Blue Dog Radio

Sacramento County District Attorney and congressional candidate Thien Ho joins Blue Dog Radio for a conversation about immigration, justice, public safety, redemption, and the long journey from a refugee boat in the South China Sea to a campaign for Congress in California’s 6th District. Ho reflects on fleeing Vietnam as a child after the fall of Saigon, learning English through Bugs Bunny cartoon...

Raised by a single mother and a grandmother dealing cards in Nevada casinos, Shannon Bird learned early that opportunity rarely arrives without a fight. In this episode of Blue Dog Radio, Bird's story ranges from a Reno trailer park to the Colorado legislature, reflecting on class, public schools, dissent, housing, democratic faith, and the women who taught her backbone. This is a conversatio...

“When you overperform like that… you do it again.” Rebecca Cooke came within two points of flipping Wisconsin’s 3rd District in 2024. Now she’s back. A waitress, small business owner, and daughter of a dairy farm family, Cooke doesn’t talk about working class life as a message. She’s lived it and loves it. In this episode of Blue Dog Radio, we sit down with Cooke to talk about the campaign that al...

The Central Valley has a healthcare problem and Washington keeps sending politicians. In this episode of Blue Dog Radio, we sit down with Dr. Jasmeet Bains, a practicing family physician, current California State Assemblymember, and Blue Dog candidate for Congress in CA-22. Here we talk about what it looks like to serve a community that’s been overlooked for too long. Before politics, Bains was tr...

Jamie Ager-North Carolina 11 This week on Blue Dog Radio, we sit down with Jamie Ager: fourth generation farmer at Hickory Nut Gap Farm and candidate for Congress in North Carolina’s 11th District. We spent a week with Jamie in Western North Carolina, walking the hills of Hickory Nut Gap Farm, talking through the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, and digging into what leadership looks like in a place...

Johnny Garcia-Texas 35 In this episode of Blue Dog Radio, we sit down with Johnny Garcia, a deputy sheriff from Bexar County who’s running for Congress in Texas’s 35th District. Johnny talks about growing up on the west side of San Antonio, the influence of his mother, and working construction and plumbing before entering law enforcement. He shares what he learned managing programs inside the coun...

What does loyalty to a place really mean? In this episode of Blue Dog Radio , we explore what it looks like when work, community, and identity are rooted in the same soil.  You’ll hear from Virginia Olsen , a fifth-generation Maine lobsterman, on the meaning of working waterfronts and generational stewardship. From the forests of Washington State, Peter Janicki , a generational logger, shares what...

Politics spends a lot of time talking about voters and not nearly enough time listening to them. In this episode of Blue Dog Radio, we talk with political analyst Simon Bazelon about the people who actually decide elections. Not the loudest voices online, but the voters in the middle who are trying to get through the week with some stability, dignity, and hope. Here we dig into what these voters r...

There’s a kind of wealth that doesn’t show up on Wall Street. It’s measured in sleep, sanity, and the time we give to one another. It’s the real economy of American life. In this episode we explore what’s called the non-market economy through three conversations that reveal how time and dignity shape our daily lives: Dr. Jamie Zeitzer , a Stanford sleep scientist, explains how the biology of moder...

In this episode of Blue Dog Radio, Representatives Marie Gluesenkamp Perez and Jared Golden sit down for a candid conversation about faith. Where it comes from, how it anchors their work, and what it means to hold belief in something larger than politics. They talk about the traditions that shaped them, the values that still guide them, and how faith helps them stay grounded in a world that too of...

In Episode 2 of Blue Dog Radio , Marie Gluesenkamp Perez and Jared Golden go Back to the Land — a conversation inspired by the writings of Wendell Berry. They explore the difference between knowledge and wisdom, the value of generational work, and how staying rooted in home and community shapes their approach to public service.

Welcome to Blue Dog Radio, where we cut through the noise and talk about what really matters to Americans in every corner of this country. This show is about common sense, community, and making politics work the way it's supposed to, for real people in real places. Episode One – “What It Really Means To Represent Home” – is the first of a three-part conversation between two of the youngest Bl...