JACOBS: I HAVE A RECORD OF BRINGING PEOPLE TOGETHER
What will be your top domestic and international priority in Congress? My top domestic priority is making sure that we do the COVID-19 stimulus well — that assistance gets to those who need it most and the decisions that are made set up the economy for success in the future. To me, one of the most important things we can do to ensure an equitable recovery is to invest in child care infrastructure by making sure care workers are paid well, ensuring working parents don’t have to choose between their work and their children, and passing the $50 billion in the bipartisan Child Care is Essential Act. It will set the next generation up for success, create jobs and immediately help families who are struggling right now. Internationally, this pandemic has laid bare just how damaging Donald Trump has been to America’s leadership role in the world and our ability to bring countries together to solve our greatest challenges. While there is so much we need to do to repair the damage of the Trump administration — rebuild our alliances, end the forever wars, and rebuild the State Department and USAID — I believe the priority must be to bring the world together to effectively and equitably address COVID-19. If done correctly, it can serve as a model for how to address similar challenges, like climate change, that are urgent and will require international cooperation at an unprecedented level.
Has the pandemic changed your approach to health care? If so, how? This pandemic has shown just how much we have underinvested in our public health infrastructure. Donald Trump has horribly mishandled this crisis, but we were also underprepared before he took office, with the CDC’s funding falling by 10 percent since 2009. This pandemic has also laid bare just how unequal our health care system is — with Black Americans dying at more than double the rate of White Americans from COVID-19, not to mention the already high Black maternal mortality rate. While the focus of health care reform has understandably been on coverage, I believe these disparate impacts show that we must also focus on access and quality of care. We also need to hold bad actors accountable for jacking up prices unnecessarily and taking advantage of a public health crisis. We need to work to bring down costs for all prescription drugs, ban drug companies from spending money on advertising instead of research, and use federal investment to ensure we are developing the kinds of drugs that will have the most health benefits, not the biggest profits. The pandemic has only furthered my belief that we need to fix our broken health care system, and that the best approach is through Medicare for All. Given the high rate of unemployment right now — with millions losing their employer-sponsored health care, if they had it to begin with — I think this is an ideal time to transition our system.
What more could Congress do to combat climate change? Climate change is one of the biggest threats facing humanity, and Congress needs to do far more to stop it. We need to transition to an entirely clean energy economy by 2030, starting with the most polluting sources of energy first. We need to make dramatic investments in clean energy and clean energy jobs. And we must repair and upgrade our existing energy infrastructure to reduce pollution, save families money and remain competitive in a 21st-century global economy. We also have to take on these challenges in the midst of the economic recovery from COVID-19. We need to make sure that as the federal government is spending trillions of dollars shoring up our economy, we don’t inadvertently prioritize and lock-in high emission industries and companies that otherwise would not be economically feasible. Longer term, stimulus should focus on building resilient, sustainable, climate-conscious infrastructure. All projects funded by the federal government should contribute to a net-zero electricity sector. As we move more information and work online, one study suggests that by 2030, data server farms could account for one-fifth of total energy usage. We must work to modernize our grid and make our electricity cleaner to offset this upcoming challenge. Both parties used to work together on environmental legislation, before science became politicized. As the climate crisis worsens, it is my sincere hope that more Republicans will rejoin the efforts to address climate change with the urgency it deserves, and I will gladly work with them to that end.
What changes would you make to U.S. immigration policy? Despite partisan rhetoric coming out of Washington, San Diegans know how important immigrants are to our community. The majority of Americans support a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants — and I wholeheartedly agree. We also need to protect young people who arrived in this country when they were children; Congress needs to immediately pass a clean DREAM Act. I believe that any approach to immigration reform should prioritize keeping families together and making sure businesses have the workers they need while preventing them from abusing the visa system to outsource jobs. We need to fully resource our immigration courts and fix visa backlogs so people can move through our legal immigration system without undue delay. I also believe we can institute responsible, effective border security — not by building a wall, but by instituting measures that will increase efficiency and speed up transit across the border. It’s possible to have a safe and secure border that is also humanely enforced. We should never separate children from their families or put people unnecessarily in detention, and we must end the illegal metering of asylum applications and Remain in Mexico policy.
We also need wholesale reform of our border and immigration enforcement agencies and we must end the for-profit immigrant detention industry once and for all. We should set a goal of welcoming 95,000 refugees a year to our country and protect people who came here under Temporary Protected Status. I am also committed to bringing home our deported veterans.
How would you address the massive national debt hanging over America’s future?
One of our first priorities should be reversing the 2017 Republican tax giveaways that gave huge breaks to billionaires and international corporations while leaving the middle class behind, that put Social Security and Medicare at risk, and that added trillions to our deficit without growing the economy. We need to increase the highest marginal tax rate and ensure capital gains rates match that, close loopholes in our tax code, and make sure everyone, including corporations, pays their fair share. As a millennial, I’m keenly aware of the burden of the national debt, and that my generation will be the one dealing with the consequences. However, given the scale of the current economic crisis, the most immediate concern facing Congress is the passage of a comprehensive stimulus that is large enough to kick-start a full recovery of our fragile economy. Fortunately, interest rates are at historic lows and we have been under-target for and at no risk of inflation, therefore it is functionally free to borrow money right now. As we learned in 2009, a stimulus that is too small will mire the U.S. economy in at least a decade of slow growth with low productivity, which will be worse for the deficit long-term because of the decreased tax base.
The real debt scenario that keeps me up at night is that this sluggish recovery triggers the United States losing its special status as a go-to safe asset, which triggers a debt crisis.
Why should voters choose you over your opponent in this election? With San Diego families facing challenges like never before, we need a new generation of leaders who are willing to listen to each other, respect one another and work across the aisle to get things done. Partisan gridlock has stopped progress in its tracks, and San Diego families have paid the price — but I’ll work with anyone to support the community I love.
I have a record of bringing people together and delivering. After working at President Barack Obama’s State Department and UNICEF, and running a nonprofit connecting schools to the internet, I founded and now serve as chair of San Diego for Every Child, a coalition to end childhood poverty.
Amid the COVID-19 crisis, we launched the San Diego COVID-19 Children’s Fund and mobilized tens of millions of dollars to support child care for essential workers and equitable distance learning for our students. I am the only candidate in this race who has experience making and implementing public policy at the federal level, who has spent years working on the international and domestic policy issues that uniquely face Congress, and who has worked with members of Congress on global public health, emergency response and economic crises.
I’m a third-generation San Diegan and a proud graduate of local public schools. I know that San Diego has given me a lot — which is why I’ve dedicated my career to building a fairer and more equitable community and world. I would be honored to represent the 53rd District in Congress.