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J. Velázquez: This is episode number 176 of the top left corner. I’m your host, Jay Velázquez. And as always, I do thank you for tuning in. Today is Sunday, October 23rd, 2022. At least that’s the date that this episode dropped. And we have a really fascinating conversation for you today. We have as our guest, Dean Martilly, candidate for First District of Massachusetts. That’s right. This is a Republican who’s going up against Richard Neal, who has been in that seat through the seat’s various transformations, including absorbing new territory for three decades now, something like that. It’s been a long, long time that Richie Neal has been warming that chair.
And this race, while in the Berkshires, may not seem to be contentious, I have heard from other areas of the district, from people out out that to the east of us. And it sounds like they have some pretty, pretty strong support out that way this campaign. So what we’ll do is it’s a long we had a much longer conversation than we intended, which happens, as you know, quite frequently in the Top Left Corner because we have such fascinating guests. So we’re going to get right to it after this word from the US Department of Veterans Affairs and the Ad Council.
Candidate Dean Martilli — website
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Top Left Corner: And with me on the line is Dean Martilli, who is running for Berkshire First District Congressional District, Massachusetts. Dean Martilli, thanks so much for being on the Top Left Corner.
Dean Martilli: Thank you very much. Great to be with you.
Top Left Corner: So this is interesting. You know, you’re running against Richie Neal, who has faced some primary challengers in the past couple of elections, neither of which were successful and but not has not faced any significant challenges from the GOP for his seat, which he’s had for about 18 years now, I think maybe more. But what gave you the idea that this was the year that a Republican might be able to take on this entrenched fellow in this seat? What was what gave you the the signals?
Dean Martilli: Well, first of all, this will be 32 years for Richie Neal in Congress. I view him as a follower, not a leader. And he shows he demonstrates that every day. And doing Nancy Pelosi’s dirty work, whatever that is. And we can get into that later. But I was I was chief of staff for a Democrat, Patrick Kennedy, out of Rhode Island. And I went in and took over that that seat to help him out. He had some health issues, and I was trusted enough to go in and take the chief of staff position and run the entire operation, both the Rhode Island office, the D.C. office and the campaign. And we worked with Congressman Neal’s office. And what I saw and I know that I was working for a Kennedy this is in 2000. Our office is a lot busier than his office. We had so many meetings. We were conducting meetings out in the hallway in the Cannon Building. And so I just watched the way we did things, in the way he the way his office was doing things. And we were far more efficient and far better. And I’ll say that one of my proudest accomplishments that we did in that office, we were there, like I said, during 911, and I watched watching Washington transform. The good news then both parties, Democrat and Republican, came together and we went to fight terrorism. Today, that’s a lot different. But what we did as an office is we strategized that the country was broken after 911. What can we do to make change? And we increase the federal debt benefit uniformed officers retroactive to all those that were killed in 911 by 175,000. So prior to us doing that, the family only received 125,000. We increased that by more than double that was signed. It was passed through the House, through the Senate, and it was signed by President Bush and the anti-terrorism legislation. That’s a great accomplishment.
Top Left Corner: That’s that’s that is a great accomplishment. Let’s let’s kind of get back to the question of whether or not you think this is a time. Now. It is. It is. Many people have many criticisms of Richie Neal, but that does not suggest that you can beat him. The question was, what makes you think this is the elections cycle to take him on?
Dean Martilli: Yeah, well, I wasn’t finished with that. I kind of segway it out, but that if you recall, I was a Democrat and I changed over the years watching the party leave me. You just saw yesterday Tulsi Gabbard, a Democrat congresswoman, also changed parties and now she’s a Republican. So the point is that the party changed. And I watched what was going on for for a number of years in Washington, in our country. And I have nothing to align with that, that that group which Richie Neal’s part of and I know that people are looking at and going out and campaigning and even before that, people are looking for a new direction. They’re looking for change and they’re looking for leadership. I knew from my experience in Washington that I could provide that I worked in Washington, and no one that ran against Congressman Neil ever worked in Washington on Capitol Hill. And I’ve got a lot of experience and all of my issues are exactly the opposite and I think more aligned with the everyday working person in the first District, which is most important to me.
Top Left Corner: Okay. That’s that’s that’s definitely that hits the question on the head. You know, the people in the first District now you have it’s a very diverse district. I mean, it’s a very large district for Massachusetts. It covers everything from Springfield all the way here into the Berkshires, which, you know, that’s that’s quite a lot of pluralism that you’ve got there. Do what kinds of surveys or polls or just sort of constituent investigation have you done that suggest that the folks of who are going to be hitting the polls are in line with with your worldview, with your perspective?
Dean Martilli: Well, you know, here’s the breakdown in this district and to to interject that the district goes further than Springfield. It goes out east to the Sturbridge area and all the way through. So it’s over 83 cities and towns, five different counties. The interesting thing is that although the Democrats in the district, they have about 170,000 registered voters, Republicans only have 65,000 registered voters. The this operation is going to come down to the unenrolled and or the independent, but they’re called unenrolled in Massachusetts. Right. 320,000 unenrolled voters. And that’s where I’m seeing the most movement. They tend to vote their mind. They they over the course of Ritchie Neal’s incumbency, they’ve tended to swing to the Democrat side. I don’t believe in anything we’ve seen that’s going to happen this time. Plus, the district has changed. It’s not rich. And, you know, came from an area in Springfield that was predominantly Irish, the Hungry Hill area. That’s changed dramatically. Even if you look at the representatives in the state house, they’re of Latin descent. So we we feel strongly that our message of of family and and the inflation rate and the cost of gasoline and everything else favors my message and that of the Republicans. And that’s how we’re going to beat Richie Neal.
Top Left Corner: I think I think you’ve hit a couple of things again, right on the head. The district has changed. Certainly. We saw it was a it was a primary race in the Berkshire district attorney’s race, but it might as well have been a Republican versus a Democrat. And we saw a progressive Democrat. Get unseated in this in this primary race in Berkshire County for for the DA’s position, which nobody would have suspected could happen even two years ago. So there’s definitely been a shift toward more conservative mindset, at least out this way. I’m sure it’s the same between especially, like you said, from Springfield out to Sturbridge. That’s that’s some pretty conservative country there. And you also are very correct in noting an astute in noting that Hispanic voters are not a monolith. They don’t all believe one thing. I think that was the big mistake that a lot of a lot of Democrats made in the last couple of elections, just assuming that Hispanics were going to turn out Democratic. And that is not the case. There are there’s a very strong, especially socially conservative. A strain in the in the electorate, the Hispanic electorate. So I think you’ve got a point there, though. I will say that this this election, I think, is really an if you’re old enough to remember, but or if you do remember, the George W, George H.W. Bush lost the election because he didn’t understand that, quote, it’s the economy, stupid, end quote. And that’s what this election is going to be about. Now, you point out that there’s a rise in gas prices. Inflation is going through the roof. There are a lot of factors that can be controlled and there’s a lot that cannot that are not really within the purview of Congress. What do you think you or really Congress can do to combat such things as gas prices, such things as inflation?
Dean Martilli: My intent to go to Washington is not sit around and worry about, oh, I got to be here for the rest of my life and vote, you know, to just ingratiate myself. No, it’s to when I when I was with Kennedy and we were running our campaign, I remember telling him over and over again because we’d get off on these crazy issues. No. Remember who sent you to Washington? Remember who you’re representing. Remember what your job is for them. So I will never forget that it’s the first District that sends Dean Martilli to D.C. to represent them there. The first thing on my mind every time and when you see what’s going on with this gas crisis, the administration, the Democrat Party, including Richie Neal, shuts down oil production. We were energy efficient. We were exporting energy. We were doing the great thing. You can’t run a country without energy. And so every single day when anyone from the first District goes, they see those gas prices going back up. President Biden is elected to draw down on the petroleum reserve that we have in this country to try to stabilize prices. That’s coming to an end. They’re skyrocketing back up to where they were. It’s ridiculous. It’s a self-inflicted wound by the administration. I will not stand for that. We have.
Top Left Corner: Got to push.
Dean Martilli: Back to produce our own.
Top Left Corner: Energy. I’ve got to I got to push back a little bit on that because Biden’s first year, drilling permitting, is a 34% increase over Trump’s. So he is permitting 34% more domestic drilling than Trump did. So I’m not I’m.
Dean Martilli: Not suppressing he’s suppressing the opportunity for companies in the United States to have leases to go and more exploration and more drilling. I don’t care what you’re telling you, it’s common sense. When President Trump was in office, gas prices were in the $2 range. And as soon as Biden got in, the first thing he did, day one was shut off the energy problem. And now it’s just like any the Democrat really, this.
Top Left Corner: Is a quarter of the year.
Dean Martilli: This is Rush on everything this.
Top Left Corner: I got I got I got a pushback here. This is according to the Bureau of Land Management. So I really it’s not they telling me this is according to government figures. Biden is is allowing 34% more drilling and has opened up vast swaths of of of ocean drilling as well. Something like 700,000 acres or whatnot. So, you know, I think that there are a lot of things that can be blamed on on Biden. I’m not sure that gas prices are necessarily on him. And when you do have Russia and Saudi Arabia turning the spigot off. I mean, they’re turning the big the big valve off that is going to decrease supply, which is going to increase price. I mean, that’s just that’s just simple market economics. If you have Saudi.
Dean Martilli: Arabia, I really I got to disagree with that standpoint. Saudi Arabia shot down Joe Biden because they have no respect for him, because he’s a weak leader. And China’s playing Biden like a patsy. And we’re into this green energy thing with China. But that doesn’t know what you say. Just use common sense. Why were the gas prices down when President Trump was president? Because he was in charge and the oil companies were able to do whatever they wanted under the guidelines of what the laws were in the United States. That thing was put away. They can print anything they want. Gas prices don’t rise incrementally after Biden gets in.
Top Left Corner: Wait, you’re saying that you don’t believe in that? You don’t believe in the principle of supply and demand.
Dean Martilli: I do believe in the princess, but they’re not telling you the truth.
Top Left Corner: So when Saudi Arabia. When Saudi Arabia. Excuse me, this is my show. This is my show.
Dean Martilli: On the Green New Deal. What’s the truth there?
Top Left Corner: That direction mostly didn’t go through. Very little of the Green New Deal actually went through. What I’m going to ask you is if you have less oil, Russia is producing less and Saudi Arabia is producing less, that means there’s less all over the world, which means that they can charge more because that because China needs it. Europe needs it. Asia needs it. Everybody in South Africa. Africa needs it. Everybody needs the oil. And when there’s less of it, the price is going to rise. That’s just. Look, I’m not an econ major, but I’m pretty sure that’s how things work. Let’s let’s move on to some other.
Dean Martilli: Platforms, playing a chess game with us. And when Biden’s in office, they’re going to win every day to Sunday. Biden can’t even stand on his own two feet and do anything. He’s got to have the Easter Bunny to save them during a kid’s program at the White House.
Top Left Corner: Yeah, I agree with you. I agree with you. But Biden is a he’s a he’s a he’s a puppet and he’s a he is a threadbare puppet, total puppet. But that doesn’t change the fact that the prices of gas are going up because the supply is going down. That’s just that’s just the fact and.
Dean Martilli: Right. You’re absolutely. Okay, fine. You’re right. The price is because what Russia doesn’t respect them, so they’re screwing us. Saudi Arabia doesn’t expect him, so he’s screwing us. So then he goes to Venezuela with his kneepads on begging for oil. We got our own oil. We don’t need that. He’s going up communist run countries. And then he’s pushing this Green New Deal, which is a total play in the communist China regime. And this is really killing our country. And that’s one of the reasons why I’m running. I’m not going to bow to China, Russia, any of these countries that are out outwardly attacking the United States, they’re making life miserable in our country and in the first District because they have no respect for the guy in the White House. And the guy I’m running against is the waterboy. If you ever saw that movie with Adam Sandler, The Waterboy for Nancy Pelosi, whatever she wants, he does. This is crazy.
Top Left Corner: I won’t I won’t disagree with that. I think that he’s got to go, you know, one way or the other. He’s got to go. And whether it’s you or somebody else, I think that at least the the water, you know, as you said, the water carrying has to stop for a lot of people. I mean, he carries the water for a lot of folks. You know, I, I think I’m not I can’t remember. But I think he has taken more money from and this is I have to check this from the pharmaceutical industry than anybody he is, you know, takes money from everybody, everybody. He’s you know, that’s that’s what he’s doing. So let’s let’s move on to, you know, the inflation food. There is a recession that it’s already started in Europe, which of course, is going to have a ripple effect on the United States. You know, we have we have come out of this pandemic or we’re coming out of this pandemic. It’s been rough. And and the jobs are still not paying what they could be paying. You know, in fact, it was the I think it was the head of the Federal Reserve who said that they want to make sure they keep wages down so that they can slow the economy down, which is to me, I think, you know, that kind of socks it to the working man and puts puts the weight of the recovery on our shoulders when we haven’t been keeping up with, you know, with the cost of living for 30 years now. But what can Congress do? Give me some examples of actual legislation that could be enacted that would help bring down the cost of living for Americans.
Dean Martilli: Well, let me let me just this is like a perfect segue into this. And if it’s going to take me a while to get there, but I promise I’ll get there quickly.
Top Left Corner: Yeah, I’m here.
Dean Martilli: Yeah, it was passed $280 Billion that was geared toward semiconductors because we learned during the pandemic we couldn’t operate a lot of things without these semiconductors. So $280 Billion gets passed through Congress. Now, it was geared to for research and development and helping companies to make faster, quicker, smaller semiconductors to fit in everything. And to help help the country. Okay, fine. I love it. But the day before this gets signed by Congress or passed through Congress, Richie Neal and the Ways and Means Committee changed one piece of legislation to allow the semiconductor chips to be outside of the United States. So to answer your question, that’s that doesn’t align with me the spending getting the most out of your money. So now we invest the $280 billion and we allow these things to be made outside the country. The law gets passed, it’s on president or the legislation gets passed, gets on President Bush’s desk for signing. He isn’t around. He’s on vacation. He’s got to ride his bike like George McFly. And and then there’s the trip that comes up and Nancy Pelosi and some of the other Democratic legislators in in the House have an Asia trip and they end up in Taiwan. And Taiwan is the largest producer of semiconductors in the world. What a surprise. All the places to go in the world you end up in Taiwan.
Dean Martilli: Nancy Pelosi. Ritchie again. Ritchie Neal, change the thing for Nancy. Nancy’s on an Air Force jet in Taiwan, and then after she gets back, we find out that her son, Polly Jr, was also on the plane and he was MIA during the missing during the meetings in Taiwan. So. I tell you, You think that doesn’t lead to suspicion? It’s a government airplane. Speaker of the House. Kid in Taiwan. Just pass chips legislation. He’s got on all the controls that the money spent in the United States. Is that the best way to get the most out of your money that you’re investing in this country? I say absolutely not. And it begs the question of of underhanded, slippery things when you’ve already seen the pattern of Joe Biden and his family selling this country out to Russia, China, Ukraine, and the FBI can’t even figure out what’s going on, or maybe they do know what’s going on and they’re protecting the president because he’s demanding that. So that just gives you a perfect example how Washington isn’t working for the first District. Now, if I was involved in that, I’m going to tell you right now you knew the thing. You’re chairman of the Ways and Means. You know, this is coming up soon, maybe in a year, maybe in six months.
Dean Martilli: What do you do? You try to get a company that’s located somewhere else to expand the CHIP facility in Pittsfield or something. Why couldn’t they do that? And then when you get the legislation going, you already have a company with good paying jobs ready to go. And another area that we need to pass legislation is we need to we need to bring all these pharmaceuticals back into the United States and make them we are beholding the China. It came out there in the pandemic, 94 to 97% of all of our pharmaceuticals are made in China or somewhere else. They’re not made in our country have a conflict with a country like China. They could just cut off drugs that we need heart medication, antibiotics, whatever it is, they cut it off or they could start cheating on it. And it’s not as strong that it needs to be to kill a virus or an infection that you have. So we need to wake up, bring bring manufacturing back. I want manufacturing in the first District. I intend to work on that vehemently when I get elected. And I’ll never let things like this go by. That hurt our country, hurt people in the first District. And as you said before, the middle class, hardworking people are taking a beating and we’re allowing this to happen in Washington.
Top Left Corner: Well, I think I think a lot of people are going to that’s going to resonate with a lot of people for sure. You know, it’s it’s a funny thing. I it was the the early nineties, I was working for a disc drive manufacturer in Scotts Valley, California. I was out there for a couple of years and the the ax dropped one Friday. We all get called in individually into the boss’s office. We get our pink slips, they’re laying us off and they’re sending those jobs to Thailand. And and that was actually because the CEO of this company had just married the princess of Thailand. So that was really convenient for them.
Dean Martilli: But good for him. Bad for.
Top Left Corner: You. Good for him, you know? You know, I’m not going to get too far into it. But, you know, he was like 70 and she was like 21 or something. So whatever. But the not that I am saying that that’s a bad thing, but, you know, it was all very, very, very sus. So the thing here is since then people have been saying over and over, well, you know, those jobs aren’t coming back. And my question has always been, why not? We were able to send them overseas. Why can’t we bring them back? So there’s only one direction that planes and boats and stuff go. The only out there’s only an X, an off ramp. There’s no on ramps. So I think that yeah, that that message of bringing manufacturing back, it was a nonstarter until the pandemic and we started saying a holy crow. You mean to tell me that we can’t produce this stuff that we need now? I mean, the fact that there’s like only one I mean, not to get to crude here, but there’s only one company or a couple of companies that make toilet paper. I think there was the first thing that we found, right? It was the toilet paper that people freaked out about in the early days of the pandemic because there’s only one, one or two places that make it in this country. And, you know, you know, people want their heart medication, people want their antibiotics, but people want their toilet paper. So anyway, let’s I know I’ve called you on a day that you weren’t expecting, and I don’t want to take up too too much of your time. I do want to address a couple of things that you have in your press release that I, I, you know, I can see that they’re going to appeal to people, but I kind of want to just run these by you. You’re saying that we have reckless, open border policies. Explain that.
Dean Martilli: Oh, my gosh. That’s the world’s worst thing ever. We’re we’re really breaking the law and letting we’re not only are we breaking the law, but as working in Washington and working with Senator Kennedy’s office over a number of years in immigration issues, it was a procedure that people had to go through so many steps to get in here and that sometimes it was a little bit cumbersome. But you know what? When people went through the proper channels, they respected this country. They, they they they had to show up at certain times. They had to produce documents. They have to give reasons. They had to wait. And so it meant a lot to all these people that came into our country. They wanted to be citizens of the United States. They want to be proud of the flag. And now we make it like the K-Mart or the Walmart. You just come in, you go down aisle three and you just hop on board. You’re in here. You don’t even know who the people are coming. The government’s doing it right now.
Top Left Corner: Okay? So I get I get before we get too deep into this, what changes in in nationalization in you know, in the in the citizenship process have taken place?
Dean Martilli: What changes?
Top Left Corner: I mean, they still have to go to classes. They still have to go through background checks. They still have to go through the health checks.
Dean Martilli: They’re not doing anything.
Top Left Corner: Yeah, I’m actually.
Dean Martilli: Doing the thing.
Top Left Corner: Actually, my son is actually my son is witnessing a a citizenship granting process today on a field trip of people who had to go through that entire process. And this has been a years long wait for them. They’ve had to go to classes, they’ve had to show up at meetings. They’ve had to prove all sorts of things. I mean, it has taken them years to get to this point. And they are proud they will be you know, they have passed their tests, which most Americans can’t pass, By the way, most people who just were born here went through the American public school systems cannot pass the citizenship test. So those people who do end up being naturalized citizens actually have a better grasp of how this country works than most of people who are born here. So I’m going to push back on that. But further, Joe Biden not only is not. A big fan of open borders, but he won’t even obey the law, which explicitly allows refugees to ask for asylum. The law says that that they can ask for asylum at US borders, even if it says whosoever arrives in United States, whether or not at a designated port of arrival, irrespective of legal status, may apply for asylum. Joe Biden says no. Joe Biden is using Title 42, which is basically it’s the Trump policy to immediately deport as many asylum seekers and border crossers as he can. Trump’s rate was about 62,000 per month of deportations. Biden’s rate so far is over 100,000 a month. So I’m not I’m not seeing I’m not seeing that we have open borders. In fact, Joe Biden is kicking out more people who cross than Trump did.
Dean Martilli: So where’s your where’s your how many people are your son witnessing taking this oath?
Top Left Corner: I don’t know how many. I know that there’s a group of them.
Dean Martilli: Okay. Where are those people that came through the border? Southern border.
Top Left Corner: I can I don’t know the specifics of the families that we’re talking about. I’m guessing probably some of them maybe some of them came from Asia. Maybe some of them came from Europe. I don’t know.
Dean Martilli: Jason. We’re talking about a very important area. You can’t guess. So my point is it’s not happening.
Top Left Corner: No, no, no, no. I said that they have they have to go through the same process that they always have.
Dean Martilli: Right. And I don’t think those people are the ones that are coming through the southern border because the rate we already the federal numbers for illegals, I’m calling them illegals because I don’t believe they’re coming in with all we don’t even have paperwork on these people. Let’s face it, we’re flying them. I can go on and on. But last year, 2 million plus came through the border. Whether and that’s not counting the guy aways this year here. We’ve already reached 2 million and we’re not done with the year. So in two years of Biden, that’s 4 million that we know of, not including the guy. Two ways that probably add another million. But after you go through three years, we will have let in the entire population of the state of Massachusetts and into this country. We don’t even know where they are now. I have been trying for a couple of days now, and I’m calling the governor’s office today because I want to know where the migrants that went on to Martha’s Vineyard, where they all ended up. I hear there was 50 some reports say they’re 49. I don’t know where they were. They final resting places, but they were put on the cape. They were in a military installation. They’re all gone now. Where did they go? And I think we deserve the right to know that. And I’m I’d like to know if a portion of them, all of them, if they’re in Massachusetts still or they’re somewhere else.
Dean Martilli: So it’s a big problem. And not only with individuals, it’s a big problem with drugs. And in your area, the people dying of fentanyl and drug overdoses is the highest it’s been forever. And I want to say that last year there were 62 reported in in the Pittsfield North Adams area, individuals that died from drug. We’ve already surpassed that. We’ll have to wait and see what the numbers come out. There’s no good reason that we’re allowing this much drugs to infiltrate into our country, killing our own citizens. And I think you’ll recall it was 107,000 drug overdoses died last year in the United States. We’re going to we’re going to really surpass that number. Isn’t that a great number to be proud of? But we also have human trafficking, prostitution. We’ve got the drug cartels in Mexico making millions of dollars every day. And and it’s it’s all uncalled for. It’s the current administration allowing this to happen. And so not only the value of the people that are coming in, like your sons probably witnessing, doing things the right way, It’s it’s giving a message that the leadership in Washington does not care about the working individual, don’t care about you. So we’re going to do what we want. We’re going to allow it to happen. And through that, the rise in crime, That’s another area that I almost forgot.
Top Left Corner: Well, let’s hang on. I don’t I don’t want I don’t want to leave this this area just yet if if you don’t mind. So it is true that 2021 saw the highest the Border Patrol calls them encounters. They recorded one 1.6 million encounters at the southern border, which is the highest level that they’ve seen. This is true. It it is a slightly more than the looks like 1998 or 1999 level. It dropped precipitously from throughout the early 2000 and the 2000 teens. And it shot up pretty much just in 2020 and 2021. So, yeah, certainly there’s been quite a few more than we’re used to seeing. However, this does not change the fact that Biden is also deporting more than any president, even more than Obama, who is called the deporter in chief. So I mean, I think that it is not that we have.
Dean Martilli: Jason he’s supporting more because it’s welcome wagon to come in and.
Top Left Corner: People it doesn’t make any sense that doesn’t make any sense why would he why would he have a welcome wagon only to deport them unless he owns the unless he owns the the trucks that ship him out of here.
Dean Martilli: His deportation numbers are minuscule compared to what’s going on. Maybe he’s just doing it. So it looks like you’re talking about it on a podcast or something. You know, it’s not. The fact of the matter is that people are coming in here and it’s crazy. And you’re. Will you also agree that he’s flown people and bus people during the early hours of the morning to locations that governors, mayors were not even told that they were arriving? Will you agree with that?
Top Left Corner: That’s that does seem to be the case. I’m not going to I’m not going to dispute that. I don’t know, you know, of the percentage of of these people who are coming in, how many were talking about whether or not this is a really significant proportion or not? I’m sure that the optics are pretty bad on that. I wouldn’t have done it. You wouldn’t have done it that way if you wanted to put, you know, undocumented immigrants into Maine or wherever, you would probably contact the governor and say, hey, you know, you’ve got some space at this military base. We need to put these people somewhere. Can we do that? That that’s, I think what any sensible person wouldn’t do. This is the Biden administration. So they’re not sensible. I’m not going to dispute that. So let me ask this one question that you’re going to get toward. You mentioned something about jobs. I have a friend who owns a an an orchard and he makes he makes cider. It’s hard cider. He’s got about 250 acres of apples. He’s paying I think he’s paying 12 bucks an hour this year in Massachusetts. You don’t even have to pay minimum wage for agricultural workers.
Top Left Corner: But he pays. He pays 12, 13 bucks an hour and he can’t find people. To take those jobs. He just cannot find people to pick apples. It’s pleasant, it’s lovely, it’s great. It’s outdoors. It’s the only picks when it’s sunny, it’s warm, It’s you know, it’s a great way to pick up some money. He can’t ever find anybody. He’ll even he’ll even transport you. He said, if you need a ride, I’ll come and get you. He cannot find Massachusetts, you know, people in his area. To come and and do agricultural work. It’s beneath it’s beneath us as Americans to do agricultural work. How are we going to solve that problem? Because, you know, we have America has enjoyed cheap produce prices forever since probably the Braceros program of the 1940s fifties. But there’s no way we can get Americans to pick produce at whatever whatever crap wages we pay these days. How are we going to solve that problem if we don’t have migrants? I’m not saying it’s right. I’m not saying it’s wrong, but it is a problem. How would we how would we feed this country if it weren’t for these extremely shamefully paid people?
Dean Martilli: Well, the way it’s going now, you probably won’t have to worry about that with China and Bill Gates buying up all of the farm and agricultural land. So we’ll we’ll be speaking Mandarin and eating it with chopsticks in a little while. But to get back more serious, I don’t know your friend. I don’t know the operation over there. I think that people are out of the work in I mean, a lot of younger people are out of the work rhythm that built this country up to be great. What it was and it’s been tearing apart. And that that was the tremendous part of giveaways to have people sit at home and really not produce and feel good about themselves, but get drug addicted and lose everything because that we’re paying you to do that. So the work ethic has changed. I agree. We’ve got to get that back. It’s got to be you’ve got to be instilled in school that’s proud to be an American. And it’s not a bad thing whether you’re black, white, green or yellow. And the other thing is I think people are looking for jobs that if their outlook and that have good benefits, health care, which is through the roof and retirement 401. And everything else, which is another thing when you look at the Biden administration, people’s retirement or the seniors that are out there are losing money all the time on their investments. They’re going down the tubes. So I don’t know exactly what the answer is total, but I do know we need to change the schools.
Dean Martilli: We need to teach a curriculum. The people are proud to be here and they’re proud to be an American. We have to change the work ethic. You take pride in your work and that’s when this when this area, especially the first District, was robust and manufacturing and we’re building all kinds of things. They were built well. They were built with people working. We’d have three shifts going in factories. You had neighborhood bars open all hours of the night when the shift changed and people were close. You had tenement houses where families lived and family unity was a closeness. We’ve gotten away from all of that, and we’ve gotten away from good work in the United States. And that’s what I’m saying. We have to invest in the future through the school system. Forget about gender equity for people in or kids in first and second grade. It means nothing woke agendas and teaching them that this country is awful and that we have slavery and everything else. So, I mean, I got to just say that Nancy Pelosi’s depiction of the Venezuelan migrants that were in Martha’s Vineyard where we we need them to do the same thing, pick crops and everything else. That, to me is like a form of slavery and it’s really degrading. And for the speaker of the House to even make a comment like that is that she even understand what’s going on. I don’t think so.
Top Left Corner: I don’t think she does either. I mean, she’s the one who’s got the, you know, $25,000 refrigerator that’s stocked with gourmet ice cream. I mean, you know, I’m not saying that Pelosi has the answer, but I am saying that the question does need to be asked if we are to maintain and you are correct, is way too much agricultural land being being bought up by not just China, but even even even places like Great Britain, Companies are buying up American farmland, which is, I think, something that we need to focus on. But, you know, we’ve got to keep I mean, it’s foolishness. It is foolishness to sell your country.
Dean Martilli: Yeah.
Top Left Corner: And from the from the from the gut, from the inside out, I mean, from the center outward. That’s that’s insanity. You don’t you don’t let your country get owned by so much foreign investment. No.
Dean Martilli: And let me just say that the families and the people that work on farming it, they’re hardworking. They’re the the they’re the people that made this country great. They’re ours, that they work in the profit that they make, and the things that they do should be appreciated. And we’re we’re totally turning our back on them. We’re we’re more interested in funding a war in Ukraine that we let get out of hand than helping our farmers, helping the food supply. We had baby formula for I’ll call them the illegals, but we didn’t have it on the shelves in the United States and we didn’t see that coming. People aren’t doing their job in Washington. You got to be proactive. You got to look at what’s coming around and you’ve got to make serious decisions before things happen. You know, the fact that we let that get out of control and we blame everything, the two big blame you can. Blame Russia. Everything. We hear that for years and years and years are we can still blame Trump. He’s he’s still in the blame game. No, it’s decisions that need to be made. And you’re in charge. You make a decision and you move forward. And if you have the best interests segueing back to what I mentioned in the beginning, the most important people that you represent are the ones that elected you to go there. And if this president didn’t isn’t supporting the people, then move out of the way. And the same thing. What Rich Neil, he’s not doing his best to support the people that sent them there. He’s running from me since we have a news station here that wants to do a debate since September 30th and they can’t pin Richie Neal down. He doesn’t want to talk about, hey.
Top Left Corner: He ran, he hid, he ran away and hid from a bunch of school age school kids who wanted to ask him about the environment. So, I mean, if he can’t even talk to eight year olds, I doubt he’s going to talk to you. But I do want to push back on the the the the infant formula for illegals. You know, the law requires that if we have people detained, we have to we have to feed them. You cannot put people in cages and starve them to death. So the detained the detained infants were the ones who got the baby formula. And if you’re going not going to if you’re not going to feed them, then either turn them loose or put them on a plane and send them back somewhere. You just can’t deny that. You can’t just you can’t just deny them food. Yeah. I mean, you know. Yeah. So you did you did want to talk a little bit about the police. You talked about the crime getting out of hand. I’ve got a couple of points to make, but what what do you think Congress can do to Because we do have a the overall trend in crime has been down, but the trend in violent crime has been up lately, especially in in this district. So what can Congress do to to address that increase?
Dean Martilli: Well, first of all, the people listening to your segment here, Jason, what they can do is, is vote people in. They’re going to represent their best interests in Congress. I’d be one of them. And then the other thing is, we have watched since the the George Floyd operation that that poor individual was killed in a situation not that he he was should be canonized in sainthood. He had a pretty sketchy background, but nonetheless, that thing took off. And we watched the COVID keep people home and people couldn’t miss watching on television or reading the newspapers of the violence that was going on in our country. So, number one, we let violence out of control. We have Vas all over this country sponsored by groups that don’t want they don’t want control of law enforcement. And I’m talking about George Soros. So let me say this. All of those all of that funding that’s coming from organizations like George Soros that are supporting people to get in office, whether they’re judges or attorneys, district attorneys, to go in there and let things go crazy. We have to eliminate the supply chain to feed money into these candidates that are going to allow mayhem to happen on our streets. So then why.
Top Left Corner: Does George wait? What Where does George Soros want? Chaos and mayhem on the streets.
Dean Martilli: He’s been doing it for years. But I wise words. What good does that do? He doesn’t because he doesn’t like the US Constitution and he doesn’t like our country. I mean, it’s clearly. Why else would you do that? And time and time again, you can you can name people all over the country. But anyway, so then the current administration allows the defunding of police that the police are the problem and we have to take police off the streets. We watch riots where people burn down federal buildings, police stations, torched police cars. And this is like prime TV. And isn’t this great that all this craziness is going on? People are getting killed? I think we lost something like 32 individuals that are just killed in these these riots that we allowed. And we make it like there’s a big undertaking to take over the country. We watched pallets of bricks being put out so rioters could throw these at people, throw them at police, break windows and everything else. Then we reduce our laws. We make it more difficult on police to apprehend people or put them away. They’re out on no cash bails and things like this. So we create a situation where the police are the enemy and that that’s definitely not the case. I support the police. I think we should spend more money on police. Okay. What would you what would you say education.
Top Left Corner: How would you respond to the fact that Biden just put out the Save America plan, which allocates $13 billion to hire 100,000 police officers around the country over the next five years, which would be to 2000 per state.
Dean Martilli: Been in office almost two years, and he’s downgraded police today. If you look at the news, five police officers were shot serving warrants, five today.
Top Left Corner: Right today. But how is that how is that how is that how is that?
Dean Martilli: Biden said.
Top Left Corner: But how is that Biden’s fault?
Dean Martilli: It’s made the police the enemy and that’s got to get turned around the police.
Top Left Corner: What what has the Biden administration done specifically to make the police the enemy?
Dean Martilli: I was just explaining to you about the riots.
Top Left Corner: But how has Biden how has the Biden administration encouraged that? And I ask this because Biden in the 1990s, Biden was the architect of the Three Strikes You’re Out program. He was the architect of welfare, almost the destruction of the welfare system. He has never been anything but a solidly law and order guy. And with this $13 Billion and 100,000 police officers he’s really that’s pretty much his game. I mean he’s he’s never varied on that. I don’t see I don’t see anything he’s ever done that that he weakened any any police anywhere.
Dean Martilli: So what is he do? All right. Let’s go back let’s go back to square one. When the COVID lockdown happened and George Floyd was killed, did you see a lot of crime on television?
Top Left Corner: I saw a lot of civil disobedience which got out of hand. I saw building some buildings burned. Yeah, I saw police department burnt. I think that that is a really complex situation because most of these these occurrences were in places that had a history of unexplained police involved shootings and neighborhoods that were tired of being overpoliced. And I think that, you know, that’s that’s such an in-depth topic. I just want to stick to the things that we have numbers for. I mean, I mean, we have numbers for a lot of things. Would you would you you’ve heard of the Cato Institute, right?
Dean Martilli: Well, I’m going to just go on record right now. I support the police and I believe that the police have been downgraded by this administration. And what the administration, if they’re doing anything and I didn’t see any legislation passed yet on the police force. What they’re doing is they’re backtracking because all they do is lie to you. And the administration allowed all of this to go on. And again, five officers in two different cities were shot today, just today, because there’s no respect for the police department and the administration allowed it to get out of hand. So if you’re listening to this right now, Dean Martilli is pro-police and I will defend the police when I go to Washington and the current congressman doesn’t care.
Top Left Corner: Yeah, I don’t know. I don’t know if if Richie Neil does care personally, I just know that there has been a lot of find.
Dean Martilli: And if you can find them, ask him.
Top Left Corner: Well, I know that there’s been a lot of this backlash against this alleged defund the police movement, but the Cato Institute, which is in no way a liberal snowflake organization, they are about as conservative and libertarian as you can get. They have a report that says practically since the first week in office, this is a quote, President Joe Biden has faced repeated criticisms from Republicans and some Democrats. Oh, wait, no, no, no. Sorry, Not the Cato Institute. This is Bloomberg News. While a few major cities like New York and Los Angeles have made large, high profile cuts, more than half the cities in this country increased spending or kept it unchanged as a percentage of their discretionary spending based on a CityLab analysis of 34 of the largest 50 US cities. Police budgets, along with total spending, have been an upward on an upward trajectory for the last decade. Take Boston, which spent 315.8 million on police in 2012. In 2017, the city’s general fund spent 375.5. So that’s up $60 Million. And by fiscal 2020, this city spending was 414 million. So it’s not basically there’s just there has not been. Nothing has been defunded, pretty much. There are some cities such as Oakland, California, where the council voted to cut the department’s total budget by $14 million and allocate that toward other civilian departments, such as they’ve piloted a new mental health related 911 call and social work to deal with things that the police themselves say they don’t want to deal with.
Top Left Corner: So in many of the cities where there was any any cut whatsoever, they are taking away responsibilities that the police themselves say they don’t want to be dealing with psychotics or, you know, people who have, you know, are having episodes. So they’re taking them. You don’t want to deal with that. We’re going to give it to somebody else. There’s just really hasn’t been any evidence that defund the police defunded anything. So, I mean, I’m just looking at the numbers, not from some, you know, progressive liberal think tank, but from pretty conservative sources that say, yeah, it didn’t happen. Whether or not the police are respected, that’s a big question. I think their reputation has suffered a lot with the rise of cell phones and cell phone cameras where people are recording police either killing or beating people. I think that that probably would do more good if they stop beating and killing people rather than just make arrests. That would probably increase respect for the police departments a lot more than just giving them money. So that’s just that’s a thought there. I mean, you know, these are the numbers. It’s not it’s not a squishy feeling.
Dean Martilli: Again, we weren’t prepared to do this today. You call me a day early. I was gracious enough to host you. I don’t have I don’t know the questions you were going to ask me. I don’t have numbers in front of me, but I’m going to tell you, the police forces have been defunded throughout this country. The squad congresswomen have been out front against police departments sending saying that social workers could go to answer clouds. But I’m going to tell you what happened to me just today. Quarter seven, I’m out dropping my cleaning off to where I go on Riverdale Street here in West Springfield, Mass. And the woman that’s always there had the door locked and she was standing behind it. And when I went to go to the door, she came out and she said, Did you see a guy here when when you came? And I go, No, no. She goes, Maybe he might be behind the building. So I went and I walked through and there wasn’t. And I said, What happened? She goes, Oh, a guy was trying to get in here. He startled me and I don’t. And she’s in there by herself. The other two businesses don’t open until 8:00, and she was afraid for her life. So who’s she in the car with? The social worker.
Dean Martilli: But I’m saying that this stuff is getting prevalent all over the place and where her or her business is is right in an area that the state dumps a lot of the illegals and people on welfare and everything else. Times are getting tougher, money is getting more difficult and this woman’s vulnerable. Being in her cleaners by herself with that hour of the morning with a purse, money, car keys or car out front. So all I’m saying is crime. Crime is on the rise. People need police. Police should be taken in reverence to keep law and order in this country. It’s not happening. You can tell me any numbers you want. It’s it’s a sad day when we break down the police and what’s happening in the country. We’re breaking down the family, we’re breaking down religion, we’re breaking down the police law and order. And we’re we’re getting in bed with China because they’re buying us out. It’s a recipe for disaster. It’s communism on the way. The current administration is a totalitarian, totalitarian form of government with all these presidential mandates. It’s not going through the proper channels. People are elected to Congress. They should be looking out for the people and their district. It’s not happening. And so that’s it in a nutshell right there.
Top Left Corner: Well, you have been gracious and I and I do thank you for taking this phone call today. I have only asked. I have only asked about things that you mentioned in your press release dated October 6th. So I anything that I asked a question about was part of your platform. So there shouldn’t be any any question that’s related to that that you don’t have an answer for and you did answer them. And I think a lot of people are going to they’re going to like I said, it’s going to resonate with a lot of people. So I will give you the last word. You are going up against Richie Neal, if you want to take this last couple of minutes and just say why it is that you think that you deserve people’s vote above Richie Neal, I’ll just take it away.
Dean Martilli: Richie Neal’s been in office for 32 years, and he is a follower. He is not doing anything proactive to take care of the people that are in the First District. Dean Markley will represent the people in the First District. I will bring good jobs, manufacturing bent on getting pharmaceuticals made in our district. I think it’s an easy transition when we have the largest biotech industry out east in the in Massachusetts. I’m for energy independence for the southern border being closed through a four strong military. Peace through strength. I do not favor government, government medical mandates where their people are losing jobs because they don’t get the job. On on a vaccine, you can’t even call it that because it didn’t go through the proper channels. People shouldn’t lose their jobs for that. For strong policing, support the police. I support the Second Amendment. So and I’m a pro-life candidate. So my my position is totally in opposition to Congressman Neal. I’ve been waiting to debate him on the issues He has refused to debate because he knows that the policies that he, Nancy Pelosi and President Biden, are enforcing are leading to the demise of this country. And I won’t stand for that. I’ll support you. I’ve worked in Washington and I would appreciate your your vote. We’ve got mail in voting coming up this week. And the the election is on the eighth of next month, November. And I would appreciate if you’d vote for Dean Martilli and that’s voting for yourself. Thank you very much.
Top Left Corner: Well, I’ll tell you, I’ve never been able to get Richie Neal to respond to a single email of mine either. So if you can get him on that stage, I think people would pay would pay to see that. I’d like to see that, that’s for sure.
Dean Martilli: I wish maybe we got to put it in one of those those fight cages. You know, just.
Top Left Corner: I would love to see that. I would love to see that. And anything, you know, we’ll get an announcer the whole the whole jab, the whole thing there. So I wish every candidate good luck and I wish you good luck. And if you do get elected, we will all, I’m sure, be hoping that you are successful and bringing jobs back not just to this country, but to Massachusetts and in the Northeast as a whole. And we hope that you have a great autumn 2022. We look forward to talking to you again. Thank you, Mr. Martilli.
Dean Martilli: Jason, thank you very much. It’s a pleasure to be with you. Thanks.
