Winston Jordan
No Party PreferenceQ1 Exposure to PFAS has been associated with weakened immune response and impaired liver and kidney function. In 2018, New Jersey passed a rule setting enforceable limits on PFAS in drinking water, one of the first states in the country to do so. Levels of two of the most harmful PFAS chemicals have since dropped by nearly 50% compared to 2006, when concerningly high levels were first found. Despite this progress, gaps persist, including soils, air pollution, and private wells, which have limited monitoring of but serve 10% of the state’s population. Do you think current policies related to forever chemicals have had a positive impact on NJ residents and what additions, changes, or different policies, if any, would you implement regarding managing PFAS levels in New Jersey’s air, soil, and drinking water? (Source - NJ Spotlight news)
New Jersey’s drinking water standards for PFOA, PFOS, and PFNA have proven that stringent regulatory limits deliver public health results. However, protecting 90% of residents while leaving private wells, soil, and air unmonitored creates an unacceptable disparity. As U.S. Representative, I support extending state and federal oversight across all exposure pathways. We must mandate baseline PFAS testing for private well systems, fully fund remediation assistance through the Spill Compensation Fund, and set strict discharge limits on industrial soil and atmospheric emissions. Environmental protection cannot stop at municipal water lines.
Q2 In 2025, the National Institute of Health (NIH) awarded over $460 million for research grants and contracts to New Jersey universities and biotech companies, which directly supported over 5,800 jobs and $1.51 billion of economic activity in New Jersey. Additionally, New Jersey legislators have proposed a bipartisan bill that would repurpose tax revenue from tobacco sales as funding for cancer research. What policies, if any, do you suggest regarding maintaining current levels of federal support for health-related research and healthcare in NJ? Do you support a push towards channeling more of that financial support through state funding, and if so, through what policies?
Federal health research investments generate vital medical breakthroughs and local economic stability. I oppose federal budget cuts to NIH and NSF programs. To safeguard New Jersey against federal gridlock, state-level mechanisms—including channeling dedicated tax revenue directly into cancer research—provide necessary stability. We must protect public health from private capture by pairing state and federal research grants with strict public interest disclosures, ensuring taxpayer-funded breakthroughs yield affordable, accessible healthcare rather than corporate monopolies.
Q3 New Jersey’s school-based mental health professionals-to-students ratios remain much higher than recommended levels, even as 42% of high school students and 50% of middle schoolers in the state reported feeling sad and hopeless according to a 2023 study. Do you support allocating resources towards researching this topic, and what policies, if any, do you support to address youth mental health and well-being in the state? (Source - Advocates for children of New Jersey, Source - NJ Spotlight news)
The youth mental health crisis demands evidence-based public intervention, not administrative indifference. I support fully funding research into social and environmental stressors affecting students. In Congress and through state partnership, I advocate channeling resources toward meeting recommended student-to-professional ratios in public schools, expanding community health centers, and removing corporate algorithms that profit from youth psychological distress.
Q4 New Jersey has a longstanding history of being seriously affected by natural disasters. Recently, heavy rainfall brought a significant amount of flooding that caused damage and loss of business in commercial and residential areas of NJ. What policies, if any, would you pursue to mitigate the effects of natural disasters, and what role would state scientists and flood experts have in the policies you propose to mitigate the effects of flooding?
Mitigating extreme weather in New Jersey requires prioritizing public infrastructure and ecological resilience over speculative real estate development. I advocate integrating state flood experts, geologists, and civil engineers directly into land-use and zoning decisions. Public policy must enforce strict stormwater management standards, mandate regional infrastructure upgrades, and restore natural wetlands rather than continuing to build in vulnerable floodplains.
Q5 In 2025, only 26% of NJ students met proficiency in science on standardized tests. In cities such as Newark, this is as low as 7%. Furthermore the number of math and science educators in NJ is waning (9% decrease). What policies, if any, would you propose to increase access to quality STEM education across the state and to address the decline in evidence-based learning?
The decline in STEM proficiency reflects systemic underinvestment in public education and teacher retention. We must fully fund public STEM pipelines, incentivize educators with competitive salaries, and increase state support for under-resourced districts. Additionally, we must keep evidence-based science education focused on rigorous inquiry, technical literacy, and critical thinking, free from political interference.
Q6 To date, there are over 80 operational data centers present in New Jersey, four more proposed, and another currently under construction. Governor Mikie Sherill has recently signed the Data Center Fair Share Act, allowing centers to offset energy demands by paying for clean energy upgrades to local homes. What other policies and regulations, if any, would you support to assess and manage the impact of these data centers on the environment and infrastructure of New Jersey?
Unchecked data center expansion presents a structural risk to taxpayers, public utility grids, and economic stability. With AI hardware facing rapid 3-to-5-year obsolescence cycles, speculative private buildouts threaten to leave public ratepayers funding stranded electrical grid upgrades if hype outpaces economic utility. While state-level ratepayer protections are a starting point, federal and state policy must address systemic financial risk. I support national data center capacity audits to distinguish durable computing demand from speculative overbuilding. Furthermore, I advocate ending uncapped corporate sales-tax exemptions for data center hardware, enforcing binding ““take-or-pay”” energy contracts so tech corporations—not working families—pay for 100% of grid expansion, and mandating off-grid self-generation for high-density compute facilities.