Political Roundtable: Carlson on renewable energy, RI’s economy and why he’s running in CD1

Political Roundtable

He grew up in Warwick, worked at Newport Creamery and won a scholarship to go to Williams College and Harvard Law School. Carlson went on to be a trial lawyer, to work on Wall Street, and as a legislative director for former Massachusetts Congressman Joe Kennedy the 2nd. The 62-year-old Jamestown resident is now a renewable energy investor, a volunteer EMT and he teaches leadership at Yale. Carlson is a potential X factor in the 1st District race, because of an ability to put a lot of his own money into his own campaign. But like many of his fellow candidates, Carlson is hardly a household name around the 1st District, and this is his first run for office. So what is his potential path to victory, and what is his vision for how renewable energy can create more jobs in Rhode Island? I’m Ian Donnis and this week I’m going in-depth with CD1 Democratic candidate Don Carlson.

Transcript:

Ian Donnis: Welcome to The Public’s Radio.

Don Carlson: Very nice to be here. And good to see you today.

Ian Donnis: Let me start with the basic question: why are you running for this open seat in Rhode Island’s first congressional district?

Don Carlson: I guess the biggest reason is I just I love Rhode Island. You know, I grew up here, grew up in Warwick, and my mom lived in Jamestown. So my roots are deep here. My family has been here for generations, I care a lot about the state. Even if I’ve lived away for a while, during different jobs. This has always been home for me. And so I really care a lot about Rhode Island. And we face some pretty serious problems as a state. And I know people are struggling with some of those issues right now. I feel like we know what to do about those problems. I feel like we’re just not doing it. And so my goal really is to bring my skills and experience to Washington to try to help the House of Representatives achieve the implementation of some of the important ideas that people have been talking about for years.

Ian Donnis: You do have an interesting background. At the same time some of the candidates running in this race with I believe 16 candidates at last count are current office holders like Lieutenant Governor Savina Matos, or former office holders like a former rep. Aaron Regunberg, what is your path to victory in this race with so many candidates?

Don Carlson: Yeah, it is a crowded field, we’ll see how the field sorts out in July when people have to file their formal papers along with signatures and so forth. So who knows how many candidates we’ll wind up with as the summer presses on. But from my own background, you know, I’m pretty proud of the fact that I spent five years in the House of Representatives, a bunch with Joseph Kennedy II when he was elected to Congress back in the late 1980s. And then again, with my friend, Jim Himes, who’s the current congressman from Fairfield County. So I understand how the house works pretty well. I happen to be down there to watch Seth get sworn in in January. And he actually was really remarkable. That slid into the McCarthy debacle.

Ian Donnis: Sure. But if I could interrupt, the question is your path to victory? How do you win? How do you put together enough votes to beat some people who, at least right now are better known than you?

Don Carlson: Yeah, I think it really revolves around three key issues in my mind, and the path to victory, climate change being the first among them for myself, because that’s where my expertise is deepest. I think Rhode Island needs a new economic engine. And I think that engine can be offshore wind, and I think that’s right in front of us right now is implementing a strategy to try to put Rhode Island really at the center of the renewable energy revolution, and especially in offshore wind would be a big part of it, I think that’ll get a lot of attention. And I think people get excited about the idea of really good high paying, high skilled jobs created right here in Rhode Island. You know, when I was a little kid, the Navy left, and that was a big blow to Rhode Island. It took a long time to recover. I’m not sure we ever fully recovered. And that’s really what we need is kind of a core economic engine for Rhode Island.

Ian Donnis: We’ll talk more about that shortly. But first one of your assets is that you have the ability to put some of your own money into your campaign. When do you plan to go on the air with television advertising?

Don Carlson: I would hope by the end of this month, you know, I think we’re looking at that right now. We’re really trying to identify the issues that matter the most to the folks in Rhode Island and the things that they care the most about in this election. So we can address those issues squarely in our TV work, and also online work digital advertising as well. So I’m hoping by the end of the month, we can be up on the air.

Ian Donnis: And how much of your own money do you anticipate anticipate putting into your campaign?

Don Carlson: You know, in theory, I thought maybe I can just match what other people put in, you know, and try to give people an incentive that way to try to sort of like they do on public radio where they do the matches, and so forth. So that might be my aspiration. We’ve said from the beginning, we think it’s something like a million dollars to run this race successfully. So I think we’ll do what we need to to get there.

Ian Donnis: You’re a renewable energy investor and you talked a bit earlier about the potential of renewable energy jobs, what does Rhode Island need to do differently to really capitalize on the potential jobs that could come with the renewable energy sector?

Don Carlson: I think two things. Policy wise, I think we need to really understand what resources are available through the new legislation, the Infrastructure Act, the chips Act and the inflation reduction act at the federal level. That’s where a congressman can really play a key role is figuring out how do we leverage those dollars. I was actually in a meeting this morning with someone who’s deep into that and was giving me a primer on the $20 billion available for example, for upgrading ports to become more automated and to really take advantage of renewable energy. So I think there’s a lot in those bills that we can work on. And we can get those resources directed into Rhode Island if we’re sophisticated. And if we make a good case. The other thing, I think, is to leverage the power of the private sector. Too often we just say this should be a government solution. And government’s going to solve this problem. I think that we can harness the creativity and the innovative power of the private sector, by if we’re not afraid to let people make a profit in this renewable energy revolution. I mean, that is how our system works. And I think it’s really important for Rhode Islanders to understand that there are business opportunities here and it’s okay for people to come in, in a for profit context, in the private sector, and to develop new businesses that will provide really good high paying long term high skilled jobs for Rhode Island citizens,

Ian Donnis: You talk on your website about the difference that education has made in your life. As it stands, as you probably know, Rhode Island has really struggled for decades to improve public education, particularly in Providence. What do you think is holding the state back from making more progress?

Don Carlson: You know, education has made all the difference in my life, I had no hope in the world to being able to get the kind of education I had when I was growing up. And, you know, fortunately, did well in school at Tolllgate High School in Warwick. And in fact, we were just going through my yearbook the other day, looking at some of the old memories from that time. And the scholarship that I got that paid for my higher education process was — really put my whole life on a different trajectory, I really want to try to achieve that for other people. And look, the bottom line is schools, we know what to do in the schools to make them better. I have a lot of experience working, for example, on the board of a charter school planting organization, as well as being a teacher for a lot of my life at the college level, we know what we need to do, which is to give teachers the resources that they need, give them the respect and the pay that they need, and really elevate the teaching profession. And to make it into something that gets the accoutrement or the different, you know, the respect that it deserves in our society. And I think that’s a really important idea for us to make teachers the center of what we need to do to reform education.

Ian Donnis: We’re talking here with Don Carlson candidate in Rhode Island’s first congressional district. And if you were to win this congressional race, and be sworn into Congress next January, you would be at the very bottom of the congressional totem pole. Given that how could you possibly make a difference in the lives of everyday Rhode Islanders?

Don Carlson: Yeah, you know, having worked in the house, different members play different roles. And you’re right, I would be at the very bottom of the seniority totem pole at the very beginning. The nice news is you have a leg up on all the folks that are elected in 2024, as well. But I think one of the things that happens in the house is that people fall into roles based on their skills and abilities. You know, in fact, David Cicilline, he taught me that there’s a difference between going on a leadership track or going on a committee track or trying to do substantive legislation in Congress. And so I think my role I think, would try to be to look for common interests and bring people together. It’s really what I’m the best at is trying to find shared interests among people. This is sort of at the root of the negotiation theory stuff that I studied at law school. And I think that to bring people together around their common interest around their shared interest is a really powerful way of getting things done. So I think you’ll never accomplish anything as a solo member of the House Representatives ever, no matter how much seniority you get, it’s really your ability to bring people together.

Ian Donnis: Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha, has been sounding off for some time about the need for the states have a long term plan for addressing needs in health care and the hospital landscape. What role do you think the next member of Congress from CD-1 should play in helping with that, if at all?

Don Carlson: You know, that’s probably more of a convening role or a facilitation role trying to bring people together and think about where we share interests. And I’m old enough to remember the greenhouse compact back in the day that Ira Magaziner created back in the 1980s, which was a plan to bring hospitals and universities and the public and private sector together to really create an economic momentum in Rhode Island. I think that’s probably what we need. We need something that brings those different elements of our society together, and leverages the fact that we have some of the greatest institutions of learning in the whole country right here in Providence, and to bring those folks together around a plan to make health care not just better, but also more accessible in Rhode Island would require that kind of collaboration.

Ian Donnis: We see how there’s a lot of concern about gun violence, given the frequency of mass shootings, at the same time moving forward politically in Washington is difficult given the partisan split in Congress. What would your approach be to trying to reduce gun violence?

Don Carlson: You know, this is one where we might take a page from the playbook of the other team and look at the long term game, because ultimately, what we need to do is reduce the number of guns in society and increase the level of gun safety. So there are a couple of bills in the legislature right now. We’ll be at the rally of this afternoon. You know, the anti gun violence rally that’s going to be at the Statehouse this afternoon. I think we have to raise public awareness. I think enough people’s lives have been touched and will be touched by gun violence in the future that maybe we can create some momentum to more fundamental change of our gun laws. You know, my daughter was actually in a shooting recently at Colby College just a couple of months ago, and in fact, I learned yesterday one of our neighbor’s daughter was in the same shooting. And this was at a party two guys get into a scuffle, one broke a bottle over the other one’s had. And his response was to pull out a nine millimeter Ruger pistol and start firing into the crowd. Now no one was killed, no one was hit by a bullet. And so no one got slaughtered. And therefore it didn’t even make the news. And not the national news anyway, but it was a pretty big deal. And my little girl spent the night in lockdown, you know, panic stricken about active shooters on the campus. And she had been brought up with these drills all her life. And so now the worst thing that could ever happen was happening. And so the trauma that those students felt that night, I think that resonates out ripples out to their families, their friends, their relatives, and enough people get touched by something, maybe eventually we’ll get enough momentum in this country to make something happen.

Ian Donnis: That’s clearly a horrible thing to experience. But how do you respond to the argument from gun rights people that law abiding gun owners are not the problem and that efforts to reduce the number of guns is an infringement on their rights?

Don Carlson: I’m not so sure it’s the number of guns is the type of guns there are lots of guns that are made really only to shoot other human beings. And those are the kinds of guns that we need to limit starting with assault weapons. I’m super proud that David Cicilline is the author of the assault weapons ban in Congress. And I’m very proud to follow in his footsteps on where he’s led on that issue. So the assault weapons be the first thing that we would want to start banning because those guns don’t really have another purpose. Aside from inflicting horrific violence on human bodies,

Ian Donnis: How do we become less brittle as a country?

Don Carlson: Brittle in the sense of polarized or divisive? Yeah, I think that’s maybe the core question for politics these days. I think you do that around building on success and looking for shared interests among individuals and building on success. You know, I’m really inspired. And I know you and I’ve talked about this before, by the alliance in Rhode Island, unique in the country, between the labor unions and the environmental movement, and how they got together and really helped to get Act on Climate passed a couple years ago. I think if we look for places like that, where disparate groups who have disparate traditions and sometimes even cultural dissonance, bring those groups together and create alliances and coalition’s you really can get things done. And that alliance is pretty much unstoppable in Rhode Island. That’s how you get things done. That’s how you move past polarization is to build coalitions around interests that can be aligned among important groups in society.

Ian Donnis: Toughest question for last, what is your favorite restaurant in the first congressional district?

Don Carlson: Oh, that is a tough one. I think I’m going to go with Pot au Feu in downtown Providence. It’s kind of a nice, warm, intimate place and it’s on a winter night. That’s kind of a nice place to hang out.

Ian Donnis: Bob Burke would be happy to hear that. Don Carlson Democrat running for the first congressional district in Rhode Island. Thank you for joining us.

Don Carlson: My pleasure. Happy to be here, Ian

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Half-winking jokes about the potential takeover by our robot overlords have proliferated for years. But now, not everyone’s laughing. Artificial intelligence has gained a lot more attention over the last year, and the consensus is that AI offers both remarkable benefits and a pretty scary downside. Regarding the latter, technologists have long contemplated what they call “the singularity” — the moment when artificial intelligence exceeds human intelligence. While some in Washington call for a more robust approach to regulating AI, the technology continues to move ahead, with uncertain consequences. You can read more about that in my Friday TGIF column, posting around 4 this afternoon on my twitter at IanDon and on our website at the publics radio.org.

That’s our show for this week. Our producer is James Baumgartner.

I’m Ian Donnis and I’ll see you on the radio.

The post Political Roundtable: Carlson on renewable energy, RI’s economy and why he’s running in CD1 appeared first on TPR: The Public's Radio.