Congressional hopeful still fuming over gas tax

Carl DeMaio spoke a great deal about his disdain for a gas tax that went into effect this past July.

An informal community coffee meeting held by Carl DeMaio Mon­day evening at the Downtown Café in El Cajon took place on an enclosed patio and saw the congressional candidate looking for a fight—with his own political party.

The 44-year-old Republican told the mostly grey-haired gathering that trying to foster change within the GOP is like trying to talk a bat­tered wife into leaving her husband, only to be told she doesn’t want to leave and risk angering the man who is abusing her.

“We have feckless, uninspired Republican leaders in California, and they have to go,” DeMaio said.

DeMaio focused most of his ire on the Road Repair and Account­ability Act of 2017, colloquially referred to as the gas tax. Roughly 150 attendees applauded and threw out a few cheers at his mention of wanting to overturn the tax.

In 2018 DeMaio led a statewide referendum against the tax that provides revenue to repair crumbling roads throughout California but the measure was rejected by voters.

DeMaio extended his evident outrage over the gas tax to the media and government employees, suggesting that both sectors benefit from the funds.

“The media actually believes in what this whole gas tax is about because they believe the car is evil… They want you to go to a govern­ment-run public transportation system,” DeMaio said, explaining that elected officials benefit from campaign donations that are provided by the transportation and public employee unions.

At one point DeMaio’s tone and remarks turned sarcastic when he mocked gas tax supporters who said the roughly six cent, and any pos­sible future surcharges increase would help reduce pollution and help address climate change.

Maintaining that he loves the environment, the would-be congress­man said he simply does not want the government to control his life.

On immigration DeMaio said that he is founding a super PAC dedi­cated to supporting President Donald Trump’s border infrastructure plan and that he will be releasing a five-point border security initiative as part of his campaign that will include mandates to enforce e- Verify, a web-based system that allows enrolled employers to confirm the eligibility of their employees to work in the United States.

DeMaio says Republicans are guilty of abusing employment loopholes so that they can ben­efit from cheap labor and sug­gests that businesses which violate the law should be fined, with profits going directly to­ward border control.

Before the evening ended DeMaio’s attention once again was brought to the gas tax. He said he would propose a truth in balloting initiative that would hinge on three points: first, that any citizen’s initiative will re­tain its original title; second, that any initiative which will result in what amounts to a tax increase must be labeled as tax increase; finally, that any pro­posal that qualified for ballot placement in 2018 or later can be replaced on a future ballot, including the repeal of the gas tax.

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