Show #190 - Challenging the Status Quo: Caitlin Marsh’s Journey to the NC Senate

Peter Pappas: Well, everybody, welcome to the Carolina Cabinet. Good afternoon. I'm Peter Pappas. I'll be your host this afternoon in studio with the lovely Mrs. Laura Musler. Hello. Hello. Welcome. Welcome. And special guest, Ms. Caitlin Goose Marsh from running for Senate, North Carolina Senate District 10 up in Johnston County. That like her last name is Goose Marsh. Goose Marsh. I have her name online. It's on the screen. you know, for those of you that know, yeah. So, um, Cause if you're going to find her, you don't be like Goose Marsh. Where do we get that name? Well, look, no matter what, we're proud to be the only homegrown conservative talk radio show in the region. And we know this is the smartest hour of radio. Our job is to give a voice to the conservatives of Fayetteville, Cumberland County, obviously beyond Johnson. So, um, welcome everybody. Thank you. Happy hump day Wednesday. Yeah, fun. Yeah. I love that too. Cliche. No commercials. Which day? Yeah. That was fun with the camel. We need to have a camel in the background. That would be good. I'm very out of touch with the pop culture on the screen. Yeah. So fun. So we got a couple things to talk about. ⁓ we had our, you, Laura, you had your first Fayetteville Republican women's club meeting as, as, as the president day, if it's a female, don't know. would be madam president or Madam law, law, LL is masculine. I don't know. All right. Well, whatever. You're a cisgender female. know that. So I had your first meeting. And at anchor alleys on Bragg Boulevard, Ali is such a beautiful human being. I love everything about her. And the servers did a phenomenal job. And the new president did a phenomenal job to If you say so yourself. If I may say, no, I'm not saying it myself because I was, I left thinking, Holy smokes, what did I do wrong? I'm trying to analyze how I could have fixed things or whatever. There were a few hiccups. We need to get a microphone, but I was sent so many messages saying, a great meeting. It ran efficiently. You did a great job. I was even told by somebody who's he said specifically, I have been to hundreds of Republican women's club meetings over the years. He says, and this was the best. most productive, well-run meeting I've ever been to. ⁓ I got bragging rights. What did you order for food last night? I ordered the honey whiskey chicken thing. It tasted just like I was eating a pancake made of chicken. If you don't like pancakes, that's probably not a good description, but I thought it was phenomenal. the ⁓ mashed potatoes were fantastic. I ordered the meatloaf because it was the top of the menu and I was like, and I, just said my mom's meatloaf. So when the little server came over, cute as a button, said, I want your mom's meatloaf. Okay. I just had to say, you dirty old man. Yeah. I mean, yeah, well, I was, I was just trying to be funny, she took it in stride and apparently she's a good Baldino's customer too. So the world comes full circle. She'll come spend some of her lunch money with me and I some with her. all right. So we had. Couple of things. GOP talking points. ⁓ great. Is that a weekly email? I think it is. We're a conservative leaning show and we are on the lists, many lists, ⁓ maybe not all good lists, but GOP talking points comes out about once a week. And this week we have a big win to discuss. So let's dive into this week's, the big headline for the first time in North Carolina history, registered Republicans have edged out Democrats. That is a pretty big shift. It definitely is. And it's something that the GOP is celebrating as a sign that voters are turning away from the left's policies. But you know, there's another layer here. It always is. So look, because while this is a milestone, the biggest group in the state, it's actually independent voters. And you know what? Both parties are going to have to work harder to earn the trust of folks. They don't want to be labeled red or blue. That's true. So the real key. key takeaway is just about outnumbering Democrats. It's about having a message that appeals to everybody. People who want practical solutions and not just party, you know, battles. Yeah, we don't want party talking points, but, that's our challenge. I mean, how do we reach more mainstream family focused message that resonates with everybody? Not just the base of the, if you say MAGA Republican or the grassroots Republican, what do do to engage? people that I've said before, the people that are going to work, want to live, work in place someplace safe in a prosperous area. They're just worried about their, their grocery bill and their mortgage. You So how do we reach more of those people? So I think that's a challenge of the, North Carolina GOP. Now, let's get some, would, I would say overall we have the practical solutions. are 80 % on the 80 % 20 issues. So the only thing that I would say for the midterm, we really need to focus on affordability. I think that that's probably, yes, one of the biggest aspects. But I will say that our tax for North Carolina has gone down from 4.25 % to down to 3.99%. Income tax? Yes. But you don't fill it. You will? You won't. You won't until they cap out the property taxes. No, no, no. I'm saying your paycheck that you got on December. 12th or 15th or whatever it is, now you're gonna get one on January 15th or January 8th or whatever like that. It's going to be more. It's gonna be more, but you're not gonna fill it. in the property taxes for the 70, like Johnson County, right? It's 70%, over 70 % we've grown ⁓ for the property taxes because our property values have gone up. They haven't capped, the property value increases. One of the things I've looked at is for that. Well, and see the property tax increases are based on the market that unfortunately we had COVID years inside of our revaluations. Now let me share with you from Realtor.com, there was an official release on their, it was one of their news items. yeah. Housing affordability. So what you mentioned, affordability would require for us to get back to 2019 numbers before it went nutsy. The average mortgage rate would have to go down to 2.65, where right now it's like six, five, six, seven. Or you have to make 56 % more income. Yeah. Okay. So we'll get to that or house prices have to go down 35 % to be back at the 2019 level. So, um, and without really sidelining here, how do we raise wages? know, wages is not a factor of government. They can't flip the switch and say, raise minimum wage. Cause that's going to make everything else on affordable. Right. So what do we have to do to go back to 1965? totals. mean, that's comparing apples to oranges. Yes, we did have a huge amount of growth and ridiculousness in 2019, but it's going to stabilize and stay. And it's just like when you bought a house in the sixties and you paid $40,000 for it you're like, Holy smokes, how am I ever going to make that payment again? It's a three bedroom, two bathroom, you know, ranch house. And you, what happens is wages do increase and that housing, housing payment of $400 a month. became more and more affordable as time went on. That's the same thing that's going to happen. We ballooned, we went out of control, we are way overpriced. agree wholeheartedly. the 60s and 50s, 60s, 70s though, think wages grew faster than in any other time in this country. So that was possible then. But now I think the challenge is how do we equip the next generation of job? We need the plumbers, electricians, the carpenters, we need the blue collar hands-on guys because they pretty much, they are the engine of this economy. And then for the for the upper level of like white collar worker, AI is doing a disservice to that whole industry right now. mean, how many apps have I seen for replace your Wall Street trader? I even found an actually outperform the Wall Street trader. The AI does. It outperforms it by like three and a half percent. So my extra money this year, I'm going to put a little bit of play money into, there's this one app that tracks trades by Congress people. senators and congressmen, women too, like tracks Pelosi's portfolio and whatever. if they can make money, shouldn't we? Right. Pelosi outperforms the, that's why I voted. That's why I put my money in Nvidia back in the day. Yeah. She knew she was doing. yeah. And then they said that they were going to pull that contract. got scared. And then the contract went through and was like, heck yeah. Don't worry. If they have their money there, they're going to make sure they have contracts. Don't worry. So I will say that I don't know much about this, but on my way here, I heard on the news, I have no facts to back this up. I know nothing about it, so don't question But we don't like facts. Go ahead, yeah. But on the way here, Trump is going to implement some kind of something about the housing where he's going to minimize the corporations, how many houses the corporations can buy. He said corporations do not live in houses, people do. So he wants to cap how many houses a corporation purchases because they have artificially inflated the price. and they can outbid individuals. I mentioned to see how he's going to delineate the institutional buyers, what you're talking about. I ⁓ don't know either. Well, some of these companies are traded on the stock exchange. So they have been either building neighborhoods en masse, or they have been acquiring for redevelopment on a large scale. And yes, that does drive up the prices of houses because they can afford to pay more. they do. ⁓ But what about Like for instance, I just got a car this morning for one of my properties. You know, we would like to buy your property and that company is based out of Raleigh. And to my knowledge, I think they flip one or 200 houses a year and it could be a husband and wife and 10 guys. So where are we going to draw the line at? I don't know. Because some people do this for a living. Right. You know, and it's not all nefarious. Like if somebody is underwater on their mortgage, I think we had a somebody in our circle even that was helping people that were in foreclosure would go in and say, look, you owe 80,000 on your house. I can take it off your hands and they can not have that mark against them. They won't lose their house. They'll sell their house. So they'll walk away with some kind of, maybe you should get paid 90 or, but anyway, these guys are not all evil. I never said that they were, however, comma. It's always that damn combo. Yes, there are corporations that are building whole neighborhoods and they have inflated the price so that now the people that are there in the neighborhood are like, I couldn't afford to live here. But they're not selling the houses, they're renting them out. So more and more of our homeowners or could be homeowners are now renting houses and don't have the opportunity to purchase their house because these houses are not for sale because These corporations are making millions on inflating houses. have a point of follow-up for Mr. Jim over here. ⁓ Fayetteville in our own backyard, we had approved a housing project that was being purposely built as single family homes for rental market. Not for sale, but it was like, imagine a condo community made up of single family houses. And they would have clubhouse, they would have all that centralized kind of amenity, but We have that in our own backyard here. Now I don't know. And what I'd like to follow up on is I know they approved the plan. It was somewhere, I think it was by the airport. just let me work with you in figuring that out. But I would like to see what the crime rates are there and how the, drive through there and get some pictures to see what it's like. I don't think it's been built. okay. See, cause I know that when in the neighborhood that I have a house in, in, in, in, Hope Mills, beautiful big house, they went ahead and built. they attached to our neighborhood of houses that have to be 2,500 or more square footage. They attached, and we also had to have at least an acre, a neighborhood to our neighborhood. They drive through our neighborhood now to houses that had to be 1,800 or more square footage, didn't have to be two story and could be on a quarter of an acre. So now we have all those homes that we drive through our neighborhood to get to those homes. They've all turned into rentals and it's... a good neighborhood anymore, which has affected our, we're on a lake. We have a two story, 3000 square foot home on a lake. And that neighborhood being attached to our neighborhood has affected it because it's all rentals now. It's crazy. My parents live in a similar neighborhood to that. Like if you go deep enough in the back, it's the larger homes, the older stuff, and then upfront or more rentals. Now, but here's the, see that, that to me is okay. You got to go through there to get to the nicer homes, but to have to drive through our neighborhood. ⁓ And let me tell you, they drive through the neighborhood bumping their stereos and the young kids are out there. Damn youngins. Let me tell you something. Yeah, no, it's they're all. Well, look, just stay strapped. Don't get clapped. You know, I'm always strapped. I don't worry about that. Lock your doors to run through there. But but this is the one question. And I think the challenge is how do you you prevent the institutional investor from buying the stuff or you clamp down on the investment activity? Okay. Or you make it a percentage. But how do you counter that or reconcile that with the housing shortage? There's not enough units coming online. Okay. There is not a housing shortage. We have lots of houses. What we have is the opportunity to purchase them and we have ⁓ a shortage of section eight housing. We have plenty of houses. There's nobody, I want a house and they can't find anywhere to live. We do not have, that's a false statement. Well, accessibility maybe. Right. Go ahead. Yeah. So I think we have the overdevelopment of homes a hundred percent, but we also have great discrepancy on who can actually afford to buy a right? Who can afford to rent a home. mean, you have like particularly, yeah, I live in Johnson County. I'm running for Johnson. You have places like add-ons, right? So they passed legislation this year where you could add on to your house and additional dwelling unit. You can add on to it. find a dandy, but you're paying a thousand dollars to basically sleep in a one bedroom apartment and share a kitchen with somebody. A thousand dollars. One bedroom apartment, share a kitchen, not even a full apartment. You know, sometimes not even having your own bathroom in that. And I think a lot of people just, they can't afford it. We have a huge issue with the Sheer Mountain Johnson County, the homeless and Raleigh, the homeless. Everyone's being pushed out from Raleigh. have the property values are going up astronomically. People can't afford it because the property values are going up. compared to wages compared to everything else. So how do we slow that rapid growth without stopping growth? And that's the bigger, think that's the question. That's the Godfather puppet master type thing. you got to figure out if I pull here, how's it going to affect their, ⁓ to me, homelessness is more of a mental health issue and agree rather than economic economic though brings us back to wage stagnation, which is not a government problem. That's correct. ⁓ the interest rates, the government could, could, but we all saw what happened in 2007 when they insisted that everybody has access to home ownership. And you had people with what's called no doc stated income loans, which means they didn't have to bring a W two. They just said, yeah, I make a hundred thousand a year. And these people, mean, I'm sorry, but there were drug dealers. There were all kinds of people with illicit activities going on. And they were getting houses and then they couldn't afford rent. Well, Johnson in particular, I mean, 70 % of our workers, they go outside of Johnson County. So they're commuters, right? But we built homes that are only for people to move there to live and to work outside of Johnson County. Okay. We have homelessness and we can't afford to live there because there's no economic development within Johnson County. building jobs outside. you're like a bedroom community, like a carry. an entire county of it, entire county. You go through and I mean, I do, there's a huge divide because there is a drug epidemic happening in Johnson, but it's, it's unmanaged. Very minimal things have been done to counter it. And I think it's a compilation of all the issues put together with what's happening there. So you have families who are just barely getting by this year. because they just can't make it work. Even though they're working full time, even though they're doing X, Y, Z, everything went up. And then have some families who just born into it, born into poverty. And I mean, I for one, I mean, I grew up in poverty. So like, know the discrepancy between the two is how, ⁓ how do we combat that? How do we really combat that? Well, and going back to the voter registration stuff, like how do we get that message mainstream? How do we get more flies with honey? What do we do to get people to help put in Republican registered folks if that's who we want as conservatives? Because I still, I know I take hell for this, but I say there are conservative Democrats. They're normally pretty old. They're normally over the 50 year old and they're not there anymore, but they do exist. They go to church every week. ⁓ But it's the mainstream what's happening now. those conservative Democrats, I think are pulling away from the Democrat party and going more towards the independence because unless you're somewhere like here where you have to be a Democrat to get ahead. Right. Well, we're 60. We're majority minority and majority Democrat. mean, but well, look in the state, let's see what the numbers were. So out of registered voters, 2.315 million of Republicans and 2.313. Democrats. We have a 2000 voter lead. That's right. Um, but the independents are much more and the independence, actual most independence, lean conservative. So that is an advantage. Unless they don't like you and then they don't do it. Well, you just got to be sweetness in life, ma'am. Yeah. Yeah. You learn how you have to learn how to be like, I, that's something that I'm struggling with because for almost my life I have been unlikeable. I don't, I don't, I don't think that's true. It's true. No, it is. I know. think so, but it's okay. In my old senior age, I am learning to become, I did the opposite. did the young crotchety woman and I'm turning into the older nice lady. Oh, you're going to cookies too? I do bake cookies. I bake cookies too. So, I look, both sides are going to have to appeal to the mainstream concerns. mean, that's just what it is. That's what we're going to talk about more with you in a little bit. Um, so We need the GOP needs local volunteers. We need people to get out the word. We need state level, common sense governance. We need people up there that don't forget who voted them in and more importantly, who didn't vote for them. Because when you're in the seat, you represent the whole hundred percent that came out to vote. That's correct. Well, you represent the residents even if they didn't vote. But I talked to a voter before I talked to a non-voter. ⁓ the registration, doesn't equal the turnout. turnout is not going to guarantee our victory. That's correct. So, I'll tell you what this, this, I, every year they always say, this is the most critical election. Every election, every election. I've never said it until right now. Yeah. Because if we don't hold the house, which we got it now, this guy died. You're talking the U S house now. The U S house. Well, right now in our house right here, we have, we're one off of the majority. super majority, super majority. Yeah. So we have the majority, but if we don't hold the house in the U S then we're to have to go through all this impeachment crap and it's going to hinder the Trump agenda. It'll just slow it down. That's well. And I saw there was an article where Trump was called out for lamenting. If you guys don't vote another Republican majority, they're just going to impeach me. Now, again, people are disconnected from the word impeach to actually out of office. They think to impeach means I'm to put you on trial. Yeah. You don't, there's no trial. support it. Look, if it gets that point, impeach him, put him on trial. You're not going to find anything. Right. The man, it's waste money. The man's a lot of things, but it's not one of them. So money. And if there was anybody that I trust right now to get our economy back online and our gas prices down and our interest rate, it's a businessman and Donald Trump, if anything, he is a businessman. Yeah. But he filed bankruptcy. what that's he used the system, which He didn't create, he didn't pay his taxes. He didn't create that system either. He used what the people in office that you've been electing for years. He used the system to who doesn't, who says, you know what? I think I, I only owe a thousand dollars in taxes. I think I'm to go ahead and pay 1500 just cause I love when you know, they're like, Holy smokes, I owe a thousand. How can I cut that down a little bit? Every person in the United States of America says that comedian Dave Chappelle talks about in a bit he's got about Donald Trump being the first person that ever said, like when he said to Hillary Clinton, you know, well, you'd be in jail. I it was the same, ⁓ same debate, I think. But he says, I use the same tax loopholes that her supporters do. And she's been up there for however many years, whatever. She hasn't closed the loopholes because it's good for the business. Right. So why should she bite the hand that feeds it? an issue whenever you don't want it to be. It's only an issue when it's for the other side. That's right. That's right. So, Jim sent me a link. ⁓ you want to so this is going to be the first kind of test. You know, Jim did it to me or what is it gonna be called? Jim did it. Blame Jim. Okay, the first blame Jim. So do you have the article pulled up? Me? Yeah, it's on my phone. Okay. I mean, the title alone. I'm like, so Harvard Mord manager who sold body parts like baubles gets an eight year prison term. That's it. Eight years. They're already dead. didn't do anything. He's just recycling. Okay. So he promises me that let's see a former manager. ⁓ geez Louise stealing and selling body parts. He was at the center of a ghoulish scheme in which he shipped brain, skin, hands, and faces to bot faces. ⁓ What are you doing with somebody's face? It's like, hello, Clare's, you know, ⁓ He just got a year. Okay. So his wife got a year for assisting him. How do you find your romantic match? It's like, Hey, you want to go sell some body parts? And she's like, yeah. So let's see. ⁓ guy tanned the hide into a person's skin to be bound into a book. my gosh. Okay. Well, I'm going through, I, know what? Look, I watched the Ed Dean thing on Netflix and that was, yeah, Jim, where the hell? ⁓ Well, you know what? And Jim's defense, this is an eight associated press news article. ⁓ will say that I did watch, I watched ⁓ Gutfeld last night ⁓ and he was talking about, they were taking ⁓ from people and insert cleaning it and doing it and inserting it to other people. And they said, even ⁓ it from dead people, ⁓ Like, you imagine JD Pritzker? Yes. ⁓ gosh. All the fat from JD Pritzker. Holy. But anyway, they're cleaning it and inserting it into women's parts, whether they want bigger butts or bigger breasts or whatever. That's gross. bless them for getting, know, could you imagine, wait, your motorboating JD Pritzker? I appreciate a woman that takes time in her body. So some of these comments that before we move off of this, like, there's a lot of people defending these people, like a bunch of Prudes eight years is insane for no victims. Moral moral and ethical issues aside, wasting resources to keep someone in prison for eight years for something as benign as selling parts from dead bodies is the real egregious it really and somebody says, well, what if it was your mom and they use her skin to make a book cover? I think we have way too many Netflix monsters series that are mainstreaming the cruelty. I never agree with anybody that says, that's inhuman because humans have an undeniable knack range of emotion that we can do some really heinous things or some really great things. So it's not inhuman. We're all capable. That's like that art piece that I feel like we're like one bad power outage away from resorting to caveman type stuff. I think we're one bad power source from that. What does that movie where they purge? That's it. Thank you, Jim. Yeah. If they ever make the siren. All right. Well, ⁓ Jim, Jim's Jim did it. You did it. But let's know more cadaver type. That's just it. Let's have like funny videos or something. stuff. Yeah. But I will say that, you know what, if you were like, I'm getting ready to die and you're like, would you like to donate your body parts? You're more than welcome to, but I don't think you should be taking other people's body parts. without their consent or the family's consent. Because if I found out that one of my dead siblings, one of my dead children, one of my dead parents, one of my dead was a mantle piece was somebody's book cover. I would be, I would be bothered by that. just wonder who would be wanting to buy that. Like, ⁓ I want a skull. buy weird stuff. People buy crazy things. People are weird. But did you know that what was it called? Whenever they did the museum display where they would travel around with human bodies and stuff. That some of them, like there was like this huge lawsuit. and they stole them. They stole them. And they were like the pregnant woman one stole it. Crazy. me see. was that bodies? Dead bodies. It's the actual thing. I saw a documentary on it it was like a huge ordeal because they would go through and they would see certain aspects of it. And they were so, who was it? There were some scientists who can went through and he was like, that's odd that they had this particular body because of something. I don't remember. Don't quote me on it. But I know they were doing some illegal stuff. Well, it's not shut down, Caitlin. No, they're still doing it. there in Vegas. Oh yeah. They still travel. They still do it. Yeah. I mean, is it unethical? Sure. But there, there's barely any laws on dead bodies, apparently. Apparently. I mean, if you dig one up, it's like just tampering with a court. It's not like a misdemeanor. Right. Well, crazy. they had games. And then if you don't claim a person, they can, yeah, they can sell you to like this Institute. A hundred percent. It's. but wait a minute if I may ⁓ of it is good use some there's like the college where they medical schools medical schools and they also sent like the the where the To say how the bodies decay or whatever right help serves ⁓ if it is up in the mountains I think ⁓ a talked about on the show There's a couple of them depending on the humidity and stuff like that They do it all over the country There's several different places like that where they put the bodies out they bury it five feet for forensic stuff for forensic So some of the stuff is good and have you ever seen it? cadaver that's in the middle of being no, no, it's not. have. ⁓ yes. Okay. So a friend of mine was in, was in medical school and basically they, I think it's like maybe four students get one cadaver and they name it. They get the life history of the person. And, ⁓ then they, it's very solemn, very respectful what they do, but I got her, I got to see her when she was like, They had just started, so they just take it some skin back. So I actually did. It was my son. He was on the table and they had taken. pulled the covers back because I wanted to see him. So I actually did see that. not after the autopsy, it was after the autopsy and they had, yeah. I'm sorry. Yeah. I want to see my son before you go. you. So I'm sorry. You're a mom. Yeah. Yeah. That's. Okay. No more dead body. No more dead body. All right. Look, let's talk about Ms. Caitlin goose. Mar I love the, I love the name and I just, we need to somehow figure out how to talk about why goose, because it's a, it's a term of endearment from your grandpa. is, it is. Goose dropped out. So she did. They dropped out. She dropped. Well, she's still on audio. Okay. Get her back in. Just wait, there's more. Yeah. We can still talk to her even though we can't see her. Yeah, of course. Although she is nice to look at. Do you have a goose? No, I didn't get one. Do know what's actually a lot cheaper about a goose, like actual live goose, than stuffed animal? They're like a hundred and something dollars. Like the life size like when you wear a suit? Okay, I don't ever want to see you as a candidate in the chicken suit. well is there too small? Even like for the arm ones. I'm not spending $40 on an arm stuffed goose. When I could spend $23.95 and go buy actual goose. to put a call out to anybody who hears this. Buy a goose and send it to... I would love it. Send me all the geese. love goose. I that be considered a campaign contribution if they sent It would make me very happy. It's a donation in kind. It is. It would also make me happy. And I'd like to be happy. love like goose because you're not home enough to take care of them. If someone has a goose at their house that's real and they want to let me borrow it, I would be more than happy to borrow it. I cannot keep it. I have an HOA. So they do not allow them in the area. ⁓ Well, welcome back on video to Ms. Caitlin Marsh running for ⁓ North Carolina. me, Caitlin, ⁓ what is your address where we could send, somebody is listening that wants send a goose to you, a stuffed animal goose, where could they send it right now? ⁓ Right now? ⁓ Well, you want me to my address online? Well, it's listed online. No, I'm kidding. Let's, let's, we don't know. It's online anyway. It's online. It is online. go to my website, yeah, go to my website is voteforgoose.com and my address is on there. Also my email and everything else. don't want to convert her into what happened to, So vote for Goose. Vote for Goose. me to stalk her. That would be fun. How do you not? You don't have any stalkers yet? I do. have one. Okay. All right. I mean, have a few. You're young yet. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Well, you don't ever see them coming. That's the problem. so this is a little bit, this is a little bit that I know about you. You're a Johnson County resident. You're a mom. Uh, you're a survivor of domestic violence. You're an advocate for families, rural communities and accountability. And wondering why the hell are you running? It's supposedly you want to add your voice and your lived experience to Raleigh So, uh, tell us just a little bit about yourself and we'll go from there. We'll start the interrogation. Oh, I love it. Well, You read the Cliff Notes, the highlights. Yeah, I'm 25. I'm the youngest woman to ever run for Senate in North Carolina. The youngest Republican woman, just youngest across the board. Single mom of three, full-time college student, ambitious, crazy to run for office. Yes, entirely. Self-research, self-launched my entire political campaign. I just, I believe, how bad do you want it? What really, what was the... In real estate, we say the procuring cause of the deal. So what was the flash in the pan for you that made you say, gotta try to run? Well, I think it's always a compilation of things. there's, I was told by two people that I should run for Senate. And I was like, yeah, you're crazy. Absolutely not because of my circumstances in life. And it was just something that kept knacking at me and going and going and going. I do this thing where I like to dissect every single reason not to do something before I do something. And if I can come up with a way to reshape it, then I should do it. And a part of me says that it was a calling from God because there's no other way I could do any of this without him being at the forefront of it. But it truly was. I dissected every single reason not to run and I viewed them as a reason to run. So it was just everything and seeing the pain that's going on, not just in our state, in our country, in our county, everywhere. the different aspects of life is hard, but it shouldn't be this hard. It should not be this difficult to do things and seeing the pain going on within Johnson County and moving back there and experiencing the gray areas and loopholes within our judicial system through being a survivor of domestic violence and just watching systemic failures across the board and talking to women, men, anyone, just not even in family court, domestic violence, criminal cases. the great divide across the board with everything, there has to be more. Okay. So I looked up Johnston County as far as like, are the key issues may be facing up there? You're knowledgeable about what's in your neighborhood, but just for people that are going to watch balancing, and I've heard you say this before, balancing the growth, but this time against farmland preservation. ⁓ getting some rural infrastructure to keep pace with the development. does that mean they want, maybe they're after sidewalks and utility stuff? We're at a water deficit. Okay. They're putting, I mean, we're this year alone, we're opening up a bunch of projects to aid with that water issue. Okay. We just put in $84 million into our water waste treatment facility. I mean, we don't have the infrastructure for the growth. In the past four years, think 50,000 people have moved to Johnston County. We don't have the schools. We don't have the roads. We don't have the utilities. We don't have the manpower. brings me to the next. Everyone's in the unincorporated. Your property taxes went up, so we're to have the money to do it. Yeah, they don't. What about public safety? Yeah. And healthcare access? 100%. So we don't have, it's, we don't have, it's just, we don't have. Do you have with your like, Sheriff's Department, are they fully stopped? They have, think they may, definitely not more than 20 sheriffs. I could be completely wrong, but I'm pretty sure they only have either between 17 and 20 sheriffs. They just hired some, all of them patrolling the unincorporated areas, but we're not like Wake County. We don't have a lot of land mass in the same way. We only grew by, I believe it was 0.07 or 0.09 % in the past 10 years. What grew? The land mass. Okay. It's just... Very small, not even like a spec essentially. didn't, our lines didn't change that much. sure. Yeah. Yeah. But Wake County, mean, they have a higher number of sheriffs because they have more area to go. it because of the area or is it because of the people? Because if there's only three people in your county, don't need very many sheriffs. No, there's not. It's, we are not basing it off of dense dabbling. Like it's the unincorporated areas are the most dense, but those are all patrolled by the sheriff's department. We're not in the unincorporated areas. We should be incorporating them, but we don't want to because of taxes. So it's just, it's a give and take. What do we want? Bringing it home. So Cumberland County, we've got close to 400,000 residents down here. You guys are around 226,000, ⁓ but you're characterized as being largely rural with fast suburban growth. So is there a little city or town in Johnson County? what's the- Yeah. So there's Clayton, which is butts up to Raleigh or to Wake County, not Raleigh. In the same demographic or geographic location. And then we have Smithfield that's growing. Do they have their own police departments? Smithfield, Selma, for Oaks Clayton and yeah, the big cities. So there is supplement to the sheriff's department. There's somebody else. But I live, so I grew up in Cleveland, which is unincorporated, but it's basically a mini city at this point. I mean, we have our own. We don't just have a gas station, grocer anymore. have a food line. We have little restaurants. We have none. No, I'm kidding. We have like five or six. No, but we're, we're just like that middle area. Should we be incorporated? I think we're teetering to that level. All right. So, ⁓ I wanted to ask you about, I got a lot to ask you about. Yeah. just, have pages and pages. I'm scared. You know, it's how do you think Johnson County, how do we welcome growth without, while protecting the farmland and the rural aspect? Like, are we trying to hold onto that rural character? I think we want to, but I think the issue is are we too far gone? I don't want to say that we are. Johnson County has always been a community. I want to go out and I go to the different events like the harvest festival or mule days or anything else. Um, hamming him classic, but hamming yam, ham and yam. You're talking my language. Well, that's fine. That was like harvest sweet potatoes. That's fine. I love it. You know, we have these events and these community gatherings that I grew up going to and they show the unity. Still in Johnson. That's there. I just, don't, I don't want to let go of that. Have seen a lot of farmers like sell large tracts of land? Have you seen that? What I see happening is we're selling off parcels and we're going in and we're buying that one spot. And then it's just slowly has just grown to, we're selling out. Someone does it. So then you have to, and it just trickles down because when you're sitting here and you have a farmer who's working on that land and you go in and you build a development right there. Yeah. It's going to infringe on the farm land. There's runoff. There's other aspects. You're over here. You're developing right beside a farmland and you think nothing's going to happen? Sure. What do they add in the legislation? If you live within a couple hundred yards away from a hog farm, you have to sign a waiver. If you're building a neighborhood to move there, don't build beside a hog farm. can't help with smells. mean, come on. But you're going to have people who are going to sue and complain. Like there's all these issues that they keep perpetuating because we have to grow, grow, grow. But what's responsible growth? What's protecting the farmland? What, what about the families who've been basically kicked out of Johnston County who were historic or generational farmers? down here we have, ⁓ what's called the unified development ordinance. ⁓ Do they not have any kind of guidance in Johnston County? Like what is that zoning? process look like? Actually, last night we had a planning meeting, a planning board meeting, and it's been 18 months since the UDO was proposed. Okay. We're still waiting. So is that, this all sounds like county issues, not necessarily Senate or state issues. issues, yeah. So how is you running for Senate? How is you running for Senate? That was some good English right there. Going to change that in your county. So personally, I The way I describe it is I look at legislation like it's puzzle. There's a beginning, middle and end. And they do the minor tweaks, which in some aspects can be good because you can't change everything all at once or people go crazy. Unless you're changing things and changing legislation to sway one way and to aid developers over time, which I'm not against developers. love them. Love builders have friends, everything. But there's, there's people who are, who live in the community. You build in the community, not the big corporations who come in from out of state. and just build straw homes that are going to, they're not going to last 10, 15, 20 years. You're to a lot more money into them than you should. But you have these builders who are from your local communities, are from North Carolina and who want to help aid the development and growth of Johnston County, Smithfield, Cumberland County, Blaydon, anywhere because they care about where they live. So I think in the Senate, especially like Senate bill 205 that they're, they haven't, it's not passed, but it's proposed. Essentially what I see them doing is taking away the county's voice in growth. Okay. And in that bill, ⁓ it, you now can have developers in 90 days sue the county. So you don't get the time to go look and see what's going on and make sure like for sewage, if they want to tap and sewage, how are you? And that 90 day perimeter with all of them flooding in, able to go see if it's actually going to mess with the infrastructure in the area or if it can sustain it. See, okay. So I just Googled that one. I thought it was familiar because that's the one that started off with swimming pools. Right. Crazy. that you couldn't rent your private ⁓ swimming pool. And then all of a sudden it's turned into a state, essentially it's like a state override of the local community. Exactly. So. Is that, is that a very Republican bill? to stay telling me what I can do with my It's not very Republican. We're a small government. I think the, and I'm not defending this bill, but I'm, think the intention was to make the counties get off their butts because the permitting process is local. So you have somebody trying to come in here and develop or do anything. And it basically gets, it dies in committee basically at the county level because, we don't have enough people working or whatever else. So. This developer can't move. So I think this is more of a bellwether for the local communities. Like you gotta be able to respond. I find North Carolina Senate with unanimous support. Crazy. It's not, but it gives, takes away the, I don't, I don't like the bill. I'm just going to be quite frank. I do not like it. And I don't like it because I feel like it puts parameters on local government, especially when we are Johnston County specifically. We don't have enough employees for things. it's because the state, ⁓ allocates most of that. They allocate the funding. Sure. But they also allocate how many like the AOC, for instance, when, when what the commissioner's meeting was Monday, clerks of court, we're having the clerk of court having to come and ask the commissioners to fund additional positions because the state has not, the Senate hasn't passed a budget. Right. We haven't passed a budget and you're having to ask a county. That's already having to spend more and more money to now fund additional positions because our court or judicial system or case law, they're backed up. So you can't get the filing done, but it's not just the clerks of court. We pull from three different counties for a one district county for judges. So you're not getting, people are not getting prosecuted correctly. It's not in a timely manner because you have a disconnect with the DA's office and certain judges. Then the mattress. We're allocated 10 from 2010, but we only have eight. So we, it goes into infrastructure failures go in every aspect. And I truly mean that that's, that's one of my hard pushes. We, if we don't fix the infrastructure, what is going to happen? What can you do to help pass a budget? A budget? That's like the biggest thing right now. ⁓ Well, maybe not hold it up in the Senate ever. A children's hospital, third one, or fourth one, excuse me, $300 million. to a children's hospital that's 30, 40 minutes away from the other three, but it's going to be a drop in the bucket because this isn't just a $300 million children's hospital. How, I don't even know how much it's going to cost billions of dollars. Where do they want to place that? I don't even, I don't, think they said apex. I think they said somewhere else. I don't even know if they have an exact location. They want the funding first. What they should do $50 million to the three children's hospitals that are already there revamp them up. I mean, and I know that from experience because my ⁓ son, he's four now, spent most of his life in and out of those children's hospitals. Two weeks old, I watched my son almost lose his life and he has rare genetic disorder. He has 22 Q11.2 duplication. Well, there's one clinic at Duke that had it. They brought capacity. So where do we have to go? John DiMaggio in Florida to get my son treatment for his rare genetic disorder. We don't have the treatment here in North Carolina with three hospitals. We need treatment now, not five, six, seven years from now. We need it now. So how can we do that? The real question is why do we actually want to build a standalone children's hospital? What is substantial about that? How many people can we save now? how would you coax them to, so if that's the holdup, how would you, what would you do to coax these people to just pass it? I think that. The fact that what they're doing is hurting so many of their own constituents, think they should just pass it. I don't think what they're doing is very animal at all, truthfully. ⁓ Well, that's the children's hospital issue. Yeah. mean, that's heavy because I don't, I don't know. mean, I don't know what's different with having an exclusive children's hospital versus a general practice. think it will. These are so wake med children's, you have Duke children's and you have UNC children. So all of them are children's hospitals, but the only ⁓ difference really is, that it's standalone. Like it's just, it's not connected to a hospital, but are connected to a I guess, doctors or teaching hospital, teaching hospital, But why is that not good? Because then you have research facilities and then you have this new state of the art things. You have grants, you have people there wanting to learn to take care of your kids. That's amazing. That's amazing. It truly is. I don't think it would be a very fiscally conservative investment. I think it would be more beneficial to, because it is tax money. It is our tax dollars. mean, is it argument maybe just it's pork. They just think it's extra and they don't want to approve it. It looks fancy. That's, that's what the point is. It looks fancy. It makes you look nice. want it. Okay. Is it beneficial though? Who is it aiding? Because I mean, will it aid some of the pharmaceutical industry is coming. What other state level? we know your background as a ⁓ DV survivor. What have you seen on a state level that you've maybe want to put your own signature on. What we need an overhaul of our family court system. That's for sure. Okay. when you have two thirds of ⁓ family court case contains domestic violence, two thirds, have a majority. Okay. They've done nothing to aid that. mean, maybe tweaks. They've done nothing substantial. ⁓ would you like to see done? I would like to see one. I think abuser treatment classes are probably the I call it re-chamillionizing the chameleon. What are you doing? You're teaching somebody who did something so heinous and truthfully, the ones who are convicted of severe domestic violence, they get slapped on the wrist. They have to take these classes. You have brutal assaults, grotesque acts being combated with classes. They're then teaching you how to go into Is that in lieu of charging them? Well, they're getting charged with it sometimes, but they don't really charge it as harshly as they should. Okay. I mean, And trust me, I know from personal experience, they don't charge domestic violence because of the way they have their tiered system for first time offenders. This is what people need to start realizing and understanding. When you are in domestic violence and you finally leave and you finally press those charges, it's not the first time, it's the worst time because that next time you'd be dead. And I stand by that statement. it's your job as a Republican and a Republican man to protect women and children. It is your job. So do your job, protect women and children. I'm not saying men aren't abused too, but I am saying that we need to do more to protect our women and children. That's the bottom line. We need that. I mean, look, is it a matter of funding? It's a matter of judicial reform. Like where do you think this begins? And I think, truthfully, I think it starts one of the key piece of legislation that I have looked at every which way, antislapped laws. And there's 11 states that do it. the law basically protects a person from malicious prosecution. you were going in and as a victim of domestic violence, a survivor, going through the family court system, your abuser can then re-abuse you through the criminal justice system or through the family court system.

Laura Mussler: So it's...

Peter Pappas: the filing of frivolous court motions. got you. Yeah. So malicious prosecution. I thought you were talking about the thing on the books about slapping your wife on the courthouse steps or whatever. That's not what it is. Okay. Sorry. No, that's a one. That's wild too. And I haven't heard that one yet. Would you try to get that off the books if it were there? Okay. have some crazy laws. mean, what there's the one about the hotel room. If you're in a hotel room with the opposite sex, you can get charged with a misdemeanor. Crazy. It's still on the books. It is. And they still do it. They keep them there so they can add up charges. Okay. Well, we'll get away from Peter's levity. We'll get back to the double slap. What was it? Slap double slap. So basically you're, you've been beaten up. You're in the domestic violence situation and they can weaponize family court, family court against you. They file these. So there's all kind of disparagement, right? You're going to court. You talk about your abuse. They can then go file contempt motions against you for disparagement. You don't do X you're scared. He's following you from. or he's doing XYZ. They can then sue you for being put in unfortunate positions. And they can just keep suing you because anyone can file a motion. ⁓ can file a motion in the state of North Carolina. That's our God given right. Right. But the issue lies is how much money of your money is it wasting? Because it's taxpayers who are paying for it. Ten million dollars ⁓ Ten million dollars. Ten million dollars being spent for men. ⁓ Sometimes women too, but abusers will say abusers to go in, file fake court motions to then keep the court system backed up. Now with anti-slap legislation, it puts the burden of proof on the abuser. But in this case, they would be the plaintiff filing that court case. So they now have to prove before it even goes to court that there's anything there. So the burden of proof is on them. not on the defendant, would be the victim in this. Okay. So what does it look like going forward? Like, what would you like to see? I mean, what would you like to see? Like the one thing that if you could improve it with a magic wand tomorrow, what would you do? In the family and just family. I like the family court. don't like the anti-slap. I like hearing what you're telling me, but how can you fix it? What's the one thing I've got a couple ideas right now, but I'm not going to tell you. So yeah, mean, it sounds like we had a piece of legislation proposed back in 2021, Um, actually one of the candidates in my County. Okay. She's a house member. She's, um, done great things, but she proposed malicious prosecution legislation or anti-malicious prosecution. it didn't get any ground or didn't get any traction. No, no, no, no, no, no, where all things go to fester. just fizzle out. But I think you have to have people who want to change it because one person is going to get anything done. But if we have a group of people who say, we want to do things for our constituents and actually improve things. Let's get the ball rolling. Let's start going at it. how do you see yourself as a consensus builder? Since you just mentioned that you do have to work with other people. Do ⁓ you play along? you? play well with others or you kind of sandbox. I'm a good friend to have. ⁓ I'm a terrible enemy. I don't know. I'll come I'll come get you. Okay. No, I'll you cookies. Put your knife down. I don't want to. I don't know. I'll make you some cookies. I'll bring you some. It'll be fine. check for weapons at the door. Stop it. what do you think about candidate Marsh here? Or what would you like to ask? Sorry. ⁓ I think I what you think. just, was going to say, yeah, you don't want to know what think. No, I'm just joking. ⁓ to be part. I'm totally joking. Everyone is doing that to me. Hey, nobody said this wasn't a tough Wait a minute, wait a minute. What if what I think is I like her and it would be great for a change? You don't know what's going on in this. I mean, yeah, that thing is a mystery. we'll it there. That's exactly right. My question was mainly, which I already asked, a lot of the things that you say are at the county level. And that's my concern that you may be, while it's great to run for the Senate and there are issues with the Senate specifically with this one bill that you've addressed, the majority of the things you're talking about. I'm just concerned. you running for the right office for the things that you want to get done? personally, I believe that everything starts at the state level. don't think, I think a lot of things we push off to the federal government that they affect, they do not control everything that affects your everyday life. The state does. And when the state's not doing their job, that's why these issues are happening in our county. But if the city is doing their job and the county is doing their job, They're all building blocks, aren't they? So you're jumping straight to the state as opposed to, what can I do for my community right here immediately? This is all I just stand still because of the state. ⁓ There's a lot of things that need to be changed. We need a Senate shakeup. The legislation is not going to get passed. We're going to, we're trickling. I mean, and I believe what my county, my state can be. And of course I want to represent Johnson County in the Senate. I want to be that the youngest woman to be in the Senate, North Carolina. But I look at it across the state of what the disparity is and where the need is. And I want changes across the board for everyone. There's things that I'm passionate about doing and I'm ready to get in there and really just have at it in a sense. It's just, ⁓ we've been swimming, Laura I, in these ⁓ political shark-infested waters in Cumberland County where we are majority ⁓ Democrat. ⁓ And ⁓ we, I think there were a lot of Republicans that ran down here that thought would have been better served. In the state? ⁓ at city council or only my concern is that when you state issues that you're concerned about or that you want to change, they don't fall into that realm of the Senate. If they fall into the realm of the county. So yes, the state sets the higher highest bar, but for the immediate change, it would be at the county level. Would it? Because personally, from what I've seen, you know, it's yes, I think that the county controls a lot of it, but I also think that in order to get the stuff done, you have to have it at a state level. think, well, my opinion is the Senate and the state reps have the purse strings of all, you know, all the stuff and it's your job as a state Senator or representative to bring the money back. And I tried to, I told people, they're like, Oh, you just bought the money. Yeah, but it's our money. We paid it. We need to get it back. So we need a representative that's going to fight. to take care of the things that you need. And I talk a lot about my county because I mean, I'm one county district. Right. So in the Senate also, though, you're after everyone. It's all for the entire state. The greater good of the state of North Carolina. Right. 110 percent. But I think a lot of, know, like you mentioned, it's the building blocks. You start here, there and you build your way up. I think that sometimes is what's wrong with it. You're going through the pipeline. You're being cherry-picked. Maybe you lose some of your fire if you go through the standard. It's completely different to run the way I'm running. I'm not... It's fun. Oh, lots of fun. It is hard. Just because something's hard doesn't mean you shouldn't do Tell me the favorite part of running for office. What do you like the most? Honestly, I think it's going out and meeting everyone and just going at it. Really not in a bad way, but just hitting the ground running every single day. Just saying, hi, I'm Goose. Nice to meet you. Or, hi, I'm Caitlin Goose Marsh running for North Carolina State Senate District 10, the Republican challenger for Johnson County. It's a mouthful, but going up to people, shaking their hands, forcing myself to get out of my comfort zone, hearing the stories of my community, hearing the stories across the state. You know, even in Wake County, going out and doing things and learning so much that you wouldn't know, even just learning how to run for office. I did that. No one told me how to run for office. I went online, I read some books. I educated myself at 25, single mom of three, educated herself to run for office. I haven't asked how I normally like to ask, but you're in college. Right. What are you going to be when you grow up? What is this degree that you're pursuing? Yeah. So I originally started, I was going to go for law school. That's kind of where I Well, you're going to have enough people hate you after running for office, so you don't need to be a You don't need to be a lawyer. So that's where I kind of got my niche for reading legislation. started a while ago. Hey, you know what? If that's what you like to cozy up to at night, then I don't know. Case law really, I don't know. It just does something for me. I my own cases. I would write my own case You're a nerd is what you're telling me. I'm a little bit. I'm a hot nerd, but I'm a nerd. Okay. I'm to put that on screen. No, but it was reading that and I just, enjoy, I enjoy helping people. I truly do. My heart is in the right place. And I think that maybe that's the difference. I'm not going in. I'm not for political ambition and truly I'm going to change stuff and everything for everyone. I want people's lives to be better. I care about my community. I care about the state. I love North Carolina is my home. It's just, passionate about it. really am. just thought it was for the money. mean, what is it? $13,000 a You're going to get, Hey, that'll keep me in a McDonald's. but you can finagle a lot with $13,000. I'm resourceful. I've only spent what? ⁓ Less than, we'll say less than $3,000 on this campaign. And I think I've done okay. I think I might have. You've got a, so you do have an incumbent opponent in the Republican primary. ⁓ And I don't want to. Cause we are going to invite him as well. So we're not going to be, I'm not going to let you beat up on them too bad, but how many terms has he been? it just one or two? started back in 22. this is the second term he's for a third. Yes. Now. Okay. All right. So, um, you've got a passion for what you're doing. You're a very, you speak so fast sometimes though. I'm like, that again. When you, you, Listen, Billy, when you tell about your son's condition, I'm like, well, what? Yeah. Yeah. I'm a redneck. It's okay. Don't let it fool you. Okay. Yeah. Okay. That's something that I'm taking as a communication class. Yeah. And they're saying if it sounds too slow for you, it's good. It's good because I do the same thing. I get excited. I start talking faster and it's like, what did you just say? I know around here, here in the South, the slower, the better. We need to walk around with a sign. This is what Caitlin's saying. I know she sounds like a redneck, but please, she knows what she's talking about. I have a tendency to surprise a lot of people. I think I do, at least. You got a brain up there, is what saying? I think so. That's not hollow. Well, Caitlin Marsh, candidate for Senate District 10. We appreciate you joining us and sharing your vision for Johnston County. We'll continue bringing voter conversations with everyone involved in shaping our region's future. So thanks for being here this afternoon. So Laura, anything for the good of the viewers? Anything on mind before we wrap it up? Nope. look forward to seeing everybody Monday night. Monday night, Monday night. yeah. Monday night. other show. Yeah. other night football. my D. No, we record ⁓ Mondays six, Wednesdays at two. And I swear our weeks are just running together. They sure are. but we're close to 200 episodes. Wow. We are. are. ⁓ I thought crossed it, but for some reason, my numbering system doesn't match the official numbering on Spotify. Okay, I have to line those up. anyway, so everybody watching, we appreciate you joining us this afternoon. And until next time, we are the Carolina cabinet.