Sputnik: You are running against Democrat Representative Maxine Waters. How do you evaluate your chances this year?
Like every year, I've been putting in work. The last time I ran against her, we put out a big team of people walking door to door. I think that's where it’s at, it’s at the grassroots level, going from city to city in the district and telling people what I offer differently than her. I think the difference is that Maxine Waters has been in office for so long and she has not delivered for so long. The people in my district want something different and they want something better for the district. We don't need someone that's going to tell homeless people to go home, people that don't have a home – people that need a home! Of course, you would think that a person that gets several billion dollars to allocate it towards the homeless in Los Angeles is going to do something for them, but actually doesn't, actually creates more problems by pouring money into a problem that really needs a solution.
In the last seven years, the LA Times reported that there are 70,000 more homeless in Los Angeles County alone. So, the homeless population has gone up. Those are numbers that have been reported by statistics and numbers. But obviously, it could be much higher than that, it could be even double, up to 120,000 people that are homeless in Los Angeles. But it has to do a lot with the lack of employment, the lack of programs that are available to the people that are homeless. Because you have a population, obviously, that is driven by drug problems, mental health, lack of jobs, like I just mentioned right now – I think those are the three core issues. And then there are just people that choose to live this way, which goes back to the mental health, because those go hand in hand with each other.
And I think that's where the directed problem is at that we need to pay attention to. Because, if you keep ignoring this issue, especially in a highly populated area like downtown Los Angeles, South LA, you're going to have a lot more people out there that are going to get in front of businesses. And what happens when a business sees homeless people right in front of them? I mean, I don't think anyone wants to do business knowing that they have thousands of homeless right outside their business daily. And it's a very dangerous situation to be in.
I think that we need to bring back some balance to this – not just the state of California, but on a federal level, where we can help people on a local level and affect them in a way where it impacts their communities and it changes them for the better.
I feel that Maxine Waters has not connected that, and that's why she's been in office for so long. People keep voting someone in that's familiar to them and they see their name on the ballot – 'well, we vote for Maxine.' That's what tends to end up happening.
If I was in Congress, what I would do is I would support anything that would obviously benefit my district back at home. And I would be voting, obviously a voting member, not only in my district, but I'll be impacting the whole country on these decisions that congressmen make, not just impact their district, but everyone in the whole country. I would obviously oppose many tax increases, because there's too many of them.
We’ve spent too much money, money that we don't even have!
We get involved in too many situations like, for example, with Ukraine. We're getting involved way too much. We’re handing them so much money – and for what? What are we getting out of this? At the end of the day, we need to figure out what we're going to do for America and putting America first. I think that should be the concern, putting our people first before any other person. I think that's what every country should do – put their country first.
Sputnik: How have public sentiments changed since 2020?
There's a lot of people on the Republican side that feel that the 2020 election was stolen. They feel that there was something that went down that was insidious and that their vote does not count. And that's where my concern is, right there – because there's a lot of people in this country that feel their concern, their vote is not going to matter. So they're not going to go and vote. I think a lot of Republicans are underestimating the power of that side of the aisle in the Republican Party that feels that their vote doesn't count.
Republicans are thinking this is going to be a red wave. I do believe that there's going to be a red wave takeover, but not the way that they're pointing it out to be, because they're not counting the Republicans that are not going to vote because they feel their votes are not going to count. That's the problem. No one has talked about, no one has really addressed in the mainstream news, talked about the concern of that. I think that's where the problem is right there. We have a disconnection between our own party and everyone else that’s in it. There's a lot of people out there, a lot – I would say a great majority of them – that believe the 2020 election was taken, stolen by the Democrats.
One could argue and say, 'Oh, well, you know, the Democrats did that back then during Bush and Gore, and they accused us of stealing the election.' And they did the same thing in 2016, when Trump won the election. They accused us of stealing the election. I mean, again, it goes hand in hand. One could argue that each party accuses each other of stealing elections. But we have to pay attention to that voter fraud is a concern, not just on the Democrat aisle, but on the Republican aisle. It's a concern on both ends. And I think this is something that should be truly taken into consideration and actually investigated by the government. Our vote matters, and it should matter, and people’s concerns should matter.
Sputnik: What's the atmosphere like at the polling stations?
I've been getting messages from a lot of people through email, on social media, on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, through all the various communications. People are asking me, 'What should I do? Where should I go? Should I send in my ballot or should I go vote in person?' I always say it's better to vote in person – just go there yourself! Because the last time I went to vote, they said I was deactivated. They said I hadn't been an active voter in a while. And I was like, 'Wait a second, I haven't missed an election in years, since I was like 18, 19, I've been voting. How can this happen?'
So, there is that level of concern of people out there. So I tell them it's better just to go there, make sure that they haven't deactivated you or anything like that, because that's what we've been telling people from my district.
Sputnik: Waters won 71.7% of the vote in 2020 – a result you did not consider fair. Do you think the result this year will be fair and transparent?
I'm not sure if it's going to be fair and transparent. I think that we still need a lot of work to do. I'm hoping that there are safeguards in place at this point, after the last election and a concern of election integrity. I would hope that there are some safeguards. We are doing everything we can within our campaign to do that. But the whole dynamic and idea behind all of this is to compete in noncompetitive areas that haven't been competitive in years. Republicans need to step up in areas that are not competitive, like Maxine Waters’ [area].
I grew up in the district. I'm not a person that just went into the district to run against Maxine, because I actually was born there. I was born in Inglewood, California in 1989. I went to school there. I'm a product of the school system of Los Angeles school districts. When I was two years old, Maxine Waters got elected to Congress. I'm 33 years of age – she's toppling, going to 90 years of age. There is an out of touch situation that goes on in our government when you have people that have been in office, in politics close to 40 years. That's a problem.
Sputnik: "This year is going to be the year of the Latina Republican," Rep. Elise Stefanik told the Washington Examiner in a recent interview. "And much like 2020 was the year of the Republican woman, this is going to be the year of the Latina Republican." Why, in your view, have Latina Americans turned to the Republican Party? What attracts them the most?
I can't speak so much for the whole Latino population in itself. But from what I've noticed, the older generation of Latinas doesn't like this whole “Woke” agenda. But from what I've noticed from a lot of the young Latinas in cities like Los Angeles that are highly populated – they're misled by the Woke agenda. They're misled by the Democrat Party. They think that they own them, the Democrats. And in a sense, they do own the younger generation, because some of these younger-generation Latino and Latina Republicans, they coincide with the Democrat Party because of immigration. They think that someone in their family is going to get deported. That's where the issue is.
Their parents did it right, but they think that for some reason, their family did it wrong and they came here illegally, when it was not so. I think that's the lack of education and transparency that's out there from a lot of people. They don't understand that. But I disagree with her saying that Latinas are going to sway more and vote Republican. I think that it could be a 50-50.
I think the Democrats have 50% of the Latina population, because a lot of the culture that we have today, and this is what I've noticed from living in California, a lot of Latinas go with this whole culture of the Woke agenda. And that's where the problem is.
But a lot of the men, I think there's a lot more men, Hispanic and Latino men, that are driving out of the Democrat Party, because the Democratic Party is telling them that they can't be men. And that's something that Latino men cannot understand. They cannot understand that.
That Woke agenda telling us that there's 13 different genders, telling us that we have to accept everyone. It's not so. We have a set of beliefs that we grew up with. I grew up Roman Catholic, I was baptized Catholic. That core belief of religion is so important within the Hispanic and Latino community, which is very vital and important. I think a lot of people are starting to realize, and a lot of the Latino men are starting to realize that the Democrat Party is not for them.
Sputnik: It has been the subject of speculation recently that non-White Republicans are being dismissed and demonized by Democrats and their mainstream media allies because they hold conservative views, even though they may be Black or Hispanic. Is it a fact that Black and Hispanic American voters are necessarily Democrats?
A lot of these populations, they think the Democrats think that they own them. They think that they should be voting for them. Again, like I said, it's not so. Many of those people have drifted away from the Democrat Party because of that belief system that they have. You know, we have real problems. Gas prices in California are almost at $7. You have the economy – you go to the grocery store and you're paying way more for the cost of goods. You're paying much more to buy property in today's world. It's so out of touch.
The average home in a decent area in California would cost you close to $1,000,000. These are issues that are real to the Hispanic community. These are issues that are real to the Black community. These are real serious problems that we face today.
The Democratic Party is not answering any of those things. That's why the Republican Party has been talking about those things. They've been talking about the indoctrination in the schools, of not wanting their kids sexualized. The Republican Party has been doing that, and that's what a lot of people are seeing. A lot of Blacks and Hispanics, Latinos have been seeing this. That's why they're driving away from the Democrat Party. That's why the Democrat Party is scared, because they're losing those demographics. They're no longer holding a grip over them. They're scared, and they're going to do whatever they can, to pander as much as they can, to do whatever they can to hold that voting bloc when they can no longer hold it anymore.
Sputnik: Why are Black and Hispanic voters perceived as tribal Democrat voters?
I think that's a misconception. I think that's like a whole historical thing. I have two families: my mom's side came from Mexico, my father's side, they came from Cuba. My father was from Cuba. My mom's from Mexico. So traditionally, my father, when he came here, he was a Republican. He registered Republican. And it's common within Cuban culture to be Republican. It is a very common thing.
Now, my mom on the other side, she was raised that Democrat means democracy. She thought that being a Democrat meant believing in democracy. Her family grew up that way. There are a lot of people from Mexico, who when they come to this country, they think that when they're voting Democrat, they think they're voting for democracy.
And that’s a different meaning. There is a confusion that goes in line when they're coming to America. There's a misunderstanding. But once they learn about the political structure, and it goes back into the educational factor of understanding the political parties. If the Republican Party goes out there and educates – and they have to go to the inner city, they cannot go preaching to the choir.
I don't see the Republican Party going into the most liberal states, like California, with the RNC pouring money - I don't see the RNC doing this. They are actually not doing this. And it's a very dangerous thing not to do this, because it is so easy to convince a Hispanic Latino voter to switch parties if you just educate them about the party platforms. Just in itself. That's how I switched my mother and most of my family members, actually, that were Democrats, on my mother's side, just by showing them the party platforms and letting them look at it. 100% of the time when they looked at the platform, they switched over to Republican.