Prairie Public hosted a debate between Lt. Governor Tammy Miller and U.S. Representative Kelly Armstrong, who are vying to be selected as the Republican gubernatorial candidate in the 2024 North Dakota primary election.
News Director Dave Thompson moderated the one-hour live debate on Tuesday, April 24, sponsored by AARP North Dakota. Watch below.
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FULL TRANSCRIPT
Dave Thompson:
Good evening and welcome to coverage of the 2024 elections brought to you by Prairie Public and our partner AARP North Dakota. I'm Dave Thompson, thanks for joining us. Tonight, we're going to have a debate between the two candidates for the Republican nomination for governor of North Dakota.
They are Congressman Kelly Armstrong and Lieutenant Governor Tammy Miller. They will each do an opening statement of about a minute each. And thanks to a coin flip, Lieutenant Governor Miller is going to go first.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Thank you and good evening. Thank you for hosting the debate. The citizens of North Dakota have a clear choice this election.
Do you want your next governor to be an outsider and business leader or a career politician? Our state has succeeded with governors who have extensive private industry experience. And our country was so much better off with Donald Trump as our president.
The ultimate outsider and business leader. Like Donald Trump and governors before me, I have extensive business experience and am an outsider. I started working in the family business in Brockett, North Dakota.
I'm a CPA, joined Border States as the accounting manager and worked my way up to be the CEO, creating thousands of jobs and growing a business. I joined the governor's office and as Lieutenant Governor with Governor Burgum, we cut taxes, we cut red tape and we pushed back on Joe Biden. As your next governor, we will continue to feed and fuel the world.
We'll cut taxes, we'll reduce red tape, we'll back the blue and we will protect your freedoms. The last thing we need is Washington style politics in the state of North Dakota. As a conservative and outsider, I look forward to being your next governor.
Thank you.
Dave Thompson:
Now for Congressman Armstrong, your opening statement.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
Thanks, Dave. Thanks to Prairie Public and thanks to AARP for doing this.
114 years ago to the day, April 23rd, 1910, Teddy Roosevelt gave the in the arena speech. It's kind of fun to be here tonight while that's going on. I've been, I don't know if anybody can live up to Teddy Roosevelt, but I've been in the arena.
I started my career fighting for North Dakota civil liberties. I was proud to represent Western North Dakota in the state legislature getting elected in 2012, fighting for conservative principles, fighting for infrastructure, fighting for North Dakota's property rights, always protecting the right to life. And for the last five years, I've had the greatest privilege of my life and that is being the one and only voice for North Dakota in Washington, D.C. And we have fought against government censorship. We have fought against an overbearing EPA. We have always fought to protect the First Amendment and the Fourth Amendment. North Dakota has a ton of opportunities and a ton of challenges facing us.
And I'm really, really excited to get back home and fight for the future of our great state. Thank you very much.
Dave Thompson:
Our first question then goes to Congressman Armstrong.
Each of you seem to be trying to out-conservative the other and tie yourselves to former President Trump and those are the ads that we're seeing on television and radio right now. So let me ask both of you, but starting with Congressman Armstrong, what are the differences between you and your opponent?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
What are the differences between me and my opponent?
I've been in this game. I've been in the fight. I have a private sector background.
I have a legal background. I've been engaged heavily in the energy and the ag industry in the state of North Dakota. And I have been in the trenches fighting for the things that matter, for both the state legislature and the federal level.
I've been involved in all of the fights that matter out there serving on the Judiciary Committee and the Energy and Commerce Committee. And I understand what pressures and pressure points that North Dakota is gonna face moving forward. And I have the relationship with the legislature, relationships with people all across the state in order to most protect our state from what's coming next and most importantly, grow our state and its future.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor Miller.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Thank you. This position as governor is the leader of the state, the CEO of the state of North Dakota, the leader of the executive branch. I have had extensive executive experience running Border States Electric.
And in many ways running Border States Electric, a 100% employee-owned company is a lot like the role of the governor, making every decision at Border States. I did it for the employee owners and in the state of North Dakota, I will be making every decision for the citizens of North Dakota. We have been around the state doing lots of community meetings.
I have a very good understanding of what the issues are. And with my background, I have a lot of experience bringing folks together to create the best solution. And I'm very confident that I am well qualified to be your next governor as the chief executive of the state of North Dakota.
Dave Thompson:
Congressman Armstrong, if you have a rebuttal.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
Yeah, I think the problem with that is the legislature doesn't work for you. County commissioners don't work for you.
City commissioners don't work for you and your constituents don't work for you. This is a relationship business. If you're gonna figure out how to really reform property taxes and lower property taxes, you better have active engagement from the legislature and you better recognize that they have a say in that matter too.
And quite frankly, a larger say than we do. If you are going to figure out a way to lower it at the state level without allowing municipalities to raise it at the local level, you better have those conversations and those relationships on the front end. I've been working with those relationships all across the state from the time I got elected in 2012 till now.
And these are the kind of relationships you need to fix these problems.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Well, I think it is a little insulting to think that a CEO doesn't have relationships. Managing a multi-billion dollar company, growing it from 485 million to over two and a half billion doesn't happen without good relationships, not only with employee owners, but with customers, vendors, and community leaders as well. So I know how to build relationships, I know how to capitalize on those relationships, and I know how to get things done.
I have a proven track record of results.
Dave Thompson:
Congressman Armstrong, any last words? Okay, I wanted to get back into the ads a little bit. Can you talk about your approach in your television and radio ads?
And I'd like to start with Lieutenant Governor Miller.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Yes, thank you. We have tried to take a very positive approach to our ads, first starting to help North Dakota understand who Tammy Miller is. I am not an insider, I am not a career politician, I have not been elected before, so there may be a lot of folks across the state who don't know me.
So we wanted to spend a lot of time helping North Dakotans get to know me a little bit, get to know my small town values, how I grew up in a town of only 34 people, now it was closer to 100 when I was growing up, how I worked in the family business, and really what my conservative family values are. So that was our first approach, and now we're trying to help North Dakota understand my experience with the energy and agricultural industries, very involved in both of them as the CEO at Border States Electric, and very passionate about supporting our top two industries in the state of North Dakota.
Dave Thompson:
Congressman Armstrong?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
Well, I think one important distinction, I got sworn in in January of 2019, Lieutenant Governor Miller got appointed to the governor's office in June of 2019. She's been in Bismarck as long as I've been in D.C. Prior to that, I was a volunteer, part-time legislator in the state senate, I was also a partner in my law firm, vice president of my dad's company, helping run a small business both in North Dakota, South Dakota, commercial real estate, and serving as a volunteer firefighter and volunteer president of a non-profit board. So the career politician thing is a little frustrating to me, but so be politics. We continue to run, we're gonna do our things, we're gonna work out there. My biggest way I run?
Get out and talk to as many people as we possibly can. We've been from Max Pass to Colfax to Leeds to Devil's Lake, and we didn't just start this when we ran our campaign for governor. I've been doing it since way back when I was state party chair and every two years as your congressman.
Dave Thompson:
Let's go back to the ads though. To Lieutenant Governor Miller, was there anything in the Armstrong ads that you would like to respond to directly?
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Well, very disappointed that my opponent came out negative with some fake news and information that was not correct. I'll just leave it with that. Very disappointing because I'd like to run a positive campaign, and I think we should both run on our records and our experience.
Dave Thompson:
Congressman Armstrong, any last words?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
Yeah, my biggest frustration in politics, and it's been my frustration since I first started, is when people poll test answers, they go out, they run their commercials, and they do all of that. People are striving for access and they're striving for authenticity, and if you've been in D.C. for five years and see what I've seen, we're gonna make sure we're running out and we're talking about the things people wanna talk about, but we're getting a ton of support all across the state, and we're running a positive campaign.
Dave Thompson:
Any further comments, Lieutenant Governor?
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Well, I don't know that it's positive when he says I haven't supported Trump. I have been a Trump supporter since 2016, and we need Donald Trump in Washington, D.C. as our next president. That's the first thing we need to do is elect him as our next president.
With Donald Trump, I was at some of the same events that my opponent was at in Mandan, as well as being at a Trump event in Fargo. I voted for Trump both times, I've supported Trump, and I was the first candidate to endorse Trump.
Dave Thompson:
Anything further?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
Yeah, I got elected in 2018, walked into Schiff's secret bunker, two Mueller investigations, been in each one of these trenches, spent numerous times in all of the hearings that matter, and I'm pretty comfortable with knowing who talked about what when that was going on, because we were on the front lines of a two-tiered justice system, and every single one of those fights, that was going on, and we're proud of that, we're proud of defending the president, we're proud of doing those things, and we're gonna continue to talk about it. Okay, our next question, it goes back to something that is said already, and I'm going to start with Congressman Armstrong. What private sector experience do you have that prepares you for the job?
Yeah, I mean, I grew up, I mean, I've been in the oil and gas business since before I was born, learned how to practice law with my great friend Alex Reichert in Grand Forks, North Dakota, moved back to work for my dad's company, been in the oil and gas industry, whatever the opposite of big oil is, that's what we are, we had nine employees until I ran for Congress, three of them had the last name Armstrong.
We've been in the farming and ranching business in Western North Dakota, ran small businesses on Main Street and around Dickinson, North Dakota, commercial real estate. I have a long, varied background in exactly the same kind of businesses that have grown this state, and I've been proud to create jobs in Western North Dakota and have seen the good times and the bad, both in the oil industry and the ag industry, know what we have faced and know what challenges we potentially have in the future, but more importantly, the opportunities moving forward.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor Miller?
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
I've spent most of my adult life in business. I started working at the family business as a teenager, went on to be a CPA, worked with many, many businesses across the state of North Dakota, large and small, and joined one of my clients, Border States, when it was a much smaller company. I had the privilege of becoming the CEO in 2006.
We put together a strategy in 2006 when we were a $485 million company. We wanted to double the size of the company in five years to provide a better return to our employee owners, and we did that. We grew the sales from $485 million to over a billion dollars in five years.
That happened between 2006 and 2011. Remember what happened during that time? The Great Recession.
So we knew how to make tough decisions, we knew how to build a big team, and we knew how to attract folks to our team to share our vision and to achieve our goals. For the employee owners of Border States and for our customers, I know how to put together a strategy, inspire action, and deliver results.
Dave Thompson:
And your rebuttal, Congressman Armstrong?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
We're working every day to make sure small businesses in North Dakota succeed. We've done that.
I started painting houses with my grandfather when I was 16 years old. When you're an American Legion baseball player, you can't hold a job, but I learned the value of hard work there. And what I learned mostly from my dad is when you live in a community like Dickinson and you are running small businesses, the single best thing you have to do is get back.
You know, when I coached baseball, I loved coaching little kids. Now as I get older, I stand on a baseball diamond, and what I really like to look around is all the small businesses that their signs are hanging on the outfield fence and understanding that those are the people who grow your communities. Those are the people who sponsor your baseball teams.
Those are the people who sponsor a spaghetti feed when somebody's sick. And that's the future for North Dakota we wanna continue to bring.
Dave Thompson:
Anything further, Lieutenant Governor?
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Yes, we have been doing a lot of great work in the state of North Dakota for small businesses and expanding businesses. North Dakota is the best state to start a business. We had over 8,000 new businesses start last year.
It is a great state for new businesses to succeed, and we are working really hard to reduce red tape so that businesses want to continue to do their work in our great state and to expand.
Dave Thompson:
Our next question comes from our partners at AARP. Their question is, with the rising costs of vital prescription drugs that many North Dakotans rely on, what steps do you plan to take as governor to ensure that older people and their families have affordable access to these life-sustaining drugs? Lieutenant Governor Miller first.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Well, thank you. I am very familiar with seniors and medication and their challenges. My parents are 85 and 88, and they live right next door to us.
So we are with them on a regular basis and help them with a lot of their issues. And we do know the high cost of prescription drugs. The first thing we need to do is reduce inflation, and the way we're going to do that is to have a change in the White House.
We need to get Joe Biden out of the White House and Trump in the White House so that we can work on inflation and we can make sure that our seniors have more of their hard-earned retirement income in their own pockets.
Dave Thompson:
Congressman Armstrong.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
You know, one of the great things about North Dakota, and particularly insurance, unless you're talking about flood insurance or crop insurances, is particularly a state-regulated agency, which means they have less of the problems of the federal government. But one of the things I think that has happened, and I've seen this in D.C., is in our, I don't care if you're the world's greatest medical insurance person in the world, you're not qualified to say whether a generic drug or a prescription drug is applicable. So we have to work with our carriers, whether it's Blue Cross, whether it's Sanford, and make sure that those markets exist. I think there are potentials for pulling small businesses together to lower some of those rates overall. But the reality is, is we have to fix the patent problem that exists with prescription drugs and deal with those things.
And a lot of that is gonna be working with our federal delegation.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor Miller, any rebuttal?
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
I think the other thing that's important is health in general. We used to be a very healthy state, and we're not anymore. And because of that, our seniors especially are using more medications.
I think we need to work very closely with citizens across the state of North Dakota to become more healthy, to eat healthy, and to have more movement in their day, in their daily activity. And we need to find ways to keep seniors in their homes like we have with my parents. We know that if they can age in place, they will have fewer issues, and hopefully need less of these prescription medications.
Dave Thompson:
Congressman Armstrong.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
I actually agree with that. Home care is actually significantly, and it's cheaper, and it's less of a burden on the healthcare.
Problems with the healthcare is the economics of it changed over the course of time. And if you are 75 miles away from a hospital in February, and you can't get to your physical therapy or those things, and you're in immense pain, I mean, you're going to be, I mean, they're going to deal with that. One of the only good things that came out of the COVID pandemic, like one of the only good things was recognizing that telehealth won't actually bring the economics of the entire healthcare system down.
Because we have opportunities to utilize some of that technology in a way that can keep people in their homes, also keep them participating in the events they do, so we don't have to prescribe them as many drugs.
Dave Thompson:
Do you have any response? No, that's good, thank you.
Our next question has to do with the 2025 legislative session coming up. Funding priorities for both of you, and dealing with sometimes difficult issues and some difficult legislators. For example, there'll be discussions about the Legacy Fund, there'll be discussions about energy issues.
And I wanted to ask first, Congressman Armstrong, how do you approach a legislative session?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
You approach it the same way you do as the legislature. You open communicate, you find out from the majority leaders, we're blessed.
We have Republican super majorities in both chambers. We're going to have a Republican in the governor's residence, and we have the relationships with them. So you figure out what their priorities are, make sure they know what your priorities are, and start working on that, quite frankly, before the legislative session, but also pushing it forward.
I mean, there are a lot of people out there talking about a lot of things. I could tell you, regardless of what happens and how everything works out, the one priority we will have is reforming and reducing property taxes.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor Miller.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Well, I will hit the ground running in the 25 legislative session. We'll have been involved in all of the strategy reviews with state agencies, as well as all of the budget discussions. And there are some big themes that are coming out that we're already collaborating with legislators on, as we did last session.
Those include taxes and housing. So we will be well-positioned. We will have our legislative relationships and champions in place as we start the next legislative session.
Dave Thompson:
Okay, I'd like to follow up with a question about the Legacy Fund. Any thoughts on what to do with it? And Congressman Armstrong, I'll start with you.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
Yeah, make it a lot more transparent. We lost, North Dakota taxpayers lost a ton of money when Russia invaded Ukraine, and we had to get out of Russian divestment. It seems to me that the solution to that now is we have $800 million in a global region market, international region market, and developing region market.
And that's about as far as you get, an $800 million in North Dakota taxpayer money. Government's at its worst when it's paternal. When government says, if you just knew what I knew, you would do what I do.
My wife's from Oslo, Norway. Their sovereign wealth fund, you can go up on real time and look at every single investment that exists. The solution to making bad investments isn't to hide where those investments are being made.
The solution is to open up to the American people and have as much transparency as possible. This is the 21st century. You shouldn't have to file an open records request to understand where North Dakota taxpayer dollars are invested.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor Miller, the same question to you.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
We are very fortunate to have the Legacy Fund. We know that oil is a finite resource, and the Legacy Fund will be there when we no longer are collecting taxes from oil. We have great transparency with the Legacy Fund.
There is an online tool, and all of the meetings that we conduct at the state are open meetings. So citizens of North Dakota can tune into those meetings and learn everything they want about the Legacy Fund. The Legacy Fund is invested in a lot of great funds, and one that I'm super excited about is the in-state investment fund.
We have carved out $600 million for in-state investments to help new and growing business in the state. We are also investing in a lot of infrastructure projects for the state. These lasting investments that will produce great value for the citizens of North Dakota, and really will be a legacy for the next generation.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
One of the other issues, of course, that are going to be entered, do you have something you'd like to say? Yeah, I think the transparency argument's a little, I mean, yeah, there's $800 million invested in emerging markets. We don't know what any of that money is, and we should be concerned, because we're invested in 23 banks in 12 countries that have actually signed the Net Zero Pledge.
That means they have agreed to support issues all of those things that are carbon neutral by 2050 or earlier. We are investing taxpayer money in North Dakota's own demise, and that's the money we know that is invested, let alone the money that we have. $800 million in emerging markets is not transparency.
That money is not, there's not an emerging markets fund. That money is invested globally across the world, and we should know where it's at.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor, last response.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
I think we do have good transparency with the Legacy Fund. The fund is always looking for opportunities, and we do have to divest of investments in these countries that hate us and are doing everything to undermine the U.S., so I completely agree. We do need to continue to work on the Legacy Fund and make sure that our investments are not with countries that are trying to do harm to the state, to the state of North Dakota and to the United States.
Dave Thompson:
So another big topic we expect in this session will be energy issues. Congressman Armstrong, where do you see the big issues are in energy in 2025?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
Well, I think the biggest issues in energy are gonna be from the federal government.
We have a uniquely problematic EPA that has existed. I mean, the EPA's mercury rule is specifically designed towards lignite coal. It's exponentially problematic for North Dakota.
I mean, we don't blend our lignite. We do all of those different issues, but I think the, I mean, that's the challenges, and our challenges are to work with the legislature, work with the attorney general, particularly in pushback. I think my five years in D.C. and my six years in legislature know exactly where the right buttons are to push. Now, the opportunities are, I think one of the only worst things, the only positive things that have come out of this administration's rush to electrification is we've really got some symbiotic relationships between ag and energy for value-added ag and continuing to promote those kind of programs that take our number one and two industry, Red River Valley soybeans, crush them in spirit wood, turn them into renewable diesel in my hometown of Dickinson, and continue to expand on those opportunities because liquid fuels aren't going away anytime soon, regardless of what the Biden administration thinks.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor Miller.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Well, the first thing we need to do is get President Biden out of the White House and elect Donald Trump as our next president to stop this crazy regulation that is trying to kill our biggest industries with energy and agriculture. As the CEO at Border States, I worked very closely with a lot of utilities in North Dakota and throughout the United States, so very much understand reliable, affordable electricity and how important that is to our country and our way of life. So we have to protect coal and reliable baseload energy.
And when I look at oil, worked with the oil industry in Western North Dakota, in Colorado, West Texas, and in Eastern New Mexico, I should say, very much understand how important oil is to our way of life. And I will do everything to protect oil, energy, and agriculture in the state of North Dakota. And we'll do that with innovation.
We've seen that be very successful in the state, working with private industry and our research universities to solve our challenges with innovation, not regulation.
Dave Thompson:
Anything further, Congressman?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
Well, I think the other answer for all our growth we've had in North Dakota, and we have, right? I grew up in Dickinson.
You have Watford City, you have Williston, you have Fargo, all of those areas. We still have smaller communities across the state that are starving for energy, starving for water, starving for growth. And we can work towards those policies.
We have it. I mean, right now, currently, we are predicted to run out of power in the Bakken. That seems insane when you know how much oil and natural gas we do.
And a lot of that, quite frankly, is figuring out ways to build out this infrastructure, because we should allow every community in North Dakota to have the opportunity of doing those things and continue to grow and build, because that's what the future looks like, and I'm excited for it.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor Miller, last bite of the apple.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
I would say, right now, we are shipping some of our electrons over to Minnesota, so I know one way to have more energy in the state of North Dakota is to stop sending our electrons over to Minnesota and keep those in North Dakota for our residents and for business growth.
Dave Thompson:
All right, I'd like to move on, and Lieutenant Governor Miller, you're first in this question. There's been a lot of question about government transparency. It's been raised already in this debate.
But the Wayne Stengem email situation has really turned things into a question, and I wanted to ask you both, but first, Lieutenant Governor Miller, does North Dakota need to do more in terms of preserving emails and being more transparent in government?
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Absolutely. We did see some things that were very unfortunate with the Stengem investigation. We need to have consistent policies across state agencies on record retention, and we need to make sure that it's consistent across all agencies and that one individual or one agency can't decide what should be retained and what should not be retained.
It is so important to have good transparency in state government and completely support having consistent regulation and policies related to transparency for emails and other records. There are many, many records beyond email that need to be retained in state government.
Dave Thompson:
Congressman Armstrong.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
Yeah, I'm fine with consistency and transparency, but the other thing you need is you have real accountability on the back end. I've dealt with this for five years in D.C. Every time we catch the FBI doing something or do it by you a lot, they say, we're gonna do more training, we're gonna put in more regulations in place, and that's all fine and good, but our citizens have lost faith in government, and they have done that, and you know this, and some of it's social media, there's a lot of different reasons, but the single best way you can gain their trust back is one, go talk to them and listen to them, and two, make sure that they know that the rules that apply to them apply to government as well, and so yes, absolutely, as much transparency as possible.
I think government works better when everybody knows. What people think when you're trying to hide something from them is because they think you're trying to hide something from them. I trust North Dakota voters.
Voters are smart. The more they know about how the government works, the better feedback you'll get to do better.
Dave Thompson:
All right, I'd like to move on to the next question.
Congressman Armstrong, you get this one first. It has to do with the issue of abortion, which has been talked about at the national level, talked about at the state level. I believe North Dakota is six weeks, the six-week ban.
Was that a good idea, or does that need to be changed?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
I think it was a good idea. I was served in the state senate when we had a ton of these bills coming forward.
I know there's some litigation going on. My mom was a Catholic kindergarten teacher. I've grown up pro-life.
I am proud to have a 100% pro-life record moving forward. I think the one thing we have to make sure and work through, and have to, is to make sure that whatever medical exceptions exist are clear-cut, on the ground, perfectly acceptable, because I don't want an emergency room doctor in a car accident having to be a defense attorney. I want him to be an emergency room doctor.
But outside of that, I'm proud of my pro-life record, and I'm glad North Dakota's a pro-life state.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor Miller.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
I completely agree. I grew up in a small town, Brockett, North Dakota, have deep Christian values, attended the Catholic church, and am pro-life. I completely support the pro-life legislation we have in North Dakota today.
It is the right thing for North Dakota, and it's appropriate for our states to make the decision. So I'm happy that Roe v. Wade was overturned, and we have the opportunity to make these important decisions in the state of North Dakota.
Dave Thompson:
I'd like to talk on a couple of other, shall we say, social issues. And one is LGBTQ legislation. Congressman Armstrong, did the legislature go too far in some of the things they passed? And how do we make our state welcoming to people who may be of that character?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
So did they go too far? I don't think so, but the number one thing, I was a girls' coach, I was a boys' coach. Boys should not play girls' sports. That is just a fact, that is a reality. And the other answer is you should not be making life-altering, either hormonal or surgery decisions on nine, 10, 12, 13-year-old kids.
That being said, every kid, whether you're 16 or whether you're 22, has the right to be who you are. I'm pretty libertarian about a lot of those different issues, and I'm okay with that. But you should not be making life-altering decisions on 13, 14, 15-year-old kids.
16-year-old kids are scared kids, and when they're dealing with those issues. But you cannot force those kind of decisions on people before they're 18 years old.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor Miller.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Thank you. I think we won the culture wars during the last legislative session. We made some really big and important decisions on important topics.
I agree with what my opponent said. We don't want our girls to be competing in sports with boys unless they're co-ed sports. We need to make sure that kids are not making life-changing decisions before they're adults.
So I agree, we have made the right decisions, and I think we have won the culture war. These are important issues. We addressed many of them last legislative session, and I hope as we move into the next legislative session, we can focus more on the economy and not so much on some of the culture war issues.
Dave Thompson:
Well, I do have one other culture war issue I wanted to ask you about. Congressman Armstrong, the idea of making it easier to ban books, was that a good thing?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
So, I just wanna back up a little. We call it culture war, but I've been from one end of the state to the other over the last three months. This is what people care about.
This is what the grassroots cares about in small towns and big towns and all of those different issues. I always get torn on that issue because I really believe in local control and education. I really believed it in the legislature and I can tell you after five years in D.C., I really believe in it too. I want local school boards making those decisions and I want Bismarck making less of the school education decisions and I for sure want the federal government making almost no school decisions. But I think, I mean, really, really, really, what those issues come down to is whether it's the state's role to be engaged in that or whether that is a local school board decision to make. And I've just always come under belief, particularly with two kids that have been in four different public school systems since the start of COVID.
If there's ever a place where you want local control, it's in your school board, it's in how those things are going. And I can't, I mean, in how you protect your school, whether it's a rural school or an urban school. So yes, those are appropriate conversations to have.
I just would prefer them to happen at the Dickinson School Board or the Fargo School Board than as opposed to the legislative session. But they're not culture war issues. People really, really care about this stuff.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
As it relates to the book bans, who wants their child to see pornography in the library? And as folks move around, it's not just in one school or one school district. We have to have consistency across the state.
I think with books, as well as with transgender sports, those are not issues that can be done school by school because kids are moving around. And I think it's important that we have, that we address these issues and we are consistent across the state.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
I think for sports, you have to. It's a high school athletics association. And sure, I'm absolutely fine making sure that pornography isn't in school libraries. I just think when you get into particular issues about particular things, you are better off at the local level.
Dave Thompson:
Any last words?
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Well, for most issues, I completely support local control and believe that our state should have local control from the federal government. And we should move that down to local jurisdictions. We did that at Border States.
We had 99 branches when I was the CEO at Border States. And we tried to make decisions as close to the customer as possible. So they had local control, buy-in and support.
I would take that same approach in state government.
Dave Thompson:
We have another question from our partners at AARP. Americans over 65 are the fastest growing segment of the population and research is showing that most want to remain in their homes and communities as they age. What steps would you take as governor to encourage the construction and renovation of housing that allows for greater accessibility and independence, therefore enabling residents to remain in their homes as they age?
We'll start with Lieutenant Governor Miller.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Well, as I mentioned earlier, my parents are 85 and 88 and we're so pleased to have them living next door so they can age in place at home with lots of support from their family. It's so important to their quality of life and to especially their health as they age in place. There are some options already available through our aging services at DHHS to help families make modifications to their homes.
If it's widening doorways, putting in ramps, I think we need to help folks know about what's already available and then help solve problems for additional resources that can keep elderly parents, loved ones aging in place at home for a better quality of life.
Dave Thompson:
Congressman Armstrong.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
Gotta work with Medicare, Medicaid expansion, Blue Cross and for the insurance people, the insurance commissioner, because I think that this is one of those things where particularly depending on where you're at and that ADA stuff's expensive, widening a door, if you're on some kind of hill and have to actually build an ADA compliant ramp, but I can tell you from all the data that I have seen over the last five years that if you can do that and are effective at it, it actually saves money and increases quality of life. And I don't know of two things you can do with an aging population that is better for that population than those two things.
So we should make sure we're talking to them, making sure that those programs exist because a lot of times they're not covered. And if you can't cover them and you run into those situations, then you don't really have those options. So figuring out how to make sure that we're working with the people who are doing that is really important.
Dave Thompson:
I'll give you another shot, Lieutenant Governor.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
In addition to everything that was said, I think we need to also work on workforce. It is really a challenge to find in-home caregivers. And I think we need to expose more individuals to those opportunities and create maybe some incentives for individuals to move into those careers because we know it is more cost-effective to age in-home than it is to go to a care facility.
Dave Thompson:
And Congressman?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
Yeah, and I think it's the differences in some of our larger communities, smaller communities, I mean, in our smaller communities, we don't really have a healthcare workforce to begin with in a lot of places. You know, I've got to tour rugby, I've got to tour Elgin, I've got to do all of those things. But however we can compete against neighboring states and home-grow more people into the healthcare profession in general is going to help our state grow over the future and is necessary for the growth of every community, big and small.
Dave Thompson:
The next topic I'd like to get into is the Second Amendment. You both seem to be very strong supporters of the Second Amendment, but I want to ask you more specifically, given the unrest in the country about some certain things that maybe we need to do something about some gun violence, are there things that you could see that could be done that might be okay with the Second Amendment and still could bring gun violence down? I'll start with Congressman Armstrong.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
Yeah, prosecute prohibited people. Enforce the laws you have. That's what you can do.
You can prosecute people for gun charges. You can have better synergy between different states. If you've been convicted by a jury of your peers of a violent crime, we want to know that.
We don't care if it's Florida or Missouri or Louisiana. If you are up here working in North Dakota, we want to know that. But the reality of every single gun piece of legislation I've seen in DC or in states all across the country is one, they're unconstitutional.
I mean, when you talk about banning assault rifles, all you have to do is read the Heller decision, common use. The most common use gun in the United States is an AR-15, which does not stand for assault rifle, by the way, which is also fun to deal with in DC. So it's unconstitutional to do that.
So the single best thing you can do is let law-abiding citizens own guns and enforce the people who have been convicted of crimes that have forfeited their right and enforce that heavily.
Dave Thompson:
What do you think, Lieutenant Governor?
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Well, as my dad said, all of us kids grew up with BB guns, probably starting at five years old and then advanced up to bigger guns as we got older. Used a 16 gauge to protect our family business when I was in high school and college, when robbers were trying to steal from Miller Shopping Center on the Prairie. And it took 30 minutes for law enforcement to come from Devil's Lake.
So very, very supportive of the Second Amendment. And we need to keep guns in the hands of good guys and girls. The bad guys, they're always gonna find ways to get guns.
So I don't think more regulation is going to make a difference. I think in addition to law enforcement, we also have to deal with behavioral health issues and make sure that individuals are getting the treatment that they need and getting treatment, not getting guns. So don't believe we need any modification to the Second Amendment.
We need to deal with mental health issues and keep guns out of the hands of the bad guys.
Dave Thompson:
Well, that's my next follow-up question to Congressman Armstrong. What about mental health issues? Are there changes or improvements that can be done in looking at those issues to prevent some of the gun violence?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
Yeah, I'm actually really proud of it. I mean, so my grandmother was the head of the North Dakota Mental Health Association for 20 years. I grew up with this.
I'll go back to something I said earlier. One of the few things we have figured, there are not enough people in college nationwide, nationwide, to fill the open mental health facility or mental health jobs in the nation right now. So there's a couple of things we can do.
One, really truly maximize telehealth and be able to utilize that. So it doesn't matter if you're in Fargo or Wahpeton or Ray or Regent, if you have those issues. Because if you have a torn ACL and you can't get in to see somebody right away, you can hobble around on crutches for two weeks.
If you are in mental health or addiction crisis and you don't get to see somebody right away, there are collateral consequences to that. So one, we can do that. And one of the things we can continue to do is continue to open up license reciprocity with other places and make sure that we are making it as welcoming and available to come here to do those jobs as possible.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor Miller.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Well, we do have a behavioral health crisis and behavioral health and addiction has been one of the five priorities for this administration. We are making progress, but we don't have enough resources. We need to make telehealth more accessible, especially in our rural areas.
We need to focus on licensure. As my opponent said, we need it to be easier for folks coming into the state to practice. And we also need to address behavioral health issues earlier.
If we can do that, especially in our school systems, it will prevent these issues from escalating and creating bigger challenges in the future. So I think addressing behavioral health issues in the school system is an area that needs much more focus as we move forward in the state of North Dakota.
Dave Thompson:
I want to do one more follow-up. And Congressman Armstrong, would red flag laws help?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
They might help, they're just unconstitutional. I've never seen one that actually protects due process rights. I spent a lot of time dealing with interim hearings and hearings, ex parte hearings, and I could tell you exactly what happens.
Nobody's erring on the side of it. And even when you're dealing with those issues, there is no, I have read, I think, every red flag law that exists in this country, and I have never found one that I think adequately protects Second Amendment rights. Everybody loves the concept of it, that's great.
But you have a Second Amendment right to bear arms, and you don't have, and if you don't have the ability to go into court and actually argue against whatever's coming at you, that's a real, real problem.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor Miller?
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Well, this is one thing I completely agree on with my opponent, red flag laws are not the solution to gun violence. We need to find a way to get guns out of the hands of the bad guys, and I don't think red flag laws do that.
Dave Thompson:
All right, the next question has to deal with EPA regulations. Governor Burgum appeared before a legislative interim committee saying he's probably going to have different budgets to deal with EPA regulations based on who wins the presidency. Is it gonna be Biden, is it gonna be Trump?
I wanted to get your thoughts on that, Lieutenant Governor Miller. Is that the right thing to do?
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Absolutely, absolutely, and first we need to make sure that Donald Trump is our next president. We need to elect Donald Trump in November. These regulations that are coming out of the Biden administration are literally killing our agriculture and energy industries.
There are volumes of regulations coming out. We need to stop that, we need to push back on that, and we need to solve our challenges in North Dakota with innovation, not regulation. So completely agree, if we don't have Donald Trump in the White House after the next election in November, we absolutely will have to have higher budgets to fight the regulations that are coming out of the EPA to protect our industries.
Dave Thompson:
Congressman Armstrong.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
I think it's partially true. I agree completely that Donald Trump was the greatest president for small business, ag and energy in North Dakota's history, and far, far, far, if he gets here, a lot of the things that are in the pipeline are gonna go away immediately because I know the people he works with, I know who he consults on these things, and he loves North Dakota, he loves North Dakota production and loves small business and wants us to be able to exert that energy dominance around the world stage.
The second part to this, though, is there's existing regulations. And legacy regulations are really difficult to get rid of regardless of who the president is. And there's a case in front of the Supreme Court coming up this fall dealing with what's called the Chevron deference.
And by every account of anybody who's paid any attention to this, we think this conservative Supreme Court's gonna roll that back. And when they do, and President Trump is president, we're gonna have really, really good opportunities to go back and fight with things that have already made North Dakota ag, energy, and coal problematic, and we should take advantage of every one of those we can.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor Miller, anything further?
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
No.
Dave Thompson:
All right, now I'd like to get into a real concern for the state of North Dakota, is we have a lot of jobs, and we're not getting people to fill the jobs.
So as governor, and I'll start with you, Congressman Armstrong, how do you tackle that problem?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
You have to figure out how to incentivize. One, we have to home grow a lot of it. I think there's different issues in all those things.
It's expensive to educate nurses. It's expensive to do those things. I think a lot of our universities, like College of Science, Wahpeton, Bismarck State Polytechnic, all of those different issues, they're working forward towards that.
But we have to do a really good job of home growing a lot of these things, and providing education to North Dakota kids for the jobs that exist in the North Dakota economy. And I watched this in Western North Dakota. I graduated in 1995.
If you didn't work for four corner businesses, you had to leave. Now it's the opposite. Every single kid who graduates from high school in North Dakota can stay here and work.
And so we have to do that. But then we also have to figure out, I don't think it's real rocket science. We have to figure out what our highest need jobs are, and we gotta figure out a financial incentive to fill those with people, whether it's student loan buy downs, whether it's all of those different issues, and figure out a way to cap that and mark that in a way that we can help recruit people to be here.
Should be the number one priority of anybody working in commerce in that department, because that's stunting our growth faster than anything.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor Miller.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Workforce is our number one challenge. Every day we have 30 to 40,000 jobs open in our great state. It's the number one challenge to growing and diversifying our economy.
Along with getting people here, we also have to solve the housing challenge, which is a top priority for us as we work toward the next legislative session. And we need to solve the childcare challenge too. Families are paying $1,000 a month for one child in childcare.
So if we can figure out childcare, I believe we can get more folks into the workforce. And we need to do a couple of things with individuals who are already here. We have men and women coming out of the correctional facilities every year.
We need to make sure that they are ready to step into jobs, and we need to ask businesses to be a little more flexible and maybe loosen some of their restrictions on hiring so some of these individuals will have an opportunity to get a job and be productive when they leave incarceration. We have high unemployment too in our tribal communities. How can we help them be skilled to enter the workforce?
So we have lots of opportunities with individuals who are already here. And then at Border States, when we opened up a new warehouse in Denver, we looked at markets that had high unemployment, and we went to those markets and tapped into those individuals, hired one or two. Soon they were bringing over their cousins, their nephews, their brothers.
And we ended up having many people from Detroit, Michigan working with us in Denver. So we need to be really creative, and we also have to find ways to get folks in the workforce sooner. Not every child needs a four-year college degree.
Dave Thompson:
Congressman Armstrong, please.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
My daughter fixes computers at Bismarck High. I've had the opportunity of going to the Vo-Tech School, and you get people for, you know, it used to be the kids that went to those schools were those kids, right?
And now you've got valedictorians wanting to come play with the 3D printers. So we have, I mean, and I have, one of my favorite things to do in DC or at home is talk to close-up kids, high school seniors and juniors. The kids are all right.
Our future's really, really bright in North Dakota. It's also our greatest resource. But I agree, we have to figure out how to home-grow them, how to continue to bring people into these professions and make them like that.
Because it's hard to find a petroleum engineer in Chicago. I'm just telling you, the University of Chicago doesn't look really high upon the oil and gas industry in Western North Dakota, but somebody who grew up in Watford City and wants to go into that industry. And then I also think with some of our companies, we have to make sure that they can continue to promote themselves here.
The last thing you want to do is go to work for a company based out of Denver or Oklahoma and get to a certain part in your career and then have to leave North Dakota. Well, if you grew up in Western North Dakota, the whole reason you went to that program at NDSU or Wahpeton or UND is so you can stay in North Dakota. So there's gonna be a collaborative effort to do this, but we can, I mean, it's a tough challenge.
It's vexed government forever, but we can find a way to solve it.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
I think another opportunity is attracting businesses that are really interesting to our youth will help us retain our youth. We have been really successful in bringing high computing and mining companies here that are working on digital mining. I had the opportunity to tour Applied Digital in Ellendale last week.
What a great company right here in the state of North Dakota. We have Grand Farm, we have Grand Sky, we have really very interesting enterprises and industries now starting in North Dakota that are really interesting and exciting to our youth. I think a lot of that economic diversification is going to help us retain a lot of our youth who may have felt that they had to leave the state to have those more interesting careers in the past.
So I do think economic diversification is going to help us with retention of the best and brightest individuals we have in the state of North Dakota.
Dave Thompson:
I have a follow-up on this, and I'm going to start with Lieutenant Governor. It has to do with higher education. It's funded, and I have a multi-part question.
Number one, is it funded correctly? Number two, are there changes that need to be made with structure higher education in North Dakota?
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Well, higher education is a significant budget item for the state of North Dakota, but it's a great investment. It's an investment in our future. And I think like everything in North Dakota, when we're spending taxpayer dollars, we don't just need to look at the inputs and how much we're spending on higher education.
We need to absolutely focus on the outputs. Are our young adults leaving higher education with the skills, with the education, the training they need to have a productive career? And will that career be sufficient to pay off their student loans?
We need to really look at student loan debt as well. I hear of students who are leaving higher education with $200,000 in student loans. It's preventing them from buying a home, buying a car, and making other significant investments.
So need to focus on outcomes as well as finding a way to reduce student loan debt.
Dave Thompson:
Congressman Armstrong.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
So I think the overall structure is always interesting. You have an overall education, higher education system in North Dakota, and then you have some competition that is sometimes good, sometimes bad, but we have to get rid of the petty fighting and have a synergy involved that we're developing a workforce. I graduated from UND with two degrees.
I love the University of North Dakota. My dad went to NDSU, my uncle went to NDSU. I actually love NDSU as well, but I can tell you the education you're getting at UND is not four and a half times as good as the one I got.
But all in, that's what you're paying. And we have to figure out a way in which to reduce those costs and make it affordable and also going towards those things and increase graduation rates and then increase in-state retention rates.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor, anything further?
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
I think we also have to have a greater focus on the use of technology in our higher education system. Those experiences and skills are so highly needed in the workforce, and I look at automation opportunities, the use of AI and other tools. Our universities need to be on the leading edge so we can attract students, educate them well, and then have them well-prepared for the great jobs we have in the state of North Dakota.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
I think how we deal with enrollment is gonna be important too. I mean, if my daughter's being counted because she's taking college classes or if you've got online classes and how you do those things. And by the way, there's a lot of future in that.
I mean, particularly for continuing education and older than average people with careers who are trying to get their degree higher, I'm not doing that, but how we do the models and how we do the calculation of that. I mean, it's very different to having an online enrollment versus somebody living in a dorm on campus being there as well.
Dave Thompson:
I'd like to just a quick follow-up from both of you on this. We were talking a lot about workforce issues and Congressman, let me just start with you. There was an effort to get Ukrainians to come to their oil fields to work.
Is this part of the future as well?
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
Yeah, I think one of the biggest misfortunes about the single, I mean, the biggest short-term threat we have in the United States right now is the Southern border. It's the single one. I mean, the Northern border is also an issue and dealing with legal commerce.
But if you talk to anybody who's been engaged in this, not only is, I mean, the legal immigration part of it gets caught up in the illegal immigration part, which is politically untenable in DC right now. It just really is, that's the reality of it. But it's getting harder.
And this is the problem because the person who's doing H-2A compliance in North Dakota is also cooking breakfast, also doing the books, also taking a kid to school. Whereas the person who's doing it at a big agribusiness in Nebraska or Missouri, they have an entire group of people that are set up to do this. And so I know farmers Northwest of Minot that have been bringing South Africans here for 20 years, great relationship, great workforce.
But if you get delayed by one month in North Dakota with our growing season, and it's that much harder to deal with it, then it's really, really problematic. And we know this isn't a number one call we get in our office, so we have to make it easier for that to happen as well.
Dave Thompson:
Lieutenant Governor.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
I agree, we need to make legal immigration easier. I have been in many communities around the state and at events like at vets clubs, all run into some of these African workers. These individuals love working in the United States.
They come back every year. Why can't we make it easier for them to become North Dakota citizens and work in North Dakota legally? Instead, we're fighting these crazy border battles on the Southern border.
We have 125 of our National Guards men and women trying to protect the border from us. And it's not just the South, it's the Northern border too. We were up in the Cavalier area earlier this month and people were concerned because there were illegal immigrants living in their grain bins on their property.
They were advised by law enforcement not to go out on their property alone. We, first of all, have to secure our borders. We need to keep illegals out of our state and out of our country as well as the illegal drugs they bring with them.
And we have to accelerate legal immigration in our country to help solve our workforce problems in the state of North Dakota and across the country.
Dave Thompson:
We're running out of time, so it is time now for our closing statements. Congressman Armstrong, you're first.
U.S. Rep. Kelly Armstrong:
North Dakota wasn't built by corporate America and you don't have to be a large CEO to be governor here. It's not actually really who we are. I mean, our state was built on small businesses, family farms, neighbors helping neighbors.
Far more solutions to the problems that exist in North Dakota are gonna be solved around American Legion tables or in church basements that are never gonna be solved around a conference table in Washington, D.C. or Bismarck, North Dakota. We're proud of what we do here. Our future is bright.
We have tremendous challenges. We have tremendous opportunities, but the single best thing that guides us is conservative governing principles that allow for freedom of our best natural resources, which are small business owners, our families, our future generations to do what they do best, which is feed and fuel the world, work towards making sure that North Dakota is the best place to live and raise a family.
Thanks for doing this. You know I always enjoy it. You're always great at it and I appreciate the opportunity.
Dave Thompson:
And Lieutenant Governor, last word for you.
Lt. Gov. Tammy Miller:
Thank you for hosting the debate. In closing, I'd like to say our country was so much better off when Donald Trump was in the White House. As an outsider and business leader, our state has really prospered under governors who have extensive private sector business experience.
I think our citizens of North Dakota now have a choice, a clear choice. Would you like a career politician as your next governor or an outsider with extensive executive business experience? I believe that we will be much better off with a business leader and an outsider.
As your next governor, I will continue to grow and diversify the economy. We'll reduce taxes, we'll cut red tape, we'll back the blue, and we'll protect your freedom, our conservative values, and our industries in the state of North Dakota. I believe with my experience, I am the best person to be your next governor and I look forward to taking North Dakota to the next level. Thank you.
Dave Thompson:
And I'd like to thank both our candidates for being here for tonight's debate. Again, Congressman Kelly Armstrong, Lieutenant Governor Miller, thank you both for being here. For Prairie Public and for AARP North Dakota, I'm Dave Thompson.