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CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (WVIR) – Candidates vying for a seat in Virginia’s 5th District are weighing some big issues. They sat down with members of area chambers, including the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce, for one-on-one interviews.
Chambers developed the questions in advance and generally asked the same questions to both candidates. They were asked about their ability to be bipartisan.
“I’ve often been asked why don’t you reach out, and I’ve asked them — tell me what the Democratic Party is doing with all the power they have and what I should be helping them do. So that’s a big part of it. I’m not going to help this Democratic Party further ruin the country,” said incumbent Republican Bob Goode.
Fifth District candidate Josh Tronberg, a Democrat, took a different approach to the issue.
“I understand the kinds of values and solutions that come from both, and one of my deepest hopes as a member of Congress is to be a person who is very solutions-oriented, who is willing to work with anyone of good will who wants to to improve the lives of the people I represent,” Throneburg said.
Good talked about what he’s most proud of in his tenure — returning $14 million in public service to the people of the 5th District.
“They owed money from the IRS, the DEA, the Social Security Administration, Medicare or another federal agency, and they turned to their office in Congress for help,” said Rep. Good.
He took a strong stand against illegal immigration,
“We must demand patriotic assimilation. I think we should require them to learn English. Consider what is happening today. We are flooding our schools with millions of illegal alien children who do not speak English and our schools are required to teach them in their language. How is that in the country’s interest?” Good said.
Throneburg says one of his top priorities is expanding access to health care.
“It would be great if there was universal health care because as an employer it solves one of the problems that – if I knew that – then I would have money to invest in other things. I want to help employers as much as possible and obviously help them help employees. So I want to support any legislation that will increase access to health care and help small businesses afford it, provide it, bring it to their employees,” Troneberg said.
Both were asked how they felt about raising corporate tax above 21%. While Throneburg said he doesn’t support raising it now, he may not always be against taxes.
“I am also a common sense candidate. We have to be able to afford the things that we spend and so if we have to raise taxes to afford certain things, let’s say we put in universal health care and we had to raise taxes a little bit to be able to cover that, I I’m not always going to be against taxes,” Throneburg said. “What I really, really want is for us to make good decisions, to spend the money we have to spend, not to waste … not to throw money down the drain that we have to raise taxes to pay for . I think there is tremendous value to me in fiscal responsibility. “
Goode says he opposes raising the corporate tax.
“I’m hyper against taxes. Frankly, we don’t have a revenue problem in this country, we have a spending problem. Spending, I’m sure we’ll talk more about that when we get to questions, but I mean $31 trillion in national debt, the largest percentage of debt to our GDP since World War II, it’s causing massive inflation. It bankrupts our future,” said Congressman Goode.
Candidates will have a personal debate at Hampden Sydney College on Wednesday 26 October at 7pm. It will also be streamed live.
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