Skylar Hurwitz, Democratic Primary Candidate for Congress

We were pleased to host Skylar Hurwitz to this morning's breakfast meeting.  Skylar is a candidate in the April 28th  primary election for the Democratic nomination for Congress.

A 2014 graduate of American University, Skylar and his wife are local residents with strong family ties to this area.  Skylar is a technology consultant and environmentalist born and raised in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. He split his youth equally between Yardley and New Hope-Solebury, worked in Washington, DC for nearly a decade, and has been running a small business in his hometown since 2018. His time in DC provided key insights into what is broken in Washington – and what must be done to fix the government so it starts working for everyday Americans again.

Skylar gained experience working directly on Capitol Hill briefly serving in the office of Congresswoman Carolyn B. Maloney of New York and working on a SunShot initiative grant at the National Association of Regional Councils that focused on lowering the bureaucratic costs of solar installations.  Skylar then spent nearly three years managing a $30 million grant portfolio and doing extensive international travel for Conservation International in Arlington, Virginia. The program protected the most vulnerable biodiverse regions on Earth by building the capacity of locals in those countries to manage problems self-sufficiently.

Hurwitz has had professional experiences working in Italy, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Ghana. With an academic background in Global Strategy and Environmental Policy/Studies, one of Hurwitz’s key interests is in finding alternative energies and reducing our carbon footprint. Solar currently represents only 2% of the U.S. expenditures on energy. Having worked at a solar energy company and studied the cost-benefit of its use in other countries, Hurwitz is a strong advocate for its broad implementation in the U.S. He would like the government to invest in the panels for all families and provided incentives to companies who convert to solar power. Hurwitz promised to work collaboratively on critical climate change issues.

Hurwitz is a proponent for universal health care. He believes if we all have such coverage, we could really leverage our power to force drug companies to lower their costs to reasonable levels (citing unfair insulin increases as an example of current gouging). He has worked with international nonprofits, helping them create metrics and track their successes, as well as working with them to secure grants.

Hurwitz is a proponent for Fair Tax reform, including a higher annual payroll tax on those families making more than $250,000 per person ($500, 000 per couple). He would use the resulting revenues to expand Medicare coverage to include vision, dental, hearing aids, and home health care coverage.

While he is a Democrat, he promised he would work for us all and across the aisle. He considers himself an Independent Democrat. Hurwitz encouraged us to vote, get involved, be “part of the change” and asked for our support. He stayed after the meeting and several members signed his email support list.

www.skylarforcongress.com