[MUSIC] >> This is election 26 on WSIU a Julie Fortier, the Democratic candidate for Illinois's 12th Congressional District.

I'm Jeff Williams alongside Brian Sapp.

This forum is being held in the WSIU TV studios on the campus of Southern Illinois University, Carbondale.

>> An invitation was also extended to Republican candidate for this race, incumbent Mike Bost.

We asked him to participate in a similar forum.

We have a predetermined list of questions that will be used in all the forums for this race.

Miss Fortier, thank you for participating.

>> Thank you for having me today.

>> We'll start with our first question.

Why do you want to serve the.

As the US representative for the 12th Congressional District of Illinois.

>> I believe this district has been underrepresented.

I believe the people in this district constituents haven't had a representative that they can ask questions to.

He has not been accountable for any of the decisions he has done in office, and I believe it's high time that he has somebody that will actually either make him ask or answer those questions, or somebody who's willing to do the job, and I'm willing to do it.

>> A little more than seven months ago, the United States entered an active war with Iran.

President Trump, during his last campaign, promised to stop endless war.

Yet there seems to be no concrete end in sight in Iran.

Congress does have the power of the purse, which could stop funding these types of hostilities.

What do you think Congress should do?

>> Well, even beyond the power of the purse, the first thing Congress needs to do is they need to have the Senate, as well as the House of Representatives, vote against the war.

They need to have the Wars Act actually voted against, and they need to ensure that this war can start moving toward an end.

As far as the power of the purse and what that can do to help actually move this ahead is we need to start limiting how much funds we're actually giving to the Department of Defense.

And currently, they are way beyond what they were supposed to get.

Their allotment is way beyond what they the appropriations actually was meant to give them.

And I do believe, honestly, that all we really need to do is ensure our troops are okay.

We need to ensure that the ones who have already been sent are safe.

We have over 50,000 troops there.

We need to ensure the ones that were sent can actually come home.

And we need to make sure that we can limit the amount of weapons, the amount of ammunition, and we need to start moving toward a resolution.

And I actually believe the only way we're going to do that is if we can put some people in charge of the negotiations that actually can move ahead and move forward in that.

>> One side effect of the war in Iran has been the disruption of global oil supplies, and that has in turn led to higher gas and diesel prices.

President Trump maintains the gas prices will fall after the election.

Others predict they'll remain in place.

Illinoisans have been hit hard in the pocketbook when they go to the pump.

What do you think Congress should do to relieve the pressure on high gas prices?

>> The first thing Congress needs to do is actually end the war.

One fifth of the whole world's oil supply actually flows through the Strait of Hormuz.

And with this war in place that has actually stopped.

And when oil does not leave the Strait of Hormuz, it actually takes a lot longer for either oil to go through the other side of Saudi Arabia, out the Bab el Mandeb Strait, or even if that is closed by the Houthis, it then has to go up into past the Suez Canal and out through the Mediterranean.

So it increases the amount of time that it will take for oil to actually get to where it needs to be.

When that occurs, oil manufacturers in the United States will actually start selling their oil abroad because they can do it for a higher price.

So interestingly, what we can do is first to stop the war.

That will actually be the first thing that needs to be done, and that will alleviate the price greatly.

We can also remove the excise tax in 2025.

The excise tax placed on fuel alone was about $93 billion that we were able to recoup from the tax.

This can only be a temporary fix, don't get me wrong, but we can remove that, and that will actually help alleviate some of the burden that the American people are paying because of this unauthorized war.

>> Tariffs have contributed to what many would consider an affordability crisis.

One.

Do you agree with that perspective?

And to what do you think Congress's role should be in setting tariffs?

>> So I think people need to be clear that tariffs are actually a fee that the American people are paying.

So when the administration.

And that happens to be Trump is placing the tariffs on the goods that are being imported into the United States, it is the American people that are actually paying that increase in cost.

He will say that the American people are then bringing in money.

But that is not true.

The American people are actually paying for that cost.

Trump was able to do this because he enacted an emergency declaration.

So the first thing Congress needs to do is retract that emergency declaration, and they have the ability to do that.

They haven't acted on that, but they do have the ability to do that.

Secondly, we need to ensure that all the tariffs, or at least the ones that aren't necessary are removed.

Some tariffs are necessary.

I get that when you aluminum tariff worked really well when we installed it, what was it 2015.

But most tariffs are actually meant to be temporary.

And right now the tariffs that are being put on any imports coming in, especially most recently with Canada, are putting on a great burden, a much greater burden for our automotive manufacturers than we'd ever had before.

Canada is the largest consumer of our automotive production that we do in the United States, and the tariffs are stopping that.

So if we want to remove the tariffs, we have to ensure that Congress is still able to control the tariffs as they're meant to do.

They're meant to ensure that the tariffs are checks and balances.

Trump shouldn't be setting the tariffs.

It should only be in control of Congress.

>> Moving on to Social services.

Recent cuts in Medicaid and other safety net programs have affected many residents here in southern Illinois and in the 12th Congressional District, reducing Illinois's estimated federal Medicaid funding by $48 billion over the next ten years.

What is the role of the federal government in providing a safety net to its citizens?

>> Interestingly, over 100 million people in the United States right now actually have some form of medical debt.

That's over one fourth of our population.

Without having Medicaid in place, that will only grow.

This social net is needed because medical costs are through the roof.

If you get sick or injured or even have to take medication every month, the costs are exuberant, right?

People just can't afford it.

So I do believe that until we have a universal health care plan, which we need to start moving toward.

Our government, the United States government, needs to step up and have a safeguard for people.

Interestingly, in this district, there are over 120,000 people that utilize Medicaid, and it is necessary for these people to survive.

And so the safeguard has to be in place in order for people just not in just this district, but throughout the country to actually get medical care they need.

>> In recent cuts in Medicaid and other programs are also threatening our rural hospitals throughout throughout the nation.

And here in, in, in Illinois, in the 12th Congressional District in Illinois, the federal Medicaid cuts are estimated to reduce rural health care funding by about $6 billion.

Further threatening the financial fragile hospitals within with service reductions or closures.

What do you think Congress's responsibility is to ensure that your rural constituents have access to health care.

>> Without the rural hospitals being present.

We then open up to even greater rural desert or medical deserts than we already had.

The hospitals provide a necessary service for people who live in the region.

This service cannot be taken place of by an urgent care.

Even if you had an ER doctor in urgent care, they cannot supply the same treatment each hospital you close forces any resident that would utilize that hospital to travel even farther.

You will have greater loss of life and you will actually remove people.

If an ambulance needs to take somebody somewhere, then that ambulance is actually being removed from an area that it usually covers.

And now for a greater period of time.

Also, when these hospitals close, any employees in these hospitals will also move Populations then decrease with a hospital present.

It also allows people to have more confidence in moving into an area.

If we want Southern Illinois to grow, if we want this district to grow, we need to ensure that people have access to health care and that includes hospitals.

>> The Social Security Administration projects that the Old Age and Survivors Insurance Trust Fund will run out of reserves in late 2032.

There have been discussions both among Republicans and Democrats as time to raise the Social Security tax.

What would you do to ensure the security of Social Security?

>> The first thing I think Congress should do is actually remove the cap right now.

Any funds that somebody earns over a year time, that is over 1000 $184,500, that is no longer taxed.

The Social Security tax, which is 6.2%.

Removing this cap will actually cover about two thirds of the shortfall that we need.

In addition, there are some economists that I follow, and I am not an economist, but I will also.

I'm also always willing to listen to somebody that's more educated in a field than I am.

And some economists I follow believe that although they invest Social Security money already, if they invested in some open markets, that actually will make up for that one third shortfall that we were still missing.

>> Okay.

I want to shift our focus a little to immigration and enforcement policy.

U.S.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement, under the Department of Homeland Security, has deported approximately a million people as part of its recent expanded immigration enforcement push.

What is your position on on current U.S.

immigration policy and and the current enforcement effort?

>> I think the current enforcement effort we have right now, Ice needs to be abolished.

It does not seem to meet any standards that we require of any other federal agency that has that much power.

For instance, like the FBI or even the US marshals, their training is truncated.

They allow people in the service that have felonies or prior convictions that you wouldn't be allowed in these other services.

So I truly think it needs to be abolished.

And we need to have a type of enforcement where we hire people that we respect and that we trust.

Secondly, I also think that the people who are being targeted, many of them, are not being fairly targeted.

This administration keeps saying that they are many of them are felons, and that's not true.

Many are not.

And many of the people that have actually been taken by this enforcement group are actually green card holders, or they're trying to do what they are supposed to do, what our government has dictated them to do in order to become citizens, and then they're being taken.

So I do believe that we totally need to revamp this.

We need to have laws that our enforcement will actually follow instead of going off on their own.

But if we totally replace that enforcement with a different type of enforcement, if we get rid of Ice, create a new enforcement body, I don't want to call it the same Ice, but if we get a different enforcement body, that actually will not only have people who are honorable working there, but follow the rules that are given to them, I think that will go a long way to helping the immigrants in this country.

>> The Constitution.

Moving to our election is less than just a few weeks away, and the Constitution of Sindh states the responsibility to conduct the elections.

Federal elections do fall under the elections clause in the Constitution.

Congress has used some power to guide, to regulate, standardize and protect the integrity of federal voting, and they have established the uniform nationwide Election Day, the Voter Registration Act, and mandated electronic voting accessibility.

What role should Congress play when it comes to the election process?

>> Congress should ensure that the executive branch does not touch our election.

They should ensure that no military personnel, no types of enforcement are brought to any of the election facilities.

They shouldn't be there.

We need to have.

If you don't.

If you weren't aware, this week we were told that we were not going to have foreign poll watchers come in.

There are only two other countries in the entire world that do that.

Do not allow that.

That's Belarus and that's Russia.

Having this as a safeguard basically was saying we believed our elections were secure and our elections were safe.

So the executive administration executive branch needs to keep their hands out of it.

It's not their place.

It's not the federal government's place.

But what Congress does need to do is ensure that military personnel are not put at the poles, and that the executive branch does what it's supposed to do.

They need to make sure that they are the checks and balances that they have not been since Trump took office.

>> According to the latest data from Gallup, Americans disapproval with Congress is at a near record high.

I believe around 86%.

What would you do to help restore trust in Congress?

What do you think needs to be done to help restore trust in Congress?

>> I think laws need to be followed when Congress allows any part of our government, whether it is the executive, whether it is Scotus, whether it is even the Department of War, when we allow.

Because Congress is supposed to be the checks and balances.

They are supposed to be the common sense of our government.

You have 535 people.

You would think that they would come to a consensus to try and not try, but succeed at following the Constitution.

And I believe that making sure that we do our checks and balances and that we hold everybody else accountable to where there is no more corruption, that there is no more theft of people's hard working tax dollars.

This is what I think the American people want.

They're tired of working hard and watching people steal it.

They're tired of working hard and not having schools or not having roads.

They want Congress to act on their behalf, and right now they're not.

Until we can get a Congress, even if it's a mixture of the Dems and the Republicans, which there will always be, until we can get a Congress that works together for the people, there will always be the disapproval with Congress.

>> Um, AG is a huge, um, part of our economy here in southern Illinois and really all of Illinois, but here in southern Illinois.

And according to the AG Economy Barometer put out by Purdue University and the CME Group, um, this month, farmer sentiment has gone down and it's been up and down, um, mirroring the uncertainty in our economy for this year.

The main concern in reading in that the farmers have been worried about higher input costs, fuel, fertilizer, all the things it takes to, to get the seeds into the ground.

Um, they say these costs restrict their financial situation, keep them, they're worried about being able to make a profit and being able to maintain their farms.

What legislation would you propose or what can Congress do to help these farmers?

>> Unfortunately, because of tariffs, the farmers, especially the ones in Illinois, because Illinois is the greatest soybean producer in the country, second in corn because of the tariffs that this administration has imposed, they lost their entire sale of soybean to China.

And interestingly, the $20 billion buyout that this administration allowed to Argentina, Argentina then utilized that to sell their soybean to China.

And I mentioned that because without the markets, without a place for these farmers, these hard working farmers that spend their days in the field, many of them have two jobs in order to make ends meet.

They need a place to sell their wares.

They need a place to sell everything that they produce.

And we need to ensure that Congress removes the tariffs and that we have open markets for them to sell their product, whatever their product is corn, soybean.

And we need to ensure that they have a market that is actually.

Competitive.

Interestingly, in the state of Illinois, I do know that Pritzker campaign actually just got a market for soybean with Indonesia, which hopefully will relieve some of the fact that there were very little sales or it was like even keel last year on soybeans.

So hopefully that will relieve some of it.

And as far as the cost of fertilizer, a third of fertilizer comes through the Strait of Hormuz.

And then if you don't buy fertilizer from that region, yours went up because it's capitalism, right?

It's just economics.

So nobody else is going to sell their fertilizer at this low price if they can increase the price, because the ones that finally get through the strait have increased their.

So it's just, it's simple economics.

And so we need the war.

Stopping the war will help bringing down prices for fertilizer.

Stopping the war will help, will bring down prices for fuel.

And then maybe the farmers can get to doing what they do best.

>> Your opponent In this race.

Congressman Bos has pointed to his work in chairing the House Committee on Veterans Affairs as a veteran.

Where do you think the United States has best met the needs of our vets, and where do you see areas where there needs to be growth or improvement.

>> Best met their needs?

Let's start on the improvements.

Um, unfortunately, as of last September, the VA had lost over 35,000 positions.

And as somebody had left, whether it was through retirement or through leaving, for whatever reason, through attrition, it doesn't matter.

Those positions were then removed.

So it looked as if they had 100% employment at all times.

And interestingly, a gentleman I know actually goes to JB barracks.

He lives on Monroe County.

So that's against the Mississippi.

So he goes to J.B.

barracks for his V.A.

care, and he was describing how long it was taking him to get care.

That is unacceptable.

When people have put on the uniform, when people have risked their lives and some people, in turn their lives have changed forever, we owe it to them for their care.

And right now, gutting the V.A.

is trying to force it to be privatized, which to me should not happen because as soon as it becomes privatized, our taxpayers money then is going to try and bolster whoever's running it.

It's for profit.

It's capitalism.

If you keep it in house, you keep it run by government entities.

The money stays in house.

Now, in saying that you need to ensure it is run correctly, you need to ensure no matter what taxes are done, that it is put to the best use of our our veterans.

We have many veterans out there.

I spoke to many veterans the other day or a few weeks ago at the State Fair that are running their own.

Support system because they don't feel enough that the VA is doing enough for people that have PTSD or for people who have come back for more.

So you ask me, what is working well.

And all I can say is we have a lot of improvement to make.

>> We've come to the end of our our questions.

We we have a couple of minutes left.

Um, so there's a way to come full circle and to wrap up this, this forum to the voters of the 12th Congressional District.

What, what would you say to them as they get ready to, to go to the polls and to vote in this election?

>> Exercise your right.

Exercise your right to vote.

That is something that our democracy counts on and insists on.

And I am running for all of us.

I am running to help everybody in this district, everybody in this country.

I'm running on integrity, accountability and accessibility.

I believe I. I know I have the hallmarks that will make an amazing congressperson.

And I know I can definitely work for this district.

>> Miss Fortier.

That concludes this candidate forum.

Thank you for taking part.

We also extend our thanks to the Jackson County League of Women Voters for their assistance in this forum.

>> And early voting is underway in Illinois.

The general election obviously is going to be on Tuesday, November 3rd, and we do encourage you to exercise your right to vote.

We thank you for joining us for this candidate forum on WSIU.

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