Originally Written on March 27th, 2016
Edited on March 29th and 30th,
and April 22nd, 2016
Thanks to Annie Dean for her helpful input
Thanks to Annie Dean for her helpful input
Joseph Kopsick, a 29-year-old
resident of Lake Bluff, is running as a New
Party candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives. He will be fighting to
represent Illinois’s 10th District, along with some other
recognizable names. An Illinois native, Kopsick was born at Lake Forest
Hospital in 1987, attended area public schools in Lake Bluff throughout his
childhood, and graduated from Lake Forest High School in 2005. He majored in
political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, graduating with a
bachelor’s in 2009. While living in Madison, Kopsick ran for the U.S. House
from Wisconsin’s 2nd District in 2012, and also ran for Oregon’s 3rd
in 2014.
Kopsick decided to move back home to
Illinois after traveling around the country getting to know different kinds of
people, and understanding their struggles and what they need most from their
government. In a country so divided, Kopsick now feels that the battle for the
House is just as important in Illinois’s 10th as anywhere else.
Kopsick declared his candidacy in November, citing a lack of diversity of
opinion among the other candidates on numerous key issues. He believes that his
opponents’ records do not sufficiently reflect an interest in reducing federal
power, practicing a non-interventionist foreign policy, and supporting personal
freedom.
Kopsick desires to reduce the size
of the federal workforce, cap spending at lower levels, and help pass a
Balanced Budget Amendment. He opposes income taxes, but would accept a Negative
Income Tax. He considers taxes on sales, gifts, estates, and investments as
discouraging productive behavior. Kopsick favors an integrated approach to
taxes and the environment, desiring to reform property taxes so as to fund
government solely through fees on natural resource extraction, and fines on
pollution and blight and disuse of land. He opposes privatizing Lake Michigan’s
water rights, favoring the establishment of community land and water trusts.
Kopsick opposes federal gun control
legislation, and supports strengthening the Second Amendment by restoring it to
its original intent of protecting the right of conscientious objection to
military conscription. Concerning immigration, Kopsick opposes building a
border wall, and would support legislative deferred action for childhood
arrivals and their parents, rather than executive orders or memoranda effecting
the same. On health, Kopsick will work to expand insurance coverage by legalizing
interstate insurance purchase and eliminating the tax credit for employer
provided insurance. He opposes federal restrictions on abortion, and considers
mandated ultrasounds intrusive, costly, and medically unnecessary.
On labor issues, Kopsick has
criticized both Right to Work laws and compulsory union voting, and prefers allowing
workers to personalize their retirements and opt-out of Social Security rather
than privatizing the program. As alternatives to increasing the federal minimum
wage, Kopsick hopes to increase the dollar’s purchasing power by reining-in the
Federal Reserve, eliminating tariffs and sales taxes, and improving the balance
of trade. Kopsick’s political writing is available on his blog www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com, and
you can join the conversation about his campaign on Facebook at “Joe Kopsick
for Congress 2016 (IL-10)”, and on Twitter @JoeK4Congress.
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