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>> Rep Liebling thanks for joining us today for this interview. Can you describe your district
and tell us in what ways you and your district are similar?
>> my district is 268 which is part of the city of Rochester, kind of the core of Rochester
it stretches from the community college all the way through downtown the Mayo Clinic campus
and the east to west across the southern part of the city I would say. It is a very diverse
district in every way it is diverse economically, it is diverse in racial and ethnic categories,
its diverse in age. >> how are you? a good you at
>> I think I'm a good fit for the district. And now my fifth term I interact comfortably
with a lot of different sectors of my community. I feel very comfortable with the working people
in my community, with the different ethnic communities I really enjoy interacting with
different ethnicities and people from different places. I have a public health background
I work on health care and Human Services so I fit with the medical community because obviously
it's very health care is huge part of the district since the Mayo Clinic is there. That
is a very good fit >> what is your occupation outside the Legislature?
>> I'm a lawyer by training. I do of a public health degree when I started running for the
Legislature a pretty much had to close down my law practice so I've sort of practice law
sporadically I keep up my law license but I'm not really actively practicing law some
would say not pretty much a full-time legislator. Certainly being a committee chair I don't
see how I could do otherwise because it is a pretty all encompassing kind of thing.
>> what legislation that you work done in the past that you are most proud of
>> on a lot of things that haven't necessarily have my name on it as chief author. For example
extending marriage equality is something I'm very proud of and really thrilled to have
been part of. Even though it's obviously I did not carry the legislation but I was certainly
active in making it happen. Expansion of medical assistance which happened in the last session
under the affordable Care Act and a lot of pieces of trying to make health services better
and more available for more people in Minnesota. That is been something I've worked on.
>> if you could go back and visit any time, what time would you travel to and wind?
>> I very much like living in the present. I just came back from a visit to Israel and
Jerusalem in particular is a place where you are really aware of all the different times
that people have lived at their the city of Jerusalem is built layer upon layer their
different civilizations that are represented physically underneath the ground you walk
on in Jerusalem. I spent the last couple of weeks learning a lot about that history and
that was very interesting and I know we live in a world with a lot of challenges is presently,
but we also live in a world with a lot of possibilities that really never existed before
in human history and I'm really glad to be part of that. . .