The Democratic candidates for Arizona Congressional District 5 joined Ted Simons as part of the series “Candidates in Conversation” to discuss major issues happening in Arizona. Congressional District 5 includes Queen Creek and Gilbert, as well as parts of Chandler and Mesa.
The candidates included Brian Hualde, Chris James and Elizabeth Lee.
Each candidate shared why they decided to run for this particular office. Hualde shared how his life experiences have informed his call to serve.
“From my perspective, democracy is kind of falling apart. I’ve spent my life serving and felt the call to serve again. I thought that I could use my lifetime of experience and just the things I’ve done throughout my lifetime to collaborate with other people. To come together and try to do something positive for the working people in this district and try to be someone that truly represents them,” Hualde said.
For James, he spoke of how he believes it was time for him to step up and lead following the previous representation the district has received.
“I really feel like it was the right time to lead. We have not had good representation in this district over the past decade. So we’ve had representation, really it’s been one-sided, so I felt like it was the time for me to bring my experience to the table. I’m a results driven guy, I’ve been living here in The Valley well over ten years and I’ve been working in The Valley, supporting communities in The Valley,” James said.
Lee shared how her background in medical care has carried over into public policy and the impact it has made.
“Legislation has upended the patient care that we can deliver in my space. And so about ten years ago I became very active advocacy on the Hill in D.C. serving as a subject matter advocate to help legislators understand the real life impact of the decisions they were making on my patients,” Lee said.
All three candidates shared how their background and previous experiences will help them be the best representative for their district.
“I deal with patients at their most difficult times and I’ve dealt in some of the most dangerous areas in the world throughout my experience as a combat medic. I have the ability to represent a lot of diverse populations as well as communicate with anyone across the aisle to make sure we get what we need,” Hualde said.
James shared how his previous experience working in the federal government would be able to carry over to this position.
“I was appointed to both the U.S. Department of Treasury and Small Business Administration. Really developing programs, driving economic development. At the SBA, I had over 1,500 employees. $350 million budget and helped drive legislation. Here in the East Valley, I’m a CEO of a nonprofit where I have continued that work in advocacy,” James said.
For Lee, she touched on how outreach in the community has better informed her of her constituents’ concerns.
“I’ve shown up in every labor hall and organization space and churches and rallies and protests to really meet people where they’re at. And people are really tired of the, quite frankly, the poor behavior from men that get overshadowed by their power,” Lee said.
As for the candidates running in the Republican primary, Hualde shared how his faith informs his actions a bit differently than those in the Republican party.
“As a Christian man myself, I have a lot of the same values that are broadcasted by a lot of these people. But at the same time, very different than what the Christian nationalist movement in this country looks like right now. I’m more of the Christian that supports feeding people that need food, helping those who need housing, and just providing care for those in need,” Hualde said.
James shared how he believes policy wise his priorities may differ from the Republican candidates.
“I’d like to stay to policy though. I want a leader who actually, that has the right policies to help fix our economy, to help lower gas prices, to do all the things that we want in a leader. And I don’t foresee that in our Republican candidates,” James said.
In talking about Mark Lamb, one of the candidates in the Republican primary, Lee shared how the recent allegations about the candidate have changed her campaign.
“It really has changed the trajectory of my campaign in terms of the conversations I’m having with people about what we want out of our representatives. We’re seeing quite clearly what we’ve been doing, who we’ve been sending to Congress is really not working,” Lee said.
In looking to improve the economy and affordability, Hualde touched on the competitive wage system, antitrust laws for the markets, keeping health care affordable, and more.
“Right now we’re at a point where we need to fix these basic things and we can do a lot of different things from the affordability standpoint,” Hualde said.
James believes that the tariffs and “wars of choice” are the two biggest things that are negatively affecting the economy. He also spoke to some of the impacts he has seen in the district.
“Right now everybody in the district, including the three of us, are seeing our gas prices skyrocket, the cost of groceries skyrocket. We have a lot of people on fixed income, and they’re not seeing their dollar is not as stretched as it once was even a year and a half ago,” James said.
Lee believes that to improve the economy with government intervention, the way is to look forward rather than looking back to how things were.
“There are very, very basic, easy ways that Congress can act today to put money back in Americans’ pockets. One of those being HR 1, I refuse to call it what he calls it. But, that dropped the child tax credit down so significantly that now no longer does the tax credit squelch 50% of child poverty. That’s something that just restoring us back to the 2021 levels of the child tax credit,” Lee said.
Moreover, all three candidates agreed that they would support a tax on billionaires.
Shifting to the state of affording health care in the country, James shared his thoughts on what needs to change.
“When we think of universal health care, I do believe that it’s important. I also believe we need to reinstate the Medicaid tax and demystify Medicare,” James said.
Hualde noted that the high cost of health care deter people from seeking care and is an issue that needs to be addressed.
“I think if we focus on preventive visits and subsidizing necessary medications for survival, we’ll have a better step towards what we need to do to get towards what we need to do to get to a place where we have Medicare for all in this country,” Hualde said.
Lee believes that there is a five year pathway that will lead to Medicare for all.
“The first couple of steps is one, to lower the age of when you can access Medicare. So I think they bring it down over the four, five years by a step wise process. It also opens up income-based access to Medicare so you’ll still be bringing more people into the fold. Which does, it requires you to hold insurance companies accountable,” Lee said.
Shifting to the topic of immigration, James spoke about how he believes Immigration Customs and Enforcement, or ICE, are not best serving the people of Arizona.
“How we’re getting to safe borders is not what we’re seeing now. ICE is overly funded, they have a bigger budget than the Marine Corps and we don’t need a mass police with machine guns going into car washes and arresting 87-year-old grandmothers,” James said.
Lee shared how her experience helping patients in the ICE detention centers have informed her stance on ICE.
“It is atrocious to know firsthand as someone who’s gone inside ICE detention centers. I serve as a pro bono patient advocate for patients with medical neglect and hearing what’s happening inside those facilities, that is not okay. That would be considered a war crime,” Lee said.
Hualde spoke to what needs to change within immigration enforcement in the country.
“But right now what we’re seeing is mass incarceration of people that are essentially committing civil infractions, not criminal infractions in illegal immigration. And so we should be prioritizing funding on new technologies at the border to limit crossings and stop illegal drug trafficking,” Hualde said.
