Our series candidates and conversation continues tonight with a focus on the office of State Treasurer, which is responsible for the banking and investment duties for the state, along with management of Arizona's permanent land endowment.

Nick Mansour is a Democratic candidate for treasurer.

He's an entrepreneur and former chairman of the Arizona College of Nursing.

We should note that the Republican candidate, Elijah Norton, declined our invitation to participate in tonight's discussion.

Nick Mansoor, good to have you here.

Thank you so much for joining us.

What qualifies you to be state treasurer?

Yeah, thank you for having me on.

The basic thing that Treasurer's office does is invest our money.

And I at Arizona College of Nursing, I managed hundreds of millions of dollars.

I managed over 1500 employee's or students there.

Our graduates there performed very well in some years.

We actually were the highest performing nursing school in the country or the state rather.

And so I know about managing money.

I know about managing people and leading an organization like this.

The duties of the office.

What do you se as the primary responsibilities?

Well, the main thing is managing our money.

And there's about $20 billion that's in our $22 billion that are for our day to day cash operating needs.

But the big thing that I'm really focused on is we have an $11 billion fund.

It's for the benefit of education.

We're not investing it well today.

And if we did what other states that have a similar fund like this hat do, we would make hundreds of millions of dollars more every year.

So that's the main thing I'm focused on.

Yeah, I want to get to that in a second here.

Prop one two, three.

But as far as the state treasurer advocating for and against political positions, where do you stand on that?

It's very clear.

I do not believe we should be injecting partizan non-financial criteria into how we make our investments.

So that is one actual difference in this race.

When we do that, it just means that we're going to have riskier investments and higher taxes.

And that's the opposite of what I'm trying to make happen.

So primarily an administrative position is how you see that.

I think I think it's best run as a nonpartisan position.

Having said that, you know, it is our chief financial officer, the treasurer should be advocating for policies.

And and I intend to do that as well.

Okay.

You tend to do that, but no as the first order of business.

I think we've got the first order of business.

You got to make sure that our money is investe well in doing a good job for us.

What should that investment strategy look like?

Well, the right order is safety, liquidity and then yield.

And that's how we've been focused for many years.

And how I want us to remain focused.

So you would say more cautious than aggressive.

I would say more cautious and aggressive but also fiscally responsible.

And we want to make sure we're investing our money smartly and wisely, because we want to get as much as we can, as long as we're getting safety first and liquidity second.

What do you think about cryptocurrencies investing in cryptocurrencies?

Yeah, we're not doing that today.

I think that's the right policy.

I'm not advocating that we do something different.

There are or have been bills floate about doing something like that.

And it's certainly worth looking at.

But today we're not doing it I think that's the right thing.

Okay.

So you continue that policy.

The government, the governor actually vetoed a bill citing volatility in the cryptocurrency market.

You agree with that?

Yes I do.

Yes.

All right.

Would you invest have the state inves in firms, in banks, businesses, what have you that disagree with you politically?

Absolutely.

I mean, I think that's that's what I'm saying.

We don't we don't necessarily want non-financial criteria affecting who we're doing business with and how we're investing the money.

And that is a big point of difference.

My opponent does want to do that sort of thing, and it ultimately means riskie investments and us earning less and therefore having higher taxes.

So your moral outlook would not affect your investment strategy.

I am absolutely correct.

I am absolutely committed that we want this office to be nonpartisan, to remain nonpartisan.

That is a big difference in this race.

All right.

Prop 123.

Yes.

What are your thoughts?

Well.

Today again you're talking about th education endowment fund.

Yes.

And we're not investing it well, but we're also.

Why are we not investing it?

Well.

We are.

If you look at what other states are doing.

Our mix between bonds and public stock index funds is we're over allocated to bonds today.

And we should be doing more on the public index side.

So that's what I would like to see change.

And there's actuall ten other states that do this.

It's a mix of red and blue states.

There's bipartisan agreement not to invest the way we're investing if we just copy those other states.

These are states like Texas, Wyoming, Utah.

We'd be doing a better job, and it would be safe and fiscally responsible at the same time.

It was interesting, you say, you know, bonds more than the market.

I mean, you said you were als cautious, more than aggressive.

Some would say that those two don't square.

Well, I think there is two things here.

And you can be both.

One is do you want to be safe?

And the others do you want to be fiscally responsible?

And I want to be both.

And you can be safe and fiscally irresponsible by not doing the right thing.

And this fund that we're talking about is a long term fund.

We're holding this money in perpetuity for the benefit of our kids and our grandkids, and we should invest it appropriately.

And we're not doing that today.

That's investment.

What about distribution?

Is it wise to increase the annual distribution from something like a state land trust?

Yes.

I think it is wise for us to do more than we're doing today.

And today we're distributing about 2.5% of the fund every year.

Most endowment funds are someplace closer to 5%.

Our legislature and our governor agree that they would like to take it to 6.9%, but they haven't figured out exactly how to do that.

And I think that's about as high as you could go.

And it only really depends on if you have certain safeguards in place.

But we can certainly be above where we are today.

The current treasurer thinks that 4%, 4 to 4.9% is the industry norm.

She wouldn't want to see us go much higher than that.

As you mentioned, the latest thing out of the legislature that never really got traction but still they were going 6.9%.

We were hearing 8% at one time.

I mean, is this is this being fiscally responsible with the public's money?

You want to protect this for the long term, and so you don't want to eat into how much money we have over time.

I think you can get above 5%.

Again, you have to have safeguards in place that make sure we're taking into account inflation and that the fund continues to grow even despite the disbursements.

You mentioned inflation, market volatility.

These are things that have to be considered when you're taking money out of this trust.

I mean, how much do you consider that especiall when it comes to distribution.

Oh, I mea you have to be considering that.

I mean, we we all are experiencing what happens when the cost of when inflation goes up.

And like I said, we want this fund to continue to grow on an after inflation basis for as long as we're going to hold it, which is forever.

A past treasurer said that doing what prop 123 does violates the prudent investor rule.

You disagree with that?

It depends on how far you go.

And at 4 to 5%, not at all.

6.9% is as much as you could go.

His idea was you shouldn't dip into the principle of a fund like this.

Oh, I do think that's one of the safeguards you don't want to dip into, into the principle of fun.

So the fund has to earn more than whatever you're goin to distribute on a yearly basis.

And for those who say this is money, the public money, it's there to manage.

It's not there to give out, especially at four, six, sometimes 8% ranges.

Do they have a point?

I think they have a point up to a point.

This is a fund that is for th benefit of education primarily, and we should be investing it both for the long term and for our students today.

And so it is a balancing act.

And we don't want to go too far on one side or the other.

So they have a point.

But we need to be disbursing the right amount today.

And as you know we are among the lowest states when it comes to funding our education.

This is a way to fund education without anybody paying any more taxes.

And we should be using it wisely today.

We're not.

Do you think that voters who would choose a state treasurer?

You've already said it's more administrative than anything.

The politics shouldn't play a part in this.

Do you think this should be something appointed by a governo as opposed to voted by citizens?

Well, I think the fact is, in our Constitution it is a constitutional office.

And so what you're talking about would require a change.

I do think it's important that the treasurer try to be nonpartisan, and I do think it's important that we have somebody we can trust.

And there are real concerns about my opponent when it comes to trust.

Last questions here regarding your opponent.

He's not here He declined to participate here.

But your biggest concern how someone watching this goes I don't know.

Nick Mansoor I don't know who the other guy is either.

Why should they vote for you?

Well I do think trust is a real issue in this election, and I have over 100 business leaders around the state who've endorsed me.

We have Democrats, independents, Republicans who've endorsed our campaign.

I grew up here.

You can talk to lots of friends around the state, and they'll tell you I'm somebody you can trust.

On the other hand Elijah Norton has made his money selling used car warranties, and we know of over 100 lawsuits between his companies and and their customers.

And they are alleging things like selling elderly adults, used car warranties for car they don't have, denying claims, failing to reimburse deceptive marketing practices.

Here's the point it it's no hard to have somebody sue you.

But when it happens again and again and again, at some point you have to wonder, is this really somebody we want safeguarding our money?

Arizona College of Nursing has had some problems along the way as well.

Is that something that you need to respond to?

Well, I'm very proud of what we do at Arizona College of Nursing.

We have helped thousands of people become nurses, and during my tim there, over 90% of our graduates passed the stat licensing exam on the first try.

Some years we were the best performing school nursing school in the state.

Did we always?

Were we 100% perfect?

No.

Were there issues?

Yes.

Di we try to resolve those?

Sure.

But the difference is the quantity.

And on the other side, we're talking about hundreds of lawsuits, including some that are continuing to go on today.

It's a patter and that should be concerning.

Nick Mansoor, Arizona Stat Treasurer candidate, Democrat.

It's good to have you here.

Thank you so much for joining us.

We appreciate it.

Thank you.

Ted.