Show Transcript

Fighting Polarization TOGETHER!

[00:00:00] Bob Gatty: Welcome to the Lean to the Left podcast, where we focus on politics and the important social issues of our time, with just a little Lean to the Left. 

[00:00:10] Jason Palmer, a 52 year old venture capitalist and a Democrat, had a dream. It was to become president of the United States. And so against all odds, he launched a campaign to challenge President Biden for the nomination.

[00:00:26] Along the way, Palmer, the candidate nobody ever heard of, worked his tail off connecting with voters across the country. He even managed to win one Democratic primary, American Samoa. Palmer appeared on the Lean to the Left podcast in February, when he outlined his hopes for America, and not the least of which, was to help heal the deep divisions that currently beset our country.

[00:00:52] Having ended his campaign, Palmer has endorsed President Biden for re election and promised to do all he can to help defeat Donald Trump. But Jason's done more than just talk. Together with two other outstanding partners, he's launched a new organization. It's called Together.

[00:01:13] And his partners are Debra Perry Piscione and speaker entrepreneur Kwame Jackson, both of whom joined Jason with us today. 

[00:01:23] Now, Palmer says Together is crafted to steer America away from polarization and extremes by mobilizing young American voters to elect a new generation of common sense leaders from all political backgrounds.

[00:01:38] You'll get to meet Jason and his sidekicks, Debra and Kwame. In just a second. So stay with us.

[00:01:47] Deborah Perry Piscione is the co founder and CEO of the Work3 Institute, an advisory firm that helps enterprises evolve into AI Work3 workforce. Kwame Jackson is a leadership strategist, Newsweek contributor, and frequent political commentator for CNN, MSNBC, Fox, and News One. So guys, thanks so much for joining us and sharing the news about TOGETHER. 

[00:02:16] Kwame Jackson: Thank you for 

[00:02:16] Jason Palmer: having us. Thank you. Happy to be here. 

[00:02:19] Bob Gatty: All right. Hey Jason, tell us about TOGETHER and how it started, and what the role that Deborah and Kwame will play in the organization. 

[00:02:28] Jason Palmer: Absolutely.

[00:02:29] Yeah. So we're co founders and co owners of together and the organization exists just like you said to reduce polarization and really energize young voters. We're going to be endorsing young candidates who are running for Congress, and we're going to try to get a million young people registered to vote by this fall.

[00:02:50] Our goal is that when all is said and done in November, people are not just talking about the presidential race, but they're talking about all these young people that got elected to Congress, and all these young people showed up to vote, and there's a new spirit of civility and youth that's transforming American politics.

[00:03:08] Now in terms of Kwame's role, I've known Kwame for more than 20 years. We helped co - a company together back in the late 1990s. And so I know him as someone who's really good at energizing people, especially young people. And he leads all the strategy and marketing related side of our operations.

[00:03:26] It's going to be our get out the vote effort, our effort to be very active on social media, our technology effort. Debra is a Republican by background, but someone who also believes in bipartisanship like myself. And part of the reason I was attracted to Debra is that she really has been someone who's kind of coast to coast, starting in Washington, D. C., and then moving to Silicon Valley. She wrote a best selling book called Secrets of Silicon Valley, and she's become a leader in the women's entrepreneurship effort out in the Valley. And so I think the three of us together, and we are equal in our ownership, are very complementary in where we come from, both on political sides of the aisle and the things that we're going to focus on.

[00:04:09] Bob Gatty: That's great. Thanks so much for that, Jason. Deborah, you're a best selling author and a serial entrepreneur. Tell us a little bit about yourself and why you joined up with Jason in this new initiative. 

[00:04:22] Deborah Perry Piscione: Yeah, happy to do first of all, thank you for having me on your show as well. I had spent 18 years in Washington, D. C., having worked on Capitol Hill, and then was appointed at the White House under George Bush and then I myself fell into media for many years, was an on air commentator with MSNBC, Fox News, and CNN, and I really learned the kind of way that business gets done in Washington, where a lot of fear is put in people you're either Part of us, or you're one of them and there wasn't a big collective effort to really bring people together.

[00:04:59] And then serendipitously we ended up moving to Silicon Valley in 2006, and I was really fascinated by this collaborative culture and ended up building out an initial company that sold and then ended up writing the book Secrets of Silicon Valley to really get a sense of what this culture was about.

[00:05:19] How can you really get ahead by bringing people together and supporting one another rather than being adversaries? So that's really the heart of my advocacy. And then I have a new book coming out in January with Harvard Business Review called Employment is Dead and very much focusing on this next generation, particularly Generation Z, and how they will engage in the workforce and the economy overall.

[00:05:49] So it's a really terrific opportunity to just be a part of this organization and engage in a way that young people want to work and be the future of work and the economy overall. 

[00:06:04] Bob Gatty: Okay, Deborah, thanks so much for that. Now, Kwame, you're a professional speaker, an entrepreneur, a consultant. Where will you fit?

[00:06:13] Now, Jason just said you're going to be in charge of outreach, communications, and so on, right? 

[00:06:19] Kwame Jackson: Yeah. So the reality of any startup organization, Bob, is that, we all wear different hats and we're all, chief bottle washer and dishwasher and firemen put her out or right. So one for having me on your show is as Deborah shared.

[00:06:34] Jason speaks very highly of the program and we're excited to share our together message. My personal lane at together is going to be chief marketing officer. So really trying to make the brand appeal to Gen Z, to grow the recognition and visibility of the brand, to build partnerships with other like minded brands I similarly see us as a extension of the rock the vote efforts of the nineties and the early two thousands making that kind of play towards unity, politics, inclusive democracy really relevant for GenZ. So that's the role that I play.

[00:07:11] I really also will be focused on bringing a lot of our celebrity influencers be they athletes, be they politicos, be they, YouTube influencers into our ambassador fold and really helping us drive the message to keep the brand relevant, young and energized. 

[00:07:27] Bob Gatty: Wow, that sounds great. Jason, many of our Lean to the Left followers saw or listened to your episode, which is still streaming, by the way, and so they'd like to know why did you end your run for the White House and what are your plans?

[00:07:45] Do you have any plans for elective office in the future? 

[00:07:49] Jason Palmer: Right now, I honestly can't see past November. I feel like the num this is the most important election of my lifetime. And I know everybody says that, but this time it really is. And I think it's super important that I lean in to vote.

[00:08:06] In my case, it's super important to me to get president Biden reelected, but also to do so in a way that's civil and reaches across the aisle and continues to engage in independence and people that I think of as homeless Republicans who maybe are not quite ready to pull the lever for the Democratic Party, but they do actually believe they should pull the lever for the best candidate possible.

[00:08:28] And that's why we're together, I've partnered up with Kwame and Deborah to make sure that this is a purple colored organization. We're also going to endorse Republican candidates. We might even endorse an independent or forward candidate as well. And that we really do demonstrate the values of reaching across the aisle and bipartisanship in everything that we do going forward.

[00:08:50] Bob Gatty: So what's Together doing now, and what are your plans? Specifically, what are your plans going forward? 

[00:08:57] Jason Palmer: Yeah, so you're talking to us at a really good time, because I know this podcast is likely to air shortly, but not today. I'd like to share with you, we're about ready to announce our first four endorsements of candidates that we're supporting.

[00:09:10] And they are all young, from a business background, either small business people or entrepreneurs. They believe in things like civility, inclusion, democracy, conscious capitalism, these shouldn't be so difficult to find a common sense center in America, and we'll be endorsing them actually tomorrow, which will be a few days ago when this podcast airs.

[00:09:34] And happy to talk about them. Now we've also are building up a team. Our goal is to have. A volunteer team of 10, 000 or more people by the time students come back to school in the fall. So we can actually use those 10, 000 volunteers to get a million young people registered to vote. You probably know, historically, young people often don't show up at the polls in as high numbers as other generations.

[00:09:59] This year, we're going to change that. And it doesn't even require that much money. We're going to only need to raise about $10 million to achieve this. In an election year when the last I saw about five billion dollars was going to be raised. So we're very much on the high return on investment side of the equation, but that's going to be thinking of it like entrepreneurs, like business people.

[00:10:21] Bob Gatty: Okay. Do you want to tell us about those candidates that you're planning to endorse? Sure. 

[00:10:26] Jason Palmer: Sure. I'll tell you a little bit about them. So one of them is Rebecca Cook and she's in Wisconsin's third district, which is a purple district in a battleground state. And she's been a small business owner in the past and decided to run for office first a couple years ago, broke her chops in, so to speak.

[00:10:44] This year, she is very likely to win the Democratic primary and actually become the candidate in November. So we're endorsing her pre- primary. This is very important because The most impact you can have on changing the face of an election is getting involved at the primary stage, but very few voters actually do that.

[00:11:02] Most of them wait until November and don't get engaged. So Rebecca Cook and Wisconsin's third. Another is Frank Pierce, who's 38 years old, who's based in North Carolina. Frank also is an entrepreneur by background. He was a restaurant general manager for a number of years. Now he runs a landscaping company.

[00:11:20] And he's not that well known outside of just that small area where people know him in North Carolina. Actually, that's the 13th district. And he's the kind of person who we believe is a common sense leader. Someone who is interested in reaching across the aisle, he's agreed to join the Problem Solvers Caucus if elected.

[00:11:39] And, they're both people that we know well now, but the average American doesn't know them at all yet. And the goal is for more and more people to know about these two and then to elect them in November.

[00:11:53] Bob Gatty: Who are the other two? 

[00:11:54] Jason Palmer: Yeah. So continue to go forward. Luis Calleja is a third. And she's actually a candidate for the at large district in American Samoa. She actually was one of the people who voted for me in American Samoa.

[00:12:08] And as an entrepreneur herself, she built a call center and technology business in American Samoa. And, after the campaign, she said she felt inspired. She contacted me a few days later and said, I've always thought about running for office. Do you think I should run for office? And we've done a number of zoom conversations.

[00:12:25] And eventually she said, you know what, I'm going to put my hat in the ring and I'm going to run. So that kind of connects the dots a little bit from American Samoa to here. And that's a, the islands of American Samoa have been held by the Republican party for a number of years. And it's definitely a long shot candidacy for Louise, but she's the kind of person that we feel like we should support.

[00:12:45] Because she's throwing her hat in the ring. She's not someone who is native to politics, but we're trying to get people who didn't think of politics as a career to be part of this movement. And then finally, the fourth is probably the most well known, but I'm mentioning him last because of the fact that we're all about generally investing in candidates that are little known.

[00:13:05] And that's Adam Frisch. And Adam is a Democrat who's based in Colorado in the third district there. And Adam actually is a candidate who some of your listeners may know he came very close 546 votes short from beating Lauren Boebert in last year, last time around congressional election so it's a very red district, and he is very much a purple candidate.

[00:13:30] He actually served in leadership in Aspen, Colorado is where he's based. And and this time around, he's doing so well even this far out from the election that Lauren Bovert has left the district and will no longer be his competitor come November. 

[00:13:48] Bob Gatty: Okay, that's, so that's what, three, three Democrats and one Republican among those four, is that where it goes?

[00:13:55] Jason Palmer: Actually, all four are Democrats in this wave. And you'll have to, people will have to pay attention closely to see that the Republicans are going to come in the second wave of our announcements. 

[00:14:05] Bob Gatty: Okay. Deborah, do you have anything to say about that? 

[00:14:09] Deborah Perry Piscione: Absolutely. No, this really, as Jason has iterated already, this is a really critical election on the future of the direction of the country.

[00:14:20] And again, I look at this less from a political standpoint and where new technologies, disruptive technologies are really going to change the landscape for us across the board. And so I tend to maybe I'm rooted in economics. And I've always tried to stay out of the fray of the politics and really around the substance.

[00:14:39] But this election cycle is one for the making for sure. Why do you say that? It really is about two individuals who are rooted in old school thinking. And this generation coming up, Gen Z, is, wants to work and live and, be a part of a world that's much more offering a sense of humanity.

[00:15:05] And I think for many of us, particularly since covid, a lot of us feel that we're questioning what's going on in our country and the hostility, the chaos it's so unnecessary. We're not in a authoritarian or totalitarian dictatorship where many of our neighbors to the south or other places in the Soviet Union or Russia, whoops, slip of the tongue China and places like that.

[00:15:31] We have wonderful freedoms in this country. But yet you feel a sense like you, just can't even talk to your neighbors these days in a way without feeling some sort of threat. And so we need to bring civility back to life in general. We need to realize that we have an incredible opportunity to really democratize opportunity for young people in particular, but just across the board. And we need a younger leader who understands, and when I say young, I don't necessarily mean age wise, but you just have this growth mindset of where the world is heading. And so that is really where I sit from what happens in this election cycle.

[00:16:20] Bob Gatty: Okay, Deborah, that's understandable, but Who's caused this division? Who's caused the rancor? Who's caused the sense of hate that is so prevalent these days? Where'd that come from?

[00:16:35] Deborah Perry Piscione: I know where you're heading in this question. I don't think it's any one person. 

[00:16:40] Bob Gatty: Okay. 

[00:16:40] Deborah Perry Piscione: But there is no doubt that President Trump gave a voice to extremists that let it be okay to be ruder to thy neighbor or expressing one's opinion.

[00:16:55] And I think COVID absolutely exasperated a lot of this and to President Trump's fault, he never really was on top of the issue early enough on that we could have abated a lot of the severity that we faced overall. I'm not going to suggest it's any one person because I think there's a lot of organizations out there who spread hate overall as well.

[00:17:23] We do need civility back in our lives and we need to temper relationships around the world as well.

[00:17:31] Bob Gatty: You know what? I'm sorry. Go ahead.

[00:17:33] Kwame Jackson: Yeah. Can I jump in and Debra one? Look I'm always in for a good Trump bashing. I am a left leaning person. But, in the spirit of unity and what we're trying to do it together to build a purple consensus, I really think what our movement is trying to do is to amplify and engage young voices and to make room at the top.

[00:17:54] Deborah alluded to that. The fact that, we have two octogenarians who are, running for president, folks who are not necessarily in touch with the modern movement in politics, in technology, in business, in sentiments around inclusion, the environment, et cetera. And I think giving voice to the causes and concerns of Gen Z and then elevating those to the forefront is really trying to make room at the top for a new generation of leadership. And so we realized that, that even the founders on this call, we're still, Gen X removed from the current Gen Z population. So what we're trying to do is build a platform, build technology, build consensus, build partnerships that enable the generation behind us Gen Z to really take the reins of leadership from a pretty dated crowd.

[00:18:44] Bob Gatty: Yeah, talk about this goal and objective that you guys have to bring in, what did you say 10, 000 young people as volunteers? 

[00:18:52] Jason Palmer: 10, 000 volunteers. That's correct. 

[00:18:54] Bob Gatty: That's amazing. How are you going to do it? What are you going to do that? 

[00:18:57] Jason Palmer: I don't, just like last time when I wasn't sure about revealing all my secrets on the podcast.

[00:19:03] But I will say that, like Debra, I work in the have been working as an impact investor and entrepreneur in the future of work. And a big part of my work has been on programs that are expanding internships, externships sometimes they're called micro assignments. Where students that are in college can get more real life work experience that then they can put on their resume, which helps them get their first job.

[00:19:30] And so because Deborah and I work in that area, we're very connected to a number of companies that actually can place thousands of students in these kind of micro internship like jobs. And because of that, we, I've been asked, do you need 100, 000 students and I said, wow, I don't know if we have room for 100, 000 volunteers, but it actually is possible now because there are that many people who are age 17 to 24 years old on college campuses around college campuses.

[00:20:02] Who, it's easy for them to sign up and get another free credit course in X, Y, or Z. It's not so easy for them to get a really useful eight week externship, internship, or volunteer scenario that's going to help them get their next job. So they're hungry for this. They're really hungry for those work opportunities even if they're unpaid or just a stipend.

[00:20:24] Bob Gatty: That sounds great. I want to know, you already told me you're endorsing candidates. I was going to ask you if you're going to endorse candidates, so you took away one of my questions. Anyway what about those positions on political issues like abortion and education and immigration and whatever? Are you going to take on those too?

[00:20:45] Jason Palmer: Yeah, let's riff back and forth a little bit. So the way we founded together, Is that it's based on values that we have in common like civility, democracy, inclusivity, a belief that there is a way business can be for good, conscious capitalism. And we, those values are very important. We believe in science and data.

[00:21:07] We believe in integrity. These are things like motherhood and apple pie, but we're not going to have any litmus tests where candidates have to believe in one position or the other. In fact, we want together to embody ex clusivity so that everyone can be a part of it. Whether you're democratic, Republican, independent, green, libertarian, we want everybody in here.

[00:21:28] We're for robust, civil dialogue that is civil, and where we're actually talking to and learning from each other, not demagoguing each other. But I call out to Kwame and Debra to chime in on that. 

[00:21:41] Deborah Perry Piscione: Yeah. So many of these issues are experiential based as well. And so we want to be a platform in a forum where people sometimes with differing views can come together and have a conversation and ensure their experience overall.

[00:21:57] I think part of this is not just to be so rooted in one side or the other, but to learn from one other's experiences and be a little bit more empathetic. To why people have the views they do, and I think that's really the platform that has been missing in the dialogue and the debate of the political forum is really to understand why people feel the way they do, whether they were raised a certain way or experience something that gave them the positioning.

[00:22:28] Kwame, My apologies. I cut you off there. So go ahead. 

[00:22:32] Kwame Jackson: Oh no. I was going to add to exactly what Jason and you are saying. I think that we share the same mindset in terms of what we're trying to build, which is a forum of inclusivity, a forum for open debate, a forum for sharing ideas and learning from one another in a civil fashion, which is lacking right now.

[00:22:48] And I do think that for us, It's, going back to making room at the top and Gen Z I know JFK when he was running, he had a great campaign that said, I am old enough to know, but young enough to do. And I think we need to really focus on that in terms of trying to bring the next generation forward to the mantle of leadership.

[00:23:07] They need to be old enough to know, but young enough to do. And that energy is missing right now from the political equation. So as far as taking hard and fast lines on any political issue, Particular point. Our principle. I don't think that's our place. I think what we will do, though, is learn from our grassroots in terms of the folks and the opinions and the issues that they care about and then try to amplify those causes that makes sense for kind of the total group.

[00:23:32] So we definitely want to be a bottom up organization in terms of the principles that we take versus, the three co founders on this call saying, Oh, we have a stance on abortion or we have a stance on the environment. We want to learn from our base. 

[00:23:46] Bob Gatty: Okay. All right. So you will be doing specific work on behalf of specific candidates though, right?

[00:23:55] That you endorse, is that right? 

[00:23:57] Jason Palmer: Yes, but I want to be a little bit more precise about that, that we founded together as two separate organizations that are connected because they have the same brand. So there's together the B corporation that's building out the technology platform. That's going to drive more people to get registered, to vote.

[00:24:16] It's going to have education programs. It's going to do future of work efforts. Like Debra was talking about. In fact, we think of it as It's a platform for causes, companies, and campaigns. Like it's inclusive of everything and it'll actually help. A lot of people raise money for their causes, companies and campaigns when it's in its full form.

[00:24:36] It'll take about a year to build out all the technology that we want to build with together. The B Corporation together, the PAC which we're also on the board of will actually be the organization that's endorsing and supporting candidates. And then they'll hopefully use the technology to do better in their campaigns.

[00:24:55] Just like lots of other people who are promoting their causes, and that was like Kwame was alluding to that, too. We're reaching out to athletes, celebrities influencers who need help raising money, especially people if you're in your 20s or early 30s, that's the biggest thing you're missing is money to grow your vision, and that's what our platform is going to enable is for young people to raise more money and use their clout for good.

[00:25:23] Bob Gatty: Wow, that's really a great idea. I hope this all works out for you. Today today in the Washington Post just by coincidence, and I think this is related in a sense traditional Republican senators John Danforth, William Cohen, and Alan Simpson announced the launching of a new organization called Our Republican Legacy, which they will serve as a big tent for traditional Republicans like themselves, what do you think about that? 

[00:25:53] Deborah Perry Piscione: Yeah, I'm happy to weigh in on that one. I think if you look at the success of the Lincoln project last time around, there are a lot of us who were in media, who were in Congress or other legislative offices throughout states and et cetera.

[00:26:13] Who don't are not consistent in the values that President Trump offered or candidate Trump at the time. I think I don't even want to call us the silent majority because I think it's something so different within the Republican Party going. We're all asking the question, how did we get here?

[00:26:30] What happened? I came from the very gentlemanly environment of the bushes both father and son, where there's decorum, there's respect for the office there's good standing in the rest of the world. I think having worked on Capitol Hill in the Senate myself and knowing Some of these senators, this is really about this is the legacy they want to leave, not this crazy, chaotic, hostile environment that you're just going, huh, what, where, how did we get to this place of ugliness and there was a big part of the Republican Party who just doesn't feel akin to where the conservative side of the Republican Party is at and is the noisiest of them all. And so hopefully this will give some noise or some credibility, a voice to those of us who are not part of the, that conservative wing. 

[00:27:31] Jason Palmer: Danforth and Simpson, those are the types of Republicans that I respect and believe are actually, George Bush the first big time important leader who I respected during the early days of his presidency. And even when he was vice president, And but when I've started companies in the past, usually what happens is you found a company and then you get a number of gray hairs to become your board who will oversee and guide you.

[00:27:56] This is going to be the opposite. We've just hired an influencer to join our team, Maya Luna, who's actually going to be recruiting a board for us of 15 young people who are kind of leaders and cause champions in their 20s and 30s. And that's going to be the board of together. So it's not going to be about the legacy of the old generation.

[00:28:18] It's going to be run by the new generation and nothing would make me happier than in a year from now. Kwame, Deborah and I, we raised 10 million, 100 million, and then we give the mantle to a 29 year old CEO to run this company, this organization into the future, part of why we're founding it is an outgrowth of my presidential campaign, but even more so it's that people at our age level can raise money much more easily. We have a lot of social capital and we want to try to raise as much as we can and give that social capital and that financial capital to the younger generation so that they can go faster to take control of our government.

[00:28:58] Bob Gatty: Okay. Anybody else have anything they'd like to add to that?

[00:29:03] So how can people learn more about Together, Jason? 

[00:29:07] Jason Palmer: So you would go to togetherpurple. org. That's our website. And you would sign up there if you want to join the movement. We are definitely recruiting 10, 000 volunteers, so we'd love everyone to go check that out. And Debra said, you don't have to be in your twenties or thirties to help together.

[00:29:24] We want people who are young at heart and who believe that it's time for people who are young at heart to take control, take the government back from the crazies and it's way bigger than just the government too. It's our whole society. It's everything that we've got going on. We have so many causes that need solving.

[00:29:41] And some of that solving happens in the government. And some of that happens with public private partnerships. And a lot of it happens with entrepreneurs. and innovators and cause champions that are working outside of the government. So that's what the whole movement is about. 

[00:29:56] Kwame Jackson: Okay. Yeah. I would add to that, that I would want people to go to our site together purple dot org, and I'd like them to sign up as either volunteers to give time to offer connections to other celebrities, influencers, or partnership organizations that can help our cause. And then also folks who can really just Give a small dollar donation. Small dollar donations really drive a lot of our political change in the current environment.

[00:30:21] And so we're looking for not only corporate partners to be, larger players in our product and our rollout release for Gen Z, but also small dollar donors to really power this initiative. I always like to say, look, no money, no movement. And so we definitely need to raise that money to create the movement and the platform that we want to amplify these Gen Z leaders.

[00:30:43] Bob Gatty: Okay. Anybody else have anything to add? I thank you both, all three of you, for joining us on our Lean to the Left podcast. This has been an interesting discussion and my best wishes to you guys. I think this is just an absolutely awesome idea. And I hope you can pull it together. Together. And 

[00:31:04] Jason Palmer: you can't help but give us free branding cameos every time.

[00:31:08] Kwame Jackson: We designed it that way. It's a together booby trap. 

[00:31:11] Bob Gatty: Yeah, that it is. Okay. This has been a great discussion for us together, I think. And I enjoyed it immensely. So thanks very much. 

[00:31:21] Deborah Perry Piscione: Thank you for having us so much, bob.