Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 131 ｜ Dan Crenshaw

00:00:00.000 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Friday. I hope everyone has had a wonderful week.

00:00:05.920 Today, I am sitting down with Representative Dan Crenshaw from Texas. You guys already know

00:00:13.000 exactly who he is. He has been making waves ever since he joined Congress, and I'm really looking

00:00:20.460 forward to you guys listening to this conversation. I hope that you have enjoyed the maternity episode

00:00:26.080 so far. I've gotten a lot of good feedback. If you guys would like to ask me any questions,

00:00:32.300 of course, you can email me, ali at the conservativemillennialblog.com. You can

00:00:37.180 send me a message on Instagram. But for now, the conversation with Representative Crenshaw.

00:00:43.580 Representative, thanks for joining me. Thanks for having me. Yeah, so I don't think I need to give

00:00:47.540 any formal introduction to everyone listening to the podcast, but if you could give us just

00:00:52.200 a brief background on who you are and how you were raised. Well, I was raised in Texas,

00:01:01.280 the Houston area. I was raised in an oil and gas family. So the reason I point that out is because

00:01:08.220 what that meant was I moved around a lot. I grew up in Houston. We also lived in Scotland. We moved

00:01:14.520 back to Houston. We lived in Egypt. Why'd you live in Scotland? You were born in Scotland, right?

00:01:18.500 Yeah, I was. Why were you born in Scotland? Well, there's a big oil industry there. So my parents

00:01:23.660 met at Texas A&M. Gotcha. And, you know, my dad's side of the family goes back six generations here

00:01:30.540 in Texas. My mom came to Texas A&M to study her master's in nutrition. And they met. And his first

00:01:39.040 job was out in Aberdeen, Scotland, you know, working in the, obviously, the North Sea has a lot of oil.

00:01:44.520 Been to Aberdeen, actually. Yeah. And there you go. And actually, the doctor who delivered me was

00:01:50.700 named Clark Kent. It's just a little fun fact. Yeah. Dr. Clark Kent. That is a fun fact. Wow.

00:01:55.560 And so were you raised a conservative? Well, I don't think there was a lot of politics in my

00:02:00.040 family. They were definitely conservative. Yeah. But it was not, you know, and I know this from

00:02:05.200 looking at baby pictures and my dad's wearing a Reagan shirt, of course. And they've always been

00:02:09.060 conservative, considered conservative. But I don't think, my family did not wear politics on

00:02:14.900 their sleeve. It was not something that came up a lot. And frankly, it's not something I even

00:02:19.480 was overly involved with in college. And the military is fairly apolitical. The SEAL teams,

00:02:25.700 the special operations community is going to be a little bit more conservative. Yeah.

00:02:29.200 Generally speaking, but in the military as a whole is for the most part. But we don't talk about it a

00:02:35.380 lot. We're focused on our job. It is not a highly political environment. And it also speaks to the

00:02:43.060 era we're in. I think as social media has gained more traction. And I think, unfortunately, and I

00:02:48.240 think this is a bad thing, politics has seeped into every aspect of life. Your job, the military,

00:02:53.380 your culture, your pop culture, comedy, it's in all of it. Can't escape it. And it's not good.

00:02:59.000 You know, I think we should have some separation so we can share some things together.

00:03:01.880 Yeah. So when did you decide, okay, I'm gonna, you know, you weren't necessarily raised always

00:03:08.220 thinking about talking about politics. My story is kind of the same way. It was during this past

00:03:12.900 election, really, that I was like, okay, I'm noticing that a lot of people my age, a lot of

00:03:17.540 young people, this is 2015, have no idea what the heck is going on. And that kind of created this

00:03:24.140 spark in me where it's like, okay, I got to talk about these values that I was raised with,

00:03:27.800 even though we weren't overtly political. So when was that moment for you?

00:03:32.760 I don't know if there was a moment. I think it happened gradually during my time in the SEAL

00:03:36.780 teams. And, and, and, and, you know, every, here's what it is for me. Every time I would look into an

00:03:43.800 issue, the, it turned out that the headline or the, you know, the, the bottom line that they were

00:03:49.520 trying to tell you up front was not actually true. Right. And that, no, that, and that every time I

00:03:55.060 actually delved into something, it was the conservative side that actually did the work

00:03:59.720 to explain layer upon layer, why this was the way it was. And I became a lot more interested in,

00:04:05.900 in the think tank work that was, that was, say, done by heritage and AI and things like that.

00:04:11.740 And, and when I had to leave the military, I, I wanted to pursue that. I wanted to, I went to Harvard,

00:04:16.840 Harvard Kennedy School. I wanted to be in policy. Like the policy mattered a lot to me. I wasn't

00:04:22.260 necessarily looking at politics. I knew in the back of my mind that if I wanted to make an impact

00:04:26.940 on a lot of different issues and, and, and advocate for an approach to governance that is

00:04:33.280 coherent and based on timeless principles and based on the founding principles that created

00:04:37.940 the miracle we have today, then I would have to get into politics. But that, I didn't have no,

00:04:41.640 I had no avenue into that. So I created an avenue by jumping through a window of opportunity when,

00:04:47.160 when Congressman Ted Pell announced retirement in my district.

00:04:49.760 And what did your wife think about that when you said, okay, I'm going to do this. I'm going

00:04:53.440 to run for office.

00:04:54.500 Yeah. So she, well, she was all for it. Um, that's good.

00:04:57.880 The way it happened was, you know, one day I happened to be in the right place, the right

00:05:02.120 people at the right time who pointed out to me that Pell announced retirement. And I said,

00:05:06.280 okay, yeah, well, you know, I was thinking about this, but maybe, maybe sometime in the future

00:05:10.380 when I have more money and I understand that policy intricacy just a little bit better.

00:05:14.980 And, uh, that's a typical military way of thinking. I think you have to be, you got to

00:05:19.220 be super prepared. And then you realize like you're way more prepared than everybody else

00:05:22.820 because I've been studying a lot of this. I knew what I thought, right. I've been studying

00:05:25.980 a lot of this for a long time. And, um, and voters do appreciate that when you can articulate

00:05:31.580 the best, what they believe. And that that's what voters are looking for oftentimes. And so I came

00:05:36.540 home and asked my wife what she thought. And she said, let's do it. And that was it.

00:05:39.580 That's the support that you need more than anyone else who tells you to run is the people that are

00:05:45.040 close to you and really know you and care about you. Exactly. What's been the biggest thing that

00:05:48.780 surprised you about the legislative process since you've been in Washington? I get asked that

00:05:53.900 question all the time and I don't have a great answer for it yet because I don't, I, I don't feel

00:06:00.500 that I've been overly surprised by anything. I sort of knew what I was getting into. I'd both

00:06:03.640 eyes open, one eye open, you know, going, going into it. Um, but you know, there's certainly

00:06:10.360 disappointments. I think a lot of the arguments being used by the left are terribly dishonest.

00:06:15.780 Yeah. And you knew that going in, but I knew that, but I knew that going in, I just, I think

00:06:21.500 I was a little surprised. I, maybe I believed the moderate Democrats a lot more than I, than I

00:06:25.960 should have believed them in the sense that they truly wanted to work with us and kind of fight back

00:06:30.220 against the leftism of their party. And, uh, I found that to be certainly not the case. I mean,

00:06:35.640 there's, there's, there's still some decent ones. And if it was up to me and them to find solutions,

00:06:40.100 I think we could, but they've got no power and they've got no willingness to actually speak out

00:06:44.660 against that, that far left side of their party. So I really don't know what direction they're going.

00:06:49.680 I would say kind of jokingly, one, one surprising thing was that, uh, I have to pay for the house gym,

00:06:54.920 you know, like, why can't I just use the gym? I don't understand. It frustrates me on a daily basis.

00:06:59.360 It's not included. Maybe that's something that you need. Well, I was going to ask you like,

00:07:03.560 what's one thing that you really want to change? If there's just one thing that you could say,

00:07:08.560 okay, this is my goal on there, but maybe it's the, the gym membership thing. That's probably it.

00:07:13.920 Yeah. A little bit on a serious, bigger policy or how the house works?

00:07:18.360 I would like to hear both actually, because I feel like you do have some beef with how the house

00:07:22.300 works. I watch your Instagram videos and I'm very enlightened by the process.

00:07:26.540 Yeah. And that's, well, in that, well, my beef that I put out on Instagram is,

00:07:30.260 is with a bigger legislative issues. Okay. And that's my beef with the policy. I do have beef

00:07:34.620 also with just the general way things work. Yeah. Um, I'm surprised how little debate we actually

00:07:40.020 do. Like we don't, we don't ever sit in a committee and just go at each other, you know,

00:07:45.180 which I think would be healthy, you know, and there's just, there's not really an opportunity

00:07:49.100 to ever do that.

00:07:50.380 Has it always been that way?

00:07:51.280 I don't know. Um, probably. And, and because it's, it's difficult to see how it was ever

00:07:56.040 a different way because of the way it's structured. I mean, first of all, in the house, the majority

00:08:00.160 really rules. I mean, you, they really don't have to listen to us at all. And so they're

00:08:05.440 the ones debating amongst themselves what to put forward because they know they don't really

00:08:09.580 care what we think. And, and, and that's a little unfortunate. It's, it's, it's so rare

00:08:13.960 that a, that a piece of legislation will go to the floor and we walk on there unsure of how

00:08:19.080 we're going to vote. It's happened very few times. It's interesting when it does and when

00:08:22.480 we're actually listening for the arguments and engaging.

00:08:25.240 And so it does happen and it's kind of cool when it does happen, but it's, it's, it's

00:08:28.320 very rare that, that, that, that, that compromise just isn't happening. Um, there is, there is

00:08:33.480 a, on a, on a, on another note, that's the way social media works. And like, this is something

00:08:37.460 I've been, uh, I've been thinking me and AOC would have, uh, have some alignment on

00:08:41.420 is, uh, is the rules surrounding social media in Congress are, are, are, are, I think

00:08:47.080 you know what I'm talking about. They're, they're horrible. They, they, they frustrate

00:08:51.580 the heck out of us. They basically take, they take rules surrounding official mail. And I

00:08:58.540 don't want to get into that cause it's confusing for the listeners and it's, it's just, basically

00:09:03.280 you have to separate campaign mail from your official mail that you mail to your constituents,

00:09:07.700 which makes sense, but they try to adapt those laws to social media, which is why, you know,

00:09:13.040 for your listeners, which is why I have like five different social media accounts. I have to have

00:09:16.660 all these different personalities. You don't follow all five of my social media accounts?

00:09:20.360 I just didn't know. Well, now that I know, I'm going to do it right now.

00:09:22.620 Jeez. There's two on Instagram. No, sorry. There's only one on Instagram. I'm battling

00:09:25.920 back on that one. There's two Twitter.

00:09:27.740 The one that I follow on Instagram, you post the videos like on IGTV. That's like, here's

00:09:34.540 the truth. I think you did a recent one about an immigration bill. So that's the one that

00:09:38.640 I follow. If there's another one where you are like AOC, where you're drinking wine and

00:09:43.520 putting together a futon, I would love to follow that one too.

00:09:46.120 I have one Instagram. I've been able to maintain one Instagram, but they, but they want me to

00:09:50.220 split it up. And I'm like, no, man, you know, I mean, AOC would agree on that. That's a, that's a,

00:09:54.540 it seems like a small thing, but what it does is it makes it hard for people to see what I'm doing

00:09:58.440 because they have to figure out where to find me, you know, and that's frustrating.

00:10:02.540 And I think people really appreciate that. I've appreciated just the simple videos that you've

00:10:06.440 done explaining what's going on, because like you said, the thing that frustrated you before you got

00:10:11.360 into politics is the thing that I think frustrates me and a lot of just, you know, of your average

00:10:15.760 people reading headlines every day. I mean, this is probably one of the questions that I get asked

00:10:20.520 the most is like, how do you know what's true? How do you know what's true? Where do you go to

00:10:24.100 know what's true? And really all we feel like we can do, unless you have access to an actual politician

00:10:29.200 is okay, I'm going to read as much as I possibly can from both sides of the aisle. And then I'm going

00:10:34.960 to make the effort to piece things together and hopefully find the truth, read the original

00:10:39.400 legislation. But the fact of the matter is young people don't have time or they just don't want

00:10:44.220 to. People have their lives to live and it's not, yeah, it's doesn't make sense to expect that of

00:10:50.780 them. And so what I try to do is not give them the talking points, right? Because people see through

00:10:56.420 that and people can tell if you're coming at them with a simple talking points that you're reading,

00:11:01.440 or if you've got a few more layers of explanation underneath that. And even if they don't trust you,

00:11:07.160 at least they can see whether you're persuasive or not. And I try to be, and I try not to just

00:11:12.260 throw out a bunch of red meat. I want to explain to you why this is wrong. And I don't think our 1.00

00:11:17.680 party's done a great job of doing that in the past. And so we're just trying to change that.

00:11:22.800 I don't think so either. I mean, we have obviously so many good people in the party,

00:11:26.780 but I do think that a problem is that a lot of legislators just don't know how to use social

00:11:31.860 media. So when they do, it's really awkward. That's true on the left too. I mean,

00:11:35.240 we've seen that with Elizabeth Warren and Kirsten Gillibrand. I mean, it's painfully awkward.

00:11:39.700 There's just a lot of people that don't know how to use it. And also they don't, I think a lot of

00:11:43.860 conservatives especially seem to not be able to get out of the like politician persona. Like

00:11:48.680 they've got the hand motions, they've got the cadence and someone like me or just, you know,

00:11:53.940 your average millennial, whatever is watching that as like, I don't really, you know, I don't

00:11:58.820 really trust you. I might like you and what you're saying, but I don't really feel like that's

00:12:02.420 scripted. You feel like they're, they're robotic about it. And then, and so that's what we're

00:12:07.120 trying to change. And, you know, that's, that's what we can't underestimate AOC too much. Cause

00:12:10.400 she's good at that. She seems very genuine. Now she says nothing when she's wrong every

00:12:15.520 time she says something. Um, and it's my job to be like, yeah, it's my job to be like, Hey guys,

00:12:20.360 this is why she's wrong in a genuine way. Um, and, and you've got to know the issues well

00:12:25.700 enough to be able to speak about them off the cuff, which is maybe another problem. Um,

00:12:30.220 sometimes people have, and you know, I, yeah, there's also little tricks, right? Like

00:12:35.280 have subtitles, have subtitles. Cause a lot of people don't turn on the sound on their

00:12:38.360 phones. A lot of politicians don't realize that. Yeah. Especially people our age, I would

00:12:43.000 say like my dad totally doesn't get that. He was in public the other day and he had, his

00:12:47.620 phone was on loud. And so you heard it ding every five seconds and he just totally doesn't

00:12:51.640 get it. But you're right. For some reason, our generation is like, is different about that.

00:12:56.140 Yeah, exactly. So that's true. Um, okay. You said what bothers you about the process,

00:13:01.800 but what about the biggest policy thing that you want to tackle? You talk a lot about immigration.

00:13:07.080 Would you say that's probably it? That's definitely a priority right now. Um, I'm on Homeland Security

00:13:12.040 Committee. It's something I ran on was border security. This is a frustrating one because it's

00:13:16.160 so solvable. All right. We need, we need to implement whether it's, you know, on the Senate

00:13:20.900 side, Senator Graham has a good bill on amnesty or not amnesty asylum reform. The way we

00:13:26.060 do asylum processing will her just came out with a good bill in the house that we should, 1.00

00:13:30.000 that we should look at, um, and get that moving forward. The question is, isn't really on the

00:13:33.720 Republican side, whether we should move forward with that or not. The question is the Democrats

00:13:37.640 want the same things we want or not. This is why this is so frustrating. We know exactly what needs

00:13:42.080 to be done. This isn't rocket science. Um, you know, and it's not just a wall. It's a wall

00:13:47.320 where Border Patrol wants that wall. It's more facilities, uh, to process illegal immigrants claiming 0.73

00:13:52.840 asylum. It's a better handle on how we, how we process asylum claims, uh, where they can claim

00:13:58.840 those things. And, uh, we have legislation to address all of that. Democrats fundamentally

00:14:03.540 want, have a different goal than we do though. And that's what I've unfortunately been convinced

00:14:06.880 of over the last few months. And what is, what is it? Yeah. Um, if, I mean, if you can guess,

00:14:12.660 that's a good question, it's, and it's, we used to agree, we used to agree at least on our nation's

00:14:17.460 sovereignty. We might disagree on the methods of how we protect that, but even just a few years ago,

00:14:22.560 I mean, Barack Obama, Chuck Schumer, they all said that they believed that we should curb illegal

00:14:27.660 immigration. They, if, when you're, when you're the liberal, you tend not to value the sanctity of

00:14:34.920 your nation the way a conservative does. And that's just in the data. That's not me making that up.

00:14:39.480 That's not me assuming that it's, that's like, that's from moral psychology data. Um, and the

00:14:44.020 way people take surveys, the way they answer questions. So they just don't value that the

00:14:47.500 way we value it. So that's the first thing. Okay. And then you get to this other, and this is the

00:14:52.160 more cynical view is, do they just want more votes? Are they, are they trying to overwhelm our population

00:14:56.680 with people who they believe will vote for them? They can tell them that they are for that group.

00:15:00.960 And this is identity politics run rampant. And if you, if this is, this is a toxic kind of, um,

00:15:06.780 situation here where you don't really care about the sanctity, the sovereignty of your country,

00:15:11.100 and you want more votes to have more power so that you can implement the policies you want.

00:15:15.960 Okay. Well, now, now they found themselves in a good spot and, uh, where, where the status quo

00:15:20.760 looks, looks pretty nice to them. Um, and they'll continue to allow this underclass to inflow into 1.00

00:15:26.020 the United States. And then they'll make the moral argument that that's an underclass and that we should 0.99

00:15:29.980 give them voting rights. Okay. Well, we know what you, you know, the rest of us have to call out the

00:15:35.080 truth that we see here. That's the cynical, that's a cynical view. I don't think all Democrats want

00:15:40.460 that. I definitely don't think Democrat voters want that, that I am sure of. There's no Democrat

00:15:44.400 voters saying this. Yeah. All right. But I think the politicians have somewhat of a, of a different

00:15:49.080 view. I do worry about those who follow in the footsteps of people like AOC, people who are my age,

00:15:58.000 who have just come out of the university system where they're basically just teaching this crazy

00:16:03.260 postmodernism that doesn't have any founding in reality. I worry about those people who for them

00:16:09.440 illegal immigration or basically having open borders is ideological. Like it's truly a moral

00:16:16.100 issue for them to where they buy into this crazy narrative that, well, white supremacy founded this

00:16:22.120 country. This wasn't our land in the first place. So why the heck do we have borders? I worry about

00:16:27.000 those people because how do you rationalize with irrational people? Do you have any advice on that?

00:16:31.840 If they're that far gone, I don't try to rationalize with them. I mean, I don't, I'm not so sure that

00:16:37.540 there's a point to it. Yeah. I think it is about, you know, 7% of the population by some, by some

00:16:43.440 statistics. And so I'm not overly worried about that and I'm not going to waste my time trying to

00:16:47.320 tackle that. I'll debate them in public so that I can, you know, put on display for the rest of the

00:16:53.040 population, like what's going on here. But, um, I mean, cause what you're describing that, that,

00:16:58.200 that postmodernism, they're coming from such a fundamentally different place. There's so much

00:17:02.860 daylight between us that it's, you can't, you can't even get it. You gotta go to, like,

00:17:08.900 they have different goals. I mean, when you have different goals, you can't compromise. You can

00:17:12.980 compromise. If we all want to alleviate poverty, like we can compromise. Okay. There's, you know,

00:17:16.840 they're going to want more transfer payments, more welfare. We're going to want some, you know,

00:17:20.840 institutionalized personal responsibility within that welfare program. See how there's a compromise 0.89

00:17:25.700 that we eventually come up with. If we want fundamentally different things, if we, if one

00:17:29.560 side thinks the country is bad, like in a, in a deep core level, it's bad and we think it's good.

00:17:36.400 I'm not so sure we have much in common anymore. And it's hard to have conversations based on that.

00:17:42.120 And it does seem like, and maybe it's, maybe it's amplified what we see in the media, but it does

00:17:47.060 seem like that position of being really anti-patriotism and thinking that America and

00:17:52.320 the West, that they're good places that have done good things. That is somehow racist and wrong and

00:17:56.980 immoral. That does seem to be a more mainstream position on the left. Do you think that's exaggerated

00:18:02.940 or do you think that's true? Do you find that in Congress?

00:18:05.600 Well, so there's, there's that extreme part of them who would, who would openly advocate that

00:18:11.300 America was founded on genocide. Okay. As that's the Ilhan Omar's of the world. This is what they 0.99

00:18:15.660 say. I mean, she's in Congress, so it's mainstream. Yeah. In a sense it's mainstream, but it, but I

00:18:20.680 would, and then I would point to the more moderate liberals, the more well-intentioned types, right?

00:18:26.320 The ones I talk about as, as being, you know, they're focused on injustice and inequality and

00:18:30.760 there's, there's, there's a naivete associated with that, but they're not bad. Right. And they do,

00:18:35.000 they do, they love 4th of July parades. Do you have an example of that? Like, like a person?

00:18:39.760 Yeah. If you don't, it's okay. Sure. Sure. Plenty. You know, like, I'll get, I'm friends with Joe

00:18:44.980 Kennedy. You know, I think he's a good person. He still loves the country. Yeah. Like you read his

00:18:49.980 Twitter account and you're like, Oh God, it makes me want to tear your eyeballs. The one remaining eyeball

00:18:53.200 you have out. But like, you know, he, he's a good, he will just have an unemotional political

00:18:58.680 conversation with you and just get to the, get to the point. Right. So there's, and then voters,

00:19:04.480 right? I mean, so I, I try to put this in terms of how I interact with voters also and like people

00:19:09.720 who say that they're Democrats. And then I have these conversations with them about what they

00:19:12.700 believe. They're still going to wave the American flag at a 4th of July parade. So they haven't,

00:19:16.280 they haven't gone into this sort of intersectional left of postmodernism where America is bad.

00:19:20.320 They haven't gotten there yet. Here's the problem with well-intentioned liberalism is they're not

00:19:24.700 willing to defend the values that they themselves live by. They're not willing to

00:19:28.480 defend the fact that they love America. They're not willing to defend the fact that they grew up

00:19:32.820 in person with a sense of personal responsibility and, and love of family and traditional values.

00:19:38.260 They live by those, but they won't defend them. And this is, this is a big problem. So this is why

00:19:44.240 it's actually, you can objectively state what you stated earlier, which is they're all the same thing,

00:19:49.080 because if you're not willing to defend something, then, you know, and if everything you do basically

00:19:54.540 enables the far left, whether it's a vote or whether it's your inability to defend the values,

00:20:00.480 you know, are right, well then that's, you might as well be the far left. And that's actually what

00:20:05.340 I see in Congress. And that's what I see in someone like Joe Biden. I think that we probably would

00:20:09.940 have said at one point, even maybe a couple of years ago, okay, yes, he was a part of a very

00:20:15.100 progressive presidency, but he himself, you know, he probably still loves America, but now we see him

00:20:20.680 kowtow, we see him, we see him totally bend over backwards to appease the far left. So I'll use 0.61

00:20:27.480 that to ask you what you think about how 2020 is shaping up. And if you have any predictions or just

00:20:34.300 any, any thoughts on the craziness that's going on there? I don't know. I have no idea, but it's

00:20:40.520 going to be really entertaining. It's going to be really entertaining. Biden obviously looks like

00:20:44.700 he's on top right now. I think your assessment of, of how he will, he will go with the wind, he will go

00:20:49.640 with the political leftist wind is about correct. And heck, even if it wasn't, you'd still end up

00:20:55.700 with an administration full of Obama era officials. I would not, it would be really, really bad. Even

00:21:00.680 if he was still sticking to his guns, he would never govern moderately. No, no, he can't. He has

00:21:05.480 no choice, right? He would, he would govern with, he would, he would bring back the entire Obama 0.98

00:21:08.760 administration. That's what would happen. I don't, I don't see any other, um, no, no. Here's, here's our

00:21:14.040 advantage there. He's going to have to answer a very difficult question, which is how is it that you

00:21:18.600 coming back is better? Cause, cause every, by every measure we have, things are better.

00:21:22.900 Now there's a lot of people who just don't like Trump and they believe that character matters

00:21:27.140 in the white house. Fair enough. And they've convinced themselves that actually the country

00:21:30.220 is doing really poorly despite all statistics to the contrary. Right. I mean, cause yeah,

00:21:33.900 once you have that emotional belief, you'll just, you'll, you'll, you'll look to confirm

00:21:36.660 that any way you can. And they do do that. They do do that. But even if they acknowledge

00:21:40.540 that by every measure, every indicator of things are better off, and that includes foreign 0.93

00:21:44.240 policy, um, by the way, as well, they'll, they'll still hold onto the idea of they just

00:21:48.880 don't like the person because, and this always goes back to why do you vote? You know? And

00:21:52.920 I would argue that the reason you should vote is not for the person. I mean, that definitely

00:21:56.660 has something to do with it. I know I'm sympathetic to these people who just don't like the president.

00:22:00.600 I get it. Um, but, and I'm, and I'm, I'm less sympathetic to people who just vote on one

00:22:05.900 issue. I don't think that's a good reason to vote. You should vote based on how somebody

00:22:09.920 is going to govern and, and the philosophical approach they bring to that. And conservatism

00:22:14.960 is a coherent form of governments. Liberalism is not, it just isn't. It's a good thing to have

00:22:20.040 in your society because you need to kind of, you know, sometimes blunt the rougher edges

00:22:24.560 of capitalism or whatever it is. It's a good thing for activists to do, to seek out injustices

00:22:29.860 and advocate. That's, that's all good. That is a good democratic thing to have, but it is

00:22:34.120 not a coherent governing philosophy. Right. Okay. One last question. If you can give people

00:22:39.120 some advice, young people, some advice going into 2020, a lot of them are scared to voice

00:22:43.620 any of their conservative opinions because they've got scary aunts and uncles and friends

00:22:47.800 on Facebook who are going to, you know, exactly. You've been called a Nazi about a million times.

00:22:53.200 And I think a lot of them are fearful of that. So if there's any advice or encouragement that

00:22:57.680 you can give to young conservatives who want to speak up, but are nervous.

00:23:01.740 Um, geez, you know, it, it's not like I wasn't in the political debate as a, as a young person.

00:23:08.560 And so I'd be lying if I said that I knew exactly how to do that. All I can say is know what you

00:23:15.600 stand for, know that you have to, to anticipate their argument and, and know a couple more layers

00:23:21.560 deep of an, of, of a particular issue than they do. So go in well-armed, um, listen to a lot of the,

00:23:28.420 especially like the younger political pundits out there, especially me. And yeah, I mean,

00:23:33.560 just totally objectively, you probably want to listen to us the most. Yeah. Just objectively

00:23:39.000 speaking, that makes the most sense. Um, cause what I try to do constantly is provide you with

00:23:43.380 the right arguments, not, not the false talking points. And we always fall into that trap. Like,

00:23:47.580 you know, and, and we always want to make sure that the data we're using is correct. And, um,

00:23:52.160 and then, and then, and then just do it with open arms. Don't show contempt for your opponent.

00:23:56.100 They will show contempt for you. But if you start to show contempt for them, it'll, it'll end any

00:24:01.280 ability to persuade anybody at all. Um, so, so do it with love and show the morality of conservatism,

00:24:08.520 show the morality of conservatism. Which is really the why something that you talk about a lot. I

00:24:12.580 think knowing the why behind what you believe, knowing the why behind conservatism, which really

00:24:17.300 goes back to even knowing why the founder set up this country and the principles that conservatism in

00:24:22.500 America was founded on, I think that can really help guide people a lot. And you do a good job

00:24:27.020 of relaying that. I think so. Thank you so much for what you do. And thank you for being here.

00:24:31.360 Appreciate it. Thanks for having me, Ellie.

00:24:32.620 Well, I hope you guys enjoyed that conversation as much as I did. I learned a lot from him.

00:24:36.640 I certainly think that representative Crenshaw is someone that we can be proud of fighting for us

00:24:42.200 in Congress. Uh, if you guys enjoy relatable, if you love the show, I would highly appreciate

00:24:48.400 you leaving a five-star review on iTunes. Uh, if not, that's okay. If you just want to listen

00:24:54.960 to the podcast and not tell me how much you like it, I still love you and I still appreciate you

00:24:59.860 anyway. I hope that you guys have an awesome weekend and I will see you back here on Monday.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - June 28, 2019

Ep 131 ｜ Dan Crenshaw

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