 Yeah, and I think if you're comfortable or if you're not comfortable with your hands... Yup. Just, just, just... Yeah, do you need some snacks? Is that right? There's always enough snacks. I see there's an apple here. Have you got an apple? I know, right? Are we on? Are we live? How about now? Now? Test? How about now? Here we go. Hey, sorry for the slow start folks. We had some technical issues. We also had some traffic issues that delayed some of the candidates and perhaps some of, some of the folks who signed up to be here tonight. But I want to thank everybody for coming. I'm Brian Schup. I'm the Executive Director with Vermont Natural Resources Council. Since 1963, VNRCs has worked at the local regional and state level to advance policies and programs that promote clean water in the restoration of our streams, rivers, and the protection of our groundwater. The protection of our forests and all of the many benefits that they provide to wildlife and to Vermonters, including economic, environmental, and ecological and cultural benefits. We've worked to protect Vermonters from exposure to toxic chemicals. We have worked to promote sustainable community development, including affordable housing and smart growth locations, the viability of our downtowns and villages, transportation options in our working lands. And we also are on an ongoing mission to combat climate change, to do our part in Vermont to reduce emissions, to make the problem worse, and also to prepare Vermont for a changing warmer world, which is already underway. We do all that through advocacy, through litigation, and through public education and outreach. One thing that VNRC does not do is endorse candidates or encourage our members or the general public to vote in any particular way in an election. We do, however, raise awareness around the issues that are important to us and our members and hopefully share that information so that you and all Vermonters can make informed choices when they go to the ballot boxes in November. And that's what we're all about here tonight, is raising awareness about the issues that are important to all of us. So that's my introduction. Thank you again for coming. I want to thank the candidates for being here. I'm going to turn it over to my colleague Lauren Hurl with Vermont Conservation Voters. Everyone, welcome. Thank you so much for being here. And I know I'm really excited to hear from these congressional candidates and grateful for their time and being here with us this evening. My name is Lauren Hurl and I'm the Executive Director of Vermont Conservation Voters. And VCV is in its 40th year serving as the nonpartisan political action arm of Vermont's environmental community. We advocate for strong environmental laws, hold lawmakers accountable, and help support candidates who share our vision and values. We believe that a bright future for Vermont includes working to advance and defend policies that protect the environment, promote health, foster social, racial, and economic justice, bolster strong communities, and strengthen our democracy. We're really excited to be here at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. And this event is also being live-streamed. And there was a lot of interest in people watching it from home and we're really grateful to those of you who came out to be with us tonight. It's fun to have an actual in-person event. And we're grateful to Orca Media for live streaming and recording this event for us. And we know that voters are really eager to hear from these candidates for Vermont's seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, particularly this being the first race in 16 years that there's not an incumbent running. So lots of interest and we're really looking for a lively discussion this evening about some of the biggest issues facing our state and nation, including the climate crisis, clean water, protecting biodiversity, housing, and democracy. Our moderator this evening is Steven Pappas, who's the publisher and executive editor of the Times-Argus Rutland Herald. Thanks, Steve, for joining us this evening. And for participants in the forum, we are really excited to be joined by Becca Ballant, who is a former middle school teacher, historian. She has served four terms in the Vermont Senate. She is the first woman and first openly gay person to be president pro tempore of the Vermont Senate. She's running as a Democrat. Molly Gray, who is a former congressional staffer, worked at the International Committee of the Red Cross, served as an assistant state attorney general, and is currently serving as lieutenant governor of Vermont. She's also running as a Democrat. And finally, Leah Madden, who is a Marine Corps veteran, national anti-war leader, MIT climate change solver and winner of a human rights award from the Institute for Policy Studies, and he's running as an independent. So thanks again for being here. I'm now going to turn it over to Sheldon Goodwin of Vermont Conservation Voters to walk through a few of the details for the event. Hi, everyone. I'm Sheldon. And I wanted to, again, thank you all for being here. I'm going to walk through a little bit of what the evening will entail. So first, as Lauren just mentioned, we're going to hear from the different candidates who have joined us here today. And we invited all the candidates who registered with the Secretary of State to participate in this forum. And to be eligible to participate, candidates must have filed for office and demonstrated at least one of the following. Has received 5% or more of the vote in a previous statewide general election or primary. Has polled at 5% or higher in a primary general election poll conducted by an independent professional pollster. Or has raised at least $35,000 or received contributions from at least 1,500 Vermonters. And we set these criteria so that our members have a chance to hear in depth from the leading candidates. And we will also provide space at the end of the event for candidates who did not qualify for the forum to give a brief introduction of themselves before the meeting. So before we begin, I just want to remind everyone to please silence your cell phones. And also to remember that we are asking everyone to wear a mask when not actively eating or drinking. Without further ado, I'll hand it over to Steve. Am I working? Great. So first and foremost, thank you, Becca, Molly, and Liam for joining us today. And thank you. It's a pleasure to be able to hear the candidates discuss such important issues right now. And you're the reason we're gathered here. Despite what you hear, newspapers remain critical to the underpinning of democracy. And the Times-Argus and the Rutland Herald are pleased to be part of today's forum on topics that are important to every single Vermonter. Because knowledge is power. And being informed is critical to making informed decisions. And for that reason alone, all of us are so grateful that you all are here to better understand what differentiates these individuals. And so with that, we're going to get started. The questions for this evening's event came from BCV and VNRC staff and from input from audience members for this event. For each question, each candidate will have two minutes to answer the question. A timer will be indicating when you have one minute left, 30 seconds left, and when your time is up. As a moderator, I reserve the right to ask a follow-up question. Sorry, that's the way that goes. And I will ask the questions in alphabetical order by last name. So Becca first, Molly, and then Liam as one, two, and three. And then we'll rotate through. So the second question will be two, three, one, et cetera, et cetera. I do want to stress that we're going to hold folks to the two-minute scope, I guess, the two-minute time limit. And we ask that everybody be civil and cordial and respectful. We're going to dive right into the questions in a moment and we'll allow each candidate to have two minutes for concluding comments at the end. So there will be no opening remarks. So with that, we're going to hop right in. So the climate crisis is perhaps the most pressing issue facing our country. What are some concrete examples of leadership roles that you've played and policies you've helped drive to address this critical issue? And Becca, if you will go first. So just testing, everybody can hear me in the back? Okay, great. So yes, it is the existential crisis of our lifetime. And I talk about this a lot with my two children. And I've done quite a bit during my time in the legislature, both as majority leader in the state senate and as the president of the senate, to try to pass bills that will address the climate crisis. So one of the first significant bills that we were able to pass concerning the climate crisis was the Global Warming Solutions Act. And without my leadership, I feel certain that this would not have been able to pass the senate. It was something I worked very, very hard on. And it set up a model for us to have a climate council to make recommendations to us. And despite having a lot of support both in the house and the senate, the governor did veto that legislation. And then as majority leader, I had to go back and make sure that we had the votes to override the veto. We passed this most recent session. We also passed the plain heat standard, which again, the governor vetoed. We did have the votes in the senate to override that the house did not. We passed the first environmental justice bill in Vermont. And that was a bill that was introduced by my colleague Keisha Rahm. And we're closely with her and the chair of the senate natural resources committee to make sure that that was passed. And we have done huge, huge investments in weatherization, making sure it's more affordable for low and moderate income Vermonters, and making sure that we benefit from the crisis in terms of us rejuvenating the economy around the Green New Deal. And I think we have a tremendous opportunity here, although it is a very scary time for so many of us. It's also an opportunity for us. Good evening, everyone, and make sure you can hear me okay. I don't think the mic is on, but closer. Okay, we'll bring it closer. Is that better? Okay. It's a pleasure to be here. I just want to start by thanking VNRC and VCP for hosting. I'll just jump right in. I grew up here in Vermont on a vegetable and dairy farm. I spent much of my high school and college years ski racing across Vermont as a competitive ski racer. Without question, I know that climate change is impacting all of us in deeply personal ways, be it in ways that relate to the outdoors and our livelihoods, our economy. And to speak to my career and advocacy around climate action specifically, not only did I work for the International Committee of the Red Cross, an organization that works in conflict zones, conflicts that are often started by climate crisis. And I have seen what climate displacement looks like firsthand, but I went to law school to study international human rights law and was here in Vermont, one of the top environmental law schools in the country, where I was on the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law. I served as a symposium editor, helping to host one of the first symposiums that the law school has ever had on climate change and national security. And that was in 2011-2012. As Lieutenant Governor, I've worked to bring Vermonters from across the state into my office, hosting a regular seat at the table series and focusing on climate-related issues. One, the intersection between climate change and food insecurity, which we saw not only during the pandemic, but we're seeing it every single day. Two, most recently, bringing together leaders in the state who have worked to build our workforce as it relates to climate jobs. The jobs needed to weatherize homes, the jobs needed to deploy solar, and certainly as Vermont's congresswomen want to sit on the Energy and Commerce Committee so it can bring our leadership here in Vermont to Washington and make sure that we're investing properly in what we're doing here. Hi, everybody. I have no policy experience. I'm not a public servant yet. My role has been as an innovator in the nonprofit and private sector and as someone who's dedicated my life to addressing climate change as a renewable energy professional. My role in this campaign is to bring perspectives to the policy discussion that I'm not hearing. And as a renewable energy professional, I obviously think renewables play an important role in our future. But what I'm not hearing enough is how the Democratic Party is basically just sugarcoating the reduction in fossil fuels that we need and the transformation of our economic system that we need with all the upside of green new jobs and green new energy. But the problem is somewhere along the line they lost track of the medicine that should go with the sugar and they kept only the sugar. Because nowhere in the Green New Deal do they mention reductions in fossil fuel use and the cap that we need and the ongoing reductions in that cap that we need nor do they mention limits to economic growth. So what the Democratic Party is doing in my opinion is not going to work and the simplest thing we can do is reduce a cap and reduce the amount of fossil fuels we use. And I'm not hearing that or seeing that in any of the state of policy positions of the Democrats in this race. Never mind do I hear mention of the more complex issue of creating and designing and implementing a steady state economy so that if we're going to try and address climate change at a root cause level then our highest priority in my opinion needs to be innovating a more inclusive and powerful way of collectively solving problems. And that's the only way we can navigate with enough public buy-in this scary task before us of creating a paradigm shift in our economic system. Restress that this is a discussion, a forum and a discussion we will not be debating tonight. So I just want to make that clear and reiterate to the candidates and mostly to the audience. Just because we have three very different points of view here coming at us. So second question and thank you all for your answers. Whether it's the health of our surface waters like Lake Champlain or the safety of our drinking water, clean water is essential. What do you think are the most pressing water-related issues we face and if elected what actions would you take to ensure access to clean water for all Vermonters with Molly? I mean access to clean water is everything for us here in Vermont. It's not only our springs and wells and being able to turn on the tap and have access to water in our homes but it's also access to water for our farmers, for our food producers. It's linked to economic security, climate security, food security. I think we've been incredibly well served by Senator Leahy and being such a champion for our great lake, Lake Champlain. Certainly as Vermont's congresswoman I would be focused on caring on that leadership and making sure that our lake remains clean. I think there's significant challenges still around phosphorus and pollution making water challenging and inaccessible at times. I would certainly support the Clean Water Act and leadership that we've seen from our congressional delegation on that front and also making sure that we're holding corporate polluters accountable. We've seen here in Vermont with PFAS contamination in Bennington that folks trying to access medical monitoring, there's obviously been a lot of leadership here in the state and we're tremendously lucky to have Senator Sears and Senator Campion down in Bennington including legislative leaders like Senator Ballant who have led on medical monitoring but it also comes down to making sure that we're expanding corporate liability and holding corporate polluters accountable. Well to be upfront, water is a human right and I am in favor of keeping water a public utility that is as democratically controlled as possible and restricting and opposing privatization of water systems and including much more strong disincentives to bottled water. And the big picture, I don't believe there's anything that rivals climate change as an environmental issue as much as food and water and agriculture is intimately tied up with water use. It uses by far the most water of any of our human activities and so it's bound up with how I approach agriculture which if I had to briefly discuss it now because I'm sure we'll go into more depth later I support removing subsidies from big monoculture chemically dependent agriculture operations and transferring those subsidies to regenerative smaller more equitably owned enterprises. In the meantime short of a paradigm shift how we operate agriculture in this world and in this country I would say the existing legislation that is most peaking my interest of course obviously supporting the Clean Water Act is just a no-brainer and a given but in terms of new water system regulations there's the Water Affordability, Transparency, Equity and Reliability Act which is a mouthful it stands as an acronym water, the Water Act I think that's promising. It works to clean up, repair and modernize existing water infrastructure for places that are woefully needing it like Flint, Michigan. So that's where I stand on water, it's a human right and we need to protect it, care for it and treat it as sacred it is as important as the climate. Thank you. So I really started thinking really deeply about the health and safety of our water when I lived in Al Salvador I lived and worked in San Salvador and was shocked to see the extent to which people had no access to clean water and my health was directly impacted by that and that was something that I carried with me for a long time afterwards and so we do often take it for granted here but when I served in the legislature it was something that I took very seriously that what happened in Flint was something that could happen here if we weren't very vigilant and as the lieutenant governor said we did a lot of work around PFAS and PFOS certainly directing our attention to what happened in Bennington but we know we're going to see more of that around the state so we had work that we did here that I know is work that we're going to have to continue to do at the federal level really concentrating on banning PFAS from all kinds of products including rugs, carpets, firefighter foam those items that we have banned it from here continuing the work that we've done on regulating PFAS contamination in water making sure we're keeping those toxic chemicals out of children's toys like we have been working on here and we have been a model in so many ways on the issue of medical monitoring and I just want to remind everybody or maybe tell you if the first time if you didn't know we had to take three different runs at that and passed it three different times before we could convince this governor that he should sign on and that is the kind of dogged work that I will do for you if I am fortunate enough to represent you in Congress you don't always have success the first time out you've got to keep working at it Before we go on to the third question I just want to check technically can everybody hear the candidates okay? I'm always hard to hear okay and are you getting okay feed for okay great so next what federal policies would you support to bring in-state renewable energy to Vermont and with this one we're going to start with you Liam like I said I think it's important to start with I am a renewable energy professional it's what I do as my day job I think it plays an important role in our energy future and I think we should continue the federal tax credit I think we should make that more of a tax rebate so it's more accessible to lower and middle income people because it's clear that you need a really large tax appetite for the existing incentive structure to really apply to you and that doesn't make any sense however the bigger picture I want to press home is that most people probably don't realize the Harvard professor David Keith did a research paper in the journal Environmental Research Letters in which he cited how much land it would take to transition to renewable energy as our primary energy source and it would take this is a shocking number but I've checked it it's 72% of American land would be needed to fully meet our energy needs via wind farms and 6% via solar energy and I checked his math on solar energy and I think he's being very conservative I think it's more and so that is just a completely unacceptable amount of land is almost more than the amount we have under arable crop production so I am for renewable energy I have dedicated my life I think there is a role for it but if we want a technologically advanced industrial civilization we need to open our mind to how much safer and more reliable nuclear energy has become in the last several decades the plants are safer the reactors can be produced in a mass production line making them more affordable and we can recycle the waste the only reason the waste is not being recycled right now is because there's a law from the 1970s stopping us but that's what France does and if we don't open our minds to a nuclear powered future by and large with some important help from renewable energy we are going to do a lot to save civilization but destroy the natural world and I am opposing that so I want to agree with Liam that I think one piece of low-hanging fruit that we can deal with right now is making sure that we continue the tax credit that has helped so many solar installers here in Vermont over the last decade and it was at 30% of the tax credit under George W. Bush and it has steadily declined and now we're down to 22% and if Congress doesn't act it's going to go away entirely I want to see an investment in this area I know that we used to lead not just New England but many parts of the nation in our solar energy and it was not just a way for us to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels they were also really good paying jobs so that's one thing that I'm very committed to the other thing is that we have to make it much more affordable for people here in Vermont to transition to renewables and so many of you I'm sure know that if you want to install a heat pump in your home if you want to install solar panels most Vermonters, average Vermonters cannot afford to do that many of them want to but they can't afford to do it they don't have the money up front so we have got to put our money where our mouth is if we want people and we do to transition off we have to not be constantly in a position of shaking our heads shaking our heads, why don't more people do it more people don't do it because they can't afford it and this is a place where federal funds certainly would help a great deal I have 30 seconds left I want to make sure that I say this last piece something that I feel like is holding us up is the level of despondency that many people feel about how to be someone who is more of a climate champion because they feel hamstrung because they don't have the resources to invest or they don't even know where to begin so some of the work that we all have to do is people who care about these issues is reminding people don't let the despondency get in the way of progress I want to start by sharing a little bit of personal insight into my own upbringing I grew up in a house where we didn't have a dryer we didn't have a dishwasher we didn't have a microwave we cut all of our own wood put it in the basement in the fall and hung up clothes on racks in some ways I think my folks were sort of OG environmentalists but actually they were really concerned just about the cost of energy and being able to afford it and I think those are conversations we're all having today but when I think about how do we make renewable energy accessible in Vermont it really comes back to me to that energy security and how can we, regardless of what's happening in Ukraine regardless of what's happening around the country that Vermonters have energy independence and energy security every day so if we take that one step further when it comes to renewables I think what we've done in the state to make solar accessible we've done a great job but there's still a lot we can do around community solar projects for example but even with strong investments and I fully agree with my colleagues here tonight about continuing incentives and tax credits federally we don't have the workforce and so it doesn't matter how much money right now we push it solar in Vermont until we have young people wanting to be solar deployers and going into the trades and signing up to be part of the incredible unions that we have here in Vermont we're actually not going to be able to meet our climate goals so for me that's a top priority making sure that we're getting kids coming out of our career and technical education centers going into associate's degrees and degrees at VTC in schools right here in the state and then going right into jobs at Sun Common and with our solar solar panel deployers across the state I think that's an incredibly important component and something that congress where congress has a big role to play and it's a good reminder that we all have to get our wood in pretty quick we're going to switch to biodiversity now a recent study found that every 30 seconds the United States loses a football field worth of natural area to roads pipelines, urban sprawl and other development to address this President Biden signed an executive order committing the US to protect 30% of its land and waters by 2030 do you support this effort and what specifically do you think congress should do to address the biodiversity crisis and the ongoing loss of habitat in the United States we're going to start with Becca so yes I do support this not just because it protects biodiversity and not because it not only because it protects our flora and fauna but also because it is better for us as humans we know that the forest economy rather excuse me the forest ecology is what often gives people a sense of peace and well-being study after study has linked it to mental health a way for people to get mental health calm and it increases our levels of stress relief and so it is not just an issue around biodiversity but also it's better for us as human beings and it's one of the reasons why I walk every day with my dog in the woods but to your specific question of what other initiatives would I support we have to do everything that we can to safeguard and protect mature and old growth forests and we need to really make sure we take a science approach to protecting wildfire risk we know that this is also a problem right now that we're facing our wildfire season is getting longer it's getting hotter we're facing more acreage every year that is a part of the climate catastrophe I would also strengthen the partnerships that we have across the country with local economies and states to make sure that we're retaining forest ecosystems that will support not just the people who live in that area but also the forest economy and we do a good job of that here in Vermont and we also have to look beyond our borders to invest in making sure that we can combat global deforestation that global deforestation impacts us directly here too we have to also look beyond our borders thank you we support the president's executive order on 30% by 2030 of protecting our land and also our waters I think what's really exciting about the executive order and also really important as we approach all of our conversations conversations around conservation excuse me is that who do we have at the table do we have our sportsmen and women here in Vermont our skiers and our snowmobiles and people who are outside those who are working our lands our indigenous communities our small business owners and trying to bring as many stakeholders to the table so this isn't a one party against another but it's how do we protect the land and environment we love so much I want to share briefly I was down in Manchester recently and I met with Orvis and Orvis was telling me how together with Protect Our Winters an organization of groups that is working to advocate for climate action and Orvis has a pretty unique following they've got a lot of Republicans and Democrats sportsmen and they figured out a way to go to Capitol Hill and get Republicans to think about climate action and to start acting slowly and so I think when I think about leadership in this moment and not only addressing the president's executive order and carrying that forward but also how do we do it it's also making sure that we have those stakeholders at the table in the process yes I definitely support protecting more of our biodiversity than even 30% of federal lands I think if you go farther what would I do in addition to that what I urge Congress to do or be part of Congress doing is invest more in smart development patterns so clustered communities less sprawl in parking lots which hurt my soul more investment in public transportation infrastructure transferring the stewardship of federal lands to indigenous communities and investing in marine permaculture which I can explain what that is a little bit down the line it's a way of invigorating life back into the oceans and creating sustainable fisheries so regenerative agriculture obviously affects the biodiversity of our surrounding ecosystems because spraying things with pesticides just undermines the base of biodiversity and the adjacent surroundings but I think the thing that's calling to me to urge into this conversation is that we take a step back and remember that climate change is only one small part of a larger sustainability crisis because we have fished over 90% of the big fish out of the ocean we are extincting species at perhaps thousands of times the background rate and we are depleting our precious natural resources including fossil fuels at a rate that will make them gone in our lifetimes so if we are too narrowly focused on climate and not on broader sustainability issues I think we might lose the forest for the trees and it's important not only so that we make good policy but so that we can be more inclusive in the conversation because I feel like we can get more people who are conservative involved in this discussion when you frame it as a sustainability issue and frame it at the things that they love that they might lose if we don't act instead of just a carbon dioxide is bad and we need to move heaven and hell to reduce it. Now I'm going to throw you a little bit of a curveball question who is an environmental leader who played a pivotal role in shaping your environmental values and why and we're going to start with Molly. Actually I was talking earlier about how I grew up and well I was really frustrating at the time to have to shake out wet clothes and come up on the line and cut wood all fall canned tomatoes and freeze vegetables I'd say my folks instilled a pretty strong environmental ethic and as my husband knows who's here we you know I reused recycle just about everything and now we've got a garden going in the backyard and yeah I guess I owe them a lot and I really appreciate their leadership. I'm also deeply proud to be endorsed and supported by Todd Stern who is the chief negotiator of the Paris climate agreement and as an international lawyer he's kind of a superhero in where he got us where he brought us to as a country where he brought us to as a world in terms of having some framework I think it's an absolute shame that the Trump administration in June 2018 pulled out of the Paris agreement and we're sort of coming back now in terms of our own dependability as a nation another person I admire tremendously I'll leave it there so I'll segment to this question into a couple the innovator who I think is currently doing the most exciting inspiring work to me is Dr. Brian von Hursen who won the X prize for marine permaculture he's the the head of the climate foundation brilliant person we should all look him up. Bill mollison is the founder of permaculture and I would say that extends down to all the people who taught me permaculture on the local level Wendell Berry the author and champion of more perennial agriculture is someone I find completely inspiring but in my personal life by far it is an author and philosopher named Dr. Bill Plotkin who wrote a book called Nature in the Human Soul that has been completely transformative in my life and I think it's in summary teaching us to fall in love with the natural world as kind of a prerequisite to being a whole and healthy human oh so many is this still on can you hear me in the back there we go okay so if I take it sort of chronologically was very impacted by Wendell Berry and actually had at my own wedding people reading excerpts from Wendell Berry to send us off right into the world Vandana Shiva a huge hero of mine Bill McKibbin who many of you know and love and who endorsed me today in this race very proud to have his endorsement Katherine Hayhoe who is an evangelical Christian climate champion I've learned a lot from her over the last few years but closer to home I would say all of the people throughout my time working at the Farm and Wilderness Foundation in Plymouth, Vermont originally moved here to Vermont to take a job there leading service trips with teens at the Farm and Wilderness Foundation worked there for many years went on to direct one of the the camps and so many of the people that I worked with there instilled in me and in my wife this is where I met her and our children who go there now this incredible incredible love of the natural world and this deep desire to protect it and I have made some of the greatest friendships of my life through that organization and if you're not familiar with it and you have a kid who is of summer camp age you might want to check it out it's really quite an extraordinary organization thank you and I would remind everyone that this forum is being brought to you by VCV and VNRC not the Independent Booksellers Association next we're going to talk about social justice and equity June is Pride Month and there have obviously been many issues in recent years pertaining to LGBTQIA rights and other social and racial justice issues what steps do we really need to be taking to build a more equitable Vermont and a more equitable United States and we're going to start just two minutes well this is where we transition to two hours each but we're going to start with Liam for only two minutes how can we transition to a more equitable society so my definition of justice is best served by enacting it through economic justice and political justice so on the economic justice front that means giving the preference for the work that needs to be done to build a more just and sustainable world to democratically and equitably run enterprises and that means in layman's terms workers cooperatives as well as to large civilian service course that would be part of a larger federal jobs guarantee so political justice to me means of course equal justice under the law but it also means giving people realistic mechanisms to bypass politicians who don't listen to them Princeton University did a study five years ago and found that there was a zero percent correlation between whether or not the majority of the population agreed with the policy and whether or not congress passed it so that's a huge problem and it's really hard to have political justice when you have a government that doesn't include the voices of the public so my website is called rebirthdemocracy.com it's not called Liam Madden for congress the core message the central focus of my campaign is about innovating better problem solving in government so how do we have better I could go on for an hour about what political justice means and how to create a more inclusive democratic process that solves complex problems better but without political and economic justice there can be no other kind of justice and I think once we do those things better then it flows into any other form of justice such a great question I'm so glad that you asked it and it cuts across all of the work that any of us will be doing if we are successful in going to congress it's not just related to issues around around climate and the very basic place where so many of us need to start and it's sad that we have to start at such a basic level but it's true that we have to admit that there is racial inequity there is structural inequity and it has been a part of this nation from before its inception and when you really accept that and understand that you don't see the world you don't see government you don't see the work that you do day to day in the same way two books that have been incredibly influential in my life in thinking carefully about these issues one being the book cast by Isabel Isabel Wilkerson and she says she likens our country to a house and its frame is rotting and if you don't deal with the rotting frame there is nothing and that book reinforced in me this sense of some of the most important work we can do as climate champions as people who care about making just transitions we have to have these really hard conversations with fellow Vermonters who don't believe that racism is still an issue and I say we have to do that first because I see the comments we just passed the the environmental justice bill you read the comments on social media why do we need this why are you wasting time on this why are you spending time on just transitions why isn't the climate council doing more important work we've got a problem here with bringing people into this work and having them understand that this has to be central to the work that we do I'm out of time it's hard to as the senator said to package up an answer in two minutes but I wanted to approach it through a couple of different aspects I guess one the process what is the process of change what is the process of change when it comes to addressing social and racial and economic injustice not only in the state and our communities but also in this country for me as lieutenant governor it started with a seat at the table series and trying to figure out what issues were not being discussed I didn't think they were coming to the forefront of our discourse and our state and our communities but then who wasn't at the table and how to get those folks to the table I guess it was a virtual table and doing that throughout the legislative session bringing up for example public health access for our new refugee or former refugee new vermoner community trying to address some of the systemic barriers we have some of the systemic racism that still exists in the state in so many different forms but I want to step back to a bigger issue and topic and level that goes far beyond that my first point was really about process how I see leadership and how I lead but the second is around fundamental human rights or fundamental rights as we've diagnosed them or accepted them in this country be it reproductive rights, be it voting rights be it marriage equality and just where we are at as a democracy right now where we're going to see in the coming weeks we don't know maybe in the coming days a supreme court decision that might overturn Roe v Wade and everything that we know everything that we know and I know as a human rights lawyer and as an attorney is now called into question and so we're in a moment where we have to dig really deep and fight extremely hard just to hold on to that which is fundamental so we are really very much at this moment in the fight of our lives well if you like that question you're going to love this one our democracy certainly seems like it is at a precipice what are you planning to do in Congress to ensure we continue to have free and fair elections in Vermont and across the nation we're going to start with Becca this is something that I have thought about so much on the campaign trail that I do feel like we are at a crisis of democracy I do feel like the Republic is in danger I was sworn in as President Pro Tem on the day that the insurrection at the Capitol happened and it was incredibly jarring to take a leadership position in the Senate on the day that I saw a wave of authoritarianism and fascism rear its head we do need to tend to the democracy it is not hyperbole to say that we are at a very frightening moment and so of course there are things that are out of our hands right now none of us are in Congress right now but we need to see the work of the January 6th commission through to conclusion people need to be held accountable for their actions that day we have to make sure we as Vermonters are not just working hard to make sure the ballot is accessible here in Vermont which we've done an incredibly great job here your legislative leadership in conjunction with Secretary of State's office has made it incredibly easy to vote which is how it should be in every single zip code across the nation so but we as Vermonters we need to make sure that we are putting our energy into making sure everyone across the nation has that same access and basic level you know we have to get the corruption out of Congress we have way too much big money in politics right now we see what happened to build back better we see what happened with Joe Manchin and his ties to Big Cole he's not the only one we have got to we've got to take back the country that's what I'm trying to say here in times up we need our leadership in Washington on voting rights now more than ever we see across this country as many of us probably know the restrictions on same day registration states for same day registration which is so important for young people on the move moving from school to school or internship to be able to show up at a voting place and to register and then to vote which is something we did here in Vermont that is now being banned in certain states across this country vote by mail vote by mail during a pandemic that's still going is now being rolled back in states across this country thank goodness we have it in Vermont for our general elections I hope as Senator Ballant knows that we have it in the future for primary elections we won't have it for this primary so request your ballot don't forget to request your absentee ballot but we need desperately right now to pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act to bring people across the aisle together in Washington to make sure that we're doing everything we can to protect access to the ballot box and also I'll end with this I was also sworn in the day after the insurrection and I felt very compelled quickly to try to do something with my office to try to help our democracy stay alive and especially here in Vermont and I started a thing called Lieutenant Governor for a day which is every Wednesday bringing kids from across the state classrooms into the state virtually just to give them a feeling of connection a feeling of connection and where I think we have connection we have a feeling of ownership and when we have ownership we feel trust and we feel a deep need to preserve and so I also think it's incumbent upon all of us right now to get as many people feeling connected and feeling a sense of ownership in this democracy that's so deeply deeply fragile so I'll start with some specific stuff same day registration is a gimme given the idea of just automatically being registered as soon as you graduate from high school I think that's a given I see most voter ID laws as a new form of Jim Crow and I oppose them and I'm of course for vote by mail to be a little bit more innovative we probably all heard of ranked choice voting and proportional representation and election finance reform and I think those are a good start but when I'm talking about rebirthing democracy I think it goes much deeper and I think you need to think about first of all the two-party system is an obstruction to doing anything innovative or significant enough to solve our problems the two-party system does not represent us it doesn't solve our problems it drives us to extremes and it is fundamentally controlled by elites so we need to liberate ourselves from the two-party system and one pathway I see to that is to make ballot initiatives which over 30 states have accessible on the federal level online because there's no reason we need to wait every two years to have public input on matters of importance and I also think we need forums where people can discuss ideas and generate solutions and if there's enough support from within a forum that it automatically gets put to legislators to make meaningful action on things like Facebook is driven by big tech that creates echo chambers and drives polarization that same big tech, that same AI can be pointed in the opposite direction to highlight what transcends the most values can be a tool to create inspired cooperation and I think we need that kind of technology so we need to expand our imagination of what is actually needed to create cooperation and we need to make sure that we understand what is happening on a scale. And then lastly I would say one of the refreshing things about what's happening right now is that new ideas and new blood are entering political conversation and what we could be doing is committing to term limits so I'm not just working for term limits but committing to them right here so I want to know Becca and Molly would you commit to an eight-year maximum term of service in the region to the next question your time was almost up anyhow Vermont became a refuge for many folks during COVID-19 and has already begun to see climate migrants move into the state which has put increasing pressure on our already tight housing market this is resulting in increased pressure for developing our working lands and forests so what specifically would you do to simultaneously protect our natural resources while also expanding access and availability of affordable housing in Vermont and again you only have two minutes on this one so I know. Molly you get to go first. I think this is one of the biggest challenges we face as a state right now I ran for lieutenant governor because of our demographic crisis and experiencing firsthand what it was like to try to find an apartment on a salary working as an assistant attorney general with student loan debt and also working a second job at night just to afford both. I know right now as we think about our workforce crisis the number of employers I talk to who say Molly we have offered wonderful jobs to folks outside of the state to come to the state and they are turning them down because they cannot find housing they can't find housing in Burlington they can't find housing in Montpelier in Burlington or anywhere in between so I think our biggest challenge is how do we build how do we build how do we expand access to housing right now I am a strong believer that we need to build up and not out that we need to think about housing that's going to be sustainable weatherized safe accessible and really looking at the spectrum of housing that we have in Vermont we have Vermonters right now who need access to supported and independent housing we simply don't have enough we have Vermonters who are living in family homes and want to move into family homes that just aren't available so how are we building and making those more affordable accessible but I think our biggest challenge right now is we try to welcome workers and keep young people who are graduating from our colleges and universities in the state is access to worker housing I am a strong believer that where Congress can step in and provide support now is one, as I mentioned earlier in building the workforce, two in making sure that we have the money to invest in water and sewer we don't right now even have the basic infrastructure support we've received some money for that but not enough and there is a way for us to do this while we also protect and preserve our land and environment our forests and our fields our streams I know we can do it here in the federal funding yeah so imagine all three of us agree that there's just simply not enough housing one way or the other this is a big subject it's like education are we talking about pre-k or graduate students so which population are we talking about housing for I think it's it's hard to put it all in one two-minute section but if I were to make an overarching statement to give you an idea of where I'm coming from I would say that rent as wage slavery is to employment and it's not to say all employment is wage slavery and it's not to say that all rent is extractive but by and large rent is a pretty exploitative dynamic and we should be more skeptical of it morally and perhaps outrage by it so what I would do to address it is that we need at least a pilot scale version of a federal zero percent loan program so that people can access housing that is part of smart development tying into how we respond to our sustainability crisis so this means clustered well insulated energy efficient homes and I think those same zero percent loans should be even further subsidized for people who are part of workers cooperatives or democratically engaged businesses as well as people engaged in agriculture and maybe some other different activities but in the meantime while we're not changing a paradigm just yet I think the existing legislation that is catching my eye is what representative Ilhan Omar is pushing forward in the homes for all act and that's the kind of legislation that I would immediately work to support but in the bigger picture we need to be thinking about how the affordable housing crisis is probably best solved by creating a civilian service core with you know I was part of the Marine Corps we should have that but we should also have a building core we should also have a regenerative agriculture core we should also have a healthcare core so I think those problems can solve each other giving people meaningful work and career pathways and educational benefits through civilian service that also solves the problem of creating affordable housing thank you test I first got interested in the issue of housing before I even served in the senate because I saw firsthand as a middle school teacher for years what happened when my students didn't have safe stable housing it impacted their learning it impacted their mental health it impacted their ability to be present and to succeed and so at a baseline you know we have to make sure that we are guaranteeing that Vermont families have safe affordable housing under my leadership both as majority leader and then as president pro tem was able to make the largest investments in new housing in decades we did not anticipate the covid refugees we did not anticipate how the housing market could tighten even further because it was already tight but where we can look to the federal government my colleagues have mentioned some of them certainly we need more federal dollars for water and sewer to make sure that we are building where we want building to happen in downtown and village centers which is what we've been doing in Vermont for years really focused on smart growth that's how it should be we're also investing a lot of money in rehabbing our housing stock we have some of the oldest housing stock in the nation here in Vermont because of that we have some of the housing that is the leakyest in terms of weatherization so these issues go together we've also been investing in accessory dwelling units and I know that that's another way that we can bring new units online quickly the other thing that we've looked at in Vermont is doing some version of tax increment financing for smaller municipalities smaller towns and cities we want to build more housing and they don't have the money to do so thank you in less than an hour President Biden is going to deliver an address to the nation about the recent mass shootings news reports say that he's going to be stressing the urgent need for congress to pass gun restrictions what specific federal legislation would you support to reduce gun violence in America let's start with you Liam okay so I am a former marine so I understand what the difference between an assault rifle is and what people have in their imagination when they hear the word assault rifle most tragedies probably could have happened or did happen with weapons that don't even qualify as assault rifles so it's important to expand the conversation a little to understand what would actually be effective to prevent these types of tragedies one we need severe restrictions on any mentally ill person having access to firearms two the second amendment it should stay intact and I think the house legislation in Vermont that made it illegal for 18 to 20 year olds to access guns is actually unconstitutional I'm not saying it's a bad idea I'm not saying I'm opposed to it ethically it's unconstitutional you need to call it spade to spade nowhere does it say that people over 18 to 20 have the right to bear arms but that said the right to bear arms is the worst punctuated amendment ever and it's it implies a well regulated militia which means that there's a community of ethics that goes along with having a firearm that imposes discipline about using deadly force and I think we need that kind of local community of ethics so that we can verify who on our community levels is actually known to be responsible enough to have the kind of weapon that is capable of doing dangerous things I think handguns and hunting rifles need less regulation but regulations are needed for weapons that have more military application and I think that should happen on a local scale because the way hunter gatherers solve this problem is to have complete transparency over society so that everyone knew everybody and it was clear who was going down a dangerous path who was unwell and we need that kind of heightened transparency that's not from government surveillance but from communities that know each other and can verify each other's wellness prior to my serving in the senate and being the majority leader we had no gun safety laws on the books in Vermont none and it was a goal of mine to make sure that we passed a package of gun safety measures while I was in that leadership position I had my dear friend Ann Brayden was the one who founded Gunsense Vermont and it was actually the first person to donate money to get that organization off the ground and I want to say to you this issue has been important to me long before I was in this role as senator I've done some great work in this role but as a parent and also as a teacher being a teacher during the time when school shootings became commonplace my job changed the way my the parents who dropped their kids off at school changed this is not the price that we have to pay for liberty watching our children get slaughtered we can make a difference we've made some great changes here we can do it at the federal level banning automatic assault rifles AR-15s putting a limit on magazines closing the Charleston loophole making sure there's handgun waiting periods more red flag laws looking at the suicide rate here in Vermont we're an outlier for men taking their lives with firearms we should be doing more and the last thing I have to say it's not a debate but I just have to say there is no connection between mental health concerns and people who commit these violent crimes we have seen it time and time again the research does not bear it out and I just have to say it is a disservice when we say that thank you Molly? I'm thinking a lot about why is it why is it right now that Congress just cannot act why? why is it when Russia invades Ukraine and is killing civilians and inciting genocide according to recent reports that we can come together as a country to protect to try to protect people to provide aid and assistance but right now across the United States where children are being killed in schools where individuals are being targeted targeted because of the color of their skin in grocery stores individuals are being targeted in places of worship because of their religious beliefs and there have been shootings since Uvaldi in Tulsa as we know how is it that we cannot come together right now as a nation across party lines to act and I'm glad that the president is giving a speech tonight I 100% support the reforms that were mentioned it's now by my colleague red flag laws at the national level we do not need weapons of war on our streets banning assault rifles universal background checks closing the Charleston loophole addressing hate crimes addressing them, prosecuting them recognizing that there is a frightening movement frightening movement across this country right now around violent extremism homegrown terrorism we should call it terrorism because that is what it is gun violence will not be addressed by simply one action this is a come together across this country across political divides to protect each other and care for each other and stop what is a very terrifying very very terrifying trend thank you all three of you President Biden has a plan to fight inflation that includes a plan to invest in clean energy to help people cut their energy bills by 500 dollars a year we are seeing inflation hitting us hitting our pocket books every day more and more how would you plan to simultaneously address our current economy inflation and climate change you only have two minutes we are going to start with you so I will start by saying I know that this is a challenging time for those of us who have been working really hard on carbon reduction and have wanted to work hard to join Vermont to the transportation climate initiative whether it is movement towards a carbon tax or carbon dividend is very difficult in this climate to have that conversation but we have to continue to have that conversation long term despite the inflation because we know the prices especially on fossil fuels are going to continue to be volatile and so they are up now they are going to be down it is challenging but we have got to be courageous and pass laws that are targeting the companies that are reaping huge benefits right now from these increased prices and not just fossil fuels certainly price gouging is not just happening within fossil fuels but we should have a windfall tax on fossil fuel companies and we should use that money to reinvest in initiatives that will help us reduce our dependency on fossil fuels and Steve I just want to make sure I hit all of the things that you are talking about there were many parts to your question that was pretty good Molly this is such a tough tough question right now I was at the pump and filling up myself and $87 is a lot right now to fill up a tank there was a woman next to me the other day who had two kids in the back of the car in a not a minivan but a car that all wheel drive and she just started swearing she started swearing at the pump and I was right there with her and I think that we are all experiencing that right now and so I see it as short term, medium term and long term steps one we have to make sure that right now Vermonters can still pay for food and pay for rent and pay for heat the number of Vermonters who have reached out to my office and they are saying it is just not going far enough so making sure that we stabilize that folks have enough to get by the day to day right now second and sort of the medium term doing everything we can to support a just transition so increase investments in weatherization increase investments in access to electric vehicles I would love to afford one and can't wait to get my hands on one when that is financially possible and they are available doing everything we can right now to get more Vermonters access to heat pumps and then in the longer term I 100% support and I think it could happen even sooner ending fossil fuel subsidies and then reinvesting as much of that money as we can right now into supporting a just transition thank you Liam upfront inflation is a very complex I don't know everything I need to know about how to tackle it but I do know that we should tack the minimum wage and federal benefits and any federal jobs guarantees to the rate of inflation that seems like a no brainer we should tax billionaires, I totally agree with Becca and we should tax the windfalls that they are reaping from head and inflation and I think in the big picture we need to think about local supply chains and that ties directly into how we approach climate change because it's not just about can we reduce our emissions, it's about can we meet our needs more locally and more regionally and we need to make those investments to do that so I think inflation is one way to deal with inflation is to focus less on money which is this abstract thing that's values changes all the time and actually focus on the needs of people so we could pay a bunch of gasoline and make sure that everyone has access to it at a less inflated rate at a certain portion of at a certain ration to people or we could you know do the same thing with other basic needs like food or heating fuel so that's another way to deal with inflation is to just meet people's needs instead of trying to keep up with the treadmill of inflation that spirals away from us so I'll just recap that benefits and wages as best possible to inflation tax billionaires and their windfalls and relocalize supply chains thank you one final question before we go to the closing statements climate anxiety especially for young people is real and it's becoming debilitating and daunting what do you say to young people to give them hope for a bright future and habitable planet and what will you commit to and to them to address the crisis at the scale and pace that the challenge actually requires Molly now proud step mom to an 11 and 13 year old and they've got some pretty big questions I'm 38 and what I've already seen in my short lifetime gives me great cause for concern knowing that we're going to have a month less of winter and maybe the next what two generations and we see tick born illness maple sugaring maybe a thing of the past I don't know about farming but I know at home we're putting up a lot more greenhouses cause the only way you can account for incredibly diverse and extreme weather patterns what I tell young people is one the commitment to action true commitment to action two incentivize right now that if you are interested in climate action that also means deploying solar panels and helping to be part of the workforce that is so desperately needed right now to meet our climate goals weather at home weather isers heat pump installers electric vehicle technicians and that action comes in a lot of deep tangible ways and how do we make sure that those are the jobs that the next generation feels excited about and supported about I feel very strongly and will stand by our commitments in the Paris agreement we can't go it alone as for monitors as Americans we have to be standing by our word standing by our obligations but then working with the global community consistently not just with one administration and another showing up every single day and certainly doing everything we can to make climate action truly accessible to every Vermonter regardless of income regardless of where they live in the state that is on us as leaders that is on us as future members of Congress as federal leaders that we have to remove all the barriers to getting Vermonters into all of the tools and having access to them to do meaningful climate action now so a friend of mine is related to Wendell Berry and she was expressing some despair in grief and he said to her the world needs us too much to despair so I think that's one thing I would say to young people it's not to have an optimism that's naive or not rooted in reality but to have an optimism that says your fear your grief your sadness is a good thing it means you're still alive and you still care it reminds me of the quote I don't know if you guys ever heard this guy Christian Emerto very wise dude he said it is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society so young people who are despairing I feel you and I think one of the things I think we should feel those feelings fully but also invest in action because I just lost a brother a few months ago to addiction and I think having a meaningful life is part of how we respond to this feeling of despair this feeling of angst and anxiety about climate change and one of the ways that federal policy can tie into that is through a large scale military sized civilian service corps that make sure that we're giving people pathways to enrich themselves and contribute to the world in ways we all agree that we need so yeah I feel your despair but I don't think it's all a bad thing and I think we can work together in a scale of action we can work together to respond appropriately Becca I just have to say well I don't there we go I just have to say I've really enjoyed hearing both the Lieutenant Governor and Liam's thoughts at the end of this it's been a really thoughtful evening and I think we all feel similarly in that we are balancing our grief and our worry and our despair with hopefully a sense that we cannot give up hope right all will be lost and one of the things that I talk about with my kids so I have an 11 year old and a 14 year old and we talk a lot at the dinner table about current events and the other day we were talking about issues around around climate change and and my son in particular was feeling very overwhelmed and you know I reminded him that when I was his age I never thought that I'd be able to marry my spouse there it was not going to be a possibility for me there was going to be you know what I felt were insurmountable obstacles in allowing me to marry my same sex partner and so I always bring that up with them that you don't know what's around the corner you just don't know I have to believe that change is possible and as Liam said not in a naive way but that I believe in human creativity I believe in human resiliency and I had a fantastic conversation the other night with someone who was so fired up about biochar he talked to me about biochar for about a half hour and I was so excited about it that I went home and did a whole bunch of reading about it because I felt like I need to know about this and I know some of you out there are going to go look it up now that we are an incredibly resilient people and yes we've made horrible mistakes and the people that are bearing the incredible costs of climate change are the people with the least amount of means to cope with it but when I feel despair I listen to someone who I mentioned earlier Katherine Hayhoe she always gives me hope always Now we're going to turn to the closing statements and sticking with the rotation that we have adhered to up to this point that would put Liam first so Liam I really appreciate being up here with Beck and Molly and I think what they want to do is have you believe that their experience tells you a lot about their leadership abilities but I would say that theirs is the experience of being servants to a broken two-party system and I ask would you trust the experience of a doctor who doesn't heal her patients would you trust a doctor who has a lot of experience prescribing band-aids for gushing wounds because if you want a Green New Deal at the hands of the Democratic Party's leadership I want you to expect to climate change what Obamacare was to health which was at least a tragically lost opportunity and perhaps a disgraceful half-measure I ask do we want their experience or do we need innovation and vision I have a logical set of policy outlines that can bring democracy into the 21st century because we must innovate our collective problem-solving systems on a structural and technological level to deal with sustainability at the root cause which is our economic system and the only way to transform to a steady-state economy one that values our planet and our people and our principles as more sacred than just profit is to create a robust and wise democratic process so that we can all be involved and have public buy-in about what needs to happen because I promise you this the future will belong to those who are using the most advanced technology effectively and right now that means the future belongs to either unaccountable authoritarian governments around the world or unaccountable tech oligarchs mostly right here at home but if we want the future to belong to the people of this planet then we must empower and refine how open and free societies embrace the technology and the mindsets needed to paradigm-shift our collective problem-solving I'm asking you do you believe that changing the players is enough? or do you know in your heart that we must change the rules of the game? and I'm asking you to listen to your heart and join us in rebirthing democracy thank you thank you Liam can you hear me? okay great this has been a really interesting conversation and I've enjoyed the evening together I wasn't sure how many people would come out and I think this is really a testament to Vermont that so many people came out tonight I want to say that one of the most important things I want you to know about me what drives me in my work is that fundamentally I love people I really love people I love serving my community I love serving my state and I think I've been quite effective at leading on these issues that you care so much about I have 100% voting record on the scorecard that VCV puts out over the course of my career from environmental justice to ban on PFAS medical monitoring, lead contamination in drinking water safe elections global warming solutions act and on and on and on I have been a partner with this organization and with VNRC for years and I feel it so deeply that it's some of the most important work that I've done and I want to say that we all can be leaders on this issue we are running for this office up here but the real action that we're going to take on climate is going to be happening in each of your communities in really meaningful conversations with your neighbors, with your children in your kids schools talking with people who have different views than you have because we all want to live in a world that is safe and healthy and we all want that and there's so much that we can use to bridge the gap between us on these issues and that is something that I've done my whole life not just in state government but my whole life trying to make that connection and that's what I will do as your next congressperson, thank you I also just want to echo tremendous thanks to Steve, thank you for my conservation voters Steve, I don't know where Brian went he's in the back, thank you thank you all for coming out tonight this is a make or break moment for us and I feel like we say that nearly every election but I'm starting to believe that this really is a make or break moment be it with a continuous war raging in Ukraine with gun violence on the rise across this country we talked about that tonight the real palpable impact of climate change democracy hanging by a thread and I think we are here and what gives me hope is that we all believe there is a path forward and we want to be part of that and that's what's hopeful and exciting about this moment what I bring to the table I'm not a career politician a life long experience here in Vermont a lot of different chapters working and living in our communities growing up here which I feel very very privileged to have nearly half a decade working in and with congress not only helping to set up and run congress in welch's office but working for the international committee of the red cross working internationally in some really tough places fighting for human rights overseas and Baghdad and Iraq and Nigeria serving as a lawyer in the attorney general's office but also as a federal law clerk at a time where we really need fundamental rights to be protected and fought for so it is a diversity of experience in a moment where we have a big diversity of challenges and we need congress to deliver for us as vermoners in a big way but also for us as a country in a big way so I look forward to staying around and chatting with you tonight but having many many more conversations in the days, weeks and months ahead and thank you for coming and I hope to earn your support in this extremely consequential election thank everybody for being so patient and for such a lively conversation it really was very interesting and on behalf of myself and the Times Argus and the Rutland Herald I want to thank you for being here and for being here this evening please give them a round of applause hi everyone hi everyone thank you Steve, thank you Becca Mali and Liam and thank you Alex for keeping time for us so well I'm going to say a couple words but before that I just wanted to take a moment to invite any other congressional candidates that may be here with us in the room this evening if they would like to take a couple minutes to stand up and introduce themselves you're welcome to come up on stage and have the microphone I'll just say here thank you I appreciate it, hi everybody my name is Shanae Chase Clifford I wasn't able to participate up on stage this evening but I am here because these are issues deeply important to me and I'm excited to spend the next I think hour so meeting and greeting with you all and sharing a little bit about myself I may be a little bit of a new face but folks have been with VCV and VNRC but I am so excited to get to know you and hear from you what's important in this election of course we heard a lively discussion about those issues but would love to talk to you about what I see my vision for our climate and ecological future as well as addressing many of the justice challenges that were talked about tonight so very excited to have an opportunity to talk with you thank you for a great discussion as well thanks thank you Shanae and if there are any other candidates for any office who would like to introduce themselves before we move into the meet and greet portion of the evening you're welcome to come up and do so Jared thank you Greta thank you Vermont Conservation Voters and Vermont Natural Resources Council my name is Jared Duvall I am a candidate here in the Democratic United States and I am the primary for state senate to represent Washington County Stowe Orange and Braintree and climate and clean energy work has been my life's work for the last 20 years have been serving on Vermont's Climate Council as a co-author of Vermont's Climate Action Plan currently direct the Energy Action Network which is a statewide network and equity goals and have been doing this work since I was a student organizer in high school similar to Senator Ballant I was honored to just receive an endorsement from my long time organizing colleague Bill McKibbin last week and would just invite anybody who's interested to learn more my website is jaredduvallvt.com there's more about who I am, why I'm running positions on the issues so thank you and I will also be sticking around and would love to have conversations with you all thank you is there anyone else out there okay hello everyone my name is Ann Watson I am okay check hello test test one two I can also just speak really loudly that's also possible one more shot here hello check check one two test test alright that's okay hello check check is this yours work okay is it working now my name is Ann Watson I am also running for State Senate to represent also Washington County Stowe Orange and Braintree I am running because every day I work with high school students that are worried about climate change I have been a teacher at the high school in Montpelier for 17 years teaching physics and engineering and mathematics and so especially dealing with energy every day it's something that I think about all the time and I am really very passionate about climate issues and making a difference especially transitioning from the way for Vermont being able to find ways to center minorities as well as the poor who are the most impacted and the least able to adapt both to the effects of climate change and to being able to make adjustments that might be needed to get off of fossil fuels in addition I hear also I am also the mayor of Montpelier right now and from here in Montpelier I hear also frequently about just the economic issues that are really troubling in society right now in terms of the lack of affordable high quality childcare, the lack of paid family leave and affordable housing these are issues that as mayor I have worked on and we have made progress we have actually been able to enact some policies that have made progress and that's very exciting and I'm really looking forward to taking those ideas to the state and working together with fellow senators and the legislature as a whole so I'm also I've got a website and Watson for vtsenit.com and I will also be sticking around so happy to chat with anyone afterwards as well so thank you very much for the opportunity to introduce myself I just wanted to know how they do will be incredibly important and I hope that you will take time to talk to each of them thank you alright thank you everyone for being here for coming out in person and for joining us tonight for this wonderful conversation about all the issues that are so important to all of us I don't think I introduced myself when I first came up here so I'm sorry about that but I'm Greta Hassler I'm the Energy and Climate Program Associate at Vermont Natural Resources Council and I just wanted to say that this work with the forum here tonight is just one component of Vermont Conservation Voters and Vermont Natural Resources Council's work but we also do a lot of work throughout the year around important policy issues and legislative advocacy so it's really we just want to say thank you so much for being here tonight and if you bought a ticket to come out and support our work thank you so much and if you would like to consider supporting our work more long term becoming a sustaining donor you can do so at the back table in the back of the room with the green table cloth and now we're going to move into the meet and greet portion of this evening there's a cash bar in the back and there's also food back there which you're welcome to help yourselves too as you mingle and meet the candidates for the meeting. Thank you.