>> have you ever tried to get clean? >> most people don't realize that the restaurant business has one of the highest rates of drug and alcohol abuse of any industry in america. and it's scrambling for solutions. >> addiction is addiction, but recovery from addiction is more than just abstinenec. >> why do i know so much about this? because i'm a recovering addict myself, and this is my story. ♪ >> i'm andrew zimmern, story teller, chef, world traveler. >> that's delicious. >> i'm exploring our country, looking at the biggest social and political questions of the day through the lens of food. >> i mean, there is no one solution. sharing some amazing meals along the way. >> and trying to figure out -- >> holy moly! >> "what's eating america." ♪ >> new york city, eight million people all packed together, all chasing their dreams. i chased mine under these bright lights until i flamed out. today i'm 28 years sober. with the right support, every addict or alcoholic can find their own path to recovery. or stories of struggle and redemption have a universal message. there is hope. that's why i'm revisiting my past. i'm also looking to the future where legal, political and medical break-throughs may one day revolutionize how we treat addiction. my story begins here on new york's upper east side. >> can i get a slice? >> to go? >> to go. >> thank you. >> there are a couple of things we do really, really well in new york. one of them is pizza. my goodness. that is just a work of art. >> how is it? yummy yummy? >> delicious. there you go. i didn't want you to drip on the -- you're welcome. >> new yorkers are friendly. lexington avenue and 71st street, my old neighborhood. >> that's the apartment i grew up, in had my first taste of booze there when i was little, micking my dad's drink and i would take a little sip. >> there was a pharmacy on the first floor of our building. >> you could actually call down and say, oh, my mom wants such and such refilled, and you could get painkillers. it's how i first tried white crosses, speed and codeine was, i think, the first pain pill that i abused. >> i was only 13. but already alcohol was in my life. >> it's fair to say we both started down the path together, getting into drinking and drugs. >> i have known clark since we were kids. >> dabbling in that, at first. and then it slowly became a bit more a part of our lives. >> i went to a prominent college. i smiled around friends and family. all the while, i was drinking to black-out, abusing prescription pills and binging on cocaine and heroin. >> at the end of college, i spent three years in japan. and i remember coming back and re-joining my pals and going right back into that scene. but it felt to me as if something had changed. and by that i mean, something elevated the partying and also the substances involved. >> new york city in the early 1980s was dazzling. all that excitement came with a dark side. drugs and clubs were the scene. especially for me and many of my kitchen friends. all of us aspiring to greatness in the high stakes, high reward restaurants of new york city. >> everybody was doing drugs. everybody was drinking, et cetera. it was the wild west back then. >> steven hansen is one of the most successful and respected restauranters in new york city. in 2007, he sold his hospitality company for $150 million. i was supposed to be there right with him and i blew it. >> i had been working a lot of different jobs around town, cooking, managing restaurants. and steve hansen had wanted to open a restaurant and was very transparent about opening many restaurants after that. and we clicked. >> it's easy to see his talent. he's exceptionally bright. he had his hands and the pulse on what was going on at the time. >> we ended up opening a restaurant together called coconut grill on the east side of new york. i think my official title was general manager. >> we were very, very successful from day one. it was like the doors blew open and there was andrew and i. >> when we expanded and i was making a little more money, i became completely unmanageable. i was stealing money, stealing booze and drinking almost to black out every single night, doing drugs on the premise of the business that i was tasked to manage. i completely unwound. >> there were times when andrew was mia, didn't show up for work and was just gone. >> i knew any day walking in i was going to be fired. >> i don't remember what happened on termination, whether he walked or i said i had enough. >> my memory of it is hazy, only because, i mean, everything was hazy at that time. but for all intents and purposes, the job was no longer mine. >> we were together 24/7. it is like you lose your best friend. >> it was ugly because i made it ugly. it was sad because i made it sad. we have never really had the opportunity to talk about what happened. >> andrew! hey, buddy. >> well, i know how healthy you are, so i thought i'd bring you 20 pounds of pastriepastries. >> unbelievable. look at this. >> turns out steven still has a letter that i wrote him 30 years ago. >> oh, my gosh. >> i don't even remember writing it. >> this is dated march 15th, 1989, which is over 30 years ago. as of last week, it has come to light that over the course of several months i had defrauded the company to the sum of $571.41. the stuff that i took, the people that i abused, the bottles of booze makes that number much bigger than that. it's further understood that my work will be scrutinized more diligently. oh, my god. i was still working for you. you gave me another chance, and i only held it together for a couple months before i just -- >> yeah, you vanished 100%. i remember. you were nowhere to be found. >> i would be irresponsible if i didn't let this opportunity go by with telling you how much all that support meant to me. i mean, seriously. i'm so grateful that we had that opportunity together. i'm so glad that we're still friends today. steven went on to great success. >> it's amazing. >> while my life fell apart. >> i would be drinking around the clock, taking the money that my father was giving me to help me get back on my feet. he was giving me one last chance before ultimately he just threw up his hands. i eventually got evicted from my apartment and ended up homeless, squatting in an abandoned building with several other drunks. >> i slept every night on a pile of dirty clothes. slept is really the wrong word. i would pass out. every couple of days i would steal or buy, depending on how flush i was a bottle of comet or ajax and sprinkle it around the clothes so the rats and the coaches wouldn't crawl over. >> that was my life for nearly a year. the high rate of addiction among restaurant workers has the industry actively seeking solutions. >> i'm sara. i'm an alcoholic. >> re-tracing my own steps is a reminder of what it takes to get there. >> what does it feel like to be back here where it all started? 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(stammering) w-we have a melon rind stew. comes with a pork and bean reduction. yeah, we're going to just do a lap and we'll come back. okay. well, we'll be here. man! why isn't this working? my mouth is watering. i think that's just your rabies flaring up. with geico, the savings keep on going. just like this sequel. 15 minutes could save you 15% or more on car insurance. we got gristle pot pies! but when allergies attack,f any the excitement fades. allegra helps you say yes with the fastest non-drowsy allergy relief and turning a half hearted yes, into an all in yes. allegra. live your life, not your allergies. ♪ >> this old restaurant and i go way back. >> it's been here since before i was born. as a young kid, i was going there for some pirigi and stuffed cabbage with my dad and his mom. when i was copying bundles of heroin, one of my dealers lived down that street. >> hearing former alcohols and addicts tell their stories helped me recover. i hope that sharing my story can do the same. that street corner outside the selca played a pivotal role in my life. >> there was a phone booth right here. i remember it vividly. i would open it, stand in inside, call her number and i would be staring at the selca waiting for her to pick up the phone. the last time i went to linda, i walked into her apartment that she and her boyfriend shared, and they were both passed out or oded. i have no idea. and my reaction wasn't to get help. that's how far my disease has taken me, and i'm not proud of it. my reaction wasn't to get help. my reaction was, now where am i going to get my drugs? and i just left. my disease brought me to a place where i crossed lines i swore i would never cross. i needed money. so the easiest thing that i could do was to steal. with all of these caves dotting madison avenue, i would walk past the tables and if i saw a purse or a briefcase on a chair, i would just grab it and then run towards central park, heart beating a million miles an hour praying nobody had followed me. >> some people may have said i needed prison. what i really needed was help. >> the meat cabbage tomato sauce. boiled pierogis and fried pierogis. >> i love eating at the selca, but it reminds me at the darkest stage in my life. >> at every stage of my life, i have always wanted to be the ring leader. but i'm the loneliest person in the room sometimes. and then i wanted to literally be alone. and i just wanted to kill myself. and that's where my disease brought me. i tried to drink myself to death in a flop house hotel. i told the guy no calls. i kept passing out. i woke up. i believe it was three days into this. and i literally plugged the phone back into the wall, called one of my best friends. i told him where i was and he came and got me. >> that was my friend clark. >> his large group of friends who really loved him, we decided he needed to go to rehab. so we staged an intervention. and the next day, he was on a plane. >> my whole life i was thrown a thousand life per ver vers and i kept tossing them back because i didn't like the color orange. finally i woke up and i'm like, okay, i'm grabbing this life preserver. >> on january 28th of 1992, clark and my closest friends gave me a plane ticket to minnesota. one way. i entered what is regarded as one of the best addiction treatment facilities in the country. what is now the betty ford foundation. >> after five weeks there, they recommended i attend fellowship club which was the halfway house. it was here at fellowship club that i met someone who is still a friend of mine today. >> welcome home, man. >> william moiers jr. is the son of the legendary broadcaster bill moyers. like me, william's addiction brought him here. he is now vice president of public affairs. >> so the living room, still a group room. whatever was going on out there, we would bring in here and process it and talk through it and do it as recovering people early on in the journey. >> the beauty of this old house was also something that was very comforting. >> everything that is good about my life today, i owe to the experience i had here because it was here i met the woman that would become the mother of my three children. it was here i learned more about the organization that i would ultimately work for. i mean, this was the end of my active using and the beginning of the rest of my life. >> a sober living residence like this one provides a safe foundation of housing, counseling and support so that patients can wade back into real world responsibilities of work, family and self-care. >> what does it feel like to be back here where it all started? >> if i think about it for more than 30 seconds, it's really hard. >> yeah. >> and it always happens. you know. i mean, how do you not? we would go to the same meetings on monday together. this is where we grew up. this is the place that gave us our life back. what gets me and what i think about the most is why am i still here? i am friends who came here who had gone through, who were several years sober, relapsed and are no longer with us. i think about that every time that i'm here. i think about all those people. >> i had a recurrence of my use or relapses, people call it. i had that after i left here. but i knew i could come back to this community and that if i came back to this community, even if i came back stumbling or on my knees that i could be let in. >> it taught me a crucial lesson. i am not alone in this. >> to have a place to learn and to grow where you are treated like a human being is the greatest gift that you can be given. >> recovery from addiction is more than just answbstinence. it is about learning to live life differently in the real world, which is what this place is all about. we opened in may, and i was in rehab in july. when i try to explain it to people that don't know, it was as if the sun had never come out. it was this darkness all the time. 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[tina] you're an old lady. so beautiful. >> oh, thank you. >> a great meal, a glass of wine, maybe two. dining out is a relaxing end to a long week for many of us. yet, back in the kitchens, it's a different world. the long hours, fast pace and pressure for perfection are just a few of the reasons the restaurant industry has one of the highest rates of substance abuse in the united states. however, this very same environment that enabled me to hide my addiction -- >> this is so ridiculously good. >> -- rekindled my connection for passion and food once i got sober. >> i venn actually took over the reigns of a kitchen in the twin cities. being surrounded by some of the people in the same journey i was got me through the first five years of sobriety in a way nothing else could. >> the industry is now recognizing its addiction problem and is actively searching for solutions, which is why i'm in portland, oregon tonight. >> may i? >> please. >> that's pretty rock star. >> this is the second annual zero proof dinner in portland, a festival that raises money for local charities. guests pay to enjoy a multicourse meal prepared by incredible chefs, all of whom are recovering alcoholics and addicts. >> this dinner is a big public expression of the value of sobriety in the restaurant business. what happens hours earlier is much more private and critically important. >> i'm sara. i'm an alcoholic. >> hi, sara. >> this is a meeting of the portland chapter of ben's friends. >> i was in the wine industry for about 20 years. and my alcoholism really kind of snuck up on me. >> knowing that there is this diverse people that all share your stressors, speak your language and understand your needs and are in recovery and not drinking and sharing that message, that's what i would call a safe space. >> and that was about two and a half years after i opened my own business. that unlimited access and keys to the bar 24 hours a day was basically the beginning of the end for me. >> just a given you could woman into work hungover and stand in the freezer for a little bit and try to chug through it for a while until that stopped working. >> that almost killed me. it put me in a position later on in my life where i surely didn't want to live. >> i got sober because a sober coach inspired me to get sober. that was over ten years ago. >> it's refreshing to hear that the restaurant industry is changing. you know, i'm just hoping that i can be a part of that change. ♪ >> i just want to welcome you guys all to zero proof 2.0. [ applause ] >> back at the dinner, chefs and cooks have spent hours preparing. now it's show time. >> just to get the elephant in the room out, i want you all to know that dinner is being prepared by alcoholics for you tonight. >> mango silver needle tea. it is sublime, and it doesn't affect you in the neck up so we can all drive home tonight. cheers. >> cheers! >> this evening is all about amazing food paired with alcohol free cocktails. >> what are you making? >> this is a coconut cocktail that we're doing, so it is coconut water, tea, licorice syrup, tea and juniper. >> we have been told that alcohol is the only thing that goes well with food, right? we can make all these things go wonderful with food. >> yeah, this is it. >> this is my friend mike. he is one of the most respected chefs in the world. a five-time james beard award winner and co-owner of 2019's best restaurant in the country located in philadelphia. mike is 11 years sober. >> this is that great veal that i think i had. >> we wrap it in cheese cloth and dry age it for one month. 300 degrees. then we let is rut rust. >> mike opened it in 2008. his addiction was in full block. >> we opened in may, and i was in rehab in july. when i try to explain it to people that don't know, it was as many the sun had never come out. it was this darkness all the time. and we opened this restaurant. and, you know, the pressure had built so much. between being sick from withdrawal and just running out of all your options and all the [ bleep ] and all the lying to yourself, it was rough. and i couldn't do it anymore. >> you have been sober a while. i have been sober a while. i feel like i'm not an arm's length away from a drink or a drug after a lot of years. but i know if i lean an inch, it's there. >> yeah. >> and i'm not worried today about drinking. today i'm worried about being a good dad. >> i have two kids that have never seen me high or drunk. i have two boys that have never known me to lie or to manipulate. the promises are true. it does get better, and it's -- you know, it is literally one day at a time. so i feel like we live it. also this smells [ bleep ] amazing. last year was the first year we did this dinner. we didn't know how it was going to turn out. the good thing is that we haven't had a drink in a year, and we got invited back, which when we were drinking we didn't get invited back to things, so thanks for having us again. [ applause ] >> for me and many other people here, this meal shines a lot on more than just great food. this is a disease that affects every single american one way or another, no matter how you add it up. i think what my addiction has taught me is that i am at my best when i'm one of many. that's amazing! >> when i'm thinking about someone else other than myself, my days are pretty darn good. am i going in the room that says danger? >> you are. >> fantastic. >> is there something in our brains that can explain addiction? revolutionary treatment may be on the horizon. liberty biberty- cut. we'll dub it. liberty mutual customizes your car insurance so you only pay for what you need. only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ with hepatitis c... ...i ...best for my family.my... in only 8 weeks with mavyret... ...i was cured. i faced reminders of my hep c every day. i worried about my hep c. but in only 8 weeks with mavyret... ...i was cured. mavyret is the only 8-week cure for all types of hep c. before starting mavyret your doctor will test... ...if you've had hepatitis b which may flare up and cause serious liver problems during and after treatment. tell your doctor if you've had hepatitis b, a liver or kidney transplant,... ...other liver problems, hiv-1, or other medical conditions,... ...and all medicines you take. don't take mavyret with atazanavir... ...or rifampin, or if you've had certain liver problems. if you've had or have serious liver problems other than hep c, there's a rare chance they may worsen. signs of serious liver problems may include yellowing of the skin, abdominal pain or swelling, confusion, and unexplained bleeding or bruising. tell your doctor if you develop symptoms of liver disease. common side effects include headache and tiredness. with hep c behind me, i feel free... ...fearless... ...because i am cured. talk to your doctor about mavyret. it's an honor to tell you that [ applause ] thank you. liberty mutual customizes your car insurance so you only pay for what you need. i love you! only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ hello. here is what's happening. washington state officials a second victim has died from coronavirus and three more people diagnosed with the disease. the first confirmed case in manhattan. mayor pete buttigieg is ending his campaign for president. he made history as the first openly gay presidential candidate to earn primary delegates. now back to "what's eating america." ♪ portland is one of my favorite places to visit, a beautiful city with great people and a sublime food scene. >> i love that. really good. >> today i'm looking at another side of portland. oregon has one of the highest percentages of elicit drug use in the country. >> good to see you. >> this sergeant and officer dave sanders are part of a new approach to a persistent program. >> we'll go hit some hot spots around town and see what we see. >> yep. >> it's called the lead program, which stands for law enforcement assisted die version. when cops come aloss low level possession offenders, the goal is recovery rather than incarceration. >> i'm here to protect and serve everybody. addiction is no different. working with people with addictions is absolutely no different. >> yeah. we want to break the cycle. >> it doesn't take us long to find a group of people sitting on the sidewalk surrounded by hypodermic needless. >> what's up, guys? >> we're okay. >> you guys cooking up some drugs here? >> there is an open needle behind you. >> see a lot of syringes. are you guys using drugs here. >> we're not here to jam you up. we're here to help you out. >> rather than progress right into treating this as a criminal offense situation, the officers are actually approaching this as a how can we help you situation. hillary is 28 years old. >> i'm going to search you for more drugs and then i'm going to talk to you about some programs that we're involved in to give you some options on how to get to a better place. >> hillary, how long have you been using? >> off and on for about ten years. >> ten years. have you ever tried to get clean? >> these folks don't need to be taken to jail. what they need is an opportunity to get off drugs. you give them the dignity and respect that l.e.a.d. offers with all of their other services like finding a place to live, then you are actually one by one solving the problem instead of throwing someone into the system that's not designed to solve the core issue. >> hey, hillary, this is officer floor and she's going to help in the search. do you mind standing up? >> i heard you say that you had something in your shirt. >> the reason that she's being searched right now is for her own safety and the officer's safety, right? >> it's more than a rinse. >> who said that it's mine? i was -- really? >> loaded works. in other words, drawn up heroin in the syringe. right? i can tell you with experience as an addict, when you have your substance of choice removed from you, you can see the anger level rising. >> go ahead and have a seat. >> this takes me right back to when i was using. i would do anything to keep my drugs of choice around me. >> and what if i told you i have a program that i can offer you? it is called l eed lead. have you ever heard of it? it's all working towards the process of getting clean. >> okay. >> is that something you would be interested in? >> yeah. okay. it takes effort and cooperation. >> the county funds and runs the l.e.a.d. program and local nonprofit central city concern provides the services. the police call in a caseworker to identify what resources are available to help hillary. >> i will continue to ask you questions about the best way to help you. >> maybe it is food, housing, treatment. maybe it is all of that. >> is it working? >> i believe so. >> yeah. >> we have been working with people who have made some pretty big changes in their lives. they feel a lot more validation having someone being there that cares about them regardless of their circumstances. >> it is hard to get clean. >> good luck. >> hillary didn't follow up on the referrals that brennan gave her. however, she's now in the l.e.a.d. system. and if she's stopped again, the health central city concern offers will still be there. >> as the mayor of this city, i am very honored to be here today to celebrate you. >> the success stories are on display at central city concern day. >> central city concern brings us together as a community. >> this is portland's mayor, ted wheeler. >> there is some people who are scared of this population. what would you say to them? >> these are people, too. they are our neighbors. they are our friends. they're family. and i believe the community social contract, if you will, is to reach out and meet those folks halfway, help them find that path to redemption. >> hello. hubert matthews is one of the success stories. he found a path to sobriety to one of the services provided to him through central city concerns. >> i got employed with the l.e.a.d. program which was dear to me because it worked with the people i came from. i'm from portland. went to school down here. i got high down here, right? so for me to be able to change my life around, it's come full circle. >> i would imagine as a casework caseworker, the ability to say, yeah, i was there tool is your most important tool. >> it is my most important tool because it's real life. you know, nobody is perfect. >> we need more love and compassion for our brothers and sisters. >> we do. >> because those people out there need what we have. >> yes, some hope. >> yeah, yeah. so that there is people like you out there doing this. >> yes. >> it's just -- just makes me really happy. just it's really -- it's amazing. some day, we might have a small chip that could provide a stimulus relieving that obsession to use. >> that is what we're working towards. 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>> for manhattan, we have the equivalent of one full-time nurse practitioner or m.d. plus one full-time rn. >> so that's two people for the island of manhattan. >> that's correct. >> that sounds like a really, really busy job. >> absolutely. absolutely. >> this well spenintentioned prm is only a drop in the bucket in terms of addressing addiction issues in the city. >> does it feel like tight? >> no, not tight. >> on the upper west side, we meet stefan. he's 58 years old, same age as me. he's been homeless 2014 when he left an addiction treatment program. >> but me, i got attitude. >> me too. >> i just kept walking. >> do you want to be sober, or does it not matter to you? >> doesn't matter. i only have four people that care about me. i lost them. >> that was my attitude, too, 30 years ago. it took a lot for me to admit that anyone still cared about me. it took even more to accept the help they offered. and eventually i learned to care about myself. >> we really focus on harm reduction because maybe a person isn't ready or interested in going to detox. >> explain that. >> at this moment. >> what's harm reduction? >> anything that you can do to sort of like mitigate those negative consequences that somebody might come into because of their addiction or their homelessness. we can prevent you getting hiv, hepatitis c. i consider it a success if i can make a meaningful improvement in someone's health while they're outside. >> uh-huh. >> try not to scratch at it if you can and i'm going to bring you some cream to cut down on the itching. >> this is the crisis that's happening every day on our streets when you're fighting the illnesses of addiction and alcoholism. >> it's just heart-breaking because, you know, 30 years ago i knew people like that. 30 years ago that -- that was -- that was me. >> 30 years ago, our attitude towards drugs was shaped by public service announcements like this. >> okay. last time. this is drugs. this is your brain on drugs. any questions? >> our understanding of the science behind addiction has come a long way since the 1980s. and what's happening right now is nothing short of revolutionary. researchers at the university of minnesota are studying the brains of addicts to try and understand why they relapse. the university has mri technology that's so precise it's paving the way for ground breaking therapies. today, they're taking a closer look at the brain of an addict with 28 years of sobriety. mine. >> the center has some of the highest field strength magnets in the world. we do cutting edge research of mapping out the connection between different brain regions. >> am i going in the room that says danger? >> you are. exactly. >> fantastic. >> i'm going to need the set up. >> we will have you lay down here. >> you can have your eyes open or closed, whatever you are most comfortable with. >> okay. and we're ready to run the very first scan. are you ready to go? >> good to go. >> these high resolution scans are able to capture brain wiring in graphic detail. >> all right. go ahead and sit up. all right. andrew. let's take a look at your brain. just looking through projections of your brain. there is your eyeballs in the front of your brain. >> where is the giant blue nodule that says that anything that makes me feel good i want more? >> that's the part of the brain that whenever you use drugs or alcohol or any type of pleasure, it fires up. >> yes. >> that pleasure center the supposed to be regulated by the prefrontal cortex. intense chronic experiences like substance abuse can interrupt the normal communication between these regions. >> people that lose that are usually the ones to relapse. >> in other words, the make me feel good part is like make me feel good, make make me feel good, make me feel good! the cerebral cortex, which is reason and everything, is saying, hey, wait a second, maybe not such a great idea. >> right, right. what we're doing is trying to enhance that with brain stimulation to help people stay abstinent. >> in the addiction research center, dr. thomas is looking for a solution. >> we're learning how the brain changes with drug exposure. now we want to modify the brain using light stimulation. we make very specific parts of the brain sensitive to light in mice, then we can activate or inhibit those brain regions and see how that affects the animal's behavior. >> in other words, maybe increasing the healthy pathway in brain activity? so someday in the future we might have a small chip or small device that just could attach to the side of the head that could provide a stimulus for human beings that would help them by relieving that obsession to use? >> that is very possible. that is what we're working towards. >> you guys are doing outer boundary of the universe, underbreaking work. that's amazing. i'm glad it's happening in minnesota, where i got sober. >> thank you. so are we. we got to remember that's why we love our country, because we have each other's backs and we take care of people. i think we need a little bit more of that in the white house. so you only pay for what you need. only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ with the world's first invisible trailer. invisible trailer? and it's not the trailer right next to us? this guy? you don't believe me? hop in. good lookin' pickup, i will say that. oh wow. silverado offers an optional technology package with up to 15 different views - including one enhanced view that makes your trailer appear invisible. wow. - that's pretty sweet. - that's cool. oooohh! that's awesome. where'd the trailer go? i love it. it's magic. they get that no two people are alike and customize your car i love it. insurance so you only pay for what you need. what do you think? i don't see it. only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ nobody loves a state fair more than me. >> what are these? >> potato chips. >> i've never tried potato chips. oh my gosh, thank you! >> the food. the people watching. the family fun. it's an experience like no other. so here's the deal. at the iowa state fair, a lot of things they're known for. if you had to pick just one thing -- ♪ it's pig, pig, pig, pig, pig, right? this state famously raises more hogs than there are people who live here. thank you very much. oh, well, we got to -- i mean, come on. doesn't get any better than that, does it? crazy. mm, wow. that's not good barbecue, that's great barbecue. can't go wrong with a pork shank, can you? while famous for all things pork, the iowa state fair is also a key stop for candidates on the presidential campaign trail. >> our chance in 2020 is to fight back. >> we have to bring our country back together again. >> i know how to get it done. >> at this point in the campaign, my home state senator, amy klobuchar, is in the thick of the race. >> hey, there, how are you? >> hi, really good to see you. >> senator klobuchar knows as well as anyone what addiction can do to a family, as she revealed during the contentious supreme court confirmation hearing of brett kavanaugh. >> my own dad struggled with alcoholism most of his life. and he got in trouble for it and there were consequences. he is still in aa at age 90. and he's sober. and in his words, he was pursued by grace, and that's how he got through this. >> i'm great, got my cheese kurds. >> the children's portion? please, i've been eating all day. >> i'm here to talk to the senator about the political steps we have to take to combat addiction. >> one out of two families have chemical dependency in their immediate family or close by. >> you're a mom. you're a wife. you're a daughter. you're my senator. is this something that you really carry with you every day? >> it is. and part of that is that i don't always see things in stark terms, mostly because i see the gray because of my dad. i always loved him no matter how much he messed up or didn't make it home on christmas morning or had to take the keys away from him when i was in high school because he was drinking out of the back of the trunk of the car. i always him. when you feel that way about someone, when you see it with other people, you always believe there may be some redemption. >> reporter: senator klobuchar has made adid i guess and mental health a focal point in her campaign. >> addiction, mental health, infrastructu infrastructure. putting a president in place that's going to have an optimistic agenda and take on these issues and get them done. >> she has proposed a $100 billion, three-point plan focusing on prevention, treatment, and ongoing recovery. why aren't more people behind it? it's not a red or blue issue. >> no, no. i think what it calls for is leadership, and it calls for finding ways to pay for thing and being straightforward with people and saying, we need to get this covered, we're tired of just hearing, oh, we're going to do it. also look at prevention so we have less people going down this road. >> why do you say to people when you're out crisscrossing the country who say, well, why wouldn't we want to just put those people away and ignore them? >> because everyone's going to see something happen in their own family or to themselves. it may not be addiction or menti mental health, but it may be something that's not fair. i remember the worlds of casey jo, champion swimmer from minnesota. she got hooked on opioids out of the emergency room when she was sick. she went on to illegal drugs. she ended up dying. the last word she said to her mom before she died was, "mama, it's not my fault." and i think a lot of people can say that. about addiction. and we've got to remember, that's why we love our country, because we have each other's backs and we take care of people. i think we need a little bit more of that in the white house. >> my greatest disaster in life, the thing that almost killed me, is now my greatest strength. and sharing that with the world has kept me sober, has given me a life that i never dreamed was possible. and i know that that's available for every single person out there struggling with this disease. >> good luck. >> if there's something that the sober world can teach everyone else, it's that dignity and respect, when it's sprinkled on human beings, the most powerful drug that we possess. it happens on tv. doesn't happen to your family. to your brother. but it does. >> no one thought it could happen to him. he was a tough guy prepared for anything. >> he always would say, if anyone tries to break in here, i'll kill them. >> instead, he was killed, stabbed in his own home. >> you're sure your dad's cold to the touch? >> his son and daughter-in-law stumbled into a terrifying scene. >> that's when i saw the gun. >> they want, we're going to have to kill you