Osmeña challenges Speier for Congress

Challenging Speier, of Hillsborough, is solar industry executive and Republican Cristina Osmeña, also a Hillsborough resident who is hoping to represent immigrants, encourage development to address the region’s housing crisis and ensure the district’s taxpayers benefit from federal funds.

Osmeña said she immigrated to the United States from the Philippines as a young child on political asylum to flee the dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos. Though she grew up in California, Osmeña started her 20-year career in finance in New York at an investment bank. She said the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, initially inspired her to become politically active with the Republican Party, but after she moved back to California to work in the solar industry resolved to run for Congress as discussions around immigration and the economy became increasingly heated.

Having gone through the experience of immigrating to the United States herself, Osmeña felt she could help fellow immigrants and contribute to national debate by stepping up to represent her district.

“I thought it would be a good idea to have an immigrant run,” she said. “I think immigrants come in all shapes and sizes and we’re all descendants of immigrants anyway.”

For Speier, past victories such as the introduction of the bipartisan Congressional Accountability Act of 1995 Reform Act — which was passed unanimously by House representatives in February and sought to streamline the process for victims to report sexual harassment to Congress’ Office of Compliance — demonstrated her record for advocating for victims of sexual assault. Signed into law earlier this year, the STAR Act, which Speier co-authored, is aimed at advancing pediatric cancer research and treatments for children and providing resources for those affected by pediatric cancer.

Both Speier and Osmeña looked to the regional housing shortage as a focus in the near term. Though Osmeña acknowledged housing developments are reviewed at the local level, she felt she could act as a leader of the political community to more efficient approval of developments to boost the region’s housing supply. She also voiced support for exploring a vacancy tax on unoccupied homes to make more homes available and potentially support safety net programs aimed at assisting the growing number of homeless residents in the district.

With recent cuts in funding from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Speier said she has been focused on working with housing officials to maximize the use and acceptance by landlords of Section 8 vouchers, which have been underutilized in San Mateo County and are aimed at subsidizing rent for very low-income families, the elderly and those with disabilities.

“If you can make sure all of these vouchers are used, it’s like building two or three apartment buildings,” she said.

Speier said getting the president’s support of an infrastructure bill moving through the U.S. House of Representatives would be a focus if elected to another term to help address regional traffic congestion. She also pegged improvements to the railroad crossings in San Mateo County as critical to the connection of an electrified Caltrain to high-speed rail in the future.

“We should be spending probably close to a trillion dollars on repairing bridges and roads and we haven’t seen from this administration that much in that regard,” she said.

Osmeña expected increases to the district’s housing stock to improve traffic congestion if additional housing units can be created close to residents’ workplaces and transit hubs, and also looked to innovations taking shape in the private sector, such as shared bikes and scooters as well as driverless cars, to make a dent in the issue.

“I think that there are private companies or innovations happening in the private sector … that are going to address that,” she said. “You need to solve housing to solve the transportation.”

Though Osmeña commended Speier’s record on women’s issues and sexual assault victims, she noted Speier has voted with the Democratic Party on most bills. She said she felt the tax reform bill passed last year, which Speier didn’t support, improved the region’s job market by cutting business taxes, which Osmeña felt made the United States more competitive globally.

“I’m going to defend night and day the cutting of the business taxes to 21 percent because there’s been a global trend of cutting business taxes,” she said.

Osmeña said she would work to further improve the bill by advocating for a higher deduction for state and local taxes and index the bill to the cost of living, noting she would leverage her experience studying the country’s economy as a legislator.

Though she identifies as a Republican, Osmeña said she views herself as a centrist who is committed to representing California’s values in the nation’s capital and striving toward bipartisan cooperation in Congress. She said she is hoping her candidacy elevates the profile of Republicans who are willing to work with the best ideas from both parties in an effort to enable a government that works more smoothly than it does now.

“There’s a group of moderate Republicans that are trying to represent the ideas that reflect California’s values,” she said. “If that means a shift to the center, then good.”

Speier said she has spoken with many constituents who are anxious about politics on several levels — from President Trump’s decision earlier this year to pull the United States out of a nuclear deal with Iran to his decision to withdraw the country from the 2015 Paris climate agreement — and wanted to send a message that the country will persevere through poor leadership and congressional dysfunction.

“We have suffered through bad leadership before and we will overcome what has become a very dysfunctional Congress and a president that is reluctant to really be educated on some of the foreign policy issues that are truly vexing,” she said. We really have to hold the president accountable and that’s … why I think Congress has got to have a backbone.”

anna@smdailyjournal.com

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