Matt Connolly wants to reduce the size of the federal government if elected to represent the 17th Congressional District.
“The government should operate quietly and efficiently in the background,” Connolly said Tuesday during an interview with The Republican-Herald Editorial Board. “Its job is to keep us safe, to enforce our civil rights, but not to run our lives. What’s going on right now is the government, especially the federal government, has become so intrusive people are stifled. I will probably be one of few congressmen who will hopefully vote to have less power as time goes on.”
Connolly, 51, of Bethlehem Township, Northampton County, secured the Republican nomination in April to challenge incumbent Democrat Matt Cartwright for representation of the 17th Congressional District, which includes all of Schuylkill County and parts of Carbon, Lackawanna, Luzerne, Monroe and Northampton counties. He defeated Northampton County Councilman Glenn Geissinger.
Connolly previously sought the party nomination in 2014 but lost to Schuylkill County Coroner Dr. David J. Moylan III.
“I’m a working class, blue collar guy,” Connolly said. “I’m a contractor, working with my hands and brain every day and that’s what this district is made of. It is made of folks just like me and that’s why I relate to them.”
A former professional race car driver, Connolly is also a real estate investor and does freelance work in the automobile racing business. He said he would work to repeal the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare.
“In my opinion, Obamacare is a solution in search of a problem,” Connolly said. “We have an issue with the cost of health insurance, but those cost drivers were never really addressed.”
Lawsuit reform is a cost driver that needs to be addressed and there is also not enough competition to drive down prices.
Connolly said it is unrealistic to deport all illegal immigrants, so the solution is to be tougher on criminals, secure the border and prevent companies from hiring them in the first place. He also believes sanctuary cities should be defunded because of the unintended consequences associated with them.
“The issue is the effect illegal immigration is having in driving down the value of labor,” Connolly said. “We have tons of people on welfare and these people are willing to work for less than minimum wage. It is a supply and demand issue. When labor is that cheap, the value of labor goes down.”
Connolly said overregulation is slowing economic growth and driving jobs overseas. He said regulatory agencies, especially the Environmental Protection Agency, need oversight.
“We have a regulatory environment that makes it very difficult to have manufacturing in the country, same with taxation,” Connolly said. “We have allowed certain regulatory entities, EPA specifically, to just freeze our ability to grow. We are now losing more businesses than we are starting and that is a death spiral.”
The country should also be striving toward energy independence with its policies, Connolly said. The best way to reduce the country’s carbon footprint while providing reliable, clean energy is through nuclear energy, he said. He also suggested launching the nuclear waste into space.
“We need to never forget the basis of our success and energy, coal being one of them,” he said. “The fact that coal is being demonized by the environmentalists, that is more of an anti-capitalist aspect than it is against coal, oil or natural gas.”
Connolly said the country can not continue to borrow and add to the national debt. Social Security also needs major reworking with the cap on earnings being raised and certain aspects of it privatized, he said.
Connolly said the country’s tax code offers too many loopholes and benefits.
“It doesn’t make any sense,” he said. “That’s why I think we need a strong leader who gets that and I think we need legislators who are not politically driven but patriotically driven and understands what’s best for the country and that’s why I am running.”
A better economic environment and more employment opportunities is the key to solving the country’s civil unrest while a strong worldwide presence and a proven military reserve will help eliminate threats to national security.
“I don’t believe the United States should be the world’s policeman, but I do believe we should have a very strong presence and a very consistent policy,” Connolly said. “When we draw a red line and it gets crossed, there has to be severe consequences.”