By BRENT MARTIN
St. Joseph Post
Long-time Republican Congressman Sam Graves is running for re-election once again.
“I never take a race for granted, ever, because you just never know,” Graves tells host Barry Birr on the KFEQ Hotline.
Still, Graves is expected to win re-election easily to a district which has grown since he first won election to Congress in 2000.
“All the way from the Illinois state line, the Mississippi River, over here to the Nebraska, Kansas state line and the Missouri River and then on the south, the Missouri River,” says Graves. “It’s literally a third of the state, geographically. It’s a big district, but you know what, it’s a great district, too, because I mentioned it’s rural and that’s what I am and we want to keep it that way.”
Graves farms in the extreme northwestern part of the state near Tarkio.
Graves, a Republican, is opposed by Democrat Gena Ross, an assistant college professor who is running for public office for the first time.
Graves is a big supporter of President Donald Trump. He says the tax cut package the president pushed through Congress helped the economy and he rejects how Democrats have characterized their proposal to repeal it.
“This idea that rolling back the Trump tax cuts is only going to affect the rich is the most ridiculous thing ever,” Graves asserts.
Graves insists the tax cut helped everyone, across the board.
“Obviously, people paying more tax got more of a cut, because they pay more tax, because it’s a graduated tax system,” according to Graves. “So, to say that only the rich are going to be affected is ridiculous.”
Graves claims no one is talking about what he sees as the top issue facing the country: the growing federal debt.
Graves says the debt had grown enough before Congress approved the $2.2 trillion CARES Act to provide help in the fight against COVID-19 and to stimulate an economy wrecked by the coronavirus pandemic.
“It was already bad. It was already horrible,” Graves says. “And we get into these budget battles going back and forth and you know you have one side that wants this in the budget and one side that wants this. We’re going through that right now with the stimulus that we’re talking about.”
Congress has yet to reach an agreement on a new stimulus package, expected to be in the $1.8 trillion to $2 trillion range.
The Congressional Budget Office projects a federal budget deficit this year of $3.3 trillion, more than triple the budget shortfall recorded last year. The CBO says that would be the largest deficit since after World War II, in 1945. The federal debt has exceeded $20 trillion.