Last Thursday’s public forum on WSRE evolved into a debate between incumbent GOP Congressman Matt Gaetz and Democratic challenger Rebekah Jones. The topics included voting laws, global climate change, reproductive rights, immigration, federal aid after disasters, transparency on donors, and the survival of VA benefits, Medicare and Social Security. Time was allowed for rebuttals, which added another dimension to the discussion.
Here is a transcript:
Do you support passage of federal voting rights legislation to provide national standards for voter registration and access to the ballot? Why or why not?
Matt Gaetz: I don’t, because I don’t believe that we ought to federalize our elections. In Florida, we used to be the laughingstock of the country. We had the hanging chads and the dimpled chads, but when Ron DeSantis became our governor and appointed me as the chairman of his transition, we endeavored to fire the supervisors of elections in south Florida who could not run clean elections.
You don’t want these decisions made in Washington because there we hear crazy arguments like voter ID is racist. We know far better than that in Florida. Now we’re a model for the country, and we certainly have the leadership of Ron DeSantis to thank, and I was glad to play a major role in that process to ensure that we now can be a model for states that need to do better.
Rebekah Jones: To an extent. I think that it’s important to distinguish where our shortcomings are and where we’re doing well. As Mr. Gaetz said, Florida used to be a laughingstock and the way that we handle elections is not exactly going in the right direction, given the recent raids on legally registered voters as an example. As to I don’t believe in federalizing federal elections, I think that there is certainly an argument for decentralized system, but everyone should have access to the ballot if they’re a legal US citizen, 18 years of age or older.
The country has seen an alarming increase in the number and intensity of fires, floods, droughts, and storms resulting from the effects of global climate change. What steps will you take to address this critical issue?
Rebekah Jones: I think it’s a myriad of solutions. As a climate scientist who has dedicated my life and career to hurricanes and climate change, I know what the risks are. I have over a decade of experience in emergency response, and we need a comprehensive plan that doesn’t crash our economy but also considers the long-term cost of environmental inaction.
Matt Gaetz: Well, I’ll say what a lot of Republicans won’t. Climate change is real and human activity contributes to climate change, and so I introduced legislation called the Green Real Deal. It doesn’t unilaterally disarm the American economy like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Joe Biden would do. Instead, it leverages tax incentives, investments in infrastructure, ensuring that we’ve got an electric grid and a system that doesn’t have energy leaking off of it. And carbon capture technology now is rapidly advancing. If we could create the right incentives to do that, we could become a stronger economy, we could lead in green energy, and we wouldn’t see the type of devastating economic effect that the Paris Climate Accord and other radical client scientists have advocated for.
If elected, what actions would you take to support the rights of a woman and her doctor to choose to continue or end a pregnancy?
Matt Gaetz: I’m pro-life. Every pro-life bill that I’ve sponsored in the legislature, some of which I passed, have exceptions for rape and incest and the life of the mother. I passed legislation as a state lawmaker to ensure that in Florida, we would never have the taxpayer funding elective abortions, and I would hold that view similarly at the federal level. Actually, Joe Biden used to hold that view, but he changed his perspective on the Hyde Amendment. The bills that allow abortions that Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats have brought to the floor, they would allow an abortion up to the point that the doctor is signing the birth certificate. Right now, America is, I think, far out of where the rest of the world is, and I think that a Florida based system is better with a national standard that we could improve upon.
Rebekah Jones: I don’t like the idea of government making family planning decisions for women, whether that’s contraception access, maternity care, or abortion. Mr. Gaetz lied. There is no such thing as an abortion while a woman is giving birth and they’re signing a birth certificate, let’s at least be dealing with reality here. I know he has an issue with that. And I know a lot of voters who are watching this may not feel like this issue affects you, but the burden that society puts on women reverberates across all of our economic and social systems. The government has no business and family planning, and what a woman decides to do as a mother of two children should be her decision and her decision alone. It’s not politics. It is whether or not you see women as individual human beings.
The House of Representatives has a big part to play in establishing adequate comprehensive immigration policy. What legislative changes would you recommend to ensure fair and humane immigration policy?
Rebekah Jones: Clearly, the system that we have in place isn’t working. We’re not doing anything significant to curb migrant access to our border. While a wall is ridiculous, there’s certainly no reason that we can’t use the digital technology and infrastructure that we have and the scientific advancements in surveillance technology to make sure that people who are coming to this country are doing so legally at the entry points where they’re supposed to and are being processed in a legal way. We can’t have shenanigans like what DeSantis did with those poor people in Martha’s Vineyard and Don Gaetz’ airport happening again. We’re talking about a lot of women and children who are just coming here for a better life, and if that’s what they’re here for, they should be treated with respect and dignity.
Matt Gaetz: You know what’s not fair and humane? The system we have right now where our border is a turn style. Joe Biden has let millions of people into our country illegally, harming our citizens, harming our country. If you don’t have borders, you don’t have a country. Here’s what I would do: Finish the wall, change our asylum laws so that you can’t just say, “I’m afraid,” and then stay forever. And then you know what? We’re going to need internal enforcement of our immigration laws. It’s not enough just to finish the wall. We have to find every one of those Joe Biden buses or flights that drop people off in the interior of the country, and we got to track those people down and deport them. Otherwise, this nation does not have the standing in the world that it ought to. Every real serious nation has borders, and we don’t have it now because Joe Biden doesn’t think that much of our country.
When communities are impacted by natural disasters, what type of federal aid would you support?
Matt Gaetz: I worked very closely with Senator Rubio, Senator Scott, Governor DeSantis, and President Trump to ensure that after Hurricane Michael, we had individual assistance and that we didn’t overly burden our counties with debris removal, that meant hundreds of millions of dollars in federal assistance that didn’t bankrupt those people who are on the front lines serving our communities. We also have to make sure that we rapidly rebuild any military infrastructure that is damaged. I work closely with President Trump to ensure that we have the hundreds of millions of dollars necessary to do Tyndall rebuild, and we’re actually still working on some Hurricane Sally damage at NAS Pensacola. We have to get that fixed because during my tenure as congressman for this district, the military mission has been roaring, and I have plans to make it even stronger and more robust.
Rebekah Jones: Well, just a quick fact check. Matt Gaetz lost three missions in his six years of not serving in Congress, and the Hurricane Michael response, which I actually was a response agent for, was a very difficultly managed one. If you ask anybody in Panama City and Mexico Beach how that’s going for them, it was a botched response from start to finish, and I would know because I was tasked with finding the bodies. Matt Gaetz voted against recovery aid, not just for hurricane, our most recent one in Ian, but he also voted against recovering losses for timber companies. He also voted against the American Wildfire Recovery Act. He’s voted against natural disasters at every possible turn. We need rapid response teams that can put into staging areas, deliver direct energy. We have tons of plans to do this, and as the only person on the stage with experience in this realm, I’m pretty sure I can handle it.
We have a request for a rebuttal. Mr. Gaetz, 30 seconds.
Matt Gaetz: Yeah. If you send me back to Congress, I’ll keep voting against anything that is titled Disaster Relief but then actually goes and does all kind of crazy pork barrel spending where things are attached to disaster relief. So if disaster relief is clean, I’ll vote for it. If it has $25 million to go redo the Kennedy Center in it, of course I’m going to vote no because that is the swamp of Washington using disasters to actually advance their agenda, not the agendas of people who are harmed.
Rebekah Jones: All right. Rebuttal, Ms. Jones. The Kennedy Center was damaged in a storm. That’s why it was included in that bill. I just thought it was important for the viewers to understand what talking point he was falsely using here.
State and local elections’ financial reporting requirements provide transparency of donors. However, this is not required at the federal level. Would you support requiring similar transparency of donations to political action committees? Why or why not?
Rebekah Jones: I think we need to completely remove what Citizens United has done to this country. I’m the only candidate in this race who’s never taken PAC money, never taken lobbyist money, never taken money from Florida Power & Light. And I think the lack of transparency and finances makes people wholly distrust political electioneering, and they’re right for that. I’m not rich. I didn’t grow up a millionaire like him. I am doing this with grassroots fundraising. $52 is my average donation, and I don’t take lobbyist money. That’s difficult, but it’s the way it should be done, and every single donation should have to be reported.
Matt Gaetz: I would go far further. I would agree with those assessments, but I think it should be illegal for federal lobbyists or federal PACs to make donations. I am the only Republican in the United States Congress today who doesn’t take any money from lobbyists or PACs. And the average donation to my campaign is actually $38. I have over a hundred thousand donors all over the country, and all they seek from me is that I be at my best so that our country can be at our best. And that means full transparency, full disclosure, and it means getting lobbyists and PACs out of this business. I would suggest maybe the reason Ms. Jones hasn’t gotten a lot of donations is that no one thinks she has a real prospect to win this race because things haven’t exactly gone great for her.
Thank you, Mr. Gaetz. And we do have a rebuttal. Ms. Jones?
Rebekah Jones: As for fundraising, we’ve raised more money than Matt Gaetz did during his first term in 2016, and we did it without giving myself a $500,000 loan or taking money from Koch Industries, Florida Power & Light, or their PAC NextEra, which he took out tens of thousands of dollars, which is available on the FEC website. And I encourage everyone at home to check that out.
Matt Gaetz: I have the most pristine record on this issue of any Republican in Congress. And you know what? I’m encouraging others to do the same because I’ve led on this issue and shown you don’t have to take the lobbyist money and you don’t have to take the PAC money. And it’s my hope and expectation that many of the candidates that I’ve been traveling around the country with and working alongside will join me in the effort to reject lobbyist and PAC money.
If elected, what are your top two legislative priorities for this upcoming term?
Matt Gaetz: My top legislative priority is to advance the military mission in Northwest Florida. When I was first elected at Eglin Air Force Base, we averaged 60 test sorties per year. Because of the hundreds of millions of dollars I’ve had invested in that base and that mission, now we are scheduled to do 240 test sorties in 2024. They’re already on the books. That is billions of dollars of additional economic impact in our community. I want to see the mission at NAS Pensacola grow. I want to see the cyber mission at Hurlburt grow. And at Whiting Field, before I was elected, we had 20, 30-year old aircraft for our maintainers and for our trainers and our pilots and instructors. Now we already have dozens of new aircraft, so I want to keep growing that mission, and I also want to advance the immigration agenda I discussed earlier, finishing the wall and doing deportations.
Rebekah Jones: I would like to bring back the three missions that Matt Gaetz lost in the last six years, but not just for our active service members, which we should absolutely be in investing in the research and all of the programs that they do, but also for our veterans. Our current facilities are inadequate. They’re not getting the care that they need, especially when it comes to PTSD and toxic substance abuse. We need to get a VA hospital built here in the first district for the area that has the highest per capita population of veterans in the country. We’ve already started planning it with the Milton mayor, and she’s on board and we’ve got all of the steps in place. And I want to bring back some of that money, some of your tax dollars actually back to this district to invest in infrastructure. Spending your money building a wall isn’t going to help fix the 98 Bridge.
And we have a rebuttal. Mr. Gaetz?
Matt Gaetz: Highway 85 is being reconstructed with a bypass because of work I’ve done alongside Senator Broxson, our legislative delegation, Triumph Gulf Coast. That’s real infrastructure that’s happening now. And of course, with mission as dynamic of ours, we gain some, we lose some, but on average, we are on a trajectory for the most military activity and the biggest increases in our military local budgets that we have ever seen in Northwest Florida’s history. When I got elected, we could only take a 100-mile test shot over the Gulf of Mexico. Soon, that’ll be 425 miles.
Rebekah Jones: A lot of that funding came from recent allocations through the Biden administration and not through any efforts of Mr. Gaetz. In fact, Mr. Gaetz has not passed any legislation in his last two terms for anything relevant to Northwest Florida or not.
What solutions do you propose to ensure the survival of VA benefits, Medicare, and Social Security?
Rebekah Jones: Well, I certainly wouldn’t entertain the idea of getting rid of the VA and all of the people who are dependent upon that as if it’s just okay to just throw that out there. VA care right now is inadequate. We need to expand the options that people have to seek care outside, but if there’s not a healthcare infrastructure around here for them to go to, it doesn’t matter. We need to build a VA hospital here. There is no reason this has not happened. It was a dream 20 years ago, and then Mr. Gaetz got busy traveling around California and forgot about it. But if I do nothing else in my first term, I will get that hospital built, and it’ll be more good done for this district than he’s done in the entire time he’s been in government, which is his whole adult life.
Matt Gaetz: I warned the country that if we passed Obamacare, that would thin the soup in critical programs like Medicare. I’m concerned that in Northwest Florida, more and more primary care patients aren’t seeing Medicare patients and aren’t seeing Medicaid patients. So to strengthen our safety nets, which I fully believe in, I would pass work requirements for able-bodied childless adults to ensure that we don’t have people that should be going to work getting their healthcare and other benefits off the DOL. And you know what? I would entertain the prospect of totally abolishing the VA and then giving every veteran in our country a card that would allow them to walk into any willing provider and get medical services from the taxpayer. I’d rather put the power of hands of the veterans, not in the hands of the bureaucracy that too often fails them.
Thank you, Mr. Gaetz. And we do have a rebuttal. Ms. Jones?
Rebekah Jones: That option is already available to veterans, and veterans who are using that care already know that. Again, if there’s no healthcare infrastructure to go outward to find, it doesn’t matter. Veterans deserve specialized care. The types of wounds and combat experiences that can lead to traumatic brain injuries and PTSD are not something that you just happen upon in regular primary care. They deserve the best healthcare with all of the available treatments that this country has to offer, and we should be doing it right here.
Matt Gaetz: Yeah. The problem with Ms. Jones’ argument is that the care that people get at the VA isn’t better than the care that they would get at Baptist or Sacred Heart or any number of other places. In fact, a lot of times, it’s worse and the bureaucracy forces people to drive far away in order to be able to see specialists. And in the meantime, we’re losing so much money because we’re not realizing any efficiencies. I would give the veteran the power. And the problem with the status quo is that veterans have to go through the front door of the VA in order to access Veterans Choice. I joined with President Trump in passing VA Choice, but we need to go a lot farther, and we may just need to put all the power in the hands of the veterans, get the government out of the system entirely.
