We're back now with overtime, with Kevin Reinke and Mr.

Reinke Just before we went to close credits, you were talking about som research you did on Mike Duggan.

You basically are saying this guy's got a shot at winning this thing.

I think Mike Duggan has a proven record in the political field and he has won a write in ballot.

He has been a white mayo in a predominantly black city.

He has accomplished, whether you agree with his politics or not, position in power, that very few, if any, people in my lifetime in Michigan have been able to achieve.

So he's an interesting deal.

I'll take it a step further.

And for the first time in Michigan's history, we're going to elect a governor, if we have three candidates, with under 50% of the vote that I'm aware of in maybe under 40% of the vote, the way things are trending and quite possibly with 35% of the vote, that to me is startling.

So as you were looking at this, was there a particular amount of money you were willing to spend on a gubernatorial race?

Yeah, I, I thought when I went through and I looked at my last run and I invested just under $10 million in my last run, and it was money well spent.

I wasn't trying to buy the seat.

I was investing in Michigan.

I thought the and I think today that to break out of the pack that you have to have a candidate that has 15 to $20 million.

For just the primary.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's going to be a god awful expensive election cycle for governor, for Senate.

And so how much of that were you willing to put in if it was going to take 15 to 20?

How much were you willing to put in?

If I were to get in, I would have committed $20 million to the primary.

Wow.

Yeah.

You just thought the party isn't ready to win yet, so I'm not going to put the money in for this.

Well, my view was this.

Even within Republicans, and because I'm not a politician, I actually had an agenda.

I was willing to identify the things that were my priorities and I wanted to work on and I didn't want to debate them.

I'm willing to admit it was a short, short sightedness on my part.

I wasn't willing to say, yo know, okay, I'll change my mind.

I want to fix education in Michigan and whether I'm governor, I'm going to fix it or whether I'm a citizen, I'm going to work to fix it.

How come you didn't take yourself out of this three, six months ago?

Becaus I hadn't come to a conclusion.

Tim, think of it this way.

In the after I lost, okay, I did 111 political events for the next election cycle.

I signed up over 400 delegates.

I was the only gubernatorial candidate that was actively going around the state and interacting and listening to the people of Michigan.

Now, when you listen, you can come to a conclusion.

Can I bring these people together or are they too far apart?

Even within my own party to say that that investment, that time commitment was right for myself and my family.

And I came to the conclusion that we didn't need Kevin Reinke and Perry Johnson, and I suspected that Perry was going to run for a long time.

I didn't like the fact that the early commits, and I don't believe that election campaign should be legal.

For more than 12 months in his state, we had people that 20 months out.

How we had John James announce he wanted to run for governor 59 days after he got elected a congressman that screwed up, that is not representing Michigan and its people appropriately so it's a problem.

You know the election cycle gets longer.

That's not a solution.

So that's why you didn't announce sooner, too, because you could have always announced last summer, last fall, and then come to the conclusion, now I'm just going to drop out.

Well I wanted to see how it laid out.

I wanted to see and interestingly enough, fo nine months, people were banging the drums on issues that were important to me.

And I said, You know what?

They don't need another person to get on top of them.

Yeah, but you started a podcast.

I did, yeah.

And you know what?

It's a damn good one.

It's called Beyond the Echo.

And I ask the people, Tune in.

We've interviewed every gubernatorial candidate on the Republican side.

I have sent letters, certifie letters, and offers to Gretchen Whitmer, to Jocelyn Benson, to Duncan Gilbert Gilchrist.

Duncan, Is this for Garland Carlin?

I'm sorry.

There's a Duncan Gilchrist that I know to Garlin Gilchrist.

I would love to have them all in.

If you watch that, it's their opportunity to talk to the audience that I believe is going t decide the election in Michigan.

Do you what role do you play going forward, if any?

Like, do you ar you looking to help Republicans?

Are you looking to help Doug in I mean, like, what role do you play in the election season?

God.

I would think that Mike Duggan would not be any amenable to me at all.

I've asked Mike to come on the show.

Absolutely not.

I've I've asked Mike to interview.

Absolutely not.

Here's the deal.

I ask Republicans hard questions.

I would ask the same hard questions of Mike Duggan and of any Democrat that comes on the show because they're the questions that people actually want to hear the answer.

So then is it wrong for him to say that I'm not going to address national issues, I'm running for a state office?

Do you buy that line?

Well, that's a yes or no.

Yes, I do buy that line.

So you can bailout on an issue that may impact in Michigan under the line that, well, it's a federal issue.

If you are saying that it's 100% of the time or not, then I would say, well, no.

Then you cannot.

But the focus should be on state issues.

The federal issues impact state issues.

Mr.

Reinke.

Yes, they can, and the press likes to distract it and you guys come up with some really great points that aren't necessarily pertinent to the election in Michigan.

They have an impact they need to be.

Example I'm sorry, I don't mean to interrupt.

Can you give an example?

So what is the advantage of talking about the federal issues?

I would challenge you give me a federal issue that you would say should impact or dictate the direction that the state of Michigan's gubernatorial campaign would go in.

Well, what about the one we just mentioned at the top of the show federalizing elections?

Yeah, I personally I chuckled.

I think I laughed, Beth, like you did.

I think that there are time that it would be best if certain people in power, positions of power, not say silly things.

All right.

And elections are an issue in Michigan.

Elections are an issue for the Republican Party.

It stirs up the base.

It alienates the independents in Michigan, every election has cheating because people don't understand how elections are run.

The safeguards that are built into them, their emotions get out in front of them.

And I'm going to tell you that in the last election when Trump lost, there was cheating.

And note that I said Trump lost.

There was election cheatin in the election that Trump won.

How are you defining cheating?

Well, for instance, there was a segmen that I did on Guy Gordon Show, and I looked at the qualified voter files.

All right.

And interestingly enough measured those every single day.

There was an individual that appeared on that qualified voter file 35 times.

We tracked down that there were 35 different applications for ballots sent to that individual.

That's part of our process.

Does that mean tha that person voted 35 times No.

Does that mean that that person could have voted 35 times?

Yes, because they had a ballot application, the system would catch it.

So then the answer would be no.

But he couldn't vote 35 times.

But they vote.

Their action is the vote.

The question is, is it counted?

And that is where the debate comes in.

People get freaked out abou my mom was dead for five years.

I'm sorry.

My father was dead for five years.

My mom died two years ago.

Both of them received applications to vote because it's no longer- After they died.

After they died.

It's no longer a law that they have to be removed from the voting rolls.

That in and of itself is wrong.

It sounds like you're goin to run for secretary of state.

Yeah, well.

There are those that would like me to do that too.

Have you said no to that too?

I you know what?

I. I haven't even considered it.

The fact of the matter is, we need clean voting rules.

The fact of the matter is that the right to vote is the greatest privilege.

It an American or someone who lives in Michigan has.

And if you don't have confidence, it's incumbent on the government to build that confidenc through their acts and actions to ensure that, you believe that your vote matters, that one person, one vote.

And that's why we've got the petition going in Michigan, of which I totally support that.

You have to have voter ID to vote.

Now you're going to say it's already a law.

It's written into the Constitution.

You know what?

Let the people feel that their voice speaks, that it was heard in that it's being enacted because they don't trust the people in power right now.

And that's a problem.

Anybody got a final one.

?I think we're good, Mr.

Reinke.

Always good to see you.

Yeah.

Don't let it frustrate ya.

It's not right or wrong.

Should they trust them?

Maybe.

But they don't.

And we need to figure that out.

Just your final question.

The final the weekend before, when Mr.

Trump endorsed Tudor Dixon, what did you think?

Well, I was in too deep to say, "oh s---."

You know, the weekend that Donald Trump endorsed Tudor Dixon, I was up in the polling, and if you had Tudor Dixon sitting here, she would tell you that I was up in the polling.

There was a significant contribution made to a PAC supporting Donald Trump by some significant people in Michigan and Tudor was their candidate.

And candidly, maybe arrogantly, we'd have a Republican governor sitting across from you today versus as a candidate for governor and Michigan would look different.

How about that, boys and girls?

There you go.

Mr.

Reinke, good to see you.