Bridge Grades: The ‘Rotten Tomatoes’ Scorecard for Congress
Some conversations feel like a relief. Not because they are easy, but because they are honest. That was the vibe when Jolene and I sat down with Brad Porteus, the creator of the website and organization, https://www.bridgegrades.org/. If you have ever looked at American politics and thought, “Surely it cannot be this divisive forever,” Brad is basically building a tool for that exact frustration.
On our podcast, We’ve Got To Talk, Jolene and I have spent the last year trying to prove something that feels weirdly radical in 2026. You can disagree politically and still stay human. You can argue without scorched earth. You can be curious without surrendering your values. Brad’s work fits right into that mission, because Bridge Grades is not about whether someone is red or blue. It is about whether they can actually work with people they disagree with. Not in a performative “bipartisan photo op” way, but in the boring, unglamorous, policy-making way that is supposed to be the job.
Bridge Grades is essentially a report card for Congress. You could think of it like a Rotten Tomatoes for politicians. It uses objective third-party data to score members of Congress on how collaboratively or divisively they govern. The scores run from 0 to 100, and the whole point is to separate two things we keep pretending are the same: ideology and collaboration. You can be very conservative and still be a bridge-builder. You can be very progressive and still be a divider. Those are independent variables, and once you see that, you cannot unsee it.
Brad told us he did not come to this as a political insider. He came to it as a concerned citizen who spent years abroad, came home, and felt genuinely shocked by how much American politics had turned into identity warfare. Not disagreement, warfare. The kind where the goal is not to solve problems, but to humiliate the other side and rack up likes while doing it. So he built something that measures what most voters say they want, but rarely rewards at the ballot box: collaboration.
The goal is not to shame people into silence. The goal is to show patterns, make behaviour visible, and give voters a clearer way to evaluate what their representatives are actually doing.
We also got into the uncomfortable part, which is citizen responsibility. Brad pushed us on whether Americans are hungry for the identity of politics without doing the work that real citizenship requires. Reading past headlines. Tolerating complexity. Holding two truths at once. He talked about younger Americans in particular, and how many of them have grown up in this environment and assume it is permanent. Like polarization is just the weather now. You cannot change it, you can only pick a side and learn to fight.
Then Brad said something that stuck with both of us. Even the loudest dividers cannot govern forever without occasionally sitting down at a bipartisan table. Eventually, stalemates hurt everyone. So the real question becomes: what are we rewarding? Because right now, Congress can feel like a status game where being a “team player” matters more than being an effective legislator. The incentives are TikTok-brained. Quick hits, public dunks, viral moments, and a constant fear of being seen as weak if you work with the other side.
Bridge Grades tries to cut through that by tracking signals that go beyond speeches and vibes. It looks at legislative activity and rhetoric, and it quantifies acts that promote bipartisanship versus acts that are mostly about personal attacks and inflaming division. It is not perfect, and Brad is not pretending it is. But it is a serious attempt to measure something we keep claiming we value, even as we continue to vote as if we do not.
By the end of the conversation, we were left with a kind of cautious hope. Not the fluffy kind. The practical kind. The kind that says maybe we can shift the culture if we start rewarding the people who actually do the work of bridging. Imagine voting based on someone’s ability to collaborate and deliver results, not just their party badge or their talent for going viral.
Brad left us with a metaphor that was equal parts ridiculous and memorable, which is exactly our brand. He said we should be elephants in a room full of hippos. Bigger ears. Smaller mouths. More listening, less charging. And honestly, in a political culture that feels addicted to noise, that might be the most radical idea of all.
If you want to explore Bridge Grades for yourself, you can find it here: https://www.bridgegrades.org/
RESOURCES MENTIONED:
Bridge Grades:
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Brad Porteus book: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/51468877.Brad_Porteus
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[00:00:00] nicole: She's a conservative and I'm liberal, and yet we've been friends for almost 40 years. Everyone says you shouldn't discuss politics, religion, or money. And we say, that's exactly what friends should be talking about. Join us as we tackle the conversations you're having in your head, but are too scared to say out loud.
[00:00:19] Welcome to, we've got To Talk. Welcome Jolene, and welcome Brad Portus. We are so excited to talk to you. He is the creator of bridge grades.org I'm gonna let you tell us what Bridge Grades is.
[00:00:36] Brad Porteus: Thanks,
[00:00:37] nicole: Thanks.
[00:00:38] Brad Porteus: Uh, and I'm glad, glad to see that this is an actual podcast because I was worried that this was just a long con to try to get me to buy my dibble dough, cookie dough, which worked brilliantly by, by the way, 'cause 10 minutes after you approached me, I was. Order any Jolene's cookie dough?
[00:00:55] nicole: You did.
[00:00:56] Brad Porteus: delicious, delicious, by the way, thanks for the
[00:00:59] nicole: That's amazing.[00:01:00]
[00:01:00] Brad Porteus: to, to spend time with you both, uh, and love. I'd love to hear your take on what I'm working on, both of you are unpacking so many of the topics that are related to what Bridge Grades is all about. But first, let tell you about what Bridge Grades is. can think of it as a scorecard for Congress, but instead of measuring, uh, the ideological beliefs of the Congress people in the House and the Senate on a left to right basis, we've created a new dimension, which is how collaboratively or how Divis one governs. And you can think of it a bit like a polarization score. what we do is we give everybody a score. Uh, all the, all the congress people in the house and the Senate, you get a score between zero and 100, and the top half of the class get A's and B's, and we call them bridgers. And the bottom half of the class gets C's and F's, and we call them dividers. And there are bridgers and dividers in both parties.
[00:01:45] nicole: This is a very basic question, but both Jolene and I we wanna know how you got into this, but we also really wanna know why it's not Ds and Fs how does the C get in there? We are both really confused by that.
[00:01:58] Brad Porteus: D. DI [00:02:00] ruled
[00:02:00] nicole: Does, does anyone ask you that?
[00:02:01] Brad Porteus: I've thought about Ds. I mean, look, it works best if there's two grades that are bridgers and two grades that are a divider. So you could do A and B and D and F, but D is already taken by Democrats. So if you're like D and D, it's too confusing.
[00:02:13] nicole: That's true. Thank you for the, now this makes sense. This makes complete sense.
[00:02:20] Brad Porteus: And
[00:02:20] nicole: Alright, before we get in,
[00:02:21] Brad Porteus: Ds anyways. You either get like a low C or an F, I mean nobody gets a D in life, right?
[00:02:26] Jolene: That is a really
[00:02:27] nicole: Listen, I did get a DAD in Stagecraft practicum, but that's another story for,
[00:02:33] Brad Porteus: Yeah.
[00:02:34] nicole: was a d plus.
[00:02:35] Brad Porteus: C.
[00:02:36] nicole: I called my mom on the payphone, like, ah, and she's like, don't worry about it. You got, I got a D my freshman year too. I'm like, okay. Alright. Brad, we hear from the interviews that we have have listened to that you weren't necessarily a political person.
[00:02:52] Can you tell us about like what your background has been and what brought you to this
[00:02:57] Brad Porteus: Yeah, well it's, it's why I'm a little bit chicken [00:03:00] to join this podcast 'cause I've listened to your podcast and you guys are way deeper in the actual politics and topics than I am. So, I'm worried about being exposed here by the two of you. I fell into this in a way from being a concerned citizen ultimately.
[00:03:14] Uh, and I spent 14 years living and working and raising a family abroad. And I came back to the US beginning of 2024 and I was honestly like a little bit nervous, uh, if not terrified about what I was gonna find. the sort of political environment and how tribal everything had become and how every topic somehow becomes like a test of one's, uh, political identity, et cetera. And look, I had been back visiting, uh, through it through those years, but you know, there's, it's, it's a lot different when you're coming back and you're gonna be part, you know, reentering society. and you know, what I was barely surprised about as I was thinking about coming back was I sort of felt like the people I was talking to my, my American friends, and this is from, from the, the, you know, wider political spectrum, seemed pretty defeated by [00:04:00] the whole tribal, uh, polarization. with not a lot of like new ideas or new approaches, sort of like this. Resignation that resigned to the fact that we're totally divided and everything's broken, and what are we gonna do about it? A lot of hand ringing. And then, you know, back to our day-to-day lives. Uh, and, you know, I was like, just sort of like curious about what, what could we do about it?
[00:04:20] Or, or is there a way out of this? Uh, and to be honest, I got inspired by a couple of other people. What one is, um, a guy named Tim Urban who wrote this amazing book called What's Our Problem? And it, he, he goes deep into sort of, uh, a lot of frameworks, but also reasons why we are pitted against each other and, and the human nature sort of, behind all of that. Uh, and then a second, uh, thing that, that fell into my lap and I got exposed to was a company called Ad Fontes Media. And, um, the CEO there is, her name is Vanessa Otero, and you should definitely invite her to be a guest on your podcast. and she and
[00:04:56] nicole: I get her newsletter right now.
[00:04:57] Brad Porteus: Yeah. Okay. So for those of
[00:04:59] nicole: Yeah.
[00:04:59] Brad Porteus: not [00:05:00] familiar with her,
[00:05:01] nicole: Yeah.
[00:05:01] Brad Porteus: has created a, uh, a media bias chart.
[00:05:04] And so what they do is they a assess and evaluate, um, news sources on two dimensions. One is their political leaning on a bias basis, and the second is, is how reliable and credible they are.
[00:05:16] So you can sort of imagine a bit of a horseshoe shaped curve of the, the, uh, media entities that they rate and the further sort of bias you have left and right.
[00:05:25] Actually the least credible, they they are. So there's a bit of a correlation between. How newsworthy or how, how what the rigor of the newsroom and a news source and, and actually the bias begins to shrink a little bit. And I thought to myself like, oh, that's an amazing framework. And, and Tim Urban's book had a similar one.
[00:05:41] And I thought somehow it came to me like, well, why can't we do this for our politicians? Because, you know, labeling the politicians as just, you know, r and d or red or blue, or left or right is just, isn't good enough because there's dimensionality within each of the parties. So, uh, the idea was, hey, could we find data sources that [00:06:00] were objective and use objective data to try to find that dimensionality within the parties? Uh, and I started poking around and one thing led to another. And, and here I am a guest on your podcast.
[00:06:09] Jolene: Brad, I think this is so important and, and I think, you know, as, as much as Nicole and I, talk about how important this conversations are and, and, we're going with, with what we're trying to do, um, one of the things that you talk about in, a lot of your work, I think is compromise versus, um, collaborating and, you know, compromise is kind of the bad word and collaborating is, is the buzzword.
[00:06:33] And, and I love that because I think that really, you know, speaks to, to what we're trying to do as well. But I wanna back up a little bit to me it's almost a, a chicken or egg, kind of scenario where is, as American citizens becoming, so have we become so lazy that we just want to identify with one party and we don't wanna do all the hard work of saying, okay, I, I kind of feel like I'm a Republican, but I disagree on this, this, and [00:07:00] this.
[00:07:00] And so that, it's just become so much easier for us to say, I identify with, with the Republican party. And that's it. I mean, I'm going to agree with everything they do. I mean, do you see that as being an expat for so many years and coming back that, that, that's kind of like as, as citizens, that we're not, we're not doing the work maybe.
[00:07:21] Brad Porteus: there is some culpability and blame on the citizens for not doing that work. But I mean, let's face it, people's lives are super busy and, I mean, I can't even imagine how
[00:07:31] nicole: I can't even imagine.
[00:07:32] Brad Porteus: into the preparation that you do for, you know, each of your podcast sessions
[00:07:37] nicole: It
[00:07:37] Brad Porteus: you probably sometimes feel like you could have done a lot more preparation.
[00:07:40] And so I, I don't think, you know, while I do agree that we have become lazy in that regard, I, I, I don't blame the citizens. I think we've sort of been tricked and trapped. Into into these camps. You know, it wasn't like this when, when I grew up. I mean, I, I'm, I'm in my late fifties, so I remember growing up in the seventies and, and eighties and [00:08:00] it wasn't like that.
[00:08:01] nicole: wasn't like that.
[00:08:01] Brad Porteus: have not changed all that much between, you know, then and now. But what has changed is that we've been, you know, splintered into our, our respective echo chambers. So, you know, I I, I have a lot of, bad feelings about the profit seeking algorithms that some people call the outrage economy.
[00:08:19] And, um, I can only imagine that, you know, even in your work, you struggle to cut through the noise to try to get people's attention because the fact is, is that we've been trained as citizens to, eat junk food. So the junk food is these, you know, click bait headlines and everything else. and so I think we are lazy from that perspective, but I don't blame the citizens for that laziness.
[00:08:39] I think the system is rigged and, and we're sort of set up for it.
[00:08:42] Jolene: addicted to it,
[00:08:44] Brad Porteus: And addicted to it. And addicted to it. Yeah. for fun, I'll even just call you guys out on it too. Like I saw the LinkedIn post that talked about, you know, Jolene, your soundbite that we engaged about, which had to do with the Venezuela oil situation.
[00:08:55] And I mean, that was a punchy point that you were making and that was designed to [00:09:00] obviously attract people's attention, but it was also controversial, right? So we're, we're in a society now where controversy is what gets people's attention. that's a hard world to be in.
[00:09:09] Jolene: Which is so funny because I think we fight against this so much saying, you know, we're, we aren't just a soundbite, you know, we're not trying to be click bait here. that's what we put out, you know, I mean, that is what the algorithms need to, to attract more listeners and viewers and all that.
[00:09:24] So it is, it's like we're, we're saying one thing and doing another,
[00:09:28] Brad Porteus: this is why I don't blame the people. I think the system is, are raided against us. And, and I do think that. governmental, uh, interventions around things like algorithmic content distribution is something that needs to be looked at very soon.
[00:09:40] Jolene: I think we would both
[00:09:41] nicole: We, we, yeah, we absolutely agree because I find that, 'cause I deal with a lot of the social media and I take a lot of deep breaths and there's so much rage and there's not a lot of listening and it can be incredibly defeating. But I have to keep moving [00:10:00] forward because I absolutely believe in this. But I agree with you, Brad, like in that, in that particular snippet, there are times that it is outraging and we're, but we're actually just trying to advertise our podcast and hope that you will come and look or listen to the full episode.
[00:10:17] But people's attention spans are so short that that doesn't, like, a lot of times people just wanna spew their rage or, or spew how right they are and not really dive in and then that's the end of that like.
[00:10:31] Brad Porteus: to Jolene's earlier point about us being lazy. We, we have been sort of trapped into it and it is just easier to, let's say associate with the, the team that you want to be a fan of, let's call it. So, uh, there's very much of a sort of a sports team fanship that's happening in politics now, and it's just easier to wear the home team's colors and cheer for the home team no matter what.
[00:10:50] It's a lot harder to, to think your way through it. and you know, that is where I was really impressed when I listened to your year end summary. And I think one of the conclusions that both of you came [00:11:00] to was that you hated the idea of being labeled, uh, a liberal and a conservative. But because while you do lean that direction, which is great, uh, it doesn't mean that you're universally for or against different topics that you quote unquote your side would be typically for or against.
[00:11:15] And so that takes work that takes effort. Um, and I, you know, I think that if you think it takes effort and work as a citizen, it's even much harder in some ways for our representatives on Capitol Hill. And the, one of the motivations behind Bridge Grades is, is to actually change some of those incentives because right now the incentives are for each of the respective, uh, senators and and house representatives to be full throated in their, uh, partisanship.
[00:11:43] Uh, because in the way that that's the way they're able to retain power. And it takes a lot of guts and courage to be the people who take a risk and put themselves out there and join coalitions, uh, with people who are from members of the opposite party and they don't get a lot of news, right? [00:12:00] So, one of the ambitions of Bridge Grades is, is to try to give them a little bit of more celebrity and actually recognize and reward that kind of behavior. Uh, and it's gonna take a lot of time, but, but we think that gradually we can nudge, those incentives in a way that will maybe potentially change the composition of people on Capitol Hill, which will then drive more collaboration for the best interests of, uh, of voters across both parties.
[00:12:24] Jolene: Do you think that we
[00:12:25] nicole: I mean, what?
[00:12:26] Jolene: to do that though because they're being incentivized by the, either the RNC or the DNC or by lobbyists or, or donors to be loyalists and not collaborators. Right.
[00:12:38] Brad Porteus: For sure there big money has a huge role to play in that, so I'm not going to suggest otherwise. But I do think that there are people who are on Capitol Hill who are doing well. I know this to be a fake fact. There are Republican, sorry, there are house representatives and senators who [00:13:00] are. collaborative than their peers and the data shows that.
[00:13:04] Jolene: Good.
[00:13:04] Brad Porteus: So the problem that I see is, is that if I were to show you and I, I encourage people listening or watching this to jump over to bridge grids.org and look at the tables of data between both the House and the Senate. And the fun thing to do is sort it by highest to lowest score. So the lowest score, if you sort of by lowest score first, you see all these names of people who are famous in, in the news all the time.
[00:13:26] So these are the ones getting the Fs, and they're the ones that are very polarizing and, and extremely partisan. The ones who are more nuanced in the way that they govern, who earn the ass and have the higher scores. I don't know the names of these people. I mean, look, I, I do now because I'm been doing the work, but, um, realistically, like I can remember the first time I, we saw the data set and I was scrolling and scrolling and scrolling and looking for a familiar name.
[00:13:48] And I was like, who are these people? And that is the big problem because these are the ones who are taking the chances. They're being more courageous, they're finding each other, they're sitting at the table, and they're coming up with collaborative solutions that are [00:14:00] win-wins for, uh, the general population as opposed to, uh, you know, the zero sum game which the, the parties love. Uh, the parties love the fact that they're fighting each other. It keeps power for both sides,
[00:14:09] nicole: I mean, I looked at how like all of the F's are famous, all of them. It's crazy and even the a's you don't know who they are and they, uh, I, and correct my numbers, Brad, if I'm wrong, there are 435 representatives
[00:14:25] Brad Porteus: right.
[00:14:25] nicole: and I counted 77 a's
[00:14:29] Brad Porteus: Right. Okay. Yes. So think of it, this is an important point, uh, the grading system is a forced curve and that means that the grades are relative to each other. So what it means is out of the 435 house representatives, half of them are A's and Bs. two hundred and six seventeen are ass and 218 are bs, sorry, are are are Cs and Fs. So half are A's and Bs. Half are C's and Fs. And so
[00:14:54] nicole: Okay.
[00:14:55] Brad Porteus: we use a standard deviation from the mean to get to an A or an F. So by design. [00:15:00] There's gonna be 77 As or, or some, some odd and, and, you know, whatever it is that the number of bs, et cetera, and some people say, have, have said to me, well, you know, how can so and so get a b?
[00:15:10] They're, they're, they're like nasty and they're divisive and so forth. And it's like, well keep in mind that this is a relative score and the bar is very low.
[00:15:17] nicole: Okay, so that makes sense why Ted Cruz has a B. Yeah. 'cause I was like, why does Ted Cruz have a B? But if you're saying it's on a curve, then it makes a whole lot more sense.
[00:15:26] Brad Porteus: so listen, I think, um, that's a great example, right? So I think
[00:15:29] nicole: Yes.
[00:15:30] Brad Porteus: the human, the, the human instinct is just to scan the data, look for people who look, look for, uh, biases that, um, back up your, your own biases and look for outliers, right? So, okay, Nicole, you're the liberal. You look and you saw that Ted Cruz is a bee, and you think to yourself, what the hell is this system?
[00:15:47] This can't possibly be the case. Ted Cruz
[00:15:49] nicole: Yeah.
[00:15:50] Brad Porteus: I mean, there's no
[00:15:51] nicole: Right,
[00:15:51] Brad Porteus: but actually, so keep in mind that the grading and the data is only. Uh, aggregated for the time that they've been serving in this Congress. And that means [00:16:00] from January 2nd, 2025 until now. So we're at one year through a two year Congress, the data from beforehand gets thrown out.
[00:16:09] Right. So there's no, so, so Ted Cruz
[00:16:12] nicole: Sense
[00:16:12] Brad Porteus: with, with, uh, the same no grade as everybody. Clean
[00:16:16] nicole: clean slate. Right, right, right.
[00:16:19] Brad Porteus: And,
[00:16:19] nicole: Got it.
[00:16:20] Brad Porteus: so, lemme just explain the Ted Cruz one because I think it's interesting because I'm always looking for
[00:16:24] nicole: Yeah, please.
[00:16:25] Brad Porteus: whether or not this system is, is working or not. And if I see a weird outlier, then I'm thinking like, uhoh, maybe there's something wrong with the data. And sometimes there is, but sometimes the data is accurate. And if you think about Ted Cruz's arc, at least in my news bubble or my news algorithm, he's been pretty quiet in 2025. I mean, he was all over the news
[00:16:45] in
[00:16:45] nicole: It's true. That's true.
[00:16:47] Brad Porteus: but he's been very low key and he's been. Off the radar, uh, again, in my bubble, in my algorithm, uh, in a way that I thought to myself, you know what, maybe he has bigger ambitions and he's sort of cleaning his own slate and [00:17:00] maybe he's laying low and all these kinds of things. So what I like about the system is, is that it gives an F student a chance to get an A next term.
[00:17:08] It's not like you are an F for life, right? And that's important because in an incentive system like this, you want to encourage people to change their behaviors. And I think the system we have, demonstrates that that's possible.
[00:17:19] Jolene: So Marjorie Taylor Greene could, had she not resigned, she could have started with a clean slate next year and been completely different.
[00:17:28] Brad Porteus: I was extremely excited to see how that was gonna play out. Um, and, uh, before, before she resigned, um, there were definitely some people who were asking me a lot about, well, is she gonna suddenly get a good grade because she's behaving now? Um, and what I, went back and looked into data and looked at her, her records, and, uh, one of the things that, um, so, so she, just to be clear to your listeners, she, she's scoring an f last term, she also scored an f not, not too big surprises there, but, uh, one of the inputs into the grading is. rhetoric. [00:18:00] So we, we use only third party data and we use data from, uh, an organization called the Polarization Research Lab. And they count the number of times they, they basically scrape the web and they scrape Twitter and they scrape, um, all sorts of like, you know, um, press releases and things and, and communications coming from every Congress person.
[00:18:19] And then they. it up into little soundbites, and then they run it through analysis to figure out, um, to, to bucket these things in different, um, buckets. And, and one of the buckets we use is personal attacks. So they count how many times somebody makes a personal attack, uh, and bless her for her change in heart.
[00:18:35] But, uh, unfortunately for her, the count of personal attacks that had gone up up until the point where she sort of pivoted was just so huge compared to everybody else, that even if she were to have stopped making a single personal attack the rest of her term, she wouldn't have been able to close the gap.
[00:18:49] It's a, the way I would tell people, it's like, it's a bit like you failed your pop quiz, you failed your midterm, you failed the homework assignment. Suddenly you're like studying for the final, probably still not gonna get an F in the [00:19:00] grade in the class. It's a.
[00:19:01] Jolene: she basically needed to drop the class, right? There was no way she was raising that grade. She needed to drop that class and take it next semester.
[00:19:08] Brad Porteus: Exactly right. Jolene. So for this term, she was sort of screwed on her grade, but I think she, I mean, January, if she would've stayed, stayed in her seat and she would've won, she would've had a, a shot like everybody else to get that, that a grade.
[00:19:21] Jolene: Brad, how do we know that the data that you are putting into to all this analysis is unbiased,
[00:19:27] Brad Porteus: Yeah. So I think, um, let's start with the premise that there's no such thing as anything being unbiased ever. there, there's always gonna be bias in literally everything. So if I'm gonna tell you that something's unbiased, yeah, you can call bullshit on that already. Uh, and, and I've learned that through, back to the Fontes Media, chart that I told you about.
[00:19:44] You know, they show that bias is a spectrum and it is a spectrum. So, my assumption and hunch is, is that there is bias within. The data sources that we are collecting. think we have to have some sort of tolerance for that. And, and I don't know exactly how that bias [00:20:00] is, whether it's left or right, I just don't know. one of the things that we are very strict about is, is that we only using third party data itself. So let me, let me share with you a little bit of the inputs that go into the grades. 'cause probably people are, are
[00:20:12] nicole: That'd be great.
[00:20:13] Brad Porteus: very curious about it at, at a high level. It's sort of 60 40, uh, legislative record versus rhetoric.
[00:20:20] So legislative record is do you know, it's things that, that you're doing as a legislator. And specifically we, um, look at how many bills that you've authored that has earned co-sponsorship from somebody from the opposite party. So if you author a bill with a co-sponsor from the opposite party, you get points. If you co-sponsor a bill that was authored by a member of the opposite party, you also earn points, but you don't earn, earn as many. 'cause co-sponsoring is a little easier than authoring, right? So, um, we, we weigh that a little bit more, a little bit less. more than half of the grade comes from, from those two specific data sources. Um, and that comes directly from congress.gov. So that, that is, actual just raw [00:21:00] data that is available to anybody. so, so what you do matters, but also what you say matters too, uh, if you're gonna be a bridger or a divider. And so I mentioned already the polarization research lab. we use two metrics that they measure, uh, from every member of Congress. One of 'em is, how often somebody is talking about the topic of bipartisanship. and then the second one I mentioned already is personal attacks. So. The polarization Research Lab, they could have bias in their methods. They're funded by, um, a wide range of ideological, backers. I feel pretty in their approach and, and work, but we're not precious to any data source. If, if another data source starts to do rhetoric analysis and we think that they're doing it in a way that's more robust, then, you know, the beauty of our system is, is that we can, uh, swap out data sources
[00:21:51] as we think is, is, is reasonable.
[00:21:53] nicole: Those are.
[00:21:54] Brad Porteus: record and rhetoric analysis are the sort of the two things that sort of give you your score. And then we do [00:22:00] a couple of interesting things on top of that to, recognize and reward bridging and dividing behaviors. Uh, in particular, one that matters a lot I think, is apply a courage bonus.
[00:22:10] And if you, you can think of it like a degree of difficulty score, like on a platform diver or gymnastics. Um, which is to say like, if you are representing a district that is a hard leaning district, either a hard leaning blue district or a hard leaning red district, it'd be really easy not to be a bridger.
[00:22:26] You could just continue to, uh, be extremely partisan and, and, you know, appeal to your base and get reelected over and over again. So we recognize that it takes a lot more bravery for somebody to engage in bipartisan. Work and bridging behavior. So we give them a little bump. If you, if you're one of these people representing, uh, a hard leaning district, it's a lot easier to be a bridger if you're like in a, in a 50 50 district.
[00:22:51] 'cause you really have to earn the, um, in the votes from, from people, from both sides. and so we, we make a adjustment for that. We also make a similar [00:23:00] adjustment for, how far away you are from the center when it comes to ideological beliefs. So one of the things that I think is extremely important is, is that we're not trying to encourage or tell people that they should be centrists or moderates.
[00:23:13] you know, we, we believe that America is amazing because we have a wide range of, of beliefs. where we suck is when we don't actually. get together and talk about those together and come up with and learn from each other and come up with the best ideas, from anywhere. And we've gotten away from this, sort of collaboration thing.
[00:23:31] And so, coalition building is, is another part of, uh, our measurement system where we want to recognize and reward congressional people who build coalitions. And the one of the final inputs we, we offer for the house members is if you're a member of the Bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus, you earn some additional points.
[00:23:49] the courage bonuses and the, and the coalition bonuses, they nudge you a little bit up and down on the margin, but the bulk of it really is, is do you govern, legislative record and do you talk [00:24:00] from a rhetoric perspective in a way that's bridging or dividing,
[00:24:03] Jolene: okay, so, so the rhetoric part of this, if, if Elizabeth Warren is always going on M-S-N-B-C, which is now Ms. Now, and Tom Cotton is always speaking to Fox News. I mean, they're just regurgitating to their base, right?
[00:24:17] I mean, they're not, they're not going out. So, would the algorithms pick up the fact that maybe Elizabeth Warren went on Fox News, or Tom Cotton went on M-S-N-B-C and MSNL, would that come up? Is that something that
[00:24:31] Brad Porteus: That's a that's a great one to think about. We haven't thought about, rewarding, I'd say communication across the algorithmic divide. That's an interesting idea. So, um, let me, let me make a note of that one. You know, the, the thing is that we try not to reward the loud mouths one way or the other.
[00:24:50] because basically all they're doing is, what I say, doing it, I mean, by being like a, a talking head on one of these programs, sometimes they're doing it because they're trying to push a, a legislative initiative forward. [00:25:00] Sometimes they're doing it just 'cause they wanna raise money, right?
[00:25:02] So, um, we don't wanna, we don't wanna rec to reward that. so one of the interesting things is when you look at the distribution of the 435 house representatives and you look at the polarization research lab data on how often someone's mentioning bipartisanship or engaging in personal attacks, can imagine like there's a few people who are doing just a ton of it, and then there's a really long tail of people who are, you know, just not that active in terms of being loud mouth.
[00:25:28] And part of that is because they get no attention. So there's no point in doing it anyway because these, a's you know, nobody's paying attention anyway. But you have this long curve of distribution and one, one of the ways we try to deal with that is, If you're engaging in a ton of personal attacks, you lose points obviously.
[00:25:43] But if it's a big share of your overall communication, that also doubly hurts you. So, there's two dimensions to, let's say, talking about bipartisanship 'cause it's more positive. know, if somebody is only saying a hundred things a year and 10 of 'em are about bi bipartisanship, they would only have 10 points for [00:26:00] bipartisanship out of a hundred, but 10, but 10% of their talking points are about bipartisanship, which is, which is a lot. So, our system recognizes the bulk of, of your communications, but also the share of your voice, if that makes sense.
[00:26:12] nicole: Because I was thinking about Bridge Grades this week when, Todd Young and Josh Hawley first voted, to examine the War Re Resolution Act. And I actually shouted out on our podcast about how excited I was that they had courage and the next day they voted with the Republicans. And then I thought, oh, I gotta ask Brad, like, they got a bunch of points and then it got taken away? is it not that singular? Is it much more of a big rolling wave versus like pinpointed.
[00:26:43] Brad Porteus: I was also watching that, um, closely and for, for the listeners benefit, there were five, Republicans who were crossing over
[00:26:51] nicole: Yes, yes,
[00:26:51] Brad Porteus: three of them were bridgers and two were dividers. And I was surprised by that because I thought actually. would be more bridgers than dividers because, let me back up a second.
[00:26:59] When [00:27:00] the eight senators from the Democrats, um, reopened the government, uh, all eight of those
[00:27:05] nicole: yes.
[00:27:05] Brad Porteus: A's or B's. And that was for me, no surprise at all because ultimately those are the pragmatists and they wanted to get
[00:27:11] nicole: It's interesting.
[00:27:12] Brad Porteus: open again and so forth. So yeah, that made a lot of sense.
[00:27:15] What, what I was surprised by was that Todd Young and, and Holly were on board with that. Actually. Rand Paul is, is somebody who scores poorly and, and he was, um, uh, part of that group. And, and then of course, to your point, um, when push came to shove, it didn't happen. So in our system, we actually don't even, and this is gonna come, this is gonna sound a little bit weird, I think, but in our system, we, we don't even include votes at all.
[00:27:39] and the reason for that is because. get some advice from some political science people who are smarter than me around how, uh, bills and how legislation works. But because one party controls the agenda of which bills get a vote on the floor, it screws up the, the balance between who's able to, uh, vote against their party and who is or [00:28:00] who isn't.
[00:28:00] So, In this case, there was never a vote, right? It was just like a
[00:28:04] nicole: Right.
[00:28:05] Brad Porteus: So you can't really give points for a threat of a vote. And then they took the threat of the vote away. It's like, that's just like too much. it's not solid enough.
[00:28:12] Jolene: Yeah.
[00:28:13] Brad Porteus: so ultimately you have to have the data.
[00:28:15] It has to, it can, it has to be totally objective. And at least until now, we've determined that voting records themselves are full of noise. and let me give you another example, example of that one. Uh, the Epstein files, were put on hold during the government lockdown. And then when the new congresswoman from Arizona got seated, then she voted for the resolution that required the vote, which then made it to the vote to, to the floor.
[00:28:40] Right? Well, at that point, 434 voted for it and one voted against it. But up until the point where they didn't have enough votes, all the people were like, no, no, no, no, no, we're not gonna vote for it. And then as soon as they had, as soon as it tipped over, then everybody's all in. I'm in. You know, 'cause they don't wanna be. Seen as somebody who wasn't, you know, who was against [00:29:00] like revealing the Epstein files. So, voting side of things is really cagey and, I think there's something there, but we haven't figured out how to, I think, distill that into a way that's fair and honest. Uh, so for right now, we don't use it.
[00:29:12] nicole: I think both Jolene and I really like about your platform is that you are looking at people that don't have to, sacrifice their beliefs, but they are willing to work with other people to work in the system to make things move forward, We used to, like you said, we're all the same age.
[00:29:36] I grew up with a Republican dad and a Democrat mom, and I think Brad, you did too. it was no big deal. And everybody got along and you might debate, but then you would go have dinner together. Like it was just not that, it wasn't this, I'm a d I'm an R kind of thing.
[00:29:52] Brad Porteus: quickly, there, there was ideological overlap between the parties in Congress as well. So there were Republicans who were more quote unquote liberal [00:30:00] than certain
[00:30:00] nicole: yes.
[00:30:01] Brad Porteus: who are more conservative. So there wasn't these two camps that were polling against each other.
[00:30:06] There was much more of a overlapping uh, distribution.
[00:30:09] nicole: Jolene and I have talked about in other episodes that it really changed with Newt Gingrich under Clinton in the nineties when they stopped living together in DC when they, when all the Congress used to live together, work together, go to the gym together, create friendships together, that that really helped
[00:30:28] helped each other see each other as human beings.
[00:30:31] And maybe they're not gonna vote the same thing, but they're not, we're not like strict enemies coming into battle. And God forbid, I think something differently than my party, right? But we're not gonna get anywhere in that way. And so Jolene and I are super excited about this idea that, of bridge grades, because quite honestly, Brad, I've never not voted for a Democrat.
[00:30:54] I have always voted for a Democrat. Always, always, always. And I'm looking at your, at your, platform. You [00:31:00] can click on the, the the state and see who has what grade. And I'm thinking, well, wouldn't that be exciting if we actually started voting for people that work together,
[00:31:12] not give up their ideals, but work together that make the government work?
[00:31:17] Like, that's super exciting to me. And I'm wondering, two things. Is there a possibility, 'cause I, I know it's, you're probably raising money and still, still a new, a newborn, but at some point are you hoping that you can not just give the number, but maybe like click on and see what they people have worked on?
[00:31:37] Like giving examples of how they got to said 98 or had got to, like I saw with the Senate that Bernie Sanders has the, I think, correct me if I'm wrong, that Bernie Sanders has the lowest score and Amy Klobuchar has the highest score. and I was thinking, what a shame if Tim Walls is now not running for men, for governor [00:32:00] and that Amy Klobuchar is gonna run for governor, we're gonna lose the highest scoring bridger in Congress.
[00:32:07] And that to me is a, is a shame. But I didn't know that until I looked at your data and said, this is exciting to me that there could be an alternative because we're always so stuck in the two party system. We need another party. Well, you're sort of giving this an alternative to another party.
[00:32:23] Brad Porteus: sometimes I look at this like a, it's like a third party hidden in plain sight. yeah, if we can drop our identity politics and, and you know, back to the, the comment de at the beginning or earlier want it to be easy.
[00:32:34] So it's easy to just say, well, I'm part of the red team, or I'm part of the glute team. Well, I mean, in a perfect world, you know, 10 years from now, I don't know how long they'll be like, well, I'm a member of the purple team and like, you know, I vote for sometimes for Republicans, sometimes for for Democrats, but I vote for bridgers over dividers.
[00:32:48] Like, okay, I mean, how great, you know,
[00:32:51] nicole: Yeah. That's amazing.
[00:32:52] Jolene: Yeah.
[00:32:52] Brad Porteus: Normalizing that would be, I think the, the big dream and, and to bring votes and money to these brave [00:33:00] congresspeople who are doing the bridging work. Is, is the dream, what you say Nicole, uh, is I think intellectually correct, which is to say personally, as a democratic vote, lifetime voter are, you know, suddenly open and willing to consider voting for a Republican for the first time in your life. I would say that's because you've spent 50 hours online with Jolene and you guys, you've, you've, I mean, that, that arc for you is pretty unique. come to the conclusion that trying to get people who are active in voting, uh, to change their votes based on bridge grades is never gonna happen.
[00:33:37] I just don't think that's gonna happen. So you would be the exception, Nicole, to say, I'm gonna use
[00:33:41] nicole: Okay.
[00:33:41] Brad Porteus: when vote for a Republican. That would be awesome. I mean,
[00:33:44] nicole: the fact that I'm even saying vote for Republican. Like seriously. But it's not for me about that. It's not. It's not vote voting Republican. It's voting for a bridger because that's the important thing. Vote. Vote. I'm voting for an A. I liked getting good grades, whatever, [00:34:00] whatever.
[00:34:00] I like my Congress people to get good grades. I'm curious. On that note, have you thought about, and this is like you have as much money as possible to do whatever you want, right? And this and this Dream bridge grades.org. Could you think about that? Like looking at the people that are running for Congress, their campaign rhetoric, their campaign speeches, how they bridge or divide?
[00:34:26] Is that a thought for the future?
[00:34:27] Brad Porteus: I mean, you're connecting the dots in a, in a great way. And just before I forget, um, just to close out the last point I was gonna make, which is
[00:34:34] nicole: Yeah, sorry.
[00:34:35] Brad Porteus: where I think that the, the impact can be really powerful is, is by reinviting people who have distanced themselves from civics and to bringing them back into the voting booth.
[00:34:44] People who are independent or people who are like just could care less or who hate both parties. If we could get them to be interested in, in government by saying, you know, you shouldn't care about whether they're red or blue, you should care about whether they're bridgers or dividers, because ultimately they're the ones looking for win-win solutions.
[00:34:59] And we all [00:35:00] will benefit from that, including you. I think that's a lot more reasonable as a play than trying to convince somebody who is a. Reliable democratic voter to vote for Republican or vice versa.
[00:35:10] nicole: I do think you have to have a little bit more faith that people might switch over only because, and you, you've said it like a bazillion times in your interviews, learning from this podcast, I am a believer that both parties suck at this point. I might be a declarative liberal, but I'm like, I am over this.
[00:35:27] We have got to figure something out. Right?
[00:35:29] Brad Porteus: one. You're not the only
[00:35:30] nicole: I'm not the only one, and I think that Jolene would maybe agree sometimes.
[00:35:35] I would totally
[00:35:35] Jolene: agree, and I would even say, I would
[00:35:37] nicole: go farther
[00:35:37] Jolene: to even say, I don't think anything's going to happen while Trump is still in office. He is a divider I think he has empowered both parties to be complete, dividers. And so everybody is, is standing firm in their camps So I don't think any change is gonna happen while he's still in office.
[00:35:56] Brad Porteus: yes, dividing is working well for him right now, so, but, but I, [00:36:00] without getting into the trap of talking about the executive branch and, and the president,
[00:36:03] nicole: Yes.
[00:36:04] Brad Porteus: think, um, let's back up one beat here and get back to your question about the, where does this go next?
[00:36:09] And do you need big money to, to
[00:36:11] nicole: Yeah.
[00:36:12] Brad Porteus: And, and I think that's an important point to, to get back to. when I first sort of began to think about this idea, it was really just an intellectual idea in my head, and then gradually it, it sort of sprouted, right? And the original idea was you need a one two punch and punch.
[00:36:27] Number one is a trustworthy system that can sort the bridgers from the dividers. And then punch number two is money and votes for bridgers, uh, and money and votes for people who can, who can defeat the dividers. So that, by the way, there's something. in there, which is we're not able to give grades to the challengers.
[00:36:46] We're only able to give grades to the incumbents. So, uh, the ideal way to change the composition of Congress would be make sure we reelect all the A's and make sure that F's lose every chance. We, every time that they're up for reelection, doesn't matter which party they're from, that [00:37:00] that would be the. The dream, right? Well, that's gonna take a ton of, uh, resource, to educate people and inspire people and, bring the money and votes to those races. so I know that we
[00:37:11] nicole: I know the.
[00:37:12] Brad Porteus: two punch. Both of those are, are needed. Uh, and I came to the conclusion pretty quickly into this work, which was like, oh, I'm pretty good at number one, but I'm pretty bad at number two when it comes to raising that kind of money and, and, and being like that sort of, um, catalyst to move the needle when it comes to money and votes for members of Congress. you know, now I'm, I'm, the way I look at it is I wanna build a public utility that can be utilized by anybody. So imagine you're reading the news and instead of it just saying like in parentheses New York D uh, it would say, you know, New York D bridge, grade B, or something like this, right? So that would be the big dream, which is like, it becomes. of the zeitgeist and, and part of the, the ecosystem. And then at that point, we need pacs, uh, and money. I mean, you can [00:38:00] imagine a bridgers pac where somebody's raising money
[00:38:02] Jolene: Wow.
[00:38:02] Brad Porteus: to essentially reelect bridgers and to, finding close races and to put money behind the bridgers, make sure they get reelected, and to push out the dividers who have had their chance and have shown us that they're not governing in a way that's in our best common interests.
[00:38:16] nicole: you're part of the builders movement, aren't you?
[00:38:19] Brad Porteus: Yeah. So I'm a, a, a, let's call the builders partner. And there's, I don't know,
[00:38:22] nicole: Uhhuh.
[00:38:23] Brad Porteus: or three or 400 people who identify as people who are collaborating on. Essentially anti-US versus them world that we live in, in lots of different ways. So it's a, you know, it's a loose organization of people doing their own thing that, uh, the builder's movement has rallied together.
[00:38:42] And, uh, they're doing an amazing job of, of putting a lot of energy and muscle and resource behind the idea that, hey, you know, the algorithm is tricking you. And there is a lot of amazing stuff that's happening, and we are a lot more aligned than what people think. And so, um, yeah, I'm proud to be part of the, the [00:39:00] builders movement.
[00:39:00] Jolene: So one of your grades is, um, or one of the, the data points is then not only what people say, but also what they do. So
[00:39:09] Brad Porteus: Yeah,
[00:39:09] Jolene: of what they say, you get as granular as like, looking at what they would say when they go back into their districts and have a town hall and, and, and you're able to kind
[00:39:20] nicole: Able to.
[00:39:21] Jolene: of that information or some of the vernacular of those conversations and, and put that into a data point.
[00:39:27] Because I
[00:39:28] Brad Porteus: I, yeah.
[00:39:29] Jolene: to the midterms and you see maybe some people, maybe are, you know, fighting for their seat or, maybe I, I see, I think, uh, some Republicans who are gonna maybe distance themselves a little bit from Trump, uh, the
[00:39:44] Brad Porteus: Mm-hmm.
[00:39:45] Jolene: to the midterms so that they can see, seem like more of a bridger than a divider.
[00:39:50] So it, how,
[00:39:51] Brad Porteus: Yeah.
[00:39:51] Jolene: take that into
[00:39:52] nicole: How do
[00:39:52] Brad Porteus: implicit in your question is, does the polarization research lab, um, do a good job of collecting, let's say, the soundbites, uh, [00:40:00] and the, the wording from these town halls and, and other events? I think the answer is yes, but I'm not totally convinced and I wouldn't, um, die on that hill. What I will say is that I believe that we're, you know, at the, in the early innings of the kind of data that is gonna become available to us over a period of time. So what I would say is, right now I think bridge grades is, 85, 15. Good. Like 90 10. Good. But look, there's still some, some areas for improvement, no doubt.
[00:40:28] And I think what you're touching on is. would love there to be a lot more, let's say, rigor around some of these rhetoric, um, analysis that you're describing, because I think exactly what you're saying is important, and that is when pe when these people are up for reelection, then their tune can change.
[00:40:46] And how do we avoid, um, rewarding that, when in the end their behavior actually hasn't changed. and, and I'm not here to call out people because again, I'm not, uh, skilled enough to understand the nuance of who's doing what. But you know, as [00:41:00] somebody who's watching from afar, you know, there are people who are often saying they're gonna be bipartisan.
[00:41:06] and, you know, I dunno, Susan Collins is somebody along those lines and Lisa Murkowski's another, and, and they're often in the conversation. And then when push comes to shove, uh, a lot of times they end up not delivering against some of these threats or promises. And so in the end, I think, say words matter, but actions matter more.
[00:41:25] Jolene: Yeah,
[00:41:27] nicole: So for any of those Congress people that are listening to the podcast right now, what can they do, Brad, to get more of an A than an F?
[00:41:35] Brad Porteus: ultimately about collaboration and coalition building. So I think it's a matter of seeking out other people who are going to be good collaborators with you. And what I would tell 'em to do is go onto bridge trade.org and look at the list and look for people who are a's especially and A's, and B's and, and get in touch with their staff, get, get your staff in touch with their staff and to try to find something in common. you guys talked about, um, the, [00:42:00] the bill that is attempting to, prevent congress people from creating and profiting on the stock market. I think there's
[00:42:06] nicole: Yes. Yes.
[00:42:07] Brad Porteus: up
[00:42:08] and honestly, one of the things we try to do with our measurement system is to identify who's sitting at the table. And I think if you think about your own personal experience, that between the two of you, as far as I can tell from the outside, both of you have developed and grown and come up with new ideas and challenged your own ideas, and, you're both better. At this work, and also maybe in other areas as well, because of the fact that you came to the table together.
[00:42:32] Jolene: Yeah.
[00:42:33] Brad Porteus: so
[00:42:33] nicole: Yes.
[00:42:34] Brad Porteus: just getting to the table and sitting at the table is already a big step. There's so many Congress people who just are hiding in their corner or hiding in their bubble, and they're afraid to, for whatever reason, they're afraid to be seen.
[00:42:48] And, and you talked about at the beginning of the, of the, um, of the session around the difference between compromising and collaborating. People are afraid to be seen as compromising, um, because they feel like that, that ceding territory or hard earned [00:43:00] turf but collaboration doesn't mean ceding any of your values.
[00:43:04] And one of the great examples I've always loved is Josh Hawley and Bernie Sanders, two people we've talked about on this, uh, podcast already. Um, ideologically couldn't be further away from each other on a, an objective spectrum provided by Vote View. and they co-authored a bill to try to cap credit card interest rates at 10%. Uh, they announced it earlier this year. Uh, and actually Trump has gotten interested in this one recently, so you may have seen that one popped up in the news, that got kicked off the be very beginning of the year. These guys are both Fs, uh, and I was like, whoa, check this out.
[00:43:35] These guys are co-authoring this bill. Like, makes total sense. So I went and like looked into a little bit, you know, Hawley's team never mentioned that Sanders had anything to do with it. Sanders's team never mentioned that Hawley had anything to do with it. Neither of them were mentioning that it was a bipartisan effort.
[00:43:49] They both were basically saying, look what I'm doing for my people. You know, I'm gonna help people with affordability and credit card, crushing credit card debt, and we're gonna push back against the banks and [00:44:00] 10% enough for them, blah, blah. But it was like they were so like shy of the fact that this was a bipartisan collaboration.
[00:44:07] that's, that's where we are now, which is really, really scary.
[00:44:10] nicole: We have to make bipartisanship sexy again, is really what needs to happen it's not sexy. And just because you try to work together doesn't mean you're giving something up. You're actually making the country better.
[00:44:22] Like that's something that I'm su what I love what you're doing, Brad, is like you are taking to account that we are all Americans.
[00:44:29] Brad Porteus: this is about finding the win-win versus the zero sum game,
[00:44:32] Jolene: I think it's, it's, when I said this earlier about, it's the chicken or egg theory, right? I mean, does it start in, in Congress and they lead by example? Or is it us as the US citizens who say, no, this is what we demand. And I, and I think that we are
[00:44:47] Brad Porteus: Oh, that's a great question.
[00:44:49] Jolene: yeah. What's the answer?
[00:44:50] Brad Porteus: What, well, what do, what do you think?
[00:44:52] Jolene: I'm gonna go back and, and say that we are so polarized that, I don't know that we would respect, as citizens would [00:45:00] respect those politicians who are willing to, to collaborate together because I, I think that we are so, hell
[00:45:09] Brad Porteus: Hmm.
[00:45:09] Jolene: on digging in our heels on what we believe that we're, I don't think that we're open to that yet,
[00:45:15] Brad Porteus: I think there's a couple things that come up for me here. One is, is like, I think. It's too easy to ascribe the positions that are gonna be taken by the 10% on each of the wings, uh, no matter what.
[00:45:25] So you're totally right about those people. They're never gonna go for it. there's a, there's a silent majority in the middle of the distribution curve who really want it, who really want this kind of collaboration. Um, but it's just not normalized right now. So I think that we have to figure out a way to normalize it in a way that. not only makes it okay for Bernie and Josh Hawley to say that this was a bipartisan effort, but actually be excited about saying that because they're showing their, their populations that they're not just, uh, only representing, you know, one part of their district who, who happens to be in the same political party that they are. So I, I think it,
[00:45:58] nicole: I think
[00:45:58] Brad Porteus: take a lot of time to your [00:46:00] point, I think we're not ready for instant, like, uh, bipartisan bipartisanship is, is the name of the game. But I do think that we can get our nudge our way there through these incentives by making
[00:46:12] nicole: making.
[00:46:13] Brad Porteus: famous, um, and essentially supporting them and saying like, these are the people who are the ones doing the work. just as an interlude, one of the examples I was looking at recently was there was a 35 member of Congress group that have co-signed a what's called a healthcare framework. And this is trying to address the, the healthcare affordability topic of the 35, um, Congress people, 20 are Democrats and 15 are Republicans. 30 of the 35 are A and Bs. 30 of the 33 5 are A and B's 22 A's 22 A's and eight B's. And five of 'em are, are C's and Fs. Great. I'm glad they're joining. But it's like, this is the group of both Republicans and Democrats who are like, these are the adults in the room. These are the pragmatists. They, they say, you know what?
[00:46:57] Healthcare affordability is a problem. And you know [00:47:00] what, let's begin to try to come together and come up with a solution. Because never in the history of America has a really great, um, long lasting, uh, legislative agenda that's been authored by only one party has that really ever survived and been been successful.
[00:47:14] I think definition, we have to sit at the table and again, the two of
[00:47:18] nicole: Get.
[00:47:19] Brad Porteus: exhibit A of, of the fact that sitting at the table together can yield all sorts of interesting insights.
[00:47:25] Jolene: Oh, Brad, you're saying there's hope. I love it.
[00:47:28] nicole: You are saying that there's hope. Thank God for you.
[00:47:31] Brad Porteus: I think we have to be patient, but we have to be determined and, um. it's gonna be incrementalism. This is like a compounding portfolio. If we can get like one SMI better this year and then a smidgen more
[00:47:44] nicole: Yeah.
[00:47:45] Brad Porteus: and then it compounds on itself, I think we can build momentum.
[00:47:47] I think we can change the composition of Congress to be more collaborative. And I do think that that will change the culture on Capitol Hill. And I think that the culture on Capitol Hill does set the tone for the country. So, [00:48:00] um, I do think that if, if everyday citizens can see people from both parties working on behalf of the American people, I think that will take down the temperature, the citizen population and allow people to drop their identity.
[00:48:12] Politics. This is the big issue, which is people are so eager to, you know, wear their team colors and, um, it's just not healthy.
[00:48:19] Jolene: From your lips to God's ears, Brad, I love it.
[00:48:23] nicole: before we go into the good for the soul and the, would you rather, is there anything else that you would like our listener and viewer to know about you? Bridge grades, any hopes, dreams? What can we do to spread this, this revolution of bridgers?
[00:48:39] Brad Porteus: tha thanks for that. I, I think it's pretty simple and, and honestly, it's just a case of remember that there's another lens to look at, um, when you're reading the news or hearing the news. I've gotten in the habit of this, and I'd invite everybody else to do it, which is whenever I see something that's happening in the news and I see the name of a Congress person, usually I don't know who they are.
[00:48:58] I looked up their [00:49:00] grades and I, if I see that they have a really low score, then I'm thinking like, okay, this person is. Um, has a motivation that is not pure or that, you know, I, I, I find that to be, you know, suspicious or
[00:49:12] Jolene: Yeah.
[00:49:13] Brad Porteus: I get skeptical. But if I see somebody who has a high score, then I'm like, okay, I'm more curious now what their position is and so forth.
[00:49:19] So, I'm not saying it's the answer for everything, it definitely isn't, but it's another lens. And so I think if we can all just get in the habit of realizing that that lens exists and trying it out, that's a great first step. And then, you know, my job is just to make sure that that lens is as easy to find as possible.
[00:49:34] And so that's gonna take some time. But the big dream is, is that, um, wherever you are, you'll have easy access to people's bridge grades, whether the, uh, Congress people wanted it or not.
[00:49:42] nicole: That's so great. Uh, so do you have a good for the soul for us, Brad?
[00:49:52] Brad Porteus: since we're all Gen Xers, I guess I would be remiss not to recommend the book that I, that I have, uh, a lot of passion for, [00:50:00] is basically a memoir written about the early nineties, uh, the last era before technology took over everything. Uh, and a love letter to Gen X about our superpower. That is the ability to improvise, um, and to make something from nothing, to use the resources that we have and to be scrappy and resourceful. Um, and the reason I really love that book is 'cause I wrote it and I published it last year. So that would be my, what I should say it's called Roll With It. Okay. Um,
[00:50:30] nicole: Okay.
[00:50:30] Brad Porteus: not, I'm not going a shameless plug, a shameless
[00:50:34] nicole: Well as soon as you started talking I'm like, I'm like, I know you're gonna just plug your book. I know. 'cause I just, I knew that you wrote that book, but I love it.
[00:50:41] Brad Porteus: Okay. Okay. Okay. But, but I'm not, but I'm not gonna use up my, uh, good for the soul without, I, I think I'm gonna something a little bit. Broader appeal. ' cause this is pretty, pretty niche appeal, which is like, um, I'm a huge fan of, of live, live music. Like, I think going and seeing [00:51:00] live music is something that people should try to do as, as often as they can.
[00:51:05] And, and I, I'm not talking about the big corporate, like tickets, things got outta control stadium stuff, and I'm
[00:51:11] nicole: Yes.
[00:51:12] Brad Porteus: about that. I'm talking about coffee house or, you know, it doesn't have to be live music. It could be theater, it could be something else. But I think that that, uh, as we enter this AI world and everything else, like human live, live arts, uh, is something that I think is really important.
[00:51:27] And not just because I think it's important, but I think it's actually good for our brain. So my, uh, appeal to people is, go see live music. Go see somebody who, uh, a performer who you don't know anything about. Um, it's even better when you don't know the music 'cause you don't have judgment about whether they're playing it well or they're not. Bring a wingman and put your phone in your pocket and just be for 45 minutes to an hour and a half, uh, and, and just allow your mind to take it all in.
[00:51:53] Jolene: you're speaking
[00:51:54] nicole: Sing it brother.
[00:51:55] Jolene: Yep.
[00:51:56] nicole: Woo. Yes. Jolene is going to give you a, [00:52:00] would you rather, and then you can give us a, would you rather
[00:52:04] Brad Porteus: Okay,
[00:52:04] nicole: you, are you ready, Brad?
[00:52:06] Brad Porteus: I think so.
[00:52:07]
[00:52:12] Jolene: Would you rather speak to a joint session of Congress and
[00:52:17] Brad Porteus: oh my God.
[00:52:18] Jolene: about bridge grades
[00:52:20] Brad Porteus: I'll take B, B,
[00:52:25] Jolene: or be on the primetime nationally televised address to the nation to explain bridge grades?
[00:52:35] Brad Porteus: I'll just go with my reaction, which is I, I think the second one, because ultimately this is about back power, you know, as, as a citizen group, um, rather than essentially, you know, adding to the games that are being played on Capitol Hill.
[00:52:48] So I think that if we can, um, you know, educate our citizens that there's a way out of this trap, then that would be, uh, extremely powerful. So I'd go for the second one.
[00:52:58] Jolene: awesome. I agree.
[00:52:59] nicole: That's [00:53:00] good. do too.
[00:53:00] Brad Porteus: So is it my turn?
[00:53:02] Jolene: Yes.
[00:53:02] nicole: It's your turn.
[00:53:03] Brad Porteus: don't overthink it, but you know, all things being equal. Would you rather have been born 50 years earlier than you were, or 50 years later?
[00:53:12] nicole: listen, speaking of seeing theater, I just saw on Friday night I, on Broadway, the show called Liberation. That is so beautiful. I highly recommend it. And it's days, basically it's written by a Gen Xer about her mom and her mom's friends and their, they're, it, it takes place in 1970 and watching these women, uh, find the women's rights movement.
[00:53:41] And it was like sitting there watching my mom and her friends. It's, it's like all of our moms. And whether they became a feminist or not, just that exploration of that all to say it was a beautiful play. I don't wanna go even farther back. I wanna go forward 'cause, 'cause the [00:54:00] women, I need my rights, y'all.
[00:54:02] I need my rights. That's what I gotta say.
[00:54:05] Brad Porteus: answer.
[00:54:06] Jolene: Oh, okay. I don't, I don't wanna be back there without you, so, I mean, I'm gonna have to go
[00:54:10] Brad Porteus: Oh.
[00:54:11] nicole: Come forward. Come forward.
[00:54:13] Jolene: you.
[00:54:14] no, my
[00:54:15] nicole: your
[00:54:15] Jolene: reaction would be to go back. but do I get to know everything? I know you said don't overthink it, but I over, I
[00:54:20] Brad Porteus: Yeah,
[00:54:21] Jolene: everything, Brad.
[00:54:21] So,
[00:54:22] nicole: always over? Thanks.
[00:54:23] Jolene: I, uh, like, do I get to know everything I know now?
[00:54:26] Brad Porteus: I don't think that's fair
[00:54:27] nicole: See
[00:54:27] Brad Porteus: then it's
[00:54:28] nicole: yeah.
[00:54:28] Brad Porteus: know,
[00:54:29] nicole: you.
[00:54:29] Brad Porteus: option
[00:54:30] nicole: you. Thank you, Brad. Thank you. Jolene. Here's a question. Why do you wanna go back?
[00:54:35] Jolene: because it's, it's the fear of the unknown, you know, like I know what happened back then, and so I feel like I could, I could navigate it much easier than the going into the future and be like, oh crap, I have no idea what's going on with y'all.
[00:54:50] Brad Porteus: tend to like air with you, Jolene, which is like, maybe it's the devil, you know, versus the devil you don't know. But for me it's like there's a technology issue [00:55:00] here as well, which is
[00:55:01] nicole: Yes.
[00:55:01] Brad Porteus: I see my kids who are in their twenties, um, and the life that they've had, like we, we are lucky as Gen Xers in that we actually saw both sides of
[00:55:10] Jolene: Yeah.
[00:55:11] Brad Porteus: So we lived and grew up in an analog world with no technology, and we've now adapted to the new technologies and everything else. So we actually have the, the, I don't know, the, the insight to understand the world through those two lenses, but, um, you know, we're the last generation to have that. I think that that's actually a superpower for us as well. And I, to be honest, I just, gosh, if I were to be born 50 years after I was born, like, ooh, we'd miss out on so many of those cool things. But it's also, it comes with the price of, of, you know, Nicole, what you're saying, which is, you know, all of the progress that we've made lost and also the food sucked.
[00:55:46] nicole: The food did suck and listen vinyl's back so we could still play our records. Like it's still gonna be cool. Like all those things are cool. Oh my gosh. Brad, thank you so much for being on this podcast with us. We were so yes.
[00:55:59] [00:56:00] So great to meet you.
[00:56:01] Brad Porteus: you know, it's amazing that we're at 20, 26 and two people who are friends who are on different political parts of the spectrum can have a podcast and talk, you know, an hour every week for a whole year and then into the next year. wanna say this in a way that shows as much respect as possible. It's amazing what you're doing. And on the other hand, it's kind of crazy that this is even like a thing, right? We're so far apart. Like,
[00:56:22] nicole: We're so far apart.
[00:56:24] Brad Porteus: wild.
[00:56:24] nicole: apart
[00:56:25] Jolene: Yeah.
[00:56:25] nicole: Can you please leave everyone with the hippo and the elephant?
[00:56:30] Brad Porteus: when Nicole's referring to is that, um, in, in a earlier podcast, I was talking about something I learned in one of my corporate trainings, which was this idea of be a elephant, not a hippo.
[00:56:43] And a hippo has two tiny ears in one giant mouth, and an elephant has two gigantic ears in one tiny mouth.
[00:56:50] nicole: so we can all be elephants,
[00:56:52] Brad Porteus: Absolutely.
[00:56:53] Jolene: I wanna put that as like our motto, like that needs to be our tagline. I love that.
[00:56:59] Brad Porteus: Well,
[00:56:59] nicole: love it too.[00:57:00]
[00:57:00] Brad Porteus: that you both have talked about, and, and I think Monica Guzman also talked about was this idea that once you stop trying to convince the other side that you're right, then suddenly you can be an elephant. Right? It's the hippos that are bi busy trying to convince the other side that they're wrong.
[00:57:15] Um, and when you're in that convincing mode, then you're not, you're not listening and you're not learning. So, it's, it's amazing feeling that when once you stop trying to con convince somebody of something and just try to understand them, then it diffuses the entire situation and yeah, you're more likely to learn something,
[00:57:32] nicole: thank you for letting us learn from you.
[00:57:34] Brad Porteus: huh?
[00:57:35] nicole: It's really been, uh,
[00:57:36] Brad Porteus: excited that you found me, um,
[00:57:38] nicole: yes.
[00:57:38] Brad Porteus: more than just 'cause of the cookie dough. Uh, but this has
[00:57:42] nicole: There's been lots of plugging. Thank you so much, Fred.
[00:57:46] Brad Porteus: Well,
[00:57:46] Jolene: Thanks.
[00:57:47] Brad Porteus: um, you know, while we're gonna plug, I, I'd say, well, it would be fun to revisit this conversation in a year from now and, uh, after the elections and, um, and see
[00:57:55] nicole: Absolutely.
[00:57:56] Brad Porteus: has come and, um, and, you know, to stay current on [00:58:00] the evolution of this whole project.
[00:58:02] nicole: Yeah, we'd love to have you back on. That's a, that's a really good idea. Who's that?
[00:58:06] Jolene: and
[00:58:07] Brad Porteus: That's my cat.
[00:58:11] nicole: Thank you. Here's to Gen Xers.
[00:58:13] Brad Porteus: Thanks again for
[00:58:14] nicole: All right.
[00:58:14] Brad Porteus: I loved
[00:58:15] nicole: Thank you.
[00:58:15]
