Tony Hernandez: [00:00:00] a lot of these credit unions went to community charters, especially after nine 11 because when they went to force protection conditions, you couldn’t get onto the base.

And so in order for that credit union to survive, they had to open up ranches off the installation, which meant they had to get community charters. And so now they’ve, they’ve grown because people retire in those communities and stay there and still want access to their, you know, their financial institution.

And so they’ve grown. ​

[00:01:00] [00:02:00] 

Josh DeTar: Welcome to another episode of the Digital Banking Podcast. My guest today is Tony Hernandez, president and CEO of the Defense Credit Union Council. When I think of the word service, there are many thoughts and examples that come to mind. One of the first thoughts for me personally is always our servicemen and women and their families that serve our country and protect the freedoms we enjoy here in America.

I also think about the service of people who’ve chosen to work in nonprofit sectors. Obviously, for us, credit unions are a major standout here. Now, when I first met Tony, his passion for service was beautifully evident, both from the feeling you get when you talk to him and hear the genuine care in his [00:03:00] voice and demeanor, and when you see his resume of actions of service.

Now, if you ask Tony, he’ll start by saying, the first and most important service he has is to his wife of 32 years and his family, then to his country, as evident by his 25 years of service in the United States Air Force, retiring as a full bird colonel, and now as president and CEO of the DCUC. Growing up in a small town in New Mexico, he wanted to get out, break the cycle, and see the world.

Although not right away, when offered a chance to go to college in Boston, made him say, eh, maybe not that far from home just yet. Although after an Air Force, ROTC and Presidential Scholarship. Helped pay for college in New Mexico. Tony enlisted in the Air Force and had the opportunity to have an amazing [00:04:00] career and live in 14 different places, meet incredible people, and hear and experience amazing stories, which ultimately took him far away from that home in New Mexico.

Today he lives in DC and as much as I would love to add to this intro, the story of how he got to the DC uc here, you need to hear it directly from him. So without further ado, it’s with great pleasure. I get to welcome Tony to the show today. Tony, thanks for joining me.

Tony: Yeah. Thank you Josh. And, uh, thanks for having me. That was a great, uh, great intro and, it always makes me smile, just reminiscing as you were, saying a couple of those things and, I’m sure we’ll get in a little bit more of that. But, but thanks. I appreciate 

The warm introduction and being here today.

Josh: Absolutely. I think hopefully it’s become evident to the, the folks that listen to this podcast on the regular, the introduction to our guest is, is really important to me, uh, on a personal level because it’s kind of my duty to [00:05:00] represent you. and I kind of couldn’t care less about myself, but I care a lot about you and, and especially just in, in all the conversations that you and I have had the opportunity to have Tony.

 it’s true, and I, I mean this in every sense of the word, just your genuineness for the heart of service is really, really special. and like I said, I mean, you, you see that in both the, the tangible resume and just the intangibles of how you communicate and how you think. So I’ve really been looking forward to having you on the show,

Tony: Well, thanks. It’s a pleasure to be here and, you know, lots of things going on in the industry, but, it’s always good to talk to, to folks to kinda get the story out, uh, you know, reassure our, our industry, but also talk about, the path forward and where we go from here.

Josh: Yeah. You know, I think that’s a really important call out that we wanna start with Tony. So we usually don’t really talk about this, but I want to actually very specifically highlight the date of recording [00:06:00] for our listeners. We are recording April 22nd, 2025. That’s gonna be important here in a minute when we start talking about some of the things that have transpired just over the last 24 hours even.

Right. but, I also wanna make the comment that because of today’s date and how busy this last week has been, Tony, I’m really honored that you’ve taken time outta your busy schedule to come and be a part of this podcast. And I really hope that this gives you also an opportunity to have a platform to have the long form conversation.

 you know, I think that’s really important when we start to discuss really complex topics. It’s important to be able to just get the news out and get the reporting out and get the sound bites out, because sometimes that’s all people have time for, and you’ve gotta really condense down the message. But I think there’s a really important need for just talking about the story behind the story too.

So that’s a lot of what we’re gonna do today.

Tony: No, I couldn’t agree with you more. I think, uh, having the opportunity to kinda, get a [00:07:00] more robust conversation rather than just a soundbite. I think we all see the soundbites, but what’s really driving stuff and. you get in a lot of discussions, you know, usually, uh, after hours, you know, before dinner, maybe during dinner, you know, over, uh, some adult beverages, and those conversations with a lot of credit union folks.

But I really think these long form, uh, podcasts, it’s just tremendous opportunity, you know, to talk about some of those things and why they’re important and where it all comes from. So, again, I really appreciate being here. Even though things are crazy in DC they have been crazy, since we had the, the transition to, you know, from the, from the Biden administration to the Trump administration, you, I think it’s all good.

It’s all expected, but it’s still busy nonetheless. And so, uh, we find ourselves reacting to a lot of stuff. But there’s a, there’s a method. There’s a method inside there, and I think we can, uh, talk about that some more later on, if you’d like.

Josh: Well, I mean, I think, is there ever a dull [00:08:00] day in DC I guess that’s,

Tony: No.

Josh: there’s always something.

Tony: Yeah. And that’s, that’s what makes living here kind of interesting because even if you don’t see it in the news, the buzz all around the capitol, you’ll always hear it. You hear it from your waiter at, at the restaurant. ’cause they pick up on something, you know, or you hear it from, d different people passing by and where they heard it.

And you know, DC uc is just a great crossroads for, uh, information flowing all over the, uh, all over the capital city. And, and out in the, uh, you know, I live in northern Virginia, so all over the dc the greater DC area, what we call the, uh, national Capital Region or NCR, or they call it the DMV here, the, you know, dc, Maryland, and Virginia.

So DMV or, or national, capital Region. Those are the two acronyms that apply to the Greater Washington DC area.

Josh: Well, we’re gonna, we’re gonna get into what keeps you busy here in a minute, but before we do.

Tony: [00:09:00] Sure.

Josh: couple of things I want to do to set the stage. So for starters, so I learned something new today that I thought was kind of fun. So what’s a bird kernel?

Tony: Well, a bird colonel is a full colonel. So in the, in the Army and the Air Force, you know, you have a, you have lieutenant colonel, which is a oh five, and then you have a, a full colonel, which is an oh six, the oh meaning officer. So those are the officer ranks. and so when you go to full colonel, uh, the ranks are, the rank looks different.

You know, as an oh five you get a silver oak leaf, which is, which signifies lieutenant Colonel and as a full colonel, you get a, you get an eagle and you put it up, you know, up here on your ettes or on on your uniform. And, uh, because it’s an eagle, a lot of people just call, just call it. You know, I was a bird colonel, and it sounds funny, but that’s exactly what it was, is, you have the eagles on your Pilates and on and on your hat and on, you know, all the different ranking signia and, and, [00:10:00] uh, it just makes it kind of fun.

It’s one of those military, uh, uh, military terminology that you see thrown around a lot. But, uh, but that’s what it means. It means a, uh, a full kernel at the O six level, and there’s only 10 levels in the Officer Corps, and O 10 being a four star general.

Josh: Nah, it’s uh, it’s fun to get just those little in, uh, inside nuggets, you know, as somebody who didn’t serve in the military, but has a deep respect for the military. I’ve got a lot of friends in the military and, I think that the military is such a great example of kind of those terms of endearment and respect.

Yeah. And it’s like, I mean, you could see in, in both sense, you know, I mean, rising to the rank of a full kernel is a, is a really impressive accomplishment, right? And it takes years of dedication and service and, and a lot of hard work to get to that point. And then somebody’s sitting, ah, he is a bird colonel.

You know, it’s got, it is like, it is both talking smack and giving you a lot of respect at the exact same time. I think that’s, that’s something that you see a lot in the military.[00:11:00] 

Tony: well, you know, you reminded me of something ’cause I had a CEO of, Paul Brucker from a railway credit union. Ask me, Tony, why do you always sign your, your emails with v slash r? What is v slash R mean? And I’m like, well that’s just, uh, something I brought with me back for the military. And it’s, uh, it’s just shorthand for very respectfully.

Josh: Oh

Tony: V is for very, and the slash is for respectfully. And if you, if you’re on my emails, that’s the way I do all my emails is VR Tony. Right. thank, thanks for all your support VR Tony. You know, what does VR mean?

Josh: Now I’m gonna have to go back and look at, uh, emails and see if I got a VR out of it.

Tony: You should, because it’s part of my standard, standard block. Uh, um, and if I’m really lazy, I’ll just put Tony on there. But, no, typically, VR and I’ve seen slash r and I’m like, huh. You know, when my, uh, back when I was a major or a captain in the colonel, I was working for Wood white slash r, so and so Colonel.

I’m like, wow, I didn’t get a vr. So

Josh: He’s not very, he is

Tony: mean? Right?[00:12:00] 

Josh: there’s levels of this, let’s be honest. That’s

Tony: if you get an email from me, I always go the full,

Josh: You get a very,

Tony: right?

Josh: okay. So the other thing that we gotta talk about, just because one, it’s kind of a cool story, but two, I just find it hilarious when you get to the, the final end of it. So tell us about how you ended up at the DCUC after retiring from the Air Force.

Tony: Sure. Well, when I was a captain in the Pentagon, you know, I just moved to DC It was the first time I was stationed here. and, you know, that was during nine 11 and stuff, but before nine 11 happened, the, I worked in the same office where the Air Force banking officer worked, and he was a couple cubicles down and, uh, he walked up to my desk and said, Hey, uh, captain Hernandez, is your wife interested in a part-time job?

And I, you know, we just moved there. And I said, sure. He goes, well, there’s a part-time, controller position or, or a, they want someone to do the books, right. for the, for something called the Defense Credit Union Council [00:13:00] and Defense Credit Union Council had just hired a retired army colonel.

Full bird. he had just be, you know, become CEO but he needed a part-time bookkeeper. And so Jennifer had been managing a, she was a controller for a Fortune 500 company at one of their regional offices. So, you know, maybe a bit overqualified, but you know, she could do it.

And then it was job, it was an income. And so she applied and got the job and she worked for my predecessor for 16 years. And that was through a whole bunch of other moves that we had, and she was able to telecommute, during that time. But, one of the features was, is that I got to go to the DCUC events, you know, ’cause Jennifer’s, Jennifer’s room was already paid for.

Uh, we have a policy that we’ll, we’ll comp military members if they want to, you know, they come to our conference. so the only thing I had to pay for was my airfare. but one thing I picked up from all my military mentors was, every day is your job interview. Every day is your first impression day.

So make a great first [00:14:00] impression. And so I would put on the coat and tie and I’d sit up front. ’cause that’s the way I was throughout my whole Air Force career. If you’re gonna be an officer and a leader, officers lead from the front. You know, very rarely do they lead from the back. And I used to, you know, I used to try all my, colleagues when they would sit in the back of the room or the back of the formation, I’m like, that’s not what it’s about, guys.

You need to lead your troops. so I’d sit up there, made all the contacts, and when it came time for me to retire, DCUC had just created a, position called the Chief Operating Officer. And so I applied for it and got the job. And so, you know, I went from, uh, I went from commanding a, a brigade level, air Force level organization, of 1400 people.

Right to working in DCUC, where at the time I think we had five, right? So it was a big transition, but I loved what I was doing. I was already familiar with credit unions and what the movement had to offer. just one small catch, actually one [00:15:00] very large catch. And that is that Jennifer could no longer work for DCUC.

And so I asked my boss, the, the CEO at, at the time, and they know, well, who gets to tell Jennifer? And he goes, I think that’s a great job under, you know, other duties as assigned, and that was to, you know, handle the personnel. So that was a long drive home, a long walk up, the pathway of the door, I had to make sure she wasn’t cooking right when I got home.

 but, uh, um, yeah. I’m a guy who fired his wife

Josh: Yeah, your first official act,

Tony: Yeah. And it was not easy, right? And so, uh, you know, I joke about it, you know, I’ve been sleeping with one eye open ever since then. but, uh, you know, Jennifer gets to come with me to all the DCUC events, and I, and I, and I take, actually, it’s part of the plan is why I bring her, you know?

And that’s because, you know, at least for the first three or four years, you know, while I was a, even when I became the CEOA [00:16:00] year later, Jennifer knew more people in the industry than I did,

Josh: Mm-hmm.

Tony: you know? And, and it was just weird being the CEO of this trade association and having my wife know more people than the CEO.

 but there’s magic in that, right? And that, uh, even, even today, when Jennifer, comes to meet at different credit union events, she knows half the room, and I know the other half. So we make a great team as far as, meeting with our members. And if there’s something she needs to pass on, she’ll let me know.

 when I’m sleeping, you know, before I, before I close my other eye, you know, the one eye I can close, she’ll, she’ll show me things that have happened. But it’s great to, it’s great for me to learn what’s going on throughout our association and who I need to talk to next and who she introduces me to that might want to, we’re at a larger credit unit event who wants to talk about DCUC and potentially joining.

And so, so that becomes a real, uh, a real dynamic, uh, within, uh, with what the Hernandez household’s able to offer. And, and then I just like being able to travel with my wife. We go [00:17:00] to the different events and, she’s still, she’s a very, very accomplished realtor here in the, in the DMV area.

And so she still does her work from afar, but, uh, that’s our one chance to get to see each other. Um, but uh, yeah, if she moves that pillow, I get a little nervous. Right? It’s today, the day, you know.

Josh: well, it’s funny too that, you know, she, she can go to events now and go, yeah, well, he was the original plus one.

Tony: That’s right. That’s exactly right.

Josh: well, so the other thing that I really wanted you to kind of start, um, and just frame the conversation for today around is, tell us about DCUC. So tell us about the foundation. tell us about the mission. Tell us about the actions that you do, the work that you do. especially for folks who maybe aren’t as familiar or, you know, aren’t getting some of the content from you all or aren’t members with you all, what do they need to know?

Tony: sure. Well, we’ve been around since 1963. We started as a CUNA council. That’s [00:18:00] why our name says Defense Credit Union Council. Right. And a lot of people, uh, you know, don’t realize that, we go back that far. We also, within our membership, if we, if we want to measure the same way, CUNA, nafcu and now a CU and the leagues measure how big they are.

You know, we’re about a quarter of the industry, right? In fact, we’re larger than the two largest leagues combined, right? It’s a pretty large trade association, but you would never know it because, you know, if you go to our conferences, they’re not huge conferences. They’re more like family reunions.

And so, historically we represented credit unions that were on military installations. But about four years ago, we worked with the Department of Veteran Affairs on the veteran Benefit Banking program, and they were trying to get at unbanked veterans, to get them a free checking account because the VA was still sending out paper checks, for veteran monthly veteran benefits, whether you’d retired.

Or you had separated from the [00:19:00] military and you had a condition and you got your benefits, you were still getting paper checks. And so it just made a lot of sense. So we stepped up and that got us thinking, you know, there is no DCUC equivalent at any of the leagues. There is no DCUC equivalent to, you know, at the state level.

 and so we fill that void and, what we said is, well, if we’re already speaking about military and we talk about, you know, transitioning to veterans, why couldn’t we represent credit unions that have veterans? And so, you know, working with the VA on, on some of our products and, I have one here, you know, as vet, this veteran guy that we worked with the va, we started asking ourselves, you know, uh, why couldn’t we open up our membership to all credit unions, not just military credit unions?

Because working with the va, we learned that every zip code in the country has at least one veteran living in it. And because that, and because that’s true. That means that every credit union in the country has at least one veteran in their field of membership. And so what people [00:20:00] don’t know about DCUC is we’re open to, you know, membership’s open to everybody.

 now some things have happened along the way is when you had the merger of CUNA and NAFCU into America’s credit unions, there is a void out there for another trade association to, you know, offer an al alternative or a different perspective on things going on. And I see it as a natural progression for DCUC to move into that role.

And so we’ve stepped up our advocacy. what I like about it and what, credit unions should like about that is we’re not opposing what America’s credit union does. We see it as healthy competition, right? Just like we, just like we talk about banks and credit unions, you know, and credit unions force the banks to compete.

I kind of see DC C’s role in forcing others to, to do more for their members. Right, because there’s that, there’s that healthy competition there, you know, for, for folks, uh, you know, looking at different alternatives and, uh, when you have iron sharpening [00:21:00] iron, you know, or you have healthy competition, who benefits from that?

All the member credit unions out there because they get better advocacy, they get better timed advocacy. And so, you know, as we, as we continue to push the envelope, we like seeing all the others come along as well too. And especially in this tax exemption fight. the fight to keep the NCUA as an independent agency or any of the other credit union advocacy issues that we’re talking about.

 when we start to compete and push others to do, uh, to do more for our members, I gotta tell you, you know, the America’s, or our nation’s credit unions, benefit from that directly because they’re getting a better product. we’re getting it faster, more efficient. and more forceful on Capitol Hill.

And that’s just a, that’s just a product of where we’re at. and so DCUC just continues to grow. we still keep our name because it opens doors on Capitol Hill. So when you see the Red, white, and Blue and Defense Credit Union Council, [00:22:00] what I like about it is that, serving veterans and military members isn’t a Democrat heavy issue, and it’s not a Republican heavy issue.

It’s a mainstream issue that appeals to both sides of the aisle. And so when you can take any credit union issue and talk about how it impacts veterans, which are in every credit union across the country, our advocacy is very effective. it’s very credible. it’s relatable. And again, it helps, it helps keep the movement, uh.

Going forward. Right. Rather than, uh, than going backwards. And so we’re real happy with our role. I’ll share something else with you, maybe your readers didn’t know. about three years ago, we had a, a planning session and we talked about whether we needed a rebrand ourselves, because when you say defense credit union council, a lot of people, don’t think they can join.

Right. the other side of coins, we kept it. We kept it because when we tell members of Congress who we are, it opens up those doors. [00:23:00] one of the names we workshopped at the time when we were, when we were thinking about rebranding, was America’s Credit Unions.

Josh: No way.

Tony: Yeah. No, I’m not. I’m not kidding. now we didn’t take it and so I wonder if someone was eavesdropping or, or leaked us Some, some. Some of those things, but you know, a kudos to, to Kuna and Nafcu for coming up with an original name.

Josh: Oh, that’s too good.

Tony: but we’ll keep that. So I, I, I tell that to a lot of folks and that, uh, it, it still makes me smile when I, when I see America’s credit unions because I get what they were trying to do. That’s what we were trying to say, is that, you know, we represent the best of our country, which is our nation’s finest, right?

Our, uh, our, our military and our veterans. And that opens up so many doors. And again, we don’t want to be in opposition or create disunity. We just think that we provide a healthy alternative for other credit [00:24:00] unions out there.

Josh: No, I mean, I think, you know, for starters, that’s such a good point, right? I mean, the cooperation model

Tony: Yeah.

Josh: is one of the things that makes America as successful as it is, right? And, and even from the sense of, you know, you referenced, the balancing of credit unions and banks and, you know, there’s even that much more of an interesting dynamic when you have a not-for-profit with a for-profit competitor.

Just that cooperation model. And at the end of the day, all of these things are working together where hopefully for all of us, the the same goal exists, which is we want to create strong, healthy financial communities for the people that we serve, and that’s who’s gonna benefit from this.

Tony: Well, you know, community banks aren’t all bad, right? I mean, I don’t like some of the, what they’re trying to do with the tax exemption, but when you, when you get outside of all that, [00:25:00] they have a mission and a purpose in those communities, and so do credit unions. I just happen to think credit unions do it a lot better.

We’re not, you know, we’re, we’re a not-for-profit model, so we’re able to do more things. but they’re good Americans too. You know, I’m, I’m just saying. They, uh, they have, they have their mission and their model and it serves a purpose, you know, and there’s things banks can do that credit unions can’t do.

And there’s things that credit unions can do that banks can’t do. Um, and when you have that healthy competition and when, and I focus on the word healthy ’cause it can get unhealthy at some points, I think the American, consumer benefits from that.

Josh: You know, you’ll appreciate. It’s, uh, we have, if you look at just our customer base, very heavy stratification and. Credit unions. We have a couple of community banks and I always love to tease my community bank customers. I’m like, y’all know you’re just credit unions that pay taxes, right? because the type of bank that wants to work with us, it just very, very highly collaborative.

Like, they’ll come to [00:26:00] our, you know, customer conference and they’ll sit next to a credit union at lunch and share all the work that they’re doing and, right. Like, that’s your point. It’s, that is healthy competition. It’s like, Hey, look, I’m gonna hold you accountable. And if you’re gonna take that tax exempt status, I want you to do some special things with that.

I want you to provide value for that. And I’m gonna go a different path and I’m gonna find other ways to provide value. And there’s areas where we’re gonna compete. But again, the, the mission is the same. We want to create healthy financial communities and we wanna build up America, right? Like that’s the end of it.

Tony: Well, I like reminding my community bank brethren, right, that a lot of them don’t pay taxes either. There’s this thing called subchapter s where they’re able to park, uh, park a lot of those profits and shield it from federal taxes as well. And then you get the long faces going. See, you guys are not for profit too.

You just don’t, you just call it by a different name. [00:27:00] and that we’ve actually written a couple op-eds on that, you know, when we counter counter a lot of the, uh, bank lobby attacks on Capitol Hill, we’ve been, do, you know, doing a lot with reminding me or educating members of Congress and reminding a few others that a lot of community banks don’t pay taxes either,

Josh: I think, uh, you worked with Ken McCarthy on one of those op-eds,

Tony: Yep.

Josh: Yeah. We’ll make sure to link that in this podcast episode

Tony: sure.

Josh: if you wanna read up on that.

Tony: yeah, and that’s, uh, that’s just something that’s important to remind folks is that, if you really want, think that the tax and credit union is gonna comp, you know, thing, take away the sub-chapter s deductions as well, you know, and then, it’s the same thing.

And so I. You know, you kind of gotta, get us all on, on this level playing field when we’re talking about, you know, the credit union tax exemption, it’s just one of those fun things that, that we do going, all right, let’s go, let’s do an apples to apples comparison here and, and now.

And now let’s see where they’re at.

Josh: Well, and I [00:28:00] think the, you know, if you look at it too, what’s the old saying? there’s only, two certainties in life, death and taxes. Right. We’re, we’re also all paying it at some point somewhere like it’s, it’s not free.

Tony: yeah. Well, I remind also the, our banks that credit unions still pay taxes. They may not pay it on some of the revenue streams that, that they have, but they pay property taxes.

Josh: Exactly.

Tony: Um, you know, they, they, they,

Josh: we are paying something somewhere. Somehow. Everybody

Tony: exactly right. Nobody rides for free

Josh: That’s just it. Yep. I wanted to go back to one of the things that you were talking about, Tony, ’cause I I wanted to dive a little bit deeper into, and you were talking about some of the original mission and just how it’s still a very big part of, you know, how DCUC uses, this as almost a a, you know, hopefully you don’t take this as a disrespectful comment, but like leverage to accomplish the things that you’re doing is, you know, the support [00:29:00] for veterans.

And, you know, this is something we’ve actually talked about in various scenarios, a lot on the podcast, is kind of identifying a niche and serving that niche because you understand that niche better than someone else may. Right. And I think that was even what you were, uh, alluding to, and this is why I would like you to talk a little bit more about it, of just, you know, having DCUC and, America’s credit unions and all the different leagues and all of them take just a, a little bit different approach.

Again, the, the, the goal is the same, right? We just wanna support members of credit unions here in the US and, you know, see them have access to all the amazing things that credit unions bring them. But you’re just putting a different lens to it and, you know, uh, perfect case in point, one of the examples we use is, there was a recently a, a FinTech that started up and I was actually talking to a community bank outta Utah.

I’m gonna get, uh, the gentleman [00:30:00] from this bank on the podcast, who was talking about, serving very specifically a niche of people. That’s doctors coming right out of college. And he said, because if you look at them through a traditional banking lens, they’re terrifying, right? Like some of these folks are, you know, 23, 24, 25 years old and are million dollars in debt

Tony: Right.

Josh: loans, and they’re trying to buy a practice, which is more debt and all of these things.

But you, you look at kind of the life cycle of their finances. You look at all of this. But the point that he was making that I found interesting was he said, look, I mean, if, if we, if we put a certain lens on it, like would you say that someone’s a doctor is a fairly intelligent person? I would say so, right?

It takes a certain level of intelligence to get through med school and and to accomplish that takes a certain amount of [00:31:00] discipline. But you know what’s interesting? Most doctors suck at managing their finances.

Tony: Yeah. They don’t teach that in medical

Josh: you’ll, yeah, you’ll have somebody who, even so, you know, gets outta college, has maybe done a good job of minimizing student debt or paying down some of that student debt, and is making, you know, high six figures and is living paycheck to paycheck.

Tony: Oh, yeah.

Josh: Right. And so the the point was, is just because you’re intelligent person doesn’t mean you’re intelligent with your finances. And it takes someone who understands your scenario and that niche. And just like doctors, what I’m kind of bringing it all the way back to is I feel like veterans are a very unique niche in that sense too, right?

Like, you think about someone, for me, it goes back to my very best friend in the world is, is an armory veteran. Did, active duty Army did two tours, uh, overseas. Very intelligent guy. [00:32:00] He’s a, a professional HVAC, digital controls specialist now. Right. But, you know, he’s been very open with me over the years talking about, you know, how he’s managed finances and things like that.

And it’s just, it, you know, he’s like, look, going from being in the military. And basically everything was paid for.

Tony: Yeah.

Josh: He’s like, you know, my housing was paid for, my food was paid for, right. I didn’t have to think about any of that stuff. And especially when he was on deployment, he’s like, I didn’t own a house.

I didn’t do any of these things. And he’s like, I stockpiled all my money and what did I use it on? Race car, and then all of a sudden having to transition to the civilian world and trying to manage things like, he came out of the military with a really, really high disability. so he gets support from the va and yes, like I knew exactly what you meant, like paper checks, right?

and then trying to manage, getting a civilian income, [00:33:00] buying a house, all of these things. And, you know, fast forward to today and, you know, he’s in a great place and he’s a very smart guy, very smart with his finances, things like that. But he had every opportunity along the way to have not been.

And you know, we look at the epidemic of what happens to many of our veterans when they get out of the service, they make up an extremely high percentage of our homeless population. They make up an extremely terrifyingly sad percentage of our suicide rate, right? And we talk about just the stress that finances puts on people.

So now not only are you transitioning out of the military world, and I mean, let’s just park what comes along with that to the side

Tony: Yeah.

Josh: and then just trying to figure out the managing this new world of finances. I mean, heck, for normal people, like finances is one of the biggest causes of divorce,

Tony: Same, same in the

Josh: about all the factors that are compiling [00:34:00] on our servicemen and women, both in and out of this service, around their finances, having somebody who understands them.

And their scenario and is advocating and fighting for them. I think that’s really important.

Tony: Well, I’ll take it one step further, right? And the reason why we work with VA on this, on this guide here, you can download this guide off the DCUC website for free. It’s in a PDF format. But you know, you mentioned a lot of people coming outta the military that never managed finances before, don’t understand what benefits that they’re entitled to, don’t know how to go about applying for it.

And so they’re looking for someone to help them through that. Unfortunately, there’s a lot of fraudsters out there. You know, that say, Hey, I’ll hook you up, you know, but I’m gonna need your bank account. I need your social security number, your date of birth, and your mother’s maiden name.

Right. And sadly, especially a lot of the older veterans are just used to being taken care of that they’ll [00:35:00] transfer that information and the next thing you know, yeah, they sign them up for the benefits, but they’re going to somebody else’s bank account. and there’s no way they can recover that. or they steal the money or they take heavy fees up front.

There’s just all different kinds of level of fraud, which is why, we’re kind of, you know, putting this together and, championing that, that issue. And it’s even at the state level with state benefits, you know, so we do a lot of that stuff. you mentioned, with homeless vets, we are work trying to work with the, NCUA and we were working with the, with a couple of the board members, and now that kind of blew up last week.

Right. well,

Josh: We’ll get to that.

Tony: yeah. We were trying to, in 2021, the FDIC authorized banks, the ability to, for a, a homeless veteran to use the permanent address where they get their care from. So whether it was a VA hospital or an off base clinic, as long as they were getting their care there and the, and the facility was seen on a [00:36:00] regular basis, then the homeless vet could use that address to open up a checking account at a bank.

Josh: Oh wow.

Tony: And so we said, well, why not credit unions? You know, uh, we, we, we would take better care of those veterans, in my opinion. Well, I’ll put it this way in my humble, but accurate opinion, right.

Josh: But you have no opinion.

Tony: Yeah, exactly. that, and I use that term a lot. That’s another thing I brought with me back from the military.

Right. but anyway, why can’t the NCUA make the same rule if FDIC could do it? What’s, what’s holding us back and NC a’s had this since 2021. And so we resurrected it, and just said, Hey, you know, can we, can we get that done? That’s something that all credit unions could, could write NCUA and let’s get this thing done because, um, we ought to be providing that service and they don’t have to be at a military credit union to serve veterans.

It could be any credit union. And if you want, if you want a homeless veteran that, that you’re aware of, to open up a [00:37:00] checking account at that local credit union, we ought to have the ability to do that. so yeah. Lot, lots of different programs that we’re working on.

Josh: Tony, I, I, you know, one of the things that’s challenging about doing this podcast as you know, unscripted long form conversation is I hate when I go to ask you for data points, and I’m like, ah, probably would’ve been nice to have given you the opportunity to prepare for that. So I don’t know if you’ll have this off the top of your head or not, but I’m just curious.

Even just a ballpark would be interesting if you have it. Do you know how many credit unions, have a specific focus on military or veterans, or kind of how many? So you were saying a lot of it was, early DCUC days were focused on credit unions that were like on military bases and installations.

Tony: Yeah,

Josh: around

Tony: so back in the day in, in 1963, there was, there were military bases all across. I, there were a lot more military bases than there are today. There’s about 450 back then. And I’m just generalizing, you know, the number [00:38:00] and so we had 450 different credit unions. ’cause a lot of our member credit unions started on the base when you had, you know, 10 enlisted members putting a hundred dollars into a briefcase and starting their credit union.

And now they’re, now they’re multi-billion dollar credit unions, you know, that have, that have moved on. But. as the military shrank and we had base closures, there’s about approximately 250 bases. we’ve got about 185 pure defense, credit union or credit unions that started on the base or have a base operating agreement.

The reason why it’s less than the two 50 is ’cause some credit unions are more than one base, right? so from a pure military, and that’s not all they do, a lot of these credit unions went to community charters, especially after nine 11 because when they went to force protection conditions, you couldn’t get onto the base.

And so in order for that credit union to survive, they had to open up ranches off the installation, which meant they had to get community charters. And so now they’ve, they’ve grown because people retire in those communities and stay [00:39:00] there and still want access to their, you know, their financial institution.

And so they’ve grown. but what we found is that there’s, and I don’t know the number, but there’s several credit unions that have large concentrations of veterans. And if you go, if you look at. The VA hospital map, you can, you can identify those credit unions or, I was surprised. I was talking to, Mid Oregon Credit Union and Bend, bend, Oregon.

Josh: yeah.

Tony: They’ve got the highest concentration of veterans in Bend, Oregon. Right. And so, uh, when we start talking about what we’re doing with all, with all these types of things, we got them to join, join DCUC ’cause we wanna serve veterans. But, you know, working with the va, I just realized that every credit union has a veteran.

So it does, to me, it doesn’t really matter to know the 4,400 credit unions that we have left in the country. They’re all veteran centered as far as I’m concerned. or they could easily pivot to, to do that if they want to offer products and services to veterans. Again, if they can focus on that, they can do stuff for other communities or other, [00:40:00] you know, niche, communities, within their field of membership.

Veterans. Just easy to understand and that’s, why we focus on it.

Josh: Yeah, that’s interesting. I’ll have to reach out to the team at Midor and see if they’d be

Tony: Yeah. Talk to Kyle.

Josh: some commentary. Yeah, I think that’s my backyard, right? And, uh, yeah. Any excuse I have to, to drive over to Bend and spend a long weekend and bend. I’ll, I’ll

Tony: Well, they invited me to their Veterans Day parade, which is supposed to be really huge. One of the biggest in the country.

Josh: Really

Tony: And, uh,

Josh: in Bend.

Tony: yeah,

Josh: Interesting. I’ll have to talk to, so my, my buddy that I was just telling you about, so he, one of the really cool things that he does in his massive air quotes, spare time, which he has zero of, so I don’t know how he does this, is, so he’s a part of a, an organization called War Fighter Outfitters.

Tony: Okay.

Josh: And, they have kind of, I think three major different practices that they do fishing, hunting, and like over [00:41:00] landing. So where they do the trucks outfitted with like tents and

Tony: Yeah. Sounds like fun.

Josh: drive into the middle of nowhere and camp. So basically if you’re a veteran, you can go to War Fighter Outfitter’s website, look at all the different guided trips that they have and sign up and it’s a hundred percent free. and the whole, you know, concept behind it is to put, you know, veterans together with someone who’s kind of been there, done that, right? Maybe done the transition to the civilian world. So all of the folks who are leading these expeditions and things are veterans themselves, but then putting ’em into community of other veterans around them with the whole mindset of one good day could change their mind about suicide.

Tony: absolutely.

Josh: and so my buddy runs the fishing side of things. Um, so he runs a, a big bad, super cool, fishing boat that he takes guys out on salmon and sturgeon fishing trips and everything. And so every year he drives, the big [00:42:00] wrapped truck and boat through the Veteran’s Day parade. So I’ll have to see

Tony: you go.

Josh: ’cause he usually does the, like Lake Oswego, Oregon one.

Tony: Yeah,

Josh: But I’ll have to see if he’s done the bend one. ’cause I know that with, especially the Overland, they do a bunch of bend trips for the Overland. So I don’t know, maybe I can even connect them with, the Midor team and maybe there’s something they could

Tony: yeah, definitely. I think that would be good. I think we, uh, I think we just sponsored their golf tournament,

Josh: Oh really?

Tony: coming up, so, yeah. That, you know, that And that’s all good. And we, you brought up a good point. one of the biggest, you know, DC Yeah, yeah. Money’s important, you know, but another, another currency here in the DC area of connections and, and who we know and who we know that’s doing different.

Different things. And we, uh, we did some stuff with a,veteran organization called Warrior Strong. And it was virtual, ’cause it kind of during covid, but it was virtual yoga with a group of veterans. And I’ll be, I’ll be honest, Josh, it’s not graceful yoga. These are guys that are outta [00:43:00] shape, or have injuries.

So they can’t, they can’t do all the bends and stuff, right. but it’s community and the stretching. You do get health benefits out of, out of yoga moves. And who would’ve thought, you know, I avoided yoga and I still kind of do, to be quite honest with you, but, but I’ve done a couple classes before. The reason I avoid ’em for is ’cause I’m just horrible at that yoga, right?

I can’t hold a pose for, for too long. And, anyway, it’s a different subject. But,

Josh: Different podcast.

Tony: yeah. But, but no, the community that came out of that keeps people, uh, connected. and they’re taking care of their bodies and they’re learning, you know, different things about where, where it hurts to stretch.

And maybe that leads to another conversation, you know, with a doctor, which they go get more information. And if there’s a credit union at the VA hospital, then they can get financial information, you know, so we’re just, uh, I just see a whole lot of, uh, you know, you can call it six degrees of separation, or second and third order effects, or, you know, [00:44:00] unintended.

I don’t like, I don’t wanna use the word consequences. Unintended benefits are all opportunities. That’s just sort of come your way.

Josh: So what are some of the other things that, that DCUC has kind of focused on over the years in terms of. maybe bring it back to kinda what you were talking about earlier. You know, it starts with the mission of serving veterans, but through credit unions. So how does that kind of manifest itself?

Like what are some of the things that you guys do on a day-to-day basis? what are the things that you’re working on for your member credit unions? What, like, what does that dynamic look like for you guys?

Tony: Yeah, we, we do a lot of, you know, sharing different ideas on what different credit unions are doing. And in fact, I just had a meeting with a brand new DCUC member credit union. He was asking what kind of product and services could his credit unions come up with for veterans. And so I connected him with the CEO in his area.

He was also on my board so that they could start talking and benchmark different ideas and then let the co-opetition begin. Right? And guess who’s gonna benefit? It’s [00:45:00] those veterans in that community. so that’s one thing we do. And we have, a series of, of conferences and events that, that we have and what I like about A-D-C-U-C annual conference, and we just really opened up the registration for our conference this summer, but it’s not your typical credit union conference.

You know, we bring in a lot of, a lot of speakers that have a military background, whether a Medal of Honor recipient, a wounded warrior, or just people that have an interest in story. And the reason why I like bringing ’em in is because their stories help inspire our credit unions to continue doing the things they’re doing.

And so last year at our annual conference, we had, Alex Peba, who was the, uh, last, he, he piloted the last C 17 out of Afghanistan. Right. And his story was pretty cool. at least I, you know, I, I, and most of our audience are, uh, our former military like myself too. And they’re now, now they’re CEOs of.

Some of these credit unions are, or they’re on the board, but he told the story of that last flight out. ’cause you know, you, we’ve [00:46:00] all seen the pictures of all the Afghan nationals trying to bum rush the, you know, the, the aircraft. And so they quit flying at during the day and they quit flying with lights on.

And so it’s completely dark on his airfield and they’re flying with night vision goggles. And, uh, he told a story looking out to the cockpit as he was getting ready to start his, his takeoff role is he was commanding a five ship, uh, mission. So he was a mission commander in addition to being the aircraft commander for the, the C 17.

But through N VGs, he could see, plane number one had already started to leave the, the air, the pattern had Marty made. Its left turn number four was, was at the apex of, its, of its climb at, and it was starting to make its turn. Three was climbing, two is at the end of the runway, rotating the wings to lift off.

And he’s powering up. And then it was the next thing that he said that was powerful, he said, and so ended America’s longest, uh, longest war in our history

Josh: That’s

Tony: and, and that guy was [00:47:00] there, right? And, uh, the message is, is that these are the people that are in our credit unions every day and how do we make life a little bit better for them so that they can execute their mission, come home safely, and then continue to build their American dream, and building those.

And so there’s a term in the Air Force, and this is an Air Force specific term. We always call it getting rebooted. So you go to Squadron Officer School or you’d go to Air Command and Staff College and you would get Rebleed, which meant you renewed your commitment back to the Air Force. ’cause you got inspired by going to these different courses, inspires a, another one of those big air quotes that you mentioned before.

Right? Um, but um. But, but I look at, uh, I look at our DCUC conferences as relu and our, uh, our CEOs and our boards of directors. ’cause we bring in people, you know, where, where, where their mission impacts our nation’s mission and whatever the, you know, whatever they’re doing. And we’ve had a variety of speakers.

And when you hear a Medal of Honor [00:48:00] recipient and then, you know, they circulate that medal throughout the audience and you’re touching an actual medal of honor, you know, you just get chills down your spine, you know, so those are kind of cool. So it’s that connectivity that we do in our industry, by having those conferences and events, we just started to do more sub councils and more virtual events.

 just getting that community and, and we’re opening it up to other people to come and see what we’re talking about. ’cause those stories play out in their credit unions as well. and then under my, uh, tenure as a CEO, we got into advocacy, you know, and that’s something that’s outta my comfort zone because as a military officer.

You avoid Congress. I mean, that just, that just gets ingrained in your professionalism that you let the legislative liaison handle Congress. And if they need you to testify, then they’ll train you on what exactly to say and how to look and, you know, when to smile and nod and all that other stuff.

But otherwise you don’t touch Congress. So when, you know, when you think about a trade [00:49:00] association, the, the first duty of a trade association is to advocate for your members. And we weren’t doing that, you know, for, for many, many years, right? Uh, almost 60 golly, we’re 62. So, you know, for almost uh, 53 years we weren’t doing any advocacy.

’cause we were relying on, you know, van Kuna and the nafcu to do most of the advocacy for us. But we started to see some things that I, I still shake my head at. You know, the Military Lending Act actually discriminates against military, uh, members from getting any type of loan. It sounded like the intent was good because it keeps, it forces, all financial institutions and lenders not to exceed 36% on the, uh, military annual percentage rate is what they decided.

Josh: Okay.

Tony: Well, did you know that the NCUA PALS two loan, the, payday alternative loan violates the Military Lending Act?

Josh: I did

Tony: When you, when you calculate the PALS two loan, it can get up to a [00:50:00] hundred percent interest for a lot of your small dollar lending. And what does an E two, right? so you have, you know, I told you oh five and oh six for the officer ranks when you enlist, you’re an oh one through nine, right?

I’m sorry, E one through E nine. Right? So, uh, what is an E two that’s not making a whole lot of money, you know, that need that, maybe, uh, ruined their uniform and they gotta go buy new uniforms and Yeah, they get a uniform allowance. But if your uniform gets ruined, you don’t get another allowance to go buy new ones.

You know, they gotta go, go maintain it and at the same time, they gotta fly home for a family emergency and they need an extra 300 bucks, to get a plane ticket. Well, in order to make, in order to comply with the MLA, they gotta go borrow $1,200. So what do they need that other $900 for? And they’ll go, they’ll go and blow it and get into debt.

And that’s where I just think some of the, some of the well-intended, legislation sounds good, but it’s actually a bad thing for the military. And so when I saw the MLA, [00:51:00] you know, go into it and DCUC didn’t have a role communicating that, I just decided that it was time for DCUC to become a true trade association and get involved in advocacy.

And so we’ve been doing that little by little. And then last year I hired a chief advocacy officer, Jason Sta Rock from, uh, He used to be the interim or the acting chief advocacy officer for CUNA and then later America’s credit unions. And then when, when they let him go, you know, we picked him up and it’s been off to the races since then, doing what we do and finally blooming into our own.

 we’re the second largest trade association in the industry and we’re growing and we’re doing more. And my, my goal is to give credit unions a choice ’cause they can all join. and like I said, healthy coop, healthy competition results in better products and services for, for our nation’s credit unions.

And that’s kind of our role. Sorry, long, long answer to get there, but

Josh: [00:52:00] No, I, I appreciate that. And again, that’s the kind of the point of this whole thing, right, is because sometimes the story of how you get there is actually more informing than the actual getting there.

Tony: right.

Josh: I think that’s what, you know, as just hearing you kind of talk through today, it’s, you know, I think what I think this is gonna be episode like 120 or something like that, you know, when I started this podcast.

One, it started as a joke and then the stinking thing took off, and now I have to take it serious. But, when we started the podcast, I named it the Digital Banking podcast, I thought that was gonna be, you know, where we focused. And it’s deviated so much from that at this point that I think if I could rename it, I probably would.

But, but I’d make that statement because, you know, if you just, if you were to just look at this podcast and look at probably the, you know, distilled down show notes summary of what you and I talked about, it could be pretty easy [00:53:00] to say, how in the heck does that belong in the digital banking podcast?

What does this have to do with digital banking and, banking technology and things like that. And, and I argue it has everything to do with it. Right? And it’s because, you and I were kind of talking about this before. Before we started recording, right? If credit unions and community banks cease to exist, I cease to exist.

 so there’s that. But at the same time, it’s kinda like you were saying there, there’s so much crazy interconnectivity through all of this. And you know, at the end of the day, the, goal, the mission is the same. it is to build up the financial health of America. And that’s done through supporting everyday Americans.

And a large percentage of that is, is veterans and all sorts of other, like we said earlier, you know, niche groups of people. But at the end of the day, we’re just, we’re just Americans. Um, and we’re just trying to build up the, the financial health of all Americans. And, and therefore, The rising tide raises all ships type of thing.

[00:54:00] And as you’re talking, you know, it’s just, it’s thinking about, so how does all this stuff play together? How does things like advocacy play into, you know, giving credit unions the ability to offer super competitive products and services? And, and how does, you know, going and fighting for things like, Hey, you know what, I know this sounded good, but it’s actually harmful for our military members.

How does that play into this whole concept of, you know, financial health and what are some of the crazy trickle down effects? And, and it just got me thinking about, you think back to, what was the, the story, it was the, the Maersk Alabama, right? The, the three CLT me members that took out the Somali pirates on the, the rescue ship.

Right. For those of you who do remember this story or don’t remember the story, for those of you who do and don’t know, just the level of epic precision that had to take [00:55:00] place in that moment for what they did to have been pulled off, right? They are trying to save an American, one of our owns as a hostage life and bring him back to his family and bring him back here.

That is their mission, and it is an incredible tightrope that they are walking to do that. I mean, Tony, could you imagine if one of those three guys that had to take that shot at the same time as his two buddies, if one of those guys was thinking, oh man, how am I gonna make that loan payment tomorrow

Tony: yeah. Or, or my, or my wife texted me this morning and she’s, uh, you know, the, uh, the check bounced. Right for the utility builder shutting off the, shutting off the power. You gotta deal with that. ’cause it’s all in your name and you deployed without doing a limited power of attorney, to take care of that sort of stuff.

So yeah, it happens. It happens a lot. The example I use is, you know, aircraft maintenance, [00:56:00] the aircraft maintenance crew, right. That, uh, is being trying to make ends meet and the financial pressures are turning and he forgets to screw in the oxygen bottle on an F 15 and now that pilot’s at 60,000 feet passes out from my pocket here ’cause the oxygen isn’t flow in.

Right. You know, just little things like that can affect. And let’s say that F 15 was, part of the lead element in whatever operation that we’re doing, and that, that affects the mission. And that’s what I tell the, the Pentagon folks when we talk to them, that, we are a very important part and we call it financial readiness.

I think the industry uses the term financial wellness, but, we use financial readiness. It’s a part of mission readiness, and that’s, that’s what we focus on, you know, at least, at least with our military. but you said something else too, you know, that, that reminded me and then I’m glad that we are talking about, you know, this being April 22nd, you know, yesterday we had a meeting, with all the other trade associations and there, there are many in our industry, there’s not just [00:57:00] one.

There’s not just two. If I, you know, count DCUC, there’s, there’s, there’s prob probably a couple dozen, national level trade associations out there that never, uh, never get included in, in a lot of the national advocacy stuff, or very rare, rarely do. I think if you take the, uh, the member access bill that happened, several years ago.

I think that was the last time we saw an industry-wide event. but this tax exemption fight is huge. And if credit unions get taxed, that affect, that doesn’t just affect credit unions. it affects DCUC, right? ’cause those are, those are our members. but it also affects our system partners, the ones that sponsor our conferences and events.

’cause then their business lines go away as well. And so yesterday we had DCUC hosted a meeting with all these national level trade associations. We invited our league partners ’cause we also partner with each of the leagues. and then, and we did invite America’s credit unions to this also, but then we also invited our [00:58:00] system partners.

I hate using the term vendor. It just seems like it’s a, has a negative connotation to it. I’d rather use the term partner. Right? And, and what I always tell them is, is sponsor is a verb. It’s not a noun, right? So, uh, so our partners sponsor our events. I like, you know, um, and, and, and I just, I tried really hard to make that distinction, but we brought ’em all in together yesterday and came up with a, 

With a six week action plan that we’re already marching down. And so yesterday was an important day in my view, or, or as I like to say in my humble but accurate opinion was a, was a big day for the industry and just lining up everybody and everybody contributes something right? And it’s that healthy competition.

But how do we harness that healthy competition and focus it toward an end state where the credit union tax exemption is safe? Uh, we still keep the, uh, NCUA as an independent agency. All our other advocacy issues are, [00:59:00] are remain on track and on track to get, to get, introduced and passed into Congress.

But more importantly, nobody ever messes with camp credit unions again because they see the power of credit unions when we’re all focused on a, on an action plan moving forward. And, it was, I thought it was a good meeting. It lasted for exactly an hour. ’cause I’m a military guy and. We, we stay on time, right?

 but, uh, I’ve already got a lot of emails and a lot of, a lot of people answering the call and, putting that together. And I think what I think what you and, the rest of the listeners or viewers on, on this, on this show, you’re gonna see a lot of things, start happening very, very quickly as a result of that meeting.

Josh: Yeah, so, so Tony, I think it would be awesome for you, you know. I wanna be careful because this is just, it’s one of the subjects that I obviously pay very close attention to, but I would absolutely not count myself as an, an expert and I will keep my, in my [01:00:00] humble, but probably inaccurate opinions out of it.

But, so, uh, you know, we, we did, we, we kind of called out why today’s recording date was specific. There’s a lot that’s gone on in the last, just 24 hours in the last two weeks. So, you know, will you talk us through a little bit of, you know, in your humble opinion, what’s going on with, uh, with the removal of the two NCUA folks, and what are the impacts of that and how is the DCUC looking at this and.

And maybe if you could kind of talk us through, so when you say this six week action plan, like what are the things that you’re recommending that, you know, credit unions collectively do together to make sure that you know, you’re able to keep up the mission that you’ve set on?

Tony: Well, I think with the NCUA, uh, you know, change it at the NCUA, I think we’re all sort of in a, in, let’s wait and see. Let’s not rush to judgment. I mean, yeah, it’s not good for the [01:01:00] industry that we no longer have a three person board. And what are the implications, of having a one person, you know, board member making all the decisions?

Can that get challenged in court? Are there precedents in place? the good news is, is that the examinations are still happening. and I know that sounds weird for a credit union audience ’cause who likes to get examined, right? But, you know, the safety and soundness of the, uh, national Credit Union, you know, share insurance fund is still being looked at and still monitored.

And that’s the good thing that’s happening. So, normal operations continue, but any new regulations or new ideas that require a board vote, those are all in question right now. And so when I talked about, the, homeless veterans, that maybe a single, chairman Hoffman, maybe he can do that for us.

I just, you know, I just don’t know. So there’s opportunity there as well. Uh, it’d be easier getting to vote a one ’cause then it’s unanimous, you know, and moving forward. But, but yeah, what’s gonna happen next? You know? And then, then will the president, you know, [01:02:00] nominate, Who will we nominate next?

 some of the other uncertainty is this the first step to consolidating the NCA under the FDIC? I think there’s enough differences between banks and credit unions and our structure plus the NCA is funded by credit unions and not taxpayers. So that’s a huge difference, you know, going forward as well.

 I kind, I kinda look at that as sort of, sort of a tax in and of itself in that we don’t take any taxpayer dollars or run our NCUA, we tax our own credit unions, you know, themselves, you know, 1.3, uh, rate, the rate. And that’s what they pay in to, to for, for the NCUA to accomplish its mission.

And so I always kind of thought of that as an in kind, contribution for, uh, for self-regulating, you know, our members’ credit unions. So, yeah, I think we’re kind of in a, you know, it depends, or let’s wait and see what happens with the NCA. it just happened less than a week ago, and so.

 so we are, you know, we’re just trying to figure out, what the landscape looks like. Now, our biggest, uh, [01:03:00] concern though is, is the industry tax exemption. And with the, uh, expiration of the Trump tax cuts, uh, from 2017, you know, something has to come in its place. The big question is, right, how do you pay for that tax cut?

And seeing credit unions, you know, officially listed on a congressional document was a bit unsettling. And so, it’s all hands on deck, you know, another military term, right, to start, start fighting this. And we’ve been watching, know, different people do different things. But if we’re gonna, if we’re gonna protect our industry, then we all need to be focused on, on an end goal.

And how do we get there? And that was the purpose of yesterday’s meeting. once we set up this super structure and how, and how we, how we accomplish this tax exemption issue. There’s no reason why we couldn’t keep the band together for other industry issues. Long, you know, long running issues like the member business lending, caps, you know, how do we get those removed?

 how do we protect against the Credit [01:04:00] Card Competition Act? You know, how do we keep, community reinvestment act out of, out of legislation that affects credit unions? And so how do we keep that strong coalition, right? that all that collaboration pointed in the right direction for everything else, you know, moving forward.

’cause once, ’cause once you build a, a huge battleship, let’s use it for a lot more than just one battle, right? It’s still intact. And so how do we maximize, uh, the effects that, uh, this coalition will bring? And that was some of the exciting part that happened at, you know, in yesterday’s meeting.

Josh: Tony, I want, just for clarity, I wanna go back to a comment that you made. ’cause I don’t know if, how much, the diverse listeners of this show may have have caught that you made a comment about. so I’m gonna oversimplify it and then you talk it through. Okay.

Tony: Okay.

Josh: we cut some taxes from some places, and so, like we said earlier, nothing’s free, so we gotta pay for it somehow.

So we came up with a list of [01:05:00] things that we could get that tax money from instead. And for the first time, credit unions were like labeled on the list. And that was the concern for you, right.

Tony: Yeah, yeah. There was a document on Capitol Hill where they listed, the credit union tax exemption, right. as being a, a potential offset, and it wasn’t very much, I think it was like $3 billion. A, a year. Right. But what, what Congress do. 

But what Congress forgot to, uh, mention was the benefit of that, of, of not taxing credit unions and the multiplier that has in the communities as well. Right. So what does that look like? Right. And that’s, that’s like 16 times whatever, tax benefit we’re getting, that’s the multiplier effect in each of these communities.

And that’s the part that, that we are educating Congress about, while they’re considering that, ’cause all that could go away, and now you have banking deserts, you know, and, and in lots of parts [01:06:00] of the country, you have less opportunity for people like myself who got, you know, who went, who joined the Air Force to lift, you know, lift up, break the cycle, and, really my entire family, my mom and dad, you know, lift them out of all that.

 when you use tax, credit unions, all that, all that is at risk too. And that’s the other side of the balance sheet. And so everyone’s focused on the one, itty bitty number, but not the other side of the ledger with all the benefit that comes on that. And so our goal is to educate Congress by showing the data, the data analytics, and then telling a couple stories.

 my mine could be one of them. yours could be another one, but what was the impact of that credit union? You, you talked about doctors, people never think about the amount of debt that comes out of the medical colleges, right? That a lot of these, that all these doctors have incurred and they gotta pay it back.

 yeah, they’re making a nice salary to start off with, but they got bills and they got issues. You, and so,all that goes away if we don’t have our institution in place to [01:07:00] handle that. And that just takes, consistent, a persistent. effort on Capitol Hill. you can’t just do this piecemeal.

It is gotta be constant, the constant drumbeat with all these things going forward. And that’s kind of what we discussed yesterday.

Josh: Yeah, no, you know, Tony, that, that makes a good point of, if you think about. I think this is why you see a lot of times two high functioning, successful former military members make really good, um, executive leadership coaches, right? As you think about, you know, just creating a really high functioning military unit and then creating a really operationally efficient organization. A lot of it about, is about, central intelligence and, and having a good stream of information to help you make decisions. Because if you think about it, whether you are, you know, the squadron leader or whether you’re the CEO of a credit union, you cannot know [01:08:00] and be a part of every single granular detail of every single thing that’s going on, right?

Think about the CEO of even just a billion dollar credit union, right? How often do you talk to members versus how often does your teller line talk to members?

Tony: Yeah,

Josh: So you’re really relying on that information chain to feed back to you of, Hey, just so you know, we’re talking about maybe deleting this product or changing this product.

I’ve had 10 success stories this last week of how this product positively impacted people that you may not know without that information chain. And I think of the, you know, things like DCUC and the leagues, and you play a critical element in that information chain for decision makers on Capitol Hill.

Right? And that’s why these things are so important is because we cannot expect our policy makers or [01:09:00] our president. To understand the epic granular levels of detail of that one member impact story, because we can’t even expect the CEO of the credit union to know every single one of those, right? So somebody’s gotta bring those, those stories bring those data points up so that people have the right information to hopefully make the right decisions that positively impact the areas that we serve.

Tony: Totally

Josh: see what you guys are doing as a really important piece of this puzzle that is creating, hopefully a good and safe, framework for Americans to live financially healthy, stable, and positive lives and futures. Like that’s

Tony: yeah, like I said, there’s a, there’s a whole chorus of credit union advocates out there that I was happy to meet with yesterday and I even learned of some new ones because I, I, I haven’t, you know, I’ve been in the industry for almost nine years now, and I heard of a new one this week. It [01:10:00] was a National Council of Firefighter Credit Unions,

Josh: Yeah. Cool.

Tony: and I went, wow, that’s, that’s now.

You know, other people had heard of. I, I just had not, but what a wonderful organization, right? And you talk about first responders, everybody can relate to firefighters and they got stories to tell, right? And, that becomes another powerful, um, niche organization that has a voice, in our society, right?

Because everybody, everybody loves what fire, what firefighters do, right? So how do we take care of them? So there’s, like I said, there’s several dozen national trade associations out there that if we, if we could properly point ’em in the right way and, you know, help them with some of the stuff ’cause they’re not very big or they don’t have a lot of resources, but how do we share those resources to get those stories and their support, or not.

I mean, if they, if you know, if they, if they don’t want to get in the advocacy role, well there’s other ways. Can we at least use the story in our advocacy role? You know, there’s [01:11:00] different ways to get the same information out, and generate awareness. So I’m pretty, uh, I’m pretty optimistic about where we’re going now.

The reason why the timestamps important is because Congress is still coming back from their recess, and they’ll take up this reconciliation bill pretty soon. And, if there is a time to fight, it’s now, there’s no more sitting on the sidelines. This is fourth quarter, right? And you see teams, you’ll always put up, they always put up the four, right?

You know, it’s fourth quarter. We’re in that fourth quarter now of this issue. And now it’s time to buckle down and, let’s get out there and win this thing.

Josh: Well, I, again, as understanding just how much you’ve got on your plate right now. Tony, I’ve really appreciated you taking the time outta your day to come and, and just have this long conversation with me and educate us on the work that you’re doing, the impacts that it’s having, and kind of how you all are thinking about things.

 I really do want to, impress upon our listeners, you know, please use, Tony and the [01:12:00] DCUC and their team as another resource of information for you, right? The more information you have, the better informed you’re gonna be. so they put out a, a phenomenal newsletter that I’m now getting, on the regular.

So, you know, sign up for those things. Make sure you’re getting that insight.

Tony: Yeah. And again, you don’t have to be a military credit union to join. All credit unions are welcome.

Josh: Yeah, I think that was an important point. I, I, again, ’cause uh, these are just the things that I, I think until you say bluntly, like you may not even think about. But yeah, you’re right. I mean, you don’t have to be a military credit union, but I bet you anything, if you survey your field of membership, you’ve probably got a ton of veterans in your membership.

Tony: Oh yeah, definitely.

Josh: So, well, Tony, before I let you go, I’d love to wrap up with, with two final questions for you. So this may be a very long list, but where do you go to get information about what’s happening in the industry? How do you stay up to date? I.

Tony: Well, of course as what’s happening, I read the trade press [01:13:00] every day and that’s a good source, but that tends to be, and that’s just reporting the news, that has already happened. But I’ve got two good sources, one with my chief advocacy officer, who’s, uh, very connected on Capitol Hill, and he picks up things from all his contacts.

And then we have a, uh, lobbyist on retainer. You know, John Ney. who is also well connected and having both Jason and John with their feelers out, feeding me information. or the three of us, and we will start early. could be six in the morning, it could be seven in the morning. we’re already, kind of forming our need on where we need to go next.

With the meeting I had yesterday, I just picked up several dozen more sources of data, and I think how do we harness that intelligence? I liked how you said we need our own CIA, our own central intelligence agency to say somebody picked up on a conversation in a committee, and it looks like today we need to tackle this issue, or at least tackle it on this front.

 because the bankers are [01:14:00] already on Capitol Hill pedaling their, their narrative. And so how do we counter that? That becomes very, very important. And so that’s kind of the different sources that I get, from what’s in the print and on social media, and then what, what our, what our human intel is picking up from their conversations on Capitol Hill.

And that, that has become very, very powerful.

Josh: Well, and if people want to connect with you or if they want to connect with DCUC and get information straight from you all, how can they do that?

Tony: Sure. We have a, uh, well, Juan joined DCUC. I, I blow people away because our, affiliate rate is capped at $3,000 a year. So it’s, it’s cheap to join DCUC. Right. and with that, you get our monthly, our weekly letter on, on what’s going on in the advocacy world. You get our monthly news newsletter. if we have webinars, we’ll jump on it.

I like giving CEOs my personal cell phone number, so if they want to know what’s going on, they can text me and I’ll answer. as soon [01:15:00] as I can. I like to be accessible. That’s probably the most direct form when people join DCUC. But if you’re contemplating join, reach out to cuc.org.

send me a, send me an email at aHernandez@cuc.org and we’ll get you hooked up. but lots of ways to communicate. I’d like to be very accessible. we put out lots of different publications on social media, and then our, our weekly newsletters, once we get you signed up, we like to share it all.

’cause the more information we share and getting it out of those individual silos and people have actionable, uh, intel that they can determine their next steps that, for whatever advocacy position we want to take.

Josh: Oh, that’s great. Thank you so much again, Tony. And I wanna say one final special thank you, to Mrs. Hernandez for gracefully stepping down and giving you the opportunity, to do all this great work you’re doing for DCU cso a a thank you to her as well

Tony: I Absolutely, I thank her every day.

Josh: as you should.

Tony: I know. But, but no, I’ll, I’ll definitely [01:16:00] pass that along.

Josh: thank you again for coming and being a guest on the Digital Banking Podcast.

Tony: Thanks. Thanks, Josh. It was a pleasure being here today.