> What is your view on the role of unions and "right to work" laws?
This is a pro-union ticket, and we believe unions have an important role to lift up wages and protect workers. We will protect unions and oppose 'right to work' laws, which are excuses just to attack unions and strengthen corporate power. I agree with 1184AZ when he said that the Federalists give "lip service" to protecting unions and "display an incredible amount of anti-union attitudes", and I think that the workers of Atlasia will be hurt if the Federalists win this election.
> What steps could be taken to create jobs?
Griffin and I are open to infrastructure spending and tax cuts for the middle class to boost our economy. More information from the GM Department would be helpful in this regard, I am very disappointed at the lack of activity from them (and Sestak's issues, while unfortunate, are irrelevant here as this was never supposed to be one of his responsibilities), and the inactivity from the GM Department can't be tolerated going forward.
I also think that we need to make sure that people don't just have jobs but they have good-paying jobs too. This is why it is so important that the minimum wage has been increased, as this will boost wages for millions of workers (and despite right-wing talking points there is no evidence that the minimum wage reduces employment). There are many other measures we are taking to boost incomes for hard-working Atlasians. We are on the side of hard-working Atlasians, not the top 1%, many of whom inherit obscene wealth while paying a lower effective tax rate than people who actually work for a living-I can assure you this cannot continue and we are ensuring that those at the top pay their fair share in tax so everyone else gets a fair go too. Income and wealth inequality cannot be solved in one election, but we are making good progress and if the Atlasian people elect us to another term the progress will continue.
> How can infrastructure be improved?
I think we have made good progress on infrastructure compared to rl, though this is certainly an area where further improvements should be considered. Once we have a budget, which again will need the GM Department to be much more active, then we can consider our fiscal position and responsibly invest in and upgrade our infrastructure. This is certainly possible in the next term.
> What is your view of criminal justice reform?
I think we have made good progress on criminal justice reform in recent years. I'm particularly proud of
this bill of mine, which addressed many different issues in the criminal justice system. I'm open to further improvements in this area, though we are much better than the rl US and this is an issue where there is bipartisan agreement in Atlasia, so a lot of problems would have already been addressed. We do need to strike a good balance between punishment and rehabilitation, and simply locking people up is not the right solution. Being tough on criminals is not the same as being tough on crime, we do need to also address the causes of crime and work on rehabilitating people so they don't reoffend.
> What should be done about climate change?
Climate change certainly has to be a high priority for us. I regard this is as a climate crisis, and am open to Atlasia declaring a climate emergency-regardless I am determined that we will ensure Atlasia does everything it can to tackle climate change. We have an 11-year window to get emissions down, and the damage would be horrendous if globally we fail to keep temperatures under 1.5 or even 2 degrees Celsius. Remember, we are currently trending for 3-4 degrees in warming over this century. Inevitably, Atlasia has to take a leading role in this. The complaining about costs of action is missing the forest for the trees, quite frankly, because the cost of inaction would be far greater.
I'd also like to point out that this administration did not introduce a carbon tax, that was passed under fhtagn's presidency and I'd like to thank her for her leadership on this issue then. I am confused however about why her ticket is promising to repeal that carbon tax though. I would strongly oppose the repeal of the carbon tax, as AZ's claims that it hurts Atlasian families are false due to 70% of revenue being returned to them in Green Checks and the rest being used to fund renewable energy, and it is a necessary measure to meet our responsibilities and keep Atlasia safe from warming of more than 2 degrees Celsius. This is certainly an issue I feel very passionately about, and I am quite frankly appalled when people still refuse to face up to this crisis and so endanger our security and national wellbeing.
> What makes you qualified to be Vice President and what sort of role in the administration will you take?
I discussed this in my opening statement, but I'm happy to elaborate. I am of course the incumbent Vice President, so people can see that I will do a good job because I am doing a good job right now. I also have my experience as Speaker of the House, where I helped deliver the most productive Congress in history. With regards to my role in the administration, this is a team effort and Griff and I will work effectively together to make a second term a success, should the voters elect us to one. On tie-breaking votes for instance we agree a shared position. I do understand the President is of course the leader in the administration and so my responsibility is in a way to help him deliver on his mandate. I have consistently been very committed to my responsibilities and shown a great level of activity, I promise this will continue if I have another term as Vice President.
> What will be your approach when dealing with congress?
I see myself as helping enable the members of Congress to fulfill their mandates from the people. So this fits in with my policy of ensuring votes have a majority of the chamber express themselves before being closed, and as I said this is a matter of fairness and upholding our democracy as I don't think a minority of the chamber should be able to overrule the majority of the chamber. I will continue to treat the entire Congress with fairness. In my administrative decisions I will not be biased or partisan, even though I often have opinions on the legislation Congress is debating. While I do have strong views, I can work effectively with members of other parties and have respectful interactions with them, something that isn't a given for all the candidates here. This is shown by the unanimous support expressed in the Senate for my confirmation.
> To Pericles: In a speech, you attacked the "extreme right-wing opposition." How do you believe the right has become too extreme?
Well, I think that it's pretty clear, and a lot of people are picking up on this. I'll give a good rundown of examples. As I said, the economic freedom zones bill and the partisan pushing through of a religious freedom law in the South are good examples. The Confederate flag fiasco also shows this, and unlike what was said by fhtagn, this was pushed through by Federalist Governor YoungTexan. The process was rigged to force through a Confederate flag, as only flags with Confederate imagery were presented to the electorate, and then despite the referendum being declared non-binding YoungTexan loudly declared it was the 'will of the people' and had to be obeyed. fhtagn called this 'fake outrage', I disagree with her that citizens shouldn't be allowed to express their views on this issue and that people just have to accept the racist imagery of the Confederacy.
Another example is when thr33 made several racist comments on Discord, and this was relevant information for voters as he was running for election to the Lincoln Assembly. Representative fhtagn however thought that the problem was that comments from Discord were posted on Atlas and repeatedly tried to deflect from this issue. As North Carolina Yankee pointed out then, the right never would have rushed to defend thr in 2016, but in 2019 they sure did.
This is not a group that represents the views of most Atlasians, and they are certainly not fit to lead this great nation. So let's resoundingly reject their extremism and force them to clean up their act, because Atlasia deserves better, and you deserve better.
