In this freewheeling conversation, Gianno talks with his friend and Fox News colleague Lisa Boothe. Lisa is a popular political journalist and commentator, and senior fellow for Independent Women’s Voice, a political advocacy organization. She was also the founder and president of High Noon Strategies, a boutique political communications and PR firm.
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Transcript:
Gianno: Welcome back to OutLoud with Gianno Caldwell. I have a great show for you today. My guest today is my friend, my colleague, and someone you may know very well: her name is Lisa Boothe. She is a prominent journalist, political analyst, and commentator. Lisa is currently a Fox News contributor and Senior Fellow for the Independent Women’s Voice, an organization that fights for women by expanding support for policy solutions that aren’t just well intentioned but actually enhance people’s freedom, opportunities, and well-being. Lisa also founded High Noon Strategies, a boutique political, communications, and PR firm and previously served as its president. Before, she spent years working on Capitol Hill and for political campaigns. Let’s go!
Gianno: Lisa Boothe, thank you for joining OutLoud with Gianno Caldwell. It is such a pleasure to have a friend, a colleague, someone who I call on the phone and say, “Hey what do you think about this?” It’s such a pleasure and honor to be on with you. How are you doing today?
Lisa: Hey my friend, it’s great to be on with you too. Also, admittedly for those listening, it did take me about fifteen minutes to get everything situated for the podcast.
Gianno: You mean about twenty-five? Don’t try to lower the count!
Lisa: I feel like some of your older guests might have been able to figure it out earlier, so I’m a little embarrassed by that.
Gianno: We’ll find out if you’re a millennial or not. We want to see the birth certificate.
Lisa: Fine, fine, I’ll share it. Full transparency. Now that we’ve got that out of the way…
Gianno: Right, right, now that we’re fully on, I want to start with the coronavirus, and I know you’ve been posting a lot about this on Twitter. And everyone should be following you on Twitter, it’s pretty dynamic, and you tweet at least every five seconds.
Lisa: It’s just when I get mad, which happens to a lot these days.
Gianno: Well, I guess twenty times a day, Lisa is mad, but a lot of people are in the same boat. Millions of Americans just celebrated Thanksgiving last week, and they did it without their families in a lot of cases because of COVID-19. Some cities and states are reimposing certain lockdown measures as the cases have increased, which brings me to something you recently tweeted, since we were talking about your Twitter. It really caught my eye. You wrote, “As much as this year has sucked, it has forced a reprioritization of the things that actually matter in life. Before I got so caught up in the busy day to day, I was focused on things that weren’t actually fulfilling.” That really struck me. Can you elaborate on what you meant, and to the extent of what you were thinking with politics?
Lisa: So here’s the thing: I think with COVID, and I’m sure you feel similarly, in our day to day lives, especially when you’re living in cities like New York, its go go go. You’re going to the office, you’re meeting with friends, you’re going to happy hour, you’re doing this and that, and you’re just so busy. I think a lot of the time when you’re that busy, you don’t have time for stillness and self-reflection and figuring out what you actually want for your life. Are you at the place in your life where you truly want to be? With COVID, it’s forced stillness in a way, at least for me, that I haven’t had in quite some time. It’s always been go go go, busy busy buy, and not really taking a moment to stop and look at my life. I think with the coronavirus, I mean I went home to my parents’ house for like three months, which I thought I was escaping shutdowns by leaving New York, but Virginia also shut down, so joke’s on me. But it was nice to spend that time at home, and it was also time to really just sit back and take in my life and think about what do I really want? Have I been doing things right? Have I made the right decisions? I think that it’s healthy, and I think it led to some productive things and changes that I’ve been making for the better. Changes that I don’t think would have happened if I hadn’t had had that time for stillness.
Gianno: Has it brought you closer to God?
Lisa: It actually has, and it’s brought me closer to my family as well, particularly my parents. I mean look, I’m 35, the last time I spent that much time at home was probably before college, when I was in high school. So, just being able to spend that time at home also made me realize, and this is probably getting really real, but even just wanting a family, wanting to get married, wanting these things that I didn’t necessarily give as much time and thought to pre-COVID because you’re so busy living your day to day. Look, work is important, and we’re both strivers, we’re both people who really want success and want to work hard to achieve your goals, and those are still things I want in my life, but I think I put so much emphasis on the work front and what I wanted from that, that I let my personal life and the things that would bring more fulfillment subside and not pay as much attention to them. That’s one of the big things that I’ve recognized for myself. So, not a lack of desire, I really want to still be successful.
Gianno: And you are successful. To me, success is a day-to-day thing, and I think your point is so salient, especially when it comes to me, is I’ve been thinking about marriage and family a lot, and I’m two years younger than you, I’m 33. But still, I don’t want to an old dad, and I have a friend who got married a couple of years ago, and he will be the guy who’s older, around 50 years old who’s picking up his kids from pre-K. And I was like I don’t want to have that for my life, I want to be somewhat young. So, I get what you’re saying, and I think there’s millions of Americans that are thinking the same thing. There’s a lot of people getting married during COVID, so that’s an interesting perspective that I think a lot of people can agree with. Speaking of New York, since you mentioned and I know you’ve been living there quite a while, the Supreme Court just recently barred New York’s restrictions on the number of people who can attend religious services and houses of worship. Governor Cuomo has imposed no capacity restrictions on certain businesses such as liquor stores, bicycles repair shops, and a lot of other things, but churches and synagogues are the ones where somehow you have to watch those folks going to religious ceremonies. “We may not know what’ll happen with COVID, but keep the liquor stores open, we’re good with that.” What do you think of that?
Lisa: Well, it’s tyranny. It’s tyranny because you look at the unequal application of the 1st Amendment. So, you look at the fact that you’ve got people like Bill de Blasio– no problem with thousands of people going out in the streets to riot, set cop cars on fire to try to cause harm the city which will really just harm the people they supposedly care about. So, there’s no problem with that, that’s totally cool, go out in masses, no masks, be around people, or go celebrate after the election! That’s totally fine as well, but if you want to go worship, if you want to practice your religion, practice that element of the 1st Amendment? No dice. That’s not welcome in the city of New York. It just goes to show what hypocrites these people are. It’s just so much. You look at people like Nancy Pelosi going to get her hair done when other people can’t and businesses can’t be open and people can’t earn a living. Same thing with Lori Lightfoot going out during the pandemic early on to get her hair done. She said it was because she’s a public face. How many people are running successful businesses or doing their jobs and having to be on Zoom calls also caring about their appearance? But somehow Lori Lightfoot is better than them and entitled to that when the rest of her citizens aren’t? People at barber shops and salons are struggling to survive, but no, it doesn’t matter, you can open for me to get my hair done, but if you want to try to make a living and put food on the table for your family, no. Even look at the mayor of Denver, tweeting ‘You get to stay home, do Zoom calls online for Thanksgiving, don’t travel’ then he goes on and gets on a flight. These people don’t believe any of the things that they’re pushing. They don’t believe their own guidelines. Gavin Newsom going out to French Laundry with a bunch of people, when meanwhile in LA their shutting down outdoor dining? It’s all garbage, they don’t even believe the science in their own guidelines.
Gianno: Yeah, you’re 100% correct about that. And I’ll tell you, being a person who’s lived in LA since 2017, two months into the LA shutdown, I just couldn’t do it anymore and I decided, it was a Wednesday night at 11 p.m., and I’ll be honest for the audience, I was watching Bad Boys 3. I said, “Hm it would be interesting to live in Miami.” By the following Wednesday, I was on a plane to Miami, looking for places, and by the next Friday, I was actually moving in to the Intercontinental Miami while I was waiting to get approved for the place I’m in now. I know that you have talked about on social media, and you and I have talked about it personally, about how upset you are about the tyranny that’s going on in New York. It may bring about a change in terms of where you’re living, is that right?
Lisa: Yeah, I mean we’re actually going to be neighbors. So, during the pandemic, early on I spent two weeks in Florida and it was free.
Gianno: It was free? Like the trip was free?
Lisa: Oh no, I wish. Like it was open. I would have loved that though. It was freedom, right? It just was a completely different mentality of approaching the virus than what I was experiencing in Virginia when I was staying at my parents and also when I went back to New York and what I was experiencing here the past few months. It’s just a completely different mentality. So, I thought to myself, I am tired of living in a place like New York City where its tyranny. There’s an uneven application of the regulations and the rules, and a lot of times things that aren’t even scientifically sound. Also, what I mentioned before with the stillness aspect, a city like New York is go go go, so when you don’t have those things, all the restaurants, the plays, going out at night, all these things to keep you busy, you sort of stop and take in the city. And you’re like “This city sucks.” It’s gross, it smells like pee, there’s trash everywhere, giant rats taking over the city, people shooting up drugs, walking around naked. You have people wanting to do harm to the city, as well as the riots we’ve seen and looting. You’re just like why am I here? You pay so much money for rent, taxes are enormous, and you’re not getting anything from it. So, I said I’m done with this, I’m moving to a place where there’s freedom and a place that has a mentality that’s closer to the one I believe, which is freedom and anti-tyrannical government that we’re seeing right now in so many cities like New York. I’m escaping and I’m so excited and ready to get out of here to be honest.
Gianno: I look forward to you being here. I’m looking for good neighbors so I’m excited we’ll be able to hang out. It’s going to be awesome. America is deeply polarized and politically divided, and I think that some would rightly argue that the country has never been more divided. Is it possible to unify and bridge this gap? I know that’s a tough question. Do you think that’s possible?
Lisa: Well, I think we probably actually always have been divided to some degree, right? We used to have way back in the day they would beat each other up. I think there’s always been divide in the country. I think a lot of it is more focused and more on the forefront because of social media, so that brings more attention to it and we see it in real time, like seeing people fight on Twitter. Whereas maybe that stuff was behind the scenes before social media brought it to the forefront. I think it’s always been like that, but I do have a concern that there’s less things that unite us. Like now, standing for the flag is political, and everything has become political which has created this toxic environment, which has led to further division in a sense. You look at it and the NFL is political, the NBA is political, corporations are now taking political stances. Every award show you watch is political and commercials are now too. Literally everything has become political, and that creates a lot of toxicity. I think the way to actually create more unification and allow people to take breather and take a break from it is I don’t think any of these companies should take political stances. I mean Twitter is entirely political now. I think that’s the source of poison in the country from my perspective to be honest.
Gianno: I completely agree Lisa. It seems like to me that with mainstream media, and we can throw in Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and what we saw this past election is that social media companies are looking to collude with the Democrats to ensure there was a Biden win. That was their aim and goal. They’ve been working this goal and aim for years now. I think we saw at the 2016 election that people were reporting to Google that they should have done more to try to see that Donald Trump would lose the election. It seems like for a lot of Americans when we’re in a divided society like this, conservatives have felt under attack for many, many years and it just hadn’t been necessarily seen. That’s why Fox News is such a popular network, because it was the only one that wasn’t a part of the main stream crowd, so conservatives at least had a corner to go in to and hear things they agreed with. So, now to me, it seems like the country, I don’t know how we’re going to unify beyond this moment because Democrats have helped divide the country. Mainstream media has helped divide the country. They can’t go out and say “Hey, now that the election is semi-over, we need to come together.” No, they’re part of the poison pill as you just stated Lisa. What we need to do is talk some truth and facts and I’m not hearing a lot of truth coming from the mainstream media. They’ve been a part of this toxic culture.
Lisa: Well, it’s hilarious because you’ve got all these people who basically for the entirety of the Trump administration saying that everyone who supports Trump is racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, which none of these things are true. They’re labeling Trump supporters with all these horrific terms, and now they’re like oh we need to unify. Like screw you, I don’t want to unify with you. You literally called us all these names, what I want to do is go out in 2022 and defeat you and then go out in 2024 and defeat you again. Your policies are toxic and you’re part of the problem, so no I don’t want to unite with you. I think it’s ridiculous to even ask that, and it is so arrogant. If you look at why these social media companies work so hard to defeat Donald Trump, the reason is, he was successful in utilizing them in 2016. I remember one of the Facebook execs, I can’t remember his name of the top of my head, but he came out and said that basically the Trump campaign had used Facebook campaigns and they campaigns they ran were better than any other one on the site he had seen. They were wildly successful in helping him win the White House. So, that’s why after that moment, after the 2016 election, we’ve seen this turnabout, particularly from the left, of trying to get Twitter to shut down the Trump campaign and trying to push for this censorship. It’s to stop him from utilizing those tools successfully, and they were able to do that in great regard because as you mentioned, Twitter is suppressing even the sharing of the Hunter Biden story and even taking conservatives off of Twitter, suspending those accounts. We’re actually in a really, really scary place as a society because if you look at the fact that we’ve had people on the left for years now who dehumanize Trump supporters. It’s the same things that Democrats do on abortion when they call unborn babies clumps of cells. If you dehumanize something, if you make it seem less than, then bad things happen, right? You’re opening the door for the kind of violence we saw against Trump supporters that we saw in the march on Washington D.C. after the election. It got violent at night with Antifa and Black Lives Matter. It opens the door for Democrats to try to put Trump supporters on lists, and all of that continues to go down some really dangerous paths that we should not be going down as a country, particularly when you go back and look at things historically. We’re in a bad place right now.
Gianno: You know what’s interesting to me, you mentioned a list. When I see folks on the left, what they do to not just Trump supporters but conservatives in general, the way they attack, the things they say on mainstream media and the MSNBCs and CNNs of the world. The things they say and how it’s just accepted and embraced, and I’m talking about some very negative things like the “basket of deplorables” things that Hillary Clinton said. It’s like if you’re a Trump supporter or voted for conservatives in general, you’re a racist, point blank period. Of course, me growing up on the south side of Chicago, that’s what I was taught from birth. If the person is a Republican, it doesn’t matter the content of the character, any of those things, then they’re legitimately a racist. That is what I was taught, and it took years before I realized the real truth. The interesting part is they continue to push this “We’re about unity, we’re about love, not about discrimination,” but the folks that are supposedly not about discrimination are the ones that discriminate the most. It’s insane! I just don’t understand how they even go out with these mantras in their party. It doesn’t make any sense to me. You guys are none of the things that you say that you are. You’re not about love and unity as you say you are because you say that and then say something evil and sinister in the next moment, so what’s the point?
Lisa: Well, their policies are set that somehow, we’re all inherently born in different places in life. I think the way conservatives view the world is that we’re all the same. We’re all God’s children is the way that I was taught to view life. We’re all just human beings. I think Democrats have a different viewpoint. You look at everything from a racial lens, through a lens of sex, through all these different lenses, of course that’s going to lead to division because you’re seeing people differently and in different lights instead of just as human beings. So, I do agree with you. Their policies and the way they view the world is inherently discriminatory and it’s wrong personally. I think we should work on policy that uplifts all Americans regardless of race or sex. We’re all just human beings, we’re all on the same playing level. Obviously, there are things that really make it hard for people to compete in life when you look at especially income. So certainly someone, regardless of race, if you’re born in to a poor neighborhood, you have less advantages than someone born in to a higher income level. I certainly believe in giving people a hand up in life, particularly from a socio-economic stance, but you’re right, a lot of the ways the left views the world leads to a lot of division. I think Trump was really able to capture that and see that, and I feel like right now in the place we are in society the people who are in charge and the people who have the most power have never been more out of touch with the rest of America. I don’t know if you feel the same way. And Gianno, COVID has made it so much worse because we’ve seen this massive transfer of wealth. Everyone who’s rich has gotten richer and people who are middle class have suffered more. If you have a small business, a lot of those businesses are gone, the people who work for them no longer have jobs. Especially the generational wealth in sense that if you have a family-run business and its under, that means everything your parents worked for is gone, everything your grandparents worked for is gone, and what you’ll leave to your kids is gone. All the policies that we’re seeing from the left are making it worse. When you continue to shut things down and lock down, it’s the middle class, the hard-working Americans that are suffering. All your elite, rich friends on the left are getting richer. It’s really messed up, and we’re going to be dealing with the consequences of this for a long time to come.
Gianno: You’re 100% correct about that. I’ll tell you; I was reading some reporting that said over 450,000 businesses have filed bankruptcy since the start of the pandemic, so I imagine that number has grown tremendously. That brings me to my next topic, which is about the politics of it all. How is the House going to look? We gained a lot of House seats this past election, and we’re hopefully going to be able to win these runoffs in Georgia, which are extraordinarily important. I encourage everyone who is within the sound of my voice, whether you’re conservative or not, if you live in Georgia you should vote Republican and I’ll tell you. You should want to see divided government. You should want to make government compromise and work together for the good of all. You should want to see that, and I think personally that’s good whether Trump is in office or it’s a Joe Biden presidency, whoever is in the presidential seat at the time, you should want to see all sides work together for the good of all Americans, not just one-party rule. I think at the end of the day, that’s the best outcome for things to get done and to force those who we are paying to go work for us not to sit around but actually work for the American people. What do you think the outcome may look like in 2022, 2024, who do you think will be the frontrunner for the presidency?
Lisa: Well, I hope for purposes of the January 5th runoff in Georgia, you have to get out, you have to vote, because Republicans need a check. If Joe Biden is in the White House, if Democrats have the House, which they’re going to have, you need a check in the Senate. The difference that is going to make is being able to prevent people like Bernie Sanders potentially serving in the Cabinet. You’re going to get more moderate Cabinet positions versus some of these crazy progressives. You’re going to get more moderate judges versus liberal judges. If Democrats have the majority in the Senate, they’ve already talked about blowing up the filibuster, if they do that, they can create two extra Senate seats with Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico. They can do things like the Green New Deal. All bets are off at that point. That’s why Republicans need to have a Senate. In 2022, I think you’re going to see an uprising because as we’ve been discussing, the people that are in charge in this country are so wildly out of touch with actual Americans. The funny thing is, the left always tries to pretend that they’re the party of the working class which now is Republicans, but their policies and their shutdown have probably done more to hurt the working class than maybe any other policies in history. They have destroyed the middle class right now during COVID. So, I think what we’re going to see in 2022 is similar to what we saw in 2010 with the Tea Party, similar to what happened with President Trump with populism in 2016 again of this feeling that the people in charge do not represent us. What you’re going to have if its Joe Biden in the White House is someone who’s been there 47 years. What does he know about real America after being in the swamp for 47 years? You’re going to have Nancy Pelosi who’s been in office for a decade and regardless of if its Mitch McConnell or Chuck Schumer, you’re going to have someone there who’s been in office for decades. So, you’re going to have everyone who’s in charge having been in public office for so long that I think it’s impossible to stay in touch with the average American when you’ve been in Washington D.C. and painted by government, which is inherently corrupt, for that long. Credit to Mitch McConnell for getting conservative judges in, but still he’s been there for so long. I think you’re going to have a lot of people just feeling like they’re not represented, and then you’re going to have these corporations that have now gotten and consolidated so much more wealth because of COVID. The economy is going to be hard hit, all of these jobs employing Americans, all these small businesses are going to probably not have survived. You’ll also have the fear from COVID subsided with the coronavirus vaccine. So, we’re going to be left with the dust settling, and a full picture of the carnage from coronavirus, which is going to be essentially largely a lot of economic calamity, as well as children falling further behind in schools. I think there’s just going to be this disenfranchisement and this anger with voters feeling not represented and they’re going to turn out in mass. I think we’ll see a lot of primaries and we’re going to see Republicans taking back the House. I really do think so.
Gianno: Yeah, I agree with that assessment fully, and I think there’s going to be some governorships that go from Democrat to Republican hands and certainly some local races that are going to do the same thing. I think even in cases where Republicans may have been too strict in some of these local areas, if they went the way of the Democrats, I can see them being voted out as well. At the end of the day, it’s about We the People, not We the Political Party. I think at the end of the day for a lot of Americans, they’re just pissed off. They want to live their life like they were before. We can do so safely. What’s it going to do to shut down a bar or a restaurant at 9 or 10 pm? Does that stop COVID? I don’t think so. Are you aware of any science? I could be wrong. Is there any science about it being on break or maybe it takes off for the night?
Lisa: I guess that’s the COVID witching hour or something? But really what I get frustrated with in the coronavirus coverage is you can desire to put the coronavirus in context and provide perspective while still taking it seriously and not wanting anyone you love to get it. The problem with what we’ve seen from the media really from the start, and what they did almost the entirety of the coverage had the same people on saying the same things about the coronavirus. There were a lot of dissenters and distinguished people out there like Dr. Ioannidis of Stanford who is world-renown epidemiologist. He’s debunked more bad research than most people. I think he’s one of the most cited epidemiologists in the country. You had people like Dr. Scott Atlas out there. These are distinguished, intelligent people that were raising different points. What Dr. Ioannidis was saying I believe back in March, what he was talking about is that from his perspective and looking at the data, that the death rate was significantly lower than what was being talked about at the time. We didn’t have a great data set to look at during that time to look at both activity rate and death rate. He was right, and nobody listened to him. Further than that, not only did people not listen to him, but they condemned him, he was called names and ridiculed. If you look at the death rate and where we are today, he was right. It’s probably even lower than we actually think because the CDC is already saying that we were missing cases by tenfold because of how many asymptomatic and mild cases there are. What that would mean is that the death rate is actually lower than what we’re looking at even now. That’s not saying it’s not serious. Of course, you can look at the data and look at the fact that if you’re 70 and older, if you have underlying conditions, then it is scary to get it and you don’t want to get it, so we have to protect those people. You can look at all that context and still take it seriously while providing context and perspective, but that context and perspective has really been lacking in the way it’s been covered.
Gianno: I just think that if there is a Joe Biden as president, and I just want to be clear here for people on one point beyond just COVID. I know people say “Hey Gianno, the election is really over, Trump is going to lose, Biden got 10 million more votes, and all this other stuff,” but here’s the point I want to draw to people. President Trump has not conceded as of the recording of this podcasts. President Trump still has ongoing lawsuits. I believe that you have to respect the process. The electors have to go in and elect whoever the president is going to be and that’s still an ongoing process. So, with respect to the fact that there’s a lot going on, it is not up to me to decide who the president is. It is not up to me or the mainstream media to decide or say who’s president or not. I’d rather there be the lawsuits and we see what happens there before we start saying that President Trump is absolutely out of office and he’s done. I’d rather let the process play out before we make declarations. With that being said, and moving beyond COVID now that we have an idea of predicting what may happen in 2022. Let’s say that in the event that Donald Trump is not president and Joe Biden is sworn in as President of the United States, who do you think would be the likely GOP frontrunner in 2024?
Lisa: I like DeSantis to be honest. I like Ron DeSantis a lot. One, because he’d be my new governor. Two, I like the fact that I think from a policy perspective, he shares a lot of the beliefs and sentiments of President Trump. I also think he’s a fighter in the sense of he faced fierce backlash on the response to coronavirus and the way that Florida as a state was handling it, especially in contrast to states like New York and California, and he did not back down. That’s the path forward for Republicans, because as we’ve noted throughout our conversation, everyone is against. You’ve got most of the media against us, corporations are against us, Twitter has literally tried to rig the election against Donald Trump, the left is against us. The whole deck is stacked against us and the only way you win is with someone who is tough enough to withstand the heat. You have to have a fighter. You can’t have another Romney; you can’t have another George W. Bush. You can’t have someone who backs down, capitulates, and bows down to the left and wants their praise. You have to have someone who’s going to double down and fight.
Gianno: You know, that’s an interesting point. I never thought about Ron DeSantis as a guy I would see running for President, but I think you provided an analysis that a lot of people after listening are going to think and say, “Wow, I’ve never thought about that but maybe you’re right.” He did double down in Florida and he said “I’m removing all COVID-related restrictions, there will be no restrictions. I want to make sure that local businesses stay open and can thrive.” Now, there’s local restrictions in some areas with city councils or county governments, but there’s no restrictions from the state level. I think that does bode well, but you don’t think a guy like Mike Pence may be a good, Christian guy to run who served as governor of Indiana and of course as vice president. You don’t think he would serve as a splendid presidential candidate?
Lisa: I like the vice president a lot. I have an immense amount of respect for him. I think he is such a good man. I think he is smart, and when he was getting so much heat saying that he respects his wife too much to go out and have dinners with female staff. I respect that. I think he’s amazing. I think we’re in a place politically where the left, even though they got what they wanted from the election, they’re still making an enemies list. That’s not enough for them. We’re in a place where we need someone who is fearless and who is a fighter. I also don’t think I will ever vote for someone in a primary who isn’t a business person or a governor. I just don’t think when you’re in the Senate or in Congress, I don’t think you have the tools to govern in the way that you develop as a governor or business person. I think the reason that President Trump was such a successful president was because he really did have an outsider perspective. I mean, you go back and look at that John Kerry clip from 2016 and he said “The only path to peace is through the Palestinians,” and that’s basically the school of thought that all of these people before had about solving the Middle East problem. Then Trump comes in with an entirely different perspective, a business perspective, and has gotten more Arab-Israel deals than we’ve ever had in history done in a single term. Or even using tariffs to get Mexico to step up on illegal immigration, using it to solve that problem, or using sanctions smartly against Iran. Just looking at things from a problem-solving perspective as an outsider who’s done negotiations and business dealings in the past, whereas the reason Joe Biden would be such a bad president is because he’s been in D.C. for 47 years. Every belief, every way he views a problem comes from that toxic, corrupt, government perspective, and also viewing problems in the same failed way that all the politicians before him have viewed them. That’s why when you look at the issues, he’s been wrong on pretty much everything. He’s going to be a terrible president and we’re all going to suffer as a result of it.
Gianno: And I will tell you, Joe Biden has flip-flopped more than Gucci sandals on South Beach my friend, I’ll tell you that. So, as we’re ending this show, you’ve been on here talking the good talk and providing a lot of analysis. What’s next for Lisa Boothe? I know you’ve been working with Fox News Channel, and I know you’re going to be there for a while. But what’s next for Lisa Boothe?
Lisa: Well, I love TV, I just really enjoy it. I used to work in politics, and I love being on the outside and really when you’re speaking for someone, your interest is to represent them and making sure they’re fully represented in the things that you say and do. I love being on the outside of politics and able to speak for myself and just being able to be like 100% like this is what I believe, this is the way I see it. I just love that, and I’m very thankful to be in this position. I’m working on trying to get a podcast going. I would love to have that outlet as well. I’m also working on a couple of other things that I can’t quite talk about yet, but I will let everyone know about them as soon as I can. Just working on some more ways to really be out there. Honestly, it just makes me sad because there’s so much wrong with our country right now, and COVID has really underscored a lot of those things with the way that the people in charge really couldn’t care less about the people they’re representing. I have not heard one person who is advocating for shutdowns who would actually have income be impacted by it.
Gianno: That’s true, that’s so true.
Lisa: Yeah, it makes me mad. There’s just a lot of things that I think are wrong and I’m doing the best I can from what I’m able to do to at least try to talk about them and get conversations going. I can hopefully advocate for people who don’t have the opportunity to at least have a public platform to talk about some of these things. That’s kind of where I am right now.
Gianno: Would you advocate in the form of running for office?
Lisa: No, because I just think Congress is so broken. I think politics are so broken. I worked on Capitol Hill for a number of years, and I worked for some really good people like Sandy Adams, who’s no longer there, and Mark Meadows. I was blessed to work for some really awesome people. It’s just broken and I think people are there for too long and they lose touch with those they’re representing. I think it would frustrate me and I think you can get more done on the outside to be honest. I really think there’s going to be a movement over the next few years of people just really seeing how broken everything is. A lot of people in the media don’t care about them or represent them and don’t have an interest in getting to know them or their concerns. You’re going to have Twitter, Google, and Facebook consolidate even more power under a Biden administration. You’re going to have leaders who acted like they cared about Trump supporters and Trump who turn their backs on them. You’ll have a lot of people I believe who feel like they’re really not represented. So, I’m going to do my best to understand their needs and communicate that in the positions I have and try to listen and not become one of those people who are so out of touch with what’s actually going on in the country.
Gianno: You’re 100% correct about that. I think from my perspective, especially being in very similar positions to you, since you’re my colleague over at Fox. I’m thankful that I have an opportunity to the same because although we have very similar ideology in a way, we have some different perspectives based on the way we grew up. I grew up in a way in which typically doesn’t lead a person to be conservative, but certainly growing up poor and having a mom addicted to drugs I think changes your perspective on life. I also think for me personally, I agree with something you said earlier when you talked about giving people a hand up, especially those who grew up in these very marginalized environments, but I think with God all things are possible and you can supersede anyone who grew up with the highest-level degrees and the best family. A partnership with God will change all that. I talked about that in my last podcasts with Dr. Bill Winton if anyone wants to listen to that. I want to certainly thank you for being here.
Lisa: Really quickly, I know we’re out of time, but I just want to say I have so much respect for you and your story and what you’ve done. Admittedly, I haven’t had those struggles, I’ve had a lot of opportunities. You just work so hard and that’s why you’ve had the success you’ve had with sheer determination and hard work. I have a lot of respect for you as both a friend and a colleague for how hard you work and charting your own course in life.
Gianno: Thank you, I really, really, really do appreciate you saying that. I always say, and people always call me exceptional, and I always reject that label because I think we’re all exceptional. If you’re not exceptional then you certainly can be and you mentioned how we’re all God’s children. We all have potential. We all have this hidden ability, and it’s up to you to the do the work, it’s up to you. For those who talked about the government and institutional racism, I’ve talked to some people who say it doesn’t exist, but I do believe it is real and exists, just like the ‘92 Crime bill pushed by Joe Biden is institutionally racist. That’s what I believe. But I think in spite of all those odds, a partnership with God changes the dynamic completely and totally and will supersede whatever is happening in this natural world. That’s personally how I feel, and I want to thank you for those warm compliments.
Lisa: I totally agree with your statement about a relationship with God. Family is important. God is important. Friends are important. Those are the things that bring the most fulfillment in life and the things that if we work our hardest to get settled, the rest comes with it.
Gianno: I agree with you. That’s the blessing of being able to do this work to have people see an example of something different whereas society says if you grew up a particular way you should end up like this. When God is saying your path is already made, just walk down and don’t fear. I appreciate that Lisa, and thank you so much my friend!
Lisa: Thank you! I loved being on. Can’t wait to see you down in Miami.
