What is Political Leadership in an Age of Polarization with Larry Roberts

Embark on a thought-provoking journey through the realm of political leadership with Larry Roberts of the Sorensen Institute for Political Leadership at UVA. Our discussion cuts through the heart of today's partisan divisions, shedding light on the institute's mission to shape leaders who embody trust, respect, and the art of civil dialogue. As we navigate the complex challenges that Virginia's unique political landscape presents, Larry offers invaluable perspectives on fostering consensus and tailoring solutions to meet the distinct needs of diverse communities. His insights remind us that effective governance is not about one-size-fits-all answers but rather about understanding and addressing the nuanced demands of local regions.

In a political era defined by narrow election margins and policy extremes, our talk with Larry Roberts reveals the public's craving for leaders who transcend party lines in pursuit of real-world solutions. Hear how the Sorensen program champions this call by molding a new vanguard of ethical, cooperative policymakers. With anecdotes of Sorensen alumni influencing Virginia's political tapestry, this episode illustrates the profound impact that a foundation built on shared values can have in creating a more harmonious and effective political climate. The conversation also emphasizes the personal commitment to bipartisanship as a catalyst for meaningful discourse and policymaking that truly serves the electorate.

This episode takes us to the convergence of ethics, history, and free speech in the public sphere. Tackling the contentious debates over critical race theory and the ethics of controversial campus speakers, we explore the significance of including a spectrum of historical perspectives in educational settings. By examining partnerships like that between Colonial Williamsburg and a historic African American church, our conversation with Larry underscores the need for a more inclusive American narrative. Wrapping up, we contemplate how one-on-one dialogues, rather than heated public debates, can lead to deeper understanding and respect for the myriad of viewpoints that make up our political landscape. Join us as we uncover the value of fostering these exchanges, even in the face of issues that resist straightforward compromise.

0:00 Navigating Political Division and Leadership

10:36 Building Political Cohesion and Constructive Conversations

19:52 Ethics and Moderation in Politics

27:46 Ethics and Perspectives in Public Life

42:35 Finding Common Ground in Political Conversations

Music: Coma-Media (intro)
                 WinkingFoxMusic (outro)
Recorded: 12/21/23

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hello everyone, thank you for tuning in today. Today's episode examines the landscape and pipeline for political leaders in an age marked by extreme division and polarization. We take a deep dive into how the Sorosens Institute shapes rising leaders and their personal methods to navigate the challenges of estrangement between liberals and conservatives. This conversation is with special guest Larry Roberts. Roberts has been the director of the Sorosens Institute for political leadership at the University of Virginia since 2020. Larry chaired six successful statewide campaigns and his government service includes counselor to the governor and chief of staff to the lieutenant governor. In his government positions, larry earned praise for his achievements, temperament and ability to work across the Parse Nile. Larry also had a career of more than 25 years as a private practice attorney in the areas of telecommunications, transportation and commercial real estate development. During his time in private practice, larry served as president of the Federal Communication Bar Association and was the founding chair of a charitable foundation that has distributed millions of dollars in college scholarships and contributions to organizations serving those in need. Larry is a graduate of the University of Virginia and the Georgetown University Law Center. Virginia Law Weekly named him as one of its 2017 Virginia leaders in the law. He won three Federal Communications Bar Association Service Awards and was named pro bono lawyer of the year by the Venomble Law Firm.

Speaker 1: 1:41

If you enjoy this conversation, enjoy the points made and the insights shared, please ask you to one subscribe on your preferred podcast listening platform, share with a friend, but finally, follow the show on Instagram at overcoming the divide, to keep up with updates, participating polls and much more. Thank you, welcome to the show, larry. How are you? How are you here? Yeah, I'm really glad to be here, of course. So you are the director of the Sorosin Institute and I am curious, starting off with because is a Institute for, say, political leadership and governance, but that's not something you see too often Just an Institute and programs directly dedicated to, say, governance and political leadership, or rather, just overall professional development. So my first question to you is what's the need that the Sorosin Institute is seeking to meet?

Speaker 2: 2:48

So initially it was people who were concerned about rising partisanship in Virginia. Virginia was a moderate to conservative state, no matter which party was in power, but we started to see more partisan battling, particularly in the 1990s, late 80s, when the parties were sort of sorting themselves out philosophically, and so some folks on the left and right got together and said what can we do to try to bring people together? Obviously, a lot's gotten worse since then, but a lot has also gotten better. We have about 2700 people in Virginia who have gone through our programs and they really do come out of it with stronger values around what we try to do in our Democratic Republic.

Speaker 1: 3:44

And speaking to those programs, what do they seek to instill into those participants? Well, I would say some of the main staple pieces there.

Speaker 2: 3:53

Yeah. So I would say for context, we try to bring together people from all over the Commonwealth and we try to bring a broad sense of diversity. So it's not just Democrats and Republicans, but it's also regional diversity. Obviously race and ethnicity and gender, but which sector? Public sector, private sector, nonprofit sector and even within the private sector, different segments of the economy. So we try to build cohorts that I wouldn't say are truly representative of the Commonwealth but bring a lot of different perspectives together. And we don't try to tell them how they should think about an issue or what they should think about an issue, but we do try to work with them to reflect on values that underpin our government, such as building trust, earning and giving respect, civil dialogue, ethics, sound and inclusive public policy processes. So it's really about promoting those values as opposed to telling people this is how you should think about issue X or issue Y.

Speaker 1: 5:06

And saying that then you're not trying to go about. Hey, you're not trying to proselytize anyone into a certain ideology or belief system. So do you believe there is a more objective, high quality way to govern that transcends a parsanship in ideology?

Speaker 2: 5:27

Well, I mean parties are always going to be with us and different ideologies are always going to be with us.

Speaker 2: 5:33

One thing we do talk about is trying to find more than 50.1% agreement with your point of view, and that how often lasting change occurs when there's a broader consensus, so you have less people say challenging the policy in court. You don't have the boomerang effect when the other party comes in power. They undo everything you just did. Not every issue can be that way, but a lot of issues can. So, trying to encourage our participants to think about broader coalitions than just who they regularly talk to, we also try to make sure that they understand the nuances that different regions face in the Commonwealth when it comes to a particular issue. Local housing and housing affordability is a great example when you go to the nine regions of the Commonwealth that we visit. Housing is a key issue in every region, but what that issue looks like is very different from region to region. So we bring people around the state and see that just what happens in your region is not necessarily a solution for someone else.

Speaker 1: 6:48

Thank you. Before getting started, we briefly spoke on the power of local politics compared to everything playing out on the national level. What do you believe exists there when it comes to the influence that, say, a local person, a local member of a board can have? That's not exactly intuitive to the average person who would consider themselves political nonetheless.

Speaker 2: 7:19

Well, you know, a strong economy underpins almost everything else and so what works in a region differs based on demographics, geographic considerations. So you know, for example, when we go to Hampton Roads in Virginia, it's very much a maritime culture. When you go to far southwest Virginia, you're dealing with, you know, life in the mountains, northern Virginia. You're right across the Potomac from the nation's capital in a fairly dense, densely populated environment. So you know, what I hope that people see is that you don't bring your solutions, your ideas, to another region and you say you should do it the way that we've done it, because the just vast differences among the regions but you know people at the local level can have a huge impact.

Speaker 2: 8:21

You know the tone of conversation is really important. If you're a city council or board of supervisors that we have in Virginia or school board is engaged in dysfunctional fights over national cultural issues, you know you're not really getting done what most people want. It may be what your base wants, but most people want to make sure that, you know their quality of life is being attended to. Do they have access to health care? Do they have access to grocery stores? Can they get to work with a reasonable commute, whether that's because of congestion or sheer distance, do I feel safe in my community? You know, these are things that resonate very much with the average American and are often overlooked in our national fights.

Speaker 1: 9:15

Virginia's dynamic that you're just detailing Southwestern has the mountains, northern Virginia much more hyper-polical atmosphere due to its proximity to the capital, hampton roads, which is or long like, say, the Eastern shore of Virginia, that region more of a maritime culture. Virginia's dynamic almost appears to be a microcosm for the US. And one thing that you said was kind of, you know, piqued my interest was that don't maybe try to take your politics or take your beliefs and just force them on to us, say over here.

Speaker 2: 9:56

Do you?

Speaker 1: 9:56

see that becoming more of an issue, just generally speaking. You know, I think you could make the case for that on the national level, but you also have, do you think that's happening, maybe on a local level too, within states? A quick example of this would be the recent debate between Governor of California, gavin Newsom, and then him debating the governor of Florida, rhonda Santis, and them really just going out of you know, exploring each other's politics and what political systems, economic systems, are better and how they operate during COVID, and all that seems to be pretty much in line to what you were mentioning before as well.

Speaker 2: 10:36

Well, I mean, the concern I have at the national level and somewhat at the state level, is that we really are holding elections that are about eking out a 50.1% victory and then governing is though you've got 80% support from the public. So I think that people want solutions and they, you know, it's not compromise for compromise sake, it's wanting to get something done that is positive, as opposed to just holding out for the next election, hoping that you can knock the other side out and then do everything you want to do. That's not really where the public is. They want to see functioning government, government that attends to their needs, and I think they're a little tired of the political food fights and I didn't watch much of that debate but you know, seemed a lot of political score settling as opposed to, you know, I mean it ought to be the.

Speaker 2: 11:40

California and Florida, as leading states in our country, are looking for ways to work together to move our national economy forward, secure our national defense. You know, instead of having an ideological battle over which state is doing things the right way. I know that may sound polyan-ish, but that really is where most Americans are and my travel throughout the state I clearly see that in Virginia. You know people want to see Richmond getting things done, they want to see their localities getting things done and they're increasingly frustrated by the tenor of the conversation, and that's something. At Sorenson. We try to provide skills and incentives for people to look at things a different way.

Speaker 1: 12:32

Shifting gears a bit. You mentioned earlier that you have over I want to say 2700 alumni to that program. Where are these people coming from? Where are they going? Who is this really? I guess that you could say maybe a training program for, or incubator for.

Speaker 2: 12:50

Yeah, it's really an incubator for people who want to make a difference in their communities. There is an element of electoral politics to it. So a lot of people who come through Sorenson programs do have an interest in running for office. Some are already in office. So, for example, in the upcoming General Assembly session in 2024, 20% of the House of Delegates will be Sorenson alumni and 20% of the State Senate will also be Sorenson alumni. We've got two members of Congress in the Virginia delegation who are alums. The current Attorney General of Virginia and the previous Governor of Virginia are alums. So there's that element of it where people really do want to serve their communities through elective office.

Speaker 2: 13:41

But we have a lot of people that are not interested in running for office. They might be legislative staff. They might be running a nonprofit and happy to be operating in that space. They might be successful business people who just want to understand enough about the public space to kind of assess what their vulnerabilities might be regulatory or political or otherwise. A lot of people come because they are in a bubble, they're talking to the same kind of people over and over again and they want to broaden their horizons or learn how the other side thinks to strengthen their own ability to argue points. So we're not a debating society. We do try to find ways for people to have common experiences and to learn about people who have very different experiences than they do, and bring them together and just have a chance to learn more about different people in different regions.

Speaker 1: 14:48

And this may not be a goal, exact goal of the program, but do you think perhaps a positive byproduct of the program is a more cohesion that these people find, or uniting these people find in one another, that someone who comes from say more a right background and someone who comes from more the left, and they're now in the same program, as you said, it's not the bait club. I'm sure that'd be quite interesting, but they are nonetheless in this educational programming for quite some time. And then coming out that what you see down break what people can find union is not saying this is a struggle, but common, say experiences that can bond people together. Do you think that is maybe a positive byproduct of this program too?

Speaker 2: 15:42

Yeah, I mean, it's a big part of what we do. We explore something called the values tactics pyramid and that essentially is saying you may disagree strongly about what a solution is, but if you work backward and try to see if your values are similar, it may be possible to find other solutions that serve your goal but maybe weren't tactically what you were approaching. So we do see people come out of Sorenson who do behave differently. I like to say that we try to help people have the gravitas to be in a room, be in situations, be in meetings where they can bring the conversation back to a constructive approach, and I think by and large people do.

Speaker 2: 16:35

I mean I'm wearing the Sorenson lapel pin and I can tell you in Richmond, if you go into a state legislative office with one of these pins on, you know it's much more likely you'll get a meeting and you will be perceived as somebody who is honest, ethical, transparent, respectful, constructive and you know you can have a conversation without appearing, you know, in the paper.

Speaker 2: 17:04

The next day is kind of a sandbag. So it means something to people who are operating government at the state and local level in Virginia. But you know that's my hope is that people come out and, whatever their walk of life is, whether they're, you know, business leader or elected official, or a state or local government employee or a nonprofit leader, a teacher, whatever they might be that they just comport themselves in a way that's different than what we see as a daily feed on on in media, because conflict attracts attention, but, you know, getting things done I didn't invent this race but things get done at the speed of trust and building that trust so that our leaders can actually get things done, you know, as opposed to just politically positioning themselves. I see that all the time in our alumni and I'm really proud of it.

Speaker 1: 18:03

And throughout your professional career, specifically in politics, it's been said that you've always received this high praise for your willingness to reach across the aisle. What made you decide maybe going back some time now but just even thinking now what made you decide then, but continuing this kind of down this road, to reach out, and you thinking, and that is the right thing, you know, that's the right thing to do I should reach out to the other side, the other aisle, rather than just kind of using raw political power to get your way.

Speaker 2: 18:43

Well, I mean, I grew up in a home where my dad was a school administrator, ultimately a superintendent of schools, and you know he had to be the superintendent for everybody and if he was too partisan, you know he'd be out as soon as the party dominating the school board changed hands. But he was superintendent through, you know, school boards that lean Democratic, school boards that lean Republican, because they could tell, you know his focus was on how do we teach children? And also, as I was growing up, you know my parents just showed me how to respect people. Like it wasn't like, oh, we're bringing people into the house who don't look like us. You know, it really wasn't something that we were spoken to in that way. It was just we found ourselves surrounded by all kind of different people with all sorts of different experiences and politics, and so, you know, I think it was just sort of ingrained in me that everybody deserves respect and that you know we ought to be watching for the people that are struggling, whether we agree with them politically or not.

Speaker 2: 19:52

So I came to it with that sense and then, coming to Virginia as a young adult, I just really fell in love with the culture and the history of the state and looked at it as a tremendous opportunity. And you know, I think Virginia reflects a lot of America, and so it was an interesting place for me to, and a place where moderation has been sort of a hallmark throughout our history. Even when the policies weren't moderate, the people who practiced them tried to couch themselves as moderate people. So you know, those are some things that just led me to even when I was involved and I was pretty successful partisan politician I chaired six successful statewide campaigns in Virginia when I was chair of a local party. I don't think we lost a precinct in any election while I was chair.

Speaker 2: 20:45

So you know, I'm proud of the success I had in partisan politics, but to me that's not the full answer. The answer is that you've got to be able to work with people who don't think like you, and I just found it always easy to sit down with. You know, I was a Democratic partisan for a while, but I always found it easy to sit down with Republicans and just say, look, what are we trying to accomplish here? You know, I respect your point of view. I respect, you know, your background, your values. You know, is there something we're both trying to accomplish that we can do together. That's not always possible. I'm not here to say this. You know we say in our programs you don't check your values or opinions at the door. You're just here to see if there's ways to get things done that you can get done with people who don't think like you, because you can find common values and common ground.

Speaker 1: 21:40

Where do you believe most people go wrong with deciding against that? That I'm just going to use raw, sheer political power that I may have now or most likely will have in the next, after the next election cycle, to get what I want Something that you brought that was interesting, that you know we're in power now and we may have that 50, 50.1% popularity or ability to do what we want and acting like it's like 90% or 100%. Where do you think most people just go wrong and writing that off and like we're just going to do what we want and not worry about the future outcomes or the sustainability of the program?

Speaker 2: 22:20

Mm-hmm, I would say there's tremendous incentives in our political system now to be divisive. There's a lot of money available to people who pursue a divisive path. Politics is a zero-sum game. The stakes are high. People perceive national issues to be so important that I have to win, no matter what I think.

Speaker 2: 22:49

Sometimes where people go wrong is to really start to buy into the fact that the other side is the enemy and that the country is going to collapse if the other party wins power. I just don't see many examples in American history where one party stayed in power exclusively for decades. You could argue that around the New Deal the Democrats were in control for about 20 years. In the late 1800s the Republican pro-business wing was in control, but we often have divided government and we often have one party in power and then the other party in power. So I think if you want to get things done that really are lasting, you have to look at those trends and say this is not the right path, but it's a convenient path I think people take that you begin to other the other side and to question their legitimacy, their values, their patriotism. At some level it feels good to have the one jersey on and to be fighting it out with the other side, but I just don't think that's good for the state or the country.

Speaker 1: 24:09

Going back to that last remark, having the one jersey on and maybe feeling like you belong to something, is it unusual to get people in your program that are more so? We'll call it politically homeless that they don't belong to one faction or the other, and rather it could be called out by both parties or both ideologies liberal, conservative, whatever the case may be, because they just don't fit in.

Speaker 2: 24:42

Yeah, I mean there's some self-selection. And who goes through a sorenson program? As I said, we're not a debating society. We don't put both sides up to make their strongest argument and then one side prevails and we all go home and say, oh, that side won the contest. You have to want to engage with people who are different than you. We do in our selection process. Look to people and if you're just not going to respect anyone who disagrees with you, like, why do I want to waste my time? We're not a rehab society. We're trying to find people who are willing to look for goodwill. It doesn't disqualify somebody if they're a strong partisan certainly not. I mean we're looking for people who are willing to accept and understand nuances in public policy, but not that you should come into the program and decide, oh okay, well, now I'm anti-abortion, although I was pro-abortion before that. Or now I believe in nuclear energy, even though I didn't before. That's not what we're about. We're really about what's a way of conducting yourself that makes it more likely that contentious issues can be resolved.

Speaker 1: 26:09

And on your guys' own website, the source and institute's homepage. It states, quote preparing ethical leaders for tomorrow's Virginia. What are your thoughts on maybe ethics falling by the wayside and just national politics? I mentioned this because of the recent scandals with, say, senator Bob Mendez from New Jersey, the expulsion of House Representative George Santos, and even something that's a little more innocuous and kind of funny was with Representative Jamal Bowman, who accidentally pulled the fire alarm in the House chamber. But still, just that one's more facetious, but regardless, where do you kind of fit into that? Or what are your thoughts on that, say, current situation?

Speaker 2: 26:56

So you know, our main goal is for you to be in it for the right reasons, and that extends to ethical behavior. But you know it's not just about is it right or wrong to take something from somebody. You know, is there a quid pro quo? We're not parsing ethics laws as much as we are an ethos, and so you know, our ethics are more about how do you approach a situation where there are often two right answers, you know, is it ethical to? You know, go down a path you know we talk about.

Speaker 2: 27:46

You know, I know you've had some episodes about the conflict in the Middle East and we've had ethical scenario. We operate on sort of a case scenario basis, and so we'll present cases and ask people to give thoughts about what are the ethics behind it. So you know, an example might be a speaker who's invited to speak on a campus, you know, where many students feel that that message is going to be threatening to them. So, not so much is this triggering something, but, you know, are students going to feel unsafe because, you know this speaker is given a platform on campus and at UVA there are particular sensitivities because of the events of August 2017 where, you know, people were injured and one woman lost her life. Two police officers lost their life and related to what was going on, but the people certainly felt fearing for their lives.

Speaker 2: 28:53

So you know we're exploring that issue of free speech versus you know what line is a line too far. You know, is inviting an avowed racist onto campus during Black History Month? You know, is that ethical or is that not ethical? And people can come down in different places, you know, depending on where their values are around free speech. So we're looking at ethics in sort of that context of how do you apply it in certain difficult political public situations as opposed to. You know, here's the campaign finance statute and we're going to go through all the intricacies. So you know what's right and wrong under those, under those regulations, if that makes sense.

Speaker 1: 29:45

And something you mentioned when first starting that answer was the two, possibly two right sides. And when you gave that example of, or the scenario of, say, you know, known racist speaker coming to campus during Black History Month, you know, two positions immediately kind of popped in to my head and it is interesting to evaluate how one can contend with that and what one. And what's ethical isn't always legal and what's legal isn't always ethical. So so there's is like interesting conversation to have.

Speaker 2: 30:25

Yeah, we do try to find scenarios where people can legitimately come, come down on either side or multiple sides. If the answer is obvious, then it's not really serving our purpose of people really exploring, you know, the ethics of public life.

Speaker 1: 30:44

Something that you were mentioning earlier too, before we started recording, was Book Internationalism by the author Sam Goldman, who was previously on the podcast early in season four, and something he said from our conversation was us, as Americans, instead of trying to find more agreement on everything, maybe we should just become more comfortable with disagreeing on some things. And I think that plays into what we were discussing earlier, which is exploring politics, whether that be on the state level or the national level. And you know, it remains unclear whether, if we in the state decide to have this curriculum in our education system, well, that should be the mandate for all the other states. That's not exactly something that someone can make the case for it, but it's not something that is, as you mentioned to when discussing issues is clear. That just is obvious.

Speaker 2: 31:41

Yeah, I mean, you know we've had the concern about critical race theory in Virginia and it was part of the gubernatorial election in 2021.

Speaker 2: 31:52

And again, you know, so we don't try to tell you is teaching critical race theory, you know, is that something you should be in favor or opposed to? And but we do explore aspects of Virginia's history and you know, not not from one side of the other, but just giving you you know we will take people into a coal mine to, you know.

Speaker 2: 32:17

So people that think we should phase out fossil fuels are learning about a way of life that you know would be very difficult for people to give up economically. And we learned that much of the coal mining in Virginia is metallurgical coal which is used for infrastructure. You can't make steel without it under any you know technology that's been developed so far. So if you're an urbanist who believes in transit oriented development as a way to minimize our carbon footprint, well, what about the people that are mining the coal that makes that possible? We go to Fort Monroe in Virginia, which was the place of the first landing of enslaved Africans in 1619. And we don't proselytize, we just, you know, explore different aspects of Virginia's history and give people a chance to talk about that, reflect on it and see, see where they come out.

Speaker 1: 33:22

Not too long ago I was at a conference and heard a debate between two, say, education advocates who were approaching the issue of, say, critical race theory and number of other sensitive topics. The one, the beta per a participant participant, was advocating for having this more rose petal lens of how we just view United States history. And the other advocate was well, stuff, you know stuff having this approach behind and stuff shifting how the perception of it. Maybe just tell it for how it occurred. Now, that's not always clear either, because there's no contradicting accounts. But to the best as we know it, and maybe present those contradicting accounts as well, Well, I'll tell you an example.

Speaker 2: 34:19

We go to a church in Williamsburg which is one of the first predominantly African American churches in the country, and one of the facts that they mentioned is that during the time of Colonial Williamsburg the population was actually majority African American. But if you had gone to Colonial Williamsburg in the 1960s you would have thought the community was, you know, 90% white and the only African Americans around were the servants. So you know, nobody's telling you that you should feel bad about that. You should feel like there was something wrong with going to Colonial Williamsburg. In fact, the beauty of it is that Colonial Williamsburg and the church are now partners in telling a more complete story of what happened.

Speaker 2: 35:11

In Colonial Williamsburg. They have something called the Freedom Bell in their church that was brought up to and it was renovated with a grant from Colonial Williamsburg and some professional help. This bell that had not been in use for decades. That bell was brought to Washington DC when the National Museum of African American History and Culture was dedicated and the Bushes George W Bush and Laura and the Obamas rang that bell together at the dedication ceremony. And then that bell was brought back to Williamsburg and the video that they show, you know, people from all political stripes are ringing that bell of freedom. So we're not looking to divide people. We're looking to highlight examples where people get past the hot button cultural issues and instead, you know, look for ways to build relationships and make things happen that you know are better reflection of us as a people.

Speaker 1: 36:26

And I think to your point as well when you empower and this is kind of the point of the show, and my idea is, when you empower people with the information and the knowledge as is and stay away from that narrative per se, you are giving them the opportunity to come to their own conclusions, instead of deceiving people for a certain agenda or buy any.

Speaker 1: 36:52

If you have a bias, you just come outside. I think it's pretty obvious my bias, say, on free speech. But I wouldn't come out and be like well, I like to look at both, like I clearly come down probably index higher on advocating for free speech than I would on a form of censorship, and there's nothing that is say unclear about that when I discuss these conversations that are more permanent on that subject. But at least it's good to kind of present that with the just, with the truth, regardless, irrespective of what that organization or person may feel. So instead of trying to persuade, rather just provide people the knowledge on what happened, what your take may be on it, at least labeling that's your opinion on how you personally feel, rather than inserting yeah, we don't.

Speaker 2: 37:45

We don't really do it that way. What we do is present a range of opinions. You know we don't say this is our opinion about this, but we will have conservative legislators, we will have liberal legislators, we will have conservative business people, you know we will have progressive business people. So we're trying to bring together, you know, over the course, in our main program, over the course of nine months you're hearing from, you know, maybe 180 different speakers and we try to bring in speakers that you know can talk themselves about the experiences they have and the challenges and opportunities that they see in the region that we're in. So our goal is for, over that period of time, that you see that you know there's just different ways of looking at these issues and don't just get into your corner immediately. Do come out and try to engage people and see if you can't find solutions that work for for both of you or everybody.

Speaker 2: 38:50

You know our trip to Southwest Virginia is routinely the most popular part of our curriculum and that's because so many people haven't been there and they have stereotypes about that region and those stereotypes are often challenged not by our curriculum but by what they're seeing with their, with their own eyes, and so you know that's really something that we're happy about. You know, a lot of people have never been to Northern Virginia, believe it or not, and coming there and seeing why Northern Virginia politicians will think differently about issues like transportation, you know, so that's valuable to us. And then seeing the friendships that develop. I mean, every year we see friendships develop among people that you would never think would be, would be friendly, based on on you know where they're coming from. So you know, yes, this is a small number of people, but if they're going out in the world and kind of modeling that behavior, I think it can have a huge impact, and I think it does.

Speaker 1: 39:57

Yeah, I believe, and I hope I'm right on the math on this but if you know a thousand people and they know a thousand people, then there's one degree of reaching a million people. Right, so people do have. I think most people have much more influence than they understand or recognize. The degree of that influence obviously varies, but just encouraging note is pretty much anyone listening to this, or anyone who would listen to this, as much more influence and you know opportunity than they probably realize.

Speaker 2: 40:29

You know we had an event last night and there was a representative from the ACLU and a representative from Americans for Prosperity, two organizations that people would not associate as able to work together, but they work together on some criminal justice reform efforts. They came at it for different reasons AFP with a more libertarian streak and a more concern about government overreach, and ACLU coming at it with, you know, a more progressive, you know rooting out systemic problems in the criminal justice system, but they found several issues that they were able to work together on and were able to get bipartisan support in the general assembly. You know we want to highlight those stories where unlikely political fellows come together and make change happen.

Speaker 1: 41:23

Yeah, you are seeing that more common in certain areas too. I would say culture is the biggest divide in a lot of the left and the right. But something such as school choice and school choice vouchers, I would say, has you know equally the amount of agreement between people on the left and the right that it does disagreement. So there's people who disagree on the left about it as well as the right, and I guess they agree that they both disagree for school choice. But there's also organizations and actors on the left and the right who come together around school choice as well and implementing that into their communities whether one may be in favor of that or not is like yeah it, regardless of the history in Virginia of rural conservatives and urban liberals coming together because issues are affecting them similarly, even though you know their, their situations are quite different.

Speaker 2: 42:23

You know both feeling at times left out, feeling like suburban concerns dominate, and so you know you do see interesting opportunities for people to come together. There are always going to be issues that where you just can't resolve it. You know through compromise, the Civil War happens. You know we could not find enough common ground to prevent that in the years before the Civil War. You know the Civil Rights Act happened. It was forced on a lot of people I think most people now would feel like that was a good thing for our society to do to to open public accommodations and schools. But you know so there are. There just are some issues where it's going to have to be decided, hopefully at the ballot box, as opposed to the alternative. But there's so many issues where people can work together.

Speaker 1: 43:20

Yeah, that's a. I think those are two great examples, as you said, like with Irreconcilable, such as Civil War, when actual war is fought, and in civil rights, where it wasn't really, you know, coming to this whole consensus, or rather just pushing through and not getting that done.

Speaker 2: 43:37

So I want to buy a partisan basis but yeah really not clearly not not welcome in southern states.

Speaker 1: 43:44

No, not immediately whatsoever, but no ends Mentioning out. But that's not the case or every issue there. There are a number of issues where you can find that common ground you can't push or something even like. I think the Agree to disagree framework is good to deploy at their science and to, but nonetheless still approaching their conversations. And something I want to quickly, you know, piggyback to was when you said you're bringing in different Speakers, both conservative and progressive.

Speaker 1: 44:14

Like even if one were to disagree with what that conservative speaker said, you still understand their perspective and why they may think it and they may challenge you on a point that's kind of loose, that that's kind of like not a strong one, and you can either like adapt your view or Dig deeper, find more information that actually, you know, counters that we give the way. Like you, I think you become better from that experience, rather than maybe semi-sic triggering, depending on how you feel about it. But regardless, I think if you approach it with the mindset of curiosity, of like, oh how this part? Why this person? Why I disagree with this person? And if they have a point, that's great. If I disagree or agree, that's still great. I'm still learning more about the you know other side. Quote unquote.

Speaker 2: 45:02

Yeah, there can be raw feelings in our program, like there's no doubt about it. This is not sitting around the camp campfire and singing. Come by.

Speaker 2: 45:08

You know there are speakers who present points of view that are deeply troubling to some of the people in the class, might be making other people in the class very happy, and you know people have the opportunity to ask probing questions.

Speaker 2: 45:23

You know we do try to say look, this isn't for you to try to convince the speaker that they're wrong. This is for you to gain more information about why a speaker thinks the way that they do, and so we do try to moderate the conversations and, again, we don't bring panels of People together to have a political food fight. You know they're hearing from one or two people at a time, but the overall balance of the program, you know we want to be Politically fair, but on a given night you know they might have a Liberal legislator that conservatives in the class just think this person's disrespecting me and my culture and you know they're promoting things that I think are socialistic and you know. So they have a chance to to have a real conversation with these speakers, but over the course Everybody's gonna feel uncomfortable with some speakers. Yeah, I think that's best.

Speaker 1: 46:22

My the most recent guest well, depending on when this airs, probably Maybe a couple behind, but Glenn Greenwald was saying that he no longer does panels and he's a journalist, but he's been said.

Speaker 1: 46:34

You have to go back a very long time to see me on panels besides, like a recent one or two. And it's because they boil down to this food fight of just like hurling insults or interrupting one another and for the sake of the class in the audience, that's not like good, even because Everyone's just throwing out points. You can't digest information that's being presented before you, and I tried listening to the Piers Morgan on censor show between like him and a few other Speakers and debaters on the Israel palestine conflict and they Immediately just went insults, like maybe just having one on at a time or having speakers that will respect one another is the best way to go. So I honestly think that's the best way to hear it when you have one or two people who are just discussing the issue and you can hear it in Best form, rather than it just boiling down and agree we will bring together people who disagree, like occasionally we'll have two speakers and Sometimes they will.

Speaker 2: 47:34

They will disagree about a lot of things, but they respect each other and so we're showing them, modeling the behavior that we want to see, you know, with the people that we want to see, you know, with our, with our cohorts. So I wouldn't say that we, we Refuse to have people that might disagree together, but it's, it's the tone of the conversation you know I Watch. When I watch cable news, those particular kind of shows you're talking about, I feel like I walk away from it dumber than when I Started and so I just don't pay attention to it if I can. I can find somebody I disagree with being, you know. You know, half hour or hour long moderated conversation I get a lot more out of that than I do. You know, rooting for somebody I agree with, you know, battling it out with, with somebody they disagree with, and just so often just it's talking past each other, talking over each other, insulting each other. You know I don't get the point other than entertainment value.

Speaker 1: 48:41

Yeah, it's almost like junk food. Made me think of like made McDonald's like you're driving.

Speaker 2: 48:44

Oh.

Speaker 1: 48:45

I love that almost like you see, something like oh, liberal or conservative acts destroys this person. Like, oh, that sounds entertaining. And then after like five minutes, oh, this is awful, I'm like fast food.

Speaker 1: 48:59

So no I definitely resonate with that, but I mean kind of closing things out. I would like to ask you because you have a very extensive, impressive career both in law and politics and I know we mainly fixated on the politics part and we'll stay in that vein, but I do want to, I'm curious on was one piece of knowledge or insight that you wish you had before entering politics, and is there anything that you would change looking back on, say, your career, on how you prosecute something, or just understood it?

Speaker 2: 49:34

You know, be honest with you, not really. You know, I worked before I got deeply involved. I was involved in politics as a college student and I actually met a lot of people who 20 years later, when I got back involved, were still, you know, had risen through the ranks and become important politicians or judges or whatever in Virginia. So I valued that experience. As a young person, you know, I met Jimmy Carter when he was at 1% in the polls and thought told my parents, I think he's gonna be the next president, you know. So I value that experience. But then I went and it was with with my career, and you know much of my career. I was a communications lawyer and that was another experience where, you know, there was just so much common ground. There were not Republican and Democratic answers. Now there are certain policy issues that break down partisan wise, but but many of things did not. So you know, I spent 20 years doing that.

Speaker 2: 50:35

I'm getting along with people of all different political stripes and by the time I came to politics, you know I was in a fairly mature place in my life and it just wasn't gonna be the be all and end all for me.

Speaker 2: 50:48

So you know, maybe if you look back and said, oh well, I could have gotten farther personally in politics if I'd started younger, but I feel comfortable with my legacy and and I think it, you know I wouldn't change it. I like that. I I Made friends across the aisle and that when I came to partisan politics, I think part of the reason I want a lot is because I knew how to Make the case for independent voters, who often decide elections, particularly in Virginia. So I had credibility on the Democratic side because of a lot of the causes that I Supported. But I also could reach independence because I respected them and Republicans knew, even if during elections we were gonna do battle, that when the elections were over we were actually gonna try to govern. So no I. It sounds a little arrogant, but I kind of like the way I approached it.

Speaker 1: 51:45

No, it sounds true and I'm glad to hear that. And and lastly, how can people just have curiosity, who want to check out the Institute? Where could they go? Is there a website we could direct them to?

Speaker 2: 51:58

Yep, so wwwsorensoninstituteorg, and it's so R&S EN. It's not named for Ted Sorenson, john F Kennedy speechwriter, but rather his brother, tom Sorenson, who was an advisor to both Democratic and Republican politicians. So it's sorensoninstituteorg, and we have programs for high school students, college students, early career People, first ten years their career and then our main program for people ten plus years into their career.

Speaker 1: 52:29

Awesome. Well, I hope everyone checks it out and I appreciate everyone tuning in and appreciate you Talking me, larry. Is a really interesting conference conversation and went very well.

Speaker 2: 52:40

Well, I appreciate it and thank you for this opportunity to present this, this way of looking at politics 100% yeah, right, take care guys.