Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 1155 ｜ Debunking the Biggest School Choice Lies ｜ Guest： Ron Simmons

00:00:00.000 What's going on with the economy? Is it time to panic? Also, will Republicans come together

00:00:07.020 and be able to pass a continued resolution to keep the government open? And what is the

00:00:12.200 truth about school choice? We've got my dad, Ron Simmons, here to break it all down for

00:00:16.980 us on today's episode of Relatable.

00:00:19.000 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Wednesday. Hope everyone is having a wonderful week so

00:00:32.900 far. Okay, before we get into the interview with my dad, which was recorded yesterday,

00:00:37.000 I want to make sure to give an update on something we talked about, the continued resolution,

00:00:41.280 which my dad will break down today, give some background on where the GOP is disagreeing.

00:00:47.580 That ended up passing yesterday afternoon. Along party lines, mostly, there was one Democrat

00:00:53.460 who voted yes on the measure, and there was one Republican, Thomas Massey, whom we will

00:00:59.120 discuss today, who voted no. The legislation will fund the government if it passes the Senate

00:01:05.440 through September 30th. So we're avoiding that end of week government shutdown. So that is

00:01:10.980 at the end of the fiscal year, September 30th. So it boosts funds for defense programs, imposes

00:01:16.660 cuts to non-defense spending. Current funding expires on 11.59 p.m. on Friday. So the government

00:01:24.540 will continue to be funded. We will talk about the good and the bad and the ugly of that in

00:01:30.380 just a minute with my dad. But first, let me tell you about Share the Arrows, y'all. I am

00:01:35.340 so excited. October 11th, Dallas, Texas. This is a women's conference. I think unlike any other

00:01:41.720 women's conference, I mean, this is clear, hard-hitting, deep theological teaching that

00:01:49.080 will arm you, equip you with truths from the Word of God to combat the craziness and the

00:01:56.340 chaos of our culture and to raise your children and courage and boldness in the Lord. One of

00:02:02.540 my favorite reviews from last year, I got a message after the conference concluded that said,

00:02:07.460 I walked out of there with zero fear of man. And that is my hope for every attendee.

00:02:13.480 The worship will again be led by Francesca Batticelli, Grammy Award winning artist. We have

00:02:18.140 an amazing lineup of speakers that we will be announcing very soon, but go ahead and get your

00:02:23.780 tickets. We are on pace to sell a lot more tickets than we did last year already, which is just

00:02:30.180 incredible, which means it is very likely that this stadium will fill up. And once we fill up,

00:02:36.420 that's it, there are no more extra seats. Go ahead, get your tickets now, bring a friend,

00:02:41.240 bring family members, bring your small group, your women's ministry, your co-workers, get your

00:02:46.960 flights, get your hotels, just get all the logistics nailed down and start the countdown to Share the

00:02:53.240 Arrows 2025, Dallas, Texas, October 11th. Go to sharethearrows.com. All right, without further

00:03:00.160 ado, here's my dad. Dad, welcome back. It's been a while. It has been. It's good to be back. I'm glad

00:03:11.020 you and I've got both got blue on today. I like that. We're matching our blues. Okay. A lot of people

00:03:15.600 have been praying for you. You had surgery a month ago, which is why you haven't been on the couch in

00:03:20.500 a while. Can you give everyone an update on how you're doing? Sure. Yeah. It's actually been four

00:03:24.860 weeks right now. Today. Yeah. So, but things are progressing along as they should be. You know,

00:03:30.200 it's a, it's not a, it wasn't a minor surgery. It was a reasonably major surgery, but doing well,

00:03:35.880 doing well and just probably a couple of weeks more. So I'm back 100% being able to play golf is

00:03:41.640 the way I define a hundred percent by the way. So I've been missing that, but you know, I've enjoyed

00:03:46.620 actually having some downtime being, being at home. Mom's done a great job. Yes. She has,

00:03:52.920 although that's not something she probably enjoyed, which I don't blame it. She's done a

00:03:56.460 great job and I appreciate everybody praying for it. It really does mean a lot. It's amazing. You

00:04:00.760 know, I haven't had too many physical setbacks in my life. So not, you know, experiencing people

00:04:07.540 praying for you really is important. I've really felt that. So thank you. And it makes you appreciate

00:04:13.540 the times when you aren't stuck in bed, when you can drive, when you can play golf, whenever you feel

00:04:20.100 that kind of pain, whenever I've, you know, given birth afterwards, I'm like, wow, I have

00:04:24.920 so much sympathy now for people who have chronic pain and who are in the hospital a lot, who have

00:04:29.620 to get surgeries a lot. It just gives you another level of compassion and it makes you really want

00:04:35.180 to pray for the relief of other people because you felt it yourself. You can empathize a whole lot

00:04:39.260 easier with that. That's for sure. Yes, absolutely. Well, I'm so glad that you're back. We've got a lot

00:04:45.520 to talk about. Let's first talk about the stock market because it's causing anxiety. Of course,

00:04:50.860 you've got people on the left taking advantage of what's going on there, looking at the markets and

00:04:54.800 saying, see, he's causing turmoil. And then you've got other people saying, slow your roll. Things are

00:05:01.140 going to be fine. So tell us what is going on here. And let's start really, really fundamental.

00:05:06.180 When people say, oh, the stock market is crashing, it's not doing well. What are they talking about?

00:05:11.340 Well, what they're generally talking about, the stock market is really made up of three,

00:05:16.180 what we call indexes. And these are just groups of companies that represent a broader industry,

00:05:24.020 like the Dow Jones Industrial is 30 kind of the core companies in the United States. Things like AT&T,

00:05:33.700 Exxon, those would be part of the industrial complex. Okay. Then there's the NASDAQ, okay,

00:05:40.620 which is a different whole stock market exchange where you can buy and sell stocks,

00:05:45.360 but that's primarily tech stocks. That's more tech heavy. All right. And so when AI stocks go up and

00:05:53.760 down or meta goes up and down or alphabet goes up and down, that's going to be influenced a lot in

00:06:00.400 that. And then there's the S&P 500, which is the one I follow the most. S&P 500 is 500, the 500

00:06:07.340 largest public companies in the United States. And that is a very good barometer of how the economy is

00:06:13.400 going at that particular time. Now, remember, stock markets overreact to news on the good side and on

00:06:23.000 the bad side. So what happens is, is when these tariffs were announced and then the other countries

00:06:29.160 like Canada, we're going to tariff you back. And, you know, well, it's kind of like, no, no, I'm going to do this

00:06:35.060 to you. No, I'm going to do that to you. That people get panicked. Okay. And it's a psychological

00:06:41.080 thing more than anything. The fundamentals of Exxon or Apple or AT&T, or those didn't change from one

00:06:49.480 day to the next. Okay. They don't change like that. The fundamentals and most investors should

00:06:55.620 just do nothing. That's my recommendation. Do nothing. If you try to sell into this market,

00:07:01.680 you're going to get whipsawed and it's not going to work out. Whipsawed means what you're trying to do

00:07:07.900 is you're trying to sell because it's gone down and then you won't, then you'll, then it starts going

00:07:13.300 back up and you're going to end up buying, you know, selling low and buying high. And that's a

00:07:18.280 recipe for disaster. You just have to be calm. In fact, what I tell people, look, if any money that

00:07:25.460 you need within the next 12 months, no matter what 12 months you're looking at, it should never be

00:07:30.840 invested in the stock market. If you're going to have to use that money, stock market should be

00:07:34.900 longer term investments. And it's the best return you can get over a long term, over any 10 year

00:07:41.700 period. The S&P 500 has been the best performing investments for the last 75 to 80 years. So you

00:07:50.280 just stay calm in that. So some people may not know who maybe haven't read your book yet, or haven't

00:07:56.720 been listening to you since you first started coming on, but you ran a successful, very successful

00:08:01.520 investment firm for a long time. And it's not like you grew up learning about the stock markets,

00:08:07.760 or that's not really something that was talked about on your kitchen table. How did you learn

00:08:11.980 about all of this? How did you get to this point of being able to say, okay, I've seen enough to where

00:08:17.580 I know that right now I have to remain calm and not act rashly?

00:08:21.360 Yeah. Well, the main thing that I, the way I learned that is having to educate myself through

00:08:27.160 reading different books, reading people that were, I would say, when I say mentors of mine,

00:08:32.700 they weren't personal mentors, but they were mentors of people I read. And these were long-term,

00:08:37.100 what I would call free market economists, people like a Peter Lynch or a Milton Friedman, those types

00:08:43.440 of people, which were economists that looked at the big picture of how economies work. And then look at

00:08:49.960 history. Then the final thing though, was just experience over time. I, I've seen the, you know,

00:08:56.340 when we first started our investment company, this is funny. The, we first started our investment

00:09:00.900 company, probably three weeks after, uh, that we started it, the market went down almost 20%.

00:09:07.820 This was what year?

00:09:09.100 1987 in one day.

00:09:11.340 1987.

00:09:12.320 Now the bet that gave us the best selling line ever. We didn't have any clients at the time. So when I

00:09:17.940 would start to meet with potential clients and say, you know what? We didn't have any money in

00:09:21.420 the market at that time. Now, the reason we didn't is because we didn't have any clients. Right.

00:09:26.140 But I mean, and what, but what I saw in that it bounced back the next year. And this is what

00:09:31.320 happened. You remember 2022, not that long ago, the stock market yesterday or Monday fell more than

00:09:37.180 it's fallen since 2022. And 2022 was a tough year for the market, but 2023 was a great year for the

00:09:44.160 market and 2024. What happens is people sell thinking, okay, I'm going to just wait it out

00:09:50.820 right here, but they don't know when to get back in and they wait too late to get back in. And

00:09:56.660 therefore, again, they've sold low and they're buying back in high. And you just don't want to

00:10:01.520 do that. The best thing is if you're invested, stay invested. Okay. If you're not invested,

00:10:08.720 I wait to invest when I see the market start turning the corner. Cause it may go down a little bit

00:10:13.600 more. Okay. When it starts turning the corner and you have two or three days in a row where you've

00:10:17.740 got, you know, pretty good, solid gains and you want to get, and you want to start investing,

00:10:22.020 it's okay to do that. If you're in your 401k plan or whatever, just keep doing what you're doing.

00:10:26.760 That's the main thing. It's going to be okay.

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00:11:50.740 So we talked about tariffs last time and what they actually mean. We don't have to rehash all of that.

00:11:55.320 People can go back, listen to, or watch that episode that we did. But there are going to be some

00:11:59.940 people saying, see, this is the result of a trade war. And because of this, we're going to be

00:12:05.420 worse off than we were before. Is this the result of tariffs? What's going on there?

00:12:10.200 Well, none of those tariffs have actually gone into effect and hurt anything yet, right? Because so

00:12:14.580 it's psychological. People worry about that. Now, what will happen in that?

00:12:20.400 I thought the tariffs on Mexico and Canada had gone into place.

00:12:22.720 Yeah, but see, he paused some of those, okay? He paused most of those that make any difference.

00:12:26.860 And remember, 99% of the goods from Mexico and the U.S. and Canada, between those three,

00:12:34.000 those are tariff-free because of the MCA, whatever it is that we signed last time he was there.

00:12:40.120 Yeah. So it's a small number of them. And again, the amount that we buy from them as a percentage

00:12:47.940 of our economy, we talked about this one time, is much smaller than the amount they buy from us as

00:12:54.960 a percentage of their economy. And we're tariffed. Like, if we were to try to import maple syrup to

00:13:02.500 Canada, that would be tariffed because they're protecting their industry. That's right. But

00:13:07.020 we're going to buy, we're going to, what we buy from them is a larger percentage of their economy.

00:13:12.780 So, and what they sell to us is a large percent as well. So what, if we tariff what they're doing,

00:13:18.460 it's going to hurt them more than what we're buying.

00:13:20.520 Right. On Monday, China started imposing tariffs on U.S. imports such as chicken, wheat,

00:13:25.820 soybeans. What is your thought about that?

00:13:28.600 Well, you know, I mean, China is a different story because they are actually an enemy in a lot of 1.00

00:13:34.620 ways, right? Yeah. Culturally, government-wise, all that type of stuff. That can have an effect on us.

00:13:41.280 But remember, we also, when we're talking about chickens, they're really talking about eggs more

00:13:47.900 than anything else. Okay. But we do a lot of that ourselves. So I'm not overly concerned about that.

00:13:54.460 We still produce most of the wheat that countries eat around the world. Again, it's going to have a

00:14:02.220 short-term effect, but it's not going to be a long-term effect. My prediction is, is that the

00:14:07.500 stock market will be higher at the end of the year than it is today. Okay. And even Trump is saying,

00:14:13.080 okay, there's going to be a period of transition here as we're imposing these tariffs. Do you agree

00:14:18.680 with that? Oh yeah. I think it could be. How long that'll last, it could last a few months or what

00:14:24.260 have you. But I think there'll be, when we say transition, it's because nobody has ever taken

00:14:29.900 this tough of a stance, at least in our lifetime, that we remember. We've always been much more

00:14:34.540 globalist than we are today. And all he's trying to do is reset the scale because it's gotten way out

00:14:41.400 of whack and that the trade deficit during the Biden administration I read the other day was

00:14:46.440 over a trillion dollars, meaning that we bought more from other countries by a trillion dollars

00:14:52.720 than they bought from us. All right. And that's not good for our manufacturers, our farmers and

00:14:57.460 whatever. We need to be sold. We need to sell to the world. We're only 300 million people. There's six

00:15:02.680 or 7 billion people in the world. Right. So why do we have a trillion dollar trade deficit? It

00:15:08.000 shouldn't be that way. And he's trying to make it better for American industry. What he's saying

00:15:13.660 is reciprocal. Look, if you don't tariff us, we're not going to tariff you. But if you tariff us,

00:15:19.260 we're going to tariff you. This idiot up in Ottawa or whatever that guy's name is, 1.00

00:15:23.640 that's putting the tariffs on the electricity going down to Minnesota, Michigan, whatever. 1.00

00:15:27.460 Some of our northern states buy electricity from Canada. And he's put a 25% tariff on that.

00:15:36.360 That guy is going to end up losing that whole fight. I promise you that. Right. And he's going

00:15:42.700 to lose it because somebody else in the government is going to call him and say, hey, buddy, because

00:15:48.340 he's not head of Canada. He's head of this province. Right. Yeah. So the way that this makes

00:15:53.300 it reciprocal and makes it better for American industry, if a product that we're getting from

00:15:57.400 China or Canada or Mexico is tariffed, that makes the price go up for us. People say a tariff is the

00:16:03.620 tax on the consumer. So to make up for that tariff, they're going to charge more and we're going to pay

00:16:08.800 more. Canadian maple syrup. And so how that helps American industry is that American products will end

00:16:15.620 up being cheaper than the imported goods because the imported goods have a tariff. And so that is what

00:16:22.080 he is hoping revitalizes a lot of American industry. We'll buy more American products that way.

00:16:26.140 And it's been going around. It's been going on for since our country was formed.

00:16:29.500 Yeah. So people saying that this is a new trade war that's destabilizing the U.S. economy. That's

00:16:34.620 just not honest. No, it's been going on for a long, long time. And yes, we did get rid of a lot of them

00:16:40.000 because, again, we were globalists. But it's something that's happened many, many times over the years.

00:16:45.560 So the jobs report. I read something this morning saying that the jobs report could also be a reason

00:16:51.380 why the stock market is doing what it is. U.S. employers hired 151,000 workers last month,

00:16:58.700 fell short of the expected 170,000 jobs added. Do you think that has a big effect on the stock market?

00:17:04.020 I don't think that's enough to really make a difference. Those are usually adjusted to the

00:17:07.220 next month. 150,000 versus 170,000. It's not that much. I don't think it makes so much of a difference.

00:17:12.560 That's what I was thinking too. And those numbers could also get worse unless you carve out the 0.81

00:17:18.360 government now. You'll have to look at non-government payroll. And I don't know what

00:17:22.720 those numbers were, but the government's going to have some job losses, right? Because of what's

00:17:28.160 going on up there with Doge, which is a good thing. Yeah. Okay. There's some good economic news. You

00:17:33.480 can tell me what you think. Consumers' assessment of current business conditions has moved higher

00:17:37.960 recently. Mortgage rates also have dropped for seven consecutive weeks. Yeah, I think that's good.

00:17:43.420 We do need the Fed to lower the interest rates, the kind of the interest rates that banks can

00:17:48.120 borrow from the government from. That hasn't happened yet. They're holding them steady. But

00:17:52.080 the other thing, you know, Mr. Powell, I think, said yesterday is that we're not in threat of a

00:17:58.160 recession at this time. Okay. And that's what the Democrats and the news media are putting up.

00:18:02.500 We're not, we're not, we're all of the leading indicators. The stock market is not an indicator of

00:18:07.940 recession. Okay. That's an indicator of psychological predictions, right? The, the recession

00:18:13.640 indicators are like jobs or like unemployment, those types of things. And so we're not, we're

00:18:19.840 not at danger of that at this time. So is there any justification for concern about stagflation?

00:18:26.940 You know, we haven't had stagflation since the seventies. And so.

00:18:31.100 And that stagflation is when inflation, so prices continue to go up and growth.

00:18:37.560 It just stays the same. Yeah. I don't, I don't see that, uh, again, temporarily because of what

00:18:43.140 we're doing with these other countries maybe, but I don't see that as a long-term issue. It hasn't

00:18:48.340 been around. I think the feds have figured out how to control that after we had that the last time.

00:18:52.960 And they, they do that by increasing or decreasing money supply, making it easier or harder to borrow.

00:18:58.200 Okay. My biggest question is, and I don't think this has anything to do with the economy. I think

00:19:02.880 it might have to do with bird flu, but I am tired of not being able to find eggs literally at our

00:19:08.020 local grocery store for the past several weeks. I cannot get eggs. I'm ready for Trump to do

00:19:13.400 something about that. I don't know what it is. Have you noticed that? Uh, no, I haven't noticed

00:19:18.480 because we bought up ahead of time because we were long-term planners and eggs last a lot. No,

00:19:23.420 I really haven't noticed that myself because I don't go to the grocery store probably as much as you do.

00:19:27.740 But, uh, but I do know that we had to buy eggs for the boys coming in this week. So I did see them.

00:19:33.240 Yeah. Well, you have to like, you have to hunt for them in the Metroplex.

00:19:37.120 We need to get, uh, Brooke Rollins on here and have her talk about it. Cause she definitely 1.00

00:19:40.800 is dealing with that issue. Yes. Now I need to look into this, but I, I read a headline,

00:19:46.020 so I'll have to fact check it. And then maybe I can talk about it, uh, on Thursday, but that the

00:19:51.720 Biden administration, because of some kind of overblown fear of bird flu ended up killing

00:19:56.760 like hundreds of thousands of chickens. Oh, I read the same thing. Yeah. That they killed the

00:20:00.580 chickens. Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know. I don't know. I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but maybe it

00:20:05.480 was to cause a little bit of distress before Trump took office. I'll look into that and I'll fact check

00:20:11.480 myself. Well, it's kind of like, you know, we also need to look into the, uh, electronic signing of

00:20:15.540 all his executive orders. Yeah. That's something else. I know that's something else.

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00:21:39.800 Allie. Okay. Speaking of Washington and what's going on there, continuing resolution H.R. 1968,

00:21:51.640 the full year continuing appropriations and extensions act 2025 was just introduced in the

00:21:57.720 house of representatives yesterday in order to prevent a federal government shutdown. According

00:22:02.300 to the associated press, the bill would trim $13 billion in non-defense spending from the levels in

00:22:08.020 the 2024 budget year and increased defense spending by $6 billion with an overall top line of nearly

00:22:13.740 $1.7 trillion in discretionary spending. So my sense is that most Republicans are on board with

00:22:21.340 this, but then you've got people, you've got, interestingly, you've got Chip Roy and Thomas

00:22:24.820 Massey who are usually on the same page about things. I like both of them a lot, but Chip Roy is

00:22:29.500 saying, no, I think that this is good. I think we're good to go. Thomas Massey is saying, no,

00:22:32.960 I'm not signing another omnibus bill. Rand Paul says, despite Doge's findings of loony left-wing

00:22:38.540 USAID programs, the Republican spending bill continues to fund the very foreign aid that

00:22:43.480 Elon Musk proposes to cut. The bill continues spending at the inflated pandemic levels and

00:22:48.800 will add $2 trillion to the debt this year. Count me as a H-E double hockey sticks. No,

00:22:56.080 Rand Paul says. Okay. Your take.

00:22:57.940 Well, I think it'll pass. All right. I think it'll pass. There may be some additional adjustments

00:23:03.760 to it. I was going to see if I had a text this morning from my, uh, friend that I asked about,

00:23:09.560 uh, congressional friend. Yeah. He said, when I talked to him this morning, he said he thought

00:23:16.280 they had the votes to pass it. Okay. Now, um, it's hard to believe that all the Democrats are going to

00:23:23.800 vote no on this, especially those that are in swing state districts, but they are usually pretty good

00:23:30.900 at keeping their nose together. Um, and it's hard to believe that all of them, there'll be some

00:23:36.140 compromise between here and the Senate, between the house and the Senate. What, what it's doing is

00:23:41.140 it's leaving. And this is why Chip Roy is voting for it. It's leaving spending levels the same.

00:23:46.960 Okay. No increase in spending overall. And it leaves Doge in place, right? If you shut it down,

00:23:53.980 then Doge is not going to be able to go in there and do anything during this period of time. Right.

00:23:58.280 Which is maybe what the Democrats want to have happen. And 80, you know, Rubio came out today and

00:24:03.100 said 83% of the USAID programs have been terminated. I'm not sure what Rand Paul said. It may not be

00:24:09.840 doing everything he wants it to. I get that, but we are making progress and the wheels of progress do not

00:24:16.480 turn on a dime. Right. It takes some time. You have to be able, people have to understand.

00:24:22.600 And this is what your friend, Thomas Massey does not understand. So Thomas, I know you listen to this.

00:24:28.220 Oh, don't be a hater. Don't be a Massey hater. Listen to Allie's dad. Take a win when you can get a win

00:24:35.860 and go back and get another win later. That's what, that's what you do.

00:24:40.500 Hmm. His beef, it seems like, is that he doesn't believe just in principle in these omnibus bills.

00:24:48.280 He wants the bills to be separated. So the American people and so Congress people actually

00:24:54.500 have time to read what is in them. You know, that Nancy Pelosi famous line, which said we have to

00:24:59.360 pass the bill so we can know what's in it. Well, he's fundamentally opposed to that, which I appreciate

00:25:04.680 that level of transparency. I think his constituents do. I'm not even saying that you're wrong, but you

00:25:10.800 know, Trump is out there on truth social saying we've got a primary Thomas Massey. We're going to

00:25:15.560 get him out. And Trump said he's going to see to it that Thomas Massey is removed because I guess his

00:25:21.240 opposition to this bill. Well, he's been primaried, I think, three times by people who claim to be more

00:25:26.380 MAGA than him. And his constituents say, no, they love Thomas Massey and what he stands for.

00:25:32.660 And so I don't know. I, I understand what you're saying, but there seems to be something to the

00:25:38.140 strategy for him and to be one of the only people to stand up and say, sorry.

00:25:42.020 Okay. Well, what does he, okay. What does he accomplish by having that strategy?

00:25:46.800 Where's his wins? What's his wins?

00:25:48.740 I don't have a list of Thomas Massey.

00:25:50.220 He doesn't have any. Okay. I can tell you what the list is. Zero. Okay. Of his wins.

00:25:55.300 Really? He hasn't, he hasn't done anything.

00:25:57.360 He doesn't have, well, I think he has done something. He stood up and said what he said. Of course,

00:26:01.560 he had you up to testify on the pro-op stuff.

00:26:03.920 Yes. And he was the kindest person to me there.

00:26:06.240 He was. He's very strong on that. But that really wasn't a very high bar as far as kindness

00:26:10.320 in that hearing.

00:26:11.360 Yeah. There's a lot of mean people there. 1.00

00:26:12.960 But, but I don't, you know, he had, and maybe there's some stuff behind the scenes that he's

00:26:17.100 accomplished, but he hasn't accomplished. He's making a point. All right. He's making a point,

00:26:21.460 but really the way, if you want that, if you want that bill broken down to individual appropriation

00:26:26.840 bills, which I would not be opposed to at all. Okay. Then you just got to do, you got to go meet

00:26:32.220 with a speaker in his office, not on the TV station, not on podcast and you work out a deal. Okay.

00:26:39.700 And you see, how do you get to the point? Maybe you can't get all of them, but maybe you can break

00:26:43.440 out one of them. Okay. Start it. Start, start small.

00:26:46.960 Thomas Massey. I wish that I had a list of your accomplishments, Congressman, so I could defend

00:26:52.400 you right now. If your team wants to send me a list of the bills you've passed, I will read some of

00:26:58.500 them on air. I'm, I'm a Massey fan. I think he's, I don't, I don't know if he's entirely right on this

00:27:05.780 subject or not, but in general, I'm a Massey fan. Brie's looking those bills up right now.

00:27:10.560 And I bet she's coming up with a big zero. No, that is, I doubt it. I bet Brie is a Massey

00:27:15.800 fan too. I actually have no idea. I didn't say she wasn't. I'm just saying, I don't think Massey's

00:27:19.320 a Taylor Swift fan. Okay. So Donald Trump, he's upset about this. He says, thank you to the House

00:27:25.260 Freedom Caucus for just delivering a big blow to the radical left Democrats. Oh, by the way,

00:27:29.040 speaking of radical left Democrats, I forgot to mention this. You mentioned the Democrats.

00:27:32.220 Hakeem Jeffries says, he's the minority leader. He says that they will oppose the bill, that

00:27:39.220 Democrats will oppose this bill. I don't know if all Democrats, but he's saying that they're going

00:27:44.320 to. And, um, as I said, Donald Trump goes on to say about Thomas Massey, that he's going to be

00:27:49.560 primaried and that, that Thomas Massey reminds him of Liz Cheney. That's kind of crazy.

00:27:56.600 Yeah. That's, that's, that's, that's too far. I agree with you on that one.

00:27:59.900 I mean, that's insane. But he's saying he's grandstanding. That's why.

00:28:03.260 Yeah. And you agree with that. It seems. Well, I don't know that he's a showboat. Like I would say

00:28:08.440 a Jasmine Crockett's a showboat. I think he's principled. Okay. I think he is principled,

00:28:13.800 but I don't think that he is going about getting things done the correct way.

00:28:18.780 You're not a fan of Jasmine Crockett. I had no idea. She said, she's so serious and intellectual,

00:28:24.440 dad started on her. Well, we already, we already talked about her last time and she's only gotten

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00:30:01.940 Okay, let's talk about school choice. Because in Texas, there is school choice legislation that is

00:30:12.480 being debated right now. And there are two competing school choice bills that have been proposed on

00:30:18.140 each side of the Texas legislature. We've got the Senate version of the bill SB2 passed the Senate on

00:30:24.280 February 5th. The House Bill HB3 was proposed on February 20th. That is currently still being debated.

00:30:31.340 Obviously, you are a big advocate of school choice. That was something you fought for when you were in

00:30:37.120 the Texas legislature. Interestingly, this has become a national conversation. A lot of people

00:30:42.120 have been asking me, what's the truth about this? There's a lot of information, competing information

00:30:47.480 out there. So first, give us the lowdown on what's going on.

00:30:50.840 Well, the reason it's national news is because it's five and a half million public school students in

00:30:55.620 Texas, right? It's huge. And when this school choice passes, which it will pass in some form,

00:31:02.240 that will mean that almost 50% of all of the students in the United States will have some

00:31:09.660 type of school choice option, which it's amazing. When it was maybe four or five years ago, that number

00:31:16.460 was in the 20% range or less. I mean, it's just amazing. But I'll tell you one thing. This is what

00:31:21.800 what Satan intends for bad, God intends for good. All of this stuff with COVID, okay? This is when it

00:31:28.180 all started. You remember when the school started, parents started getting involved in their kids'

00:31:33.980 schools when they were going to school online and all that type of stuff. And it really started in

00:31:39.600 Virginia, if you remember, where the parents fought back. And this is the result of all of that.

00:31:44.820 This is the absolute result of us finding out they were teaching CRT. They were teaching all of these

00:31:51.240 other things that they shouldn't be teaching. And sometimes they weren't teaching at all. And so

00:31:56.440 it's been incredible. And that's a, and you know what I think about teachers. I mean, my, your

00:32:01.120 grandmother, my mother was a teacher. Your mom is a teacher. We have cousins that are teachers, nieces,

00:32:06.100 nephews. So we love teachers, but the whole system is something that's broken. But what's happening in

00:32:12.200 Texas alley is, and this happens all the time. And that is, you have a Senate version and a House

00:32:17.480 version. And the Senate version come, came out first. And it's done by my friend, Brandon Creighton.

00:32:24.720 Of course, Lieutenant Governor Patrick's very involved in it. And it essentially says that

00:32:30.480 we're going to put a billion dollars aside for parents to be able to choose whether or not they want,

00:32:39.460 where they want their kids to go to school. And that billion dollars though, is prioritized.

00:32:44.520 It's prioritized first for parents with kids with special needs. And then for parents who fall within

00:32:53.420 a poverty, what we call low income. Okay. And that's a certain percentage of the national poverty

00:33:00.900 level. Okay. Up to two or 300%, I think maybe more than that. And then if there is any money left over,

00:33:07.920 which there won't be, by the way, anybody can apply for it. All right. So the rhetoric out there

00:33:14.140 about it's only for the rich kids is just simply, it's just a false, it's just totally false. And

00:33:19.780 they're going to allocate about $10,000 per student, a little bit more in the Senate version for disabled

00:33:25.200 students and what have you. And even a couple thousand dollars for homeschoolers that want it.

00:33:30.640 Now, some of the people are saying, well, I don't want the government in my business. Okay. Well then

00:33:35.140 don't take it. You do not have to take it. You don't have to take it. If I had little kids again,

00:33:40.180 I wanted to send them to a private school. And I said, okay, I'm using this, this money that's

00:33:44.460 coming through the state, the school, we don't accept that. There's no, there's no have to do

00:33:48.500 that. But I think the fear is that once a school starts accepting students who are subsidized in this

00:33:57.880 way that, okay, the government has its foot in the door and that later on they will say, okay,

00:34:04.660 any school that, that takes this government money through these kinds of school choice programs,

00:34:11.200 you have to follow this list of rules. You have to teach this, or you can't teach this,

00:34:16.660 or you have to have this non-discrimination policy or whatever it is. I think it's a fear that

00:34:23.260 in the name of giving kids a choice, you are allowing the government into Christian private 0.90

00:34:29.420 schools and even homeschool co-ops. Well, the only way that the government could ever do that,

00:34:34.220 which remember they can do that on anything, is it would have to pass through the legislature. It

00:34:38.840 cannot be done by fiat. It has to pass through the legislature. This is all in statute. So the people

00:34:46.120 that people need to talk to about that, they need to wake up in the morning and look in the mirror

00:34:49.740 because it's the very people they're voting in. If they don't want that to happen, then make sure

00:34:54.640 that you're voting in people that don't believe in that. All right. Don't, there's nobody to blame

00:34:59.600 but ourselves if that happens because it's the voters that determine that. It's not, it's not

00:35:05.800 some bureaucrat, right? They can't do that. The statute in both of these bills is very specific and it

00:35:12.560 really, all these bills do from a government standpoint is it makes sure that if I get the money,

00:35:18.300 I don't go spend it on a vacation to Florida, right? That that money goes to a specific list

00:35:24.140 of things. All right. The only other requirement in there is that if you are a private school,

00:35:29.920 then you have to have some type of accreditation test, but it doesn't tell you even what to have.

00:35:37.280 And all schools have that already. All right. Now for homeschoolers, I have less sympathy for them

00:35:43.880 because they don't have to take the money. They can keep doing what they're doing. It's not going

00:35:48.720 to get involved in their lives at all. All right. So if you want the $2,000, got it. If you, if you're

00:35:56.600 worried about it, don't take it. It's okay. All right. You don't have to, there's no requirement to do

00:36:01.540 that. Some people have expressed concern that this actually raises the cost of tuition at private

00:36:07.800 schools. I guess the math works as if you're a private school and you're saying, okay, we're only going to

00:36:13.100 take a hundred students and now say 25 of those students are subsidized. Well, then the school

00:36:18.420 has lost money. And so they will, to make up for that money that they lost, they will now charge the

00:36:25.240 other 75 students more than they were before. Now, why are they saying they're, I don't understand

00:36:30.700 the subsidized part of it. Well, I subsidize through school choice. They're subsidized in the sense that

00:36:36.020 now their parents are given the money to pay for the tuition at the private school. But aren't they

00:36:40.740 paying the same price as everybody else? Well, but the, yeah. Okay. I, I, yeah. I think they're

00:36:48.040 paying the same price as everybody else. The question could be though, let me, maybe the argument is

00:36:52.400 supply and demand. Maybe I misunderstood. No, maybe it's supply and demand. In other words, if there's

00:36:56.100 more demand for private schools now, cause there's more money available that the supply is not there yet.

00:37:04.380 So therefore we'll look, if I've got 200 people wanting to go to a hundred person school, then I can

00:37:10.500 raise the price. Okay. I mean, that's the theory. I think, uh, that hasn't happened. Yeah, that probably

00:37:16.560 is. That hasn't happened in the other 30 States. All right. Now may what we hope will happen is that

00:37:23.760 the supply will increase. And usually where there's opportunity there, somebody comes in to meet the

00:37:30.460 demand, right? Usually where there's demand, somebody usually provides a supply. Yeah. And I've

00:37:36.240 gotten a lot of messages from a lot of families. When I was talking about this on Instagram, they live

00:37:40.980 in Arizona, they live in Iowa, they live in different places. There's always going to be

00:37:45.020 debates and different feelings about school choice, but the families I've talked to who say,

00:37:49.140 I would not be able to give my kids the Christian education that they're getting without the education 1.00

00:37:55.460 savings account that I have, depending on the state or the voucher that they have, depending on the state

00:37:59.480 that they live in. I mean, that's an incredible testimony. And it basically comes down to the idea

00:38:04.260 that your fate should not be bound to the zip code in which you were born. Right. And if we really

00:38:11.260 believe in equality of opportunity, if we really believe in so-called social justice, this is like,

00:38:17.880 this is a justice issue. If you want to see it through that lens, kids who are born into

00:38:23.100 these communities where there's not a lot of hope and not a lot of opportunity,

00:38:27.800 they are given that hope and opportunity through education.

00:38:31.260 It's going to change people's lives. I mean, you know, I think it's, I think, you know,

00:38:36.120 you and your brothers having Christian education was a big factor. Yeah. And I just think it'll

00:38:40.940 change, it'll change people's, the direction in people's lives that we don't even know yet.

00:38:45.840 Just think about half the population being eligible if they choose to for something like this.

00:38:50.540 You know, one of the other big misrepresentations, let's say, be kind, is that this takes money from

00:38:58.480 public schools. All right. And I don't know how everything worked in other states, but I know in

00:39:03.740 Texas, that's just an out and out falsehood is that public schools received, they're going to receive

00:39:10.240 the funding that they receive. $80 billion is spent allocated to public K through 12 public schools

00:39:19.860 in Texas. Okay. $80 billion. Now it is true that $6,200, I think of that, a price average, okay,

00:39:30.060 goes towards something they call WADA, weighted average daily attendance. So each school district

00:39:36.800 gets paid this $6,200 on the average attendance that they have. Like if it's 11,000 students,

00:39:45.000 okay, they get $6,200 per one of those. Well, when, if I take my kids out of school, then that $6,200

00:39:52.520 go, that's not in their, you know, WADA anymore. All right. That is true. However, the total funding

00:39:59.920 for each student in Texas is about $15,000. And if you don't believe me, take $80 billion,

00:40:08.700 divide it by 5.5 million, and it comes to right at $15,000. So the $6,200 of that $15,000 is technically

00:40:18.460 going away, but $9,000 is left, right? So when you take that, now you take that $9,000, that there's

00:40:27.180 not even a student there to use that money, you actually get more money per student overall than

00:40:34.040 you would if that $6,200 stayed with you. So you get more money for less students. I mean,

00:40:40.360 I don't understand what the big issue is. Also the billion dollars that we're using in Texas,

00:40:46.140 it's just coming out of the general revenue fund. It doesn't come out of the, the school's funding,

00:40:51.200 right? It's not money they would have gotten otherwise. All right. So, uh, it's just, it's

00:40:56.240 just so many misrepresentations on this. And that that's really what is disappointing. I've

00:41:00.980 actually did a Facebook video. If people want to watch that on my Facebook page,

00:41:05.380 explain it about a 10 minute video that kind of talks about it. Yeah.

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00:42:55.080 That's preborn.com slash Allie. And for those maybe on the conservative side who are afraid that

00:43:07.780 this change would just like change private schools or would change Christian schools, the Christian 0.76

00:43:13.800 schools who now might get applicants that couldn't be applicants before, they will not be

00:43:19.500 forced to accept these people. They'll still have the same standards. For example, the school that I

00:43:24.040 went to, at least one parent, but preferably both parents had to be born again Christians,

00:43:30.160 give their testimony. They had to be a member of a church with a pastor recommendation in order to

00:43:37.240 even get your foot in the door to interview. All of those standards will still be in place.

00:43:42.240 It just might accept someone who financially couldn't make it work before, but did share

00:43:47.860 all of the values and desires that you as a parent have.

00:43:51.300 Yep. That's what it's intended to do. And not all of them will be faith-based schools. Some of them

00:43:57.740 will be private STEM schools or something like that. And so, you know, I just encourage people to go

00:44:04.340 look and see what's happened to Florida faith-based schools, if they're concerned about that, as to what

00:44:10.080 the government has done there, which I think they'll be comforted by that. Yeah. And, and, you know,

00:44:16.540 uh, it looks like we have the votes. Uh, I filed the bill in 2015 and 2017 for this. So if we get this

00:44:23.720 through, this will be a big, a big, uh, moment of celebration. Absolutely. Absolutely. It's things like

00:44:30.980 you said, they don't happen overnight. Yeah. Thomas. Yes. Yes. Okay. Speaking of Thomas Massey,

00:44:37.940 I have some unfortunate news. Fortunate for you. Unfortunate. And you know, my dad's motto growing

00:44:44.680 up was start, he said, start with me being right. And then back up from there. I may not always be

00:44:49.780 right, but you do get there quicker. Yeah. Just start there and then try to figure out the answer.

00:44:54.900 And it appears that you are correct. Okay. As of March 11th, 2025, representative Thomas Massey

00:45:01.900 has not successfully passed any bills he sponsored into law during his tenure in Congress, which began

00:45:07.660 November, 2012. So that's been a long time. So, and then I was like, okay, well, did he block anything?

00:45:13.400 Anything during the passage of the cares act, the $2.2 trillion relief package in response to the COVID-19

00:45:19.600 pandemic, Massey attempted to block its approval, which I appreciate by the way,

00:45:24.020 it's a valiant effort, but couldn't get enough support. Massey didn't block a COVID specific

00:45:28.720 bill via unanimous consent post cares act, but he introduced bills opposing COVID mandates like HR

00:45:33.980 3860. And, uh, that didn't advance past committee. I will say though, that doesn't mean that all of

00:45:42.160 these efforts are wasted or bad. I do still believe that he is a prophetic voice many times when it comes

00:45:48.340 to Congress and he speaks truth. But when it comes to what he has tangibly accomplished,

00:45:54.040 Ron Simmons is correct. Yeah. Sorry, Thomas Massey. Well, it could be too, Allie, like school

00:45:58.620 choice for me. I mean, that was very disappointed I didn't get that done, but it just may be timing,

00:46:03.380 you know, he may be ahead of his time. Yeah. And it wasn't wrong of you to push it at the time,

00:46:07.300 even though you didn't succeed at the moment. As a matter of fact, I was mentioned, I got a Google

00:46:11.560 notice this week about a bill that I filed in 2017 regarding the use of locker rooms and stuff.

00:46:18.780 Yeah. And, uh, because there's another bill that's filed, that's absolutely going to pass this time.

00:46:24.200 Right. Yeah. Isn't that crazy? The thing is society's view on that has just changed. I was

00:46:29.320 just a little bit ahead of the game on that, even though we knew we were right. Maybe Mr. Massey

00:46:34.620 knows he's right on some stuff. Now, what I did though, is I really worked behind the scenes to try to get

00:46:40.260 stuff done. And I would encourage, and maybe he does that. I would encourage him to, if he hasn't.

00:46:44.560 Yeah. And just to say, just this legacy really matters of school choice and what you helped

00:46:51.020 accomplish. You pushed the ball down the field and it's going to get all the way soon. But, um,

00:46:57.260 according to the daily signal, because a lot of people say, you know, this actually has a negative

00:47:01.040 effect on students, but according to the daily signal, as of March, 2023, there have been nearly

00:47:06.680 190 studies on the impact of school choice. Researchers have looked at financial effects,

00:47:11.580 parent satisfaction, test scores, civic values, school safety, and racial integration in both

00:47:16.600 red and blue states to collect information for these studies. This is according to the Mountain

00:47:20.500 States Policy Center. Remarkably, 84% of these studies, 84% of the 190 studies show a positive effect

00:47:27.760 and only, and 10% show no impact at all. And 6% show a negative result. So when it comes to test

00:47:35.140 scores, when it comes to educational attainment, parent satisfaction, all of those things,

00:47:39.700 most parents are saying that this has had a positive effect on my student and a positive effect

00:47:46.540 on our family. And actually test scores have gone up. Their comprehension has gone up. I mean,

00:47:53.280 I don't think anyone could argue with the fact that our public schools by and large are failing.

00:47:57.920 Well, yes. Well, yeah, it's, it's, it is. And it's not a money issue, right?

00:48:02.800 No, it's not.

00:48:03.580 Some of the places that spend the most money have the worst performance. And that's very,

00:48:07.400 very disappointing.

00:48:08.900 Yep. Absolutely. So there's a lot more to talk about on the school choice. Go check out my dad's

00:48:15.180 Facebook page. He's got more on that and we can talk about it more as time goes on. There's a lot

00:48:19.400 of propaganda out there.

00:48:20.420 There'll be more, uh, you know, when she gets through committee, what happens is it gets through

00:48:23.960 committee. Okay. And then it goes, uh, to the floor. It's already passed the Senate floor and

00:48:31.960 then it, the house will pass their version. Some, it may be amended and then they'll get

00:48:37.000 into conference committee and merge the two somehow they'll come to compromise and it'll

00:48:42.340 get voted. Probably won't get voted on until, uh, out of the house, maybe sometime in April.

00:48:47.900 Okay. Gotcha. Well, dad, thanks so much for joining us. Yeah. Tell everyone about your book.

00:48:52.440 Life Lessons from the Little Red Wagon. You know, it's never more pertinent than it is today

00:48:57.620 because as we go through uncertain economic times and what's going on in DC and all that,

00:49:02.500 you need to have a foundation of where you are. And what this book really does for us is it just,

00:49:08.440 first of all, it makes sure that you don't overreact to something. And also it reminds us,

00:49:15.340 you know, the last few weeks have reminded me of this. I've been, I've been in the wagon. I haven't

00:49:19.520 been put on the handle. Yeah. I can't even push the wheels for very long. Because of your recovery.

00:49:24.220 Because of my recovery. I've been in the wagon and sometimes that recovery period in the wagon

00:49:29.140 in certain areas of your life can be the most beneficial to you. Yep. So. Amen. Well,

00:49:34.460 thanks so much, dad. You bet. Thanks for having me.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - March 12, 2025

Ep 1155 ｜ Debunking the Biggest School Choice Lies ｜ Guest： Ron Simmons

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