Chris Campbell

As the only candidate in this race with real world experience with the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act, I recognize the Environmental Protection Agency assigns responsibility for compliance to the states. It is the state that ensures their population is protected from emissions from multiple sources. As a congressman, I will ensure that the EPA acts to maintain standards that protect Americans from pollutants that create health concerns and negatively impact the environment. We will trust the science. I agree with America’s concern about data centers. Data centers are energy hogs and will push more heat into an already over heated environment. The EPA needs to catch up with threats to the environment. Policy needs to be established to regulate fugitive heat as a pollutant.

The antiquated electric grid will have a difficult time managing the additional load from data centers. Prioritization of electricity should favor everything but a data center. If load has to be shed, data centers will be first offline. Residential customers have long been a bane to electrical utilities. Congress must protect families from increased costs for modernizing the grid and increasing generation capacity.

The science is sound with respect to vaccinations. Partisan politics is now jeopardizing our children’s wellbeing. Ideologies cannot replace the research and trials for vaccines and the decades of successful use. Congress must stop political appointments that cater to special interests on both sides of the aisle. Appointments should prioritize leaders in their respective fields not talking heads. This continues to erode the trust of Americans in their government and the extensions of it. As for vaccines, draconian responses such as mandates will only worsen the divide. From a policy stance, parents choosing to forgo vaccinations on behalf of their children must be required to discuss this with a physician. After the discussion, physicians must document the parents were informed of the benefits and risks of immunization and non-immunization and their recommendation for that patient. In the same documentation, parents must acknowledge their decision to accept the risks of waiving immunizations.

The harrowing stories from survivors, first responders and volunteers during and after Helene must be preserved. The Library of Congress, the Smithsonian and or the National Archives should be in the communities capturing the firsthand accounts. Dramatic weather patterns are part of a new normal for Americans. Research for early warning through the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration must be funded. When creeks and streams can increase 20 feet overnight, there are a lot of homes in East Tennessee that are now at risk that have never seen water at their doorsteps. The Federal Emergency Management Agency must re-evaluate flood zones and frequencies, update maps and communicate changes to communities that are going to be the most impacted. Electric utilities must restore line maintenance and replace the aging infrastructure with equipment designed to withstand these new normals for extreme weather.

As a classically trained mechanical engineer, I unapologetically support funding research that lowers our energy consumption, improves efficiency of generation and distribution, reduces transportation energy and conserves and protects our water. Funding for the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation will continue but each needs to improve relevancy to the American people. With the changes coming with a warmer planet, both agencies should be leading the research of new ways to fight pathogens and protect our food supplies. Both agencies need to include research outside of Big Pharma and Big Ag. While they have been instrumental in protecting, healing and feeding us to this point, we need to be considering means other than a new pesticide or a new drug for the next problems that arise. Both agencies need to be investing in the next generations. They should be in our classrooms getting our children excited about science and the thrill of discovery and the importance of pursuing knowledge.

Necessity has always been the parent of invention. Science shortens the path to invention. We are living in a very strange time. Policymakers are inconsistent in their approach to science due to the highly polarized electorate. Scientists are often single faceted and struggle with strategic perspectives. We cannot move forward without policymakers acknowledging the importance of scientific advancements and scientists looking beyond their highly concentrated fields of study. A perfect example of scientists and policymakers moving America forward was the implementation of the corporate average fuel economy, CAFE, standards. The policymakers, Congress in this case, recognized the need to decrease the dependency of America on foreign oil. The initial 18 mpg requirement was regarded as unattainable by the automotive manufactures. Through research and scientific study, the automotive manufacturers realized that it was achievable. This same process has now resulted in CAFE standards require a 1% improvement yearly and an average of 34.9 mpg in 2031. This is how it should always work. Policymakers should recognize the problem at hand and enlist the scientific world to come up with the solution. And when policymakers are slow to act, then scientists need to sound alarms. Not adhering to the science of the generation is akin to ignoring the prophets of the Old Testament.