TJH Speaks with Doug Tuman, Candidate for Congress

Believing in Strong American Values TJH Speaks with Doug Tuman

BY NATE DAVIS

Doug, you’re running for Congress. Tell us about your experience in politics.

I’m running to represent the 4th Congressional District. I never ran for public office before; this is my first time running. I’m a professional engineer, an attorney, and I’m the Commissioner of Engineering for the Town of Hempstead.

Is that a full-time job?

Yes. I’ve been working in civil service my entire life so I know what it means to work for the people. I’ve been doing that since I gradated with an engineering degree. Then I went to law school at night to become a patent attorney. I was filing patents at night and decided to stick with the engineering by day, and I worked my way up and became Commissioner of Engineering.

What does that job entail?

I’m basically in charge of the infrastructure for the entire Town of Hempstead, which is the largest township in America. It’s vast, and unfortunately most of it was built at the same time so it’s all crumbling at the same time. We are actually working on a road-raising in Inwood right now, which is a fairly large project.

I’m very result-driven as well. That’s been the theme in my department. Any opportunity I have to push projects forward, I do. We certainly need to cut down on regulation and bureaucracy.

Tell us about how your campaign is going.

The race has been going well. It’s very much a grassroots effort. I’m doing a lot of campaigning in Democratic areas. And I’m running on the Republican line. I’m very much a Republican at the core. I have fiscal conservative values and strong values in support of what I believe is being the foundations of this country – upholding our liberties.

I’m spreading that message and trying to bring people onboard to unify them around that message of what I believe it means to be American and what I believe are American values. I don’t pitch myself as Doug Tuman, the Republican. I pitch myself as Doug Tuman, the neighbor that’s running for Congress that believes in these strong American values – not necessarily Republican values – and I’m finding that a lot of people seem to agree. The pitch is that I see the role of government is to provide a platform for a free and open society to flourish.

Where do you live?

I live in West Hempstead.

There is a large Orthodox Jewish community in West Hempstead.

I haven’t lived in West Hempstead for too long, but I am getting to know the community; I’m very aware of the Orthodox community there and getting to know them as neighbors.

You may have noticed that for a lot of your neighbors in West Hempstead, one of the issues that they grapple with is the high tuition fees for private schools.

Yes, I’m very sympathetic to that. I’m pro-school choice.

What is your prediction for Election Day?

I saw an unofficial poll on Twitter – somebody who has 40,000 Twitter followers that does these polls as a self-proclaimed pollster – a month ago and he was showing us that we were just three or four points behind, so I’m pretty confident.

I certainly think we could flip the seat red. And like I said, not so much because of Democrat versus Republican, but because people, especially in Nassau County, for the most part are middle of the road. They’re not extreme in their views. I think that’s what they elected Kathleen Rice for. But even she has started to lean left. The extreme

left is gaining power in this country. They’re gaining power and influence in Congress. They’re gaining power and influence on Twitter, and she’s not standing up strongly or strongly enough against it. She’s even pandering to it at times.

How so? Well, I think even with some of the issues with the Jewish community and Israel. I mean, I don’t know how strong she’s standing up to the BDS. I don’t think she’s doing enough to stand up against that. The Black Lives Matter movement and the fact that it turned into an anti-police movement and the defund the police movement – she didn’t stand up strong enough and talk about the need for the support of our police. We need a representative that’s going to support all the people, support all groups, and is also going to have the backbone to stand up and point out these flaws at a time when it’s difficult to do so, and she didn’t do that.

She’s also just hasn’t been present. She’s not present in the community. A big part of my campaign is going around and talking to the people and literally asking them, do you know who your congressperson is? Like I said, I’m doing this primarily in Democratic areas, and nine times out of ten people don’t know.

She comes across as a reasonable person. She’s intelligent, but she’s not working hard enough. She’s not doing it. Maybe she was. She’s certainly not doing it anymore. And I think it’s really starting to wear on the community. A big part of my campaign is just making the community aware of that and aware of the fact that, if elected, I’d end up being the most accessible congressperson this district has ever had.

How would you do that? Well, I’ve already been doing it – I’ve been plastering my cellphone number everywhere so people can text me. And I have my team answering texts as they come in, and I answer them and I call people back. We’ve had thousands of texts at this point from different people who have reached out, and I talk to them about the issues they care about and making myself very accessible in that way. If elected, I’m starting a text-based polling system.

What does that mean?

I’m going to allow every constituent in the district to register [to a platform] and hopefully get them to do it. Then, I’m going to text out every issue on the floor of Congress so people can vote directly on every issue. I will use that information to help determine how I advocate for them in Congress, making me accountable to all our constituents in a very real way. It won’t be just through words and saying that I want to listen to all the different communities throughout the district. It will be by creating a platform and a technology to do so that will make me personally accountable to everyone.

Has any national money been put into this race?

No.

Based on hearing from constituents, how is Trump doing in this district?

I’m out talking to people every day all over the district, and I’m hearing proTrump things in corners of the district where I would never expect to hear it.

Like where?

In Roosevelt, in Uniondale, in the Village of Hempstead, on the streets of Terrace Avenue. Now, don’t get me wrong – there’s people out there who are adamantly opposed to him. But I’m also very pleasantly surprised to hear positive things about him.

Is this from the Latino community?

My anecdotal information is that he would win among the Latino community.

There are those that don’t like how he’s being portrayed to having a stand on immigration, but there are many of those that like his stance on immigration.

What about in the black community?

A lot of people in the black community are very up in arms with the police issues that we’re seeing right now. A lot of them don’t understand – they’re like, “Of course, we like the police.” But they don’t understand why there needs to be a pro-police movement. They’re like, “Why do the police need backing? The police are just fine. They don’t need backing.” They don’t like to back the blue. They see it as divisive.

I think there’s things to be said about how the Black Lives Matter movement is divisive. I do find Trump supporters in the black community, but I think there are a lot who are turned off by his rhetoric.

What are some of the important issues for you?

I mean, there’s a ton of things. Obviously, improving infrastructure was kind of first and foremost on my to-do list. But since Covid hit and with everything that recently happened, the pandemic has become top priority.

What do you think of the lockdown?

I think we need to get the economy back up and running and get back to normal – not a new normal. I think Cuomo has implemented too much control. He’s destroyed our local economy, all while not practicing common sense himself while sending Covid patients back into nursing homes. I don’t know how you do that and then claim to be doing the smart thing. Like I said, I’m a big believer in upnormal.” holding our free and open society and that’s even in times like these. We just need to figure out how to continue to move forward with the virus. Putting funding towards protecting the vulnerable while allowing everybody else to get back to normal is the approach that I think we need to take. One issue that I’m sure you hear about a lot is high taxes in Nassau County.

Absolutely. Making Nassau County more affordable is something I want to focus on.

Is that ever really going to happen?

Trying to lower taxes is something that I’ll certainly be striving for.

But isn’t it the state taxes that’s killing us here?

Yes. I want to repeal the cap on the SALT tax deduction. It’s also proof of the fact that I want to work across the table here, not just toe the line of the Republican

“We need to get the economy back up and running and get back to normal – not a new

Party. That will benefit a lot of people in Nassau County tremendously, getting rid of the SALT cap. And then I have a six-point tax plan, which includes extending the pro-small business tax deductions, allowing for tax deferrals for startups, eliminating the marriage penalty, increasing the child tax credit, and things that will help promote families while reducing taxes.

Sounds good. Good luck with the race!