 Welcome to the show. This is Think Tech Hawaii. My name is Durasian and I am the host for this show. It's every other Tuesday at one o'clock and it's called Finding our Future. So we, I bring on guests that are really leaders in the community and or experts in various issues and we talk about solutions to problems for us in the future here in Hawaii and beyond. So really happy to welcome Will Caron on the show. Hi Will. Hi. So Will and I, we went to school together. Yeah, we were both undergrads at the same time. Is that right? That's right. Yep. Yeah, we worked in the school paper for the school paper together and various projects, but Will, is it co-founder or just founder of Young Progressive Demanding Action? I'm the co-chair. I wasn't the original co-chair, so I can't claim that, but I am the co-chair now as of now. Our organization was founded at the very end of 2016 and I joined the first board and I was a committee chair, a secretary, and eventually the co-chair along with my co-chair, Teresa Frick. Awesome. Yeah. I guess for some back for folks, you can share why Young Progressive Demanding Action started and if there was a reason it started around that time in 2016 and what you feel is the main goal of it. Yeah. I mean, Young Progressive Demanding Action kind of grew out of an electoral campaign, the work that some students were doing at UH Manoa in support of the 2016 Bernie Sanders campaign actually. And I think the message that Senator Sanders was broadcasting in 2016 and is still broadcasting this year too of people in general, but young people in particular realizing that we actually do have power if we exercise it, if we work together, if we get organized and we are able to fight for the values that our generation believes in in a constructive and organized way, then we can actually make a difference. And I think that message really resonated with people. And so after the primary election in 2016 and Senator Sanders wasn't the nominee, the people that had organized the Students for Bernie movement on campus wanted to continue doing some work to advance the values that the campaign really kind of showed us were within us all along. And so rather than let that energy disappear, we decided to continue to organize. And by the end of 2016, the general election when Donald Trump became president, I think that was kind of the second shoe dropping for us realizing that we really needed to continue organizing and continue doing work because not only did we realize that we have the power to make change if we do take on the work and do participate in the system and try to reform it as well from within and from without. But if we don't do that, if we do nothing, if we just allow things to happen and don't take our seat at the table as young people that represent the values of our generation, then someone like Donald Trump can become president, which everyone at the time was saying was impossible. It was not something that could ever happen. He was too absurd. I mean, he was too outside of the normal sort of political class for it to make sense. But that obviously was completely wrong. And so I think it really awakened something in us that, hey, this is a moment in history where the stakes are really high, where we're facing down the threat of climate change, where we're facing down the threat of nuclear armament, we're facing down the threat of global unrest because of the socioeconomic injustices that are just ramping across the globe these days. And so it's a really tenuous time for us. And if we want the outcome of this sort of hopefully just four years, but we'll see of kind of peak struggle and try to reduce the struggle from here on out and not let it get worse and worse and worse, we really need to get organized and we really need to do something. So the very first event we did was a big march. It was the first thing that I participated in personally with young progressives demanding action. And it was just a week after I think the general election. And it was a march that was labeled as the love Trump's hate march. And it was kind of a unity thing. People were upset. People that showed up to the march were upset about someone like Donald Trump becoming our president. And so it was kind of an outlet for people to express some of that disappointment and some of that fear, quite frankly. And so from there, we organized our first board. We had elections. As I said, I joined as a secretary initially. Wasn't exactly sure what this organizing thing was, but I knew I could show up to meetings pretty regularly, take good notes. I'm a communications person. As you mentioned, we worked at the school newspaper Kaleo Hawaii. So I have media experience and so I could do sort of like our social media and email list work and stuff like that. And then the work really sort of pivoted away from electoral stuff into legislative stuff. We sort of reduced our partisan slant. We weren't really associated with the Bernie Sanders campaign after the summer of 2016. But once the 2017 legislature got under way, we really sort of relaunched ourselves as a legislative advocacy organization that worked on bills and tried to organize average citizens, everyday residents of Hawaii, to participate in the legislative process, to submit testimony, to come to office visits, to call their legislators and just tell them their opinion on a given issue, the important issues of the day. And so we really sort of rebranded a little bit and but doubled down on our belief in community organizing. And really the values and the goals didn't really change. It was just kind of the arena that changed went from electoral to legislative. And so we've been doing that ever since. Every year we have a presence at the legislature. Yeah, yeah. So that's what we're doing now. Yeah, I want to go into, Sid, before we get into that, because I do want to get into the policy specifics, because I think you guys are following and influencing some of the most important policies that affect everyday people here. You know, we're coming off of a day after the Iowa caucuses for the 2020 election. So while we're talking about 2016 and Bernie Sanders, we're here four years later. Bernie Sanders has run again, which I think maybe for us as individuals at least is really exciting. And there was a big chaotic disaster for the Iowa caucuses where results weren't posted, they're still not completely posted today, which what are we at now? A day and a half, you know, or, you know, long after it's supposed to be released. So there's a lot of suspicion, there's a lot of crying foul. So what are your top of the line reactions about what happened there? My top of the line reactions are that it's much, I think it's probably much more likely that the app legitimately just doesn't work very well as someone who has dabbled in the sort of the confluence of organizing and technology, trying to find new ways to organize people digitally. I can tell you firsthand that these kinds of apps break all the time. They just sometimes they never work to begin with honestly. And for people, for poll workers and volunteers who are probably a little bit older and maybe not super familiar with app technology to begin with, with mobile app technology. It's also entirely possible that a fix could have been found earlier had the right people been on the ground on taking a look at it. So it's, you know, it's possible that there was some sort of interference. And I think certainly the Buttigieg campaign, which has some sort of connection with the app developer, there's, you know, some kind of payment that was made from his campaign to the app developer. But, but I mean, that could be a mobile app that they were using to Canvas, you know, it could be anything. But so while it's possible, I think the real thing that people need to remember is that there's a paper record. Not only was the app being used, but the Iowa caucus volunteers were collecting ballots by paper as well, based on how people were caucusing. So there is a paper trail and I'm not too worried about it being, I don't think it's the disaster that everyone is kind of going off on on Twitter about it. I think it's probably going to be okay. I last I just checked right before we came on and they're about 60% of the precincts reporting in. So in the next, you know, a couple hours, we should probably know who won. But it's really close. It's neck and neck. So it's really important that they have those paper ballots and double count them, make sure they get the count correct. So I think everything will be okay. Yeah, I guess my conspiracy theories are, you know, some of the issues that happened with 2016 with the DNC, you know, getting involved more heavily than they should have in helping Hillary Clinton get elected. And in some ways sabotaging Bernie Sanders campaign, which led to a lot of progressive voters not participating or voting for third party candidates or even Trump in 2016. So I guess I'm just concerned that things are happening again, even if it is that the results are accurate, the fact that they're delaying it could mean that what definitely means that Bernie and Pete and whoever is ultimately the winner has have lost a significant percentage of the media coverage they would have gotten if the Iowa caucus results were released in a more timely manner. So I guess that's my greatest sadness around it is just that there's candidates, whether I support them or not, have all put in so much work to Iowa specifically because it is the press coverage that comes out of the results that evening that help them gain that momentum and the fact that it's become so confusing, whether it's the technology or not, it just makes me a little bit sad for all the candidates who have put in millions of dollars and thousands and thousands of hours to canvas and campaign there. So that's my feel in Iowa. I hope it's innocent and whatnot, but we'll see. Anyway, so I guess coming into local elections 2020, we know that there's some unique things about Hawaii elections this year that will be brand new. So can you just share a quick overview of that for the average new or existing voters so that they're equipped with that information? Yeah, definitely. I mean, the baseline for getting people involved in the political system is to get them registered to vote. That's number one. So we definitely have been going around to a bunch of different events, some of which your organization has invited us to. So thank you for that, to table and register folks to vote. And yeah, one of the things that I've learned is that despite statewide outreach through the government, a lot of people still don't know about some of the changes that are happening in our electoral system, and they're really good changes. So we're taking it as an opportunity to educate people and would encourage folks to learn about the changes themselves so that they can educate their friends and family too. And the biggest one this election is going to be the change over to all male voting. And that's MAIL, so vote by mail. And basically what that does is it eliminates the precinct level election sites. So like your school cafeterias and public libraries and such will not be open on election day for you to cast ballots in because your ballot will have gotten mailed to you about a month ahead. I want to say maybe three weeks ahead of the actual election date. So the election date is still there, right? It's August 8th this year for the primary November 3rd for the general, pretty sure. And so instead you'll get your ballot mailed to you and you'll be able to fill out your ballot in the comfort of your home, which is great because I think it's really an opportunity to, you know, you look at your ballot and you say, I don't know who these candidates for prosecutor are. I should maybe do some research first. And you have a couple of weeks to look at their websites, to call their campaigns and talk to them if possible, talk to your friends about them, and get a little bit informed so you can make a more educated vote. So I think that's that's going to be really, really nice for people. But you do need to make sure that your address on file with the office of elections is accurate. And you know, you'd have to do that anyway. But there are people who show up to their precinct location and you know, they've moved like just across the street. So their precinct location is the same, but their address is not. And that in the past was not such a huge deal, especially with same day registration, the polling workers could just re register you there on the spot and give you your and give you your ballot. I know that happened to me a couple of times as a student at Manoa, I would or I'd even go to the wrong cafeteria and they would be able to actually basically just pull my ballot format or send me to the right location of the street. The problem this year is that if your address is not correct, you just won't get a ballot. And what they're supposed to be doing is they're supposed to be sending out postcards ahead of time, like well ahead of time, like this like in the next couple of months, I think, to your whatever address you have on file. So you should get this postcard and what they're going to do, but I know people who have so it seems like yeah dispersed. I think I think it's going to be kind of like on a rolling thing. Yeah. But people should be getting them relatively soon, I think. And basically what happens is if you get the postcard and send it back, then they know that they have the right address and it's all prepaid so people can just pop it right back in the mailbox. If they don't get a postcard back from you, they're going to try to they're going to follow up. They're going to say, hey, how come you didn't, you know, send your postcard back. And if your answer is I never got a postcard, then they know that the address might not be accurate and they can check to make sure the rules are correct. So that's supposed to happen. But you know, the easier thing to do would be for folks just to log on to the Office of Elections website and just just put in your current address and make sure that your registration is up to date. So that's the biggest thing is the vote by mail. And then and just to clarify that piece of it, people will the timeline for getting the ballots is about three to four weeks before the election. Is that correct? Yeah, I could try to look up real quick for the actual date is but it's on the Office of Elections. They have a calendar schedule for the election cycle. And one of the dates that they present is the drop date for ballots. So that's the day in which you should start getting ballots. You might get your ballot a couple of days later, because that's just how the mail works. But I want to say it's a couple of weeks ahead of the election three or four weeks ahead. And I just want to share with people that, you know, the mail in voting thing is the intentions are really good. I think there are pros and cons to it. But I actually really want to share this like visual of like, you can have your coffee on your couch with your friends or with your laptop, you have a discussion, do research and really have the time you need. Because I found myself, I'm aware of a few races, but many races are surprising to me. I didn't know there were like 15 races on the ballot sometimes. So I'm doing research in the ballot box, which is just like wasting time. And it's also probably inappropriate to be doing it in that moment. So I really like ballot or like ballot initiatives, you know, like, nobody knows what the ballot initiatives are going to be until they they're in the box looking at it. And then sometimes I'm sitting there like looking at op-eds for and against because it's so vague. So anyway, I think this is like such a great way for people who want to be informed to like get that ballot weeks in advance, have that time with their friends, family, and loved ones to like make these decisions and have these robust discussions. So I'm really optimistic about it. I do think there are some barriers to overcome, but I really recommend and encourage people because Hawaii has a bad rep for being a low voter turnout state to just take the opportunity for the convenience, vote in your pajamas. All you have to do is walk out to your mailbox and go to the Hawaii office of elections website. It's all available online. So you don't even have to leave your house to do any of that or deal with the postcards even. But anyway, I'm feeling really good about that. One other thing about that that I should mention too, just for informational purposes, although the precinct level polling locations will not be open on election day the way they have been in the past, there will be early walk in voting the way that there has been in the past still for about I think for the 10 days leading up to the election like it like it always has been, right? So if you for some reason don't want to send your ballot in by mail or maybe there's some reasons why people just absolutely have to vote in person and cannot vote by mail. The early walking locations are still going to be open. So that's Kappalei and Pamalu Halley about 10 days leading to it. So it is still possible to vote in person is just that you can't go to your local school cafeteria to do it anymore. And most I think for most people that should be fine. I think most people would even prefer that. It may take a little getting used to, but I think overall it should be good. And it'll actually save the state a bunch of money too. So in the long run, so yeah. So that's happening this year. That's happening this election cycle. It's the first time. Can you share also quickly about the presidential preference poll timing? You thought that's mid-April. So is it the same in terms of the mail-in or is it more of an in-person experience again? So that's a little different, but it does use vote by mail as its primary process. So what you're talking about is the presidential preference poll is the Democratic Party's selection process for who will be the nominee for president to go up against Donald Trump. So that process is internal to the Democratic Party. If you are a registered Democrat, then you would be participating in that, but otherwise not so much. But it's interesting because they are using vote by mail. Registered Democrats will get a ballot sent to them as well, but they're also using something called rank choice voting, which is another one of the suite of good government electoral reform initiatives that states are testing out here and there in small batches. So the first one is vote by mail, the first of those. The second, you could say, would be rank choice voting. And what it does is instead of when you get your ballot, normally you pick one candidate for each office. And that's just it, right? Even if there's like five or six people running for it. And with rank choice voting, what happens is you actually get to rank your order of preference. So you say, I think that, let's say, you know, for me, it would be Bernie Sanders, I would put him first. But I can also pick from the other remaining candidates and rank at least up to the top three for the Democratic primary. It'll be the top three. Rank choice voting allows you to rank every single candidate choice, though, from one down to 10, 11, 12, and so on. And it'll still work. The process will still work. So what happens is after everybody has ranked their candidates software program, it can be done manually, but it takes a long time, but a software program, and they've had these for a long time. So they're very reliable. You can test it out for free online. You can, you know, rank your order of lunch preference or something fun like that and test it out. But what happens is each, the ballots are collected and then the process goes through rounds of voting. So the first round, the software looks at everybody's number one choice. And if any one candidate has broken the threshold, then they are declared the winner. But more likely, especially when you have a bunch of candidates running, more likely what happens is nobody is able to break the threshold for victory. And so you have to go to the second round of voting. And so the way a ranked choice voting operates is after that first round of voting, whichever candidate has the fewest number of votes gets eliminated from the election. And the people who voted for that candidate, their second place choices get redistributed, their vote gets redistributed to whoever they picked as their second choice for the second round. So let's say you're supporting Joe Biden. And, you know, as of, like I said, 10 minutes before the show, Joe Biden was not doing super well in Iowa. So let's say he got eliminated in the first round because he didn't have enough votes. The people who did vote for Joe Biden, their votes would get redistributed to maybe Amy Klobuchar, maybe Elizabeth Warren, maybe Bernie Sanders, whoever they put as their second choice. And then in the second round of voting, the process repeats. And once again, whoever has the fewest number of votes after the second round of voting, and that includes the redistributed votes from round one, that candidate gets eliminated as well. And then that candidate's third choice votes get redistributed to the remaining candidates and so on and so forth until there's at least one candidate who has broken the threshold for victory and has declared the winner. So what that does is it allows people to really vote their conscience. You don't have to worry so much about a spoiler effect. You don't have to worry so much about electability. You vote for the person that you think is best, genuinely best because you have a almost sure likelihood that your vote will still count. I guess it's possible that you could pick a loser every single round until the very last person. But that doesn't happen all that often. Most people will end up with their second or third choice if not their first choice. So what you end up with is a candidate that at least most people can live with if not support, if not outright love. And it's just much less likely for unintended consequences of electoral campaigning to happen. And that allows candidates to campaign genuinely and to not worry about spoiling the election and say, I believe in these things, I'm like campaign and not worry about it. And like trying to weave in people from all sides, you know, like it allows them to be more authentic and for people to vote in a way that's not based on fear, but more based on like alignment of values and beliefs. So I think, you know, that the right choice voting, the vote by mail, these are some of the ways in which Hawaii is really leading the way in terms of policy. So it's, it's great that we're moving closer to a more direct democracy. Obviously, there's still some barriers in place, like the electoral college, which puts Hawaii in like a funny position. But I think for April, like, you know, what's unique about Hawaii is that the primaries tend to be more important because we tend to just be a blue state, you know, it's really rare that Republicans went office in Hawaii. So that's just something to know as well for folks who aren't super deeply involved that, you know, the general election is not as significant of an influence, at least for your individual vote, because we tend to swing blue most of the time. So just getting involved in that presidential primary as well as the primaries that are local. So that's April for presidential, and then August for the general election, as well as all the other races that are happening in for our local government. Kind of, just a quick clarification. Yeah. So the, yeah, so the April, the April event is, like I said, Democratic party only, and it is just to, is just to decide who the presidential nominee is. That's all, it's a presidential preference poll. The Hawaii has a primary in August where all the other races are decided. So, you know, Democrats going up against Democrats for state house, for state Senate, and as well as mayor and prosecutor, what it does is it basically just eliminates, unless somebody wins outright with 51% of the vote, it moves on to like an elimination round. So you'd have two candidates, the top two candidates face off in the general and then the generals in November. So it's weird. We have like a weird kind of like three-step system, but only if you're a Democrat or I guess a Republican, the Republicans have their own equivalent process normally, although they canceled it because they're just going to vote for Donald Trump. So they actually don't have one this year, but normally they do. But then there's the primary in August and then the general in November. So it's a little confusing, but I just want to make sure that people understand that the April thing is Democratic Party only and it's just for the president. And then the August primary is, like you said, the real actual election where we're deciding basically what Democrat is going to sit in power because we are such a Democratic state. So that primary is super important. Yeah. And we're coming up on our last minutes. I'm going to have you share last thoughts, but I also just want to share one quick note that there's so many elections in Hawaii that are lost or won by 20 votes, 40 votes, or even closer. It's really, really common because we have a small voter pool. So people who say their vote doesn't matter, your vote really does. And it especially does in April and August. So please just be aware of those dates rather than the November one if you're a Hawaii resident. So yeah, one more minute, share maybe living wage, anything really, really quick that you want. Yeah, sorry, I blathered so much about other stuff. But yeah, there's some really important bills coming through the legislature now that people should look out for and try to support, including there's a bill that would raise the minimum wage. Currently the language is $13 an hour by 2024, which is really just not even close to enough for people to survive on. And it just takes too long. So we're pushing for $17 by 2025. And if people want to support that bill with that particular amendment, they can go to raiseuphawaii.org. So raiseuphawaispelledout.org. And there's a bunch of different actions people can take to get involved. There's a bunch of different research there for people to look at if they have questions about the actual public policy itself. There's also another really good electoral initiative called automatic voter registration, which there's a couple bills going through that that people should really support because if people are automatically registered to vote, they are much more likely to participate. And we've seen evidence of that from states like Oregon. And it's just it would it would make things a lot easier for people to just participate in the process with fewer barriers. And that's that's kind of what YPDA is all about, actually. So we really support that initiative too. Yeah, so follow YPDA Hawaii on Instagram, find them Young Progressive Demanding Action. Thank you Will so much for being on the show. It was really awesome. Maybe we'll have another one of these conversations soon. Thank you. Yeah, sure. That'd be great. Thank you.