How to Get Involved in Politics | with Manny Kess. EP 51
53:34 Share

From the art of the deal to keeping it real. Live from the Simply Vegas studios, it's The Power Move with John Gafford. Back again, back again, back again. Welcome back to The Power Move. I am John Gafford. I'm your host. If you're a huge Colt fan or maybe a huge Chris fan, again, maybe today's not your day. Colt decided to take his family to somewhere in California, I don't know, Universal or something, and

Connell is doing lawyer stuff, stuck in a mediation, I guess. So he is stuck there today. But that doesn't matter, because it doesn't matter that it's just you and I here today, because it's not just you and I here today. Actually, we have my friend Manny Cassi here in studio, who is running for the office of Nevada State Treasurer. Now, before you...

turn this off and think that it's going to be, man, I don't want to hear some guy pitch me for 30, 45 minutes about why it should be treasurer. I don't want to do this. That's not what we're doing today. We're going to talk a little bit about that. But again, success leaves clues. Success is out there everywhere. And my job is to get you the best information I can to make you more successful. And a dude that's built a successful business that's run for state treasurer probably knows a thing or two. That's what I'm going to guess anyway. So welcome to the studio. Manny, how are you, buddy?

John, I'm great. Excited to be here. Thanks for your time. Glad you could be here. So, man, what we're going to do today, you know, if you haven't done a lot of these, I'm sure you've been. You've been everywhere in the state, running for treasurer, doing all this stuff. Man, I'm going to dig a little bit into you, man. I'm going to try to figure out what makes you tick. And again, the purpose of this is to try to find some of those clues, those little breadcrumbs, those little snippets that you may have left behind.

that did this. But first of all, I got to talk about, welcome back from Memorial Day weekend, if you had that this weekend, if you did that. I got to tell you, Vegas was Vegas. I didn't leave the house. That's how I did Memorial Day weekend. I don't know. How was your Memorial Day weekend, Manny? What was it? I mean, mine was crazy. One of my companies is one of the largest hospitality companies in Vegas. So we were slammed. But for me, it was kind of half work, half

and then more work campaigning. So it was nonstop. Just nonstop the whole weekend. So let's back up. So your main business is one of your companies is the large hospitality business. So let's talk about that. What does that business do? And what exactly does it do?

Sure. So we have, I own one of the largest hospitality companies in Vegas. What we do is we plan people's trips to Vegas from all over the world, whether it's two people or 2,000. You contact us, hey, we're coming in. These are our dates, hotel rooms, restaurants, shows, nightclubs, pool parties, shooting guns in the desert. Whatever you want to do, we set it up and we create a custom itinerary for your group. So the ultimate concierge, I guess is a good way to put it, is what you are.

Absolutely. You're like the ultimate freelance host. You're not beholden to one casino, if you will. Exactly. You can do whatever you want. We cater for the client, yes. You cater for the client. So it doesn't matter. Like a lot of hotel casino hosts try to keep those people on property as much as possible. You're looking for the best possible experience regardless of where that may be. Yeah, the best experience for the client. Well, let's back up, dude, because obviously you built a pretty amazing business there. And I met you as owning that business. That's how I met you, first of all.

And, you know, but again, like, where did this all start? Like, where did you grow up? Where did this start? Let's go back to young man, if you will. Well, I'm from New York originally.

What part of New York? From Queens, Bayside, Queens. From Queens. So from Bayside. Yes. What do your parents do? What do your parents do? Well, my father passed away when I was in college, but before he passed, he was in a taxicab business in New York. Taxicab? Did he own a medallion? He had many medallions. Oh, my God. So for those who don't know what that business is, okay, first of all, so now- It doesn't exist. Okay, that's good. How did your dad wind up with a couple of medallions? Because medallions in New York are like $100,000, right?

Well, they were a lot more at some point. Yeah, because that's the right to own and to operate a cab. You have to have this medallion stamped literally into the hood of the cab, if I recall correctly. No, you're right. Absolutely right. And you had to be somewhat connected to get those medallions, I think, Manny. Is that accurate to say? No, that's not accurate. You have to work hard. It's like buying a house, but it's an asset because you keep paying the mortgage when you keep working the taxicab. So how many medallions did your dad have? At his peak, he owned 50.

50. Yes. And he had a fleet of another like 100 that he managed. That's amazing. Yeah. So you're saying that the value of those medallions dropped? Yes, since Uber and Lyft are gone. I mean, the value went up to, I think it was like at its peak, 7,000, 800,000 per medallion. But now they're not worth their weighting in gold. So dad was a hard worker, man. Oh, yeah. He came from Greece and never stopped. Came from Greece. And what did mom do?

Stay at home mom. Stay at home mom. So how many brothers and sisters? One sister. That's it. A Greek family with one sister. That's it. Two of us. You know, cause dad was too busy making those taxi cabs go. Exactly. That's what happened. That was too busy with that. Making oil changes happen. Making oil change happen too. So I always ask this to all the successful people that we have on the show. I always ask this one question, which was what was the first hustle, man? Like what was the first, okay, how old were you? And what was the first way that you realized that, okay, I can make some money doing this and you were doing it. What was it?

Well, my first hustle was working for my dad when I was like 12 and 13 years old. I was pumping, putting gas in the taxi cabs, cleaning them. You know, I said he operated over 150, 180 medallions. So big lot, cleaning the lot.

I mean, it was a lot of grunt work, but at the time I was making 50 bucks a week, which was, you know, big money for a kid. Great money for a kid. It might be considered child slave labor now, but back then, you know, so that was my first hustle. But then as I got into high school, I worked at Macy's part-time, you know, when I wasn't playing soccer or in school, I worked at Macy's. So that was my first quote unquote real job. Mm-hmm.

I was the best dressed kid in high school because I got my discounts. You got the discount. Polo and Tommy Hilfiger back then. So I basically worked to be able to get some. To get your clothes. Exactly. That's how it was. Were you an athlete growing up in Texas? Yeah, I played soccer through college, yeah. Played soccer through college. So you're on scholarship? Well, I went to Naval Academy. So technically you're not on scholarship, but I was one of their blue chip recruit athletes, yes. So you went to the Naval Academy.

I did. So what was that process like? Was that something you always knew you wanted to do? No, never. No, it just kind of fell into, how'd that happen? I, when I got into high school, we're just looking at different schools through a friend. They were like, you should look at the service academies and,

And I just did my research and back then, you know, there was no Google. So just went online and got a brochure and, uh, AOL was a thing back then. And it was just, it was beautiful. The camaraderie, the teamwork and the history was great. So I just, I went to the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, toured their campus. It was pretty awesome. And then I, we drove to Annapolis cause it was four hour drive from the house and we just sat around my dad. I'm like, all right, well, I'd rather have you drive four hours. It comes to me, play soccer than a three hour flight. Sure.

It was not easy. You have to get a congressional, senatorial, presidential nomination, which is extremely, extremely painful. Yeah, so how does a kid whose dad owns a bunch of medallions come up with that?

I was very active in my church. So my priest, you know, there are a lot of Greeks in New York. So my priest did us a favor, called our congressman and said, hey, I want to recommend one of the kids at our church for you to consider. So I went, you know, read a letter, met with the congressman, showed him all the stuff that I did. He didn't care about the grades. He didn't care about the soccer. He cared about all the community stuff that I did. I was in church every Sunday. I played for the Greek League. I went...

Okay, I'll tell you something no one else knows. Oh, let's get here. We get both We do here on the power movie. I sang in high school. What is this? So saying I sang in high school So I would go tell me it was a boy band dude Come on. Okay, but um, but you know this one minute I'm just you know soccer player big jock and next minute I'm singing in courses, but we travel around we go to you know, elderly homes you go to hospital So we did a lot of charity work. Yeah, so

He was impressed that I was very well-rounded at that point as a high schooler. And I had a job. And he was like, how do you do all this? And I had a job. I worked...

You're not supposed to work more than 14 hours in high school back then. I was doing 20, 25 hours a week. So I literally would go four hours a day on the weekend because I didn't have school. I'd work an eight-hour day. And he was just like, how do you fit this all in? I'm like, well, five hours of sleep. So let me ask you. So was that you being self-driven or were your parents driving you? Oh, no, no. My dad worked day to night. So no, it was me being driven.

It was, I wanted to outpace him and catch him one day and I wouldn't take no for an answer. I was like, give me more. Yeah. So you feel like your dad set that bar that you were chasing? Yeah. I mean, my dad immigrated from Greece with nothing and he was very successful, but it was because he worked 16, 18 hour days. He didn't know what a holiday was. Yeah. So I wanted to,

to reach that plateau and I wanted to, you know, surpass it. So when you hear, so let me ask you a question. So going from that story, let's hearing that it must drive you bat shit crazy when people say there's no opportunity in this country. Oh my God. Yeah. Especially now. I mean, come on. You have,

five, six year old kids opening up presents, making millions of dollars on the internet. - Evan, watch some of those videos myself. - It's incredible. So yeah, it's so easy now to make money. It's a lot easier than it was when we were growing up because we didn't have all the technology, we didn't have the internet at our fingertips like you do now. So it's crazy to me. Yes, it's easy to make money if you apply yourself.

So you're in Annapolis. Did you graduate from Annapolis? No, I didn't. My father passed away my freshman year. So I completed my freshman year and then I left and I went home and I started working. Yeah. I could have turned my back and just gone. But no, I had to go home, start working, take care of the family and just...

I couldn't do it. It just wasn't right. Did you take over dad's business? No, my dad got out of the cab business right before he passed. The writing was on the wall. The things were changing. So unfortunately not. I started working, and then I ended up buying a restaurant about a year after I went home. So I got into completely different than my family. We were never in restaurants, so...

Just an opportunity for them to present itself. My uncle was like, hey, come in and invest. Originally, I was going to invest, but like most Greek people, it was three partners. The two elderly ones got into a fight. They're like, you got to buy me out. I ended up buying one out. That's got nothing to do with people being Greek, by the way. Let me tell you. I went from a passive investor to a majority owner of a restaurant, and I was like, all right, I'm going to learn about restaurants now. Let's figure this out. So what did you learn from running the restaurant that helped you in your later life?

I mean, I came from the restaurant industry too. Well, for me, it was, you know, I literally would clean the toilet. I would freaking cut carrots. I would do everything. And people sitting there going, you own this place? Why are you cleaning the bathroom? Because somebody's got to do it. There's no shame in work. Yeah. And what I learned was, again, you've got to look at things from different perspectives. So I had every chicken purveyor come in.

And not only show me what kind of chicken they had and compare the cost, but I wanted to know who they were serving in the area.

Cause you can't tell me I'm 10 cents cheaper, but I don't service anyone in Manhattan. I'm only servicing people in, let's say Jersey. Right. Well, why? Maybe your quality is not good. So you just have to be able to look at things, decipher what's real, what's not. And in the restaurant business, you have to, it's all about making profit margins. So you have to save wherever you can. Two cents here, four cents there. Oh no, no, no. I, you know, it's funny. I was reading a book, um,

The pocket MBA, I guess was the book I was reading not too long ago. And I was reading all of this stuff and, and, and it's funny. I don't think there's any business out there that prepares you more for running any other business more than the restaurant business. Cause you've got more, um,

And KPI is that business, which is key performance indicators, which for those of you that don't know that phrase, what a KPI is, is essentially a place where your business can either get bogged down or accelerate to profitability. It's essentially what it is. But you've got all these different little places in your business when you look at it as a system and you try to improve either efficiency or cost or drive more revenue. And when you look at a restaurant,

When you look at that industry, if you were, if a restaurant manager, I applaud you. I'm going to give you, I'm going to give you a bit of advice. I'm going to congratulate you. Number one for being in that industry.

And then I'm gonna warn you about something else in that industry coming up, 'cause I thought about this too. Now, if you're running a restaurant, you're dealing with incredibly difficult labor costs, incredibly difficult. You've got to be able to, I mean, the difference between being profitable in a restaurant is sometimes cutting cooks exactly at the right time. It's sometimes cutting wait staff exactly at the right time. But if you cut wait staff at the wrong time, then all of a sudden now you're short and then the customer experience suffers. I.e., we just went to lunch,

And it was, I think both of us coming out of the industry can understand that, you know, at two o'clock, it was uncharacteristically busy for this restaurant at this time. And I happened to know the manager and I asked him, I said, how many people you got on? And he said, one. And I was like, oh boy. And what happened, our food took over 40 minutes for a salad. And you know, and I'm not bashing him, I understand that, but it's moments like that that really test you as an entrepreneur. So you're running very difficult labor costs.

then you're running a moving target on food costs because produce changes cost depending on the weather, depending on everything else. I mean, you look at the cost of produce, I mean, or poultry, everything, like you just said, chicken. I mean, the reason that a lot of restaurants are failing right now is because

Chicken cost is through the roof if you didn't know that. I mean, like I think it was like Wingstop. It was like, oh, try our new brand new spicy thighs. And everybody's like, no, don't want that. And that was out of necessity. You know what I mean? They did that because they had to do that because they can't get chicken wings. But you're running very expensive chicken.

very hard to control cogs and cost of goods that you have. A lot of outside sources there. Then you're running a customer service business where people have very high expectations and they have the general idea of how long things should take.

I think after about 15 minutes, people start looking around, where's my food? - Well, the best and worst thing that ever happened here is to us is Yelp. People don't go on Yelp to say, oh, this place is awesome. It's usually to complain. So it's an unfair advantage. But yeah, you're right. I mean, the hard cost of operating a restaurant

is what make or break you. It's incredibly difficult. Payroll, overhead, like I said, food costs, those things are hard costs. I mean, nowadays, some people can fluctuate online, you can change your prices, but when I did it,

almost 20 years ago you had a menu you're not reprinting menus every single day so your price is your price so if chicken goes up or if you know like you said if lettuce goes up you're eating that that's less profit yeah you're not going to tell your staff i'm sorry i'm going to pay you a dollar less an hour it's not happening so it's a business where you have to really be on top of it and when you're not there you know people say you're getting robbed no you just

Your opportunity and efficiency goes down. That's it. Well, and you also, this was the warning I was going to give you. I thought about this the other day.

Which is, if you are in the restaurant business, and I know a lot of people that make a bunch of money waiting tables, bartending, standing in front of the nightclubs, get people in, whatever the hell they do. And in Vegas, a lot of those people have something in common, which is pretty good looking people. Pretty decent looking crop of people hanging out in front of those restaurants. Well, here's my advice. You better do something right.

to get into management as quickly as you can, even though it's not as profitable. And the reason that you want to get in management is because you want to save your money and open your own place, because here's what's going to happen. You are going to ugly out of the job that you have.

Ain't nobody paying a 55-year-old woman $200,000 a year to bring a sparkler and a bottle of Grey Goose to a table. It ain't going to happen, right? That's just not going to happen. You're going to ugly out of the job, especially if you're in a place like Vegas. You're getting the power of truth, not the power of move right now. This is a truth. This is a power of move. But if you are in management and you get stuck in management,

If you get stuck there without saving your money because they pay you pretty well and, hey, man, I can go to this place and I get comps and I get this and I get that. I did this, man. This was I did this. I made this mistake so I can speak to this. I got stuck and I got out cool to the job.

I got out cooled and then I got stuck where I was just, you know, there are other people that would do what I knew how to do cheaper than I would do it. And then it becomes very difficult to get another gig. So if you were going to stay in the restaurant business, even though you didn't, but for those of you listening to this that might be in it, if you're in that business, get into management strictly with the goal of saving your money to learn the information you need to open your own place.

Because if you don't got your own place, you're eventually going to be in real trouble because you're not learning any other practical skills that are going to translate to anything else. And what's incredible, and people should know this, once you have one, it's not hard to go to two, three, or four. No, it's not. Because it's like, okay, here's my model. It's working. And you shouldn't look at one because if you have four, you get better pricing. You have a lot more flexibility. You can control. You have more staff that can work and be controlled.

more flexible to you. Leverage. Oh my God. Yeah. Leverage is a great word in most businesses, whether it's real estate, whether it's restaurants, but people, like you said, get comfortable. They open up one place and they're making good money and they can take a day off when they want. And it's like, okay, that's it. No, that you could, if you really want to build wealth, expand. Yeah. You got it. You're there. Especially now you're there growing or dying, man. Those are the two options that you get. And that's why any business I have, when I look at the numbers and they're stagnant, it freaks me out. Even if the numbers are great.

if they're stagnant i'm like oh yeah how can i grow and then like you know you look at all these different things and like i'm i'm taking a flight tomorrow so uh you know i got a long layover in houston and i've got my books and my podcast but i'm going to go on net on netflix see everything to watch and one of them was like the rise and fall of abercrombie and fitch

And I'm watching this and I'm like, bro, I'm totally going to watch this. And I'm going to watch it because how quickly that brand got to the top of all brands and then fell off a planet. And here I am as I look at the stats in Vegas and I'm like, oh, Simply Vegas offices, number one, number three. I mean, dude, I got nowhere to go but down, right? If I don't work my ass off every day to maintain everything that we do here and grow it,

Somebody's gonna come knock me off the first cuz that's what happens. It's life. It's when you're on the top So back to so you run the Greek restaurant now you do that and it was a Greek restaurant just right a training Mediterranean restaurant Are you doing that? So you're running that how long how would you in this happen? So you just won your school. So you're probably 21 I'm guessing at the spot when I I took over the restaurant. It was in 2002 Okay, so at the time I was 23 24 and

And we had it up until 2010. People forget what happened in '08 with that huge economic collapse. - I don't think anybody forgets that.

A lot of younger listeners are like, what happened in 08? So when the economic collapse happened, at that time, I had the restaurant, and then I had multiple. I had four rental properties, all in Florida, coincidentally. So I had passive income. Why Florida? Did you spend time there? How'd that happen? Well, I'm from New York. I spent time there. You go there in the winter just to get away, get some sun. But also, there was this good opportunity. Orlando and Miami at the time were growing cities, and it was just a great opportunity. What year did you buy these properties?

between like probably 05 and 08. So you were, so you just started the restaurant not too long in. Yeah, restaurant was in 2002. Okay. And how old were you when you bought these properties? I was in my mid to late 20s. Mid to late, okay. 25 to 28. Okay, got it, got it, cool, got it. So the 08 economic collapse happens and New York, where you come to Ghost Town. Were you 100% on those properties? Were you 100% levered?

It's not that I was 100% leveraged. What I did was I put down 30% in everything that I bought because I wanted positive cash flow and I wanted my money to work for me. And my goal at the time was I want to have 10 in 24 months. So let me start with these four, build some equity, get some rent roll coming in, and then I can say, okay, look, now give me some leverage and buy more.

Unfortunately, it was the worst time to do that because a couple years later, everything fell apart. So 2008, the collapse happens. And what drives me crazy is we gave billions to the financial institutions and the banks that

I don't want to blame them, created it, because there are many reasons why the bubble burst, but they were involved in the collapse. The banks? Yes. Oh, sure they were. Well, they were incentivized by the U.S. government. Yeah, depending who you ask, right. So small businesses like myself, especially in New York, we ended up getting tax bills because they had to fill their budget.

the city was dead no one was coming to new york you have all these banks going under and they're like uh oh so by 2010 i just i fought like 18 months to keep it alive it just wasn't working closed the restaurant and i got this huge tax bill so i went from being a millionaire and successful in 17 i'm 17 in 2007

to being broke and bankrupt in 2010. Well, I don't think they're... I think that story is pretty congruent with a lot of people. Back then, absolutely. I mean, millions of people, right? But... So here's the... Did you let the properties go before? Yeah, I had to. I mean, they went... Each one of them was...

north of $600,000 and then in a matter of a few months they were under less than $300,000 each and I'm sitting going I'm not gonna pay at the time like 11,000 a month in mortgages no one's paying rent yeah so did it make sense who knew we didn't know how long it was gonna take and thank god because it took years to come back so I would have been bleeding a buck and a quarter or more a year and I didn't have that money yep so the decision was what do you do next

Do I start something new in New York or do I go elsewhere? And luckily for me, one of my buddies from New York had moved to Vegas and he was doing really well. So when I was talking to people, what should I do? He's like, you need to come out here. Cost of living is a third of New York, no state income tax. And here, if you make a dollar, there's something left. So what did Manny do? Packed up, broke, I had like a grant to my name, came cross country. Yeah.

I started here. Started working for a company for a year. Again, that's a story that's been a lot of Vegas success stories started exactly like that. My whole family in New York, I came solo, started working in a hospitality company, got my feet wet, learned the way that the city- Where'd you start? What was your first gig? I worked at Wet Republic.

Okay. At the pool. I was a host. At the time, it was a company called AMG. It was a small company, but they were growing. They had Pure Nightclub, which was very, very famous back at that time. Famous for the wrong reasons. Yeah, Dick's Last Resort. They had some stuff. Yeah. But, you know, great ownership. They were hungry. They were growing. So I worked for them for a year, and then I ended up starting my own company. And what happened was...

When you work for one company, you have to push those properties. Yeah. Well, that's what we talked about when we first started. Exactly. So I saw that there was a gap there.

You know what? If John from Texas comes to Vegas and wants to go out for three days, maybe he doesn't want to go to Pure every night or go to Republic every night. He might want to go to XS. He might want to go shoot guns in the desert. He might want to go around the racetrack with some exotic cars. Well, I can't do that because I have to work here and there. So I started my own company in 2012. In 10 short years, one of the largest hospitality companies in Vegas. And this is what's important. People don't understand. It didn't happen overnight.

I didn't make money for the first six months. Nobody wanted to pay you. Nobody wanted to do what they're like, show me. Right. So you got to take clients out and not make money and grow your reputation. And it's all word of mouth. I had no money for marketing. So you grew. Okay. So you started this out. You started your company. Yep. I'm guessing you probably, you probably, you made it ahead of it. Did you make an investment in a website at least?

Did we get a website up? Not in the beginning. Honestly, I just started opening a corporation, filed the paperwork. LLC and some business cards, that was it. Yeah, in the beginning. And then I just started telling people, hey, I'll take you out. Didn't make any money. What people? How did you find the people? Well, I mean, from New York, I had friends, business owners. I had people that worked on Wall Street. I had a couple of professional athletes that were buddies of mine at the time. So just my network. I mean, I moved here in 2011. So when I moved here, I was 33 years old already. Let me ask you this.

How many phone numbers and names in your phone? Thousands. Thousands. Many of thousands. Well, here's the lesson. The lesson here is people don't understand the power of network until they don't have one. And they don't realize that they need one until they need one. So if you are somebody that's listening to this, anytime you connect with anybody, get them in your phone.

Get them in your phone. And so let's say you meet, I just want to hear what you say about this. Let's say you meet somebody new. What's the best way to get them in your phone and be memorable? What do you do? Well, it depends how I mean it. But usually when it comes to hospitality companies, like, hey, what do you do? What are you doing in Vegas? And like, oh, I'm here for a convention. Okay, what do you do? And then I connect with them as to what they're here for and what I do. So let's just say the real estate convention, ICSC.

Huge convention. I'm like, oh, well, I work with this person with this company. And that person is like, wait, how do you know them? What do you do? I'm like, well, I own this hospitality company and I set up this person's dinner here and I did that. And that's how I hook them because where's the common ground? Right.

So when I say I work with, you know, SRS real estate, or, and I say, I work with this one and that one, they're like, Oh wait, because they, they're in that world. Yep. You know, when it's a car show and I say, yeah, I work with this car company and this room company and this dealership company, they're saying, wait, how do you know them? Yep. And this is what I do. I do it the same. I do it the same way in a different way, but the same way, you know, what I'll do is if I meet somebody, no matter what they do, I'm like, Oh, do you know this person that might be somehow related to maybe be able to help them?

Like, no, I don't know that person. Oh dude, you should really know them here. Give me your number. I'll connect you. And then I'll get their number on my phone and then I'll immediately connect them like, Hey, this is so-and-so they do this figure. You guys maybe want to chat. And then when that gets done, then I'll send an individual video text message, follow up later. Like, Hey man, it was really great to meet you. If you ever need anything else, you let me know.

Because I think the best way to build your network, and I say this from stage every time I speak pretty much, is if you want to be somebody of extreme value, get known as the person that knows how to connect the dots for others. And if you do it with no expectation of reciprocation,

People will gravitate towards you. I mean, I don't know who I was watching the other day. I think it was maybe, I think maybe Dave Metzler said something I thought was so smart. He says, you know, give with no expectation of reciprocation. He's like, if you are trying to figure out what you're going to get back, you're trading. You're not giving. You're trading. And I love, I love that thought. And it's so true to how I build my network and how I have thousands of people on my phone and why I can,

Pretty much whatever you need, I can connect you with somebody that can probably make it happen. And expanded on that, I mean, let's be real. What I do, A, is not rocket science, and B, there are probably a hundred companies in Las Vegas that do it. I didn't get to where I am by being mediocre and not paying attention. No. And to this point now where we deal with

you know a third of the nfl players in the league and quarter of the nba and that's not bragging it's so you work hard you take care of someone and they refer their friends and then you become the person oh dude look you don't have to tell how well you hook people up to me look yeah look for those you don't know i have exceptional vegas night tickets i like to believe

Exceptional. And guess what asshole's sitting in front of me? This asshole over here. I see his mug like four rows in front of me. I'm like, oh, this is just great. Although I personally, I feel I can see more from my seats than you can. There you go. So I'm going to stick with that. But you hit the nail on the head. You know what? It's about putting in what you can't, not expecting a return. And what I tell people is give out what you would expect in return. Yeah. So if you treat others the way that you want to be treated, yeah.

they're always going to be happy. Yeah. This is the reality. The golden rule. People forget it all the time. Or the best gold rule. He who makes the gold makes the rules. Yeah, I try to tell my wife that. It doesn't fly. She doesn't like that rule. She throws that one right back at me. So let me ask you this. You move here. The company's doing great. Obviously, everything's going wonderful. And then this weird thing happens, which I see now you're going to run for treasurer of the state of Nevada. Okay. Yeah.

How does that happen? Walk me through the decision process to do that. - Sure. I mean, full disclosure, I've never wanted to be in politics. And let's be honest, no one grows up wanting to be a treasurer. It's not the sexy job to have. But the reality is I currently own 11 companies. And I say that for a reason. January of 2020, life is great. Traveling the world, doing whatever I want. I have zero bosses.

And then March comes around and we have this global pandemic. And I'm sure like me, you were like, oh my God, what's going to happen? Yeah, like everybody. And then 60 days later-

I quickly realized, depending on what state I lived in, I'm either gonna die a horrible death or I'm gonna thrive. If you live in California, New York, Vegas, North Carolina, you're gonna die. If you live in Florida, Arizona, or Texas, not only are you not gonna die, but you're gonna thrive. So I'm sitting there going, okay, that doesn't make sense. Then July comes around, 2020, and our governor of Nevada says, okay, we're gonna have an essential and a non-essential list.

If you're a casino owner, you're essential. If you're a church, you're not essential. If you're a dispensary, you're essential. If you're a barber, have a beauty salon, or a small business owner, you're not essential. And I'm sitting there going, wait a minute. I own all these companies, and my staff are all non-essential, so we can earn a living. But if I worked at Walmart...

I'm essential. So COVID isn't going to kill me at Walmart. Yeah. But if I go to my barber, get a haircut, we're both dead. I think the best meme I saw was the guy in like the Baskin Robbins ice cream cone outfit. And it said, how the F of my essential. There you go, buddy. You know, we'll put it great. And it's funny. I just met Ted Cruz about a month ago. He spoke here and he was like, so we got to wear a mask and we go on this plane and you're basically touching elbows with the person next to you who's a stranger. Yeah.

And if you take the mask off, you're going to die. But if you grab a peanut, COVID no longer exists. Your mask can come off and you can eat your peanuts. Soon as you put the peanut down, put your mask back on. But you know what cures COVID? A Diet Coke. You grab that Diet Coke and the mask comes off. And I'm sitting there going, this is what we've been fed for two years? So back to why I'm doing this.

I applied for a PPP loan. Okay. In my hospitality company, I had 14 employees. One for him.

Well, guess what they don't tell you? If you're not on payroll, you're not eligible. All my employees are independent contractors. But their employees were eligible individually. No, they were not eligible in the beginning. In the beginning. They were not. They had to have a corporation and file independently later, which none of them did. They all just filed their taxes themselves. So 15% of Nevadans are independent contractors. So again, we decided...

we had no say we our elected officials decided those people don't matter so i'm sitting here going hold on you are elected official your job is to protect and help your constituents but all you're doing is dividing us and saying you're essential you're not and then you're telling people oh if you're not on payroll you also don't care about you you don't qualify for anything what so i decided you know what

I'm not doing anything right now. I'm yelling at the TV every single day. Let me get into this. Let me change this because no one's doing it. So here's an interesting question because I think a lot of people were probably at home yelling at the TV. There's a lot of people that would probably like to get involved. How hard was the process of actually running for office? Super simple. What is that exact process in the past? Super simple. Let me tell you. All you need...

is to spend a couple of hundred bucks and file. But that is the last step. The first step, you could do it as simply as printing up some posters or getting some business cards. What I did was I hired a campaign team. I said, I'm going to do this. I put a hundred grand into a bank account. I said, all right, let's get started.

I researched it. You need a campaign team because they organize your life and they tell you what to do. Hired a company. We're off to the races. Got business cards, got some literature, got some stuff ready. And then I just start making calls. Hey, I'm Andy Kess. I'm running for office. Want your support. Start going to meetings. Get your name out there. It's that simple. Now you might say, hey, I don't have a hundred grand. You don't need it to start. I did it because I was committed and serious. I'm like, if I do this, if I make this monetary investment,

In six months or in a year, I'm not going to get cold feet. Yeah. Because we all know it's not easy. Burn the bridges, buddy. And for a penny and for a pound. There you go. So all you really need is to say, hey, I want to do this, and then you can start. I mean, I've met candidates that have no campaign team and that have spent like two grand in just getting business cards and some flyers. So why treasure it?

That's a great question because I have a business background over 23 years. I know a lot about stretching a dollar. I know a lot about payroll. I know about hiring and firing. I know how to pick up where things don't add up. Well, what does a treasurer do? You're basically the CFO. You're managing money. You're overseeing money. And what's important in our state is the last several treasurers we've had are

haven't really cared, haven't done much. They haven't like revolutionized the position. So I was like, I can really make a change here. And you're going to say, why? Well, we handle things like unclaimed property. We have over $900 million in unclaimed property right now. Let me tell you something. It's a lot of money to be sitting there during a pandemic and we're not actively trying to get that back in people's hands. It's their money. Mm-hmm.

We have the worst education K through 12 in the nation. 50th. Why do you think that is? I have an opinion. There's a few reasons, but I don't want to guess. I want to know. So I want to audit. Well, I'll tell you my opinion. Go ahead. Tell me. This is my, this is why we have the worst education. It all has to do with the casinos. Okay. And I'm going to tell, I'm going to tell you why this is why, because Mary goes to school. Her dream her entire life is to be a third grade teacher. It's what she wants to do. So she goes to college. She goes to college.

She gets her degree in education. And then I'm pretty sure, as I've heard, Vegas has some pretty decent incentives for moving to Nevada to become a teacher, right? So she does. She moves here. She lives in Vegas. Oh my God, I'm moving to Vegas. Living in Vegas, how exciting. Gonna live my dream, be a third grade teacher. It's gonna be amazing. Moves here. Mary meets Kimberly. Kimberly works at Hakkasan.

Kimberly carries bottles to a table with a sparkler. Kimberly makes $250,000 a year carrying bottles and a sparkler. And Mary makes 40 grand. Guess who's working at the pool next summer? Mary is.

I don't think we can keep good teachers because I think, and I think that is the same with valets. I think that's the same with any tipped position in Vegas. I think it draws away. So I think that's 50% of the equation. The other 50% of the equation is if you look at the sheer number of people we have that work in the hospitality industry in this town as parents that do not value education as much as they should.

Don't worry about it, son. Dad's going to get you a job at MGM in the Valley with me when you're 18. Don't worry about it. We'll get you a job in a culinary union. Not enough emphasis is based on education for the state. Not enough emphasis is paid on education by Nevadans. That's the problem. Boy,

Well, you know what? I love the fact that I can actually say this to you. Okay. I think you're wrong. Okay, perfect. Okay, great. That's what we're here for. Yes, obviously there is some of that, but I think it's a much smaller percentage. And Kimberly is not making a quarter million dollars. Really? She's not? No. What's Kimberly making? She's making $100 to $150, depending on where she's working. Okay. Depends on the size of the sparkler. There you go. But here is really the issue. The issue is, number one, we have...

the worst education. So young professionals are not moving. No. They don't want to come here because automatically they got to put their kids in private school. Yeah. Number two, teachers are underpaid here. And number three, why are you going to move to a state where this year alone we had 5,000 cases of major crimes in schools?

Our teachers get beat up, attacked. - Yeah, that's a disaster. - And the kids are not even getting arrested. So we are not protecting our teachers. And you might say, "Well, isn't that happening nationally?" I'm not focused on nationally. I'm focused on our state. - Yeah, yeah. - So we need to-- - Let me ask you this. - Yeah. - Weren't we supposed to get weed revenue to solve the educational problems? - We did get weed revenue to solve the education problems. But what happened was we had an original pool of money that went to education.

So we were told let's legalize marijuana and we're going to get more money. Well, the marijuana money is there. This money is gone. It's gone. And no one knows where it's going. That's the problem. Yeah. We spend $2 billion a year in education in our state per pupil.

We spend the same amount of money as Florida. Florida's top 10 in the nation. We're 50th. So the problem is not we don't have money. It's misappropriation of funds. I mean, I do think that it's the flashing light. And obviously, you know, if you can go in there, valet's making $70,000, $80,000 a year. That's a great living and you don't need a college degree to be a valet. So yeah, some of that does affect people and people.

Culinary union people that are in it. They want their kids in it. I mean great benefits But the reality is it's so much deeper and it's the fact that we're graduating seniors with an eighth grade education Yeah, and then people are not taking advantage of Millennium Scholarship funds. They're not taking advantage of college savings plans where parents can put money in now and guarantee their kids can go to state schools because that money that they're gonna put in now is

over the 17, 18 years appreciates. People aren't doing it. So that's the problem. So what's happening? People are getting educated here, high school, and then they're leaving, going out of state someplace else. And they don't come back. No. We have to do better. And adding to that, cost of living in Las Vegas and in Nevada in general is going up every single year.

taxes are going up. So Texas and Arizona and Florida are very, very enticing. Yeah. All right, Mr. Mr. Mr. Politician, man. What is the what is Nevada's fix for the gas prices right now? What's our fix? Man, what say you, Mr. Treasure? I don't think I can say that on the air with the fixes. But the reality is we have people

in Congress and we have people running our country that don't care about us. They're career politicians that only care about one thing, making their own money. And I'm going to give you a fun fact. What is the number one held stock in Congress? Number one held? Halliburton maybe? No. Exxon? No. What? Pfizer. Pfizer. Oh, well, there you go.

What was the number one drug that got approved in America during the pandemic? There you go. Pfizer. So we have to get rid of these career politicians and let's get new blood, preferably business owners that don't need the money or the job and want to help create change. Well, let me ask you this because there's a lot of speculation about this. You look at what, you know, they always talk about like what Pelosi's worth and all this stuff. Now,

I don't even know if you can answer this. I'm just going to ask a question. What she's worth is insane. No, my question is, how much more do you think Steve Sisolak has worth today than before he took over the governor's mansion? How much more do you think he's worth today? Clearly, a lot. A lot. I mean, like you said, Mitch McConnell, Pelosi, they're making a quarter million dollars a year. 20, 25 years later, they're worth 50, 70, 80 million dollars. Like,

I don't need to be a rocket scientist to understand that a quarter million times 20 does not equal 50 to 80 million. Yeah, they're not that good with money. Doesn't happen. Doesn't happen. Well, let me ask you this, because you were running unopposed for Treasure for the longest time. And then there was a little shift there at the end, that little, we'll call it the March surprise, if you will.

Well, where Michelle Fiore, who is a, we'll call her embattled, I guess is a good word, city council person for Vegas. I mean, always seems to be fighting with somebody for something. I mean, I don't know. That's just, I think that's a word I would put on her is embattled, you know. She decided she was trying to run for governor, and I guess that didn't go well. So then it was like, uh, I really want to be elected official, so I'm going to switch gears and I'll be treasurer. So she jumped into your race. Mm-hmm.

How was that day? I mean, quite frankly, that day sucked because 15 months I was running on a post. I had no primary at the time. Yeah. And I was the golden child for the party. They're like, you're young, you're energetic, you're a successful businessman. Oh man, we're going to get behind you and everyone's rallying behind me. Yeah. And then, and you said it perfectly well. I literally,

Last day of filing gets the opponent. And it's like, wait a minute, you were running for one thing. You talked about something else. So you've just changed your mind several times. And you know what's America, you can do what you want. But it just, it was a very smart strategic play on her part. She went from a primary with 15 candidates to a primary with two candidates, her and I. So it showed me that politics really is ugly.

A lot of politicians don't care about anyone but themselves. They just want to keep the crown and keep getting that free check. Well, you said something that was really interesting to me when you threw out the numbers of registered voters in Nevada. Because I made this thing. Because, like, dude, you know, here's the deal. When I read this and I saw this happen, my first thought was, ah, crap, man.

And that sucks because it's going to hurt Manny because, you know, like it or not, I mean, if you make the news for the good reasons or the wrong reasons, people still start to remember your name. And a lot of times when you're looking down a ballot and there's a bunch of names you don't know, you see one that pops off the page.

you don't, most voters don't take a second to remember. Is this a good memory or is this a bad memory? It's just, yep. Recognize that one. I'm going to check that box. I've been in line for half an hour. I want to get out of here. That's it. Just want to go, just want to be dumb for the day. And, uh, and they just check the box and move along. And I think that when I, when I heard this, I was like, ah, man, cause the name, my condition. So,

Me, you know, I kind of automatically thought like, well, this is going to be it. You know, this is going to be done. And I asked you a question right when you showed up today, you know, and I was, and I was asking it off the air. I wasn't expecting to get a nonsense. And I want you to get the same answer you gave me. And I was like,

How bad does this screw you up? I mean, what's the chances of you even pulling this out? Because I assumed if you don't win Clark County where this person was a council person, if you don't win Clark County, you're completely screwed. That's what I thought. And then what was the answer you gave me? So yeah, the reality is, again, it's the Republican primary, right? So we're focused on that.

Republicans are in third place in Nevada. First place are the Democrats, second place are independents. Independents outnumber registered Republicans, and then third place are the Republicans. So even though Clark County has 70% of the voters, the majority of the voters in Clark County are Democrats and independents. When you go to the rest of the state,

So Clark County's got 2.1 million residents. The rest of the state has 1 million residents. Yeah. Rest of the state, 75% conservative. Yeah. So you win the rest of the state?

you're in a really good position to win. - Well, the good news for you, I think, running for treasurer, is I think really you just have to run a platform of fiscal conservative. And we talk about this a lot on this show. We talk about how unfortunate it is, the two party system in America. - Sucks. - How unfortunate that system is, where if you have to draw a line and unfortunately as a politician, it's almost like you gotta be for a bunch of shit that you may not be for just because that happens to be the color of your armband. And that sucks.

And the good news, when I heard how many, 600,000 plus registered independents there are, I'm like, there's probably a lot of people in that group that might be fiscally conservative, but yet somewhat socially open or liberal. Not quite crazy out there libertarian, but just in general have a different set of values. And the fact that you are, and I really hope people will start to vote the candidate, not the party. Find out what people actually think about things.

And I hope there will be a point in the future where candidates can actually not be beholden to have to agree with shit that they might not agree with just because it's what the party does. Yeah, and I'd love to expand on that. This is the thing that I tell people. I've been saying it for 17 months. I don't work for the Republican Party. Currently, we have a Democrat treasurer. I did not like what the treasurer did for our state, and I don't like the direction that the Democrats are going nationally. Yeah.

It's the same thing, left or right. I work for the constituent. So I am not going to be beholden to some ideology or some person. And I say this all the time. Mitch McConnell does not represent me. These people, just because, like you said, they're the same color armband, we're not the same. And what's important to figure out within our state is that

What works in Nevada or doesn't might not work in California or New York. So Ted Cruz, people live in Texas. But you know what? Does that drive you nuts watching basically Sisolak through the whole pandemic to say- Yes, we're not California. Whatever California does, I'm just gonna do it. California had a surplus- Oh my God, that drove me crazy. During a pandemic, a surplus. And people don't know that because you're not told that. It drove me crazy watching that. So we need people that can A, win elections, and B, can work with the other side.

whatever party you're with, you have to be able to do what's best for your constituent. And for me, it's a state level. I need to work with the assembly men and women from both parties to

whoever the governor is and all the state senators. So I'm not going to be there with a MAGA hat and a pitchfork. That's not me. I have my morals. I have a very strong backbone where I will not bend over for anyone, but I'm smart enough to know as a business owner who has companies that are all word of mouth that, you know what?

i heard this saying as a kid you catch a whole lot more flies with honey than you do with poop sure that's the reality poop catches i think it's vinegar as a real estate and poop catches a lot of flies not as many but i gotta tell you you know i was something happened in vegas over the weekend and it made me think i don't know why it always goes to the state or conscious of america

which is if you don't live in Vegas, we had an incident over the weekend on the northbound 95 just down from my house in Henderson where you had two rival motorcycle gangs in the middle of broad daylight shooting each other going down the interstate. Like seven people got killed. And I'm thinking to myself, these dudes are willing to, in broad daylight, shoot at each other because they have different colored vests on. And I thought, what a great...

micro example of America. You know, somebody says, how many, how many people in this country are Democrats that somebody says I'm a Republican and they immediately hate them. How many people are Republicans and people say I'm a Democrat. They immediately hate them. We got to get to back to a place where we're listening to ideas and

And we're trying to progress ideas, not just feeding in through I'm with these people because we hate those people. Yeah, my mom and I talked about this because she's not really actively politically involved. But her son's running for office. So I'm like, Mom, who's your favorite president? She goes, Reagan. I go, okay. Back then when you voted for Reagan, did you like the other candidate? She goes, yeah. I just liked President Reagan better. He was an actor and a good-looking guy, but I don't want to know the... Okay. Okay.

Now, when you vote, what happens? She goes, I don't like either one. I go, exactly. So 30, 40 years ago, you picked someone that you liked a little bit more than the other person. Now, you're picking who do you hate less. And that's the problem. It wasn't that somebody woke up and said, oh my God, I love President Trump. Oh my God, I love Biden. It was like, who do I hate less? Because they're both very...

and have completely different messages. And that's why, like you said, you hit the nail on the head. Our country, instead of being together, is very divided. And it's a shame. Why can't I be a Republican and you be a Democrat and us be friends and just have a conversation? Well, and that's what we try to do on this show. I mean, we try to, you know, I know so many people that just fall in line with what a hand... You look on social media, right? And you'll see like one of the gurus say something. And then, I mean, I can literally...

Set my watch by it. 10 minutes later, here come the videos with people just regurgitating the same bullshit.

The same nonsense. And it's like, you know, be a leader, don't be a sheep. And it's like, bro, you're being a sheep by, what are you doing? Like you're doing what you're saying don't do by doing it. And it just, I think that's the one thing I do hate about social media is it became imperative for some people, for everybody in America to have an opinion on everything, even when they have absolutely nothing.

No fucking subject matter experts. They're talking about, I mean, it's just like, well, I was a COVID expert. Now I'm a monkey box expert. And it just, yeah, just, it never seems to end. Yeah. International global war expert. Exactly. Just, it just goes on and on. Well, well, Manny, man, I appreciate you coming in today, man. It's a, I look forward to seeing you hopefully win that primary. I know I'm going to vote for you and hopefully I will, because again, I, you know, I want to vote for some good ideas and not just a party.

And yeah, we need people that want to create change, change, want to create something. One thing I want everyone to know that right now is early voting. So no matter who you want to vote for, you need to use your voice. Yeah, I want to be a voice for change. So hopefully your listeners

understand that we can't just keep electing career politicians. And I'm going to leave you with this quick story I told last week. You have a mechanic that you love. Your car breaks down, you go to your mechanic. Oil change, you go to your mechanic. Flat tire, you go to your mechanic. 10, 20 years, you love your mechanic. One day your mechanic calls you and says, hey, I just bought a plane. Let me fly you to Utah.

Are you going to get in the mechanics plane? No. I'm going to say, show me your pilot's license. Show me how many hours you've flown, but also show me where you've flown. Because if you flew around your neighborhood a hundred times to qualify, I don't want you flying me to Utah. Mm-hmm.

So just because some name you recognize or someone has held an office, it doesn't mean they're automatically great for a different office. Sure. And when it comes to like my opponent, she's been in politics for a dozen years. Doesn't mean she's going to be a great treasurer. No. A quick Google search between me and her.

And then tell me, okay, Manny, I like you for X reasons or I like her for that. I like that. Actually do some research. Don't just go and go with the name. Yeah. Go with what you actually do. Well, Manny, thanks so much, brother. I hope you come back on when you win. And guys, I'm assuming the next time you see her, we'll have Connell and Colton unless they're off gallivanting or doing whatever trial they're doing. So we'll see you next time.

Hey, it's John Gafford. If you want to catch up more and see what we're doing, you can always go to thejohngafford.com where we'll share any links that we have things we talked about on the show, as well as links to the YouTube where you can watch us live. And if you want to catch up with me on Instagram, you can always follow me at thejohngafford. I'm here. Give me a shout.