Issues & Solutions
Medicare For All
The United States has failed to provide a basic social minimum to its citizens. The Covid-19 pandemic has shown us just how cruel and irrational employer-based private insurance is, leaving millions of newly unemployed Americans without care when they needed it most. Americans get sicker, die younger, and pay more for their healthcare than any of their peers in comparable nations. Death and sickness are driven by the greed of private insurers, the indifference of easily corrupted politicians, and wall street speculation. They keep America sick to line their pockets. We do not have a private healthcare system; we have an illness industry. Care must not be a consumer good. No American should gamble with their life or live in fear of losing their benefits.
we Must
Ensure that every person in America has comprehensive healthcare, with no co-pays, deductibles, or premiums -- we must abolish the illness industry.
Work to prevent pharmaceutical companies from price gouging by permitting federal drug price negotiation.
Heavily invest in the infrastructure of communities that have been left behind by the private healthcare system.
Expand healthcare to cover eyes, ears, dental, and mental healthcare and institute non-punitive, publicly funded treatment for those with substance abuse disorders.
Ending Gun Violence
40,000 Americans die due to gun-related deaths each year. The most vulnerable members of our society account for the majority of those deaths. Mass violence has robbed my generation of our childhoods and cut many of our lives short. The attempts to simply regulate the sale of weapons haven’t worked. That’s why I support a holistic approach to gun violence, developed and championed by the Gun Violence Prevention movement.
In Congress, I will work to
Ban assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines.
Require background checks for all gun sales.
Fund and support local community violence intervention programs, and ensure congress allocates at least $37 million to fully fund public research on gun violence.
Fight to end the corruption of the gun lobby and dismantle the NRA, and ensure our courts enforce licensing revocation for gun dealers and manufacturers who break the law.
Develop a national task force to end gun violence of which 25% of the membership is composed of youth and BIPOC representatives who are most affected by gun violence.
Stopping the next pandemic
Millions of people lost their lives and our country suffered a $16 trillion economic loss because of Covid-19. It is absolutely critical that we make serious investments in pandemic preparedness now in order to avoid the next pandemic, which could be even worse than our current one.
As a member of Congress, I will do everything in my power to:
Ensure we pass Biden's Pandemic Preparedness Plan
Work to reduce biological risks that will help us prevent outbreaks in the first place and prevent outbreaks from becoming pandemics.
Increase funding for Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) and invest in prevention and preparedness R & D. This agency is the primary place where the federal government advances vaccines, treatments, and diagnostics.
Develop systems that help us identify possible outbreaks and pandemics early, such as metagenomic sequencing and wastewater sampling, so that we can better contain them.
Create vaccines now that will protect us from future viruses. Developing these vaccines now will help us save countless lives. This will also help us greatly reduce the need for lockdowns and quarantines.
Design better personal protective equipment that is reusable, sterilizable, and better minimizes the spread of a virus.
Develop better, cheaper testing
Increase oversight, update enforcement, and broaden the scope for Dual Use Research of Concern.
Environmental Justice
The greatest challenge facing our country and the world is the climate crisis. The effects of climate disasters are compounded by already existing inequalities of class and race. Frankly, the continuity of the species depends on whether or not we transition from a carbon-dependent economy to one which is powered by green technologies and green jobs. If there is a future, it is a green future. We cannot hesitate and we cannot let big-oil, big-business, and the 1% decide our fates for us.
To tackle climate change we need to enact these bold policies now:
Green New Deal and the Thrive Act.
Establish a civilian climate corps to provide good-paying jobs, build the robust no-carbon infrastructure we need to combat climate change.
Crackdown on corporations that heedlessly pollute our communities.
Ensure that every community has clean water, access to food, and clean air.
Reimagining Justice
The billions of dollars in federal grants which flow from Washington DC to state prisons and police forces exacerbate the policing and prison crisis, encouraging more arrests, more aggressive prosecution, and unnecessary incarceration. The United States has less than 5% of the world’s population, but nearly 25% of its prisoners. Beyond the cruelty of our penal systems, mass incarceration contributes significantly to the American poverty rate, destroys the futures of its victims, and accelerates the cycles of violence it’s supposed to prevent.
In Congress, I will work to
End all federal subsidies contributing to mass incarceration, demilitarize the police, and abolish the death penalty.
Fully fund community-led violence intervention programs nationwide.
Legalize Recreational Marijuana and expunge all marijuana convictions, and fully decriminalize sex work.
End sentencing, prosecutorial, and pre-trial practices that compound the cruelty of our justice system such as, mandatory minimums, cash bail, and coercive plea-bargaining.
Restore voting rights to all Americans including those currently incarcerated and ensure folks leaving the prison system have the support and resources to reintegrate into their communities and the economy.
Housing & Transit
One of the most intimate parts of your life is where you live and how you move around. For too long, our elected leaders have not paid enough attention to how their actions – or lack of action – have affected these aspects of your life. And, importantly, these things are very closely related. If we are going to build strong communities with abundant, affordable housing, then we have to build a fair, sustainable transportation system to move people around. And if we are going to invest in smart transportation like buses, rail, and safe streets for all ages to enjoy, then we have to have a sufficient level of housing to support those forms of transportation.
If we continue to think about housing and transportation separately, we will continue down our path of long commutes, environmental degradation, and unaffordability. It’s time for a smarter vision of how we build our cities, our towns, and our neighborhoods.
Housing affordability
There is a housing crisis in our nation, and in Central Florida in particular. When adjusting for wages, the greater Orlando area is the fifth least affordable in the country for housing. Every day, the burden of excessive rent and housing costs rob Central Floridians of the financial stability they need to pay down debt, start businesses, form families, plan for the future, and live comfortable lives. For us to fully realize housing as a human right, we must:
Institute national tenant protections, including rent stabilization, restricting evictions without cause, and a tenant right to counsel:
I will support legislation like the “A Place to Prosper Act,” which would provide a variety of tenant protections, including a cap on annual rent increases at 3% or the national level of inflation.
We must amend the 1968 Fair Housing Act by prohibiting landlords from discrimination based on legal sources of income, including housing vouchers and other federal assistance.
Every American deserves a right to counsel in eviction proceedings, just as they do in criminal proceedings. According to the National Coalition for a Civil Right to Counsel, only 3% of tenants have legal representation in eviction proceedings, whereas 81% of landlords have legal representation. An equitable system must ensure that tenants have full access to the legal rights to which they are entitled.
Massively increase funding for public housing and social housing in the US to spur the construction of mixed-income, dense, beautiful housing in our cities
I will support legislation like the “Homes For All Act,” which would direct investment for 12 million new affordable housing units over ten years, with a requirement that these homes remain permanently affordable.
Residents should have access to free wrap-around services, like healthcare, childcare, and employment assistance.
I will also push our federal agencies to explore alternate models for public housing, such as mixed-income social housing models that have been successful in parts of Europe, and have been explored for implementation in the United States as outlined by organizations like the People’s Policy Project.
Condition federal grants on reforms to exclusionary zoning laws that local governments have in place
I will support legislation like the “Housing, Opportunity, Mobility, and Equity (HOME) Act,” which would require recipients of Community Development Block Grants to end exclusionary zoning laws in their jurisdictions.
Too often, local governments use these outdated laws––with nefarious and often racist histories––to keep certain types of housing and people out of their neighborhoods.
In Greater Orlando, our population has increased 1.5x as fast as the number of housing units over the past decade, leading to a severe housing shortage and affordability crisis.
Artificial constraints on housing in the form of zoning laws, parking requirements, and lot sizes must be undone for our communities to find housing abundance.
For regions that undo their exclusionary zoning practices, I explore the creation of grant-funded programs that invest in local community-builders who can provide much-needed “missing middle” housing in our communities.
Institute policies that curb real estate speculation, and encourage localities to do the same:
In 2021, Orlando saw a surge of homes sold to investors. This was particularly true in Orlando’s predominantly Black neighborhoods, where as may as 43% of homes purchased were done so by investors. I will ensure that Congress and the Department of Justice explore instances of potential antitrust behavior by large real estate investment companies.
I will explore opportunities to replace regressive and inefficient taxes like payroll taxes, with economically efficient and anti-speculative taxes like a land value tax
Transportation
For too long, our country’s transportation system has prioritized private automobile over all else. The results is a system of roads is packed with emission-spewing vehicles, sprawling regions, and highways that frequently barrel through historically black and brown neighborhoods. In Central Florida, the average resident planning for a thirty minute commute has access to one one-hundredth the number of jobs if using public transportation, relative to driving a car. Mobility is opportunity, and our failed transportation policies have robbed too many people of opportunity.
Our current transportation system that prioritizes private automobiles at all costs pushes the cost of car ownership onto private individuals, which costs the average American nearly $10,000 every year when accounting for costs like fuel, maintenance, and depreciation. To build a better, safer, more sustainable tomorrow, we must:
End our national addiction to car-centered transportation at the expense of all other forms of more sustainable, efficient, and competitive transportation.
I will join with fellow congressional progressives in calling for an end to the arbitrary rule that dictates 80 percent of transportation funding to highways and just 20 percent to transit.
We must acknowledge the unjust history of many historical highway projects, including Orlando’s I-4, and explore ways to rectify those past wrongs. One program included President Biden’s bipartisan infrastructure bill offers a potential way forward: the reimagining of urban highways. In Rochester, New York, a $22 million investment to turn a highway into a ground-level boulevard is expected to generate $200M in community investment. Smart transportation should spur investment in our communities – not plow through our communities.
I will support incentives to get folks out of cars and into more sustainable, safer forms of transportation, such as an e-bike tax credit that was incorporated into President Biden’s Build Back Better legislation.
Invest in regional rail and bus systems, and tie those investment to local commitments to increasing nearby residential and commercial density to ensure ongoing ridership
I will champion efforts to provide federal support for Lynx, SunRail, and potential rail expansions throughout Central Florida, including east-west connectivity.
I will support a network of high-speed rail connectivity between Orlando and other Florida hubs, including Miami, Tampa, and Jacksonville.
I will push for federal transportation investments to be made for transit operations, and not just capital and maintenance costs.
Develop competitive grants for local governments to replace car-centric design with safe pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure
Greater Orlando is consistently ranked worst in the country when it comes to pedestrian and bicycle safety. We must do better.
I will support sustained funding for federal grants to go towards road improvements that actually improve safety, such as lane reduction, separated bike lanes, and wider sidewalks.
My office will prioritize coordination with local governments to apply for and win these grants to serve our constituents.