Kevin Roberts

You sound like a Knicks fan.

I was trying to trigger you.

I'm a Celtics fan.

I was just growing to like you.

Come on now.

The American people.

No, the people.

Now, some of the – when I say people, I really mean everyday Americans, people who are small business owners, blue-collar workers, grandmas, whoever they are.

Now, of course, several hundred thousand of them will also be donors to us, for the most part, small donors, and we very much treasure them.

So in no way am I being dismissive or ungrateful, obviously, but the reason Heritage has been so successful –

The reason people call us, other people say this about us, we try not to engage in this, call us the most influential conservative think tank in the world is because we put the American people first.

And so I'll tell you a story that underscores this.

A few years ago, four years ago now, I was asked to come into a meeting of Republican senators to try to, by the conservative senators in the Republican conference, stop the end of your omnibus, which is just fancy Washington speak for spending more money that we don't have.

i went in and i said i'm not here on behalf of my colleagues who are budget scholars although i rely on their work i'm not here on behalf of our board although i'm grateful for their service and i'm definitely not here on behalf of you know my importance whatever that may be or not be i'm here on behalf of heritage members and i have to speak on their behalf and say you have to stop spending this money that mindset

that has allowed us to be influential because we then pair that with what I think is the policy brilliance of our colleagues.

And then in some cases, policymakers who are willing to become our spokesmen on things.

Probably not.

I've talked to Charlie about that, although I forget what theirs is.

And part of that is Heritage is one of the two or three largest membership-driven organizations.

And because a lot of that is through snail mail, that donor base will skew older.