PRIORITIES

The cost of living is too high. Wages have not kept up, while CEO salaries and stock buy-backs are prioritized. We must raise the minimum wage, expand unions, and guarantee paid family and medical leave. We must close tax loopholes, and fund the IRS’ enforcement staff so they can focus on the biggest tax cheats, who engage in complicated accounting schemes. We also must pass a version of the “Tax Excessive CEO Pay Act,” under which companies would pay higher taxes when the ratio of their CEO pay to their typical worker pay exceeds 100:1.

[Walmart’s ratio is 930:1, for example – its CEO made $27.4 million in 2024 – 930 times the median Walmart worker’s salary of $29,469.]

We are overdue to enact Medicare for All. We are the richest country in the world, and the only one without healthcare guarantees. We spend more money on healthcare than any other peer country and have the worst outcomes. It’s time to face the facts: our for-profit system is getting more expensive and less effective every year. Medicare for All would end co-pays and high deductibles, and save our economy billions annually, according to the bipartisan Congressional Budget Office.

Too many Floridians can’t afford to buy a home. We must outlaw private equity companies buying private housing, which lowers supply and drives up prices. We must foster the building of affordable housing in ecologically responsible ways. And we must establish a federal reinsurance program to protect property in climate-affected states like Florida.

Human rights are not political. We must reject the politicization of individual rights and the government’s wrongful insertion of itself into our private lives. We need to codify the Supreme Court’s decisions protecting individual rights, including Roe v. Wade, which guarantees access to reproductive healthcare, and the Obergefell decision, which guarantees marriage equality.

We also must legislate around bad Supreme Court decisions, like Second Amendment overreaches, and implement gun safety regulations in support of our fundamental right not to be killed as a consequence of reckless gun availability.

Our immigration system is broken and cruel, but it can be fixed. We must streamline the path to citizenship. We must improve border control with technology, and demand accountability from our border agents. We must welcome and protect refugees fleeing persecution in the American tradition. Finally, we must work with domestic industries that hire immigrants, like agriculture, construction, and tourism, to support both business and immigrant success and safety.

Floridians know climate change is real and destructive, and that we must take steps to manage it. Implementing clean renewable energy is no longer an option. We must streamline our national move away from fossil fuels, strengthen water and air quality, and address rising sea levels, warmer sea temperatures, and a warming planet.

We must make Congress more accountable to the voters, and less beholden to special interests. To this end, campaign finance reform is essential, and overturning Citizens United, the egregious Supreme Court decision that reversed century-old campaign finance restrictions, and enabled corporations and other outside groups to spend unlimited money on elections, is key.

We also must ban stock trading by members. And we must pass a federal ban on political and racial gerrymandering, and demand that independent redistricting commissions draw fair maps.

Finally, we must eliminate the Electoral College, a slave-era relic, to elect the President by popular vote.

Americans no longer trust the US Supreme Court to be a politically neutral body. Justices are picked by partisan politician machines, several Justices are ideologically extreme, and investigations of corruption are warranted. We must expand the Supreme Court to 13 members, mirroring the number of Circuit Courts of Appeals, and we must discontinue lifetime Supreme Court tenure, which fosters unaccountability and Justices serving way past retirement age.