My Platform

After my first bid to run for Congress, I was diagnosed with Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma in the Fall of 2022. As a result, I had to fight a harrowing 6-month battle to beat the disease and am now happy to say that after 1 major spinal surgery, 4 lumbar punctures, 6 infusions of chemotherapy, and countless hours of strenuous yoga and physical therapy, I’m officially in remission and have a new lease on life. However, not every American is so lucky.

While my medical insurance covered my treatments, I am painfully aware that others throughout our nation have had their life-saving treatments outright denied by their insurance providers and/or faced medical bills that they simply could not afford to pay, and that is not right or fair. There is no reason why I should be here and others not simply by the nature of what level medical insurance we have.

We are the only industrialized nation on Earth that does not provide universal health care to our citizens and I aim to be a voice to change that. Healthcare is a human right, and it’s high time that we put people over profits, once and for all.

I stand for a humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza and for the immediate release of Israeli hostages by Hamas. The events of October 7 in which Hamas murdered ~1400 innocent Israelis was wrong and a vile action that I firmly condemn, but the over-the-top response of the Israeli military to indiscriminately butcher 30,000+ Palestinians (as of most recent estimate dated March 1st, 2024, the majority of which have been innocent civilians & children), is beyond the pale.

Two wrongs do not make a right and there can be no peace and healing in this conflict or the region until this unjust bombardment is ended and the Palestinian people are treated with dignity and respect, either in the form of a lasting two-state solution and end to the occupation of Palestinian territories, or the more likely long-term outcome of a one-state solution where Palestinian citizens enjoy true equal rights to their Israeli neighbors and an end to the apartheid-style conditions that they presently suffer under.

As Israel's main ally and supplier of military equipment and funding, we are complicit in these civilian deaths and it should be our responsibility to broker peace with diplomatic solutions and humanitarian aid to put a lasting stop to this violence once and for all.

Photo Credit: CARE International UK

The United States—the “land of the free and home of the brave”—is the world leader in mass incarceration, hosting 5% of the world’s population but 25% of its incarcerated population.

Much of this disparity is related to mandatory minimum sentencing stemming from the War on Drugs, which has led to millions of our own people—especially in communities of color—being rendered permanent pariahs and second-class citizens with little hope of getting their lives meaningfully back on track once they’ve served time.

What’s more, too many people have lost their lives at the hands of law enforcement without due process and little repercussion, and I aim to change that.

I am for the full federal legalization of cannabis, decriminalization of personal use narcotics (in order to treat addiction as a medical rather than criminal issue), ending “no-knock” warrants, and requiring that all law enforcement officers be required to wear body cameras when armed and engaging with the general public.

What’s more, I want to ensure that we treat prisoners serving time humanely and emphasize education and reform over purely punitive punishment.

If we can commit to developing more programs of re-assimilation into society to avoid recidivism, we may ensure that folks who have served their sentences can become productive citizens through greater access to opportunity to participate in our democracy and economy.

Photo Credit: Sohee Cha

The “American Dream” belongs to all of our people and I will not sit idly by as lawmakers across the country enact policies that unfairly discriminate against our citizens on matters of sex, gender, sexual orientation, or race.

According to the ACLU, as of January 2024, 387 pieces of anti-LGBTQI+ legislation were been put forward by state legislatures across the country, and as a friend and family member to queer and trans people, I will not let these bigoted affronts to the civil liberties of our people go unanswered.

It is high time that we pass the the Equal Rights Amendment to ensure that “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article,” as the Amendment would enshrine in our Constitution.

The struggle for civil rights began long before us and will continue well after we are gone, and though it is up to each generation to respond to the crises of their respective times, NOW IS OUR MOMENT to ensure that the spirit of the Constitution applies to all our people in equal measure. If we do this, I believe that a new age of prosperity and harmony will be given life and that our culture will continue to evolve to become more equal, just, kind, and accepting than it has been up until this point.

According to NASA, “the effects of human-caused global warming are happening now, are irreversible on the timescale of people alive today, and will worsen in the decades to come.”

In our District in particular, we can see the effects of this in the form of droughts that have greatly reduced our water supply and left us prone to devastating wildfires. Climate change is a global issue, but it affects our communities directly.

Sustainability & Renewable Energy are the keys to our future, and I plan to use this platform to take on climate change head-on through legislation that influences the largest greenhouse gas-emitters in energy, agriculture, manufacturing, and single-use packaging to focus greater development of green, renewable, and sustainable alternatives to do what we can—while we still can—to preserve our environment for future generations.

Photo Credit: Kincade Fire - Josh Edelson/AFP-Getty Images

I believe fundamentally in a woman’s right to her bodily autonomy and ability to make her own medical decisions that impact her health and future. Her choices in this regard are none of our business.

I believe that Roe v. Wade should be codified into federal law in defense of women and their civil liberties throughout our Nation.

I plan to continue the work of the civil rights leaders who came before me to ensure that we establish a more perfect Union, first and foremost by defending the right to vote through efforts like passing the John Lewis Voting Rights Act and making Election Day a National Holiday.

We must ensure that we have equality of opportunity for all of our citizens under the law, and that our rights are not infringed by tyrannical governments or increasingly powerful private corporations and their lobbyists.

As such, I would also like to add my voice to the cause of overturning Citizens United to get corporate money out of politics as well as support ranked-choice voting initiatives to lower the barrier to entry for normal citizens to participate in the democratic process.

Photo Credit: Tara Jacoby

Each of us has a personal stake in the well-being of our respective neighborhoods and communities, and I think that volunteer work is a great outlet to get involved to help our neighbors in need and ensure that our roads, waterways, and environment at large are clean of litter/pollution and preserved for future generations.

There are local organizations that are already doing important work in these areas, and I want to use my platform to encourage others to get involved and lend their direct support by connecting the public and private sectors to solve local challenges of food insecurity, litter, and pollution.

As an Eagle Scout and Congressional Candidate, I have sworn to defend the Constitution and the civil liberties it enshrines on behalf of our people. With that said, the right to bear arms without restrictions is not how I interpret the 2nd Amendment and the present way we are handling America’s gun violence epidemic is clearly not working and only getting worse.

As of April 2023, in each of the last three years, there have been more than 600 mass shootings, almost two a day on average. To make matters worse, according to the National Institute of Health, gun violence has now surpassed motor vehicle crashes as the leading cause of death among people ages 1-19 years in the United States.

We are the only industrialized Nation on Earth that has mass shootings on the scale and frequency that we do. How many more mass shootings is it going to take before we actually do something about it?

Background checks and banning the sale high capacity assault weapons are the least we can do to combat this epidemic, and I think we need to do much and more to ensure that gun safety training and licensing is required to purchase any weapon that has more firing capacity than a bolt-action rifle or a break action shotgun. We must also invest heavily in providing access to healthcare (especially in the realm of mental health) for our people and our youth.

Above all else, we must change our culture to embrace non-violence as a means of settling conflict and work together to heal the divides that exist within our Nation. Enough of our people and children have died needlessly in the past decade not to act.

Common sense policy with regards to the use and sale of firearms is possible if we choose for it (that is why the Constitution has the concept of Amendments in the first place), and I plan to lead by example to do what I can encourage others to embrace this way of thinking.

Photo Credit: AP Photo/John Minchillo