Hello and thanks for watching the hot seat. I'm Darrell Forges right now. We're focusing on the race for *** house seat in ST Tammany Parish that includes areas like Mandaville Springs and LA. The seat is currently held by state rep Paul Hollis, who is barred by term limits from seeking re election. So two candidates have qualified to run both Republicans. One of those candidates is John Raymond, talk to Mr Raymond multiple times by phone and through email and he has not responded back to our repeated requests to attend this debate to talk about key issues in this race. The other candidate is Jay Gale, also Republican and local businessman Mr Gale used to work here at W DS U as *** meteorologist. He left W DS U in 2017 and Mr and I have never worked together at this station. In fact, we just met *** few minutes ago *** couple of minutes ago. So thank you so much for joining us, really appreciate it. So we have *** lot to get to. But before we get to *** lot of the big topics affecting that district, you have, uh we wanna give you some time to do an opening statement. You have 60 seconds, Darryl. Thank you for that. Uh My name is Jay. Obviously, I'm *** native of New Orleans. Grew up, born and raised here in New Orleans. I attended Holy Cross High school. Graduated from Loyola. Uh, I come from *** family of small business owners in the restaurant business. Ironically enough. So does my wife, speaking of my wife, uh, Diana, we've been married going on nine years who without her support, I wouldn't be here. I have to tell you, uh, we also have two kids. My son, Gauge is in the second grade at Our Lady of the Lake in Mandeville. My daughter, Mila, she's in kindergarten at *** lake. We are parishioners there. I'm *** member of the men's club. We're very active in our faith. We help run the family faith initiative if you will called fire. Um, I am *** Marine Corps veteran, served six years in the Marine Corps, both in active duty and in the Reserves. And I'm also *** former television meteorologist. This, this set looks oddly familiar to me. Very familiar. Right. Yes. And, uh, when people ask me why I'm running for two reasons, my kids, my son and my daughter, I'm running for your kids, my kids and all, all the kids here in Louisiana, uh, all of our grandchildren because Louisiana is *** course correction. And, um, I think the problem why we need *** course correction is because we have the same table top issues we've had for 2030 40 years. Speaking of those table top issues, let's go and get right into it. So, the biggest issue in this race may be the insurance crisis. So what will you do if elected to work on that issue at the state level? You have 60 seconds, right. So, I was just on *** Zoom call with the incoming commissioner and lots of good ideas were, were talked about, uh, we need to have more competition. Uh, we need to bring in more insurance companies who are willing to take the risk and come here in the state of Louisiana. Um, I think we have an issue with, uh, litigation. Uh, we're very litigious over here, uh, litigious rather. Um, which is ***, *** nice way of saying we like to sue too much. So, an insurance company have *** hard time coming to the state if they're afraid they're gonna get sued at the drop of *** hat and there's no, if there's not enough competition. So in order to get the, the, the rates down, we need more competition. We need *** little tort reform. Um, and we need to eliminate or reduce the risk and we do that by fortifying our homes. The talk of uh, fortified roofs has been *** big talk. I think that will help. I know in Florida, uh, the insurance rate is different because they put forth new codes and those new codes help reduce risk, you reduce risk, the premiums would come down. It's gonna be interesting also to see what the new incoming insurance commissioner is going to say as well about what things he would like to change. So, *** lot of people know you from here at W DS U as *** TV, meteorologist, but you're still *** newcomer when it comes to politics. So how will you get up to speed and work across the aisle for the betterment of Saint Tammany Parish? 30 seconds. That's an excellent question. I like to think that I have the patience, the discipline and the respect of my colleagues across the aisle. I am *** registered Republican had been in my entire life. I like to make the distinction that I'm *** constitutional conservative. Um because uh as *** marine, I took my hand raised, uh took my hand, took the oath to protect and defend the constitution. So I'm big on the constitution that's important. Um But I know there are people, the Democrats, for instance, we have different motivations, we have different upbringings. Um and we just see the world differently. So in order for me to be effective, it's not, you know, it, it, it doesn't help to force my viewpoints along them. My goal if I'm going to be ***, if I'm gonna be effective is to have us find the center ground because I think we agree more than we disagree. So my goal, my goal is just mutual respect for opposing points of view. And do you think since we're in this political climate that that's even possible to reach across the aisle? I think, yes, I do because it takes proper leadership. And that's what I believe I bring to the table. I believe I have the character. I have the courage I have the commitment to, to lead and I wanna provide leadership. I think that's what we need. We need leadership. Another thing I wanna go ahead and get into is the issue of these burn bans and fire protection. So fire protection is important now as we're still under *** burn ban. So do you have *** plan to work with state and fire leaders to enforce the ban? Well, the, the bans need to be enforced as *** meteorologist. I'm here to tell you we are in *** drought right now. It is dry and I would work with, with any state leader to make sure that the rules are being followed and the laws are being followed because we saw what happened in Hawaii. We don't want *** replay happening here in Louisiana. So I gotta ask you about this. We, we've talked about *** lot of things about fires and insurance, but I wanna go and move over and talk about crime. That's *** big issue, not only in New Orleans, but really all across Southeast Louisiana. So how will you work with state leaders if elected on making people in your district safer. 60 seconds. On the state level, we, we have limited opportunity to work down on the local level, but we can work with them. Some of the things that we can do, we can put, we can put forth laws that were required. For instance, uh, minimum time serve for certain offenders. It would rest on, are they repeat offender? It would rest on the violence of the crime. It was *** violent crime. These are the things as legislators that we can put forth on the state level, create state laws that would require certain offenders under certain conditions to have to serve most of their term. Most of, of their, uh, of their, uh, their sentence. That's one of the ways we can do that and just continue to, to listen to our local leaders and figure out what they need, you know, what can we do to help them, uh, create *** safer environment, *** safer community. Ok. Absolutely. All right. I wanna move over now to *** couple of yes or no questions. I ask *** couple questions. Just give me *** yes or no, if possible. Yes or no. Ok. So first question, yes or no. Do you support current sheriff Randy Smith in his bid for reelection? Well, look, yes or no. Here's the thing. If I come out and if I, if I come out and say who I support that's gonna influence some votes. And my goal is not to do that. My goal is to work with either Randy Smith or whatever other sheriff that gets elected, whoever gets elected, I will work with them. That's what I can tell you. So, no. Yes, no, no. Just whoever. Well, again, if, if, if, if I pick *** choice, if I pick *** sheriff, then I am gonna be on record and possibly influencing votes. That's not my goal here. My goal here is to work with everyone. So Randy has done some good things. Some people are happy. Some people aren't ok. All right. Move over to the next question. Yes or no. Do you support the death penalty? If the suspect accused of shooting and killing Mandeville, police officer Vin Liberto is convicted of murder? Yes or no. So I know I'm supposed to answer yes or no, but I need to, I need to color this with *** little, *** little commentary. I'm not for the death penalty and I'm gonna tell you why my Christian values dictate that. It's one of the commandments. Thou shalt not kill. It's the same reason I'm pro life. Life is precious. Life is valuable. It is not for me to decide who gets the death penalty or not. That's for the big man upstairs. I am. I am, you know, I, I don't have great comfort in deciding who should be put to death. I believe the death penalty is driven by vengeance. I believe it's driven by anger and rightfully so. Ok, this next question is not *** yes or no question. It's *** different type of *** question. But, uh, who are you supporting for governor? I know all of the candidates, whatever Republican candidate that gets elected, I will work with them. I have some personal relationship with others, but again, I have to run my own race. I have to focus on my own race and whatever presumably Republican governor gets elected. Uh Darrell, I'll work with them. So you're not openly, uh, openly endorsing any candidate or putting your support by any candidate at this point. You're saying, hey, whoever is the Republican pick for governor, I will support that person is 100% 100%. All right, moving over back to our time questions. So I gotta ask you, what do you think about the parish council vote killing the proposed development as set harbor? You have 30 seconds to respond to that. Well, that's what the people wanted. Uh So is not necessarily in my district, but I live very close to harbor. Uh My understanding, talking with the Mandeville city council members is that in its current iteration, it, uh it was *** no go. It was too big. It was too vast. There were too many questions. Um I think some of the citizens there, even the council members I believe would maybe like *** smaller version. But, and, and and, and its current configuration just was *** no go. And I do support that. So I gotta ask you to follow up with that. Um Do you think that this project could bring *** good economic boom to that area if they do come up with *** different solution to make this thing work? Absolutely. But you have to understand that area that they want to develop. It's um it's, there's limited space there and there's already limited space in Saint Tammany Parish. We were, we already have traffic issues. You know, we all know about the drainage issues, but the traffic is infamous over there. And so when you, when they wanted to put *** complex, the size of harbor, it would have had negative impacts on the quality of life for those, for those, uh, for those res resonances there. And look, when we're in public office, our job is to represent the will of the people. That's what they put this in there for moving over to our next question. Um, what is your stance on banning sexually explicit books at parish libraries? You have 60 seconds to respond to that. Look, I'm not *** book banner and I don't, and I'm, I'm not trying to ban books. What I think we ought to do when it comes to the library is that, and it's not *** question of banning books. See, I push back on this argument. It's not *** question of banning books about it's about what's appropriate for Children as the father of *** soon to be eight year old, *** six year old, I'm here to tell you that there is material, there is adult material that is inappropriate for kids and that's really what the issue is. It's simply about appropriateness and I do not believe young minds should be, should have access, direct access to inappropriate material, whether it be sexual in nature or violent. I think those books should be put in *** place without access by minors. So it shouldn't be removed from those public libraries but put in, in ***, in *** different area. I guess that's only limits to, to adults. Is that what you're saying? Correct. Ok. Alright. Alright. Moving over to our next question. Uh, why did the state GOP not endorse you as your opponent who's facing criminal charges? Got an endorsement? What's your response to that? 60 seconds? Why didn't they, they, why didn't they endorse me? Why do you believe they did not endorse you? Well, I could speculate my, uh my opponent like you said is facing four criminal count, four counts of criminal, juvenile cruelty and yet he received the uh the nomination or the endorsement, um which I think is an embarrassment as *** lifelong Republican. Um, it doesn't help our brand if you will as being the protector of Children, values, morals and principles. Um, my opponent does sit on the Saint Tammany Parish Public Executive Committee he's been *** member there for *** while. He also sits on the State uh central Committee. So I would assume that his relationship with some of those members helped him get the endorsement even though I think that I uh I, I deserve it. What I think should have happened because there is *** presumption of innocence, the state party should, should have stayed out of my race. That's what I think. So, just again, for our viewers out there, I just want to remind you that we did reach out to Mr Raymond several times via text via email via phone call to be *** part of the hot seat. He has not responded to any of our calls or emails, just want to make sure for our viewers to remember that once again. So uh Mr Gale really appreciate very substantive conversation about what you would do if you became if you were elected. But you want to end now with your closing arguments, you can go ahead and get started. Like I said, Louisiana needs *** course correction. We have the same issues that we had 30 40 50 years ago by my estimation. The reason that is because the solutions are simple. I think we lack the political will and the political leadership in Baton Rouge in the legislature to take the hard votes. That's the job of the legislatures to take the hard votes. It's understandable. Some of these legislators, uh they don't want to take the criticism. I get it. But we've come to *** time where the state, as I like to say is literally circling the drain right now. If we don't make *** course correction, now our kids are not gonna have the same opportunity. So I'm asking for your vote if you live in my district, house district 104, which incumbents as part of Mandeville, uh Lacombe, parts of Slydale, *** little bit of Covington. I ask for your vote because I will provide the leadership in Baton Rouge to take the hard votes to do the job to show up. That's what I bring to the table. Character and commitment I will lead and I will do the job. Ja Thank you so much for joining us, sir. I really appreciate it and best of luck to you and your election. Thank you, sir. That's it for now for the hot seat. I'm Darryl Forges till next time.