California’s affordable housing crisis has been raging for decades, and is the defining issue of our time. I firmly believe that living up to our progressive values means ensuring everyone who calls California home truly has a place to call their own. Just days after I was sworn in as Assemblymember, I went on a different kind of listening tour across Assembly District 15, visiting homeless encampments, shelters, and service providers. It was crucial to me to hear from people impacted by the crisis, so I could learn from their stories and carry them with me in my work.
Delivering on our shared progressive values means ensuring no one has to work more than one full-time job to stay afloat, that women get equal pay for equal work, and that new parents can take care of a newborn without risking financial catastrophe.
My entire career has been centered on people power — and the belief that when people come together around their common interests, there isn’t anything they can’t accomplish. As an organizer, I stood with organized labor to demand fair wages and healthcare for Wal-Mart employees. And in my leadership role in the White House Office of Public Engagement during the Obama Administration, I brought stakeholders and advocates to the table to pass the Affordable Care Act — standing up for millions of consumers and holding the health insurance industry accountable.
The issue of gun violence is personal to me. I met my husband working to pass the Manchin-Toomey bill in the U.S. Senate that would have expanded mandatory background checks on most commercial gun sales. My husband was Rep. Gabrielle Giffords’ legislative director when she was shot at a public event in 2011. I am the mother of a girl who will be going to kindergarten in just a year, and another a few years after that — I don’t want them or any of our kids living in a world where gun safety drills are a constant part of their educational experience.
Our East Bay community faces a severe shortage of homes that are affordable to low- and middle-income young people, families, and seniors. Too many members of our diverse community—from artists and teachers to service workers and seniors who’ve contributed to our community—are being displaced, and we need to provide as much protection as possible to those facing wrongful evictions and skyrocketing rents. As your Assemblymember, I would champion three key approaches to address our community’s shortage of homes: one, build more affordable homes for low-income people more quickly two, protect existing tenants from displacement, especially seniors and people with disabilities and three, grow in a smart way by building more homes in walkable, transit-oriented neighborhoods, so we can share our community while protecting our East Bay way of life.
We must also recognize that the shortage of homes in our community cuts across other issues: exacerbating homelessness, contributing to more greenhouse gas emissions from workers forced into long car commutes, and denying low-income families and hardworking young people equal access to the world-class educational and professional opportunities of the Bay Area. I believe in—and am committed to fighting for—an East Bay that is sustainable and accessible to all.
I am a product of public schools – from kindergarten through college. It helped propel me from a single-wide trailer in a small town in northern California to working for President Barack Obama in the White House. I believe everyone has a right to quality public education and I will support legislation to reduce teacher shortages, increase funding for K-12 public schools, invest in community colleges, and ensure our public universities are accessible and affordable for California residents. We cannot let access to safe schools and a good education be determined by where you live, the color of your skin, or how much your parents make. Our legislature must be a champion for educational equity through specific funding increases for resource-starved schools and by giving teachers the tools they need to lead disadvantaged students on the path to success. We can find that funding by taking a hard look at corporate loopholes under Prop 13, among other strategies.
California is taking an important and necessary look at universal healthcare and creating a single-payer system. Making that happen will mean making some difficult choices in our budget and tax policies. I believe California can and should be committed to providing single-payer health care for its residents. I am ready to be bold, tackle tough spending questions, and keep California moving towards a stable single-payer health care system – while immediately moving to protect vulnerable Californians from the Trump administration’s plans to take critical medical coverage from millions.
Climate change is real, people. I am ready to fight to keep our state around for future generations. That means joining Governor Brown’s honoring of the Paris Climate Agreement and continued aggressive reductions of greenhouse gas emissions. I support California’s cap-and-trade program because it is essential for both state-level climate policy as well as supporting global momentum to protect our planet. But “green” policy needs to be more than just rebates for electric car drivers – I will fight for clean air and water for all Californians, and fight against corporations that try to maximize profits by passing on the financial and human costs of pollution to poorer communities and people of color.
We must be honest about the outrageous racial disparities in our criminal justice system, work to end racial profiling and mass incarceration, and promote fair and impartial policing. And we must support re-entry programs to put formerly incarcerated individuals on a path to success. Although California has made progress in passing strong new gun laws that have helped make us safer, we can build on that success and invest now in tested community violence intervention programs to further reduce gun violence and save lives. We should increase funding for California’s CalVIP program and identify areas to bring private funding into fighting community violence. And to promote long-term community safety, we must also ensure that all of our children have a fair shot with equity in education.
California is ranked 47th out of 50 for the standard of living for children. This is unacceptable for the world’s 6th largest economy. While our state is making important strides to support working families, I will lead the push for a package of legislation aimed at promoting the health and safety of California kids. We need to transform our system of early childhood services at the state and local levels to be more child-centered. California’s child-services system is fractured and diffuse, both in terms of how it is funded and the quality of care it provides to the millions of California children it serves. I believe we should have one single, affordable, accessible, high-quality, and integrated system of early learning and care. We also need to support families by enacting the most comprehensive paid leave policy in the country – a full 12-weeks paid leave for the birth of a new child or to care for a sick loved one. As women are increasingly the breadwinners for their families, and still the primary caregivers, the pressures they face are real. To ensure a level playing field for women and their families, I will fight for universal childcare, close the gender pay gap, and ensure all Californians have access to quality reproductive healthcare.
In the Spring of 2017, I joined tens of thousands of women across the country who stepped into the arena and decided to run for office for the first time. I’ve never been a candidate before, but felt the need, with my daughter by my side, to get out from behind the scenes. With that, I filed for office to be the next California Assembly member for District 15 in the East Bay.
It’s great that we have more women running for office. And given the recent progress from the #MeToo effort, I think it’s time we have more women in positions of power. Research shows that when women reach the threshold of more than 30% of the leadership of an organization, the culture of the organization shifts. The California state legislature is behind the national average at 22% and given the recent departures by four male state legislators due to sexual assault allegations, I think it’s high-time we push past that 30% number.
But what’s also critically important is that our elected officials – both women and men – support policies that push for essential rights and protections for millions of women. This is the kind of structural change we need to level the playing field for women.
As the current president continues expanding his list of who does and does not belong in the United States, California must stand firm in protecting vulnerable members of our community from attack and unjustified deportation. I support proposed sanctuary state legislation because the best use of law enforcement resources is catching dangerous criminals, not threatening and deporting our undocumented neighbors. We must reject the politics of hate and fear, and we can do that through responsible legislation that protects crime victims and keeps undocumented immigrants out of the shadows. Our strength is our diversity, and our diversity is reflected in our vibrant immigrant communities. I will do everything in my power to make immigrants from all corners of the globe feel welcome here.
California’s workforce and economy is like no other. We are home to one of the most diverse and innovative workforces in the country, and we have the fifth-largest economy in the world — but we know that our economy is not working for everyone. Meanwhile, the economic recovery and progress that we have seen since the Great Recession is due squarely to the grit and innovation of our workers. They are the backbone of our thriving community life, and our state government must work hard to ensure that all workers benefit from our state’s economic prosperity.
As your Assemblymember, I would:
California is taking an important and necessary look at universal health care and creating a single-payer system. Making that happen will mean making some difficult choices in our budget and tax policies. I believe California can and should be committed to providing single-payer health care for its residents. I am ready to be bold, tackle tough spending questions, and keep California moving towards a stable single-payer health care system – while immediately moving to protect vulnerable Californians from the Trump administration’s plans to take critical medical coverage from millions.
Our district has an incredible history of leading the state and country on disabilities rights. Yet today, we still see glaring inequalities, inaccessibility, and under-representation for the 22% of Californians –about 3.8 million people– with some type of intellectual, emotional, or physical disability. It’s time for our district and our state to do more to lead again on ensuring that people with disabilities can live their daily lives fully and access the public rights and services that we promise to all Californians. And we all know moving the needle on disabilities rights doesn’t just help people with disabilities– a more accessible society helps us all. We must consider disability needs and priorities in every policy area we discuss and in every equity issue we tackle, from housing and homelessness to workforce training and wage equity. I would fight to bring disability rights leaders to the table on all issues, ensure quality education for our students with special education needs, improve our developmental disabilities services funding structure, and reform our mental health services and funding approach.