Let's Meet in the Middle

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Welcome to beyond you'd why Podcast, where we go beyond just talking about your why and actually helping you discover and then live your why. And so if you're a regular listener, you know that every week I bring on somebody that has one of the nine whys and then we see how their why has played out in their life. And so for today, we're going to be talking about the why of contribute to contribute to a greater cause, make a difference, add value, or have an impact in the lives of other people. People with this why feel compelled to be part of a greater cause. They don't want to be the cause necessarily. They simply want to participate and offer their contribution. They love to support and relish the success of the greater good, the company, the team, or whatever the cause may be. You'll often find them behind the scenes looking for ways to make the world a better place. You may also find them in more of a public forum trumpeting a movement or a message. People with this why are go to people, the ones you look for when you need help with just about anything. They use their time, their money, their energy and their connections to help other people do better. Now today I've got a guest for you I've wanted to have on for quite a long time, but there's a reason I haven't been able to get him on here. And let me read you his bio. Now. He showed up, he's one of my really good friends and he showed up with his bio and it's about two pages and he's like, yeah, here's my bio, go ahead and read it. I said, you know, that's about a 10 minute read. And so I'm going to read you just the beginning of it and then we'll talk about some of the things that are on his bio because it is very fascinating the path that he's been on. His name is Jeff Apodaca. He is the president of 47 LLC. It's a venture group incubating and developing new investments in business in New Mexico and this region. Businesses such as Fathom New Mexico or High Desert Hemp. He co founded and serves as president. Fathom is a hemp seed farming processing extracting company in the explosive new industry. He's the Co founder and partner of Go Station, a new green technology powering electric vehicles. He also advises the APO Action foundation, which stands for Advancement, Progress and Opportunity. It's a non profit group working with businesses, social and political groups to advance economic and educational opportunities for New Mexico. He launched, produced and co hosts a weekly TV show called let's Meet in the Middle, bringing political and business leaders together, discussing ideas that bring leaders together, not divide them. The goal is to work together to grow New Mexico. He is also a former gubernatorial candidate in the state of New Mexico. Just last year. Well, in 2017, 2018, there's a whole lot more I could read and there's a whole lot more we're going to get into, but I want to bring him on. Jeff, welcome to the podcast.

You know, it's not that long. You just, you're just a slow reader.

That one is two pages you gave me.

That is not two pages.

This one's one pages. But that one's two pages.

Yeah, but, no, but. Well, it's the same bio, by the way, but thank you very much. It's great to be here.

So you now host a TV program. It's called what? Let's Meet in the Middle.

Let's Meet in the Middle. You know, as you said, I ran for governor. You know, we moved back here, gosh, 11 years ago, Jackie and I. I'm from Santa Fe and My wife's from Al Quirky. I lived in New York and LA in the media business for 27 years. And so we really had no intention of going into office. And one of the things that our political system is so divided now that during the campaign I would go talk across the board on everybody. And one of the big issues, I'm a Democrat. One of the big issues some of the Democrats had within our party was that I was literally campaigning at Republican events. I was campaigning, I would go on conservative talk radio and talk about issues and how we can solve New Mexico's problems. And so I got pushback from my own party as a Democrat. And so I thought that's exactly what we need to do right now. Eric Strauss, who's my co host, he's on conservative radio. Actually, him and I got together and I said, you know, we should do a show called let's Meet in the Middle, where you bring your right side, I bring the left side. Let's talk about New Mexico issues and how we can solve the problem where sometimes in the middle, where your grandfather, your father, my dad, who was a former governor, worked with both sides to get things done. And politically it's so polarizing. So our TV show, let's meet in the middle. We talk about issues and the goal is we bring both sides on roundtable discussions. But by the end of the show, it's like we talk about crime. Okay, what are the solutions? Everybody's complaining about it, but what are the solutions? And that's really what our show tries to do every week.

Let's go back, let's bring everybody. Let's let people get to know you. Because there's a lot more to you than just what you're doing currently. Because you were. You grew up in Santa Fe and your father was the governor at that time.

I was born in Las Cruces and my dad became a state senator in the late 20s. And in his late 20s and 30s, at 40, he won for governor. So I was probably about 11. And so we moved to Santa Fe when was 11. So I kind of say I grew up down south and I matured up north.

Okay, so you. Then athletics became a big deal for you?

Oh, that's all it was. I mean, I played football in college. I was a pretty good high school football player and so where'd you play football? Played at Santa Fe High. We won state my senior year. And then I actually got recruited to go to SMU back in the early 80s in Dallas. Played there for a couple years, came in as a running back and realized there's two future hall of Famers that were sophomores, Eric Dickerson and Craig James. So I played there for a couple years, ended up transferring back to New Mexico and I finished my career here and actually moved me over the defense. And I started my last three years on defense. And so I played football and athletics was really my whole career.

Hold on, I'm not gonna let you off the hook here.

Okay.

Because you have one of. It fascinates me because you have one of the all time best plays that they show on espn. It's one of the most amazing plays on espn. What happened?

Well, I think I was a junior, it was 84 and we were playing BYU, happened to be on ESPN national TV, and I anticipated to jump over the center on a field goal and block the field goal. And I think the center realized what I was doing. So as I jumped over the center, he didn't hike the ball. I landed right in front of the snapper, right in front of the holder. And to be cute, I thought they were going to call me offsides to be cute. I jumped back over the line and didn't touch anybody. And back then, there was no encroachment rule. The rule was if you jumped over, if you jumped off sides, but you got back before the ball was snapped, you weren't offsides. Well, no one ever anticipated someone to jump over the line. And so I kind of started arguing with the refs about it. And all of a sudden the refs are like, well, why did you call the flag? And they're like, well, because the offensive line moved. And they said, well, the offensive line moved after he was already back. And I'm touching. The rule was, as long as you didn't touch anybody. So they actually called BYU for legal procedure. And I got back, but they changed the rules pretty much the next year. If you encroach, the first rule was if you encroach by jumping, you're automatically offsides. But now, as you know, across the board, you encroach within that line, you're automatically off site. So they. They called it the Apodaca rule. After I graduated, never really knowing it was that big of a deal. And then, you know, ESPN ran it, and then it was like, play of the year, play of the decade, play of the century. It's always kind of a fun thing, but it's been 35 years, so it's. You know, the younger generation just doesn't even know what's. What it is. But every once in a while, like you say, every once in a while it does come up.

So for those of you that are listening, that are not real big into football, you know, when everybody lines up to kick a field goal, Jeff jumped over everybody and then realized the guy hadn't kicked the ball yet. So he jumped all the way back over. And then the player for BYU moved, got a penalty. And they made him move it back, Correct?

Correct.

Did he miss it after that, or did he.

No, he made the field goal. He made it.

But it was just. But it still was one of those great plays. Okay, so then you went to college. You went to played football in college, graduated no pro career for you. Off to where?

Well, actually, in college, I wanted to. You know, I knew I'm only 5 8, so, you know, I could jump really high. I was really fast, but I knew my limitations. I had a couple offers to come to many camps to try out, but at the same time, I had studied broadcasting, and I was going to be a sports broadcaster. I wanted to get in the broadcasting world on the front of the camera. But I realized very. What intrigued me more was the business side of It. So I actually studied broadcast management, they called it. I actually studied the business side of broadcasting and I interned at the local NBC affiliate here in Albuquerque and got a job right with them right out of school doing really sales for a couple of years. And then I was in New York at the age of 26. And I always thought it'd be cool to work. You know, New York is the hub of network television. And so I was there for business kind of pleasure. And I basically cold called all the networks and somehow got into the president of cbs. And he was so impressed with me, in a matter of 30 minutes, he introduced me to two other people and they offered me a job at the age of 26 to go work for CBS Sports in New York. So, you know, how can you not turn that? You can't turn that down. And that really, you know, that started my career at the national level. And I worked for CBS for 10 years, New York, LA. And then they moved me out to LA and then I got into the entertainment side. And then by doing that, the Internet started. That's how old I am. I remember when the Internet started and the Internet started, and it was around 99, I think it was. AOL recruited me to basically launch their entertainment division. And I did that for a few years. And then we're golf partners and we play a lot of golf. And my wife Jackie, sometimes she gets mad I play too much golf. And when she does, I just say one word, Univision. Because I met the president of Univision on the golf course. We brainstormed ideas for them, and next thing you know, within a month, I'm hiring. They hired me to roll out all their new media. And I was with Univision in different roles for 16 years. And then we moved back here, gosh, about 11 years ago, basically left LA, came back home to raise our kids. We have twin boys that are 11. And we got back here. And as you live here and I live here, our State is ranked 50th pretty much in everything. And I was being encouraged to run for political office. I was being encouraged to run for mayor for other roles. But then I wasn't encouraged when I said, well, if I'm going to run, let's run for governor and try and change the whole state. And so that's when I decided to run for office.

So I've always wanted to ask you this. I saw you run for governor. I saw you go from a buddy playing golf to becoming a gubernatorial candidate. And essentially you disappeared for two years. I didn't see you hardly at all for two years.

That's pretty accurate.

What is it like to run for governor? What's it like to go into a small town and have people hitting you with questions? What's it like to have people having hope in you and wanting you to succeed? And obviously, and not obviously, but you didn't win. You made it to the end, but you didn't win. What's all that like? Because I'll never do that.

Well, it's funny, it's frustrating, it's energetic, it's exciting. But keep in mind, too, to the people that are listening to this is. I grew up as a kid in politics. My dad was a state senator and then was governor, and so I campaigned out in the campaign trail with him. My wife calls me the social butterfly. You know, I'm one of those guys that in the entertainment business, everybody knew me. I went to all the parties, I networked, you know, so to me, that energizes me so. But the biggest reason, and it goes back to my why, to contribute the biggest reason I ran. And if I didn't do the why with you and Jackie, I don't know if I'd have ever run for governor. I always knew I wanted to give back. I always knew I wanted to help people. I've always done that. But, you know, when you're out there campaigning, the reason I ran more than anything else is because what I do is. And I guess you look at my why, it's why, how what, you know, I make sense of things and then find better ways. And I've always done that, whether I was playing football, where I was a team captain, and stuff like that. So I'd actually created a white sheet of how we can solve New Mexico's issues. And I peddled that around for 10 years to politicians. And the biggest issue is our politicians really just don't understand business, don't understand some of the things. They worry more about their political careers than doing things. So it was really, for me, it was like, let's go out and talk about the issues and talk about solutions. And if people like my ideas and solutions, then they'll maybe like me, and then I can help change the state. And so, you know, it's hard. I mean, I've never done anything like it before. But I knew it was really actually harder on Jackie because she didn't anticipate it. There were times you got booed, There were times you were welcomed. The machine was against you because I'm the new guy coming on, and I Would literally hear, you know, these other guys have put 20, 30 years into the party. Why are we going to support you? So, I don't know. I guess I'd have to think about it. But, you know, I'm used to giving speeches. I'm used to talking to people. I've been on platforms, but really I had solutions. So for me to sit and, like, I would literally sit in front of groups for three hours and take questions and talk about ideas and solutions. And so to me, it wasn't that hard. It's draining. And I'd be like you said, I was gone for two years and I was on the road a lot. But. And there's times you're sitting there with three people at a coffee shop or you're on TV and a debate. But really the key is you want to get out and talk to as many people and really sell yourself and sell what you're doing. And there's days it's energetic. The worst thing is, I'll tell you right now, it's call time. The worst, worst thing. And I'm really good. In fact, some of the people that ran my campaign said they've never seen anybody raise money and be on a phone call asking for money, asking for support. And they said I was a natural at it. But it's very. I mean, literally, I'd spend eight hours a day calling people, asking for contributions. And that's the hardest part, because you have to raise money to compete. And I was the new guy. So in a short, I guess to summarize it, when you're talking to people, when you're visiting with people, and you see their hope and you see their energy towards you, it's uplifting. When you sit and you sit in a room by yourself or with one person as an assistant, you know, calling 300 people a day asking for $5,000, it's draining. It's draining. And if we could take that element out of politics, it would really make it a lot better for everybody.

Highest of the highs, lowest of the lows, what were they?

Well, the highest of the high. Well, the lowest of the lows was losing that night. Coming in second. Right. But coming out of the gate the first time, the highest of the highs was, I guess again, I'm all about winning and I'm all about giving back. But I guess, like, when you talk to people specifically in our rural communities, because I try and tell people, you know, 50% of the population lives within 45 minutes of Albuquerque. The rest lives outside our rural communities. And they see no hope. So when I was there talking to them, the highs of the highs is when you would talk to people and they loved your ideas, they saw hope, they saw opportunities right where they didn't see that before. I would say those were the highs of the highs. The lows of the lows were basically, you know, you have your good days and bad days just like anything else. And politics is tough. Politics is tough. I guess the lowest part was the last thing my father told me before I announced was, win or lose, you're going to find out who your true friends are. Which we did. It's complete factual. We really did.

What do you mean by that?

Because people always want to say or support you, want to say you're friends, but then when it comes down to it, friends support you, your loyal friends support you because they believe in you. But there's people that were. That would say they're your friends or that would say, hey, we're going to support you. And then they would literally backstab you, talk about you, go to the other side or, you know, things like that. So I believe in loyalty. I believe in loyalty. The low of the lows, though, for me was really not me. It was really Jackie. I saw wear and tear on Jackie. And in politics, my opponents started rumors about us. My opponents started. We, all of a sudden we came out of the gate, you know, no one knows. Apodaca. Next thing you know, we're in second place, right? And gaining. So rumors started, you know, that the opposition started rumors against us. And again, growing up in politics, and I've always been involved, whether I lived in LA or New York, I've always been involved in the political system. I've just always been behind the scenes. And so it was almost like the machine that doesn't want to support you. The Democratic Party, that's the machine. They're supporting other candidates. They're actually the ones that actually tear you down the most. They're the ones that, I mean, I went to.

I mean, your own party was tearing.

You down, your own party was tearing us down because they had loyalties to other candidates or, hey, we've been supporting this person, it's her turn. I mean, that's what I heard. I mean, my whole campaign was turned to Mexico around and, you know, wait your turn. Those were phrases I used on the campaign, because those are phrases that literally came my way. Jeff, it's not your turn. And actually, the way I decided to run is the party. And some of the party leaders that are running the party today, they actually came to me, wanted me to run for mayor of Albuquerque. And it got so serious that candidates that are mayors now or ran came to me and said, look, if you run with your background and your support, and if they support you, we have no shot beating you. My philosophy was, I'm not running for political office to start a political career. I wanted to make changes. I wanted to see. I've worked around the country. I've seen how other cities, other states, other politicians have changed their state for the better, and we're not doing it here in New Mexico. So I just really wanted to make those contributions and changes, make those changes and get out. That's really all I cared about. I didn't care about political careers. And, you know, I did learn one thing. It's like when I made it very clear that I wasn't doing this for political gain or to protect the party. That's when the party turned on me the most. And not everybody in the party, but some of the progress. I'm not a progressive socialist. I'm a very moderate, conservative Democrat. They used to call us JFK Democrats. Right. And so I saw within the party, my own party, some of the leadership on the progressive socialist side really turn on me.

Yeah, I'm sure that was tough to see and feel, all the work you put in. That, to me seems like you have to have the right. You have to have thick skin for what you went through. You do don't have that. I know as soon as somebody boos me, I'm okay, I'm out. I don't want to do it, but.

Well, and they're booing you because here's an example, you know, at three progressive summits that one of my. Keep in mind the congresswoman who's now governor, she refused. There were 14 gubertorial summits or debates. She only showed up to two. So she was leading the poll. So she stayed away from us all. So it was hard for us to create the conversation. But the ones that she did show up, one of the questions was, you know, are you willing to go away from fracking? And if you know, for your listeners, New Mexico, 42% of our economy is the oil and gas industry. Now, I would say we can do it better, we can do it faster, we can do it cleaner, we can protect the water, we can protect rights. But it's 350,000 jobs in the state of New Mexico with a population of 2 million people. It's 42% of our economy in the last two years, all over the press. Oil and gas has generated over $1.1 billion of surpluses annually for our state. So that's a lot of money for the state of Mexico. So I would literally get booed because the progressive socialists within our party, which control the party now, literally would boo me or set the stage to shame me on stage because I was the candidate that was going to protect the economy, was going to protect economic growth in New Mexico, at the same time protecting our environment. We can do both, right? I also came out with a plan to invest a billion dollars into renewable energies. So I laughed about it. But sure enough, the person that won, she never addressed it. She never answered the questions. She would tell cute little stories. But no one's going away from oil and gas, and we're not stopping fracking, and we have reserves to the, you know.

So have you felt politics to be a fair fight?

Oh, no, not at all. Not at all. But I didn't expect it to be a fair fight. And I knew I had an uphill battle and I tried. And I think a lot of people thought, like, they, you know, in fact, the candidate that won, they came to me, they wanted me to run for lieutenant governor, they wanted me to run for mayor, they wanted me to even run for Congress. They tried to get me to move back to Cruces to run for CD2, or they wanted me to run.

Wait your turn, right?

Yeah, wait my turn or go to another position and we'll back you there and then work your way up and you can run for governor in eight or 10 again. If I was in my 20s and 30s, that might be an opportunity. But I wasn't doing it because I wanted a political career. I wanted to do it as. When we were kids, our parents, generations, our grandparents, generations. New Mexico actually had term limits. And so when my dad became governor, he could only serve for four years. And you had to leave. And so my dad tells the story. He knew that once they got in, they had four years to fix things. And if you do things right and you structure things right, it can actually affect the economy and affect your state for 40 years. If you do it wrong, it can affect it for 40 years the wrong way. There is a reason we're 50th. A lot of the changes, a lot of the things that we've done in the state of New Mexico has hurt business, has hurt economic growth. And again, you have a flourishing economy. You don't have drug abuse, you don't have poverty, you don't have 50th in education, you look at the economies that are booming, Colorado, California, Arizona, Texas, all around us, and they have 1.82% unemployment. They don't have a lot of crime, they don't have a lot of homelessness, because everybody's working and it drives the economy. Here we have the highest. The second highest unemployment in the country, even though it's gotten better, still the second highest unemployment in the country. We're in 50th in education, we're in 47th in job creation. And so we're always at the bottom of the list. In the 70s and 80s, it wasn't that way. We'll never be number one or number two, but we were as high as 26th, 27th. I mean, even when Bill Richardson was governor, we were ranked in the mid-20s in job creation because he saw things and really invested into job opportunities.

So I don't want to make this a political conversation, but I wanted to let. I wanted to ask Jeff the question about what it's like to run for governor, because I know him well enough to know that the reason he did it was not because he wanted a political career. It was so that he could give back. And it was so obvious. You left a great job, you left the easy life. You could have just wrote it out, no problem. And then you jumped into something that's like a pot of boiling water, and you took all this pressure on. And I saw it. I saw it for two years. You just, on the road, disappeared. And I don't know how many people would do that.

Unfortunately, in today's world, not many. Yeah, I mean, the grinds. And there's people that have more resources or finances. You know, I'll be very frank. It's public record. I mean, my wife and I put a half a million dollars, our own money, into a campaign we do well, but we're not wealthy wealthy. So that was a lot of money for us. But I felt like I had to do that because I just didn't see our political leaders, who are my friends, who are people I grew up with, I didn't see them doing the right things. They're doing the right things for their political careers today. If you look at the political leaders, they're pushing platforms that the socialist, progressive side of our party is pushing, but it's not for the greater cause. It's not for the greater good.

Yeah.

And what frustrates me is working in la, working in New York, working around the country in the entertainment business, I've seen opportunities. New Mexico has so much opportunity to grow that we third wealthiest state in the country. And people say, what are you talking about? Because New Mexico is a poor state. We're not poor. We literally have $26 billion of investment funds that we invest into other states to grow those funds. But we invest nothing in New Mexico. We don't invest in small business. We have a tax code that literally hurts small business. We incentivize big companies to move here, but then we don't. We, you know, we don't work with our universities to train New Mexicans for those careers or those jobs. So that's the biggest reason companies don't move here, because they're like, wait a minute, I can go to Arizona. And Arizona State has, you know, 71,000 students going to school there. And you're training them for 12 different industries. Literally, they can move their industries there and have a pipeline of workers.

So we could do better? For sure. We could definitely do that. Yes. Well, let's change subjects here because we left out a big part of your story, and that was cancer.

Yep. 40 years ago.

Tell everybody what happened.

So I was a senior in high school, in high school and playing football, getting recruited to go play Division 1 football. Our state was ranked number one in the state. I was the leading running back in the state my junior and senior year. So, you know, pretty confident I was going to go to college, pretty confident I was going to go play in the old Southwest Conference because that's where I wanted to play. And played six games my senior year. We were ranked number one in the state. We were undefeated, kind of beating everybody. And I woke up one morning and couldn't go to the restroom. And I was slowing down. I was sluggish. I remember at certain games when it was really hot in the fall, I was getting fatigued. I would throw up. And I just always felt tired and sluggish. I didn't know what was going on. And so sure enough, I had a rare sarcoma, the soft muscle that embedded in my body. And my soft muscle and embedded. It was embedded in the prostate. So the press called it prostate cancer, but it really wasn't that. But I was the ninth person in the world to ever have my type of tumor. It was fast growing, so we caught it early, thank God. But basically, football went away. They told me I'd never play again. I spent two years of chemotherapy and radiation from New Mexico. We went to MD Anderson because Dr. Jaffe was the only person in the country that had ever dealt with this type of cancer before. And knock on Wood and praise the Lord Jesus that, you know, 40 years later, I'm still here. So I tell people all the time it was two years of misery, but I wouldn't change a thing. You know, I missed out on playing in the state championship game. Absolutely. But the doctor said I'd never play football again. Proved them wrong, Came back and played college football. I've used that to be able my story helping, you know, me going through cancer. I've actually been able to help and reach out and touch more people doing that. In 1983, I came back in 81. I got sick in 79. So I came back in 81, you know, went to SMU. They stayed with me, went to SMU to try and get back on the football team or get on the football team, which I did. But in 1983, the American Cancer Society. I did, like a little video here. One of my class. It was actually funny. One of my class projects studying broadcasting. When I transferred back here in 83, 84, I had to do a class project, and I did a class project how to help kids with cancer. That was my class project. I did this whole video thing. And back then, you know, it's 40 years ago. Back then, when they told me I didn't have cancer anymore, they never really told me that. There's a word I don't even know comprehend what the word means. Remission. I have no idea what that means. That word means. I don't use that word. It's either you're cured or you're not. You know, remission means it's hiding somewhere and it might come back to me. It's either I'm cured or I'm not. But I remember talking to the doctors and saying, you know, what are my chances? They said, well, we're 80% sure the cancer won't come back in 10 years. I go, well, what happens after 10 years? They're like, we don't know. In 1979, 1980, they never had any patients that had survived longer than 10 years of cancer. So they might cure you here, but chances were you're going to get cancer in the next 10 years and die. So really, our generation is the first generation to survive longer than 10 years from the treatments they took. So I kind of just laughed about it. So I don't use that word, remission. And so it's either I'm cured or not. And so I've looked at it like I've been cured since 1981. But in 83, 84, I did this project in school, one of my projects about how to reach out to kids and help kids, because I was a teenager and I was in pediatrics. And so this 17 year old's hanging out with a bunch of 7 year olds. So, you know, and then the other people that have cancer in their 30s, so teenagers. I never felt like I was part of anybody. I felt like I was on an island by myself. And it was very lonely. And it wasn't until Nancy Bodleson, a dear friend of the family's who had survived, came back from Denver, was going to medical school and her. And I sat down and I was struggling mentally with it. But it wasn't until Nancy Bodleson and I. Nancy and I sat down and talked in Santa Fe. She was home visiting. And I finally sat there and said, wow, there's another survivor. There's somebody that understands what I'm going through. Because even that I had the prayers and the support of friends, right, and family and tremendous support and tremendous love. I still felt like I was all by myself. Because no one really knows what it feels like. No one knows the chemotherapy taste. No one knows the burns of radiation. No one knows what it's like to be a 17 bald and lost 38 pounds and lose your scholarship to go play Division 1 football, right. And be told never to play football again. And so I felt like I was on an island. So when I got cured, I went back to college. I said, that will never happen again to another teenage kid. So in 83, I did this project at UNM, basically saying, how can we help kids that are going through cancer? It turns out the American Cancer Society got a hold of that. They played it, and in 1983, they came and asked me to go speak at the state at the national convention in New Orleans. So I went and spoke to 2,000 people. And the most amazing thing that happened when I walked off that stage, I was the last speaker of the night. When I walked off that stage, you'd have thought I was a rock star. I literally got bombarded by parents. And what I heard was, I now know my kids have a chance. Right, Sorry. Gosh, sorry about that. So it really hit me where all of a sudden my story not only helps kids, but helps parents know that their kid will survive. From that moment on, it was time to get back and tell my story. Not because I want my story out there, but to give hope to people. I remember being in bed, going through chemo, and I would see a story of an athlete that overcame this and that would give Me, Hope. That's really what I started to do. And then I got involved with this organization called Cancer Mount. Cancer Mount. And it was really recovered patients talking to patients. But at the time they had no one in the program. And you know, keep in mind, I was like 23, 24. So they had no one in the program. So I actually spent the next five or six years on the off season just working with high school kids around the country, around New Mexico, helping them. And then I, you know, on the off season, I, in college, I traveled speaking at conventions or speaking to groups about there is hope, there is success. Look at me, right? And I've been doing that ever since. And then back in 1999, I guess it was around 2000, Jackie and I, we basically started a foundation here because we lived in LA and we were doing things in New York, we're doing things in la, but it was time, like, okay, we're in a financial area, we're in a financial secured area in our lives where New Mexico needs help. We're going to these, like, you know, we go playing a golf tournament for the cancer society in LA, and literally they'd raised $3 million at a golf tournament. You come to New Mexico, they might raise 20 grand. So we actually turned our resources living in LA, we turned our resources back to New Mexico and said, even that we live in la, let's get back to the kids of New Mexico. So we came back here and started a foundation here. And it was tied to my 20th anniversary of surviving cancer. And we had a big party. Bunch of Hollywood buddies of mine came in. We had over 550 people. And what I learned at the time, and I'll summarize it really quick, is by that time I was at aol. I had left cbs, I was at aol. I was in shock because what upset me more when I went through treatment, being a teenager, there was nothing to do in the hospital but take your treatment, read a magazine and go home or watch soap operas. That was really it. Technology really wasn't around. Was shocked. 20 years later, pretty much in every hospital, that was the same thing going on. So we came back here and we pitched the idea to the children's hospital and the cancer center, and we raised $1.5 million. And we built out the multimedia center. We built out programs. We built out programs for the kids. So when the kids are in the hospital, they have a computer center, a multimedia center, they have a movie room, we have pizza night. So we do all this stuff and we create an Endowment, now that's funded. So a lot of people will give money, which is awesome, but then they leave. And then all of a sudden, year two, year three, year four, there's no funds. So we made sure not only did we build out a multimedia center and start these programs, but we created a scholarship fund and an endowment fund to make sure those programs are run for at least 20 years. So we're very blessed on that.

You know, I've heard you talk about that multimedia center for years, but I didn't even know what it was. I never knew the story behind the multimedia center. I bet you most people don't know that at all. Most people don't know any of this about you. They saw the governor's son running for governor. That was what they saw pretty much.

And you would hear like, you know, he thinks he should be governor, and my opponents use it against me. He's just running for governor. Yeah, but you're right. You and I sat down and you helped me with my why. And we felt like we came up with a pretty good message. And then things get crazy. You don't see me. And I have a messaging team that thinks they know what they're doing better. And I think you said it the best when I had you on my TV show was like, no one really got to know who you were.

Yeah, it was all about, here's my solution, solution, solution, solution. And who is this guy?

Right?

What's the story behind the guy? Why is he sitting there? Why am I listening to this guy? And that's why, for me, I really wanted to have you on here because your story is so much more about the rich kid from Santa Fe whose father was the governor, who wants to now be governor because it's his time to be governor. That is so far from the truth of who you are. And I saw it, but the story never really came out right.

I would probably agree with that. And I think if. And I'm not sure if I'll ever run again, but I'm getting encouraged to run again, especially now. You know, I mean, here we have surpluses and our legislators want to raise our taxes and the economy's still struggling. So I don't know if I'll ever run again, but if I do, I will tell you. We joke about simplification. There was a couple of guys on your podcast earlier about simplify, and I can't remember one of the guys names, but I remember thinking like, okay, that's the guy that's going to do my messaging. He can Simplify, because that's what he does in his world. Right. I can't remember your guest names, but that's what he did. He would simplify. And he works with companies to simplify their messages. And. And I think you and I have talked about that.

Yeah.

You always come up with better ways. Right. Because that's your why. Mine is to contribute for the greater cause. But I also. My how and what is also to make sense of things and find better ways to do things. And so that's what I do really well. But then I've always kind of, you know, I use. I tell people like, you know, I was successful in the entertainment business because I built a team to make sure the team was successful, not me.

I saw you many times go to bat for your team. You didn't go go to bat for your team to get more for you. You would go to bat for your team to get more for them, get them a raise, get their lifestyle up. It was never, hey, give me this money. I remember that because you were talking about one of the first things you did when you moved back here and took over the media company here is got everyone around you, their wages up.

Well, what amazed me was New Mexico, because, keep in mind. So I took a step down from corporate to move back home. But in the meantime, I took a kind of a lateral move and ran all the stations of property, 77 of them. Texas West, Right?

Yeah.

And so when I came back here, there was 43 employees, right. It was less than 50 employees. Some of my markets have 250 employees. This one was 43. But what I noticed very quickly was New Mexico, like I'd never seen this before. Like, I built companies from scratch. I built divisions from scratch to 3, 4, or 500 people. I had never been to a place where the turnover happened almost every three to five, six months. And if you don't know business, it's actually harder and more resources and more expensive to train people and turn them over. What I was noticing really quickly, specifically in our newsroom, in our production room, and not really the executive level, but the working level. Within three to five months, I realized we had become the training facility for the entertainment business here in New Mexico, because people would come here, then they realized, holy cow, I'm getting paid minimum wage. And then they'd go to the other stations. Yep. And so what I did was. And it took me a couple of years, it took me about 18 months to fight corporate. But what I learned was a third. A third of my employees were making Minimum wage. And one of my employees literally had. He wasn't the greatest employee in the world. He worked from 3 to 11 o' clock at night. And when I first got there, other managers, like, we got to fire him. We got to fire him. So as I dug into it, well, he's always on his computer. Well, he's always falling asleep. And so I started looking at it and I'm like, okay, he comes to work at 3. He's one of our engineers. He comes with master control people. He comes to work at 3, he leaves at 11, 12 o'. Clock. And he's willing to work weekends, right? So actually he works more than you guys give him credit for. Why is he always on his computer? What I found out was he's a photographer on the weekends. So the only time he has to do his photography editing is when there's some downtime, when he's, when they're, you know, when the shows are running. So that's what he was doing. Why was he falling asleep sometime? Because I found out he also had a job from 7am to 2pm, would go home for 30 minutes, shower, have lunch and then come to the job. So he was actually working from 7am to 11pm in two jobs, then his photography job. So really you guys are saying he's a bad worker. He has three jobs because he was getting paid minimum wage. So what I said was, okay, we're going to give you a living wage. We're going to get you up to about 14, 15, $18 an hour, well above minimum wage. That allowed him to quit his day job, his morning job. You can still do your weekend job. I don't really care. Just don't do it here at work when you're at work. Well, he came in at 3 o', clock, so now he can do his computer work in the morning. Right. And all of a sudden he became a great employee. But my point was, he's not a bad employee. It's just we were paying him where he needed to survive on other jobs. So I remember about two years into it, we're at our board meeting and our COO walks over to me and says, you know, we've noticed something where Albuquerque had the highest turnover in any of our markets in the country for years. And within two years, it's now has the least amount of turnover in the country. What have you done different? And I started laughing. I said, well, maybe they just like my management style, I don't know. But to be honest with you, we're paying them competitive Pricing and the other markets you got that I didn't report to, you guys are struggling. So to go back to your story, that was a long story. But to go back to your story is stop that flow of people leaving because we have to pay people. And again. And once we did that, our ratings went up, our production went up, the whole team started netting. We made $2 million more a year for the company because the production went up. And all of a sudden, out on the street, we had people coming to work for us. Now they wanted to come work for us where we looked as a sweatshop. They don't pay you. All of a sudden, we became the place like, everybody wants to go work for apodoc. Everybody wants to go work for that team because it's a good place to work now. Yeah.

So if you're listening to this, you probably have heard over and over and over how Jeff wants to make a difference, wants to create value, wants to contribute to a greater cause, wants to be part of something bigger than himself. And he's done it over and over and over throughout his entire life. He is a perfect example of contributing to a greater cause. And that's why we really desperately needed you as the governor. And hopefully, I don't even want to ask you the question, but hopefully you'll run again.

My answer to that always is, it's God's plan. I'm a very faithful man. It's in God's plan. If it's meant to be, it'll be right now. I'm. Now I'm starting a new industry. Oh, yes, the hemp industry. Again, going back to. I was looking to invest. I mean, you and I were talking about. We put an investment group together. Let's invest into the hemp industry. I think it's going to be exciting. Well, as I was doing the investigation of where we should invest, I noticed very quickly the rural communities, the farming communities that have struggled for years, here's an opportunity for them. They needed help to get it to the market. And so that's really what I started our company for, is how we can help the farmers grow the best hemp products, the raw products, and now get it to the market and the farmers make more money, will be successful, and then hopefully grow this new industry for New Mexico to bring opportunities for them.

So what's the name of your hemp company?

It's called Fathom New Mexico. Fathom New Mexico. And we have a small partnership out of Colorado. And what we're doing is we're working with Farmers to grow hemp, the raw product. We then harvest it, manufacture for them, process it for them, and then we sell it and get it to the market. Market to order over 87 different buyers and extractors around the country, helping keep.

New Mexico farmers profitable during this whole thing. Instead of stripping everything away from the farmer, you make it a win, win, win for everybody.

For everybody. And keep in mind the people that don't know New Mexico, it's about 12 to 15% of our economy. It used to be 20, 25% of our economy. And the rural communities don't have big industries there. So the rural communities really depend on agriculture, ranching and farming. A lot of these communities have really been struggling. So the hemp plant grows very well in New Mexico, goes well in dry climates, goes well in different altitudes. So this could be a new agricultural crop for struggling farmers. So that's our goal, is how do we help them grow the best? And then, look, we all want to make money, but how do we help them grow the best? And New Mexico becomes the best hemp producer in the country. Like we are with green chili, like we are with pecans.

You seem, you know, based upon everything we've heard here, you're like the perfect person to bring this to the world, to bring New Mexico hemp to the rest of the US and the world, if that's possible.

Well, we hope. I mean, that's, that's the goal. I mean, that's the goal. So, you know, we're good position right now. We've helped 12 farmers this year. We have 27 farmers signed up for next season. We're in multiple conversations with some of the largest food manufacturing companies in the world. Basically we're pitching them, let New Mexico provide cbd. And for your listeners don't understand. It's not cannabis, it's not marijuana, it's the hemp plant. It still has the CBD oils that are health benefits for you, but it doesn't have any thc, the medicine in it, that or the ingredient that gets you high. So I always tell people hemp is the non alcoholic beer of beer, right? But it has the same CBD medical products, plus the fiber in the plant. You can make 2,500 different products. So the goal is the hemp plant. Not only is there medical benefits to it, there's fiber, there's feed, there's things you can make from it too. So it could be a major industry for the state.

So if people are listening to this and they're interested in hemp with you who would you like, have contact you and how should they contact you?

Well, they can go to fathomnm.com or they can find us on Facebook at fathom and it's F a t h o m fathom nm or just look for me on Facebook or on social media. Or you can call 505-309-0839 and that's my cell phone and they can reach me there.

Who would you like to have reach you?

Farmers, extractors or buyers that want to buy the hemp product and then farmers who want to really grow the business. You know, we come in and help the farmers grow and get it to the market and harvest. So we're looking for both sides. We're looking for farmers to help them grow, make a great product. And then basically on the sales side, extractors and people, food product manufacturers that want to put it in their foods, want to put it in their CBD oils and their medicines to get it across the board.

Awesome. Jeff, thank you so much for being here. I've been wanting to do this a long time.

I know we could go forever, but, Gary, thank you so much. I really appreciate it.

Have a great day.

You too.

Sam.