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Every election in the battle for U.S. Senate is crucial to the balance of power in Washington.

Its long time incumbent Senator Patty Murray facing off against challenger Tiffany Smiley.

That's the discussion next on Northwest.

Now.

Millions of dollars are being spent on Washington's U.S. Senate race.

The nation is watching.

Typically, the party out of power makes gains during off year elections.

But this year, with the abortion issue dropping into the Democrat's lap, along with the continued anti-democratic leanings of the Republican Party, predictions of a Republican resurgence may not pan out.

Patty Murray has spent 30 years in the U.S. Senate.

The former state legislator is now in her fifth term and sits as the chair of the Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions.

Senator Murray, welcome to Northwest now.

Great to have you as a guest to talk about the upcoming election season.

This may give you a bit of a chuckle.

If it does, it is what it is.

Did you ever think that in a million years you'd be able to run on the very concept of democracy and the peaceful transfer of power in this country?

As a campaign issue?

Tom, it is stunning to me that I grew up just believing a democracy was what we had in America.

And it would always be here.

But I will tell you, I was in the Capitol on January 6th.

I was stuck in my office and outside my door were insurrectionists who were incited by a president to do everything they could using brute force to take over our peaceful transfer of power.

And that was a frightening day.

But the lesson that I took away from that is a democracy doesn't happen because you just think it's there.

A democracy is something that you have to work for every day to make sure that our voices and our votes and what we want is something we use our voices and votes for and that we speak out loudly against those who would use brute force to take over this democracy.

With that said, do you worry a little bit about the Democratic Party strategy of supporting MAGA Republicans in the primary?

Some of those guys won.

So does that increase your level of concern?

I believe very strongly.

We need to do everything we can to make sure that we elect people who are going to be there, to make sure our democracy is strong, that our economy works for families, that women have the right to make their own health care choices, and that we need to do everything we can to make sure that those candidates who support that are elected.

You've been criticized for supporting coup school closures during COVID.

Opponents say that the pediatric death rate was low.

What they fail to realize is that we wanted to keep the kids healthy so they didn't bring it home to mom and dad and the grandparents.

So to some degree, it really seems like we're kind of campaigning not necessarily in this race, but in a lot of them with this kind of in this sort of understanding free zone.

So experience with the issues is vital.

But with that in mind, how do you differentiate in the minds of the voter between experience and entrenchment?

And that's a really important question.

And I always do my job by talking to people in Washington state, working really hard to make sure I understand what is going on and taking those voices, the values that I have growing up and living in Washington State, my families and my state, that this is my life and my future and being at every table in Washington, D.C., to make sure I am doing what we need to do for today.

The pandemic is a perfect example.

I mean, we can't just freeze that out of what happened.

That was a time where we were worried about people, many of them dying.

Our hospitals were cramped.

We had health care workers who were sick, who were exposed to so much during that time.

And we were trying, all of us, to get our arms around that.

We can't go back and say, well, that didn't happen, it happened.

And we have to learn the lessons from that.

In fact, it's one of the reasons that I'm now working on a bill to prevent pandemics in a bipartisan way, taking the lessons we learned from that time, putting them into law and making sure we have in place for tomorrow the lessons that we have learned in the last few years.

Inflation isn't helping President Biden's approval ratings and is affecting things possibly down ballot.

When I talk about the infrastructure act and the rescue plan, you know, you know, there are some basic economics says that more dollars chasing, fewer goods and services, the only thing that can happen is, is prices to rise and we get inflation.

So the question for you, campaigning, supporting those acts is how do you persuade people that the pain of inflation is worth what we're or is worth it?

Well, look, I mean, we're all struggling.

Everybody is doing all we can.

I know I am.

To lower the cost of the goods that we all need in order to provide for our families and do what we need to do.

And one of the reasons, remember, that we do have inflation today is because the supply chains around the globe stopped and are still struggling to get back on their feet.

So we have fewer products on our shelves and that's one of the reasons they are costing more.

One of the things I've been very focused on is making sure we manufacture here in our country the products we need.

Case in point is chips.

Chips is in everything we use from our phones to our toys to our refrigerators, to our computers.

And the supply chain and the dry up of chips caused a shortage of products across the spectrum that drove prices up.

I am so proud that we passed the Chips in manufacturing bill and are beginning now to produce chips here at home.

That's jobs.

It's research for the future.

It's making sure we have those product projects, products on ourselves.

Not going to happen overnight, but it's certainly an important step forward.

And I also have to say the other thing I'm very focused on is lowering costs for people.

I'm very excited that we were able to pass the Inflation Reduction Act, did a number of things, including a major investment in climate change, but also lowering prescription drug costs.

That's something I've worked on for a long time, allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices.

So we lowered those costs of prescriptions, making sure that we cap insulin at $35 for seniors.

And I'm determined to do that for everyone.

There's major steps in that bill that will help to lower our costs.

Are we done yet?

Absolutely not.

We need to continue to focus on that.

And that is what I am doing.

You're United States senator.

And I think that question about how the economics work of that is still an open one that I'm sure you'll you'll be discussing as you go forward and possibly into the debates.

Speaking of issues that you and Smiley possibly will certainly probably differ on the Snake River dams, you know, well and good as a Washingtonian you started as a this at a disadvantage in this conversation just because you're a west hiker.

But don't forget what my dad grew up in the Tri-Cities.

Well, there isn't this entire state.

There you go.

But if you support taking out those dams, would it not be prudent to at least make sure we've got funding in place prior to any shovels moving on.

On on dam destruction for agricultural products and transportation.

Doesn't that have to be first?

Let me correct you a little bit.

So the issue of taking down Snake River dams has been on the table as a solution by a number of people for a very long time.

What I did, along with Governor Jay Inslee, is step back and say we need to understand realistically what this means.

And for the last year, plus, we are spending a great amount of time talking to everybody that's going to be impacted if that decision were to move forward.

From our shippers to our irrigators, to those who depend on the Snake River for getting their goods to the West Side, including our energy that we are dependent upon from that.

We did a major in-depth look at that, talked to everybody, spent a great deal of time on this.

And our conclusion is, is that although taking down the Snake River dams may be something that needs to be done in the future, we are not ready today.

And what we really need to be focused on is making sure that we have those investments in place and making a commitment to work with everyone to make sure that we are ready.

If that decision has to be made.

And that's going to be costly.

It's going to take a lot of work and it's going to take everybody putting their shoulder to the wheel.

That's what I'm committed to doing, and I think that's a good comment to hear that we're not rushing pell mell into something prior to some plans being in place.

You've run down through a few of them here in this conversation, but maybe explicitly what are your you know, if I, I know you have so much on your plate, but if I put it first, you had a meeting, pick the top two or three priorities in the next term.

What would those be?

I think they're very clear to me.

I think, number one, getting our economy back on track, lowering costs for families, as I talked about, whether it's prescription drugs, access to child care, a major issue that I'm working on and want to get done, making sure that people have the ability to have the training for the skills for the jobs we need today.

Our economy needs to work for all working families, not just those at the top.

Secondly, we need to restore the rights of women to make their own health care choices.

That I am so appalled that the Supreme Court overturned that constitutional right that has been part of our country for 50 years.

And we're seeing the outfall of that across the country in states that are banning women's ability to make their own health care decisions, even in the case of rape and incest, endangering their lives, endangering the providers, and impacting women in so many different ways.

So that's a critical issue I believe we need to work on.

And finally, you mentioned at the top democracy fighting to make sure we are working every day for this democracy to work, making sure that we never allow brute force to overtake our voices and our words, making sure we restore voters rights so that everyone feels a part of this country and that their votes count.

These are critical issues in this election.

And what I want to work on when this campaign's over, I want to talk specifically Washington state.

When you look at the infrastructure and Investment Act's, what is coming to Washington state, that you take credit for that as a result of your seniority.

These items are we're going to see these changes, maybe your your top highlights.

You know, there's a lot in the infrastructure bill that we passed, and I have the opportunity to be around Washington State and see groundbreaking virtually across our state, the highest investment in transit ever in the history of this country.

And we know that in the Puget Sound how important those investments are, making sure that we get people to and from where they want to be, but do it in a way that helps reduce our impact on the climate.

That's important.

I think another part of that.

Obviously, roads, bridges, ports, our infrastructure critically important, but a part of that bill that I am very excited about is making sure everyone has access to broadband.

We saw up close and personal during the pandemic.

There were haves and have nots having access to broadband.

And the use of the Internet affects health care.

It affects our ability to make sure kids get school access to education, workforce skills, making sure that people be able to communicate with others.

And for our businesses who rely on that.

And for too long, broadband has built up for some and not for others.

The infrastructure bill is going to make sure that everyone has equal access to broadband at a cost that they can afford.

Well, thank goodness for broadband, because that's what it's allowing this discussion right now as we sit here today.

All right, Senator Patty Murray, thanks so much for coming in northwest now.

Thank you so much.

Tiffany Smiley has no government experience, but when her husband got blinded fighting in Iraq, she took on the VA and won.

Smiley has raised nearly $3 million, much more than previous challengers, but still well below Murray's 14 million.

As you might expect here in Washington, Smiley is not packaging herself as overtly Trumpist.

For instance, she acknowledges Biden's presidency, but is campaigning for increased election integrity as just one example.

Abortion is another example against a national ban from the feds.

But wanting state legislatures to decide.

So no recognition of a broad constitutional reproductive right for women.

Tiffany Smiley is from Pasco.

Tiffany Smiley, welcome to the Northwest now.

Great to have you.

I'm going to start with maybe it's a softball question, but I still have to ask.

You've got six years potentially of commuting in the dead of winter to Washington, D.C. and to a possibly deeply divided federal government.

Why do you want this?

Well, I want this for the future of my children and the future of this country.

You know, my fight really began in 2005 when I resigned from my nursing job.

I was working as a nurse here in Washington State.

I took a one way flight out to Walter Reed Army Medical Center, and I didn't know if I was going to meet my husband dead or alive, but I was going to be there.

And at 23, I walked into his trauma care unit where he had tubes coming out of every orifice of his body.

He was in a coma.

He was unrecognizable from the lifesaving medication that they're pumping into him.

He was paralyzed on the right side of his body.

And the one thing that was certain, it was that the suicide bomber that he was negotiating with in service to our country in Mosul, Iraq, had detonated his car and the shrapnel from that detonation had obliterated both the Scotty XYZ.

So he would be forever blind.

He would never have a chance of ever seeing again.

That changed my life.

It changed the trajectory of my nursing career.

And that's really when my fight began.

I took on the department of Defense.

I had this wild idea that perhaps someone, even though they are blind, that they could still contribute and be of service to our country.

And so I took on the big government, I took on the DOD, the Army, and my husband made a miraculous recovery, went on and became the first blind active duty officer to ever serve our country and as a nurse, I knew I had to go back and make it right for everyone else.

So I took on the VA because there was a lot of red tape, a lot of struggle that me and Scotty had to go through just to get the care that he earned.

So I went back and took on the VA, was able to work on meaningful reform that directly helped injured veterans and their families.

So, you know, it was truly in that fight that our family realized we have so much more to be fighting for.

And so that's why I've got in this fight, you know, and I look forward to I had to build bridges, I had to build coalitions and people who came from different backgrounds, different beliefs to believe in the future.

And so that's what I look forward to, going to D.C. and doing as a military family member.

You know, that rank and seniority matter.

So what are you telling voters about how to weigh your opponent's experience and rank versus the idea of maybe entrenchment?

Well, that's the problem with our government.

Rank and seniority shouldn't matter.

We should be able to go to DC and pass policies that directly impact the, you know, the voters and the people on the ground.

So, you know, there's no point in having seniority if you don't use your megaphone.

If, you know, Patty Murray has failed us at every turn, even though she is does have a, you know, senior position.

You look at the VA, you look at the Cerner program that was just rolled out that cost veterans their lives, that cost them health care.

It was a total disaster.

They had to halt it.

I look forward to stopping that kind of just it's it's a waste of government time and it affects the customer.

I always say the customer is the American people.

You know, you look at the baby formula crisis.

Senator Murray is chairwoman of the HELP Committee.

She didn't do anything until there was a crisis.

I mean, I was talking to single parents all over Washington state who were driving around on almost $6 a gallon for gas, searching for baby formula.

What is the pathway for you here?

Politically, I don't want to get bogged down in politics, but I can imagine a map where you were in your election with Senator Murray.

You were going to win the real estate, you're going to win the acreage.

But by the same token, the population centers are going to be tough.

What message do you have that really cuts through to urban progressives and liberals?

And you're going to need some of them.

Yes.

It's a quality of life.

It's it's quality of life issues.

These aren't Democrat or Republican issues.

These are American issues.

And our family certainly knows what it feels like to be pushed around or held down by the big bureaucratic government system.

I also know what it's like to take it on and make it better for everyone else.

So, you know, when you look at cost of living issues across Washington state, we have our grocery bills are continuing to skyrocket.

Diesel's going up.

So you know what?

That's going to cause our food prices to go up even more.

I'm deeply troubled, troubled by Patty Murray's voting record.

She voted for the American Rescue Plan, which Democrat and far left leaning economists warned would would send us into inflation that we haven't seen in generations.

That's exactly what we got.

Inflation is a tax, a hidden tax on every single American and people on the ground here in Washington state are feeling the effects.

You know, I'm talking to people who are on fixed incomes who are having to decide, do I put gas in my car or do I buy a gallon of milk?

That's the message that will win at the end of the day, does not have to be that way.

And I will solve that when I get to D.C.. All right.

Let's talk about inflation.

You know, Democrats got abortion handed to them.

Republicans got inflation and crime handed to them to run on when it comes to inflation.

What are the specific fiscal policies you would support as a long term remedy to inflation?

Well, first, we have to rein in the out-of-control spending.

I mentioned the American rescue plan, $1.9 trillion.

And Patty Murray was the deciding vote on allowing a billion of those dollars to go to criminals like Larry Nassar and the Boston bomber.

That has to be stopped.

You look at the infrastructure or or the pardon me, the Inflation Reduction Act, that is just simply again, you know, Patty Murray was the deciding vote for an excise tax on natural gas.

So Washington families are going to see their gas or their energy prices go up heading into winter.

So we have to rein in that out of control spending.

We need fiscal accountability within our government.

I look forward to also extending.

We cannot permanently extend the 2017 tax cuts for the middle class.

We need to get people back to work.

Those are things that we can get to work on immediately.

In addition to that, energy independence is key to helping offset the cost of inflation as well.

And I believe next year we can become energy independent again.

We do it the best in this country.

We have the best environmental standards, and that will save Washington families money immediately.

Great segway into this question about the Inflation Reduction Act.

Economics 101 tells us that a big pile of money of more money chasing fewer goods and services is inflationary, despite what the name of the bill is.

But what about and you talked about the fuel and the energy independence piece.

What about the climate piece within that?

You've said in the past that you think that climate change is a problem best solved locally.

Really?

How do you see that working?

Well, you know, I know that Senator Murray shut down our energy independence, not only billions of dollars in wages, but she gave it to enemy countries that hate us.

And it had no environmental standards.

So we have to get our energy from somewhere.

And now it's with enemy countries that don't like us and have zero environmental standards.

That is ruining our air and our environment.

We do it best.

I think it's important to note that Senator Murray has taken maxed out donations from the Nord Stream two pipeline lobbyist.

So I look forward to having an all of the above approach here in the United States of America, because we do do it best and enemy countries should be buying energy from us.

I'm going to shift gears here a little bit to the abortion piece.

I don't want to debate the abortion piece.

You know, you're personally pro-life.

You want the feds out of the way and first state legislatures to deal with it.

That's clear enough.

Here it is.

My question for that, though, let's say we get a federal judge coming to that one of the one of the various benches that you'd be voting on to, even up to the Supreme Court.

You like them for veterans Affairs, you like them for fiscal, you like for them for some of the things that you've talked about.

But they're not pro-life.

They're pro-choice.

Does that stop you?

How do you handle that?

No, I would say they based on their credentials and best fit for the job and what our country is facing.

That's how I would weigh that decision.

Okay.

So there's there's no litmus test, if you will, in your mind when that comes across your desk?

No.

I will look for the most qualified judge to fill that position that best protects the people of Washington State.

One of the other things that I think may be coming your way fairly early on, I would guess, you know, the situation with mass shootings is just awful.

Anybody in any party can agree with that.

I wouldn't be surprised to see an assault weapons ban come across your desk.

What are your thoughts about the Second Amendment and specifically about a carve out for assault weapons?

Well, we need to make sure that we are protecting our Second Amendment rights, that law abiding citizens are being protected.

You know, I think we really have a crime issue is what's going on.

We have a crime issue and we have a mental health crisis in this country.

So I'm encouraged by what I am seeing come out of the Senate.

I look forward to building bridges, working across the aisle, ensuring that our kids are safe in this country.

Something that we can do is ensure that there is a police officer at every single school in America.

One point of entry and again it's we can piecemeal this out so many different ways.

But I think the bedrock of it is ensuring that we are protecting law abiding citizens, Second Amendment rights, and that we are holding criminals accountable, especially repeat criminals.

And we got it.

We have to get rid of this soft on crime agenda that is ruining our cities and wreaking havoc across Washington state.

In addition to that, I look forward to pushing for mental health reforms.

We need that immediately.

So it sounds like an assault weapons ban, though, for you is a nonstarter.

Well, we have to protect Second Amendment rights.

And I've been very clear, law abiding citizens.

You know, we also need to secure our border and stop illegal guns from coming across our border and getting into the hands of criminals.

And we need to work on first.

Yeah.

I want to give you a chance here, not because I think you subscribe to Q and I, but I want to give you a chance to be clear, just so you're on the record with it.

What are your thoughts about the legitimacy of Q and on and the phrase the storm is coming as a storm coming?

Do you put any stake in any of that or not?

I don't really know what you're talking about.

But if we're going back to like the presidential election, I have been very clear.

I answered it three times on CNN.

Joe Biden is our president.

We have real issues that are facing the people on the ground here in Washington state.

And that's what I am fighting for.

You know, our family certainly knows what service to this country is.

So this is service over self.

This is country over party.

And this is getting to the work and delivering results for the people of Washington state.

Joe Biden is our president.

I'm looking forward to the future and delivering results.

Last question for you.

What should people know about Tiffany Smiley that they don't?

Oh, I would say, you know, I am a common sense problem solver.

I have had to do that my whole life.

We have I have taken on big government and won for the greater good.

I you know, I love this state.

I was born and raised in Washington state.

I love this country.

I will never stop fighting and standing up and and doing what's right.

You know, as a farm girl who grew up with not much, but it taught me the value of hard work going the extra mile and putting people first.

And that's what I want to instill for the for the next generation.

That's what I'm doing for my boys, fighting for their future and for all of Washington state.

Tiffany Smiley, thanks so much for coming in northwest now.

Thank you.

I really appreciate it.

Listen, elections matter.

The bottom line.

While Republicans must defend 21 of the 35 seats up in November, inflation, immigration and crime may give them a fighting chance to get it done and even add a few.

For a midterm election, this one is a doozy.

I hope this program got you thinking and talking there.

Watch this program again or to share it with others.

Northwest now can be found on the Web at Key Beats, dawg.

And be sure to follow us on Facebook and Twitter at Northwest.

Now, a Streamable podcast of this program is available under the Northwest Now tab at Key Beats Dawg and on Apple Podcasts by Searching Northwest.

Now that's going to do it for this edition of Northwest now until next time, I'm Tom Larson.

Thanks for watching.