Scott Comegys' Issue Positions (Political Courage Test)
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New York State Legislative Election 2024 Political Courage Test
| Pro-choice | a) Do you generally support pro-choice or pro-life legislation? | ||
| Yes | b) Do you support legalizing abortion when the pregnancy resulted from incest or rape? | ||
| No | c) Do you support the prohibition of public funds (e.g. Medicaid) for organizations that perform abortions? | ||
| I believe that a person's healthcare choices are theirs to make and they should have access and ability to carry out those choices as they need. I support the standards that were set by the Roe v Wade Supreme Court case determining viability and therefore sets the limit to when an abortion can be done (with exception to cases where the health and safety of the mother may say otherwise). As reproductive healthcare is healthcare, those programs that fund healthcare should cover all aspects of healthcare, otherwise we are setting up an unequal and inequitable status in our society, which goes against our US Constitution. | |||
| Yes | a) In order to balance the budget, do you support limiting state government spending on social programs (e.g. SNAP, TANF)? | ||
| Yes | b) Do you support a decrease in income taxes in order to promote economic growth? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support a wealth tax in order to pay for public programs in your state? | ||
| Yes | d) Do you support the implementation of congestion pricing in New York State? | ||
| These questions are put to us as binary options when they are not, in fact, simple "yes" or "no" questions. I believe we need to rebalance our tax system such that the burden is equitably shared among all of the people living in our state. Further, I believe that those who enjoy the greatest amount of wealth, admittedly few of us, do so because they have benefitted greatly from the prosperity the state enables them. Their taxes should reflect this, but should not do so as too much of a burden for them. I believe that congestion pricing will address several issues pertaining to health, safety, and economic development in a positive way. | |||
| Yes | a) Do you support capital punishment for violent crimes? | ||
| Yes | b) Should an individual under 18 accused of a violent crime be prosecuted as an adult? | ||
| No | c) Do you support the enforcement of federal immigration laws by state and local police? | ||
| No | d) Do you support the use of private prisons? | ||
| No | e) Do you support mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent drug offenders? | ||
| For clarification, as the questions do not allow for nuance, capital punishment is appropriate for certain violent crimes where there is not a shadow of a doubt regarding the guilt of the convicted and where the crime is so egregious that capital punishment is warranted. Keep in mind that is a very high standard. In cases of violent crimes perpetrated by an individual age less than 18, it all depends on the crime and the circumstances. There can be no blanket policy and each case must be considered on its own. If the circumstances and the crime warrant it, then the individual can be tried as an adult. Federal immigration laws must be attended to by the federal agency in charge. State and local police have an obligation to be a trusted agency for all to utilize should any person be a victim, and the fact of the matter is that there are some who would worry too much that if they do properly report to the local law enforcement that they risk running afoul of immigration enforcement even if they are citizens descended from people associated with being undocumented immigrants. That not only interferes with people seeking justice, it inhibits local and state law enforcement efforts to provide the service and protection that are their sworn duty. Our justice system should never be used for profit, thus we should never have private prisons. Privatization creates a profit motive to incarcerate people rather than creating places where accountability, reform, and rehabilitation can occur to see that justice is done. | |||
| Yes | a) Do you support state government spending as a means of promoting economic growth (e.g. grants, tax incentives)? | ||
| Yes | b) Do you support reducing state government regulations on the private sector (e.g. for business or the environment)? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support an increase of the minimum wage in New York? | ||
| Yes | d) Do you support government spending on affordable housing projects in New York? | ||
| Yes | e) Do you support prohibiting non-compete agreements from employers in New York State? | ||
| In order to fulfill its role in ensuring that everyone in the state can successfully live the lives they choose with dignity, prosperity, security, and justice, the state has an obligation to promote economic growth. We have to make sure that how the state does so has the best impact without causing undue burden and that is the job of the state legislators. One of the way the legislators do their job is exercising oversight of the spending and the regulations passed. We have to continuously review the goals of regulations, measure their impact, and refine them to get the desired impact or, if the regulations are simply creating costs without benefits, eliminate them in favor of regulations that work. This does not mean eliminating all regulations. It means that we have to make sure the regulations make sense and enable people to live safely in our state while also enabling the commerce that helps to make out communities thrive. Minimum wage is often a contentious regulation and efforts to keep that floor to a level that supports a worker being able to make a true living have caused burdens on both workers and employers alike. I favor the approach that sets the floor of the minimum living wage such that a worker right now could afford the human needs that they will have and is then tied to an economic indicator (such as the CPI) so that when that goes up, the minimum wage goes up. This sets a more affordable expectation for employers and helps to prevent people from becoming impoverished even though they are working. Non-compete agreements have limited out economic growth and prosperity by limiting worker mobility and preventing the competition necessary for a healthy marketplace. | |||
| Yes | a) Do you support adopting federal education standards (e.g. Common Core) in New York? | ||
| No | b) Do you support state funding for charter schools? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support increasing teacher salaries AND/OR benefits in New York? | ||
| Yes | d) Should immigrants in the United States who graduate from New York high schools be eligible for in-state tuition at public universities, regardless of immigration status? | ||
| I have no issue with the common core standards as a goal for education. However, we must allow teachers and students to achieve those standards in a manner that works for them rather than insisting on a particular method for achieving the standard. We have to recognize that each student learns in their own way and should be encouraged in the way that they learn. Similarly, we should respect the teachers' ability to teach in their own style and allow them to adapt to the students they are teaching as well. Charter schools will always appeal to people who feel that public education is failing, yet they are taking resources away from public schools and preventing public education success in the process. What I have liked about charter schools has been the ability to try new approaches to education, but unless the models used are able to be adapted to the wider public education system, we are creating inequity in education and that means we are creating inequity in our society. We are better served investing in our public education system as a whole than diverting resources away from it. | |||
| Yes | a) Do you support state funding for the development of renewable energy (e.g. solar, wind, geo-thermal)? | ||
| No | b) Do you support state governments allowing permits for drilling on public lands? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support increasing state funding for clean drinking water initiatives? | ||
| Yes | d) Do you support the establishment of the Home Energy Affordability Transition (HEAT) Act? | ||
| Yes | a)Do you support limiting campaign contributions from corporations, unions, and individuals? | ||
| Yes | b) Do you support the use of an independent or bipartisan commission for redistricting? | ||
| No | c) Do you support requiring a government-issued photo identification in order to vote at the polls? | ||
| Yes | d) Do you support automatic voter registration? | ||
| Yes | e) Do you support the implementation of ranked choice voting in New York? | ||
| Yes | a) Do you generally support gun-control legislation (e.g. red flag laws, closing the boyfriend loophole)? | ||
| Yes | b) Should background checks be required on gun sales between private citizens at gun shows? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support the right to concealed carry in New York? | ||
| I support gun regulations that enable safe and responsible gun ownership and use. The majority of Americans agree that background checks, training requirements, licensing and registration, etc... do work to enable that safe and responsible ownership and use and prevent many deaths. Just like automobiles, the sales of weapons from any one entity to another should require all steps in the process be followed. Having satisfied the requirements for legally owning and carrying a firearm a person should not be restricted in exercising their right to carry unless the place that they are going does not allow weapons to be carried on those premises. | |||
| Yes | a) Should the state government increase funding for treatment facilities to combat opioid abuse? | ||
| Yes | b) Do you support a government-run (e.g. single-payer) healthcare program such as Medicare-for-All? | ||
| Yes | c) Should an individual have the right to choose to die (e.g. those with a terminal illness) through euthanasia? | ||
| Yes | d) Do you support mandating vaccinations (e.g. for school or employment)? | ||
| Yes | e) Do you support expanding paid family AND/OR medical leave benefits (e.g. maternity leave)? | ||
| Yes | f) Should the government be able to regulate the cost of prescription drugs? | ||
| Yes | a) Do you support inclusion of sexual orientation in New York's anti-discrimination laws? | ||
| Yes | b) Do you support the inclusion of gender identity in New York's anti-discrimination laws? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support greater efforts by New York's state government in closing gender, racial, and other wage gaps? | ||
| My legislative priorities are all focused on the goal of everyone successfully living the lives they choose as their genuine selves with dignity, prosperity, security, and justice. To achieve that goal we need to ensure that our government is working in partnership with the community and supporting strong economic growth, ensuring that our freedom and rights are preserved and protected, ensuring that we are being good stewards of our environment so that our planet is a place where life can thrive both now and for future generations, and ensuring that all people in our nation are treated with fairness and equity. This requires that every person with the legal ability to do so is encouraged to participate in the political process and vote. This also requires that we are including all areas of our state in the work that it enacts, so I am dedicated to ensuring that rural areas have a strong voice in our legislature. With that voice I will advocate for infrastructure improvements in our communities that support residential life and growing businesses, such as making sure all of our roads, bridges, and sidewalks enable good transportation options, ensuring that telecommunications and broadband internet are accessible and affordable in all communities, updating our energy infrastructure to be more resilient to the changing conditions caused by climate change and transition to renewable and non carbon emitting sources to address the alarming rate of climate change and reduce pollution. This effort creates good paying jobs for our communities, creates a system that is more sustainable and affordable, has better health outcomes (which will help reduce healthcare costs), connect communities, and create the foundation upon which new businesses can succeed. At the same time I will focus on our healthcare system and advocate and pass a single payer system so that everyone in our communities can more easily access necessary healthcare in a far more affordable way, enable better health outcomes, create good paying jobs, and ultimately give security for everyone in their lives. At the same time I will work to ensure our public education system and other education systems are properly funded to empower our teachers to teach, our students to learn, and our communities can be more united. Finally, I will dedicate efforts to empowering our communities to grow as they determine with funding for municipalities that allows them to enact programs and projects for their growth, and funding that enables small farms and businesses to start up and succeed. When done in a holistic manner, these priorities enable our state to be a more affordable place for everyone to live, a safer and healthier place to live, and makes each of our communities a destination for people to live, work, and thrive. |
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