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COURTESY PHOTODr. Brad Allen
Brad Allen is running for Congress because he sees America going in the wrong direction.
He cites crises such as an insecure southern border, mismanagement of the pandemic and out-of-control government spending.
“The Inflation Reduction Act is a typical Washington health care solution,” said Dr. Allen, a pediatric heart surgeon who lives in Summerland. “You pay more to die sooner.
“They’re not addressing why drugs are expensive. And they’re going to cut R&D (research and development) to miniscule amounts,” Dr. Allen told the News-Press. “You’ll pay more for health care, but you won’t get the pills you need to fight the disease. You’ll die sooner because you won’t have the new drugs.
“If I had a hospital, I would never bring in a politician to fix it,” said Dr. Allen, the Republican candidate who is running against U.S. Rep. Salud Carbajal, D-Santa Barbara, for the 24th Congressional District seat.
KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESSDr. Brad Allen stands outside the Reagan Ranch Center on State Street in Santa Barbara.Dr. Allen is emphasizing his goals in his Contract to Restore California, which he said was inspired by former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s Contract with America.
The contract features goals such as:
— Tame inflation by restoring fiscal responsibility.
Dr. Allen said that means a balanced federal budget.
“We’ve got to stop Congress from spending money that we don’t have,” Dr. Allen said. “They keep running up the national debt.”
“We have to get back to what’s causing the inflation,” Dr. Allen told the News-Press. “Two years ago, we didn’t have this inflation. Gas prices weren’t high. Rent and housing weren’t through the roof. What happened?
“The guys in Congress only know how to do two things — tax and spend,” Dr. Allen said. “The debt is up to $21 trillion. The interest on the debt will soon surpass $1 trillion a year, which is higher than health care, defense and Social Security. This is unsustainable.
“The first thing we have to do is to stop spending money we don’t have,” Dr. Allen said.
— Reduce regulations to let businesses prosper.
Dr. Allen said excessive regulations are hurting the supply chain, increasing inflation and, because business costs are too high, preventing the creation of jobs.
“That’s passed on to the consumers in the form of inflation,” he said.
— Support law enforcement to bring back public safety.
Dr. Allen said Congress is defunding law enforcement by the House Democratic leadership’s refusal to allow a vote on two bills designed to fund more police officers and improve their training.
“They (Democrats) say they don’t want to defund them (police),” Dr. Allen said. “But by just not giving them the extra funding, they’re defunding them. And crime is going through the roof.”
In addition to supporting funding for law enforcement, Dr. Allen is calling for the creation of federal penalties for people who target law enforcement officers with violence.
— Improve education by giving parents support and choices. Dr. Allen stressed parents have the right to be involved in their children’s education.
He also called for an emphasis on math, science and literature instead of gender identity and critical race theory.
— Lower energy prices by increasing domestic production. Dr. Allen explained he’s referring to more production for all sources, from fossil fuels to nuclear and renewable sources such as wind and solar, while recognizing the need to protect the environment.
He said the answer isn’t importing oil from nations such as Venezuela.
“We have to stop looking at energy as if we make California clean, the rest of the world is clean,” Dr. Allen said. “If you move carbon from one area of the world to another, you haven’t made the planet cleaner.”
— Stop government mismanagement of COVID.
“I’m a doctor. I knew two years ago the lockdown would not stop the spread of COVID,” Dr. Allen said.
“We shut down our schools when they weren’t doing that in Europe,” Dr. Allen said, adding studies pointed out the harm to students.
And Dr. Allen told the News-Press he would like to decrease health insurance costs by allowing people to buy insurance across state lines.
On the issue of abortion, Dr. Allen said he agrees with the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization that the issue should be decided by the states. He noted the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg thought so.
“Dobbs did not outlaw abortion as some people are trying to say,” Dr. Allen said. “Dobbs said it goes back to the states, back to the people.”
He said women continue to have a right to abortion in California and that society isn’t reverting to the time before the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade case.
On foreign policy issues, Dr. Allen said the U.S. should continue to give Ukraine what it needs to stop the Russian invasion.
“I think this was one of the easiest wars to prevent,” Dr. Allen said, blaming past foreign policy decisions in Washington, D.C.
He said America waited too long to implement economic sanctions against Russia.
“What did Putin learn from the last 10 years from the United States?” Dr. Allen said. “He went into Georgia. We only talked, did nothing. He went into Crimea. We only talked, did nothing. He went into Syria. We talked, did nothing.
“When we told him not to go into Ukraine, he thought, ‘The last four times, they talked, but did nothing,’” Dr. Allen said.
He said he would be in favor of Ukraine joining NATO, but only after the war with Russia is over.
Dr. Allen’s Contract to Restore California also calls for securing the southern border with a “permanent resident and modern-day Bracero program to provide the workers American farmers and businesses need. This will enable immigrants to legally find jobs, pay taxes and go home and return to the United States without penalty or fear.”
He noted the smuggling of fentanyl across the border is the No. 1 killer of young adults.
email: dmason@newspress.com
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