Tuesday's Times interview with Doug Hoffman
Douglas L. Hoffman, a Republican and Conservative candidate for the 23rd Congressional District race, talked to the Watertown Daily Times today about his candidacy.
In the first part of the interview, Mr. Hoffman reveals that he plans to move to the district and discusses his positions on earmarks, health care reform, defense spending and tax breaks.
Here's the transcript:
Q: I'm curious to know why you'd like to run again for the 23rd Congressional District, instead of running for the 20th seat, which is where you live.
A: I grew up in the 23rd district. I was educated in the 23rd district. I served in the Army in the 23rd district. I trained at Fort Drum. I have been in the 23rd district either living or working all my life. I have six offices throughout the 23rd district that go all the way from Lake Placid to Watertown.
I think I'm a son of the 23rd district. That's part of me and it has been a part of me all my life.
Q: Do have any intention of making a permanent residence inside the 23rd?
A: Yes, I do. I have a purchase contract that I just closed on last week. We're working on the financing and we hope to close on that property next month. It's in Saranac Lake, my hometown where I grew up. And I'll be moving back home.
Q: And that will be your main residence?
A: That will be my primary residence.
Q: Bill Owens has recently requested that about $204 million in funding be included in the federal highway bill for local projects, including projects as large as the Northern Tier Expressway and as small as installing GPS tracking devices in Oswego County vehicles. During your last campaign, you were critical of earmarks. I was wondering. In your estimation, where Mr. Owens' requests appropriate?
A: I think that we always need highway improvements. They're now working on the 781 connector to Fort Drum. We need the improvements. We need the upgrades. We need to fix the potholes. We always need money in the highway budget for the north country with the frost heaves and the severe weather that we have up here. So any congressman is going to have to go after funding for highway improvements.
As far as earmarks go, I think all you have to do is - it's the issue of earmarks that we have a problem with. I think all you have to do is look in December at the health care bill negotiation. For $300 million of taxpayer's money to be given out to bribe a senator to vote for the health care bill, that money could have been better used in highway improvements around the country to fix the things that we need fixed.
Q: So you're OK with adding funding for local projects that only benefit the localities?
A: I think that if I get elected as congressman, I'm going to fight to get every dollar that we possibly can that's available in Washington for the 23rd district.
Q: If you had been elected instead of Bill Owens, you probably would have been faced with several important votes. You mentioned the health care vote. I want to ask you about several bills and ask you if you would support or oppose them. And let's start with health care reform.
A: Health care reform I definitely would have voted against.
Q: Tell me why, as succinctly as possible.
A: I think that No. 1, we can't have a bill that's going to spend a trillion dollars over the next 10 years that we don't have. We can't have a bill that's going to add taxes to the small businesses and the middle class taxpayers. We can't have a bill that cuts important benefits from Medicare in our elderly. We can't be talking about a bill that doesn't truly address the cost-cutting measures of health care, which importantly is tort reform and interstate competition. The present bill doesn't even start to address those issues. Those are the major issues that can really cut the cost of health care.
Q: Staying in health care arena, I want to ask you about the Stupak-Pitts amendment. Would you have been for that or opposed to that?
A: I...
Q: Stupak-Pitts was (opposed to) federal funding for abortions.
A: I would been opposing to that so I would have voted for that because that prevented the federal funds for abortion.
Q: How about raising the limit on the public debt?
A: I would have voted against that. Because I think that until we start limiting the amount of national debt, we're not going to have serious conversations about reducing spending.
Q: And in that same realm, the pay as you go model that was approved.
A: Pay as you go model, if I understand it, is that unless you have the money you don't spend it. That's certainly is what we do on a home budget basis and I think that's what the government should start doing.
Q: OK, so you're for that?
A: Yes.
Q: The $636 billion Defense Appropriation Act.
A: Well, one of my strongest planks in my platform is a strong national defense and I think that has to take top priority. I do know that the budget for defense this year was reduced by some $800 million, $36 million for Fort Drum alone. And I oppose reduction in the national defense. I think we have to keep that strong and we have to put the money where our mouth is and spend it.
Q: So it sounds like you're in favor of it. You would have voted for that bill?
A: Oh, absolutely I would have voted for it. But I would have even tried harder to restore the parts that were cut out of it.
Q: I was just wondering if maybe the fact there were 1,700 earmarks totaling $4.2 billion would have caused you pause and maybe to oppose it.
A: You can't vote against a bill - that's the problem with earmarks. They tag them on and if you vote against it just because of the earmarks, you're not going to get your important priorities through. That's why I'm against earmarks because the fact that they know you have to vote for a bill like that because you need a strong national defense. But we don't need all the earmarks tagged onto to it just to spend taxpayer dollars on special projects for people around the country that may not have anything to do with national defense.
Q: Another bill I want to ask you about is the Tax Extenders Act of 2009, which continued $31 billion in tax breaks through 2010. It's an annual tax break reappropriation. Is that something you would have supported?
A: Well, I would have supported the ones that had to do with cutting taxes for small businesses, because that's the economic generator of our country. Every time you increase the tax on small business, that's less money that they can reinvest into equipment and expansion. If they're not reinvesting, then they can't hire new people.
Q: So it sounds like, because that's what this bill did - cut taxes for small businesses and families too - that was something you would have been in favor of?
A: Absolutely.
Q: This bill did include a new permanent tax that subjected carried interest to the regular tax rate instead of the capital gains rate. That's a permanent tax, so I didn't know if that would cause you, again, some pause and to maybe worry about.
A: Well, you're in Congress - you're asking me questions off the cuff here - when you're in Congress, you need to know every integral detail of a bill. Certainly as you're looking at the bills, I'm not naive enough to think that when I get to Congress, every bill is going to be perfect and I'm going to like 100 percent of the bills. I understand that movement is made in Washington through compromise and you're going to have some items that you don't like and you're going to have some items that you do like. And you have to weigh each bill to determine if it's worth the compromise to get this bill through, to get the issues that you want through.
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In part two, Mr. Hoffman discusses Mr. Owens allegedly breaking three campaign promises, his allegation that "ACORN, the union and the Democratic Party" "tampered" with voting machines, his willingness to debate his Republican opponents and his desire to run in another three-person race:
Q: You told some of those who interviewed you at CPAC that Bill Owens had broken three campaign promises immediately upon taking office. What were those promises and how were they broken?
A: Well, immediately after being sworn in, Bill Owens voted in favor of the health care bill in Congress. The health care bill that he voted for included higher taxes on the middle class and the small business and it also included reductions in Medicare. And those are three campaign promises that Bill Owens made that he broke within 24 hours of being sworn in.
Q: OK, so the three promises were higher taxes on the middle class, higher taxes on small business and reductions on Medicare?
A: Yes. All of those were included in the new health care bill.
Q: I just wanted to ask you - the Congressional Budget Office is saying that the value of the additional benefits given under Medicare Advantage would amount to about $85 more per senior per month in 2019. So they’re actually saying that, for the majority of people, Medicare benefits would actually go up for the House bill. So I was wondering if you had different information or you disagree with their assessment.
A: I’d have to read what you’re reading. They’re saying it would go up. Just with inflation it would go up over 10 years. So what about net of inflation? Are the numbers you’re citing net of inflation or just gross numbers?
Q: I actually don’t know.
A: Well, that’s what you have to look into.
Q: Switching gears on you here a little bit, the possibility exists that this race will among three candidates again. So I wanted to know if you're willing to run against two candidates again?
A: Am I willing to run against two candidates?
Q: Yes. In the last special election, you ran against two candidates - Bill Owens and Dede Scozzafava. Are you willing to run in a three-way race again?
A: I think that's a hypothetical question. We have to see what develops here. Certainly if Dede Scozzafava got into the race again, I'd run a three-way race.
Q: Do you think you could prevail in a three-way race?
A: I think that's a hypothetical question again. I think if you look at last year, I got 70,000 votes on the conservative line. I think it's a hypothetical question. It depends on whether Dede runs again.
[Rob Ryan, Mr. Hoffman's spokesman]: It also depends on who the candidates are, what lines people are on. There's so many variables here.
A: The answer to that question is that I'm going to work very hard to reunite the Republican Party, the Conservative Party and the Independence Party in this campaign. I think that by successfully doing that, we're going to defeat Bill Owens. So I'm going to expend [inaudible] as a lifelong Republican to earn the Republican nomination. And I'm going to try to seek the Independence line. I already have the Conservative line promised to me, but I don't think there's [inaudible] to beat Bill Owens.
Q: This is my first time getting to talk to you since November, so I've got some residual questions from the end of the last campaign. You had put out a letter that suggested ACORN, the unions and the Democratic Party had tampered with the voting machines during the last election? Is that something you still believe?
A: First of all, I think we made that clear to you. I didn't put out that letter. I had a surgery at the time that letter was put out and that letter was never passed by me and I would have never approved it.
Q: Oh, OK. So who put it out?
A: I have no idea. It was somebody on my staff that did that. It was, like I said, I was involved in surgery. I wasn't even able to read. I had major eye surgery and that letter should have never gone out. I did not authorize it and I did not agree with it.
Q: Did you believe there was a virus in the machines that people used to cast their ballots? That was a separate letter.
A: I think that's been confirmed by the commissioners that there was a problem with the programming. I don't agree there was a virus. I think there was a programming error.
Q: Do you think it cost you votes?
A: I think that the commissioners on elections did a great job in recounting and I agree with the final results.
