Florida Lt. Governor Jay Collins: Retiring From Special Forces, the VA System, & Fixing America From the State Level | Ep. 297 | Pt. 2

Mike Drop

Mike Ritland

Politics, Society & Culture, News, Personal Journals

4.9 • 6.5K Ratings

🗓️ 25 June 2026

⏱️ 72 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Jay Collins served as a one-legged Green Beret before retiring on his own terms, then transitioned into nonprofit work and eventually Florida politics — passing 55 bills in three years as a state senator and now serving as Lieutenant Governor under Ron DeSantis while running for Governor. In this episode, Jay breaks down the VA system's failures and how to fix them, why states should lead where Washington has repeatedly failed, and what it takes to bring a combat veteran's mindset into government. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Breaking news. The wait is over now. Waiting for summer? Over. Waiting while charging your electric car?
0:09.0	Ultra fast over. Turn up summer energy. Discover charging in minutes all across Europe. And for even more summer energy,
0:17.9	stream the new Ionity remix by Elderbrook on Spotify now.
0:23.3	Ionity.
0:24.2	Charge faster.
0:25.4	Enjoy more.
0:29.8	What was the, I guess, the ultimate decision-making process for retiring slash getting out?
0:36.2	I made a promise, actually.
0:38.3	I said if it gets to the point where I'm having a hard time keeping up, it's time to
0:42.6	hang it up.
0:43.7	You either meet the standard or you don't.
0:46.4	I don't want to be the weak link.
0:48.4	I did all those things and I had an opportunity to go back to some cured organizations.
0:54.7	There were some offers in D.C.
0:57.0	And then there was an opportunity to jump into the regular SF and compete for
1:02.7	Sergeant Major.
1:04.1	Right.
1:04.9	So when you get injured, you kind of come off the tracks of career growth.
1:10.1	Yeah.
1:10.2	Yeah, you just, what do you do, right?
1:12.6	I was like, all right, fine, we'll figure this out.
1:14.6	So I took over as the first sergeant in the 18 Delta Committee in the course, right?
	...

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