Kamala Harris’ ‘to-do list’ could have been done, Maryland Republicans say

BALTIMORE — Kamala Harris has tried to cement one of the biggest differences between her and Donald Trump in the final week of the campaign, often saying he has a list of enemies and she has a to-do list.

But some of the moderate Republicans she’s trying to convince, along with the Republican faithful, wonder why she hasn’t been able to complete some of her to-do list over the past four years. They worry her too bullet point plans would endanger the country.

Harris recently shared a list of 14 priorities that includes tax cuts, lower prescription costs, a bipartisan border security law, affordable housing and legalizing recreational marijuana, which has won praise from Democratic Maryland Governor Wes Moore, who in a video on to have’. at this time.”

However, Harris’ proposed tax deduction of up to $50,000 for small business start-ups worries moderate Republicans like Harold Mendelson.

“That’s kind of scary,” said Mendelson, who lives in Baltimore County. “She wants to lower taxes on the one hand and give money away on the other. It doesn’t make sense.”

He describes himself as a Larry Hogan Republican who would never vote for Trump, but Mendelson said he can’t vote for Harris either.

“I’m in the middle of it,” he said. “Nobody really represents me.”

J. Matthew McGlone, a moderate Republican voter from Towson, said he thinks Harris’ to-do list is as thin as most of her answers in interviews.

“There is some merit, but not much merit,” he said. “She is all joy, hope and future without any content.”

McGlone thought the Biden-Harris stimulus program was “inflationary and put too much money into the system.”

“I don’t have much confidence in her kind of spending,” he said.

Harris and Trump are “two bad choices,” which is why McGlone said he voted early and wrote in Nikki Haley.

Kim Klacik, the Republican candidate to replace retiring U.S. Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger in the Baltimore County district, said she is particularly concerned about Harris’ agenda on housing, energy costs and immigration.

Klacik, a longtime Trump supporter, said she doesn’t believe Harris, or the bipartisan bill she supported that passed Congress earlier this year, are strong enough in controlling the flow of undocumented immigrants across the border .

“And it’s not because I know everything, because I don’t, but I would say because the Border Patrol came out and supported Trump. I think that probably tells us a lot more about the story,” Klacik said. traveled to the border during her campaign. “But I’m not going to pretend I’m an expert when I go to the Rio Grande a few times, because I’m definitely not.”

Klacik said she is also “very concerned about her opportunity economy,” the term Harris uses for her economic platform. Specifically, she said she believes giving new homebuyers $25,000 for down payments, as she has proposed, could backfire.

“If they default on their loans, and God forbid, but there’s probably a reason why they don’t have that $25,000, right?” Klacik said. “I think this will lead to a situation where we end up having to bail out the banks again. That’s not something I don’t think anyone wants to see, no matter what side of the aisle they’re on.

State House Minority Leader Jason Buckel said he doesn’t understand the robbery.

“My first reaction is, why hasn’t the Biden-Harris administration done any of these things over the last four years, some of which are objectively positive, including two years where they had full Democratic control of Congress?” he said.

“Instead, they implemented policies that worsened inflation, strangled our energy independence and seemingly focused on far-left policies that divided rather than united Americans,” he said.

Asked to respond to Harris’ to-do list, Nicole Beus Harris, chair of the Republican Party of Maryland, emailed a terse sentence: “Why hasn’t she done that in the last 3.5 years?”

Kamala Harris’s to-do list:

•Cut taxes for more than 100 million Americans;

•Strengthen Medicare and protect Social Security;

•Working with the private sector to build 3 million new homes to increase housing supply and reduce costs;

•pass the bipartisan Border Security Act to strengthen and secure our border;

•Restore reproductive freedom;

•Legalize recreational marijuana;

•Limit the cost of insulin to $35 per month and the cost of prescription drugs to $2,000 per year for all Americans;

• Expand Medicare to include home care for seniors and people with disabilities;

•Protect and strengthen the Affordable Care Act;

•Advancing common sense gun safety laws to protect Americans from gun violence;

•Invest in American manufacturing and clean energy;

•Expand the small business start-up tax deduction by a factor of 10 to $50,000;

•Give families a $6,000 tax credit during their child’s first year of life;

•And implement the first-ever federal ban on corporate pricing on food and groceries.

—Reporters Jeff Barker and Sam Janesch contributed to this report.

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