February 12, 2025 • 29 mins
Saturday February 15th and Sunday February 16th, 2025 Hoover homeowner Kendall Early says her house was infested with mold and it drastically affected her health, her husband’s health and even her daughter. She tells the story of their struggle and also offers a warning for anyone looking to buy a home. Then Alabama State Rep Susan Dubose joins us to to talk about her “What is a Woman Legislation.” Finaly JT talks with Sen Katie Britt about her experience traveling to the Superbowl on Airforce 1 with President Donald Trump.
To Help Kendall go here: https://www.gofundme.com/f/a-toxic-mold-nightmare-help-the-earlys-rebuild-their-live?qid=23da84b49f463c0913b2ab86e48c6d43
To Help Kendall go here: https://www.gofundme.com/f/a-toxic-mold-nightmare-help-the-earlys-rebuild-their-live?qid=23da84b49f463c0913b2ab86e48c6d43
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
It sounds like something out of a Stephen King novel.
Kendall and Stephen Early purchased their home and hoover in
twenty twenty two. One month later, their daughter developed a
bad cough. Shortly after, Steven developed asthma, and then Kendall
started showing stroke like symptoms. Hello, I'm John Mounts and
welcome to Viewpoint, Alabama on the Alabama Radio Network. I'm
here to tell you a story of a family whose
(00:23):
house almost tried to kill them. And I'm joined right
now in studio by Kendall Early in our study to
tell the story of what happened, and it's kind of
a warning to everybody. Kendall, welcome to Viewpoint.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
So when you purchase the home, you all your hopes
and dreams were wrapped up because for all of us,
our biggest purchase is usually our home and we always
have very high expectations. And you thought this is going
to be great and tell the story what happened next?
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Yeah, I mean this is like our ideal neighborhood. We
house hunted for seven months. You know, in twenty twenty two,
people were bidding way over our houses and fighting over them.
And we were just like thrilled to get this house.
And yeah, once we moved in, my daughter was the
(01:12):
first to show symptoms. She was a little bit less
than two and she first we noticed she had a
chronic cough. And I took her to doctors and they
were like, she's not sick, and so we ended up
giving her medication for this chronic cough.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
Probably think it was allergies or vented real something like that.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Yeah, and I remember actually posting on social media like, hey,
my daughter's coughing all through the night. None of us
are sleeping, Like I can't get her to stop coughing.
It's gone on for weeks.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
Again.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Yeah, we kind of chalked it up to allergies, except
she didn't have any allergies in our first house. So
I thought it was weird at the time, but couldn't
come up with any like real reason for it.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
In this home, it's a pretty standard what three bedroom,
two baths, something like.
Speaker 2 (01:59):
That, just your regular ranch style house from the sixties.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
Okay, yeah, I've got one just like it in Hoover.
It has a crawl space, or does it's on a
crawl space Okay, So I'm just trying to paint the
picture for everybody. So regular house, like a lot of
us live in in the Hoover area, a lot of
our listeners live in the Hoover area. And so she
was sick, and then it continued on and your husband
got sick next.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Yeah, he developed adult asthma and was having to like
use it inhaler, like three in the morning. He would
wake up and feel like he needed it inhaler. And
he had had like childhood asthma and had grown out
of it when he was like five. So, you know,
we're in our thirties now, and it had for it
to kind of resurge all of a sudden, we thought
was weird. But again, we never suspected the house.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Right, it seemed like it's unrelated stuff as far as
you could figure. Yes, So about.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
Ninety days into living there, I developed stroke like symptoms
and ended up in the hospital. Again, we never thought
it was the house because there was no visible water damage,
not even a single water spot. Did you smell anything, No,
there was no musty smell. There was no indication that
(03:09):
anything was wrong. I think that's like the scariest part
about it is, you know, we never suspected the house.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
So who was the one who recommended to you. They said,
you know, maybe you should get the air quality or
something like that tested in the home.
Speaker 2 (03:23):
So it wasn't really recommended for it went on where
I actually my health just really declined. We were there
for a little over two years and I started getting
all kinds of random diagnosies. I ended up having seizures
in the house. My dog had a seizure in the house.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
Like the Canarian and coal mine kind of thing. Yeah,
it was really crazy.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
And actually I didn't suspect anything about the house until
my dog had a seizure. And I didn't tell this
to the news, but I thought, this is getting weird.
But again, what you don't see, you can't like. Mold
was just not on our minds.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
Now most people don't think about it unless, like you said,
unless you can see it, right.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
Unless you can see it. So one day I'm just
scrolling on TikTok. This is you know, to a little
over two years in and somebody had almost identical symptoms
and I was like, this is weird.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
And she was like, if this is happening.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
To you, you have hidden toxic mold in your house somewhere,
and I was like, I'm ordering a test right now.
So I just got like a Petri dishes from Amazon initially,
because you know, just in case it wasn't there. I
didn't want to spend thousands of dollars on testing, so
I put one in every room of our house. And
it became pretty clear after a couple of days of
looking at those Petri dishes that there was something going on.
(04:45):
So that's when I called a remediation company. I called
an environmental company. I ran something that's called an ERMY,
which is like the DNA dust test of your health.
Because I was like googling any and everything at this
point trying to figure out where it was, and it
was hidden pretty much everywhere it could be.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
It's like inside the walls, inside the duct work, all
the above.
Speaker 3 (05:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
Yeah, they cavity tested our walls, the environmental company, and
that's when they discovered that the levels in our house
were actually five hundred times above normal.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
Not two times, not ten, five hundred times above normal. Yeah,
and that has to be a scary feeling, although in
a way probably I guess to some degree reassuring, because
you're not crazy. There is something wrong, and these people
kept saying, oh, go, it's fine, you have allergies, Go
you can quit one. There was something wrong, and you
knew there was something wrong.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
Yeah, And I had been in and out of the
hospital about a dozen times, and you know, every time
I would go, I would feel better at the hospital
and they would be like, your vitals are stabilizing, You're fine,
and then I would go back home and have another hypertensive.
I was having like hypertensive episodes and I'd never had
trouble with my blood pressure before. I was also having
(05:59):
like sensitivities. I was having anaphylactic responses to things, and
I'd never really dealt with allergies before. We lived in
this house either, which is crazy. So it just like
manifested differently in each of us. And then I also
was like feeling drunk in the house and like bumping
into walls, and they thought I had MS. I know
(06:22):
it sounds like really obvious when you look at it now,
but when it was happening, you know, the puzzle pieces
were not clear yet.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
Once you realize that it was the mold, what was
your next step.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
Well, We've thoroughly investigated the house. At this point, I
wanted to know everywhere that it was, which is why
we ran so many tests, and we got multiple mediation
companies to come in and look at the house and
kind of investigate. We had tons of roofers out to
look at the house. I just got as many opinions
(06:54):
as I could to try to make sure we weren't
missing anything. And so now we're just you know, we're
faced with a very very very expensive remediation on the house.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
And you can't live in the home right now, can you?
Speaker 4 (07:05):
Oh? No?
Speaker 2 (07:06):
I left back in August because I was having like
uncontrollable seizures.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
So where are you guys living with my parents? Okay,
so you've got a home, and I assume you're still
paying a mortgage on this home. Yep? That you can't occupy? Correct?
And I'm gathering insurance has not been very helpful.
Speaker 5 (07:24):
No.
Speaker 2 (07:24):
We tried to get interests to cover it, and we
fought them on it twice and they declined it both times.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
Is it because they say that it was a pre
existing condition. I don't know if that's a thing, but
they said that when you purchase the home, this problem
was there, thus it's not our responsibility. Correct.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
They said they only cover it if it is storm
damage or a sudden leak neither, which unfortunately is our case.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
So they think it was there for a long time.
Thus they're saying they're washing their hands of it. So
where does that leave you? You're completely responsible for everything. Yes,
so it's tens of thousands of dollars. I assume it's
close to six figures. Yeah, that's incredible. That almost it
almost seems like you'd have to like bulldoze the house
and start over. At that point, we're.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Having to demo a substantial amount of it. Not like
when I say demo, I mean they're gonna have to
like rip the walls out, rip up the floors, and
all that kind of.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
Stuff, and so and so, all the and and all
of this is very expensive. You don't have to get
a second mortgage or how are you able or how
are you looking at trying to pay for all this.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
We pulled a heelock for what we could. We'd only
been there for two years, so it's you know, not
a lot of home equity, yet not not tons of money.
Obviously we have our own whatever the small amount of
savings we had after buying a house, and then we
have a gofund me as well.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
So and I'll give you a chance to if you
want to publicize that. What is that gofund me? It's
just what do you mean? I if people want to
if people listening to this want to go out there
and toss you five or ten bucks, where where should
they go?
Speaker 2 (08:59):
You can find it. W b r C actually did
a news article and it's at the bottom of the
news article, and then it's also on my Facebook, Kindle
Early or my Instagram account, Kindle Early, or your TikTok.
I think I found TikTok, my TikTok, Kindle Early.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
And I'll post a link to it as well. Uh
this this Uh, this program also becomes a podcast on
the w e RC website. I'll post a link to
it on the podcast as well. What would you say
to other people who are experiencing similar problems and they
never considered mold, Like, what what would you say? They
should go get one of these these tests because not
everything is mold, of course, but it's to be considered. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
I mean, you could do the Amazon Petri dishes, but
I don't find them to be terribly accurate. They did
not show any of the black mold that was actually
hidden in our house. I find I found that the
army that we ran, which is the DNA, does test
of your house to be the most accurate. And then
there are there are environmental companies that will come and test,
but in they're going to like cavity test the walls.
(10:02):
If they just air test in the middle of a room,
I don't think they're going to give you an accurate
depiction of what's actually going on when.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
You purchase the house. I assume you got an inspection,
right of course. Yeah, and that's that's not something I
guess they do during inspection. It's not standard. I'll bet
you the next time you buy a house, you'll have
it done if it was part of the inspection.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
One hundred percent. I think everyone should run a mold
test when they're buying a house.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
It's because here in Alabama it is very humid here
and so it's kind of we kind of live in
a giant peatra diishtion a way, so I could see
how this would develop. Did they say there was anything
specific that might have gone wrong over the years, You
said it was probably what about a fifty year old
house something like that.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
Yeah, it's from the nineteen sixties. There is some structures
off the back that were added probably a decade ago, unpermitted,
and they look fine if you look at them. And
when we bought the house, everything checked out fine. But
what really was happening is where they were attached, it
was slowly letting water into the wall, probably for a decade.
Speaker 4 (11:01):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
And that's probably what led to it. And that's just
that's something you don't think about, and it's quite frankly,
it's every home buyer's worst nightmare. I'm so sorry this
happened to you, Kendall. It looks like what maybe if
you're able to scratch, you have the money, you're back
in your home. What another six months or something like that.
I imagine it's not a fast process that would be
(11:23):
the hope. Well, Kendall, I really am so sorry this
happened to you, and I know it's been a long battle.
Like how's your daughter? Has your husband?
Speaker 2 (11:31):
They're doing much better now that we're kind of out
of the toxic environment.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
And the dog also not having seizures.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
No, he's doing fine too. He's at my parents' house.
We actually had another dog that unfortunately did pass away
in the house. She was older. But our current our
other dog is he's okay, So.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
That's good that at least it didn't seem like it
caused long term damage. It was something you guys were
able to recover from. So if there's any I guess
silver lining, it's that that it wasn't hopefully permanent.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Hopefully it's not. I'm still somewhat symptomatic, but I was
by far the sickest of the three of us.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
Well, Kendall, like I said, I'm so sorry this happened
to you, but thank you so much for this is
a very important warning for all of our listeners. As
part of the process of purchasing a home, check for
mold and don't just do like a quick and you
drive by smells okay and here, actually have the inspector,
just like they checked the electrical or are the roof
or anything else, have them check for this too. For sure. Kendall,
thank you so much for being on Viewpoint today.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
I'm John mountsin This is Viewpoint, Alabama. A couple of
weeks ago, Governor k Ivy gave her State of the
State address, in which she outlined some of her priorities
for the upcoming legislative session. One issue she highlighted was
the need to codify gender in our state from a
legal perspective. In particular, she gave praise to the author
of the what is a Woman legislation in our state?
Speaker 3 (12:47):
Next there are only two genders? Mayo, fee, Mayo. I
look forward to finally putting my signatude home what does
a woman be? By Representatives Susan Debos.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
And joining me now in our viewpoint Alabama Studios is
Alabama representative from Hoover, Susan de Bo's Susan, welcome to
you a point, thank you, happy to be here, and
I'm glad you're here. So set me straight this legislation.
First of all, why is it needed?
Speaker 6 (13:15):
You know, that is a good question, and why are
we doing this? But honestly, when you have a Supreme
Court Justice Kintaji Jackson Brown, who when asked by Senator
Marshburn what is a woman, she could not answer.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
Well, she said she wasn't a scientist, so yeah, yeah,
I apparently have be.
Speaker 6 (13:32):
A psiologist, so I can't answer that. So honestly, it's
not just that, but there are a lot of instances
where we need to define male and female and sex
we need to clarify that there are only two sexes,
male and female, and what is a male and what
is a female? And I loved what my I loved
(13:56):
what Senator April Weaver said on the floor. She brought
this to the Senate, she did the heavy liftings, she
got the votes, and she said, look, let's make it easy.
If you have lady parts, you're a female. If you
have man parts, you're a man. Now we say it
scientifically in the bill, of course, but it's based on
your reproductive organs. It's common sense. I hate to have
(14:16):
to do this, but we really do well.
Speaker 1 (14:19):
I would think you could even go a little deeper
into it and just go straight up genetics. If you
have two X chromosomes, then you're a woman. If you
have an X and a Y, then you're a man.
Because that way it codifies from birth. How you know
how God made us?
Speaker 6 (14:31):
Yes, that's right, we know that God created us man
or female at conception. You're identified as male or female
at birth. But we have had the best legal minds
come up with the definition, and we're basing it on
reproductive organs. That's what we feel like cannot be scrutinized
in the courts, and we're going with that.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
Because one of the things you run into, of course,
is this whole pre op versus postop with the transgender folks,
which you know, what's interesting is there was a time
when transgender it was something that was very rare and unusual.
You never heard it. And now if you were to
believe the stuff you see in media, it's as if
every other person is transgender now and I don't I
don't see that actually happening. But now there's a question
(15:13):
of well, are you pre op are you postop? That
sort of thing, And we have a lot of people
who are a pre opt complaining claiming they're going to
be a man or they're going to be a woman,
so they're on their way. So they're just gonna go
ahead and declare it. Now.
Speaker 6 (15:25):
Look, if you want to gender identify any way you want,
you are free to do that. This bill does not
take away the rights of anyone to a gender identify
the way that they feel. But legally, male and female
is determined at birth, and you are one or the
other at birth.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
And that and there's so many reasons. I've heard stories
where somebody goes to the doctor and they they can't
ask them what they what they actually bio biologically are,
and they'll declare, well, I'm a woman or I'm a man,
and they will and they will start to treat them
as such and then realize, oh my gosh, you're not
a man, You're actually a woman. They're offended, but it
turns out that's what they need, because they need a
(16:04):
certain standard of care based on their real honest to goodness,
you know sex.
Speaker 6 (16:08):
Look, if you're a female, you're going to go in
for a PAP smere if you're a male, you're gonna
go in for a prosshead exam, regardless of how you identify.
You want to have the correct standard of care. And
we need to know. Doctors need to know what you are. Obviously,
women have different prepositions to get certain things in the
health care field.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
I know.
Speaker 6 (16:29):
I'm really involved with the American Heart Association, and women
are far more likely to have heart disease and strokes.
You better be honest with the doctor and tell them
what you are.
Speaker 1 (16:37):
If you want to walk in the door, if you
want to be treated the way that you need to
be best cared for.
Speaker 6 (16:43):
Yes, absolutely, it's really it kind of gets insane. If
a doctor had to ask me how I identified on
a form, I really think I would turn around and
walk out of that doctor's office. He needs to know
what my sex is, male or female. That's how we
need to be treated medically.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
That and what is interesting now is we have taken
this issue and it has become an issue that doesn't
seem like it needs to be. It's almost like the
you know, next up you're gonna have to propose the
you know, the Earth is round law. I love that.
Speaker 6 (17:13):
Let me give you an example of why this is important.
Another example. So, I'm working on a bill that you
might have heard of. It is allowing breastfeeding women to
be exempt from jury care. Right, we've had.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
An issue, there's a recent issue, yes, very.
Speaker 6 (17:28):
Recent issue, where a woman she was breastfeeding her three
month old child and she had to go in to
try to get exempt from jury duty. They made her
sit there for over an hour. Finally the judge did
let her go, but only after he threatened her with
DHR if she ever came back with her child again.
So we're going to promote legislation for breastfeeding women so
(17:50):
that they do not have to serve on jury duties
while they're breastfeeding. Now does that include breastfeeding men?
Speaker 1 (17:57):
I was going to say that's going to be the
next challenge it because.
Speaker 6 (18:00):
But look, when we use the word female, we now
know what a female is. We intend for this to
be used for females. So the female definition is important
in the courts for clarity and for transparency, and that's
what this bill does. It clarifies for the courts and
it's transparent in the legal sense as to what male
(18:22):
and female are.
Speaker 1 (18:23):
You're listening to Viewpoint Alabama on the Alabama Radio Network.
My name is John Mountain, speaking in studio with Alabama
Representative Susan Debos. She is a representative from Hoover who
has proposed the What Is a Woman Act, which, as
we've discussed, is apparently necessary because we can't seem to
agree on definitions, which is kind of what the law
is based on. And the legislation has actually already been
(18:46):
passed in the Senate, so.
Speaker 6 (18:48):
Senator April Weaver has already run this through Senate Committee,
Senate House floor. She stood up for over three hours
and debated this issue. She did a terrific job she
is my hero. Now I'm going to be bringing it
to the House Committee and the House floor. The dates
haven't been set yet, but I anticipate this to move
very quickly through. This was a top priority for KIV.
(19:12):
She announced it in her state of the state, and
I was so honored that she made this one of
her top legislative agendas. Look, we have common sense in Alabama.
We had common sense before the rest of the nation
had common sense. We passed the Women in Sports protecting
women in sports two years ago. I was in DC
just last week when Trump signed the Executive Order protecting
(19:35):
women in Sports. So they have caught up with us nationwide.
So Trump signed the executive Order protecting male, female, and
sex only two sexes on the first day of office.
Now we're going to secure it here in the state
of Alabama.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
And isn't that funny how the rest of the nation
always looks at Alabama. Oh, they're so backwards, when in reality,
we're leading the charge on something that just makes so
much sense and it's scientific. And so often we have
people from out side the state say, look at those
backwards people in Alabama. They don't understand science. We are scientific.
Look Alabama is actually leading the charge here on making
(20:10):
a scientific This is science. This is and if your
feelings are hurt, I'm sorry, I can't.
Speaker 6 (20:15):
Do anything about science is science. Common sense is common sense.
We are making common sense comment again in the state
of Alabama.
Speaker 1 (20:22):
And Susan as you already brought up this dovetail so
nicely with the Trump administration's agenda. Last week, he signed
the ban on transgender athletes competing against women in women's sports.
Here was what he had to say with regard to
the upcoming Olympics that are coming back to America.
Speaker 3 (20:40):
In Los Angeles in twenty twenty eight. My administration will
not stand by and watch men beat and batter female athletes.
And we're just not gonna let it happen. And it's
gonna end, and it's ending right now.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
And President Trump's comments, of course, are referring back to
the twenty twenty four Olympics in which a I believe
her name, his name was Immani Calif. He was a wrestler,
walter waite wrestler who beat a woman as a woman's wrestler,
but he was a he who transitioned. And you can say, well,
(21:14):
he's had the surgery done, so now he's a she.
But the reality is he went through puberty as a he,
and so he has the bone structure of a man,
the muscular structure of a man. Doesn't matter how many
Hormonesi's on now, he still has an advantage and beat
the daylights out of a female competitor in the Olympics.
And all we're trying to do is say, maybe this
(21:37):
is not fair, Maybe this isn't right. Maybe we should
act as a civilized society and protect women from being
attacked in the ring. Give them the access equal access,
which is one of the ideas I thought we strive
for in this country, equal access to sports opportunities, making
sure that women can be on their own separate competitive
(21:57):
swim team, track team, whatever the team is, give them
the opportunities to succeed. We're not asking for special opportunities,
just equal opportunities for both sexes, as defined as it
was on their birth certificates. This is the reason why
legislation like this, sadly is necessary in twenty twenty five.
And I want to thank you so much, Susan de
(22:18):
Bo's for coming in, for talking about this and for
putting some sanity back into our laws here in the
state of Alabama. Thank you for coming in. Thank you.
Speaker 6 (22:27):
It's my pleasure being here.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
Finally, this week on Viewpoint Alabama, our own JT had
a chance to catch up with our Senator Katie Britt.
She was able to catch a ride with Donald Trump
and Senator Tubberville to the Super Bowl. She shares her experiences.
Speaker 5 (22:41):
Senator Katie Britt joins us now after a big whirlwind
last few days.
Speaker 1 (22:46):
Katie, welcome in, thanks for being here.
Speaker 4 (22:48):
Thank you so much. JOT. As always, I love being
on with you and being in front of your listeners. Sarah,
I appreciate you letting me, let me come on. And yes,
what a whirlwin of a weekend.
Speaker 5 (22:57):
So all right, let's start with dinner and mar Lago.
I saw you in West are So what was on
the menu and what did you guys enjoy with the president?
Speaker 4 (23:05):
Look, I mean that was just incredible. So that was
about forty four Republican senators and their spouses there invited
to have dinner with President Trump. She spoke to us
at links, talked about all of the exciting things that
are happening, Executive orders, pieces of legislation, you know, things
that were doing, things that were moving. He did when
(23:28):
he talked about no biological boys and girls' sports. He
did have fun with Wesley. He said, I mean, he said, Leslie,
stand up. Look at this big boy. Look at him.
Look at him. Do you see his wife? Do you
see his wife? He said, she's the size of his leg.
He's literally the size of his leg. She said, do
you think those two people could compete? So it was
(23:48):
so it was fun, just a great evening, a lot
of unity in that room. My daughter had called, and
my children both know that I will answer the phone
no matter what when they call, unless I am literally
in the middle of questioning at a hearing, which has
happened once. They were trying to FaceTime me. My daughter
was to show me a dress that she was going
to wear to a dance, so I had to call
(24:09):
her back. But otherwise they know that I will answer,
and so I answered. I stepped outside and she said,
where are you, mom? I said, well, I'm it. You
know Marlogo having dinner with President Trump. She said, well,
will you tell him? We said thank you for what
he did for girls' sports. Her team ended up sending
a video. I walked over and showed it to President Trump.
He immediately responded with let's send them a video back.
(24:32):
So we did a selfie video. He he said, hey,
done it, talked to her team and said congratulations on
their big win. And anyway, it was such a special
moment and I think goes to the heart of who
he is.
Speaker 5 (24:45):
I got to tell you, I'm pretty excited about that.
That's just awesome. He just immediately said, hey, let's respond
to your daughter. Here the president of the United States.
One of the biggest issues facing the country. He fixes it,
and your daughter says, thank you.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
How old is your daughter?
Speaker 4 (25:01):
She is fifteen. And so she had her entire versy
girls basketball team. They did a video saying thank you,
showed it to him. My kids you not, he immediately said,
And I told him, I said, they just won their
game and that, and so he writes something. He said,
let's video I'm back, and so you said, let's do
a video back. So we did. It was really incredible.
It really incredible.
Speaker 5 (25:21):
You know what's going to happen next, don't you? Next
time you're with President Trump. Guess who's going to be
facetiming you me?
Speaker 4 (25:28):
That sounds great? Well, that Hey, listen, we had a
new continued, maybe I'll have to call you if I
ever get back on Air Force one. Yes, we did
on Air Force one to head to the super Bowl.
Obviously Coach had been there before. If you you know,
and this was my very first time I talked about
I said, oh, gosh, I've got to make sure that
my son gets here and my daughter gets here. He said,
(25:50):
you know, you can make a call from Air Force
one because your phone does not work the low and behold.
They have operators on there. You can make a call.
They call and you know, some daughter and got a
call that said, you know, air Force one is calling
and Senator Britt would like to speak with you. Will
you please hold? Oh yes, Gus knew how to do
it all on there, but that was such an incredible
(26:11):
experience as well. Had cut it into hey, and guess what, Jake,
we got to be on the plane Coach and I
did as we flew over the Golf of America for
the first time as he signed it, that the plane
went down so that we could see it as he signed,
you know, as he signed the executive order, did the stuff,
(26:33):
and they said, congratulations, you are the very first people
to fly over the Golf of America and then they
went back up to the altitude that we needed to
be at. It was pretty darn cool.
Speaker 5 (26:42):
That is really awesome. I mean the fact that you
were on board. Now, how did you and Senator Turberville
end up getting the invite to fly with him on
that because.
Speaker 4 (26:52):
I mean, right, you know, I got a call last
week and from you know, from his executive assistant that
said the President would like for you to join him
at the super Bowl. And so you know, at first
you're thinking, am I getting punk? Is the other That's right?
That's right? But it was so I said, absolutely, what
(27:12):
an honor. And the President was so gracious to Wesley
had we had had given Ridgeway tickets to the super
Bowl for Christmas, and so the President allowed Wesley and
Ridgeway to come up and say hello when we were
in the box, which was so nice and so special,
and so it was just an incredible evening and it
was fun to experience it with Coach Tubberville. There was
(27:34):
no other stake with both of their senators on that plane.
And so what a moment for Alabama and how special
to fly over the Gulf of America. And then how
incredible to be with the first sitting president to actually
attend a Super Bowl and for me as an Alabama
fan to be able to watch seven former Alabama players
dominate in a Super Bowl was was pretty pretty special.
(27:57):
And I have to say, you know, roll Tid and.
Speaker 1 (27:59):
Gobert Hi quickly.
Speaker 5 (28:00):
I want to get your thoughts where we are in
the Senate confirmation process here, my got Can we just
get this done and let's move on?
Speaker 4 (28:08):
That's right. I actually I just got off the phone
with RFK, with Bobby Kennedy and told him I cannot
wait to send him a congratulatory text this week. So
today we will get Toulci gabbered out. I actually sent
Tulci a text. I sat in the chair when we
started her cloture vote. I got to be the very
first one to vote yes, which made me feel so good.
(28:29):
I am going to well vote her final passage. Today.
We have RFK, we'll get started on him. He'll be next.
We're going to do Howard Lutnik at Commerce. He's going
to be a game changer. Brooke Rollins at AG. I mean,
she came out of committee twenty three to zero, and
then We've got Kelly Lesler at the Small Business Administration,
which I don't know if you and I have talked
(28:50):
about this. She asked me to introduce her at her
committee hearing, which was such an honor did that. We're
going to get them all across the finish line and
a committee. You will get to see you on Thursday.
We will vote out Cash Patel to be the next
FBI director of a committee. It's going to be on Thursday.
(29:10):
It's going to be a good moment and I am
going to be proud to be able to cast my
vote in the affirmative to get him in that agency
and get him started cleaning it up.
Speaker 5 (29:19):
Well, Katie, I really appreciate you coming on. I know
you're busy, no doubt about it this weekend. Thanks so much,
and yes I am writing it down Katie Britt Donald
Trump FaceTime very soon.
Speaker 4 (29:30):
Okay, I love it, I love it. I love it.
Speaker 1 (29:33):
All right, we'll talk about Thank you, Katie.
Speaker 4 (29:35):
Hik Thanks so much.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
Jakie, you've been listening to Viewpoint Alabama, a public affairs
program from the Alabama Radio Network. The opinions expressed on
Viewpoint Alabama are not necessarily those of the staff, management,
or advertisers of this station.
It sounds like something out of a Stephen King novel.
Kendall and Stephen Early purchased their home and hoover in
twenty twenty two. One month later, their daughter developed a
bad cough. Shortly after, Steven developed asthma, and then Kendall
started showing stroke like symptoms. Hello, I'm John Mounts and
welcome to Viewpoint, Alabama on the Alabama Radio Network. I'm
here to tell you a story of a family whose
(00:23):
house almost tried to kill them. And I'm joined right
now in studio by Kendall Early in our study to
tell the story of what happened, and it's kind of
a warning to everybody. Kendall, welcome to Viewpoint.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
So when you purchase the home, you all your hopes
and dreams were wrapped up because for all of us,
our biggest purchase is usually our home and we always
have very high expectations. And you thought this is going
to be great and tell the story what happened next?
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Yeah, I mean this is like our ideal neighborhood. We
house hunted for seven months. You know, in twenty twenty two,
people were bidding way over our houses and fighting over them.
And we were just like thrilled to get this house.
And yeah, once we moved in, my daughter was the
(01:12):
first to show symptoms. She was a little bit less
than two and she first we noticed she had a
chronic cough. And I took her to doctors and they
were like, she's not sick, and so we ended up
giving her medication for this chronic cough.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
Probably think it was allergies or vented real something like that.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Yeah, and I remember actually posting on social media like, hey,
my daughter's coughing all through the night. None of us
are sleeping, Like I can't get her to stop coughing.
It's gone on for weeks.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
Again.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Yeah, we kind of chalked it up to allergies, except
she didn't have any allergies in our first house. So
I thought it was weird at the time, but couldn't
come up with any like real reason for it.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
In this home, it's a pretty standard what three bedroom,
two baths, something like.
Speaker 2 (01:59):
That, just your regular ranch style house from the sixties.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
Okay, yeah, I've got one just like it in Hoover.
It has a crawl space, or does it's on a
crawl space Okay, So I'm just trying to paint the
picture for everybody. So regular house, like a lot of
us live in in the Hoover area, a lot of
our listeners live in the Hoover area. And so she
was sick, and then it continued on and your husband
got sick next.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Yeah, he developed adult asthma and was having to like
use it inhaler, like three in the morning. He would
wake up and feel like he needed it inhaler. And
he had had like childhood asthma and had grown out
of it when he was like five. So, you know,
we're in our thirties now, and it had for it
to kind of resurge all of a sudden, we thought
was weird. But again, we never suspected the house.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Right, it seemed like it's unrelated stuff as far as
you could figure. Yes, So about.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
Ninety days into living there, I developed stroke like symptoms
and ended up in the hospital. Again, we never thought
it was the house because there was no visible water damage,
not even a single water spot. Did you smell anything, No,
there was no musty smell. There was no indication that
(03:09):
anything was wrong. I think that's like the scariest part
about it is, you know, we never suspected the house.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
So who was the one who recommended to you. They said,
you know, maybe you should get the air quality or
something like that tested in the home.
Speaker 2 (03:23):
So it wasn't really recommended for it went on where
I actually my health just really declined. We were there
for a little over two years and I started getting
all kinds of random diagnosies. I ended up having seizures
in the house. My dog had a seizure in the house.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
Like the Canarian and coal mine kind of thing. Yeah,
it was really crazy.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
And actually I didn't suspect anything about the house until
my dog had a seizure. And I didn't tell this
to the news, but I thought, this is getting weird.
But again, what you don't see, you can't like. Mold
was just not on our minds.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
Now most people don't think about it unless, like you said,
unless you can see it, right.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
Unless you can see it. So one day I'm just
scrolling on TikTok. This is you know, to a little
over two years in and somebody had almost identical symptoms
and I was like, this is weird.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
And she was like, if this is happening.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
To you, you have hidden toxic mold in your house somewhere,
and I was like, I'm ordering a test right now.
So I just got like a Petri dishes from Amazon initially,
because you know, just in case it wasn't there. I
didn't want to spend thousands of dollars on testing, so
I put one in every room of our house. And
it became pretty clear after a couple of days of
looking at those Petri dishes that there was something going on.
(04:45):
So that's when I called a remediation company. I called
an environmental company. I ran something that's called an ERMY,
which is like the DNA dust test of your health.
Because I was like googling any and everything at this
point trying to figure out where it was, and it
was hidden pretty much everywhere it could be.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
It's like inside the walls, inside the duct work, all
the above.
Speaker 3 (05:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
Yeah, they cavity tested our walls, the environmental company, and
that's when they discovered that the levels in our house
were actually five hundred times above normal.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
Not two times, not ten, five hundred times above normal. Yeah,
and that has to be a scary feeling, although in
a way probably I guess to some degree reassuring, because
you're not crazy. There is something wrong, and these people
kept saying, oh, go, it's fine, you have allergies, Go
you can quit one. There was something wrong, and you
knew there was something wrong.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
Yeah, And I had been in and out of the
hospital about a dozen times, and you know, every time
I would go, I would feel better at the hospital
and they would be like, your vitals are stabilizing, You're fine,
and then I would go back home and have another hypertensive.
I was having like hypertensive episodes and I'd never had
trouble with my blood pressure before. I was also having
(05:59):
like sensitivities. I was having anaphylactic responses to things, and
I'd never really dealt with allergies before. We lived in
this house either, which is crazy. So it just like
manifested differently in each of us. And then I also
was like feeling drunk in the house and like bumping
into walls, and they thought I had MS. I know
(06:22):
it sounds like really obvious when you look at it now,
but when it was happening, you know, the puzzle pieces
were not clear yet.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
Once you realize that it was the mold, what was
your next step.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
Well, We've thoroughly investigated the house. At this point, I
wanted to know everywhere that it was, which is why
we ran so many tests, and we got multiple mediation
companies to come in and look at the house and
kind of investigate. We had tons of roofers out to
look at the house. I just got as many opinions
(06:54):
as I could to try to make sure we weren't
missing anything. And so now we're just you know, we're
faced with a very very very expensive remediation on the house.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
And you can't live in the home right now, can you?
Speaker 4 (07:05):
Oh? No?
Speaker 2 (07:06):
I left back in August because I was having like
uncontrollable seizures.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
So where are you guys living with my parents? Okay,
so you've got a home, and I assume you're still
paying a mortgage on this home. Yep? That you can't occupy? Correct?
And I'm gathering insurance has not been very helpful.
Speaker 5 (07:24):
No.
Speaker 2 (07:24):
We tried to get interests to cover it, and we
fought them on it twice and they declined it both times.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
Is it because they say that it was a pre
existing condition. I don't know if that's a thing, but
they said that when you purchase the home, this problem
was there, thus it's not our responsibility. Correct.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
They said they only cover it if it is storm
damage or a sudden leak neither, which unfortunately is our case.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
So they think it was there for a long time.
Thus they're saying they're washing their hands of it. So
where does that leave you? You're completely responsible for everything. Yes,
so it's tens of thousands of dollars. I assume it's
close to six figures. Yeah, that's incredible. That almost it
almost seems like you'd have to like bulldoze the house
and start over. At that point, we're.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Having to demo a substantial amount of it. Not like
when I say demo, I mean they're gonna have to
like rip the walls out, rip up the floors, and
all that kind of.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
Stuff, and so and so, all the and and all
of this is very expensive. You don't have to get
a second mortgage or how are you able or how
are you looking at trying to pay for all this.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
We pulled a heelock for what we could. We'd only
been there for two years, so it's you know, not
a lot of home equity, yet not not tons of money.
Obviously we have our own whatever the small amount of
savings we had after buying a house, and then we
have a gofund me as well.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
So and I'll give you a chance to if you
want to publicize that. What is that gofund me? It's
just what do you mean? I if people want to
if people listening to this want to go out there
and toss you five or ten bucks, where where should
they go?
Speaker 2 (08:59):
You can find it. W b r C actually did
a news article and it's at the bottom of the
news article, and then it's also on my Facebook, Kindle
Early or my Instagram account, Kindle Early, or your TikTok.
I think I found TikTok, my TikTok, Kindle Early.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
And I'll post a link to it as well. Uh
this this Uh, this program also becomes a podcast on
the w e RC website. I'll post a link to
it on the podcast as well. What would you say
to other people who are experiencing similar problems and they
never considered mold, Like, what what would you say? They
should go get one of these these tests because not
everything is mold, of course, but it's to be considered. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
I mean, you could do the Amazon Petri dishes, but
I don't find them to be terribly accurate. They did
not show any of the black mold that was actually
hidden in our house. I find I found that the
army that we ran, which is the DNA, does test
of your house to be the most accurate. And then
there are there are environmental companies that will come and test,
but in they're going to like cavity test the walls.
(10:02):
If they just air test in the middle of a room,
I don't think they're going to give you an accurate
depiction of what's actually going on when.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
You purchase the house. I assume you got an inspection,
right of course. Yeah, and that's that's not something I
guess they do during inspection. It's not standard. I'll bet
you the next time you buy a house, you'll have
it done if it was part of the inspection.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
One hundred percent. I think everyone should run a mold
test when they're buying a house.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
It's because here in Alabama it is very humid here
and so it's kind of we kind of live in
a giant peatra diishtion a way, so I could see
how this would develop. Did they say there was anything
specific that might have gone wrong over the years, You
said it was probably what about a fifty year old
house something like that.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
Yeah, it's from the nineteen sixties. There is some structures
off the back that were added probably a decade ago, unpermitted,
and they look fine if you look at them. And
when we bought the house, everything checked out fine. But
what really was happening is where they were attached, it
was slowly letting water into the wall, probably for a decade.
Speaker 4 (11:01):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
And that's probably what led to it. And that's just
that's something you don't think about, and it's quite frankly,
it's every home buyer's worst nightmare. I'm so sorry this
happened to you, Kendall. It looks like what maybe if
you're able to scratch, you have the money, you're back
in your home. What another six months or something like that.
I imagine it's not a fast process that would be
(11:23):
the hope. Well, Kendall, I really am so sorry this
happened to you, and I know it's been a long battle.
Like how's your daughter? Has your husband?
Speaker 2 (11:31):
They're doing much better now that we're kind of out
of the toxic environment.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
And the dog also not having seizures.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
No, he's doing fine too. He's at my parents' house.
We actually had another dog that unfortunately did pass away
in the house. She was older. But our current our
other dog is he's okay, So.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
That's good that at least it didn't seem like it
caused long term damage. It was something you guys were
able to recover from. So if there's any I guess
silver lining, it's that that it wasn't hopefully permanent.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Hopefully it's not. I'm still somewhat symptomatic, but I was
by far the sickest of the three of us.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
Well, Kendall, like I said, I'm so sorry this happened
to you, but thank you so much for this is
a very important warning for all of our listeners. As
part of the process of purchasing a home, check for
mold and don't just do like a quick and you
drive by smells okay and here, actually have the inspector,
just like they checked the electrical or are the roof
or anything else, have them check for this too. For sure. Kendall,
thank you so much for being on Viewpoint today.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
I'm John mountsin This is Viewpoint, Alabama. A couple of
weeks ago, Governor k Ivy gave her State of the
State address, in which she outlined some of her priorities
for the upcoming legislative session. One issue she highlighted was
the need to codify gender in our state from a
legal perspective. In particular, she gave praise to the author
of the what is a Woman legislation in our state?
Speaker 3 (12:47):
Next there are only two genders? Mayo, fee, Mayo. I
look forward to finally putting my signatude home what does
a woman be? By Representatives Susan Debos.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
And joining me now in our viewpoint Alabama Studios is
Alabama representative from Hoover, Susan de Bo's Susan, welcome to
you a point, thank you, happy to be here, and
I'm glad you're here. So set me straight this legislation.
First of all, why is it needed?
Speaker 6 (13:15):
You know, that is a good question, and why are
we doing this? But honestly, when you have a Supreme
Court Justice Kintaji Jackson Brown, who when asked by Senator
Marshburn what is a woman, she could not answer.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
Well, she said she wasn't a scientist, so yeah, yeah,
I apparently have be.
Speaker 6 (13:32):
A psiologist, so I can't answer that. So honestly, it's
not just that, but there are a lot of instances
where we need to define male and female and sex
we need to clarify that there are only two sexes,
male and female, and what is a male and what
is a female? And I loved what my I loved
(13:56):
what Senator April Weaver said on the floor. She brought
this to the Senate, she did the heavy liftings, she
got the votes, and she said, look, let's make it easy.
If you have lady parts, you're a female. If you
have man parts, you're a man. Now we say it
scientifically in the bill, of course, but it's based on
your reproductive organs. It's common sense. I hate to have
(14:16):
to do this, but we really do well.
Speaker 1 (14:19):
I would think you could even go a little deeper
into it and just go straight up genetics. If you
have two X chromosomes, then you're a woman. If you
have an X and a Y, then you're a man.
Because that way it codifies from birth. How you know
how God made us?
Speaker 6 (14:31):
Yes, that's right, we know that God created us man
or female at conception. You're identified as male or female
at birth. But we have had the best legal minds
come up with the definition, and we're basing it on
reproductive organs. That's what we feel like cannot be scrutinized
in the courts, and we're going with that.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
Because one of the things you run into, of course,
is this whole pre op versus postop with the transgender folks,
which you know, what's interesting is there was a time
when transgender it was something that was very rare and unusual.
You never heard it. And now if you were to
believe the stuff you see in media, it's as if
every other person is transgender now and I don't I
don't see that actually happening. But now there's a question
(15:13):
of well, are you pre op are you postop? That
sort of thing, And we have a lot of people
who are a pre opt complaining claiming they're going to
be a man or they're going to be a woman,
so they're on their way. So they're just gonna go
ahead and declare it. Now.
Speaker 6 (15:25):
Look, if you want to gender identify any way you want,
you are free to do that. This bill does not
take away the rights of anyone to a gender identify
the way that they feel. But legally, male and female
is determined at birth, and you are one or the
other at birth.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
And that and there's so many reasons. I've heard stories
where somebody goes to the doctor and they they can't
ask them what they what they actually bio biologically are,
and they'll declare, well, I'm a woman or I'm a man,
and they will and they will start to treat them
as such and then realize, oh my gosh, you're not
a man, You're actually a woman. They're offended, but it
turns out that's what they need, because they need a
(16:04):
certain standard of care based on their real honest to goodness,
you know sex.
Speaker 6 (16:08):
Look, if you're a female, you're going to go in
for a PAP smere if you're a male, you're gonna
go in for a prosshead exam, regardless of how you identify.
You want to have the correct standard of care. And
we need to know. Doctors need to know what you are. Obviously,
women have different prepositions to get certain things in the
health care field.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
I know.
Speaker 6 (16:29):
I'm really involved with the American Heart Association, and women
are far more likely to have heart disease and strokes.
You better be honest with the doctor and tell them
what you are.
Speaker 1 (16:37):
If you want to walk in the door, if you
want to be treated the way that you need to
be best cared for.
Speaker 6 (16:43):
Yes, absolutely, it's really it kind of gets insane. If
a doctor had to ask me how I identified on
a form, I really think I would turn around and
walk out of that doctor's office. He needs to know
what my sex is, male or female. That's how we
need to be treated medically.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
That and what is interesting now is we have taken
this issue and it has become an issue that doesn't
seem like it needs to be. It's almost like the
you know, next up you're gonna have to propose the
you know, the Earth is round law. I love that.
Speaker 6 (17:13):
Let me give you an example of why this is important.
Another example. So, I'm working on a bill that you
might have heard of. It is allowing breastfeeding women to
be exempt from jury care. Right, we've had.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
An issue, there's a recent issue, yes, very.
Speaker 6 (17:28):
Recent issue, where a woman she was breastfeeding her three
month old child and she had to go in to
try to get exempt from jury duty. They made her
sit there for over an hour. Finally the judge did
let her go, but only after he threatened her with
DHR if she ever came back with her child again.
So we're going to promote legislation for breastfeeding women so
(17:50):
that they do not have to serve on jury duties
while they're breastfeeding. Now does that include breastfeeding men?
Speaker 1 (17:57):
I was going to say that's going to be the
next challenge it because.
Speaker 6 (18:00):
But look, when we use the word female, we now
know what a female is. We intend for this to
be used for females. So the female definition is important
in the courts for clarity and for transparency, and that's
what this bill does. It clarifies for the courts and
it's transparent in the legal sense as to what male
(18:22):
and female are.
Speaker 1 (18:23):
You're listening to Viewpoint Alabama on the Alabama Radio Network.
My name is John Mountain, speaking in studio with Alabama
Representative Susan Debos. She is a representative from Hoover who
has proposed the What Is a Woman Act, which, as
we've discussed, is apparently necessary because we can't seem to
agree on definitions, which is kind of what the law
is based on. And the legislation has actually already been
(18:46):
passed in the Senate, so.
Speaker 6 (18:48):
Senator April Weaver has already run this through Senate Committee,
Senate House floor. She stood up for over three hours
and debated this issue. She did a terrific job she
is my hero. Now I'm going to be bringing it
to the House Committee and the House floor. The dates
haven't been set yet, but I anticipate this to move
very quickly through. This was a top priority for KIV.
(19:12):
She announced it in her state of the state, and
I was so honored that she made this one of
her top legislative agendas. Look, we have common sense in Alabama.
We had common sense before the rest of the nation
had common sense. We passed the Women in Sports protecting
women in sports two years ago. I was in DC
just last week when Trump signed the Executive Order protecting
(19:35):
women in Sports. So they have caught up with us nationwide.
So Trump signed the executive Order protecting male, female, and
sex only two sexes on the first day of office.
Now we're going to secure it here in the state
of Alabama.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
And isn't that funny how the rest of the nation
always looks at Alabama. Oh, they're so backwards, when in reality,
we're leading the charge on something that just makes so
much sense and it's scientific. And so often we have
people from out side the state say, look at those
backwards people in Alabama. They don't understand science. We are scientific.
Look Alabama is actually leading the charge here on making
(20:10):
a scientific This is science. This is and if your
feelings are hurt, I'm sorry, I can't.
Speaker 6 (20:15):
Do anything about science is science. Common sense is common sense.
We are making common sense comment again in the state
of Alabama.
Speaker 1 (20:22):
And Susan as you already brought up this dovetail so
nicely with the Trump administration's agenda. Last week, he signed
the ban on transgender athletes competing against women in women's sports.
Here was what he had to say with regard to
the upcoming Olympics that are coming back to America.
Speaker 3 (20:40):
In Los Angeles in twenty twenty eight. My administration will
not stand by and watch men beat and batter female athletes.
And we're just not gonna let it happen. And it's
gonna end, and it's ending right now.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
And President Trump's comments, of course, are referring back to
the twenty twenty four Olympics in which a I believe
her name, his name was Immani Calif. He was a wrestler,
walter waite wrestler who beat a woman as a woman's wrestler,
but he was a he who transitioned. And you can say, well,
(21:14):
he's had the surgery done, so now he's a she.
But the reality is he went through puberty as a he,
and so he has the bone structure of a man,
the muscular structure of a man. Doesn't matter how many
Hormonesi's on now, he still has an advantage and beat
the daylights out of a female competitor in the Olympics.
And all we're trying to do is say, maybe this
(21:37):
is not fair, Maybe this isn't right. Maybe we should
act as a civilized society and protect women from being
attacked in the ring. Give them the access equal access,
which is one of the ideas I thought we strive
for in this country, equal access to sports opportunities, making
sure that women can be on their own separate competitive
(21:57):
swim team, track team, whatever the team is, give them
the opportunities to succeed. We're not asking for special opportunities,
just equal opportunities for both sexes, as defined as it
was on their birth certificates. This is the reason why
legislation like this, sadly is necessary in twenty twenty five.
And I want to thank you so much, Susan de
(22:18):
Bo's for coming in, for talking about this and for
putting some sanity back into our laws here in the
state of Alabama. Thank you for coming in. Thank you.
Speaker 6 (22:27):
It's my pleasure being here.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
Finally, this week on Viewpoint Alabama, our own JT had
a chance to catch up with our Senator Katie Britt.
She was able to catch a ride with Donald Trump
and Senator Tubberville to the Super Bowl. She shares her experiences.
Speaker 5 (22:41):
Senator Katie Britt joins us now after a big whirlwind
last few days.
Speaker 1 (22:46):
Katie, welcome in, thanks for being here.
Speaker 4 (22:48):
Thank you so much. JOT. As always, I love being
on with you and being in front of your listeners. Sarah,
I appreciate you letting me, let me come on. And yes,
what a whirlwin of a weekend.
Speaker 5 (22:57):
So all right, let's start with dinner and mar Lago.
I saw you in West are So what was on
the menu and what did you guys enjoy with the president?
Speaker 4 (23:05):
Look, I mean that was just incredible. So that was
about forty four Republican senators and their spouses there invited
to have dinner with President Trump. She spoke to us
at links, talked about all of the exciting things that
are happening, Executive orders, pieces of legislation, you know, things
that were doing, things that were moving. He did when
(23:28):
he talked about no biological boys and girls' sports. He
did have fun with Wesley. He said, I mean, he said, Leslie,
stand up. Look at this big boy. Look at him.
Look at him. Do you see his wife? Do you
see his wife? He said, she's the size of his leg.
He's literally the size of his leg. She said, do
you think those two people could compete? So it was
(23:48):
so it was fun, just a great evening, a lot
of unity in that room. My daughter had called, and
my children both know that I will answer the phone
no matter what when they call, unless I am literally
in the middle of questioning at a hearing, which has
happened once. They were trying to FaceTime me. My daughter
was to show me a dress that she was going
to wear to a dance, so I had to call
(24:09):
her back. But otherwise they know that I will answer,
and so I answered. I stepped outside and she said,
where are you, mom? I said, well, I'm it. You
know Marlogo having dinner with President Trump. She said, well,
will you tell him? We said thank you for what
he did for girls' sports. Her team ended up sending
a video. I walked over and showed it to President Trump.
He immediately responded with let's send them a video back.
(24:32):
So we did a selfie video. He he said, hey,
done it, talked to her team and said congratulations on
their big win. And anyway, it was such a special
moment and I think goes to the heart of who
he is.
Speaker 5 (24:45):
I got to tell you, I'm pretty excited about that.
That's just awesome. He just immediately said, hey, let's respond
to your daughter. Here the president of the United States.
One of the biggest issues facing the country. He fixes it,
and your daughter says, thank you.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
How old is your daughter?
Speaker 4 (25:01):
She is fifteen. And so she had her entire versy
girls basketball team. They did a video saying thank you,
showed it to him. My kids you not, he immediately said,
And I told him, I said, they just won their
game and that, and so he writes something. He said,
let's video I'm back, and so you said, let's do
a video back. So we did. It was really incredible.
It really incredible.
Speaker 5 (25:21):
You know what's going to happen next, don't you? Next
time you're with President Trump. Guess who's going to be
facetiming you me?
Speaker 4 (25:28):
That sounds great? Well, that Hey, listen, we had a
new continued, maybe I'll have to call you if I
ever get back on Air Force one. Yes, we did
on Air Force one to head to the super Bowl.
Obviously Coach had been there before. If you you know,
and this was my very first time I talked about
I said, oh, gosh, I've got to make sure that
my son gets here and my daughter gets here. He said,
(25:50):
you know, you can make a call from Air Force
one because your phone does not work the low and behold.
They have operators on there. You can make a call.
They call and you know, some daughter and got a
call that said, you know, air Force one is calling
and Senator Britt would like to speak with you. Will
you please hold? Oh yes, Gus knew how to do
it all on there, but that was such an incredible
(26:11):
experience as well. Had cut it into hey, and guess what, Jake,
we got to be on the plane Coach and I
did as we flew over the Golf of America for
the first time as he signed it, that the plane
went down so that we could see it as he signed,
you know, as he signed the executive order, did the stuff,
(26:33):
and they said, congratulations, you are the very first people
to fly over the Golf of America and then they
went back up to the altitude that we needed to
be at. It was pretty darn cool.
Speaker 5 (26:42):
That is really awesome. I mean the fact that you
were on board. Now, how did you and Senator Turberville
end up getting the invite to fly with him on
that because.
Speaker 4 (26:52):
I mean, right, you know, I got a call last
week and from you know, from his executive assistant that
said the President would like for you to join him
at the super Bowl. And so you know, at first
you're thinking, am I getting punk? Is the other That's right?
That's right? But it was so I said, absolutely, what
(27:12):
an honor. And the President was so gracious to Wesley
had we had had given Ridgeway tickets to the super
Bowl for Christmas, and so the President allowed Wesley and
Ridgeway to come up and say hello when we were
in the box, which was so nice and so special,
and so it was just an incredible evening and it
was fun to experience it with Coach Tubberville. There was
(27:34):
no other stake with both of their senators on that plane.
And so what a moment for Alabama and how special
to fly over the Gulf of America. And then how
incredible to be with the first sitting president to actually
attend a Super Bowl and for me as an Alabama
fan to be able to watch seven former Alabama players
dominate in a Super Bowl was was pretty pretty special.
(27:57):
And I have to say, you know, roll Tid and.
Speaker 1 (27:59):
Gobert Hi quickly.
Speaker 5 (28:00):
I want to get your thoughts where we are in
the Senate confirmation process here, my got Can we just
get this done and let's move on?
Speaker 4 (28:08):
That's right. I actually I just got off the phone
with RFK, with Bobby Kennedy and told him I cannot
wait to send him a congratulatory text this week. So
today we will get Toulci gabbered out. I actually sent
Tulci a text. I sat in the chair when we
started her cloture vote. I got to be the very
first one to vote yes, which made me feel so good.
(28:29):
I am going to well vote her final passage. Today.
We have RFK, we'll get started on him. He'll be next.
We're going to do Howard Lutnik at Commerce. He's going
to be a game changer. Brooke Rollins at AG. I mean,
she came out of committee twenty three to zero, and
then We've got Kelly Lesler at the Small Business Administration,
which I don't know if you and I have talked
(28:50):
about this. She asked me to introduce her at her
committee hearing, which was such an honor did that. We're
going to get them all across the finish line and
a committee. You will get to see you on Thursday.
We will vote out Cash Patel to be the next
FBI director of a committee. It's going to be on Thursday.
(29:10):
It's going to be a good moment and I am
going to be proud to be able to cast my
vote in the affirmative to get him in that agency
and get him started cleaning it up.
Speaker 5 (29:19):
Well, Katie, I really appreciate you coming on. I know
you're busy, no doubt about it this weekend. Thanks so much,
and yes I am writing it down Katie Britt Donald
Trump FaceTime very soon.
Speaker 4 (29:30):
Okay, I love it, I love it. I love it.
Speaker 1 (29:33):
All right, we'll talk about Thank you, Katie.
Speaker 4 (29:35):
Hik Thanks so much.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
Jakie, you've been listening to Viewpoint Alabama, a public affairs
program from the Alabama Radio Network. The opinions expressed on
Viewpoint Alabama are not necessarily those of the staff, management,
or advertisers of this station.
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