Rep. Lyle Larson: The platform for the perfect statewide candidate
Now that filing to run for office has opened in Texas, lots of discussions are taking place about which issues the candidates should focus on.
This is what a statewide campaign should include.
First, we must fix the grid, once and for all. We need a hybrid capacity market to create the incentive to build more power generation. It’s time to stop demonizing renewables, as the inclusion of these power sources lower all of our electric bills significantly.
Texas has turned down $40 billion in federal funds over 8 years because the legislature has refused to expand Medicaid. Medicaid must be expanded to end additional closures of rural hospitals and stop local hospital taxes from rising.
The ideal statewide candidate would push an initiative to allow voters to determine whether Texas should have legal medicinal cannabis, casino gambling, term limits and abolish daylight saving time.
It is time to restore our focus on water and transportation projects to prepare our state for the continued population surge and economic sustainability. A statewide plan to address this should include seawater desalination plants in Corpus Christi, the Rio Grande Valley and the Lake Jackson/Freeport area.
This candidate should create a multi-layered strategy dealing with the border issue. The border should be secured by military experts using technology and best practices used throughout the world protecting borders with donor and recipient countries. The catch-and-release policy must end immediately.
We need to seize the opportunity to get more labor in our communities by setting up portals on the Mexican side of the border and have the Texas Workforce Commission work with immigration services to allow those with HB work visas to fill jobs in restaurants, hotels, construction sites, farms and other industries with labor needs.
This candidate should commit to travel to Mexico City with the U.S. State Department continuously until this is fixed. They must discuss the 1944 water treaty to ensure that Mexico will fulfill its obligation to release water annually to Texas as required by the treaty.
The ideal candidate should work with the local leaders and the folks in Washington D.C, regardless of which political party they are affiliated with, to make Texas a better place to live and work.
We need to listen to medical professionals regarding any public health crisis and make the right decisions, not the easy decisions. This candidate should amend Senate Bill 8 to add an exception for rape and incest, and remove the bounty and civil enforcement provisions.
The candidate must listen to the parents, teachers and superintendents on education-related issues and follow through on requiring the state to pay a minimum of 50% of the cost to operate our schools, which will result in the lowering of property taxes across the state.
Having been to the Dachau concentration camp, it is unquestionable that the Holocaust is real, 9-11 was a terrorist act, and the KKK murdered people because of the color of their skin. No legitimate candidate should get away with denying these facts.
This candidate must champion a bill that limits political contributions to the governor or lieutenant governor to $2,500 from any individual (or their family member) who is appointed to a board or commission.
This individual should self-impose a term limit to two terms (8 total years) in office and should openly concede the Republican far right and the Democrat far left votes.
It is high time to focus on real issues and let the extremes dither in the wind over the cultural wars they want to fight.
Larson, R-San Antonio, is a member of the Texas House of Representatives.
This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Rep. Lyle Larson: The platform for the perfect statewide candidate
