'Nobody Trusts Her.' Ruben Gallego on Challenging Kyrsten Sinema for Her Senate Seat - TIME
Cross posting from GD
https://democraticunderground.com/100217620637
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TIME: Why are you challenging Sen. Kyrsten Sinema for this seat?
Gallego: She’s just abandoned Arizona. We hardly see her anywhere, she doesn’t have an unscripted moment, we see her fighting for pharmaceutical companies, for hedge fund managers. She skipped votes to go do the Iron Man in New Zealand. Her priorities aren’t the priorities of Arizonans anymore. There’s an opportunity to change that, and I’m going to do that.
What would you say are your three most important issues?
Passing the Child Tax Credit.
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And for six months, we had this beautiful period where Americans had a little stress relief. I heard from parents all over the country who said for those six months, I didn’t have to worry about how I’m going to pay for childcare this month. For those six months, I didn’t have to go to overtime, I actually got to stay home with my kid. It reduces child poverty by 60%. This is the kind of thing that could be revolutionary to this country, and we just kind of gave it up.
Second, we have to deal with climate change and drought in Arizona. Our future is entirely tied with how we’re going to manage this.
And lastly, immigration reform. We can’t ignore what is happening at the border, we clearly have a refugee and asylum crisis. We can fix it, but right now everyone’s solution is one-sided. We passed three bipartisan immigration reform bills out of the House and they got to the Senate, and even though we had control of the Senate, we didn’t really because of the filibuster.
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You mentioned in your launch video that there were some dark moments after you got back from serving as a Marine in Iraq. Can you tell me about that?
The biggest problem is you don’t really know who you are when you get back from the war, because you were a totally different person when you went. I was a lot more anxious, I was quick to get angry. You have survivor’s guilt. There were a couple times when I should have died instead of my friends dying because we switched places. There were times where instead of dealing with it in a smart, sane way, I decided to drink instead of going to a therapist. I never got into a DUI or anything like that, but it’s also not a healthy way to deal with anything. And instead of healthy relationships I focused on a superficial idea of success. Focusing on getting a job, getting a better job, when I was really internally just breaking apart.
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What was your breaking point? Take me through your period of disillusionment (with Sinema).
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But post-January 6, after talking about being friends with John Lewis and John Lewis being her mentor, she uses the filibuster to stop the John Lewis Voting Rights Act. And then it was other things that kept on moving in that direction, whether it was rejecting the $15 per hour minimum wage or negotiating for pharmaceutical companies to keep their pricing. Or lastly, when she went to the floor to fight for private equity managers and hedge fund managers, while the poor in Arizona are hoping to get a Child Tax Credit.
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What is your message to independent Arizonans?
It is not independent nor is it moderate for you to be negotiating for pharmaceutical companies in Arizona. We’ve got Arizona seniors who are driving to Mexico to get cheaper drugs in Mexico than they could at Walgreens or CVS. That’s not moderate. It’s not moderate to be negotiating for private equity managers. Your Senator is supposed to be negotiating for you, not for people who have power. You may not agree with me 100% of the time as a citizen of Arizona, but I guarantee you’re always going to know where I stand.
https://time.com/6250049/ruben-gallego-arizona-interview/