PAWcast: A Republican and a Democrat Take a Road Trip and Search For Common Ground

Jordan Blashek is from the Class of 2009, and his co-author, Chris Haugh, is a UC, Berkley graduate; the pair met while in law school together at Yale. Blashek served for five years as an infantry officer with the United States Marines and is now part of a new company called Schmidt Futures, founded by former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, Class of 1976, which works on a wide array of public-interest projects. Chris has served as a speechwriter for the State Department and is a journalist who has written for The San Francisco Chronicle and The Atlantic. In their new book, ”Union: A Democrat, a Republican, and a Search for Common Ground,” Jordan, a Republican, and Chris, a Democrat, describe a series of road trips they took throughout the last four years, arguably some of our country’s most politically divisive. During these cross-country journeys, the two friends worked at finding common ground in their political differences while also meeting with people from all over the nation — and even in Mexico — who are the most impacted by United States policies and its politics.