Issues

The Person:

Much of my professional career including most recently as a nonprofit executive providing home repairs has been dedicated to serving seniors. Our seniors have given a lot to our country, state, and communities and there is a responsibility we have to honor them with our policies. 

The Principle:

In Psalm 71:9, the Psalmist states that he does not want God to abandon him when he is of old age. God answers that prayer throughout scripture as He demonstrates that His care and value for us isn’t dependent on our age or living conditions.  

The Problem:

Seniors are not able to live comfortably because of the lack of investment from politicians. I specifically want to address Social Security because I believe this is one of the issues that highlights how broken our system is. If you’re a billionaire, you get to pay less than 1% of your income to Social Security. However, if you’re an everyday Texan making $50,000 then you have to pay 6.2% of your income. Everyday folks having to pay more for Social Security than billionaires for Social Security is wrong. In addition, the fixed income that many of our seniors live off of is not enough to pay for increasing utility bills and a higher cost of living.

The Policy Proposal:

1. I will introduce legislation to remove the FICA cap of $182,000 on Social Security so that billionaires aren’t paying a lower percentage of their income to Social Security than everyday folks. 

2. I’ll work to provide seniors who are living on fixed incomes with financial assistance on utility bills so that they can live comfortably without worrying about not being able to keep the lights on because the electricity and water bill is too high.