Candidate Q&A
Why are you running?
He’s a working man from Bonfield who’s spent 32 years in Kankakee County watching the same broken promises while your property taxes climb, your healthcare costs more, and Washington couldn’t care less. He’s running for Congress because somebody from this district needs to finally fight back. No PAC money. No consultants. Just a trucker who’s had enough.
What do you think is the most pressing issue facing your constituents and how do you plan on addressing it?
Affordable health care and Housing costs- Support low-cost loans for new home buyers.
What is one unique challenge your district faces and how do you plan to address it?
The Challenges: For most of the 20th century, the 2nd District was a powerhouse of heavy industry, steel mills, and rail manufacturing centered around Lake Calumet, South Chicago, and the Pullman area. The collapse of the steel industry in the late 20th century left a trail of economic downturns. Today, the south suburbs (such as Harvey) experience significantly higher unemployment rates, lower average incomes, and deep financial distress compared to other Chicago suburban regions.
Proposed Solutions: Regional strategists and community leaders argue that connecting the Southland to the global economy is vital. A long-standing proposal supported by regional leaders involves developing a new major commercial airport in the south suburbs to serve as a massive cargo and passenger transit hub, creating thousands of localized, high-wage jobs. Candidates also emphasize leveraging the district’s remaining automotive industrial footprint—such as the Ford assembly and stamping plants—while attracting clean energy manufacturing to fill the vacuum left by the legacy steel industry.
What do you think federal immigration reform should look like?
The legal immigration process is a disaster. Mike and his wife have dealt with it firsthand. People who want to come here the right way face a system that’s slow, confusing, and stacked against them. We need to fix that — make legal immigration work so people have a real path to do things by the book.
Refocus ICE enforcement on violent criminals who pose actual dangers to your community.
Stop wasting resources targeting people who aren’t a threat. Fix the legal immigration process so it’s clear, fair, and actually works — Mike knows from personal experience how broken it is.
Secure the border and enforce the laws we already have. Support legal immigration — America is stronger when people come here the right.
How should Congress address the rising costs of health care?
Convert health insurance companies to nonprofit organizations — eliminate the profit motive that drives up your premiums year after year. Cut your out-of-pocket costs by removing corporate shareholders from the healthcare equation Keep healthcare in your hands, not the government’s — no socialized medicine, no bureaucratic takeover. Attack the root cause of rising costs instead of slapping band-aids on a broken system Protect you from surprise billing and predatory pricing that can bankrupt a family overnight.
What approach would you take on tax policy and what is your top priority?
Government should live within its means — the same way you have to.
Fight to roll back Illinois’ highest-in-the-nation property taxes so your home doesn’t become a financial burden.
Push to reverse the 52-cent gas tax hike that’s been draining your wallet since 2019.
Cut wasteful federal spending and demand accountability for every taxpayer dollar. Stop politicians from treating your paycheck like their personal slush fund. Hold government to the same standard your family lives by: don’t spend more than you earn.
Is the House currently using its oversight powers in the way it should be? What areas of government need more or less oversight?
Reformers and organizations like the Project on Government Oversight suggest several ways Congress could restore its oversight capacity:
- Reinvesting in Staff and Training: Increasing committee staffing levels and providing nonpartisan training on fact-based investigations.
- Leveraging Support Agencies: Better utilizing independent data and recommendations from the GAO, Congressional Research Service (CRS), and Congressional Budget Office (CBO).
- Streamlining Legal and Interbranch Disputes: Creating clearer, faster-track judicial or institutional mechanisms to resolve executive privilege and subpoena standoffs so oversight efforts are not indefinitely stalled out by court battles.
What is the most pressing foreign policy issue facing the country and what role should the House play in dealing with it?
- Focus U.S. resources strictly on core domestic and economic security rather than trying to police or stabilize every global crisis.
- Encourage capable foreign partners (such as European nations) to assume a larger share of their own regional defense and financial costs.
- Diplomacy and Multilateral Re-engagement: Rebuild the capacity of the State Department and international institutions to negotiate arms control, manage global health threats, and disrupt transnational supply chains like synthetic fentanyl.
- Establishing Regulatory Frameworks and Guardrails. Governments use different legislative styles to manage public and private sector AI, trying to protect citizens without stifling technological progress.
- Risk-Based Approaches: The European Union pioneered a horizontal framework through the EU AI Act. This system classifies AI applications by their potential risk—banning high-danger uses (like social scoring) and placing strict auditing and transparency mandates on others.
How would you describe the current state of your party and what changes or new approaches would you like to see your party adopt?
Innovative Policy Paths and Potential Changes
To move past current internal deadlocks and appeal to a broader electorate—particularly younger voters and the growing working-class minority demographic—think tanks and reform-minded Republicans have proposed several modern policy evolutions.
- Pro-Family, Working-Class Economic Policy
While traditional legacy platforms ignored the national debt to cut corporate taxes, a modern populist-conservative hybrid could lean into “pro-family” economics:
- Expanded Child Tax Credits: championing direct financial relief for working families, framed as a pro-life, pro-family alternative to government welfare.
- Apprenticeship and Vocational Infrastructure: Moving away from the “college-for-all” narrative by offering federal tax incentives for businesses that create robust trade apprenticeships, directly targeting working-class economic mobility.