EP. 40 — CONVERSATIONS: FORMER REP. CARLOS CURBELO

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Weston Wamp: I'm Weston Wamp, and this is “Swamp Stories,” presented by Issue One. 

Carlos Curbelo: I think the former president, a lot of the people around him want people to remain obsessed and focused with the past. And forget about politics and government, that's just not a way to live. Right? You cannot obsess over the past. You cannot change whatever happened in the past. And on top of that, it's based on something that there's no evidence for, right?

Carlos Curbelo: And that's just not why my parents came to this country. They actually came to this country to get away from that kind of mentality. They came to this country so elections and institutions would matter, so that we would respect the rule of law. 

Carlos Curbelo: I don't want my daughters to grow up or to live in a country where rules don't matter, where one guy or one woman can say, "Well, I'm just going to declare this or that, and that's how it's going to be." No, I just can't accept that. And I'm cautiously optimistic that Republicans are moving past that strange period

Carlos Curbelo: Democrats should take advantage of the fact that Mitch McConnell and others have said, "Yes, we are open to making sure that this law is clear in that there's no discretion here in terms of accepting election results."

Weston Wamp: From the school board in Miami-Dade County to the U.S. Congress and on to national television, Carlos Curbelo is one of the most unconventional and candid voices within the Republican party. As the son of Cuban immigrants, he brings a unique and salient perspective to the challenges facing democracy both at home and abroad.

This is Episode 40: A conversation with former Congressman Carlos Curbelo

Weston Wamp: Well, Congressman, thanks for joining us. I've found you to be one of the most unique and bold voices within conservatism these days. Will you just start by telling us a little bit of your personal story?

Carlos Curbelo: So I was born in Miami at 1980. My parents fled Cuba in the 1960s. I'm the only child they were able to have, so they are really proud of me. They don't have much of a choice because there's no one else. But my story doesn't say as much about me or my family as it does about this country, where two political refugees can come to the United States dirt poor, start from scratch and then one generation later their son can serve in Congress. That's just amazing. That does not happen almost anywhere else in the world. So now we're just extremely grateful to this country. I think a lot of immigrants, refugees, exiles tend to be some of our best citizens because they're just so grateful, and appreciative, and don't take anything about our freedoms here for granted.

Carlos Curbelo: So that's the way I was raised in terms of thinking about our country and thinking about government and politics. I stayed in Miami for college. I went to University of Miami. And while I was there, I started working for a member of Congress, who I had interned for while I was at high school and also paged for. So I knew I liked government and politics from an early age, 13, 14, 15. And I stayed involved ever since. Ran for the school board after we had had our first daughter — we had two daughters, my wife and I — and we had had our first daughter, decided to run for school board. And then four years after that ran successfully for Congress and served in the House and had a wonderful experience, although I did become very familiar with a lot of the weaknesses and flaws and challenges associated with our system of government.

Weston Wamp: I think this is one of the things that fascinates me most about your rise in politics is that you started at the school board level, but in one of America's largest and most important and, frankly, highest quality school districts. Can you talk a little bit about how starting at the school board has informed your opinions and perspectives as a member of Congress, but even now as a national voice? It's just such a different place to start than so many people who end up in national politics.

Carlos Curbelo: Well, a couple things first. The school board really is ground level. When you are ultimately responsible for the education of people's kids, their sons and daughters, it's intense and people expect the best and they should. So there's a lot of just one-on-one meetings, listening to people, understanding how schools or the system more broadly is, in some cases, failing them, in other cases, doing right by them. So that's a fairly unique perspective. And then I'll tell you in Miami-Dade County, my experience on the school board really gave me hope and confidence in government as a potential force for good, as an agent in society that can actually contribute to people's lives by being efficient, by holding people accountable, by being transparent.

Weston Wamp: A lot of people who may not have known you regionally or people who've got to know you in the last couple years, may have because you've been quite outspoken about the unusual, let's just refer to it this way, the unusual few years that the Republican party’s had. You and I both are Republicans who've said, quite early on, said that the 2020 election was not stolen. How much pushback in south Florida have you gotten from saying those things about the election? And has it changed from early 2021, now as we approach the middle of 2022?

Carlos Curbelo: Well, I mean, I have gotten pushback, and I wouldn't say it's broad, but there's certainly a small but loud base of former President Trump supporters who do believe the lie that the election was stolen. They are convinced of this, even though there's no evidence, even though countless judges, Republican appointed judges, Democratic appointed judges have in their rulings expressed that there's been no evidence. There is still a small and I think dwindling number of people who believe in this. I will tell you lately, whether people have changed their minds or not, it seems like they have started to move past this idea and the controversy and a lot of the anger and the strong feelings that have been associated with this. 

Carlos Curbelo: And I just think that's important because I think the former president, a lot of the people around him want people to remain obsessed and focused with the past. And forget about politics and government, that's just not a way to live. Right? You cannot obsess over the past. You cannot change whatever happened in the past. And on top of that, it's based on something that there's no evidence for, right? So that's why he's lashed out at even supporters of his like Mo Brooks, a congressman who is running for Senate in Alabama, because Mo Brooks said, "Well, I'm not going to keep talking about the 2020 election." And for Trump that was betrayal. And since then they've had a falling out. And Brooks has come out and said, "Well, Trump asked me to try to overturn the election result," which of course is what he's expected of anyone who claims to support him.

Carlos Curbelo: And that's just not why my parents came to this country. They actually came to this country to get away from that kind of mentality. They came to this country so elections and institutions would matter, so that we would respect the rule of law. That's why I'm in this country because my parents made that choice. So we don't need to act, and I know this term is politically incorrect these days but I'm not one for much political correctness, we don't need to act like third world countries. I mean my family left what has become a third world country because they wanted something better for themselves and for future generations. So here we are, and I don't want my daughters to grow up or to live in a country where rules don't matter, where one guy or one woman can say, "Well, I'm just going to declare this or that, and that's how it's going to be." No, I just can't accept that. And I'm cautiously optimistic that Republicans are moving past that strange period as you called it.

Weston Wamp: I want to ask one follow up about the election and then come back to your family's perspective on authoritarianism versus democracy. The quick follow up is that one of the problems in the days after the 2020 election and before President Biden was sworn into office was there's so much ambiguity, even as the son of a former member of Congress, a lot of question about what the role of Congress is in counting electors, certifying an election, and even what these words mean. There's been some bipartisan talk in Washington and some agreement that we should revisit the Electoral Count Act and for once and for all, clarify what the role of vice president is and what the role of Congress is. Do you think this would be a good idea? How much time have you thought about this? I mean, certainly in hindsight, Vice President Pence ended up playing a pretty critical role by not going along with what President Trump thought to be the appropriate steps.

Carlos Curbelo: Yeah, we should, Weston. And this is somewhere where Democrats, they have their big goals on reforming elections and there's some good ideas there and some terrible ideas, but they should focus on what we can all agree on. And the Electoral Count Act, which was never controversial. And I don't think on its face, if you just look at it and say, "Well, we need to clarify this," because we just assume that people would respect elections and that people would do the right thing every time. And by the way, Weston, I was in the chamber in 2017 when Vice President Joe Biden presided over the counting of electoral votes. And there was a cadre of Democrats on the House floor, who wanted to challenge the results and they were being boisterous and a bit disruptive.

Carlos Curbelo: And I remember Joe Biden looking to the right, because that's where Democrats sit. I don't know why I was in the chambers. There were very few people in the chamber. We used to kind of take this stuff for granted, right? We knew who won the election and we moved on because we're a serious democracy. But Joe Biden looked to the right and slammed the gavel and said, "Enough. It's over." So we never thought that we actually had to go in and reform this law and make sure it's very specific and explicit. But because someone decided to, without any evidence, without any data to try to overturn an election, yes, we should. We should make sure it's explicit. We should make sure that there's no discretion here, right? Because Vice President Pence was a patriot. He refused to go along with this ill-fated plot, but someday we might have a different vice president and things may not go the way they should.

Carlos Curbelo: So definitely Democrats should take advantage of the fact that Mitch McConnell and others have said, "Yes, we are open to making sure that this law is clear in that there's no discretion here in terms of accepting election results."

Weston Wamp: Let's take a step back and think more broadly about the world and the challenges we see. It's been my experience that south Florida is the most distinctive and maybe aspirational place for the Republican party right now, because there are so many folks in our generation whose family heritage actually encountered strong men. There's a different type of appreciation, even sobriety about democracy. Are we in an inflection point in terms of democratic governance around the world? Obviously Ukraine has taken center stage. I think it's caused a lot of people to think about these freedoms. It can so easily be taken for granted. How do you perceive what's going on in the world from the perspective of the son of Cuban immigrants?

Carlos Curbelo: Democracy is under threat. I think dictators like Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping, which that will be confirmed here in a few months that he is indeed a dictator, have come to realize that freedom is contagious. And their goal is to undermine our system of governance. They resent that with technology, with social media, with television, the internet, their residents can see what it's like to live in a free society. And they prefer that. And that's a nuisance for these dictators. So they are every day being more and more aggressive about undermining our institutions, our social norms, our respect for one another. Because even if we have strong laws and strong institutions, ultimately we need citizens to act in good faith and to have a minimum level of trust in society where we can function and where we don't have to assume that people are lying to us at every turn.

Carlos Curbelo: So this is an inflection point and we need to decide, even though we do have some challenges, even though we do have some major disagreements on cultural issues in this country, even though our economy, it's still the strongest and the greatest economy in the world, which is why so many people are trying to get into our country constantly. But there are some challenges, there are some inequities that need to be addressed in a number of different ways. And of course we would strongly disagree with our friends on the left on how to address them. But what we should all agree on is that we need to have this system where we can have these debates and where we can be constructive in reaching compromises in negotiating. That's what makes us strong. That's what makes us different. That's what my dad used to tell me when I was a kid. He would say because he still to this day says the Americans, because he thinks of himself as a refugee. He says, "The Americans don't fight the way people did in my country. When they have disagreements, they talk about it, they figure it out and they move on." We have lost that. We are now more like the country that my father left, Cuba, where because they couldn't agree on this social contract, they just gave one guy all the power. And that guy sure enough, and his family, are still in power today over 60 years later. And they have destroyed the country and there's no hope in Cuba. No opportunity, no wealth to redistribute.

Carlos Curbelo: So we are at inflection point, Weston. And we need to choose the right path. And every day I set aside my opinion, my views, even some of my passions to remain committed to the truth. I think the most important thing we can do as a society is have a common truth. We shouldn't even have to call it a common truth, but that's how much things have deteriorated. And once we have a common truth, then we can figure everything else out. But we have lost that common truth and we have people on the extreme right and on the extreme left, manipulating the truth on a daily basis for their personal gain. And in doing so, they're weakening us all.

Weston Wamp: Well, you got really close to answering my next question with that statement about the lack of commonly held truth. What is the appropriate way to talk about democracy and your concerns, my concerns around it? I fear sometimes that there's hyperbole about the decline of democracy in America, while at the same time having a real deep concern about, for example, a lack of commonly held values or truths. 

Weston Wamp: On the left there is, it seems, an agreement that democracy in America is declining rapidly and that our core institutions lack trust and that it all could end very badly, very quickly. I mean, I juxtaposed that. I mean, you and I are both Republicans. We live in very different parts of the country. I mean, my friends who are big Trump supporters are in the same breath the most freedom loving people you could find. Right? I mean, they're convinced that their ideology and even their support for Trump is born out of a willingness to defend and promote freedoms. And I'm just wondering, exactly where are we? I mean, it doesn't seem like it's as bad as some people say it is, but we certainly are trending in a direction that could be-

Carlos Curbelo: Well, yeah. Look, I do think people are at a point where freedom has become relative. People are for freedom as long as you agree with me. And once you disagree with me, then no more freedom for you. And that's just not who we are. That's not why this country was founded. So I do think there's some alarmism. There's alarmism on every issue. I work a lot on climate change, and a lot of Democrats tend to express themselves in a way that make us hopeless when it comes to climate change. “Oh, it's all over if we don't do this or that in the next 11 years, then forget it.” Or on the Republican side I've worked a lot on immigration. And even though it probably is the case now, for years people have been saying, "Oh, well the border is horrible and our country is being overrun by illegal immigrants." And people just tend to exaggerate.

Carlos Curbelo: And when we overreact, when we exaggerate, when we take alarmist positions and approaches, we turn off a lot of people. So I do think that when it comes to these elections issues, the left needs to be more disciplined and more sincere and sober about its criticisms. Certainly we all agree that what former President Trump did is highly troubling and problematic, right, making false claims without any evidence based on whatever his capricious nature, overturn an election result, that's all wrong and we need to prevent that.

Carlos Curbelo: Now, here in Florida, there were some tweaks made to our election laws last legislative session. They're not really going to make a major difference in terms of who votes and how, I mean, minority voting in Florida is strong, has been strong for a long time. I don't see that changing. And Democrats have overreacted saying, "They're trying to keep certain people from voting in Florida." And then that's where you start losing the middle of the country. And that's where you start losing the opportunity to actually strengthen our laws to make it easier for people to vote while making sure that the people who say they're voting are the people who say they're voting, right?

Carlos Curbelo: So we just really need a healthy, commonsense balance approach to all of this. And the extremes in their criticism and in their faux outrage, a lot of times, end up doing more harm than good and end up becoming unwitting co-conspirators to the people who are actually trying to make it harder for others to vote and to suppress certain people and groups from voting.

Weston Wamp: The last question you're really well positioned to give us an interpretation on. Not too long ago, there were 63 Republicans who voted against a pretty basic bill reaffirming support for NATO. There were several different reasons given. You've got some fringe opinions on our side of the aisle about Putin in Russia. How do you explain what has gone on in conservative politics, not just in America, but abroad that has led to 63 members of the U.S. House being unwilling to just reaffirm basic support for NATO?

Carlos Curbelo: Well, I do think this is part of Trump's legacy. The lack of appreciation for our values, our system of governance, our respect for individual rights and responsibilities. I mean, fundamentally, that's what NATO is. Of course it's a military alliance, but at the end of the day it doesn't just protect countries, it protects ideas, it protects a way of life, a way of life that is under assault by the Putins, and the Xi Jinpings, and the Castros, and Maduros of the world. They want to destroy our way of life. They do not want us to be free people who go out into the world every day and make choices. They don't want that. And NATO is designed to protect that way of life. And there are some, and thankfully it's a minority, but there are some Republicans who have been infected with this virus or bacteria that we don't have to care about what happens in other parts of the world, that we don't have to protect human rights and just the right to be free.

Carlos Curbelo: We do. We do, because ultimately we don't act, the cost of inaction is far greater. Ultimately problems will show up on our doorstep or inside our home, as we saw on 9/11. We need to understand that what happens everywhere in the world matters. That doesn't mean we can be the world police, that doesn't mean we have to fight every war. But we have to do as much as we can every day to lead the world because if we don't lead the world, the Chinese will lead the world, or the Russians will lead the world, or terrorists would lead the world. And certainly we don't want that. That will ultimately hurt us. It'll hurt our kids. It'll hurt our grandkids. It'll ruin our way of life. It'll diminish our quality of life. So I really hope we can root out this trend in the Republican party. I hope we can return to a time when we understood the value and how much we save by living in a world where our country is the leader.

Weston Wamp: On the next episode of "Swamp Stories," we'll look at the role of private philanthropy in the 2020 election and the importance of regular federal funding for state and local election administration.

Weston Wamp: Thanks for listening to “Swamp Stories,” presented by Issue One, the country's leading political reform organization that unites Republicans, Democrats, and independents to fix our broken political system. Please subscribe to the podcast and share it with your friends. Even better, rate and review it on iTunes to help us reach more listeners. You can find out more at swampstories.org. I'm your host Weston Wamp. A special thank you to executive producer, Ethan Rome, senior producer Evan Ottenfeld, producer Sydney Richards, and editor Parker from ParkerPodcasting.com. “Swamp Stories” was recorded in Tennessee, edited in Texas and can be found wherever you listen to podcasts.

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