bit.ly/TWIHI494ScottBessent Last month, I was invited to The Reagan National Economic Forum. Why I get invited to events like this is a bit of a mystery, but I was glad to attend and looked forward to hearing about the state of our economy, our public markets, and the defense industrial space from a number of notables. In fact, it occurred to me that if I was interested in hearing from these people, perhaps you might be, too? So, I asked the organizers if I could bring a small camera crew with me and record a few episodes of the podcast right there at the Reagan Library. They said sure. Then I asked a few of the attendees if they’d like to sit for a chat, and everyone I asked said they’d be delighted, including the @SecScottBessent. I knew I wanted to talk to Scott a few days earlier, when I saw him running a press conference from the White House. The way he handled the reporters made me laugh out loud. (Why are they always shouting? How does he decide who to call on? Who can be counted on to ask the most reliably foolish questions?) And, then again the next morning, when he was back on the TV, gently asking one of his interlocutors in a Congressional hearing how they’d become so “profoundly uninformed about market fundamentals.” And finally, at the Economic Forum itself, when he delivered one of the best speeches I’ve ever heard from a sitting cabinet member. It was called, While America Slept, and I wish it were published on the front page of every newspaper still in production. The entire speech is here, bit.ly/4vAhuEX, but in short, Bessent argued for something Washington has spent decades avoiding: a serious American industrial policy that starts with a simple acknowledgement that some things matter too much to be left entirely to quarterly earnings, short-term cost-cutting or the lowest foreign bidder. Every paragraph is a truth bomb. “For four decades we worshipped efficiency. Production chased the lowest cost on earth. Inventories shrank to nothing. The price tag on the shelf became the only scorecard that counted. We mistook comfort for strength. We treated efficiency as a substitute for resilience.” And this one.. “A country cannot outsource its industrial commons, ignore strategic concentration, and expect to remain secure, for manufacturing is more than output on a balance sheet. It is a reservoir of practical capability: engineers and welders, tool-and-die makers and logistics networks, plant managers and workers who know how to solve problems on the factory floor. When that ecosystem is strong, a country can adapt quickly. When it is hollowed out, adaptation becomes slower, more costly, and less certain.” There are so many examples of this, but shipbuilding really makes the point. In 2023, Chinese shipyards turned out 972 oceangoing commercial ships. The US built seven. The Office of Naval Intelligence puts China’s shipbuilding capacity at roughly 200 times our own, and the rare earth situation is even worse. According to the International Energy Agency, China refines over 90 percent of the world’s supply. We're talking about nearly all the heavy elements that make guided missiles fly, fighter jets soar, and the magnets inside almost every single electric motor actually spin. Why did we just hand that over? Well, because refining rocks is a dirty job, and we figured it was easier to let somebody else do the heavy lifting for less money. Reasonable people can disagree on the impact of tariffs, and the endless compromises baked into countless trade deals that force our manufacturers to compete on an un-level playing field. But the decision to depend on China – a direct rival - for the very backbone of our own national defense is flat out nuts. Surge capacity isn't something we can just conjure up overnight. Strong supplier networks, specialized machine tools, and—most importantly—the skilled tradespeople who know how to use them take generations to build. Our whole conversation is here. bit.ly/TWIHI494ScottBessent Hope you like it. I’ve got a few more in the can from this same event, and they’re all better than average. PS. Not that it needs disclosing, but you should know that I’m up to my neck with a new initiative to reinvigorate the skilled trades called BuildFreedom.US, sponsored by the DoW. This is the same campaign I lobbied Congress for 15 years ago, and I’m happy to see it finally come to fruition. You’ll find thousands of trade jobs in the industrial base highlighted on the website, along with lots of scholarship money from mikeroweWORKS, (including a $10 million donation from Build Freedom. Also, I’m currently involved with an American mineral company that’s determined to claw back a measure of our “metal independence” from China. Along with rare earths, (which aren’t really rare,) we’ll be collecting a few million tons of polymetallic nodules from the bottom of the ocean – billiard sized rocks packed with critical minerals like nickel, copper, cobalt, and manganese. More on both, later. PPS Lots and LOTS of feedback from my conversation with JD Vance last week, including (grave) concerns from several listeners who fear I’m entering the world of politics, and troubled by occasional appearance of government officials on the podcast. The Secretary’s appearance will no doubt exacerbate those concerns. Well, fear not. I have no plans to take the podcast in a different direction. The guests will continue to be individuals that I find interesting, or relevant to things that I’m engaged in. Some will almost certainly do or say things you don’t agree with. I can live with that, and hope you can, too.

Josh Smith is one of the most talented bladesmiths in the world. He started the @Montanaknifeco six years ago, in his garage in Missoula. Last month, he moved his operation into a 51,000 square foot manufacturing facility. bit.ly/43kqCln Josh invited me to the grand opening of his new facility, but the schedules didn’t work out. But when I saw the video online and observed hundreds of people standing in line for hours to take a tour of his new facility, I was intrigued. So, I invited Josh back onto the podcast talk about the remarkable growth of MKC, and the tricky business of making things in America. It should go without saying, but I’ll say it anyway. It’s really, really, really hard to run a successful business that makes a quality product in this country. Some states make it harder than others, but no place makes it easy. Regulations, taxes, HR challenges, labor lawyers, and yes – tariffs – all pose enormous obstacles for entrepreneurs like Josh, and I thought it might be helpful to learn what it takes to turn a one-man knife making operation in a garage into a manufacturing triumph. I also wanted to do my part to acknowledge this extraordinary accomplishment and celebrate the way one man’s vision can transform a modest knife-making operation into a multi-million-dollar business that employs over a hundred people and does great things for the local economy. Anyone espousing the benefits of reinvigorating the skilled trades and bringing manufacturing to America should be using MKC as an example of how to do it right. Share if you concur. Our whole conversation is here. bit.ly/TWIHI485JoshSmith PS I’m also grateful that Josh has chosen mikeroweWORKS as a cause for MKC to support. Thanks to sales of The Rocker - the perfect utility blade for the workingman - Josh has raised nearly $200,000 for our work ethic scholarship program. And now, he’s made some additional blades to benefit my foundation. I’ll have more details on that in a few weeks. As always, you guys will get the first look at whatever Josh has created. They always sell out in hours…

There is no set criterion for who makes a great podcast guest. Or, if there is, it varies dramatically over the sprawling landscape of Podcastlandia. Personally, I look for people that I’d like to share a meal with. People who have lived big, adventurous, and consequential lives. People who have assumed great risk, worked hard, endured their own share of setbacks, but ultimately made the world a more civilized place without losing their sense of humor. Having shared several meals with today’s guest, I can assure you that he checks all the boxes, and I’m excited for you to meet him. Tom Albanese has spent over 30 years in the mining industry, which is, with the possible exception of agriculture, the most important industry in the world. He has run, and continues to run, some of the biggest mining companies on the planet, and worked in over a hundred countries. His latest endeavor – the one that brought us together - involves the pursuit of polymetallic nodules. These are small, spherical deposits of critical minerals that have been laying on the seafloor for many millions of years. Some are as small as a milk dud. Others, the size of a softball. The ones in the attached video are golf ball sized. In fact, imagine a massive driving range covered with billions of black golf balls. That’s what much of the seafloor looks like 20,000 feet below the surface – thousands of square miles blanketed with round rocks, all packed with critical metals. They form like pearls over millions of years, and cover much of the abyssal plane. And they are suddenly, very, very important. Along with myriad rare earths, these polymetallic nodules consist of nickel, copper, cobalt, and manganese – all of which are critical to the $10 trillion infrastructure that America is now committed to building. These are the same critical minerals we’ve been mining in the rainforests for decades, except here, they’re not underground, they’re underwater. They don’t need to be mined, per se, they need to picked up and processed. Obviously, that's more complex than it sounds, but it's doable, and the United States is now fully committed to doing it. We need these metals, and we need them quickly. Tom Albanese is in charge of the only American company poised to get them. Our whole conversation is here, and it's fascinating. bit.ly/TWIHI484TomAlbanese

"Mike - You said on your podcast that you have "tens of thousands of unanswered emails." It’s not that I don’t believe you, but…really? Tens of thousands? How can you function knowing your inbox is that flooded? Aren’t you tortured by what might be in there? A job offer? A note from an old girlfriend? A letter from the IRS? The anxiety would kill me...Candice Ramon" Hi Candace, I've told you a million times I never exaggerate. Ha! See attached. PS. Personally, I find it harder to ignore an email once I’ve read it. That’s when it needs to filed, or replied to, or deleted. Easier to just let them pile up. There was a time when a few dozen unread emails kept me up at night, for all the reasons you mention, but then, when it became a few hundred unread emails, I started to realize I could never catch up. My email address isn’t hard to find, and being a public figure invites a lot of unsolicited queries. Also, my time is now a zero-sum game, so every moment spent reading an unsolicited email is a moment spent not doing something more important. (Like answering your question.) Several years ago, when I tried to explain this to Mary, my business partner, her left eye began to twitch. Mary had glanced down at my phone and noticed 1,100 unread emails. “Eleven hundred unread emails!! Are you kidding me??” “Yeah, it’s a lot,” I said. “More than I can handle.” Mary is a legendary multitasker. I’ve seen her read an email and send a text at the same time - often while drafting a contract and running a Zoom call during a lunch meeting. This is a talent I admire, and benefit from a great deal, but do not envy. “How can you possibly have eleven hundred unread emails?” she said, eyes bulging. “On your business account! What’s your Follow Up File look like?” “My Follow Up File? What’s a Follow Up file?” “What do you mean? How do you not know what a Follow Up file is?? It’s the most important file there is!!!” “Well,” I said, “if I don’t read my emails, there’s really nothing to follow up on, is there?” It was at this point Mary’s right eye began to twitch, so I quickly changed the subject, and got one of those privacy screens for my phone. From a business perspective, I understand her exasperation with me. There were probably some legitimate opportunities buried in those eleven hundred unread emails, along with some other interesting...offers. Today, with 39,218 unread emails, I suspect there’s even more. And by the end of this year, when I expect to cross the 50,000-threshold, (hey, it’s important to have goals!) I guess they’ll be more still. But again – in a zero-sum game, every new opportunity means that Mary has to walk something else behind the barn a shoot it. So, what’s the point? As for old girlfriends and the IRS, I suspect either will find me, if it’s really important. The bigger question, obviously, is what will happen to the rest of Mary's face if she sees this?

Xi Van Fleet is an American patriot. She was born in China, lived through the Cultural Revolution, and was sent to work in the countryside at the age of 16. After Mao's death, she was able to go to college to study English and has lived in the United States since 1986. In 2021, she attended a school board meeting in Loudoun County, Virginia, and spoke with great passion about the danger, the madness, and the abject stupidity of Critical Race Theory. Cameras were rolling, thankfully, and her remarks went viral. I was among the millions inspired by her willingness to speak out, and thought to myself, “I’d love to meet this woman someday.” Well, today is that day. @XVanFleet has written two terrific books about what America must do to resist the slow creep of communism and socialism taking root all over our country. The most recent is called Made in America, and I can’t recommend it enough. The book contends that the U.S. not only failed to understand communism, it allowed the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to rise. Xi argues - very persuasively - that American business and political elites enabled this, and that the U.S. is now facing its greatest threat as a result. Xi now devotes all of her time and energy full to warning those who will listen about the dangers of communism, and the shocking parallels between what happened in China under Mao, and what’s happening in America today. I believe we ignore her at our peril. Our whole conversation is here. bit.ly/TWIHI482XiVanFleet

The only thing I knew about @jasonaltmire before I invited him onto the podcast was that he’d written a terrific book about the importance of reinvigorating the skilled trades, and that he was the current President and CEO of @CECUedu, a national trade association representing private career schools and trade programs. I didn’t know he was a life-long Democrat who had served three terms in Congress. I didn’t know he lost his reelection because he voted against the Affordable Care Act, or that he had the most centrist voting record in the House when he got out of politics. All I knew was that he shared my interest in closing America’s skills gap by making a more persuasive case for the skilled trades. And now, we're friends. I have no idea what this guy might have accomplished had he survived his own primary, but he didn't, and the reason is clear - our current system is designed to smother even-handed, commonsensical, moderate voices who care about the country, on both sides of the aisle. To those of you who have urged me to enter politics, this is why I haven’t. To get the endorsement of your party, you have to fall in line. And I’m not a big fan of falling. Or lines, for that matter. And I guess, neither is Jason. Who else would object to the border fence between Mexico and the US, based on the fact that it was constructed of steel imported from China? Anyway, that’s all behind him. Like many of his predecessors, once upon a time, Jason did his time and then returned to the real world and got busy. Today, he’s focused on reimagining our workforce, and I’m super interested in what he’s already accomplished. What a fun, non-partisan, totally worthwhile conversation. A short clip is below. Our whole conversation is here. bit.ly/TWIHI481JasonAltmire His book, Trade Up: Why the Future Belongs to Skilled Trades and How Career Education is Transforming the Workforce, is out this week, and worth your time. tradeupbook.com

washingtonexaminer.com/opini… I was delighted to interview this guy a few months ago on my podcast, and today, I'm doubly delighted to see him featured in a terrific article by The Great @ZitoSalena. Thomas Tull is the kind of American billionaire you wish every American billionaire would emulate. Under the radar, generous, patriotic, self-made, and determined to make our country a better place for everyone in it. Knowing him as I do, I can assure you that this article made him blush. In fact, I'm pretty sure he's turned his phone off, given the response an article like this is sure to generate from those surprised to see him speaking out so publicly. Begging the obvious question, why would he risk his legendary privacy to speak out at such a time as this? Why would he agree to be interviewed by the likes of me and The Great Salena Zito? In short, because Thomas is worried - seriously worried - about the state of our workforce, the state of vocational education, and America's ability to complete a $10 trillion infrastructure build-out that will determine our place in the world. The stakes are very high, and Thomas is going all in to back the home team. We're lucky to have him and could use a few more like him. PS. We could also use a few more writers and journalists like Salena. No one has written more, or more eloquently, about manufacturing, reshoring, reindustrialization, and workforce than Salena. Or, for that matter, quoted me more kindly, and done more for mikeroweWORKS. Thanks Salena! Keep 'em coming!