trying to get private sector to

lock in for some things that might not

have a payoff for 5 10 years and how do

we avoid student body left, student body

right with administrations coming and

going. So we're we're trying we're we're

working on well this is an incredibly

nuanced and I think an important point

because we have this very vibrant as you

know tax equity and transferability

market that allows a lot of these

organizations to make these five and 10

year investment cases and you know for

all the issues with the IRA of which

there are many I think the one narrow

aspect that it did was um it calmed the

markets about the future of those

specific ITC credits and transferability

and And it's a critical thing because

there was a report, you probably saw it,

but you know, FK said 90 plus% of our

incremental electrons as of

December were from sources that were

leveraging these ITC credits and that

transferability. So to your point, we

have this very delicate balancing act of

making sure we but but there there's the

the tax side, but then the regulatory

side with with fossil, it's tougher

because it crosses a lot of state lines.

There's a lot more permitting, right?

a lot less permitting for solar farms,

for wind, for geothermal. Yeah. Yeah.

And nuclear. Uh nuclear is going to be a

big part of it, but it it's not going to

happen tomorrow. We got to fix the

supply chain and the regulatory. Well,

we got to fix the supply chain. We got

to fix the regulatory.

Um I we've got to decide which model are

we going to go with. And you know, I I'm

told that you you two probably know more

about nuclear than I do, but he loves

it. I hate it. Okay. Well, no, I don't

hate it. I mean, I I like I like

nuclear. I just think it's 10 years

away. He's a loser. Don't listen to him.

Yeah. He doesn't really It's just not an

investable thing for the

next but it's important because the

question is when it becomes one, that's

when we know we've fixed the problem.

But but but to to the point that it's

not investable, that's where the

government needs to step. Absolutely. I

100% agree with you like we that's where

we have to bridge to to the technology

we have to do the time arbitrage and

also I'm told especially with the

smaller plants that you that you need to

cluster them and you got to find

somebody who wants to cluster them and

all that. And um let me ask you one more

question as we kind of get to the end,

but uh what's been the most surprising

thing for you in this role since you've

um since you've been in office? Uh the

national security aspect that I I would

say 40 50% of my day. uh Treasury does a

lot of national security work whe

whether it's cifhious in terms of uh

foreigners who want to buy US assets

whether it's sanctions whether it's OFAC

anti-money laundering we we've just

designated the Mexican cartels as

foreign terrorist

organizations we President Trump over

the weekend launched a very aggressive

strike on missile strike on the Houthi

assets. Well, underneath that, we had

already been working for several weeks

on their bank accounts. I see. So, or

anyone who is adjacent to them, the

Iranians supply the Houthis

with the their

ecosystem. Previous to my getting here,

uh, Treasury had disrupted the ecosystem

so much that, uh, the Iranians used to

hand them cash. Now they're just handing

them here, take take this oil tanker and

try to sell it, right? So like there

there is the ability to to break that

down. When you go home and you're

talking to your kids, you're talking to

your husband and you're

like, "This was so cool." There must be

these moments where you're like, "This

was so cool. Do you have any anecdotes

that you you're comfortable sharing

where you're just like this is like I

can't believe I'm doing this job? Uh

well uh there have been several but a a

good example my family was actually

there because after the inauguration I I

asked President Trump may I bring my

family in say hello get a photo and

we're we're sitting in the oval. So,

it's myself, my 11year-old daughter, uh

my spouse, 15-year-old son, and the

President Trump's having a great

conversation with them. And and then he

said, "Oh, Scott, while you're here, let

me call in these other two people and we

need to discuss this." So, they actually

got to see government being done live.

So, you there there's that. Um, I I you

know, I I have to say I I think the the

moment with um President Trump, Vice

President Vance, President Zalinski was

kind of a once in a-lifetime thing in

the Oval Office. I hope it's once in a

lifetime. And they um but you know, I I

was sitting there kind of in the front

row of history. I I vice president,

Secretary Rubio, myself on the sofa and

watching President

Zullinsky do what I thought was the the

biggest diplomatic own goal in history.

Yeah. Yeah. I think you said it very

well in in TV afterwards. It really

really was based on and you you said

because you were there, you tried to

negotiate with him in Kev. It was a very

escalated I think you use the word

escalated or high high decibel

conversation. High decel. Yes. Yeah. So,

but it kind

of my my job for 35 years was to be

outside the room, try to put my ear to

the door, maybe lift myself over the

transom, figure out what the leaders

needed to do, were going to do, and then

how it would affect the markets. And now

it

it's fantastic and amazing and

stimulating and a little scary being the

person in the room who has

to what should we do? What can we do?

How's it going to affect the markets?

How's it going to affect the real

economy that what what's it going to do

to working people in America? So, how do

we fix affordability?

um we're just going to have to go

through and where where's the problem?

What's the

solution in terms of like are are the

insurance markets broken, right? What

can we do there? There's been no in I

I've been involved in the house building

business. There's been no technological

change in house building in 50 years,

maybe 60. Some of the building codes go

all the way back to the Chicago fire,

right? So, what can we do that the way

we categorize housing, it's stickuilt or

modular? Mhm. Is there something in the

middle prefab? Because the more that

comes out of a factory, the more that is

standardized that neighborhoods from DC,

from DC to Bethesda to PTOAC to like you

could be in contiguous neighborhoods and

if they're different municipalities,

they'd all have different building

codes. Not zoning, building. Yeah. And

why is that? Like it they're adjacent.

Why do the houses have to be? So, is

there some kind of window guidance that

the federal government can give in terms

of the more that comes out of the

factory, the cheaper it'll be, the

faster we can make it, things like that.

Is there pressure that you could apply

or influence you can apply? One of the

things you mentioned earlier was just,

you know, take San Francisco. There's an

artificial constraint that's created by

the zoning paradigm and it's not clear

how you unlock that. you know, maybe is

it up to private citizens to sort of

like have regime change at the local

level? Um, but how do we sort of unclog

that part of it to marry up with this

kind of stuff? Because it would be great

if you could just build up in many

places. Yeah. Well, I I I think there

are a lot of things where you can look

around and

find what's

interesting that some what's something

that's interesting that's being done

somewhere. So, I I lived in Greenwich,

Connecticut for a while. may maybe the

richest suburb in America. There's a ton

of multifamily there. Very expensive,

very nice multifamily. There's some

affordable housing, but Greenwich is not

all 10 acres and a horse farm.

The state of Connecticut has put in a I

guess it's a law that every municipality

has to allocate 10% of vacant land to

multifamily. And if the zoning board

won't give you a hearing, you as a

developer, you as a nonprofit for

housing can go over the top and go to

Hartford and then Hartford will give you

the authority. Well, no, no town wants

the state doing on their behalf. So now

the towns negotiate. Yeah. So, like I I

think that there are a lot of things

that that can be done again on on

insurance. Is there something that I

I've been thinking about is there

something the federal government could

do for California where we come in

everyone's paying homeowners insurance

then there's reinsurance on top of that.

Then I think the California reinsurance

companies called Fair. Yeah. On top of

that. So it's a well it's a separate

plan but yeah yeah but but it it's it's

a you're stack you're stacking it. So is

there something we could do where you

put another layer of private money in

there and then the federal government is

the fifth risk trunch right? But if the

federal government comes in can we

mandate down here proper hygiene changes

in the building code? Well, changes in

the building code, changes in brush

cutting, right? And material choices.

Yeah. Right. Right. Yeah. Makes sense.

Great. So, I I think there's a lot if we

And obviously energy I mean just getting

back to affordability, right? Energy

costs come down. I took the words out of

my mouth. No, no, no, no. But I mean

energy costs are energy costs, but then

there's also the for food, the

transportation cost of getting it to the

to the grocery store, everything that

that's made out of petroleum products.

So I I think we we can do that. And um

you know, I think there's a lot to do.

Yeah. And it shouldn't be too hard. So

we're actually we should probably be

announcing it in about 10 days. We're

going to have an affordabil

affordability zar, but it's going to be

someone with a lot of experience in

supply chains figuring out what are a

lot of the quick fixes we can do because

back to the question,

what really has people

anxious, inflation for now is

actually pretty quiet in. And

um but the affordability has gotten so

away from everyone that how can we bring

that down? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Good. For

all our friends at home who talk a lot

about the conversation about climate

change and carbon-f free. I think one of

the things that I always point out to

people is the cheapest way of driving

energy production in this country is

that there's a low carbon or carbon-f

free alternative that's out there that's

actually cheaper than standing up new

new plants. Um, and there's an

acceleration. I don't know how much this

administration thinks about that

relationship. But it seems to me like if

we can unlock energy production, costs

come down and this economy transitions.

Well, it transitions and I think it's

also not being dogmatic.

Like I I I saw what the Biden

administration did with EVs. I I have an

EV. I can't wait for it to come off

lease and but also have a hybrid and I

think I fill it up maybe three times a

year. Totally. But this administration

had a jihad on hybrids because there it

it they didn't pass the purity test. So

they were picking winners and losers in

a way that a lot of us were left

scratching our heads. Yeah. Yep. And

cheap I think cheap energy solves a lot

of problems. I I I think it'll a and uh

cheap

energy is energy security too 100%. Cuz

that that's why Europe's kind of over a

barrel literally. And it's a it's why

the Russian war machine hasn't again

literally run out of gas. And to the

extent that we believe we're in an

existential arms race for technical

supremacy, it's really on one dimension,

which is AI. And that

is so needy of energy. So if we don't

pull all of these issues together and

realize that we need to basically take

the incremental cost to zero, whatever

we do, we need to create the incentives

and package it all together. I mean, we

can't we can't compete manufacturing as

without energy without we certainly

can't compete without energy. Yep. Yeah.

I mean, we're we're we're not going to

crush labor like China and some other

countries have done. So, we got to crush

the energy price. Right. Exactly. Right.

And when you're in the Oval, what are

the truths and misconceptions of the

president? Meaning on the outside and

what people know or don't know. Oh, how

about this? I we we had a lot of um

foreign leaders come in and I I knew

someone in in the in one of their

entouragees. I won't tell you which one,

but afterwards he comes up to me, he

goes, "Holy crap." He goes, "He's really

smart. President Trump has perfect

recollection because he was talking

about something that had happened in

that country 30 years ago and he said

and he really So the President Trump

listens. He is judicious. He is just

taking it all in. He likes to see how

people react.

Um it it's just incredible executive

skills. Uh yeah, and the other thing too

that he he's tough, but I went in and I

showed him, we were talking about

something the other day and I said,

"Well, you know, this is going to cause

some layoffs." He goes, "Well, let let's

try to fix it." Yeah. Yeah, let's try to

fix it. So, I I always say he really

regards himself as the mayor of America,

right? 330 million people. He wants to

be personable to everyone and he cares

deeply about all of them and he doesn't

care whether you're Elon Musk or the the

guy cutting the rose garden, but you're

his constituent.

Great. Well, Scott, thank you so much

for taking the time. This has been a

wonderful a pleasure and we really

appreciate the insight. Yeah. And thanks

for the service and thanks for doing the

role. Good. Thanks. Appreciate it.

Thanks.

[Music]

Thanks. I'm going all in.