Equality
I support full equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) individuals. This includes the freedom to marry and the freedom to openly serve in the US military. I also support the repeal of the California’s Proposition 8 and the federal Defense of Marriage Act.
Women
I am 100% pro-choice and support the right of women to have full access to contraception and reproductive health services. I also support passage of the Violence Against Women Act and I support equal pay for equal work.
Immigration
As a prosecutor, it frustrates me that individuals who I have prosecuted that have committed serious and violent crimes – and are here without documentation – are released back into our communities after serving his or her sentence. I support removing violent, convicted criminals who are in our country without documentation. For the vast majority of undocumented individuals who work and contribute to our economy, I support a pathway to legal citizenship. I also support the Dream Act and believe it is in our economic interests (and the right thing to do) to allow children of undocumented individuals who have attended school in the US to have access, not preference, to higher education.
Social Security
Social Security is one of our most successful government programs, lifting seniors out of poverty and offering most seniors the only means of retirement income. To ensure the long-term viability of the program, I support lifting the cap on wages above $110,000 and also support raising the retirement age gradually and tying it to life expectancy rates.
Medicare
I am opposed to any plan that dismantles Medicare and the guarantee of health insurance for our seniors. Current proposals in Congress to move seniors into an insurance exchange that will require them to find their own private insurance and the government will help pay the premium will cost the average senior $6,000 a year in out-of-pocket expenses. This is unacceptable.
To ensure the long-term viability of Medicare, we must do more to better deliver health care, especially preventative care, and hold down the rising cost of providing medical care. As a prosecutor who has prosecuted fraud cases, it is important that we fight Medicare fraud to realize savings. Also, we must have a Sustainable Growth Rate, that sets what a physician is paid for services, that is fair but controlled for physicians.
Citizens United
I oppose the recent US Supreme Court decision granting corporations the same first amendment rights to free speech as individuals. This ruling has opened a floodgate of unlimited corporate campaign contributions to Super PACS who buy influence and have an unfair financial advantage in gaming our political system and winning campaigns.
Affordable Care Act
I support the Affordable Care Act and the benefits that many are already receiving, including health insurance coverage for children up to age 26 under a parent’s health insurance. I also believe we need to do more to control the costs of providing health care. For instance, as a member of the Alameda County Fire Commission, we developed a pilot project that provides low-cost preventative health care at our fire stations. We need to do more to provide preventative health care that is accessible and affordable to avoid higher costs for health care later.
Transportation
People want to spend less time commuting and more time with their family.
As a resident of the Tri-Valley and Bay Area, I understand, like you do, the importance of maintaining and expanding our region’s transportation system. The productivity of our businesses depends on an increasingly mobile workforce and local businesses depend on this system to ship and receive their products and render services on-time. And, to sustain our high quality of life in the Bay Area, people want to spend less time in their cars and more time with their families.
Cities, counties, the State, and our Representative in Congress need to work together to leverage local investments to secure federal dollars to advance local projects. We will reap benefits sooner and reduce gridlock and air pollution, while increasing productivity and creating good paying jobs.
The Bay Area has a history of “self-help” when it comes to paying for transportation improvements. Seven of the nine counties in the Bay Area have passed local sales taxes (passed by a 2/3 margin) to fund local streets/roads, highway and transit projects. This guarantee of local funding helps attract federal dollars. But, we need a Representative in Congress willing to fight for our region’s transportation priorities in Congress.
This November, voters in Alameda County will have the opportunity to renew Measure B, the local one-cent sales tax that will generate $7.8 billion in new funding to invest in a set list of transportation improvements (Measure B expenditure plan). This plan would fund many important projects that I support-like extending BART to Livermore as well as rehabilitating BART’s aging infrastructure, stations and railcars. Measure B also invests in high-occupancy vehicle (HOV) and express lanes on I-580 and I-680 as well as in local streets and roads. Express lanes are HOV lanes that provide single-occupant vehicle drivers a choice to pay a toll in order to bypass congestion and have a fast, reliable trip time. These express lanes will help us manage our network of freeways in the Bay Area while giving commuters a new choice. And, express lanes are one more tool for generating revenue to reinvest in maintaining the roads and improving transit in these corridors.
The 15th Congressional District and Bay Area deserve a strong federal partner to leverage these local investments by ensuring the Bay Area gets its fair share of federal funding and accelerate delivery of key infrastructure projects that will keep our region moving.
Environment
I have been an active champion for a healthy Earth and a national Green Energy Policy that reduces our greenhouse gas emissions. I am a Advisory Member of the Tri-Valley Conservancy, a land conservation group. On the Dublin City Council, I successfully passed a wine and open space initiative that will allow more open space in Dublin, and encourage further land be used for viticulture and agriculture. I understands that the United States has 3% of the world's oil supply while consuming 20% of the world's oil. We must have an all of the above approach to provide our energy needs and reduce our dependence on foreign sources of energy.
