- [Voiceover] Production of Evening with the Governor is made possible in part by Martin Waymire, a full service strategic communications agency partnering with clients through public relations, digital marketing and public policy engagement.

Learn more at martinwaymire.com.

Also by Business Leaders for Michigan, dedicated to making Michigan a top 10 state for jobs, education, widely shared prosperity and a healthy economy.

Information at businessleadersformichigan.com.

(upbeat music) Off The Record presents Evening with the Governor with Governor Gretchen Whitmer and first gentleman Dr. Marc Mallory.

- Well, isn't there room in the democracy for irrational behavior?

- For irrational behavior?

There's irrational and then there's dangerous.

- So what did you do during the campaign?

- Well, I kept the home fires burning basically.

I do whatever she tells me to do here.

From the Michigan Governor's Residence, here's Senior Capital Correspondent, Tim Skubick.

- Governor Whitmer, thank you for having us back at the executive residence.

I want you to know that in 1972 back by that fireplace was the first Evening with the Governor that we did.

And I want to thank you for your continuing commitment to do this.

You know who that was with, of course?

- Bill Milliken, the governor from when I was born.

- When were you born?

- [Gretchen] 1971.

- [Tim] Wow, so you missed that show, right?

- Yeah, I wasn't paying attention as closely as I do now to politics.

- Thank you for having us back.

If you had known then what you know now, would you have still wanted to be governor?

- Yes, I'm really grateful to be the governor of this great state.

I love it, even on the hardest days and we certainly have had more than our share.

Talk about all the crises my predecessors had to confront, I don't think any one of them can compete with all the things we've had to navigate.

And yet, I still feel really grateful to be here.

I am excited about a second four years and hoping that we don't have nearly the kind of challenges we had the first four, but we're making progress and I wanna keep doing this work.

- It couldn't possibly be that bad.

- Tim, don't temp fate.

- Well, I mean, that was a boatload of stuff that you dealt with.

And a normal person, Governor, might say, you know what, I want no part of that at all.

- I've talked to a lot of people across the state and most recognize we've been through so many unheard of challenges in a row.

And they don't envy the job, but I feel really grateful to be here and I know the work that we're doing makes a difference in people's lives.

- During the debate, one of the two debates in the race for governor, you said that if you had to do it over, you'd do some things differently on COVID.

Would you share just a couple with me, please?

- Well, I often say, we were building the plane as we were flying it.

We had a White House that was not being helpful.

In fact, they were undermining our efforts, misinforming the public, undermining our work to get masks in the middle of a pandemic where we had hospitals that were full, morgues that were full, refrigerated trucks outside of hospitals.

It's important to go back and remember what we are really confronting.

With all the knowledge we now have of this virus that was brand new, would I change some things?

Absolutely, I would make Michigan the mask producer of the world and we would help people stay safe in the middle of COVID, but we didn't even know it was respiratory-- - Would you have changed the nursing home policy?

- You know, I'm glad you asked that because there's been this characterization about nursing homes that's not just accurate.

Nursing homes were never forced to take COVID patients.

We had protections and we had a policy in the event that they did bring the residents back onto the property, but they were never required to.

And I think that was one of those talking points that my critics perpetuated and it just simply was not true.

- If we took Proposal 3 out of this past election, would it have had a different impact on the race for governor?

- I mean, it might've been a little closer.

I don't know, who knows?

I know that we saw people engage who hadn't been engaged before.

I did round tables all across the state and we didn't just have pro-choice Democratic women at the tables.

We had Republicans, we had Independents, we had people who never voted before but were furious that rights that they'd come to expect and had been there for 49 years were now being ripped away from their children and their grandchildren.

So I think that this is an issue that certainly animated a lot of voters and brought them out.

What the difference was, I think you saw there was some analysis of the voter in this current election, this most recent election.

I think it was 40% came out to vote for me, 40% for the ballot initiative.

They voted for me and for the ballot initiative.

My voters voted for the ballot initiative, too.

So it's hard to say which drove what, but I'm grateful that we put that on the ballot.

And Planned Parenthood, ACLU did a heck of a job.

- During the debate you said, "Schools will be closed for three months."

Did you know after you said that you put your foot in your mouth?

- Well, I was getting a little tired-- - The answer's yes.

- I was getting a little tired of my opponent saying I had shut down schools for two years.

It was wrong.

Under my orders, schools were out for three months and then it went to the locals.

We worked closely with the locals-- - But you didn't say that, but you didn't say that.

- Tim, in a debate, you got 60 seconds to talk about a lot of stuff and then you get 30 seconds to clear the record.

I went into it, didn't have enough time to say the extra part, but it wasn't an effort to mislead, it was simply to clear up the record because my opponent said a lot of things that were wrong and I tried to correct as many as I could.

- What did you think of that debate format?

- Well, I agreed to two debates right out of the chute, soon as the primary was behind us.

And there were a lot of candidates across the country who wouldn't even debate their opponents.

- Ms. Dixon got pretty good reviews in the debates.

Did you think she performed well?

- She had a lot of training when it came to cameras and she was an actor, so I wasn't particularly shocked.

I'd watched some of the debates that they had when the Republican primary.

So yeah, I wasn't particularly surprised.

- Let's talk about some issues.

Do we need to have a tax on electric vehicles?

- A tax on electric vehicles?

One of the things I'm trying to get done is a rebate to make electric vehicles more affordable for people.

- Well, just a second, the people would argue that the people that have an EV are paying a higher registration fee but they aren't paying the gas tax.

So it's an equity issue.

Your friends over at MITA, the road builder, say, give us the VMT.

Are you gonna endorse the vehicle miles traveled plan?

- Well, I do think that as this industry transitions, we have to have a way to pay for roads and bridges that transitions as well.

No state's figured this out yet.

I'm confident we can figure it out, but I'm not gonna endorse something that I haven't had the opportunity to study and work with the legislature to see if we can get over the finish line.

- But you're certainly open to some sort of a user fee on electric vehicles.

- Yes, I am.

I believe that it's important for us to have a sustainable revenue source because our roads and bridges have been underfunded for decades.

We've made a big difference in four years, but we have not solved it because I've not had a legislature that's willing to roll up their sleeves and work.

I'm hopeful and confident that with the new one, we'll have a lot more substantive conversations and work with industry to try to get something done, so that a future governor's not trying to cobble together an infrastructure plan.

- And the environmentalists will say your endorsement of a fee increase on electric vehicles would discourage the people from buying them and therefore, you're hurting the environment.

- You know, most environmentalists I talk to are very pragmatic people and they understand that if we're going to encourage people to make the transition to EVs, we've gotta do things like build up the infrastructure to support them.

- Presidential primary, you wanna have it in Michigan earlier?

- I do, and I'm hopeful we can get it done.

- [Tim] You know what's gonna happen if you do that, Governor?

- What?

- Well, they're gonna say, our favorite daughter ought to run for president.

- Maybe they'll say that I'm doing it so that Tim Skubick can run for president.

He's the one who talks about it all the time, not me.

- Well, I'm trying to make news here, Governor.

Can you help me out?

You did, to your credit, you said, "I'm not going to run for president in 2024," but then you left the door open after that.

Is the door open after 2024, Governor?

- Tim, you know what?

I've got four years, I'm so excited about serving the second term.

I've got a whole huge opportunity in front of me.

I don't know what I'm gonna do after this four years, but I can tell you what I'm gonna do for the next four years and that is govern the state of Michigan, put it in the strongest position we can be in, make sure that this is a place where every person can make a good living, raise a family, retire with dignity and hand this over to whomever succeeds me in an even stronger position than it's in today.

That's my sole focus for the next four years.

- Just one follow-up and then we'll move on, I promise.

- Oh, you promise?

You've promised before.

- I promise, okay, but when we talked earlier this year about this, I said, will you ever run for president and you said, "Ever?"

Okay, well, Governor, you could've said, no.

- Tim, can I fathom in 10 years, in 15 years maybe I'm called to serve?

I guess that's possible.

I'll tell you this, when I left the legislature, I never thought I'd run for office again.

- You were done, you said.

- And here I am, I'm gonna be starting on my second term as governor.

I didn't plot this out, I didn't plan it.

I just saw a state that needed some leadership, I thought I had something to offer and I'm grateful the people of Michigan agree.

- There are some Democrats who are overjoyed that there's a disarray in the Republican Party.

Is that disarray good for our democracy?

- Well, I do think that robust debate amongst leaders who can agree on a set of facts but have a different opinion on what those facts mean, I think that's important.

And we don't have that in today's Michigan Republican Party, sadly.

My father was a commerce director under Bill Milliken.

I think that it might be the Romney Obama election which was the last presidential where I thought I really hope my guy wins but if the other guy wins, it's not gonna be the end of our democracy.

And that's really what we're talking about here, extremists, election deniers, conspiracy theorists.

People are willing to encourage violence against their political rivals.

That's dangerous and that's really what we're seeing in the Michigan Republican Party right now.

- Well, isn't there room in the democracy for irrational behavior?

- For irrational behavior?

There's irrational and then there's dangerous.

I believe that anyone who denies the will of the people, denies election outcomes, sows conspiracy theories, encourages violence and undermines our confidence in our democratic institutions is dangerous.

That's not irrational, that's dangerous.

- Do you think our democracy is at risk of collapsing?

- I think that what we saw in this last election was a rejection of people that are working to undermine our democracy.

And I'm inspired and optimistic because of that, but I do think that the stakes continue to be high.

- And you had somebody over the weekend say we should suspend the Constitution.

- I mean, you're making my point.

- Is he dangerous for this country?

- Yes.

- [Tim] What does that mean?

- You know, for three years, I was trying to get Republicans both here in the state of Michigan and in the Trump administration to turn down the heat.

Over and over again, I said, someone's gonna get killed.

They wouldn't do it, they didn't take it seriously, then we saw what happened January 6.

And then we saw repeated attempts to hurt me and my family, other leaders, whether it is the local public health officer or is a teacher or a police officer.

This rhetoric and the proliferation of weapons in this country has made it a very dangerous moment.

And so I do think that the former president poses a very real and serious risk to our democracy, to our future and to the safety of the people of this country.

- You originally wanted to be an ESPN sports reporter.

So put on your sports reporter hat for just a second.

Student athletes making money off their images, great idea?

(Gretchen laughs) - I don't know-- - [Tim] Why did you laugh?

- I don't know.

- Well, if you were a basketball player and you could make an extra 50,000 a year with your image, wouldn't you wanna do it?

- Yeah, and I understand it because a lot of people are making a lot of money off of them and they're not able to, so I see the rationale.

I have a very conflicted view of sports and money and what it all means in this country right now.

- Conflicted because?

- Well, you just see, we've got these phenomenal sports programs, but they're paying tens of millions of dollars and these are institutions who are supposed to be educating and also have a sports team, not sports teams that also do a little educating.

- Well, it's kind of backwards.

- [Gretchen] Agreed.

- Well, one of your universities that you went to is one of the groups that's doing this.

- It's happening everywhere.

It's not one or the other, it's not just here in Michigan.

It gives me pause.

- What would you do to stop it?

- I don't know that there's anything I can do to stop it, I just say I have a very mixed reaction to it.

I recognize that sports programs elevate a university and give them a platform to continue doing their good work, but when you look at university presidents' or professors' pay compared to those in sports, it sometimes seems a little twisted.

- Just to make the record clear, it's not just Michigan State that's doing this.

Okay, it's everybody-- - It's not just the Big 10.

- All right, keep your hat on for a second.

Selling booze at college sporting events.

- Is there a question?

- [Tim] Yeah, you favor it?

- I anticipate that if the bill gets to my desk one of these days, I would sign it, yeah.

- And I read into that answer, you're not totally comfortable with that, Governor.

- Well, you know, alcohol makes everything a little more challenging, right?

(Gretchen laughs) No, I will sign the bill if it gets to my desk.

- But let me just try there 'cause what's going on there?

If you love something, you'll say, I'll sign it, that's it.

- It's not easy, I mean, anyone who's been on a campus.

I gotta tell you, a 8 PM game, I used to look at like that sounds like a lot of fun and over the last I don't know 15 years especially during the time when I was prosecutor, I look at that and think that's a recipe for disaster, makes me nervous.

- For somebody who had a robust social life that you told us four years ago, that's heaven.

- That would've been the perfect scenario for mayhem.

(Gretchen laughs) - Well, maybe the universities and the Big 10 and the organizations ought to get together and ban that stuff.

- Don't be writing a headline that that's what I'm proposing, you said it.

- When making a tough decision at the end of the day, do you come down on the side of what you believe is the right thing to do or let's say the majority of people in Michigan don't wanna do that, which is more important to you?

- Well, I mean, I've always... Any officeholder has to ask themselves, am I here to simply reflect the people that I am supposed to lead or do I lead when my thoughts don't exactly reflect where they're at?

And I've always concluded the latter.

I think that people hire me because I see the world similarly, but also because they trust my judgment.

And so when it's a judgment call, I get as much information as I can and I make the tough call.

And I don't twiddle my thumbs.

For better or worse, people rarely have to wonder where I'm coming from.

- Well, then your critics would say, well, Governor, you're smarter than the rest of the people in Michigan?

- No, I'm not smarter.

I'll be the first person to say that.

I have learned so much from the people of Michigan.

I have a great deal of respect for people with very different opinions than I have, but I also know at the end of the day, I gotta make the call.

I think it's important to remember when I had to make the decision to take kids out of school, that was hard.

It was really hard because not only was it going to have ramifications for academics, but a lot of kids in our state get their meals at school.

So we had to build up apparatus to continue to make sure that kids had access to food.

But what I was worried about was the 1918 flu, which was the last global pandemic we had.

And it disproportionately killed children.

And so I was thinking about all the parents and families who were worried and what if this virus was like that and we saw children disproportionately be the ones that lost their lives in this pandemic?

So that's what was driving that decision.

I know there were a lot of people who didn't agree with a lot of the decisions I had to make, but listening to the experts and then ultimately making the tough call, it's what this job is.

- Before we call in the first gentleman to join our conversation, one last one.

You said recently you're happy to have four more years, but you'll probably be unhappy after it's over.

What did you mean by that?

- It's a tough job.

I am grateful to be here, I really am.

Someone asked, "Should we extend term limits for governor?"

I said, no.

I think eight years, you can get a lot done in eight years.

It goes by fast, the time goes fast.

But I do think that it's healthy to have a change in leadership.

- But part of this is your public service gene, where did that come from?

- Both my parents, my grandparents.

My grandma was a teacher, my grandfather was a superintendent in Pontiac Schools, my father was commerce director and my mother worked for Frank Kelly in the Attorney General's Office.

- So you had no choice.

- We had choices, my sister is... Well, she's now on a school board, so I guess she's got the public service gene, too.

No, I think that it's we were raised in a household where it was reinforced all the time we're not better than anyone else, we are more fortunate, lucky than some.

And so where there are opportunities to help, we need to take them.

- Dr. Mallory, thank you for doing this program.

I know this is not high on your list of your to-do list, right?

- Well, it's my pleasure.

- Yes, nicely said.

You ought to go into politics, which you're never going to do, right?

- Never.

Have you ever thought about running for office?

- Never, not at all.

- You mean living with the governor is enough to turn you off to that.

- That's right, there it is.

- So what did you do during the campaign?

- Well, I kept the home fires burning basically.

I do whatever she tells me to do here.

- This is good, you took care of the dogs.

- Yeah, I took care of the dogs.

- [Tim] Did you make any campaign calls on her behalf?

- No, I don't think so.

No, no, I don't really campaign, I don't do any politicking.

- [Tim] You never got on the bus?

- No, well, I think I did, I got on the bus there.

- They let you on the bus?

- Oh yeah, they let me on there for a little while.

- He brought a history book with him that was about that thick and he read the whole time-- - Did you sit in the front or the back?

- I think it was the back, buried in the back, yeah.

- And when they got to the karaoke part, what did you do?

- Oh, I hid even worse.

You'll never catch me singing.

- Did you participate in the karaoke on the bus?

- I might have, yes.

- [Tim] To which tune?

This one I wanna hear.

- I have to think, I can't remember.

I can tell you my daughter was singing show tunes.

It was the funniest thing.

- [Tim] It was from the Broadway hit, Les Miserables.

- Yeah, she was singing from Les Mis.

- So give us two verses.

- I don't think so.

I don't know that I'll ever run for election again, but just in case.

- Okay, what gobbles up your time now that you're retired?

First of all, did you make the right decision to retire when you did?

- Yeah, I do believe that I made the right decision-- - You know there are a lot of guys who say, I'm sitting at home and I'm watching soap operas and I'm not having any fun.

- Yeah, I'll never get bored.

I've got, I don't even wanna go on.

I'll bore you with the list of things that I have to do.

- [Tim] Bore me.

All right, well, one is I love walking.

I average about 10 miles a day.

And I love reading, so I've had now time for I've always loved history, okay.

And recently I've gotten into science and all sorts like geology.

And Michigan's a great place for rocks, another reason to come to Michigan actually.

- One of the things that I don't think the general public totally understands is what it's like to be a political family and the sacrifices that have to be made.

What percentage of the time during the campaign did you see your bride?

- Geez, during the campaign?

- When we were both awake.

(Gretchen laughs) - During the summer, yeah, not even 10%.

- Wow, that's incredible, isn't it?

- Yeah, yeah, 'cause it was just go, go, go 'cause she had to run the state this time, too.

So the first time around, it was just campaigning-- - This is the second campaign that you had to go through, was this any different than the first one?

- Yeah, it was different.

I was a little more invested.

The first one, I didn't... - You didn't know what you were getting into.

- Right.

- Governor, didn't you tell him what he was getting into?

- [Gretchen] No.

- No?

- He might not have stuck around.

(Gretchen laughs) (Tim laughs) - I think that's probably untrue.

So did you watch any of the debates?

- Oh yeah, I watched all the debates.

- So what does a first husband, first gentleman think when you see your wife up there under the gun?

- Well, first of all, I'm so proud of her.

I just see her up there, I mean, the whole time I had faith and confidence in her.

- Did you ever go... - Oh yeah, I was doing that a lot.

I guess I'm biased.

When I was reading the reviews afterwards, I was, oh, they're all wrong.

- The media got something wrong, Doc?

Tell me about that.

- [Marc] Right, you know.

- Well, I mean, she performed fairly well didn't she?

- I thought so, I thought she did great.

- An 11-point win is not too slouchy.

- [Marc] Oh yeah!

- You didn't think it was gonna be that big of a... - I wasn't sure what to think.

I was just, you know.

- Did you ever think she would lose?

- No, I had faith, I had faith.

I had faith.

- Governor, you told me the other day you thought you would lose.

- You know what, Tim, every election I've ever run, I've won every election I've ever run, but every single one of them I thought I might lose at some point.

So yeah, the people decide and things can happen, you never know.

And so work hard, do the right thing and hope for the best.

- Tell us a little bit about your kids, what they're doing and all that good stuff.

- One of them got married this summer, one of the twins, identical twins, the dentist.

- And your wife turned around and had COVID just before it.

- Yeah.

- I made it to the wedding.

- With the mask on, right?

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

It was six days before.

It was good timing as far as getting it.

And one of my sons got it the day before, the other identical twin got COVID right before the wedding.

So he couldn't make his own identical brother's wedding.

He's a lawyer in Cadillac, he's doing great.

And then Winston's still at Michigan down at school with her two daughters, by the way are at Michigan.

So we got three.

- Three kids.

- Well, this is good.

You'll have to get a job to pay for this.

- I know.

- Oh yeah.

- Doc, what's the toughest part about being a parent?

- Oh, well, let's see.

That one hit me out of the blue.

Watching them fail, which you have to do in life in order to succeed.

So I'd say that's the toughest thing for me.

- Reflect for me on the last four years.

- Reflect on the last four years?

Well, again, I just gotta say I am so proud of Gretchen.

I mean, with all the things that hit, I'm not even gonna go into it.

But the COVID alone, again, technically I'm a scientist, I am a dentist.

I didn't know anything about the viruses and stuff.

So here it is, she's gotta take advice from other specialists and that sort of thing.

I thought it went as well as it could considering the situation.

I mean, with the focus of keeping deaths down, I don't wanna relive that, but I'm just proud of her.

I sit back and look at it and see it going on and I'm like, wow!

- You guys having fun?

- [Gretchen] Yeah.

- [Marc] Oh yeah.

- We have a lot of fun together.

And it's nice 'cause when we're together, we're not talking politics, which is good for my mental health, too, I think.

- So let's stop talking politics and wish you a happy whatever holiday is coming up.

And you know that I appreciate this opportunity to talk to both of you.

- Thank you.

- Thanks, Tim.

I appreciate it, too.

- [Tim] Thanks.

- [Voiceover] Production of Evening with the Governor is made possible in part by Martin Waymire, a full service strategic communications agency partnering with clients through public relations, digital marketing and public policy engagement.

Learn more at martinwaymire.com.

Also by Business Leaders for Michigan, dedicated to making Michigan a top 10 state for jobs, education, widely shared prosperity and a healthy economy.

Information at businessleadersformichigan.com.

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