Editor, The Smithfield Times:

We must reelect Congresswoman Elaine Luria. She has worked for a strong military and a thriving shipbuilding industry, disabled veterans to increase benefits and compensation, improved infrastructure to dredge our ports to increase our shipping business, flood mitigation measures for coastal cities, manufacturing microchips domestically, reducing the deficit with a minimum corporate tax, addressing climate change and reducing health care costs, including a

$2,000 cap for seniors’ prescription drugs and insulin capped at $35 per month.

Having watched all three debates, it was obvious that her opponent, state Sen. Jen Kiggans, was clearly overmatched. Congresswoman Luria responded with an impressive grasp of the issues and specific methods to address them while Sen. Kiggans responded in generalities, just repeating Fox News sound bites. Funny how repeatedly Kiggans invoked “Nancy Pelosi” rather than specifically address how she would handle the important issues.

Sen. Kiggans would support a national abortion ban. Congresswoman Luria advocates codifying Roe vs. Wade, giving women freedom of choice for this most personal decision.

Republican leadership vows to alter our Social Security and Medicare benefits. They threaten to hold the debt limit hostage to achieve this end. Sen. Kiggans would likely vote along party lines.

Disturbingly, Kiggans has repeatedly refused to publicly acknowledge President Biden won a free and fair election. She was one of only four Virginia senators to vote in favor of a forensic audit of the 2020 election. Biden carried Virginia by 10 percentage points, there was absolutely no evidence of fraudulent voting and the cost to Virginia taxpayers would be $70 million. Kiggans’ undermining of a cornerstone of our democracy, a peaceful transfer of power, should disqualify her from holding elective office.

Sen. Kiggans’ voting record, her failure to provide specific answers as to how she would address issues and her allegiance to the disproved and dangerous notion of a “stolen election” render her unfit and too extreme to represent the citizens of the 2nd District.

Congresswoman Luria has always put the best interests of her constituency first and has been a shining example of what a public servant should be. Smithfield’s former police chief and Isle of Wight County Sheriff Mark Marshall has publicly endorsed Elaine Luria. Congresswoman Luria has earned our vote and another term in the U.S. Congress.

 

R. Hutter Gale

Smithfield