Editor’s Note: All candidates for Governor, Secretary of the State, Attorney General, U.S. Senate, 2nd Congressional District, State Senate and State House Districts for Haddam and Killingworth were invited to send a brief statement and a photo to HK-Now.com. These are being posted online as they arrive. They also will appear in Haddam Killingworth News over four Thursdays in October.
Posted on October 6, 2022:
I was born in 1973 in Arcadia, California to two schoolteachers. In 1995 I graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of California, Berkeley with a Bachelor’s in classical languages. After moving to Connecticut that year I earned two Master’s degrees in classics from Yale. Since 2004 I have taught Latin and Ancient Greek at the Hopkins School, where I have also helped to organize community service programs. I am married and have one child and have lived in West Haven, Connecticut since 2006. I am a long-term unaffiliated voter.
I am running for U.S. Senate because I believe our nation is being damaged by the growing distance in positions between the Democratic and Republican candidates and by the reinforcement of the artificial groupings of platform issues that define the parties. There is no logical reason why someone who champions free trade does not also champion environmental protection to minimize global warming. Someone who asserts that a human embryo possesses the right to life can still assert that the gains of racial and ethnic groups who have been systematically repressed are still precarious and need attentive protection. I will collaborate in a constructive, positive way with those on my right and left to promote these issues as best I can.
Moreover, I believe it is essential for the long-term success of the American experiment to restore confidence in both our founding principles and our national institutions, which no longer enjoy the allegiance of many on the Left and Right respectively. I espouse servant leadership and will be mindful that the role of the federal government is not only to protect all of our people and unite them in a shared purpose, but also regularly to defer to states and act as supportive partners with them in addressing challenges. My overall goal is to strengthen the conditions that promote the fulfillment and flourishing of everyone in our nation, while being especially aware of the needs of poor, vulnerable, and marginalized people.
I have been asked to name my priorities. However, priorities are negotiable and open to compromise in the legislative process; principles are not. I will instead explain what my principles are: budget deficit reduction; environmental protection, free trade, originalist federal judges, protection of rights and freedoms enumerated in the Constitution, honoring federal debt obligations, dismantling of systems of oppression, and federal recognition of unborn human lives as human persons. I believe government action should not come at the expense of any of these. For instance, I will not try to shrink the budget deficit by refusing to pass legislation to pay interest on the national debt. I will not try to protect the environment by limiting free trade. All of these principles can be ensured through the principled discipline and sacrifice needed to ensure the genuine grandeur of our country.
