Super Star Stefanik! | Episode 87

22:19I started in the Obama administration. Trump, one. Biden, Trump, two. So four administrations. and really interesting vantage point of just many perspectives.

22:30Shelley:All right, we're going to get there. Let's talk quickly about Harvard, though. So then you go to Harvard, and I read, so again, Poison Ivy is an incredible book, and it's not just about anti-Semitism. There's a good bit about Elise, so it's very exciting and interesting, and it is sort of depressing. But anyway, you didn't get the email as quickly because it went into your spam or something. It wasn't. So I, it's interesting. This is sort of an interesting tidbit from this generation. I was the first year that Harvard sent out acceptances with email. Right. And AOL accounts, which I did not have at that time and never really had, they got caught in spam.

23:16And it made the New York Post. My situation was I had a Hotmail account. Do we remember those free Hotmail accounts? Yeah, I never had one. I had. And this was the era of Hotmail, AIM, Napster. All the millennials will know what I'm talking about, the older millennials. And they would bash the emails, accepted, deferred, waitlisted or rejected. And I didn't get the email the same time as some of the other students who had applied at school. But by the time I got home, I couldn't forget it. I drove myself home, went on the family computer. And it was just a life-changing moment to get accepted.

23:52Shelley:Yeah. I mean, Harvard. Yes. And I had a great time, Shelley. I had an amazing time during my undergraduate experience there. And that was why, sort of, to bring it full circle to this congressional hearing, it became, it was unrecognizable to me what was happening on Harvard's campus versus the experience I had. And I, you know, I was at Harvard at an interesting time, too. Mark Zuckerberg was a classmate. So, yeah, so Mark Zuckerberg, Pete Buttigieg. He was a year older than me. So do you remember, like, I mean, obviously, not obviously, but everyone saw the movie, you know, about, what was it called, the Mark Zuckerberg movie?

24:31Shelley:The Social Network. The Social Network. Yes. So do you remember him running around campus? I do. And were there so many, like, tech bros like that running around? Well, this was pre-tech bro. I mean, Mark was really, Mark had sort of the co-founders of Facebook. They lived in Kirkland House, which was near, I was in Winthrop House, kind of nearby there. But I vividly remember sophomore year, he started Facemash.com. Oh, right. Which was sort of the hot or not, and that kind of, the campus was very focused on that. Right. Voting there. But at the same time, there had been kind of a controversy at school where each dorm, each house, some would have open Facebook so you can look up people.

25:15Some would have closed Facebooks. And if you look back in the Harvard Crimson, there were a number of editorials saying we need some type of transparent, centralized Facebook so you can look up your fellow students. That's where that name comes from. It also comes from the freshman members of Harvard. You get handed a yearbook. Right. They still do it. That was called the Facebook. Right. So I have mine, and I'm in the same freshman class as Zuckerberg. That's, you know, only 1 ,600 of those exist because that's about the number of the incoming. It's incredible. So he starts Facemash.com. I knew one of his co-founders pretty well or one of the kind of group affiliated with him.

25:51And a really good friend of mine was his freshman roommate. So lots of connections. And I remember Mark leaving school and going to California for the summer and not coming back. And I remember thinking, oh, that's an interesting project that those people are going to do. But I'm going to go to my class and keep going, standing on track. So it's been fun to see Mark. I mean, I am in touch with him periodically when he is on the hill. Is in town, yeah. And is the impression that people got from the movie, is that accurate?

26:29Shelley:Is he nicer? Is it similar? You know, the movie overplayed. I think the social kind of fraternity. Yeah. No, Mark is very friendly, and he's married to his college girlfriend. Priscilla was also a Harvard student, and they are married. I mean, he met her at Harvard. Oh, I thought he met her later. No, also at Harvard. Huh. So what were your impressions of Pete Buttigieg? Very intellectual. I mean, I knew Peter, known as in college. He was very involved in the Institute of Politics, which I was as well. Oh, right. And he was just very intellectual. And you can see that, I think, in his candidacy, various candidacies he's had in the past.

27:17Another person who was a year below me was Vivek Ramaswamy. He, at that time, I think was pre-med. I remember him being more on sort of the science track. but he also was involved at the Institute of Politics. Vivek, I mean, he's a great buddy, and it's been interesting. Same hair.

27:36Shelley:Same hair. I mean, he has a little bit of a different, you know, spiffed up vibe. Oh, it's more spiffed up now. Yeah, more spiffed up vibe. But he was a really nice, nice kid. Yeah. Nice student. Right. Very smart. Extremely smart. I I mean, that was being at Harvard or many of these schools, you are with such talented people that are just challenge you and also help hone. It actually helped me hone my sort of debate skills because there were so few Republicans, which is the norm for college campuses. And the other person is Kevin Kiley, who's a member of Congress serving on the same committee as me.

28:18But now, as I sigh, let's go to the hearings.

28:24Shelley:I mean, the hearings heard and seen around the world. Talk about your preparation for the hearing, which you write about in the book. I mean, clearly everybody is now well aware of what a good questioner you were. So talk about what you thought the hearings were going to achieve and then the moment when you asked your question, which wasn't even on your sheet. Yes. So let's go back to when I was first elected, Shelley. You get to list the committees you want to be on. I was the only newly elected Republican who listed education in my top two. Really? And I wanted to be on the Armed Services Committee and the Education Committee, and I got on both of those committees.

29:08I feel that the education issue in general needs to be much more of a priority in this country. Now this committee is considered a blockbuster committee because of the hearing. But previously, I know. But it was a long journey to get to this point. So after years of focusing on national security issues on the Armed Services Committee and then educational excellence, We saw after October 7th when Hamas had a terrorist attack against Israel, the bloodiest day for the Jewish people since the Holocaust. In 24 hours, these campuses like Harvard, Penn, Columbia became engulfed in pro-Hamas encampments.

29:46And Jewish students on those campuses were facing unbelievably unsafe, vile threats, physical assaults. It was unrecognizable to me. So I wanted to go ahead. Excuse me. Where were you on October 7th, by the way?

29:59Shelley:I was. It was a Saturday. I was in upstate New York. And I well and I was in D.C. and I woke up and my husband was like, there's been this terrible attack in Israel. And I remember my heart sank and then you just can't stop watching it on TV. I can't stop watching it. I remember vividly seeing the news footage. And of course, there was so many of these images that are imprinted in people's minds. Noah Argami, who was one of the hostages of her being pulled away on that motorbike, eventually she was returned. Yeah. And I got to know many of these hostages and hostage families. But the, so that was over the weekend.

30:40And it was immediate on these campuses. And the university presidents failed to enforce the rules. They let this takeover happen. And because I had gone to Harvard, I was so well connected, not only to alumni, I, but of parents, of students that are there. And I just knew the campus. I knew the campus, knew all the organizations. So I told my colleague, Virginia Fox, who's chair of education committee. Who's so lovely. Yes, who was the right chair at this right time. Right, right. We need to haul in these university presidents. So they came in December. So remember, two months later, it was Penn, MIT, and Harvard.

31:16My preparation, I had, I'm showing her Shelly in person, but many inches thick prepared materials of even some that were not publicly reported of here's what's been happening on campus here are first-hand accounts here are students that have come to my office they did a tremendous amount of work to have all these examples and I had you know some themes that I wanted to ask in questions but I find Shelly that I know traditional members of Congress they kind of read what their legislative staff prepares and I have an amazing staff I have found that the shorter, more direct questions are oftentimes the most revealing, and the simpler questions are more revealing.

31:56And I literally thought to myself, when we, I'll get to that, but in the hearing, I had a couple different rounds with the Harvard president at the time, and was just not getting direct answers. And the final few minutes, another member yielded me the last three minutes of the hearing. And I thought, how can I ask this in the easiest, most direct way to force them to answer correctly, does calling for the genocide of Jews violate your university's code of conduct? I expected they would say yes, and my follow-up was going to be what disciplinary action. Right. But then they blew it. It does not depend on the context.

32:31MIT, Penn, and Harvard. And what was eerie is no one, they didn't think anything was wrong. They sort of stood up, because that was the last little minutes of the hearing, and there was no media at that time, because the hearing had gone all day. It was just C-SPAN footage. And it went viral. It was a billion views in one week. And that's more than Watergate, more than impeachment. It set off an earthquake in higher education that was long overdue.

32:59Shelley:Yeah, it's exactly right. It was an earthquake and the reverberations are still playing are continuing. Yes. And I remember I saw you at our mutual friends tea that December. And honestly, I wanted to, you know, like bow down. I mean, it was it's so important what you're doing to every American, let alone every American Jew. But I mean, it's and you're not even Jewish. As I think people, most people know. Right. I am Catholic. Yeah. I think it is very important that we have non-Jewish voices speaking out with moral clarity to condemn anti-Semitism, which is the canary in the coal mine of broader anti-Americanism, anti-Western civilization.

33:49And that's what this book talks about, that this was really the veil lifted on what is happening in higher education in terms of attacking our values. And one interesting part about the book, Shelley, that I even learned about is I went back to the founding missions of these institutions. Harvard, founded in 1636. Penn, where Benjamin Franklin was one of the visionaries. Columbia, Alexander Hamilton. These are timeless mission statements and mottos, and they've shifted so far of what their founding missions were. And it's very important that they return to the founding missions of academic excellence instead of this very radicalized, very woke, very, frankly, un-American and anti-Semitic embrace that's been happening at these schools.

34:39So the book, I wrote the book because I felt that the media was going to brush it under the rug what happened in this era in higher education post-October 7th. And they have brushed it under the rug. But when you read all of this in one volume, I wanted it to be a seminal volume of what my office had gathered from. Because we came to the repository, thousands of emails. People reached out with different stories. Parents would come in my office, various students. And that was important to document in addition to the education committee findings and report that went out. Because when you read it, you see that this is systemic.

35:17This wasn't just a few instances. This was widespread. And this will be an important book looking back on this moment to ensure that we move in a different direction, in a better direction, and save higher ed, but just to see how bad the problem was.

35:33Shelley:It's so astounding. So let's talk about foreign money. Yes. And the preponderance of foreign students. I mean, so you give the histories, as you just implied with how Harvard was established, UPenn, and Columbia. And then did you touch on MIT? I do. So I broke down the book, and I made the decision. This is my first book, and I loved the process, even though it's a very challenging subject matter and can be very kind of negative and depressing. I chose not to write the typical political memoir. I wanted to do an issue that was very important. And I layered in a little bit of my memoir, my educational time, and how I do congressional questioning.

36:20Shelley:Well, because it made sense, because it gave the reader, I mean, who didn't know you. Exactly, just a little basis of who you are, where you come from, how you got on the committee, and then the day of. Right, but it's a more interesting book because of that, Shelley, because the typical politician writes just about themselves. Exactly. And I broke the book, Harvard does a deep dive, does a deep dive of Columbia, does a deep dive of Penn. And then I do not each individual chapters, but sort of broadly MIT, Northwestern, Princeton, Yale, some of the issues at those campuses. Then I shift to what schools are getting it right and positive, like Vanderbilt, University of Florida.

36:58And then why we... Some schools in Texas. Texas schools, yes. Why we got here, and the foreign money is when I touch on that, and then how we can fix this over time.

37:07Shelley:Well, let's just dive into the money, the foreign money. Back to that, because as you mentioned, Harvard has billions of dollars in endowments. Then they get billions of dollars, and these are B's, of taxpayer money, and billions of dollars of Qatari money. Where is all the money? Are they just investing and getting a great return? What do you think they do with it? So they will endow different professorships, go to different centers. and, well, of course, not that much in terms of the billions. What we have done in Congress is we passed in the House what's called the Deterrent Act because previously countries could give dollars to the Middle Eastern Studies Center, a particular professor, and it wasn't fully disclosed.

37:57We've now closed that loophole, so that has to be disclosed. Why are we even accepting money, period, is my question. Because strings are attached, and we saw in the case of Northwestern, They, Qatar, which Northwestern has a formal relationship with Limited Northwestern's response to condemning Hamas' terrorist attacks against Israel So literally shaping the position that Northwestern took publicly And could teach Right, and could teach, exactly So that's what I talk about when, if you're taking these foreign dollars There are strings attached There's got to be And U.S. dollars, to your point Yes, and, I mean, again they have enough U.S.

38:39Shelley:dollars. That's my point. Like, what are they doing? They're just sitting on top of so much money. The fact that they get taxpayer dollars at all is upsetting. Well, that's one of the reasons we saw. I mean, again, the hearing happened in 2023, December. There was a year left of the Biden administration. These schools had an opportunity to fix themselves. They did not. They dug their heads further and further into the sand saying this is not a problem. and President Trump was correct in freezing funding to the schools because it was the only way that they would respond. They could have fixed all this and they didn't want to hear it and now they think they're entitled to these funds.

39:16They're not if they're not protecting civil rights protections for students on campus, which these students were, I mean, these were checkpoints that you'd have to talk about whether you were Jewish or not, whether you were a Zionist or not, to go across the university yard, physical assaults.

39:34Shelley:I can't even believe it. And, you know, I was talking to my father over the weekend, and I said, I wonder how you would have reacted if I were faced with that. I mean, in your book, one of the kids that sued Harvard had to walk around with security. Yes, they did. And, you know, the book, again, I tried not to write about my perspective and really highlight the students' perspective because they were the bravest of everybody in this story. At 18, 19, 20, they're testifying before Congress, Shelley. Imagine doing that at that age. They're testifying, sharing these horrific experiences on the congressional record.

40:14That is tremendous courage and bravery. And they're fixing these institutions for people who maybe didn't feel that they had the voice or the courage to do that. So I highlight many of these students who are already leaders. I mean, they've graduated and they're leading, they're at think tanks, they're doing media. I mean, really extraordinary, just really extraordinary young Americans. Yeah.

40:38Shelley:You know what the book didn't seem to address as much as what I was thinking, which sort of gave me a little bit of, I don't know, solace, was I thought some of the demonstrators were just paid George Soros people. Remember, because they all had matching tents and all of that stuff. So at one point I was thinking maybe it's not the students. Maybe it's like these outside agitators that are drumming this whole thing up. Yes, there definitely were some of those examples. Columbia is a prime example because you're in the middle of New York City, and there were outside agitators, graduate students as well, in some cases professors, but there were outside agitators.

41:20One aspect of sort of post-October 7th is they did have kind of on the iPads the signs ready to go to start these encampments. So it was highly organized, and we still need to do more investigations as to who was funding what, and I believe foreign, what foreign dollars flowed in to fund the signage, the coordination, all of this. And it's interesting. It relates directly to what is happening politically. in Colombia's case, many of the same people that organized the pro-Hamas encampments were organizing Mom Dami's campaign.

41:57Shelley:Right. And there's a direct line to what's happening at Colombia. You don't have a Mom Dami without a Colombia in what happened post-October 7th. You're listening to Lunch with Shelly. So you are athletic. I miswrote. I know you played varsity lacrosse, and I thought you rode in college. You rode in high school. Did you row at all? Didn't you try rowing? I tried rowing my senior year of high school. I was part of the Albany Rowing Club team. And it was a great experience. I did not do... Early risers. Early risers, yes. Oh, my God. On the Hudson River. Yes. Right under 787, which is the name of the interstate, right along the Hudson River.

42:35Yes. And not so warm, even in the spring. No. And you don't want to... You know, the Hudson, we've worked on cleaning it up over time. But then, it was not something you wanted to fall into. The flight this is Guayana. Yes. And then I played lacrosse. I did mock trial and I did dance from when I was four until my senior of high school. Oh, yeah. What kind of dance? I did tap jazz and ballet. Me too. I'm still in touch with my dance teacher, Miss Barb.

42:59Shelley:Mine is Bob Nisnick. He has passed. Miss Barb is still running that dance studio. I was texting with her a few weeks ago. Oh, my goodness. Well, so what do you do now? So what do you do sports wise and what do you do to relax? You know, I, it's been, with all the travel back and forth to the district in here, I have not prioritized. And I'm going to moving forward, especially after having a baby and just the challenges of young parenthood. I like to walk. Yeah, me too. That is very healthy. I'm a big advocate of walking. And particularly where we live in Saratoga County, which is very rural, it's just a beautiful walk in all seasons.

43:38I like to I'm playing with my four year old Which that's a lot of Running around Particularly with a boy Some soccer Yes I also I think particularly as women age Pilates type exercises I don't say just because they age

43:55Shelley:But I do Pilates all the time Yes Not all the time But it's fun It's strengthening It helps with posture Yeah That's something that I hope to get more into And then light weight lifting Light weights Right that is also a priority. And it's interesting. You have to, particularly as women, you know, I was in my early 20s in D.C. I was in my 30s in Congress. You kind of have to adjust to your lifestyle, the different types of exercises. So the high-intensity workouts maybe in the 20s, not so much in the 40s. Were you a jogger? More in high school, in college. That's one thing. I love to walk so much, but I can't lift my butt off the ground.

44:35Shelley:I can't run. Walking is one of the best. One of the best. It's better for your knees. Do you have pets? We don't have a, well, we have three fish that Sam got at the county fair that keep growing and growing. Oh, boy. Yes, we just got a bigger tank because the goldfish, we didn't realize they live 18 to 20 years. Yes, but don't get worried because, you know, they smelt or melt or something. Like something gross happens and then they come back to life. I don't know that that happens yet. But yes, we have the three fish. And previously, my family had a dog who was like a family member to us. Nice.

45:10Shelley:Yes. I was going to, we're very dog-centric. We are dog-centric too. What did you have? We had a yellow lab. Her name was Nala. It was like losing a family member when she ended up passing away. And we talk about Nala. We talk about Nala. It was my brother's dog. I consider her a sister. And it was heartbreaking when, you know, it's a gift. These dogs are a gift in life. I know. And again, we treated her as a family member, full blown. Well, what do you do to relax? I love to read, Shelly. I love to read. Do you read novels or biographies? I read widely. I read all sorts of things. I'm reading a great book right now.

45:50It was contemporary fiction. It came out last year or the year before. It's called God of the Woods. It was one of the bestsellers. Oh, I'm writing it down. But it's set in the Adirondacks, which was in my district. It's sort of a thriller slash contemporary fiction. And then the best book that I've read this year is called Endurance. And this is about David Shackleton's exploration on Antarctica when they got stranded. And he saved all 29 people or 30 people. And it was a period of like three years it took them in the early 1900s. this book endurance was written in the 1950s has never been out of print it was one of the best

46:34Shelley:leadership reads i've ever read i was just gonna say so that's what you get out of it like you're just inspired by inspired but also i mean it's a riveting story it's a riveting story of survival and that's not a book that i would necessarily pick out myself yeah it was recommended by my chief of staff and other people who have read that book and there's a reason it's never been out of print but i would read it it's like you cannot believe what you are reading just what what these people overcame. So that's another good book that I read. I like to read memoirs. I mean, I read a lot. Yes. Well, would Endurance be a beach book?

47:09Probably not a beach book, although God of the Woods is a good summer book. Okay. You can read that in the summer. Endurance, that's more of a winter book because you're in Antarctica, you're talking about snow. Oh, okay. And I read it in the winter. It's funny.

47:22Shelley:This is really good. Yes. Because actually I'm going to. I am a seasonal reader and kind of a mood reader. Right. Whatever strikes my fancy. No, I get it. I get it. And actually, I'll tell you later, but that's good. I need winter books. But speaking of the summer, do you have a song of the summer yet? Do you have, like, what music are you listening to? You know, I feel like 90s music is making a comeback. The 90s music era was sort of classic. I was just sending a text to one of my group chats with my New York Republican colleagues about 90s hits. Because we all kind of came up in the 90s. Right.

47:57Shelley:I know, but give an example. I'm so bad at decades. I'm still sort of stuck in the 70s, but I love the 80s. You will know these 90s songs. Like, just, I mean, even the one hit wonders. But there was hip-hop, there's Oasis, there's just great songs. Would 10 ,000 Maniacs be 90s or 2000s? Yeah, I think it is, I don't know. I've gotten back into 10 ,000 Maniacs. Interesting, yes. But so, because you have, I guess Sam is too young to actually get into, like, what the hip high school music is. He doesn't know the music. Although he loves, we do listen to music. And we, I mean, from things like the classics from the 70s and 60s, which my dad always listened to that stuff.

48:46To, we'd listen to Disney, like traditional Disney songs. Yes. And he liked the record player, which is, you know, now comes full circle. Well, now it's back in after he went back out.

48:58Shelley:At least you don't have to listen to Barney. No. I have to listen to Barney. That was my brother's era. I know, I'm super, super old. I know. So, okay, well, just by the way, Bruno Mars has a good album out. I love Bruno Mars. I love his music, yes. So that's sort of my summer. But then there's a lot of country women that are apparently, thank you. I also, I love Broadway music. I love Broadway in general. Oh, yeah, right. And that, like the Hamilton soundtrack, because a lot of it references upstate New York. Exactly. Because I live in Schuylerville, named after the Schuyler family. Oh, right.

49:37Shelley:Yes. Oh, that's so fun. Named after Philip Schuyler, Eliza Schuyler's the daughter. Yeah, right. Who married Alexander Hamilton. I know, I'm just trying to sing the song in my head. Yes, we are right literally down the road, Shelley, from the historic Schuyler farm. Was it beautiful? Yeah, they have a historic building. It's a national site. You can go there and visit. And I live a few miles from Saratoga National Battlefield, which during the Revolutionary War, the Battles of Saratoga was the turning point. It was the first American victory of the Revolutionary War. You're listening to Lunch with Shelly.

50:11Shelley:What was the impetus of naming your son Sam? Because I have a Sam, too. Sam, we loved that name. My husband and I. A secondary name. Yes. We chose it together. and it fits him like perfect. He came out like a Sam. And it's interesting. Paul Ryan had said to me, this is when I told him I named Sam Sam. He has a son named Sam. And he said, Oh, I didn't know that. He's like, I've never met. Every Sam you meet is a friend. Great guy. Great guy. Yes. And that's proven to be the case with our son too. Just a great, sweet little boy. Happy and curious. So we love that name. Yeah. I mean, it almost makes you smile when you say Sam.

50:52And also, it's so brief that it's just really helpful.

50:57Shelley:You know what I mean? It's not like, I don't know, like a longer name like Edward or Rachel. You're just like, Sam, Sam, Sam. So, let's make news on the podcast, Elise. Okay, okay, Shelly. What is next for you? By the way, there was this Politico piece recently that said, what is next for Elise? And the second page, there's a hideous picture of me with my mouth wide open behind you. I'm sure you didn't notice, but several people sent it to me. That was the party that Maddie Brooks and the RGC had for you. So what's next? I'm excited for this next chapter, Shelley. I don't think these positions in Congress, you should have them for life.

51:42Shelley:I felt that same way about serving in the government, in the federal government. You have to put your all in it, but it is a citizen representation. And when I ran, I said I would term limit myself, and I have. So I'm excited for this next chapter to continue to be a leader in the areas that I've worked on in Congress, protecting national security, emerging defense technology, as well as the higher education issues. And we're just ready for this next chapter as a family. I will tell you, and other members will say this as well, the back and forth which if you're you know most members do it is hard to be away from your child yeah and you never get those years back and and i'm we are hands-on parents we don't have a nanny and these years are so important for our family um and i want to make sure that we have that stability which we've given to my son and which my parents and my husband's parents have how they raised us.

52:42So it will be just much more family friendly. So we're excited. I think that's exciting.

52:47Shelley:Well, will you be here? Will you be in New York? Will you go back and forth? We'll always have our place in New York. Yeah. And, you know, haven't made any final, final decisions. But, you know, excited to continue to, as I said, be a leader in various issues that I've worked on. How do you balance being a mom and a congresswoman and a general rock star? I think as any mom would say, you sort of, you figure it out and you juggle it the best you can. For us, I mean, I have a very supportive family. We, you know, my husband and I make it work. My husband works full-time as well, but we sort of try to structure our schedules so that Sam has the stability of one or other of us.

53:32When I am, during district work time, when I'm in upstate at home. We spend a lot of time together and then I'm always in touch when I am in D.C. away from Sam and my husband Matt. And then I think, you know, there are stories that are two days after, a couple days after I had Sam, Shelley, you'll appreciate this. I gave birth to Sam on Friday. The following week was the National Defense Authorization Act markup and I'm on Hask. Oh God. I was at that markup. I mean, they let me zoom in when I was holding Sam at 3 a.m. and I'm passing my amendments. um so that's crazy and also groundbreaking groundbreaking for doing that because now women will be able to more women will be able to have babies and vote and that matters i remember when i was first elected kathy mcmorris rogers was in leadership she had just had her third baby yeah and i remember thinking seeing her that helped me feel the confidence that i could do that in leadership and members have said to me some of the younger women who have just had babies younger than Sam saying, we're watching you.

54:39And that's made us realize we can do this.

54:41Shelley:Congratulations on EPAC, by the way. I mean, what a huge success. There's still not enough female Republican members or female members in totem, but what a great job. And that has a lasting impact. And I'm sure you're going to still be involved with EPAC. What happens to EPAC? Is someone else going to run it? No, that's my leadership pack. And we're continuing. I mean, another check to Julia Letlow and what's interesting Shelly is many of those women where I was the first one in those races yeah Ashley Hinson right Julia Letlow look at them run like elevating which EPAC elevate they are now elevated and running in higher offices so I view this as a pipeline development long term absolutely and it's going to going to continue to be a theme of my leadership and it goes full circle back to the single sex education but I also want to credit right now EPAC all these organizations are important to work together Women's Forum there are great women's organizations right now being number one but the more is better it's better because it's more support systems exactly and anyway well I just want to do thank you and applaud you for so many things but epac is really awesome too and i mean everything you're doing is just it's blowing up in the best way thank you thank you okay so my final question each and every time for the podcast is if you could have lunch anywhere in the world where would it be and what would you be eating good question i could have lunch anywhere in the world um I would love to have, and I do frequently, a home-cooked meal with my mom.

56:28Shelley:Oh, nice. But anywhere in the world, if we're talking travel, I would have to say Italy. Probably Italy with homemade pastas, just the Italian food. And I'm Italian-American, too, so we would love to do that. Would you be in Verona? Verona was, I went to Verona with my husband when we were on our honeymoon. That was amazing. but the food in Tuscany was incredible. Just extraordinary food. It's unbeatable. Yes. And what would you be eating at your mother's kitchen table? I get a lot of that. A lot of that. You do? You do? Well, my mom, she's a fantastic cook, not just of Italian, but just in general, and she's sort of a self-taught cook.

57:12She follows recipes but goes off of them and just has things memorized. She makes amazing homemade raviolis. She makes amazing homemade meatballs. meatballs she makes you know family recipes she makes this chicken and broccoli chicken divan dish which i think is sort of an old-fashioned yeah she makes it amazingly well right of um my you know one of my relatives that taught her that just you know those home-cooked yeah those home-cooked things you love and remind you of your upbringing exactly and i always it's funny my dad will tell me because i love to cook too and so does my husband but when we have birthday parties for our son, Sam, and it's in the summer.

57:50So I'll make like a specific pasta macaroni salad that my mom makes. My dad will tell me this is like spot on with your mother's.

57:59Shelley:Oh, wow. Like this is identical. The highest compliment. Yeah. Yes, it is. Wow. When my mom agrees too, that's a big compliment. Wow. That is an enormous compliment. All right. Well then I think we're going to have to end there with the pasta salad for sure. Elise, you are just incredible. You are an incredible, incredible woman, and I am so grateful that you took the time to be on my podcast because I'm just so wowed by you and thrilled and appreciative and grateful. So thank you so much. Oh, Shelly, you're a great friend above all. Thank you. And look forward to continuing this friendship. Yes, for sure.

58:42Shelley:I hope you stick around a lot. But in any event, thank you. Thank you a million times. And I know you have six more months. So keep working super hard. And thank you. I hope everybody enjoyed this episode as much as I did. And Karan did, who's with us. Thank you, Karan, again. Check out other episodes at www.lunchwithshelly.com or wherever you get your favorite podcast. And in the meantime, and as always, peace, love, and lunch.