JA: Starting out: important question. What is your favorite flavor of ice cream? 

DP: I like what we used to call peppermint bon bon, mint chocolate chip, perfect combination. You just made me hungry, too. 

JA: I thought for sure you were going to say a gelato. 

DP: I’m an ice cream kind of guy. 

JA: You talked about hiking Mount Washington; you mentioned putting your hiking boots on earlier. Are you an outdoorsman? 

DP: Love the outdoors. Literally learned to love the outdoors right here: sailed on Labelle Pond, hiked Mount Washington, Franconia Notch, and canoed on the Saco. It’s a big part of my life. Exposure to the outdoors started here. And in my great state of Minnesota, the combination is remarkable. 

JA: Someone asked that I ask if you’d done the Boundary Waters in Minnesota. 

DP: I’ve yet to do the Boundary Waters. Isn’t that amazing, I’ve climbed Mount Washington and I’ve not done the Boundary Waters. I protect them, but I’ve not been yet, and I have to. By the way, in the Boundary Waters, do you know what the Minnesota state bird is? [JA: No.] The mosquito. You get to know a lot of them.  

JA: Do you follow the Minnesota sports teams? [DP: Unfortunately.] Well, you beat the Packers.  

DP: Yeah, and also lost Kirk Cousins for the whole season. That is a prototypical Minnesota moment. Beating the Pack at Lambeau, first of all, rarely happens, and then to lose our quarterback. It’s just such a Minnesota tradition. We’ve been suffering, by the way, since the inception of the franchise. But I’ll tell you, the Minneapolis Lakers became the LA Lakers, and we won championships with them… about 25 years before I was born. But I can also tell you, the most extraordinary moment of my life, maybe before filing at the statehouse the other day, was the Minnesota Twins won the World Series in 1987. And, for anybody whose team wins for the first time and you’ve been suffering for years and years, there is no way to describe that moment. I know Red Sox fans could probably empathize with that, too. 

JA: What’s in the water in Minnesota? There’s been a couple of Minnesotans who’ve gone for the White House: Walter Mondale, Amy Klobuchar, Hubert Humphrey, Eugene McCarthy. Why? 

DP: There’s some similarities between New Hampshire and Minnesota. It starts with civic engagement. There is a culture of participation, a recognition that we have to assess and vet and participate. In fact, the district I represent in Minnesota has the highest engagement in the country. Our voter turnout is the highest. Our census self-return rate is the highest because that’s kind of a Minnesota tradition. We’re participants. And, I think we’re also a state of conviction and recognition that you can’t just observe; you have to jump in and pursue principle. Even when that presents personal risk, and it did for Humphrey- his 1948 speech in Philadelphia. He struggled hours before over whether he should make that speech because everybody told him, “Your career will be over if you so much as utter those words of getting out of the shadow of states’ rights and into the bright sunshine of human rights.” And, I think it’s that Minnesota tradition that I honor, and that’s why I’m here. As for what’s in the water? I think it’s a lot of ice cubes. 

JA: You signed at the Statehouse Friday. It’s been probably a pretty hectic five days for you. [DP: It’s been an amazing five days.] Tell me a little bit about it. What have you been feeling? 

DP: So, I think you know this, but I’m one of 21 Democrats on that ballot. Not all the names are well known, but the fact that in our country, anyone 35, who was born here, can go to the same place that I went, offer the same check, and write their name on the same paper that I did is such an extraordinary tradition that I wish every American could just take a moment and recognize that they could, and in many cases should, do as well. That’s what started this whole thing out, and the last five days have been the most magnificent, educational, joyful, and also concerning days of my life. Because I feel people’s pain. I’ve met with homeless people. I’ve met with people who don’t have health insurance. I’ve met with people who are subject to bullying. I met with people who were addicts, who are trying to recover, against all odds. So it’s this extraordinary combination of joy and grave concern that I have for this country. That is exactly why we do this, and why we do it here. 

JA: After Andrew Yang ran in the 2020 election, he spoke of how, when he was a candidate, people around him started treating him differently and speaking to him differently than they had. He said it was a terrifying thing. Have you noticed now that you are officially in the race that people react differently around you? 

DP: I do, and that’s why I think I said the same thing twice in the other room, which is that, Americans are actually afraid of their government. Only 17% of Americans believe that their own government is making decisions in their best interest. And, when Americans can’t approach a candidate like me, who has affection for them, no matter their politics, if they’re intimidated by that, that says a lot about the state of affairs. That’s why I want to make sure that the White House becomes a welcoming house for all Americans- literally. I want people to be able to come to their white house and meet with their President. Of course, you can’t do that for three-hundred and some million people, but we can change how people do that. That’s what I’m doing here. I hope I’m not intimidating because I’m actually wanting to hear from you and learn from you. I’m human just like you. When people recognize that we are just human beings, we might have conviction, we may have an opportunity to actually help our country in ways that other people don’t. That’s the only difference. But, I do notice that, and I think that’s why so many people whose ambition is power become increasingly insulated. They back away. Especially when you’ve been doing this for decades in Washington, you become further and further and further removed from people, and but for a primary, like this, there’s no incentive to get out and reintroduce yourself to people and actually listen to them. That’s what’s so important. I do see it, and I’ve only been at this five days, but rest assured. I told you about my life story, how it started tragically and then I was blessed with opportunity. That’s what gets me up every morning to really listen to people, look them in the eye, oftentimes give them hugs and handshakes and high-fives- because we’re in this together.  

JA: You spoke about bringing in people who disagree with you or who you disagree with. Is there someone in American politics today, who you disagree with, who you’d like to hear more from or if you were president, you’d like to hear more from?  

DP: Many people. I think the worst decisions in history are made by leaders who surround themselves with yes-men and women who support the leader’s contention and disposition. That’s why we have Vladimir Putin. That’s why we have dictators all around the world who make decisions that are dangerous. That’s why democracy is so different. It’s designed to be able to surround yourself with teams of rivals. Abraham Lincoln, best known for it. I think we should be reintroducing that notion because, in my past life, in the business world, if you didn’t surround yourself with people who had different backgrounds, ideas, and perspectives, you could never succeed. It’s even more true in government and I think it’s time to reintroduce to Americans the idea that everyone will have a voice at that table. Their president, in this case, would be a Democrat, but their president would be welcoming, encouraging, and demanding of different perspectives. I have some very dear friends in Congress who are Republicans. I have some very dear friends who were in Congress, who either retired or lost their primaries because they were people of principal. I’m sure you know some of their names. I think we should be rewarding principle, and I want my Republican members of Congress, my friends, when they might become President, to do the same with Democrats. There are some who feel exactly the same way. We’ve talked about it, we’ve discussed it, and we know how to do it. That’s why I’m part of the Reagan-O’Neill club, where we talk about this question every single time we’re together. When I become President, that will become realized, not just talked about. 

JA: You’re on the House Foreign Affairs Committee. [DP: I am] International affairs, international crises, have been in the headlines recently, but do you feel that there is a country, conflict zone, or potential hotspot that hasn’t been as covered as it should be? 

DP: Absolutely. Sub-Saharan Africa is a perfect example of a massive number of countries at massive risk. Infiltrated by terrorists, increasingly so, asking for American help, and we oftentimes ignore what is down the road in favor of what might be right in front of us or even right behind us. That is going to be tragic if we don’t reengage with African nations, who are not just recognizing the risk to themselves, but who are recognizing that the only solution is to work with us and like-minded countries. This goes back to what I said in there, if we don’t go back to investing in preventing conflict, preventing wars, why would we expect them to just vanish? It’s part of the human condition, part of human history, that’s why we should use American prestige, power, influence, and diplomacy to actually prevent the very problems that are now occurring in Ukraine and now occurring in Israel. We’ve had generations of leaders in this country that ignored it, that had opportunities to do something about it. They resisted for either political reasons, or, frankly, they didn’t have the courage to do what was right. That’s what I’ll do; we need to. 

JA: Finally, do you have any advice for our business majors here at Saint Anselm College? 

DP: Yeah. Go out. Build a business, a little business, and craft your skills by building a successful business that rewards the people that make it possible. Rewards first the risk-taker, but then all those who contribute. Learn lessons and learn how to sell, because when you sell you’re actually listening. By building a business that actually succeeds for the owner, then succeeds for its employees, and then succeeds for the community, is, to me, the very best training to bring those skills to public service. The absence of those skills is why I think our government is in the circumstance it finds itself. So many people have made it their career to be in public service, which I honor, but absent life experience outside of that… our founders would be appalled that people were doing this for decades. So please, do what I did. I went to business school and so much of what I know can be fixed, and how to do it is because of those experiences in business. It wasn’t because I was telling people; it was because I was listening to people, and I think you’ll find the same thing. 

DP: I have a question for you. What do you want me to know? What are your friends ,your fellow students, and your generation thinking about, caring about, and disappointed in? 

JA: I think that, to whatever degree they acknowledge it, so much of young people’s lives is being stolen by social media. [DP: Stole?] Yeah, when you add it up, several hours a day over the course of a lifetime, it’s taking years from them. I think there is a growing acknowledgment among people my age that we’re a little bit addicted, or more than a little. 

DP: this might surprise you, but I had that same addiction, and about four days ago, I took Twitter off of my phone. It was really hard to push that final button. I was shaking, and I did it, and I’ve never felt better. Ever. It’s a choice. Nobody’s forced to have Twitter; nobody’s forced to be on Instagram eight hours a day. That’s a choice, and by the way, you know they designed their algorithms to addict us the same way cigarette companies addicted us and knew it. The same way opioid companies did the same thing. Social media is doing the same thing, but it’s our choice and the nice thing is you don’t have to go to a recovery or treatment center; you just turn it off. Turn off the TV and get outside. That’s what I’m going to do, so let’s go do it.