NDN Blog

Last week, I opined on the decay and potential renewal of "social capital" in America. As chronicled by Robert D. Putnam, tectonic shifts in American culture, society and the economy led to decreased participation in civic organizations and dissipated communities, which in turn weakened the social fabric that holds together American life. In that introductory post, I proposed the online sphere as an alternate "public space" to strengthen (not replace) offline communities, and to put forward a few questions, the first of which I'll try to answer here: How can new technologies help foster civic engagement and create social capital, without detracting from the same?

I'm not blindly sanguine about the impact technology can and will have on human relationships and society. We can sit at a bus stop in New York and video chat with a friend in Morocco or Thailand-- a phenomenon that by historical standards might fairly be considered a miracle-- but that same act can make us blind to the world at our feet. A few months back, the New York times ran an article describing "parallel play" in the fully wired (er, wireless) American home. Perhaps you know the scene: a family is gathered together in the home for the evening, but the room is quiet, each individual gazing, grimacing, giggling at their respective device, headphones in. These scenes are creepy, and they should serve as a reminder that just as these tools have the potential to bring people together, so too can they divide us and make us distant from those right around us.

"Go online to get offline" is a catchy phrase (and has been adopted by sites like Meetup.com and dating site HowAboutWe to describe their approach), but it's perhaps the most concise summation of the social potential I see in network-- and especially mobile-- technologies. I'm not interested in online qua online. Purely online activities can have their value, but they're unlikely to build social capital. An online protest never threatened any existing power structure. An online church service isn't going to build a strong community. And I tend to find that even online conversation can only sustain a personal relationship, rarely build one. Rather, I see potential where online human networks intersect with offline, "real world" communities.

Kickstarter is crowd-sourced fundraising tool, giving small projects-- often in film and the arts-- a platform to raise a bit of money and, in the process, introduce people to their work. Of course, giving money doesn't necessitate any deeper engagement, but Kickstarter can tie together a group of interested people around a project or performance-- often with a social or local focus-- that might not have otherwise come about. Meetup, mentioned above, is an online space that allows people with shared interests to find each other and arrange offline meetups to pursue their shared interests together. These are two well-known examples of online platforms that successfully facilitate offline activity.

There is a different issue, however, with platforms like these: they tend to bring together a narrow slice of a given population-- groups of people who already have a great deal in common. Given the information flood that can overwhelm us online, most online spaces necessarily cater to very narrow segments of the population. There is certainly social value in convening all the dog-loving pescetarian chess players in a given town or city-- "bonding social capital," as defined by Putnam-- but our tendency to self-segregate online can have limiting impacts. Eli Pariser has done excellent critical analysis of the impacts of what he calls the "filter bubble"-- the internet's tendency to funnel us toward a limited selection of familiar media and information that tend to reaffirm our existing viewpoints and put us in information silos that are hard to escape. I'm describing a similar version of the same thing-- not about information and media, but about the same tendency of the internet to introduce us to people like us.

Bringing together a diverse community of people online is hard enough; bringing that into offline space is still harder. But, ultimately, that "bridging social capital" is where there is great potential to create social and civic good. Around what issues will diverse groups of people come together? What I will argue in my next post is that local issues-- particularly urban, local issues-- have the potential to engage and excite diverse groups and bring them together. And furthermore that mobile technology is uniquely suited to bridge the gap between groups, and between online and offline spaces.

As I said in my initial post, I don't think I'm breaking any new ground here-- in the tech venture capital world, "local," "mobile," "location-based" and "social" are the hot words that everybody wants to be right now. I'm just hoping to push a little further down this road, and find out whether social capital, community engagement and civic good can be built in this way. Check back here next week for my next installment in this series.

In good times, a President without clear economic policies may not suffer for it.   But in shaky and uncertain times like today, failing to advance a coherent strategy to ease people’s genuine economic troubles can be fatal politically, for a president or his opponent.  Yet, it happens with some regularity, often because the candidate simply prefers to talk about foreign policy or other things.  Consider the first George Bush in 1992, dismissing people’s economic worries to return again and again to his Gulf War success.  Think of John McCain in 2008, with no plan to stem the financial meltdown but eager to talk about his opponent’s character failings.  And reaching further back, there was George McGovern decrying the Viet Nam War, but with little to say about the inflation and slow growth.  

Both parties will certainly have economic programs for 2012.  Yet, both parties are in danger of passing lightly over the core issues of jobs, housing values, and incomes.  The problem for the Republican nominee is the Tea Party, which may well force him or her to embrace its’ radical bromides.  That assumes, of course, that the GOP doesn’t nominate Rick Perry or Michelle Bachman, who won’t need to be convinced.   Whoever the nominee is, he or she will have to stand for abolishing the minimum wage.  On the budget, the nominee will have to support moving Medicare towards vouchers with spending caps that don’t take account of health care costs, and a balanced budget amendment that won’t take account of recessions.  The nominee also will have to stand for the repeal of Wall Street regulation and more tax cuts to frost the cake of the rich.  

This prospect presents President Obama with two choices.  He can run against the Tea Party platform and insist that a minimalist approach is preferable to the other side’s eccentric agenda.  One catch is that the GOP nominee almost certainly will have a “Sister Souljah” moment when he ostentatiously distances himself from some loony piece of the Tea Party platform.  (My personal favorite is the call to abolish our “fiat” currency and revive the long, well-buried gold standard.)  And if the GOP nominee can weave a story about how a balanced budget and less government will help create jobs and restore housing values, and repeat that story often enough, it could be sufficient to trump Democratic minimalism. 

But the President has another choice.  He can offer up a new program of “Big Ideas” that directly takes on jobs, stagnating incomes, housing values, and the nation’s debt.  The conventional wisdom is that this is too risky, because it would tacitly acknowledge that his first-term program didn’t deliver the prosperity his economic team promised.  But since everyone in the country is already aware that it didn’t deliver as promised, acknowledging it would be a small concession.  

To be sure, the Tea Party-dominated House probably wouldn’t pass anything that Obama proposes before the election.  The economy will get a little more support from the Fed, but essentially will be on its own.  Nevertheless, the President can lay a foundation for stronger job and income gains in a second term – if he’s reelected – by campaigning for a new economic program.

With persistent, high unemployment, he needs to show that he knows how to reduce the costs for businesses to create new jobs and preserve old ones.  One direct way to do that would be to cut the employer side of the payroll tax by half, and then he could propose to pay for it through tax reforms that include a carbon-based tax to help address climate change.  He also can show that he knows how to help create new, small businesses which, in turn, will create new jobs.  Since our major financial institutions have largely stopped providing credit to small entrepreneurs, he could propose a new government-sponsored enterprise that could float bonds for community banks to finance those business loans. 

The biggest obstacle to a stronger recovery remains the sick housing market.  Nearly two-thirds of American households, in effect, grow poorer every month as the values of their homes decline and, with it, any equity they built up.   And people who feel they’re becoming poorer don’t spend, which in turn keeps this recovery anemic.  The best leverage we have to stop the decline in housing prices is to bring down home foreclosure rates.  The President can show he knows how to do that too, by proposing a new temporary loan program for homeowners with mortgages in trouble.  To be sure, this is treacherous territory, politically and economically, since it could enrage homeowners who don’t qualify and induce moral hazard for those who do.  But the President can address both problems with some tough love.  Homeowners who receive the loans would be on the hook not only to pay them back.  On top of that, 10 percent of any capital gains from an eventual home sale could go back to the taxpayers. 

Finally, the President can show that he knows how to help Americans prepare for the new jobs that the rest of his program would help create.  Nearly half of all working people age 35 and over today still have only the most rudimentary computer skills, leaving them unprepared to perform well in most 21st century jobs.  The President could propose a new grant program for community colleges that will keep their computer labs open and staffed in the evenings and on weekends: Any adult would be able to walk in and receive IT training at no personal cost.  

This program won’t assuage the Tea Party’s followers – in fact, it will likely incense them.  Let’s hope so.  The President should welcome a debate – okay, a pitched battle -- over a genuine and understandable strategy to improve the lives of Americans.  Even if unemployment is still well over 8 percent, a serious plan to bring it down should trump the grab bag of far-right nostrums that passes for policy in the Tea Party. 

In this and my next several blog posts, I'm going to try to draw out a few ideas, and pull together several disparate strands of thought around what I see as the great promise (and, to some degree, a great threat) of network technologies-- including social media, the internet and, most of all, the mobile phone. The ideas I'll be discussing are not new; rather, they've been described and detailed carefully by men and women much cleverer than I. But I hope to pull some of these strands together in a fresh discourse that will drive toward some kind of an agenda.

This first post will be largely an introduction of the problem, drawing largely on one particularly piece of sociological research... I've been re-reading portions of Bowling Alone, Robert D. Putnam's seminal sociological chronicle of the decline of "social capital" in America in the past several half-century (up to the book's 2000 copyright date). For the uninitiated, Putnam describes social capital this way:

By analogy with notions of physical capital and human capital-- tools and training that enhance individual productivity-- the core idea of social capital theory is that social networks have value. Just as a screwdriver (physical capital) or a college education (human capital) can increase productivity (both individual and collective), so too social contacts affect the productivity of individuals and groups.

Putnam draws a dreary picture, illuminating an across-the-board decline among the organizations, associations, and memberships that can illustrate the strength and density of American social capital. Skipping to the end of the tome, Putnam reveals his best sociologist's estimate of the causes behind these dreary trends. Fully half of the decline he attributes to generational change, particularly the aging of the "long civic generation" born in the early part of the last century who were historically notable for their "joining" instincts.

On this particular challenge, NDN Fellows Morley Winograd and Mike Hais offer a lot of reason for optimism in their two books Millennial Makeover and (forthcoming!) Millennial Momentum. I highly encourage you to go read their books and their blog; I'll clumsily paraphrase one of their broader arguments this way: the Millennial generation, born roughly between 1980 and 2000, seems to be a "second civic generation" sharing many joining instincts with their grandparents, the cohort that contributed to the high-water mark of social capital in the 1950s and early 1960s. It's encouraging that history's largest generation seems uniquely predisposed toward civic engagement, and for my purposes, useful to note that they (we) also happen to be the first "digital native" generation.

But if this generation is to rebuild American social capital, it needs fora in which to connect, build bonds, and establish the mutual obligations of social relationships. While the primary causes Putnam points to are immense, historical shifts, the secondary causes can be largely boiled down to the resultant decline of membership in general community organizations: churches, Rotary clubs, PTAs, etc. It's hard to imagine most of these organizations making a powerful comeback among the Millennial generation, and we're left with the question of where, exactly, Millennials will come together to build social bonds.

Another cause Putnam identifies as contributing an additional 10% toward the decline in social capital is "suburbanization, commuting, and sprawl." This trend has reoriented American communities away from the neighborhoods, downtown areas, corner bars, and public squares where social capital was once forged, to a landscape dominated by highways and strip malls where the closest thing to a shared public space can be found in the Caverns of Walmart. And so, in addition to the evaporation of civic groups, our shared physical spaces are also disappearing, and the question of where social capital can be created in the 21st century becomes still more confounding.

As you've no doubt guessed by now (Sorry this took so long. Actually, I'm not sorry at all. Brevity is for cowards.), the point I'm driving toward is this: with the decline of community organizations and associations, and the disappearance of shared public spaces, I look to new network technologies to bridge some of those gaps, and help create the shared public spaces of the 21st century.

In some of my writing earlier this year analyzing the impact of social media in the Arab Spring, I concluded that the great power of these new technologies lies in their ability to create a "second public sphere" in countries where offline speech and assembly are harshly censored. Well, it turns out we need a similar vitalization of our public sphere in America.

To be sure, an online public sphere already does exist in America: on social networks, blogs, and through the myriad connections facilitated by our myriad devices. But the questions I want to answer in the coming blog posts are these: how can new technologies-- mobile, social technologies-- help foster (and not detract from) civic engagement and social connections? How can these technologies enhance a place, or a city, rather than distract from it? How can civic structures around the world be strengthened by new technology?

I hope you'll join me in taking on these questions, and help turn this into an interesting dialogue.  If there are things you think I'm missing or should be reading, please pass your ideas along in the comments or via email!

There is plenty of blame to go around for the recent debt and deficit shenanigans, but who should get the credit? I nominate George W. Bush.  Not only did his administration’s negligence secure the foundations for the financial upheavals which ultimately created much of the short-term deficit.  The role of his tax cuts in driving much of the medium term deficits is also certainly well-known.  But the last month’s budget warfare also highlights the significance of his distinctive innovation in fiscal policy:  Unlike FDR and LBJ, W established a major new entitlement – Medicare Part D prescription drug benefits for seniors – without a revenue stream to pay for it.  This unhappy innovation also helped shape the austerity plan the President signed this week.

Consider the following.  The only certain budget cuts in the deal are $915 billion in discretionary program reductions over ten years.  In fact, those cuts very nearly match the $815 billion in unfunded costs for Medicare Part D over the same period.  And Bush’s dogged resistance to paying for those benefits has now revealed the priorities of those in both parties who think we do have to pay for them.  Since those priorities dictate no new revenues for Republicans and no cuts in Part D benefits for Democrats, that leaves only the large-scale cuts in discretionary programs in this week’s deal.

But this also creates a quandary that is certain to become very prominent, very soon.   The plan says clearly that avoiding entitlements and taxes trumps everything else in the budget.  Yet, the arithmetic, both budgetary and political, says that Congress and the President cannot deal with the long-term deficits and debt without venturing deeply into both areas. So far, the Tea Party’s acolytes in both houses have vetoed any new revenues, which in turn has locked in the progressives’ veto on entitlement changes.  Yet, this week’s deal also sets up a choice down the road that will very likely isolate the Tea Party’s denizens in Congress.

The President and Harry Reid in the Senate have already vowed that unless revenues are part of the next, $1.5 trillion tranche of fiscal changes, they’re prepared to let across-the-board cuts go forward – and blame the other side.   And when that tranche of deficit reductions comes due, the Tea Party won’t have the leverage of an expiring debt limit.  Instead, progressives will have more leverage, because the across-the-board cuts would slice through the fat at the Pentagon and well into the muscle.  If history is any guide, conservative Republicans hate deep cuts in defense spending even more than they abhor tax increases.

George W. Bush never had to choose between defense and taxes, because Bill Clinton left a big budget surplus to spend.   When it ran out, W. opted for his legacy of large, structural deficits.  Ronald Reagan started out the same way, but the deep recession of 1981-1982 brought on his big deficits quickly.  And when that happened, Reagan opted repeatedly for new revenues to protect his defense spending.   Today’s Tea Party Republicans are no Reaganites:  As John Boehner discovered when he tried to cut a deal with Barack Obama that included higher revenues and limited defense cuts, Tea Party House members have been determined to avoid new revenues even if it means much less for defense.

Limited defense cuts – $350 billon over ten years – are already part of the initial round of cutbacks.  When the additional $1.5 trillion comes due, defense’s share of across-the-board cuts will draw dire predictions and protests – all with the administration’s tactical blessing.  When that happens, what can conservatives like John Boehner and Mitch McConnell do but follow Ronald Reagan’s example.  So, whatever the rightwing flank of the GOP says today, next time out Republicans will be forced to accept revenue increases.  And since Medicare is on the line with defense, Democrats will also be forced to accept some changes in entitlements.  The combination will leave the Tea Party with no choice but to howl and take their case into the 2012 elections.

The recent release of survey data by the Pew Research Center indicating that the party identification of Millennials had narrowed from 60% Democratic vs. 32% Republican in 2008 to 52% Democratic vs. 39% Republican in 2011 produced a flurry of articles by political observers.

USA Today maintained that “in 2012, youth voters may prove elusive for Obama.” Michael Barone posting in the conservative Washington Examiner under a misleading headline that “Under Obama, Millennials move into the GOP column,” could barely contain his excitement at the news that a majority of white Millennials identify as Republicans (52% vs. 41% Democratic). A careful examination of the Pew data indicates that even in 2008 a larger percentage of white Millennials identified outright as Republicans than Democrats. Most of the movement that has occurred since then was among those who leaned to the Democratic Party and had weaker ties to it to begin with.

Nevertheless, given the importance of the Millennial Generation to President Obama’s victories, beginning with the Iowa caucuses all the way through the general election, the data certainly highlighted a source of potential danger to his re-election and to Democratic hopes for regaining their position as the majority party in American politics. Such speculation however ignores some other hard facts about Millennials and why they are likely to continue to be a key part of the Democratic coalition.

Millennials are the most ethnically and religiously diverse generation in U.S. history. Forty percent of all Millennials are “nonwhite” i.e., African-American, Asian, and, especially, Hispanic. These groups will represent an even greater percentage of those Millennials turning 18 in the next decade. Virtually all of the Millennials’ movement away from the Democrats and toward the Republicans in the Pew research has occurred among white Millennials, who, in spite of their increasing Republican proclivities, still more strongly identify as Democrats to a narrow but statistically greater extent than older whites. Nonwhite Millennials continue to overwhelmingly identify as Democrats over Republicans (71% to 17%).

Millennials are also half as likely as older generations to be white Evangelicals or Catholics and a quarter less likely to be white Mainline Protestants, groups that in recent years have trended toward the GOP. While the “Teavangelicals” gathering this weekend in Texas at the invitation of Rick Perry, its governor and possible GOP presidential candidate, may represent an important part of the Republican activist base, they don’t represent Millennials. Members of America’s young adult generation are twice as likely to be Hispanic Catholics or unaffiliated with any faith and a third more likely to be non-Christians—Jews and increasingly Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists—groups that tilt toward the Democratic Party. Any political movement that attempts to use Christian doctrine as the core of its appeal is sure to turn away most Millennial voters.

There are a range of other factors that seem likely to limit a wholesale movement of Millennials to the Republican Party, so long as it adheres to its current belief system. For one thing, Millennials clearly endorse an economically activist government. A March 2011 Pew survey indicated that by 54% to 39% Millennials favored a bigger government that provides more services rather than a smaller government that provides fewer services. Moreover, most Millennials are confident that governmental activism is useful in ameliorating societal problems. A majority of them (52%) believe that government often does a better job than people give it credit for. These beliefs suggest that for many Millennials the major complaint about President Obama and his party is not that they favor “big government,” but that they haven’t used government as often and effectively as Millennials would like.

In addition, one in five Millennials has an immigrant parent. Not surprisingly then, large majorities of Millennials believe that immigrants strengthen the country (69%) and support a legal pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants (82%).

Most Millennials (including white members of the cohort) are also strikingly tolerant on social issues. About two-thirds believe that homosexuality should be accepted by society (69%) and support the legalization of gay marriage (64%).

Such attitudes make most Millennials uncomfortable with the anti-immigrant and religiously conservative views that so many Republicans, particularly Tea Partiers, espouse. As a result, some young Republicans such as Meagan McCain, the Senator’s daughter and Margaret Hoover, the 31st president’s great granddaughter, have called on their party to moderate its stance on social issues in order to attract Millennial voters.

Finally, most Millennials do not approve of the GOP’s current highly ideological approach to politics. The Millennial Generation is made up of pragmatic idealists who search for win-win solutions to the problems facing the nation.

As a result, in a Pew survey conducted during the recent dispute over raising the nation’s debt ceiling, a large majority of Millennials (71% to 57% for older generations) preferred a balanced approach that would have combined spending cuts and tax increases to deal with the federal deficit. Two-thirds of the generation (65%) called on Washington politicians to compromise with those holding different views in order to prevent federal government default rather than sticking with their principles (28%). Not surprisingly, after viewing the summer’s events in the Capitol, a large majority of Millennials (60% vs. 27%) believed that the Republican rather than the Democratic Party was most likely to take “extreme” positions on issues.

For all of these reasons, most Millennials simply don’t like the Republican Party very much. In March, Pew research indicated that a majority of all Millennials (56%) held unfavorable attitudes toward the GOP and favorable attitudes toward the Democratic Party (57%).

Of course, none of this is etched in stone. The Democratic Party still has to convince Millennials that it can effectively use government to solve the problems confronting their generation and the nation if it is to retain the cohort’s loyalty. But the GOP is in the much more difficult position of having to change almost its entire imagery and approach to politics and government in order to win over skeptical members of the Millennial Generation. GOP attacks on Pell Grant funding and attempts to restrict student’s ability to vote suggest many Republican office holders haven’t gotten the message about the importance of this new generation of voters. The big question for Republicans is whether their ideological Boomer leadership will ever be willing to alter their ideological principles to accommodate Millennial attitudes and beliefs.

As we point out in our book, Millennial Momentum: How a New Generation is Remaking America (to be published in September), Millennials will comprise a quarter of the voting age population in 2012 and more than one out of every three adult Americans by 2020. In politics, as with just about everything else, which way Millennials decide to go, will determine the country’s future. Right now, that future is up for grabs.

Morley Winograd and Michael D. Hais are fellows of NDN and the New Policy Institute and co-authors of Millennial Momentum: How a New Generation is Remaking America to be published this fall and Millennial Makeover: MySpace, YouTube, and the Future of American Politics.

This week the Justice Department filed suit on Alabama's SB1070 copy cat law. Today I was on Fox News debating the merits of the suit the clip is below:

NDN President Simon Rosenberg on FOX News 8.2.2011 re: tax code

Following on the heels of their critically acclaimed 2008 book, Milllennial Makeover, NDN Fellows Morley Winograd and Mike Hais have their next book coming out this September, Millennial Momentum: How a New Generation is Remaking America.   In this new book, Winograd and Hais investigate how the beliefs of the Millennials are transforming other areas of American culture. 

We are proud to be hosting them here in Washington at NDN, 729 15th St NW, for a launch event on Thursday, September 15th at 12 noon.  For more on the book, including info on how to buy it and to book them for a talk, visit their site.  Feel free to send this invite on to others, and please RSVP to ensure your seat here.

As someone who has worked closely with Morley and Mike these past few years, I know this book will help you see the emerging "youth" of America in new and exciting ways.  If you want to buy the book before the event it will be on sale in late August in traditional and digital forms.  Hope to see you in September!

For months, members of the 21st Century Border Initiative have been busy cultivating a network of stakeholders throughout the Southwest and capturing their thoughts about the state of the U.S. - Mexican border region. Today we're proud to announce the release of a 21st Century Border Initiative YouTube page, a great portal for hearing directly from those in leadership positions – Mayors, Sheriffs, businesspeople – about the extraordinary progress made along the border region in recent years.

Through a new and better strategy, more resources and greater cooperation with our Mexican partners, the border region is much safer today. Crime is down, illegal migration has slowed, seizures of illegal drugs, guns and bulk cash has soared, all while trade and legal border crossings have increased. Despite the very real challenge of the cartel violence, the US side of the border has seen great progress in recent years. The voices on our new site testify to the progress which has made, and the to the very real challenges which remain.

Our inaugural 21st Century Border Project event was held over a year ago, and featured CPB Commissioner Alan Bersin and the Mexican Ambassador Arturo Sarukhan discussing the merits of the United States and Mexico working together to create a true 21st century border, one where more good things happen – trade, legal migration – and fewer undesirable things - flows of illegal guns, drugs, people and bulk cash. The video can be seen here. The full transcript of the event can be read here.

Some of the people featured on the new site:

Mayor of Nogales Arturo R. Garino, AZ: Mayor Garino is a former City of Nogales Firefighter and a former Law Enforcement Officer both in the City and Santa Cruz County. He Served over three and a half years as Public Works Director for the City of Nogales under Mayor Cesar Rios, Mayor Marco Antonio Lopez Jr., Mayor Albert Kramer. He is currently the Mayor of Nogales Arizona. In his video Mayor Garino talks about the importance of how the Nogales border is safer then ever.

Vice Mayor of Tucson Richard Fimbres, AZ: Richard Fimbres is a lifelong resident of Ward 5 and Tucson, graduate of St. Ambrose and Tucson High Schools and a 20-year veteran of the Pima County sheriff's Department. He is a Vietnam-era veteran of the United States Army having served as a military policeman, patrol and narcotics dog handler. In his video the Vice Mayor Fimbres talks about the importance of Mexican tourism to Arizona's economy.

El Paso Mayor John F. Cook, TX: John Cook is Mayor of El Paso, Texas. Cook formerly served as president of the El Paso Health Care Facilities Financing Corporation and El Paso Housing Finance Corporation.In his video Mayor Cook discusses the importance of legal migration for the economies of border cities.

Sheriff Tony Estrada, AZ: Sheriff Tony Estrada was first sworn into office on January 1, 1993. Sheriff Estrada was born in Nogales, Sonora, Mexico, immigrated with his family as an infant and grew up in Nogales, Arizona. In his video Sheriff Estrada talks about how the border in Arizona is safer then it has ever been.

Pima County Sheriff, Clarence Dupnik, AZ: Clarence W. Dupnik has served as the Sheriff of Pima County, Arizona, since his appointment in February 1980. County voters endorsed the choice nine months later by electing him to his first four-year term and ratified that decision by re-electing him six additional times. In his video Sheriff Dupnik talks about the dangers of the political rhetoric surrounding the border.

Sheriff Lupe Trevino, TX: Guadalupe "Lupe" Trevino is Sheriff of Hidalgo County, Texas. He currently serves on the State of Texas Homeland Security Office Mass Migration Committee and on the Executive Committee of the Texas Radio Interoperability Coalition. In his video Sheriff Trevino discusses how the border is much safer then political figures would have you believe.

Ruben Barrales, CEO SD Chamber of Commerce, CA: Ruben Barrales is President and CEO of the San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce. He served in the White House for five years as deputy assistant to President George W. Bush, where he was the President’s liaison to state and local elected officials. In his video Ruben talks about the importance of economic security along the southwest border.