Robert Menendez

The cost of child care and education has skyrocketed in recent years, disproportionately impacting working families and making life even more difficult for residents of our district. In Washington, I will legislate to:

Expand and extend the Child Tax Credit;

Support Democratic proposals to cap child care costs at 7% of income for many families;

Guarantee universal preschool for all families;

Provide federal funding for children’s hospitals to expand mental health services;

Invest in early childhood care; and

Fully fund child nutrition programs.

Tropical Storm Ida, Super Storm Sandy, and other storms in recent years devastated our district with a significant toll of human life, extreme property damage, and damage to our infrastructure. Climate change is here and has had severe impacts on our area, hurting underrepresented, marginalized groups the most. I think every day about the world we are leaving to the next generation. In office, I will advocate to:

Support Democratic efforts to provide half a trillion dollars for our clean energy economy;

Cut greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030 to improve the sustainability of the planet;

Provide cost savings and rebates to district residents as they transition their homes to clean energy;

Ensure that clean energy technology is manufactured in the United States, creating union jobs while battling climate change;

Electrify our public transit infrastructure; and

Champion environmental justice through the Clean Energy and Sustainability Accelerator Act so that majority-minority communities are no longer forced to shoulder the burden of pollution and climate change.

In recent years, gun violence has plagued our country: more people than ever before are dying due to gun violence, more than 45,000 in 2020, and nearly 80% of murders in the United States involve a gun. In the past decade, hundreds of mass shootings have occurred, killing and injuring thousands. And during the pandemic, gun violence only became worse. Republicans across the country are fighting to make it easier to get access to violent weapons with a stunning disregard for the safety of those who own guns and those around them. As your representative in Congress, I will fight to:

Increase the scope of background checks so that Americans are no longer able to buy guns from private sellers without any safety measures in place;

Re-enact the Federal Assault Weapons Ban;

Close loopholes in gun purchasing laws and expand the ability to take guns away from abusive dating partners, felons, and children;

Educate the public about suicides committed using guns, which account for roughly 60% of suicides and are fatal 90% of the time compared to only 3% for drug overdoses;

Ensure that guns are not put in schools near our children; and

Support Ethan’s Law and any legislation that ensures safe storage of weapons

We need to continue to expand access to affordable healthcare for every person in the 8th Congressional District and to protect a woman’s right to choose. The Affordable Care Act has provided access to healthcare to tens of millions of underinsured or uninsured individuals across the United States, including many in our district. While Republicans in Washington, D.C. continue to try their best to make healthcare harder to access through countless attempts to gut the ACA and through their dismantling of the protections long-afforded to women through Roe v. Wade., Democrats are working every day to expand the ACA and find meaningful solutions to the healthcare challenges facing our families. We must ensure that access to all forms of healthcare is protected and expanded. In Congress, I will fight to:

Protect and expand the Affordable Care Act for the millions who rely on it every day;

Lower the cost of quality health insurance coverage for all families in our district;

Make sure that every American has access to the best medical care available regardless of ability to pay; and

Codify Roe v. Wade and restore a woman’s fundamental reproductive right to have autonomy over her own body—period.

Enact support legislation that protects a women’s ability to access medication that has made abortions safer and more accessible for those who have made that choice.

Advocate to the FDA to lift restrictions and make it easier for women to obtain these medications through the mail so their reproductive choices are not limited by where they live or work.

Repeal the Hyde Amendment, which only serves to make it harder for women of limited means to access abortions.

Increases in housing, energy, food, and other costs have made it more difficult than ever before for many working families in our district to make ends meet. As your representative in Congress, I will support efforts to:

Enact Democratic proposals to create over 1 million affordable homes through nearly $10 billion for a new Affordable Housing Access Program and affordable housing with mass-transit access;

Provide $65 billion towards addressing the capital needs backlog for public housing;

Support tax fairness for our district by restoring the full SALT deduction;

Work toward federal solutions for the ongoing supply chain crisis;

Increase the federal minimum wage to $15; and

Address the student debt crisis.

We need a public transportation system that meets the current and future needs of our workforce and our communities. While significant progress has been made by our New Jersey delegation, our federal government still has underfunded public transit infrastructure. This has resulted in outdated equipment, service delays, and bridges and tunnels that are not meant for 21st century transportation needs, leaving residents of the 8th Congressional District frustrated and disserviced. As a Member of Congress, I will work to:

Ensure that our district gets every dollar and cent it is entitled to from the historic Bipartisan Infrastructure Act;

Secure funding and federal support for the largest critical infrastructure project in the country, the Gateway Program, which will create thousands of jobs while replacing century-old bridges and tunnels that have the potential to cripple the Northeast Corridor;

Upgrade our power and clean-energy infrastructure through investments in electric buses, charging stations for electric vehicles, and cutting-edge energy technology to secure a zero-emissions future; and

Fight for even more funding to improve transportation and create good-paying union jobs across the 8th District to build a transportation system of the future.