Angie Fiedler Sutton
Welcome to Destination Change: a podcast where we talk recovery, treatment and more. I'm your host, Angie Fiedler Sutton, with the National Behavioral Health Association of Providers.

Our guest today is Andrew Kessler. Andrew Kessler, JD, is founder and principal of Slingshot Solutions LLC, a consulting firm that specializes in behavioral health policy. His clients past and present include IC&RC, CCAPP, and NBHAP.

With 20 years of policy experience, and over a decade in the behavioral health industry, Andrew is a fixture in circles that advocate for substance abuse treatment, prevention and research. He collaborates frequently with congressional offices, the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, NIDA, SAMSA, and other federal actors.

Andrew has written legislation and report language adopted by both the House and Senate Appropriations Committees, and as presented orally before such bodies as the Scientific Management Review Board, the National Conference on addiction disorders, and the college on problem of drug dependence. Thank you for joining us today. Andrew,

Andrew Kessler
Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure to be here.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Now, I'm going to ask the simple question first. What exactly is an advocate and what do they do?

Andrew Kessler
Advocate is a tame word for lobbyist in Washington, DC. It's really is more of a term of art or term of preference, just because words matter and how and phraseology matters. And I am of the opinion that if you say the most of the American public lobbyist, they picture someone who takes money from all comers to present their issue. And that's not what I do. I only work on one issue, which is substance use disorders. And like many of my colleagues in Washington only work on one issue, often either in-house or for a select number of clients. We prefer to call ourselves advocates, because we're really advocating for the rights and the treatment, the benefit of those we represent. So I like to think of lobbyists as more of a private sector kind of thing and advocates more of a public health, you know, public benefit kind of thing. So it's really just a term of art that I prefer.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
No worries. Tell me how you kind of got into this, why this versus all the other career options that are out there?

Andrew Kessler
Well, it's a combination of you know, life choices and life just taking you where it goes. From a young age from about 17, I was I was always planning on coming to Washington DC. But from that same young age, no, SUD was not really a thought of mine as a career. That's just kind of where my career took me. I spent some time on Capitol Hill, as many young people in Washington do. I spend my time doing some partisan politics, I spent my time doing some campaigns just gaining experience in politics and policy.

And then I happened to get a job that put me squarely in the middle of issues like neuroscience, and I was advocating for neuroscience research, which led me to a real expertise in substance use disorders and mental health. And it kind of went from there. So sometimes, you know, the DC part, I think, was always in my future. Working on substance use disorders, that just kind of happened. And my career has kind of been, you know, a union of those two, a confluence of those two factors.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Now you started Slingshot Solutions in 2008, according to your website, is that correct?

Andrew Kessler
That's correct.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
What made you decide to start your own organization rather than working for someone else?

Andrew Kessler
I had worked in Washington for a couple of different associations, you know, nonprofits that worked on behavioral health. And I worked with some passionate, I will call them citizen advocates, not not professional advocates like myself, but people who are part of this community in treatment and recovery, who, you know, volunteer their time to advocate, in addition to their to their paying jobs, most of which would be either, you know, research or counselor in the space. And my observation was that there was a real passionate base to work on this issue, and a real lack of professional advocates to take what they had to say and make things happen.

When I started Slingshot Solutions, I can only think of one other firm in Washington, DC, that really is specialized in SUD advocacy. And that's, you know, the case today, still kind of the case today. There are more people who work on this issue, but there are not tons more people who specialize on the issue as professional advocates. So it was really, you know, a sense of, 'Hey, there's this issue that no one's working on. Yet, there are people out in the states outside the Beltway who want us to work on it'; it seemed like a good opportunity. And I started Slingshot Solutions. And I believe my first client was, as you mentioned before, the California while at the time it was CADAC. But now it's CCAPP, California Consortium of Addiction Programs and Professionals, which has a working relationship with NBHAP and I've been with them for about 15 years.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
And then you know, you've been doing this for 20 plus years. What has changed over the last time? Do you find it easier, harder?

Andrew Kessler
I will be the first to say at the same time, as much change as we've seen, as much as we've benefited from more attention, we're not close to where we need to be, we'll probably get to that later. It's a willingness to discuss the issue, probably the biggest change on Capitol Hill: if I were going up to the Hill 15 years ago to talk about SUD, odds were good one in seven, one in eight offices would be really interested and say tell me about it. Talk to me about it. Now, when you want to talk about the issue, offices are pretty welcoming. Look, there's 535 elected officials on Capitol Hill. And I don't want to give anyone the impression that all 535 have their doors open for anybody. But advocates are more comfortable talking about this issue, because members are more comfortable talking about this issue, because they've seen the devastation that causes because they get phone calls from back home, because people are willing to speak up.

That's kind of a question that really I could break down and take the rest of our time together. I won't. But let me let me tell you what has changed. Public attitudes and perception, obviously, has changed the most. The opioid epidemic from around 2014 to 2018 really changed the opinion of Congress, government, the White House towards this issue of substance use disorders.

So as recently as probably 10 years ago, wouldn't have dreamed that the ... we'd make the progress we've made in the last 10 years. But like I said, maybe something to get to later in our discussion. Still, it's still a very long way to go. But a willingness to talk about this and a willingness to understand what SUD is, you know. I would say when I started in this space, not even I knew myself included, didn't know about how it's a disease, how it comes to be, how people who suffer from it are not at fault, how people ... there are dozens of options for people: all of these things are making their way into policy, which 10-15 years ago, we probably never imagined that.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Well, I mean, that definitely leads to the next question of what is what do you find harder nowadays than you did back then?

Andrew Kessler
What I find harder is because more people are talking about this issue on Capitol Hill, but still don't have a comprehensive, thorough understanding of what it takes to solve the problem. That can create some really bad friction. It used to be that if no one understood the issue, or no one was talking about the issue, it was hard to get discouraged about nothing being done. Now, a lot of members of Congress want to talk about the issue. But they're not necessarily willing to commit the resources to solving the issue, which is very common in Washington. I don't want anyone to think that we're alone in that regard.

One of the biggest issues of the day, on all the newscasts than all the social media is immigration. And that's an issue we've been talking about for decades in Washington where politicians love to talk about it. They just don't like to do anything about it. So that's become one of the more frustrating, you know, the you know, politicians will say, we've got to do more, we've got to do more. You'll say okay, here's what we need to do, and it doesn't get done. So whereas ... Do I prefer that to no one talking about it? Yes, of course I prefer people talking about it to no one and talking about it, but it creates a level of frustration and a level of of confusion, because people outside the Beltway will hear what politicians say, but rarely see what politicians do. So that level of frustration has probably become one of the one of the greater challenges we face.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Now, I know you probably don't have an average day, quote unquote, but in terms of, you know, and typically walk me through what it's like being an advocate. I mean, I'm assuming it's lots of meetings.

Andrew Kessler
Absolutely, no, there is no average day. But there are average blocks of time. You as an advocate can ... well, it used to be the old rules are kind of out the window. It used to be you could tell by what time of year you're in what you would be working on. And within that time, so for example, right now, we're in early March, and that is traditionally a time for appropriations, which is the funding programs by the federal government. For those of you for your audience who listens to this, who might be familiar with their states or their counties or their municipalities getting funding from the federal government to work on any number of issues concerning SUD: that is what we call the appropriations process.

Anything that is funded by the federal government, that is not mandatory spending, and mandatory spending is basically Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, veterans benefits, interest on the national debt. Those things are always going to be paid for. Everything else, whether it's transportation, agriculture, defense, justice, health and human services. Pretty much every dime has to go through something called the appropriations process. So February, March is usually working on that funding.

When we're not working on funding, yeah, you pretty much nailed it. It's meetings. There are thousands of pieces of legislation introduced every year. How many of them become law? Fewer and fewer, unfortunately. But my quote, average day, is looking for either legislation or federal regulations, through something called the rulemaking process, which is done through executive agencies like the Department of Health and Human Services, looking for opportunities to insert our priorities. That's probably, you know, there's this misnomer that an advocate or a lobbyist is only working on legislation. That is not the case. Because there are like I said, there's opportunities like rulemaking.

So for example, there was recently a rule change concerning methadone. That was not legislation, that was rulemaking. There was recently a rule change concerning patient confidentiality, that was subsequent to legislation. So there's lots of moving parts in government and what you're doing what your tip, quote, unquote, typical day is, is looking for opportunities to make sure the people you represent have their positions heard.

So for example, my work for NBHAP is to make sure behavioral health providers are getting opportunities either to expand the types of services they can provide that could be possibly covered by Medicaid or covered by veterans benefits, or in the criminal justice system. Always looking for opportunities to say, 'Hey, if we made this change, or we made this addition, it would be of great benefit to the people I represent.' So a lot of it's looking for opportunities. And a lot of it is trying to make the changes you need to make to make sure that the people you represent are operating at maximum efficiency when it comes to federal regulations.

So in addition, there is a lot of time we spend, that advocates spend that has nothing to do with either legislation or rulemaking and that's education. I spend a lot of my time on webinars, on you know, in meetings to learn more about the latest developments in behavioral health and substance use disorder. An advocate must be educated. I can't just go to Capitol Hill, or the White House, or agencies with the same story every time. I need to know what the latest and greatest is. So if there are advances in methadone, in medication assisted treatment, in inpatient treatment and outpatient treatment, in youth treatment and prevention in recovery residences, if there are advances, I need to know about those because policymakers are always want to know what the climate is.

So I spend a lot of my time educating myself so I can make a cogent argument or a cogent precen ... I don't wanna say argument because it's not always confrontational, a cogent presentation, to policymakers to let them know, we're making advances in this space. We are making progress, the money you have invested in the past, whether it be through SAMSA, or Veterans Affairs, or the Department of Justice, the money you've invested is leading to advances. You need to show lawmakers, 'Hey, the investment is paying off.' So by participating in these webinars or these briefings and learning what is out there, what you're doing is showing lawmakers, 'Hey, we are not static. We are constantly moving forward. And we're constantly trying to better the treatment and services we provide for the communities we serve.' So that's a big part of it.

And the last big block is coalition meetings. No one goes it alone in Washington. And I mean, no one. I sit on at least four or five different coalitions, because that's where we share information. The most important commodity in Washington other than your phonebook and people you can contact is the most like, as I said before, recent information. And in these coalition meetings, I heard ... you talk to people, I heard this, I heard that, this office is interested, that office is not interested. One hour in a coalition meeting can save me several hours down the road by knowing which offices to approach, what they're interested in. So whether it be the Coalition for Health Funding, the Mental Health Liaison Group, the Addiction Leadership Group, I'm part of a coalition concerning the opioid settlement funds, I'm part of a coalition for all behavioral health called the Coalition for Whole Health ... coalition meetings. So it's a mishmash, and I can't give you a typical day. But like I said, the time of year will kind of dictate where I am going to be busiest.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Great, that gave me a couple of different questions. First of all, with regards to legislation, can you walk me through what it's like to write a piece of legislation and kind of the plusses and minuses and the process of that?

Andrew Kessler
Yeah, absolutely. It's for the for people my age, and I don't know how many are out there listening to you. And, and probably your age, the starting point, the reference point we all have is a little ditty called, 'I'm just a Bill on Capitol Hill' from a great TV program called Schoolhouse Rock. Those were these little animated snippets you caught on Saturday morning cartoons. And there's a very famous one of a piece of paper sitting on Capitol Hill, who explains how a bill becomes a law.

And the real simple version is: one chamber, the House, writes a law. The other chamber ... and passes it, the other chamber passes it, then the President can decide to either sign it, in which case it becomes a law, or veto it in which case it doesn't. That is like saying, 'Yeah, you go to the moon in a rocket, end of story.' Building, the rocket, calculating the launch, the all the million things that could go wrong are kind of glossed over. And that's where the the devil is really in the detail.

So when it comes to substance use disorder treatment, it's very difficult to regulate private insurance. Very, very difficult. But what the government can do is regulate Medicare and Medicaid. So what you will do is go back to the very beginning where Medicare and Medicaid were created back in the 60s and amend and say, you add substance use disorders or you add inpatient treatment, or you add outpatient treatment. Or if you're talking about workforce, and SUD counselors weren't covered or allowed to do certain things, in that bill, you add SUD counselors. So a lot of it is finding what already exists and adding on to it, whether that be treatment services, recovery services, prevention services, so on and so forth.

So in writing legislation, what you're usually doing is you're never creating something out of whole cloth. You're usually amending something. There are these ... in the United States Code, which has our our laws written down. There's the Social Security Act, there's the Americans Disability Act, there's the Affordable Care Act, you know, there's all these old laws that kind of make up our system of health care. And what you're often seeking to do is amend those to expand what services can be provided. So for example, working in SUD, let's say there's a program that says for example, a lot of the work I do ... the federal government, believe it or not, is very limited in what they can regulate.

What you need is a congressional office to work with. I am never going to sit down at my desk and say I think I'll write a law today. You need an office that says this is what we're looking for. And you work with them and you have a back and forth. Then you need a office in the other chamber. If you start in the House, you need an office in the Senate. In this day and age, odds are good you will leave two offices in each body, because you always want to try and be bipartisan.

So I don't want to discourage anyone or give anyone the wrong idea because it's a very worthwhile process when it succeeds. But from pen to paper, from idea to law, if you can do that within five to six years, you're operating at lightspeed, because a Congress is divided into two years, two sessions. Right now we're in the second session of the 118th. Congress. So it usually takes one Congress, which is two years, to flesh out the idea: what are we really want to do, here's an outline, here's an idea. Let's start getting pen to paper. It takes a whole nother Congress of back and forth to say, 'These are the finer points, this is what must go in must come out. This is what is workable, this is when' you know. So ....

And then by then after maybe a couple of years, you got to start shopping it around, which you might have done earlier in the process. But in any event, I once worked on a piece of legislation that we worked, there were hundreds of us working on it, it was and at the end of the day, from the idea on the back of a napkin to it passing Congress, I think was about four years, like three years, 10 months. And that was absolutely blown away by how fast that got done. So that's an example.

But the short answer is, you're never really making anything up out of whole cloth, you're always taking what is there and trying to expand. Or at least in my space. In other areas, maybe not. But SUD, the real challenge of substance use disorder advocacy is you have this whole healthcare system out there, which is not perfect, or even great to begin with, that you're trying to be part of some more people can have access to it. And so what you're doing is you're seeking to expand other services to include substance use disorders. That is how ideas get started when creating legislation.

And let me say something before you even ask it. There's two types of legislation. One is for the most part regulatory, which says 'so and so can do this.' An SUD counselor can build Medicare, for example. That's regulatory. There's also the creation of programs. The creation of a grant program that I'm just going to make something up off the top of my head, I don't want your listeners to think this is real, that counties and municipalities can apply to, in order to hire more people to work at methadone clinics, blah, I just made something up, you know. Now, if it's a grant program, even if the legislation passes, then you have to year after year go back to what I was talking about before -- the appropriations process, and fund the grant.

So when even when you write a law, and you're successful, if it's grant-based, and it's about budget and money, you're never really done with it, because you have to keep going back year after year, and keep asking for the money. So if you're going to write a law, be ready for it to be a lifetime haul because, and I've done this, there is legislation I've worked on, it passed about six years ago, and every year, I've got to go back and say, 'Let's fund it, let's fund it. Let's fund it.' So you know, part of its, you know, part of the time you're breaking new ground, and part of the time is Groundhog Day. And you're just doing the same thing. And it's a combination of those two that you know that you have to balance.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Now, you mentioned earlier that, you know, a good chunk of your job is also just keeping informed and, you know, educating yourself. What kind of resources do you use on a regular basis that we can maybe provide to people who might be interested?

Andrew Kessler
You know, there are lots and lots of organizations out there some government funded some privately funded or association funded, that are always hosting webinars or seminars or whatever you want to call them. Like, for example, the National Academy of Sciences has a Behavioral Health Division. You know, every couple of months, they'll have a webinar. You know, there's groups like the American Psychiatric Association, has webinars on the latest in psychiatric treatment of SUD. There's National Council of behavioral health is constantly having webinars. There's ...

I mean, really, what it comes down to is for me, finding them in my email box. You know, we all get hundreds if not more emails a day and, you know, I'll get an announcement, you know, save the date webinar or blah blah. Government entities that may do it: the Office of National Drug Control Policy will every so often host webinars on the latest in terms of policy developments. So you could really ... there are you could really find them anywhere. But I am on tons and tons of mailing lists that just flood my inbox with you know, 'hey, you know, webinar are on methadone, webinar or on workforce development, webinar on recovery. If you're interested in recovery, NARR is a good resource -- National Alliance of Recovery Residences for information on that. You know, they always have good information, Faces and Voices of Recovery, Mobilize Recovery.

I mean, there's literally hundreds, if not thousands of organizations out there that are dedicated to this issue. And sometimes some of us who've worked in this space wish, you know, maybe there, if we could all unite, we'd be a stronger voice. But that's a story for another day. There's lots of resources out there for people in this space who want to stay informed about t the latest developments.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Now, if someone wanted to get into becoming an advocate, what would be some of your advice?

Andrew Kessler
Well, first of all, I have to I gotta throw the question back at you. Do you mean a citizen advocate or a professional advocate? Because there's a difference.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
True. Let's start first with citizen.

Andrew Kessler
One of my pet peeves is people who start at the national level and don't know what's going on in their backyard. Every member of Congress, I shouldn't say every... a good member of Congress, they know what's going on in their backyard. And if you want to sell them on your issue, you've got to tell them how there is a federal solution to their local problem. So get involved locally, is always first. If you're a counselor, there's your state, you know, counseling association, if you are a recovery residence, you know, like I said, there's NARR (National Alliance of Recovery Residences). If you're a prevention specialists, there's coalitions for prevention, like CADCA, and so on and so forth. That's one, and they will all be able to point you in the direction of this is how you get involved locally.

If you want to be a citizen advocate, you always start local. That's always been my advice. So if you're listening to this webinar, let's say you're in California and you're an SUD counselor: get involved with CCAPP, California Consortium of Addiction Programs and Professionals. Go to their website, get on their mailing lists, find out you know, what programs they're offering, what webinars they're offering, what educational services they have. Always start local and work your way up.

You start to work your way up, maybe at the state level. Find out who in your state is working on this issue. And then you get to the national level: who's working on this level nationally. But don't ... a lot of people make the false assumption that Congress is all powerful. I will tell you this: on this issue, the key to success is the county governments on the SUD issue. The counties bear the brunt. Who has to provide all the ambulances for all the overdoses? Usually it's the counties. Who funds the hospitals where overdose patients go? It's the counties. Who funds the police force? It's the counties. And where does money find its way, when money, when federal money goes to the states, where does it make its way down to for local services? It's the counties. Find out what's going on in your county, before you do anything else if you want to be a serious, serious advocate. And then you work up from there. County money comes from somewhere, usually the state. State money comes from somewhere. Sometimes from the state's own funds, sometimes from the federal government. So that's my advice: know what is going on locally, find out what's going on locally, get informed locally, things will take care of themselves from there.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Before we move on to the next question, a quick plug for a NBHAP resource. We do have a page where you can Find your Rep and that's on all levels local as well as national. Just go to the BHAP website (NBHAP.org). And look for that find rep. Now let's talk about the professional as a career. What would you suggest in terms of advice?

Andrew Kessler
Well, first thing you got to do is get a taste for humidity and come to Washington, DC. It's interesting because after the COVID pandemic, I had a lot of friends who .. or during the COVID pandemic, I had a lot of friends who split Washington and they're professional advocates. They spent about half their time in DC, half their time in another city. And if your budget and calendar can do that, then you do it. But nothing is more important in being an advocate than being seen and being known. Showing up is more than half the battle, because eventually, the people who make the policies are going to think, 'Who do I know that can help me with this?' And they're going to remember who shows up.

So ... now, I don't want to give anyone the wrong idea that, again, the federal government is the be all end all, you can be a professional advocate at the state level, I have friends in Sacramento, I have friends in Jefferson City, Missouri, I have friends in Albany, I have friends in Austin, Texas, I have friends in Atlanta, in Denver. You can be a professional advocate at the state level. And it's important, as I just said, it just went on and on about how important things are locally. But whether you're at the state level, or whether you're at the federal level, you have to be prepared to be seen. People have to know who you are. The other thing is, you have to have a passion for it. And I don't mean your subject matter. Well, yes, your subject matter, but also for the process of advocacy.

There's really, it's interesting, there's two types of professional advocates in Washington, DC. There are those who are here because they believe extremely deeply in their cause. And these would be, for example, take any association, I'm talking about the American Psychological Association: maybe you're a psychologist, and you believe in the profession of psychology so much you want to advocate for it. You're a psychologist who advocates for psychology, that's one.

The other kind is me. I just love policy in DC, and, you know, the ability to create change through the process. And SUD happens to be the subject matter I work on. But in either case, you've got to have a passion, this is not a punch in at 9:00, punch out at 5:00, kind of job. And I don't mean that the hours are absolutely unforgiving. There are people who work more, you know, ER surgeons or police officers and paramedics or you know, work, you know, more ridiculous hours. What I'm talking about is being so passionate that when someone says I need you to show up, you show up.

And from there, the other thing it takes is the ability to communicate in a variety of forms. Sometimes brevity is your friend. And you know, probably more often than not, you have to sum up everything in your space in two paragraphs, because most emails longer than two paragraphs in this town? They're not getting read, you know. But sometimes you're called in for a meeting and those could last 20 minutes. Can you talk for 20 minutes? And it's, you know, kind of having a sense for which one is called for. So in addition to having the passion for the issue and the process, you have to be able to know, 'How do I best communicate?' Because it's, I would love to think and lots of people would love to think that policy makers act on issues because it's the right thing to do. And out of the goodness of their heart. Okay, maybe once in a while.

The key is getting policymakers to act, because it will make them feel like they have scored a win. So you have to be able to say, 'Here's why my issue and you working on it is a win for you,' i.e., votes. You know? There are members of Congress who are here to do the right thing. Sure. Yes, there are senators that are here to do the right thing. Yes, sure. But how far will that get you with the other 534? That's why I say all this. I'm not saying you are have to communicate to get one member of Congress on your side. I'm saying you have to communicate to get enough to get your bills passed on your side. And the way to do that is to translate your issue into a win for them.

And it doesn't have to be SUD: you don't have to ... I don't have to convince a member of Congress that they have to care about SUD to get a quote win with them. This is audio so I'm making the air quotes. I can walk into a congressman's or congresswoman's office ... if they're big on Veterans Affairs, I could talk about SUD in the veteran community. And they want to hear about that. If their big thing is teachers. I could talk about SUD in schools. If their big thing is military, I could talk about SUD in the Department of Defense. If their big thing is criminal justice reform, I can talk about SUD in jails and prisons. So you have to be able to take what your issue is, and be able to communicate it in a way that the member of Congress or policymaker you are talking to will say I want a piece of that. That's how you become an advocate.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
And then if you could go back in time to When you were first starting, what would be the advice you'd give yourself?

Andrew Kessler
If I could go back in time to the time I first starting the advice I would give myself is probably buy stock in Apple Computer. Because I was start ....

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Regarding advocacy. Regarding the job.

Andrew Kessler
okay, well, she won't do but on advocacy Ooh.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Or phrased better: what's the biggest lesson you learned?

Andrew Kessler
No, it's ... I hear you saying I'm trying to, I'm trying to try to say I've seen a lot of changes, obviously. It's funny, I mentioned Apple Computer, when I came to DC not to sound like a dinosaur, but one of my first jobs on the internship as an intern, we had to take a pile of mail every day and walk it from our office, three blocks off the Capitol, up to the Capitol and drop it off at the offices that had to go to. Why? Because we didn't have email. You know, it's just it was such a different time. I'm just trying to think of, you know, the differences.

I think, I think a lot of young advocates learn this: play the long game. This is not a place for instant results. This is not a place where like I said, you say I've got an idea and you write a law and it passes and you do your happy dance like, you know, like Snoopy, it's, it's just not. Learn patience. Also, the other thing I would probably say is, and this may sound cynical, but it's realistic, and I am in the game of in the business of succeeding: whenever you are going to work in an area that is young, and for lack of a better term fledgling, start thinking about a PAC, a political action committee. Never underestimate the role of fundraising in your success. And that's one of the first lessons I wish I had learned in Washington, or at least, I did learn it, I wish I'd taken it a little more seriously.

The ability, the access you have with a PAC is tremendous. With a well funded PAC. You get to certain members of Congress in settings that are less crowded, and you get an opportunity, not necessarily to change their minds, but to just get on their radar. So yeah, working in this space, I would have said, if you had said to me, you know, 20 years ago, you're gonna go out on your own, you're gonna form Slingshot Solutions. You want to be a success and advocacy. 20 years ago, I would have said, on a parallel track to building Slingshot Solutions, build a PAC that went to the issues I'm working on as well. That's probably the one lesson I would have liked to learn a lot earlier.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Now the difficult question. Last time I checked, you're a human not a robot. How do you keep yourself bipartisan and especially in today's world where politics is becoming more and more?

Andrew Kessler
Yeah, you've got to compartmentalize. It's the game. Look, every game has rules. You can't play baseball, and as the ball is pitched to you catch it and throw it over the shortstop's head for the single. It's against the rules. In playing football, you can't kick someone to tackle them, you must use your arms. It's the rule. One of the rules in Washington is keep your eyes on what's in front of you.

So how do you keep it bipartisan? I think it goes back to the way you phrased the question about being a human and not a robot. The people you're dealing with are also human. They're never going to agree with you 100% of the time. Be happy if you can get them to agree with you a little bit on what you're talking about right in front of you. I do get this question a lot from friends of mine who work in Washington, not on Capitol Hill. Believe it or not, I have friends who are lawyers, computer programmers, journalists, you know, and they asked me that same question, how do you do it? So I may be talking to a member of a party that doesn't believe in my big picture solutions, but I'm talking about an issue in front of them, a very small part of the solution that they do agree with. Take the win.

The rule is don't sacrifice that just because they don't believe in the big picture. That's the the rule. It's not for everybody, but nothing is. I don't want to sound like I'm such a you know, I'm so skilled or such a special breed that I'm one of the few people who can do this. Because I could never be a doctor. Why? Because I pass out in any emergency room. I could never be, you know, a mathematician. Why? Because even though I'm good at math, I could not sit still pouring in front of numbers all day, it would drive me crazy. Everyone has a skill suited to what they're good for. Being able to, you know, stay focused on the conversation at hand and being able to communicate is one of my strengths. So keeping my cool some people especially my wife would say is not one of my strengths, but she only knows me in a personal setting, not in a professional setting.

You know, a good poker face, the ability to stay focused only on what you're talking about. That is how you do it. Is there frustration due to the lack of bipartisanship? Yeah, there's frustration, Is there moments of, you know, blowing off steam? Of course, there's more, we all have to blow off steam. There's moments of that. But it's really kind of an intangible that I wish I could explain, but the best rule to follow is, for the time you're meeting with someone, stay focused only on what you're talking about. And that is it.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Awesome. Now, before we go into how people can find you, was there something that you thought I was going to ask, but didn't or that you wanted to talk about that? We haven't?

Andrew Kessler
Well, you know, just just how, um, you know, I thought you might ask about, you know, kind of, like the SUD issue in general, and how, how I see things, you know, shaping up in the present in the future?

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Go ahead.

Andrew Kessler
Yeah, it's really kind of a matter of perspective. You know, those funky camera shots where it starts on like one house in a villa, and they zoom out and you see the neighborhood, and they zoom out, you see the village, and they zoom out, you see the city, and the state, and the United States, and the Earth, and the solar system. You know, it all depends on which point of which camera angle you're at, you know? In the moment, the fact that 110,000 people die every year of an overdose or a substance use disorder, and we're really not investing what we need to is frustrating. But if you zoom out, you see that we have invested billions of dollars in this issue, whereas 10 years ago, that was beyond anyone's wildest dreams. So are we making progress? Yeah, we're making excellent progress. But are we where we need to be? No, we're not anywhere near to where we need to be. The analogy I use is, imagine you've fallen down 100 foot well, and you've gotten up 30 feet. That's great, you're 30 feet closer than you were to getting out. But you still have twice as far to go as you've made it.

So it's keeping perspective. And in this day and age where you talked about bipartisanship, and how do you deal with it? We're at a point right now where bipartisanship is having a different kind of impact. It used to be, I disagree with you, this got a vote, it won or lost, on to the next thing. Bipartisanship, or the lack of bipartisanship now is holding up the whole process: less and less is actually getting passed. That's more of a frustration. So it's not that there's a weak stomach for SUD: there's a kind of a weak stomach in DC for everything. We're kind of a victim of the whole process right now. I think there's a lot of good stuff sitting there waiting to be passed. We have plenty of members of Congress who have cooperated with us on excellent legislation concerning methadone, concerning recovery, concerning workforce. The legislation has been written. And it's stalled in a traffic jam. And I don't think that's the fault of a lack of interest in SUD, I think that's a, you know, a greater systematic problem we're facing. But overall, compared to 2013, I am really happy with where we are. Looking just at 2024 and looking in a vacuum at 110,000 overdose a year and overly a couple of billion dollars going to the problem? I'm not. So it's all a matter of what day, what hour, what minute is and which which lens I want to look through.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Awesome. Now if someone wanted to hear more about you, or contact you, where would they go?

Andrew Kessler
My website, www.slingshotsolutions.net. And I am also on Twitter at slingshotDC but be warned unless you're ready for rants, the New York Giants and other things that may pique my personal interest -- There's a little policy there too. The best place for policy where there's absolutely no personal biases or interests anywhere is LinkedIn. I keep that 100% professional. So you can find Andrew Kessler in Fairfax, Virginia, on LinkedIn and that is where most of my professional postings go. It used to be on Twitter, not the biggest fan of Twitter anymore for a variety of reasons. So Twitter's a little more place for personal ranting, which I guarantee you was quite amusing, and you'll definitely be entertained. But if you want to find me and talk just professional issues, my LinkedIn profile Andrew Kessler is probably the best.

Angie Fiedler Sutton
Awesome. You've been listening to Destination Change. Our guest today was Andrew Kessler. Thanks for being here. Our theme song was "Sun Nation" by Ketsa and used via Creative Commons licensed by the Free Music Archive.

Please consider rating and reviewing the podcast on Apple podcasts so we get more listeners. In the meantime, you can always see more about the podcast including show notes and where else listen on our website, www.nbhap.org. You can also get our advocacy information there. If you have any questions for the podcast please email us at info@nbhap.org Thanks for listening.