Hello, I'm Zeke and welcome to the Zekely podcast. Let's talk Pennsylvania.

The guest I have today is a graduate of Rutgers Law School and served as Montgomery County, Pennsylvania's assistant district attorney where he prosecuted cases involving sexual assaults and economic crimes against the elderly. Currently, he is serving as prothonotary for Montgomery County.

Thank you so much for being here, Noah Marlier.

For years, I’ve knocked thousands of doors all over Pennsylvania and poured my heart and soul into supporting candidates and causes that make a difference—from local school board races to national elections. The personal is political, and I take every election in Pennsylvania personally.

Where the mainstream media has failed you, I will give you truth and independence. You’ll hear from Democratic leaders, candidates, and change-makers who are working to improve the health of the Commonwealth, and it won’t be boring as hell.

No matter where you are, I’ll meet you with hope and a plan to make your community better one day at a time. Welcome to the Zekely Podcast. Let’s talk Pennsylvania.

Thank you so much. I'm excited to be here.

It's so great to see you. I mean usually I ask people have you ever been on a podcast before but this is not your first rodeo, right? You've been on a lot of podcasts

Let me tell you, when you're the prothonotary, you are in demand.

I can

see you are a very eclectic guy and we're talk all about it. I'm so excited you're here We'll play some games get to know all about you. So let's get right into it. Okay?

Sounds good.

All right, so Noah for the guests. What the hell is a prothonotary?

That's a good question. you did great. You already pronounced it the right way. Prothonotary. And when I spell it, every time I spell it, I have to say Prothonotary. And I've been the prothonotary for the last five years and I still have to say it that way in my head.

Yes. Yes.

Yeah.

The Prothonotary is a really important position. It's where you file legal papers with the county in the Prothonotary's office. So I run an office, I'm a countywide elected official. I run an office with 27 employees and I need to make sure that that office is run effectively and efficiently because when people are filing for divorce or getting sued or suing somebody, being evicted from their home, when they're being abused in a relationship and need help from the courts, when they're doing a name change.

All of those legal filings get filed through the Prothonotary's office. Now, nothing criminal, none of the criminal matters get filed in my office, but almost everything else does.

Okay.

And how long is the term for prothonotary? Four years.

Four years, so I'm

a year and a half almost into my second term.

second term and there's no limit to how many terms you can serve as prothonotary.

No, listen, Zeke, every little boy's dream, third term for prothonotary.

I

know, we won't amend the constitution in the county, okay, so we'll just leave it the way it is.

No, don't... Don't... Constitution, that's right.

Well, what was it like serving as an assistant district attorney and what motivated you to pursue this position of prothonotary?

Yeah, so I think there's a line, a through line throughout all the things I've done in my adult life and that's trying to serve the public, serve my community, and specifically here in Montgomery County. So I graduated law school,

and when I got out, you know, I had opportunities to take the job at the big law firm downtown or to go to the Philadelphia DA's office, but frankly, I wanted to come home and I wanted to serve here in Montgomery County. So in the four years after I graduated law school, I was a DA right here in Monco. I prosecuted mainly economic crimes. I was in the economic crimes unit, but I prosecuted all kinds of crimes, domestic violence, sexual assault, aggravated assault, and all throughout the county.

And what was really incredible about being a DA was a lot of people think, you know, the DA comes in, he or she is one part of the system. The DA is a very integral, important part of the system because the DA sets right from the jump the offer that's on the table to the person who's being accused of a crime. And that's a lot of power, a lot of power.

You come in and you say, I'm going to offer you four years in jail or four years probation. That can totally change where that case goes.

Yeah.

And then how did that merge into wanting to be a prothonotary?

So after I was a DA, I was an attorney for five years representing municipalities all through Montgomery County, some in Bucks County as well, townships, zoning, hearing boards, sewer authorities, but all municipal government. So I got to represent people that were elected officials or were appointed by elected officials. And I really thought that was an important job guiding them.

to follow the law, to do the things that they wanted to do, many of them Democrats with liberal ideology. And I helped them, helped them find their way in government. And during that time, I started getting involved politically myself.

And that led me into running for prothonotary. So I, you know, I did not know what a prothonotary was frankly, until I became a lawyer. It wasn't my dream growing up, but I did always want to run for office.

But as a lot of people found out after...

Now, do you have to be an attorney to be a Prothonotary? Okay.

don't have to be an attorney. And

frankly, there hadn't been an attorney in the position for a long time. I believe it helps me.

You know, again, as prothonotary, you're working with the courts, you're working with judges, how things get filed. And I knew how things got filed. I knew some of the issues. So, you know, a lot of my support comes from attorneys, Republican and Democrat, who really, really appreciate somebody who knows the system being in that position.

As we discussed, there are no term limits to prothonotaries, but if it was your dream to be a state rep, Noah, I think that that dream can be a reality someday for you.

I think our state rep, Napoleon Nelson is doing a heck of a job and he's a good guy and a friend of mine. as long as he wants that position, man, God bless.

Well, know, that's fine. Hey, but if

he ever, you know, wants to move on, the dream can still become a reality.

I feel like I already know the answer to this question, but are you a big Phillies fan?

Okay, I didn't just look down at my phone to see if they won an extra innings. I didn't do they won four to three. I didn't do it during a podcast.

Okay, it's fine. Well, that's good.

That's good. I'm sure you are, as most people are who live in the Philadelphia area and Pennsylvania, because I am extremely vulnerable when it comes to sports. mean, if anyone watches or listens to this podcast, you know, I am very sports deficient. So in the spirit of good fun, I'm going to give you permission to roast me about my lack of knowledge about the Phillies. Okay, so I'm going to allow you to ask me three questions about the Phillies that anybody should know.

Gotcha.

Okay.

Okay, but that I'm gonna show you that I do not know and I'm going to humble myself to my viewers Okay, and I hope I don't lose view. I'm actually lose viewers. This may not this may this may backfire actually Now that I'm thinking about this may backfire But I'm gonna do it anyway because I have no shame. Okay, so ask me three questions about the Phillies that any Person with a heartbeat should know in Pennsylvania

Maybe, but it's good. All right.

Number one, who is their biggest home run hitter?

When he hits a home run, it's called a schwerbomb.

Schwartze? Is it Schwartze the... this is embarrassing. I don't know. Who is it? I don't know! I don't know. And it's embarrassing because my wife Jess is a die-hard Braves fan. Atlanta Braves. It's a long story. Actually, previous podcast episodes I've talked about it. She probably knows all of the answers to this question.

I'll sh- a whopper? Come on, you don't know this? Okay.

Yes. ⁓

just by her super peripheral knowledge, even I don't pick up that from her. Okay, so first one I bombed.

I'm

she's incredible besides that.

Yeah, she is amazing. She is. Yeah. And the fact that I don't follow sports doesn't bother me that she likes the Braves. Alright, so I failed the first one. Good. Two more. Two more.

I feel like,

okay, I feel like I can see his face. I feel like, didn't he hurt his hand recently or something? Okay, okay, hold on, but I don't know if I know his name. my God, I don't know if I know. I'm not, this is not an act.

Yes, you're on it.

This is incredible.

You can

name all three justices that need to be retained, but you don't know Bryce Harper.

Yeah, okay, see Bryce Harper. I can

see his face and I feel like I saw something on Facebook where he hurt his hand or something, but that's as much as I knew. Okay, Bryce Harper. There you go. All right, so Bob in the second one. Okay, third one.

that algorithm got it all wrong when they gave you that.

Harper was in elementary school.

Jimmy.

Hafer?

This is fun. This is like

Chase. Oh,

Chase Utley? Did I get that one right? Okay, Chase Utley. right. That was just like in the recesses of my brain.

You got it, yeah.

all right. Well, that just further proves that I know nothing about sports and I'm comfortable with that because I know, I mean, look, you are amazing. Obviously, you can juggle Philly's knowledge and politics. I just, I do the doctoring and I do the politics and I haven't made an

That was pretty incredible. Okay.

What kind of doctoring

do you do, by the way?

Anesthesia critical care. So I do anesthesiology and I also do critical care for cardiothoracic surgery.

my

favorite politicians was an anesthesiologist. Yeah, Dr. Valerie R. Cush.

Yeah? Who's that?

yeah, of course, of course, I should know that, yes.

Yeah, she actually came and lectured when I was a resident, going through anesthesia residency in Albany, New York. She was a speaker there, so yeah, she's lovely.

Well, again, I'm sorry, but not sorry. I don't know a lot about sports.

normally I only do the next segment for state reps, okay? But you provide so many services for people that I've decided to make an exception for you. So let's do a little constitu-what? Where you tell me all the things that your office offers to people in the county.

Okay.

My philosophy on governing and running an office is you wake up every morning and you ask yourself one question. That is, how can you help people who need help the most? So my office, a few minutes ago, I went over a lot of the different kinds of filings that are filed in my

And I run the office effectively and efficiently for all those people that file legal papers. But when I ask myself who needs help the most, you're talking about people that are being evicted from their home. So we make it as easy as possible, lower barriers for people to appeal their evictions. There are district judges in Lower Merion They may evict somebody in their court.

that person being evicted can appeal that eviction in my office. So during COVID, the courthouse was shut down. People were being evicted. Some evictions still were happening, but they couldn't appeal their eviction to the court of common pleas because the courthouse was shut down. I worked with the county commissioners to open a special annex office outside the courthouse just so people could appeal their evictions. And here's why that's important. Over a year, over a year,

That's incredible.

five to 10 people a week were being evicted. And if they couldn't appeal that eviction, they would be on the streets. When you appeal your eviction, you can potentially keep yourself in the home while you're appealing.

And so those five to 10 people, you do the math, for over a year the courthouse is closed, five to 10 people a week, we kept those people in their home while they were able to appeal. That's an issue that disproportionately impacts people of color in our county.

And I wanted to make sure that those people that really were struggling, by definition, if you're being evicted, you don't have a lot of money, most likely. Can't afford an attorney, but they should have their day in court. And we made sure of that. Another thing we do is name changes. We do a name change clinic every year for the last three years that has been unbelievably successful. So proud of this. So 15 to 20 people,

last three years get to have 30 minutes with a lawyer that does this pro bono. It's fantastic.

The name change process, not the most complicated legal matter there is, but it can be really overwhelming to, let's say, somebody who's transitioning. And they want their name to match the way they present gender-wise. And that alignment can mean the world to them, right? It can be something that just is liberating. And you see it in court, you see people just...

breathe a sigh of relief and a huge smile on their face. And so this name change clinic, do cater it to the LGBTQ plus community. It's open to anyone above 18 years

And the third one that I would focus on, if I could just touch on this one real quick, it's so important. We take in 30 to 50 petitions for protection from abuse a week. to 50 people suffering from domestic violence in the county per week.

Yeah, sure.

And we have lowered the barriers for those folks. We have made it easier. We do outreach programs. We've done our literature in multiple languages. Go to every public event I could possibly go to to talk about helping survivors of domestic violence. We're talking women that come into my office with bruises on their face, bruises on their arms from being abused that morning or the night before. They have their children with

And we've created a number of programs that we're really excited to go into with you to help those folks.

Yeah,

yeah, we're going to talk about those a little bit later, but you have such an eclectic office. There's so many things that you offer for people in need, and I'll be sure to advertise your websites. can log on and check out all the other things that you offer, but so important, so important. It's, know, local issues affect you locally, and you know, you're a local politician, and that's just so wonderful that you offer all those services for people, and that I'm sure a lot of people listening or watching have never even heard of before.

That's right. you know, Montgomery County also, you touched on the local aspect of it, but it's also 860,000 people, right? it's bigger in population than four states. And so when you run an office as large as mine and in a county as large as this one, right? I mean, that comes with a lot of responsibility, a lot of responsibility.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

And it's crazy because even if you're not part of a struggling community, you could be part of a struggling community eventually, right? Like you might not be getting evicted tomorrow, but in a year you could be in that position. You might not be abused today by someone who you love, but in a year you could be. And you might not have a child who comes out as transgender, but in a year you might. And so these resources might not be for today.

Shit.

But imagine someone like you exists in the community, you'll be there for them when they need it.

you talked about this a little bit earlier, but you wrote an op-ed recently in the Inquirer about supporting members of the trans community in Montgomery County in regard to name changes. What was your inspiration to write this article? I mean, you were already doing this, but you obviously wanted to spread this message to the community. So what was your inspiration for that?

And I'm to tell you, your listeners, and anyone who will listen, and this is why I wrote that op-ed to the Inquirer, we have to support the LGBTQ plus community because it's the right thing to do.

It is the right thing to do. mean, you're not judged in your country how you treat the wealthiest people. You're judged on how you treat the most marginalized people. And I just am so honored that you are an elected official in my county and you care so much about these issues that only affect a small portion of the community. But when you help the most marginalized, you help everyone. I mean, that really it is that simple.

exactly right.

And you're doing that. I mean, you are doing the right thing every day. And I think that that is going to make a difference ultimately in the end.

And thank you. And what I would say is, you write the op-ed, right? And that's great. And people see it. And what that does is it sends the message to that community, I'm here for you. I'm here for you. And I am an elected official. So someone who is elected and in government.

cares about you. And I think that's important, but then you also have to take action, right? So you do that name change clinic and that's action. That's real tangible stuff. Those people walk out of that courtroom, they've been helped. They've been guided through that situation, that filing, and that says something to them too. And then you don't stop there. You continue to talk about it. And yes, you go to the Pride flag raising. Sure, you go to as many as you can, and I do.

and you go to the events all through June. But then you talk about it all year long, because you're right, these folks are some of the most vulnerable. Black trans women disproportionately are assaulted and murdered in this country at a disproportionate rate, highly disproportionate rate to other folks. And we need to be talking about those folks. We need to be telling them that we care about them, we're here for them.

you're not a performative ally. And for those who don't know what that means, there may be people who do go to a LGBTQ plus pride rally, or there might be people that go to a flag raising ceremony, or they might post some things on their social media during pride month, but you are not performative. You actually go into the community and you make changes to help people. That is a true ally. That is not a performative ally. And I am just so grateful that you do this for the community.

Well, that's the goal, right? That's the goal is to take real action.

Yeah,

Well, how does your office engage with the community to promote this understanding of what you offer? Because you obviously offer amazing services to people. So how are you getting the messaging out there?

Okay, so I need your help with this. So I go on every podcast I can go on. I am active on social media. So we have a Facebook, a Prothonetary Noah Marlier. We have Instagram, we have Blue Sky, we

Sure.

Mm-hmm.

boy, the Instagram,

we are unbelievably active on social media. We engage with the public through there.

We cleaned up the website dramatically. Like I said,

It is

a nice website, by the way.

Yeah, we've really tried to clean it up and make it more

accessible with the tabs that make it easier to access. Going out to the libraries, I think that's really crucial and a next step.

And I talk about this all the

meeting people where they are, right? So if you're a public servant, you need to meet people where they are. So we are taking that civil viewer that you could always look at online, but you got to pay for each sequence. So if you want to look at a document, you have to pay for it. always been able to come into my office and you can sit at our computers and you can view them for free. Taking that to every library in Montgomery County.

Mm-hmm.

okay.

nice.

because you need to meet people where they are if they want to look up their docket and do it for free. We're in Norristown Public Libraries, we're in Indian Valley Public Libraries, and we're going to spread it to every library in Montgomery County.

Yeah.

I didn't know that. So it's going to be a dedicated computer from the Prothonotary's , office so can look up your vital records.

Yeah, on the computers at the library, it's going to be a dedicated icon that you click on. Boom. You're at our civil viewer that until last year, you had to come to Norristown if you wanted to view it for free. And this is lowering the barriers for folks. is the folks that can't afford to pay the money to look up their document. They can go to the library and they can do it for free.

Mm-hmm.

huh.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm. That's

amazing. Is Montgomery County the only county in the state that offers out of public libraries?

I have not heard of any others that do this. There's many counties that don't even don't have it electronically at all, just to be clear.

I mean, I wouldn't be surprised.

That's phenomenal.

And I will say also, we've done a lot of customer service training in my office. We never end a conversation with, sorry, I can't help you with that. We say, I'm sorry, I can't help you with that here, but over on the wall are some resources and some literature for legal aid or the bar association. And there are places that can help you. And we've translated all our literature.

into at least Spanish, if not other languages as well. The county commissioners are helping me right now get some funding so that we can translate into Mandarin, Russian, Creole, all the languages that are dominant here in the county and we're going to be doing that.

It's just amazing. You really have your finger on the pulse of how to move this office forward. And I have no idea if there's a statewide conference every year of prothonotaries, but I would guarantee that if you showed up there, people would be asking you a lot of questions how to bring their area, prothonotary into the new age. It's just really great what you're doing.

So you're

going to get real jealous here. There is a statewide conference every year for the planetaries. And I know, I know you're going to want to go. The first one I went to, there was a people up on the dais talking about landlord tenant actions, a district judge from Lancaster, local district judge goes.

Okay.

I'm geeking out. I'm geeking out.

Is the prothonotary from Montgomery County here? And everyone started pointing at me. This is my first one. I'm like, you? And he said, your website and your social media is fantastic because during COVID we did on this new platform called Zoom, we did all these forums.

Ugh.

Yes it is.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

on the issue of landlord tenant, housing insecurity and homelessness. We had the county commissioners on, had state senators, state reps, judges, and he called me out from the dais So it's pretty cool.

That is awesome. mean, I love that I get to have bragging rights that Noah Marlier is the best prothonotary in Pennsylvania.

Well, you have an office manager named Linda, correct? All right. Well, we're going to play a game called Linda Listen. Listen, Linda, listen. Have you seen that video? I hope you've seen that viral video. You haven't? my gosh. There's this cute little kid who is talking to, think, his babysitter or something.

Yes.

I am not, but I'm excited to play along.

And he's like, Linda, Linda, listen, Linda, Linda, listen. Every time she wants him to do something, it's how you just Google it. It's there. It's a viral video.

Linda is the best office manager in the county. Let me tell you.

Well, this

game is dedicated to her. Okay, so I'm gonna give you some scenarios and I want you to tell me how you get me or others to listen. Listen, Linda, listen, listen, okay? So there are important judicial races coming in November. Listen, listen, tell people how important is this.

Understood.

we have three justices of the Supreme Court that have to be retained. So listen to me when I tell you, okay, the last decade or so, the Democrats, the liberal justices have controlled the Supreme Court. And here's what that's gotten you. They de-gerrymandered the congressional districts. This is crucial. You know what?

These liberal justices, I'm sure Donald Trump would call them activist justices, they had an opportunity to draw a map that highly favored Democrats. They didn't do that. They just drew a map that was fair.

If those liberal judges weren't on the Supreme court, that does not happen. And we have unfair districts that are heavily, heavily favored to Republicans, but they've also really protected other rights.

labor rights, the right to choice. They're the firewall, right? mean, God willing, Josh Shapiro gets reelected next year. He has to. And God willing, the Democrats keep the House. But those Supreme Court decisions are crucial. If those three justices are not retained, the court will flip and it'll be a conservative court. And Donald Trump will just blow his way through the lower courts to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.

and that would be a problem. Listen to me.

we're not gonna let that happen. Listen,

listen, Linda, listen, we're gonna retain vote yes for all three state Supreme Court justices this November 4th. I love

Yeah.

right, here's the last one. Linda, Linda, listen, every election is the most important election, every election. Tell them, tell them Noah

Well, listen, Linda, the prothonotary is up every four years, right? And some people might call that an off-off-year election. I call that the most important election.

Mm-hmm.

It is. I mean, there are, yeah, there

are elections every year in Pennsylvania. Every year. That's right. A primary and a general election.

Twice a twice a year.

And the general, and they're all crucial. And here's why, listen, Linda, you got the presidential's. Obviously we know that it's important. Every two years, you're voting for your congressperson. Now a lot of places are pretty gerrymandered to the point where those congressional districts are heavy favored Dem or heavy favored Republican. We got one just north of us, Bucks County that is right down.

I'm listening.

Yeah.

the middle. Next year, you we don't know who the candidate is going to be, but there's going to be a Democrat running against Fitzpatrick. And got to get him. Yeah. He's the worst because he says he's the most moderate and you know, he's the most moderate. And then he voted for the big, beautiful bill, right? That's going to reduce the taxes for the rich and squeeze the middle class. And he voted for it.

I know. ⁓

We gotta get rid of him. We gotta get rid of Fitzpatrick. He's the worst.

He's not.

I know.

And I don't know if he read the bill. Marjorie Taylor Greene says she didn't read the bill. don't know if Fitzpatrick read the bill, but I'm looking at you, Congressman. You voted for that bill. So if you want to oust him, next year's your chance. And then on the odd years, not the off years, you got local elected officials, lower Marion, all joking aside, had a very important school board race, right?

Of

Yep.

Mm-hmm.

lot of candidates came out. That primary was critical because the Democrats are going to win most likely in the general. So that's why you say twice a year. Sometimes the primaries are really

Right.

Yeah, and I know that we use the terminology off-year elections, but to me, I don't like to use any off words. Every election is the most important election, no matter what year it is, and in Pennsylvania, you should be engaged two times a year, and the best way to know what's coming down the pipeline, your local Democratic committee. Listen. Linda, listen, listen. You're gonna watch that video after we're done this. You're gonna love

Listen Linda, get involved with your Democrats.

I

Well, I noticed while stalking you on social media that you offer opportunities to high school students to shadow in your office. Now there must be some amazing young adults out there to not only search out that opportunity, but also participate at a prothonotary's office.

So can you explain what these people are doing and what their experiences have been like?

Yeah, so that's one part of an overarching project to create a pipeline of students from the Norristown School District to the court system, working for the courts and lowering that stigma.

Lowering barriers for those kids, lowering the stigma about what the justice system means to those kids, I think is crucial. So we do it in a couple different ways. Number one, shadowing program. We just had a student from Norristown in shadowing. She has a full ride to Boston University next year. I mean,

Norristown is underfunded.

and it is underappreciated by some, but it's a gem. And these kids have so much to offer. So we created the shadowing program, which is just in its infancy. We're gonna flesh it out and go to more schools, get more schools involved. But for the last three years, we've been going to Norristown School District.

Again, because you meet people where they are, you help people who need help the most. We've been going to the Norristown School District, working with a school counselor there to do a social justice career fair. And what it is is a member of the DA's office, public defenders, prothonotary, clerk of courts, probation office, sheriff's department.

Every department, all those departments are represented. That's a lot of the departments, a lot of the offices in the courthouse. And we go to Norristown schools, we meet with these students, we explain what we do, we explain how much we need them to apply for jobs in the county.

and create that pipeline of students.

And we've taken that program of going to Norristown School District and we've gone to Aclamo. Aclamo is a great organization that advocates for Latinos in Norristown and all around the county. And they have a youth program and we went in and did the social justice career fair for them. And I was asked by a student, how can I overcome the fact

Okay. ⁓ Gotcha.

that English is my second language. And I looked at him and said, that's a superpower. The fact that English is your second language is a superpower. We need people to apply that can speak two languages. That's a bonus. That's why I'm here with you trying to recruit you to come to the county. And if we can create that pipeline from Norristown School District to jobs in the courts in Montgomery County, what a beautiful thing.

Yeah.

That's great, it's such a great idea. And it's an educational platform. It brings people back to the community for service. just what a great idea, Noah. You're just full of great ideas, man.

why are you a Democrat and why do you choose to represent the Democratic platform?

Okay, so growing up, this is the God's honest truth. My earliest memories are my parents taking me to protests in Washington. I don't even remember what for. I was like two, three years old just holding onto their finger. I remember the thousands of people and tens of thousands just all over the place. remember that.

Yeah.

They instilled in me

Values that I think are really important,

But to me, Democratic values are caring about workers, caring about unions, labor.

the sanctity of the workplace and respecting employees. It means good education, right? And almost every state constitution talks about free and fair education for all. Okay, we forget that the United States constitution doesn't mention education at all, but almost every state constitution does. And so when I talk about school vouchers and charter schools, we got to ditch

really fund those public schools. Norristown's public schools should be funded the way the Lower Marion public schools are funded. It is unfair, inherently. labor,

Right, 100%.

I think those are the democratic values that we got to get back to frankly. Now that does not mean abandoning the LGBTQ plus community. That does not mean turning your back on DEI. You know, could walk and chew gum at the same time, right? We can talk about those issues and advocate for people who need help the most. Help people who need help the most, meet them where they are while also concentrating on our core values. And that's going to lift everybody up.

Right.

Mm-hmm.

I 100 % agree with you.

What gives you hope?

What gives me hope is that we have been here

We have seen this kind of corruption before. We have seen this kind of strong man before. What gives me hope is that we have defeated it before. Make America great again? Come on, man. We're not going back five decades to Jim Crow. What made America great is the soul of America, the...

Yes.

the heart of America, which is the people that care deeply about others in their community, raising people up, right?

But we as Democrats need to stay true to what we care, but that gives me hope.

Right, yeah, I think it's hard to not have hope when you read about history. When you read about the arc of this country's trials and tribulations, it takes good people who wake up every day and look at the bad things and try to do one good thing a day. That's how you move the needle forward. And I think a large part of why the Republican platform tries to erase history is because it takes away hope.

If you take away any references to overcoming adversity and difficult situations, then you lose any hope to make anything better. You think this is just my lot in life and this is where I'm meant to be. And I agree with you.

So keep bringing that

My last question for you is what plans do you have to get yourself through these next few years?

Okay, so again, and I say this to every Democrat, I say this to everybody who wants to listen, independents, reasonable Republicans, wake up every morning and say to yourself, how can I help people who need help the most? Find those folks that are hurting and find one way to help them. And we can all do that. You could do that in your church. You could volunteer at your schools. My kids' schools in Springfield, they can't get substitute teachers.

Right? Schools are struggling. Volunteer your time. Join your democratic group.

give to the ACLU. Right? Don't stop reading the news, but don't be consumed by the

Keep reading your history and we're going to be okay. Now I have friends who say no.

You all told us that this was the end, that this was it, if he got elected. Don't tell me now we're gonna be okay. And I hear him and I'm scared for where this is going, but I'm hopeful that we can get through it.

Yeah, I think that when we were telling people that this could be the end, right, I think we knew how bad it was going to be. And we were scared and we didn't want other people to be subjected to this type of state that we're in right now. But that does not mean that we can't make it better. It's just going to be harder now, right? It's going to take longer. Instead of being a straight line, it's going to zig and it's going to zag. We're going to have a couple of steps backwards.

Right.

But we are going to try and get the messaging out there that if we don't want to be here now, we're going to have to remember this moment or the moments that we are seeing and then try to be better next time. And so that's the message, I feel.

And I just have to say that having someone like you,

who wakes up every day to make our community better, that's the Democratic Party. That embodies the democratic values that I cherish so much. And there are hundreds of thousands of you all over this country and

part of why I did this podcast is to promote that very fact because, well, most people in Montgomery County might not know what a prothonotary is. They might not know that you are doing all these amazing things using your core democratic values. You do exist.

And I want to show everyone that you exist and to bring people back to the democratic platform that never left, that was always there.

and somehow things got lost in the sauce for a lot of different reasons. But you were the same person before the election last year, and you're the same person today. And you're gonna wake up tomorrow and do the same thing that you said you're gonna do. How can I help one person in Montgomery County? And that's the Democratic platform, period, end of sentence.

I would, agree with you wholeheartedly. would ask Republicans to be able to do what Democrats can do. Democrats can say we are the party of social security. We have the party of Medicaid, Medicare, Great Society, EPA, pro-choice women's rights. We are that party. I beg you Republicans to rattle it off. What are you for?

They're for tearing it all down and saying, look, this doesn't work when you're the ones that tore it down. And so if we want them to stop dismantling the pillars of our democracy, we're going to have to wake up every day and try and help our neighbor and show up in every election. And that includes this November 4th. Noah, I'm so grateful you came on to my show and I can't wait to spread the word about all the great things that you do. And I cannot wait to collaborate with you on TikTok.

Yes, sir.

Absolutely, we'll dance together. Thank you so much for having me. It was a blast and I appreciate the platform.

Absolutely.

Well, thank you so much for joining me here on the Zekely podcast. Stay hopeful and get involved and until next time, let's keep building a stronger Pennsylvania together.