In the 2018 midterms, Harley Rouda defeated Dana Rohrabacher, a Republican 30 year incumbent for the House of Representatives, and turned CA-48 Democrat for the first time ever. Since then, many people have seen the negative effects of his policies as well as the policies of his party, and Republicans have since then taken a majority by seven percent. Enter Brian Burley, a 26 year old small business owner and graduate of USC, who has announced his campaign for California’s 48th congressional district, and Orange County might already be ready for him. I decided to sit down with him and figure out first hand what his campaign and potential career as congressman would be all about.
He first visited Huntington Beach in 2007 to see his mother who had moved here for cancer treatment; and though she tragically died four years later, Brian would come to dream of living in Orange County. That dream came true, and he would come to study at California State University Fullerton, and transfer to University of Southern California. One might wonder why Brian Burley, someone who is very conservative, is still here in Southern California. When asked, he acknowledged that California as a whole has been becoming more and more liberal over the last 10 years, but that Orange County still remains largely conservative in the face of our state’s evolution. Considering this, he’d rather stay and fight than pick up and leave.
Harley Rouda won the election in the 2018 midterms to become the new congressman of CA-48, and he is up for re-election in 2020. On Brian’s website, he said he felt that certain politicians lack an ability to relate to those whom their representing. When asked in person, he agreed that Harley Rouda falls under the same category, based off of the court cases Rouda settled after firing employees to not have to pay for their cancer treatment. For this reason, Brian thinks that Orange County will find comfort in a candidate like himself who is a bit more relatable. A candidate saying that they’re going to “fight for Orange County families” doesn’t mean anything unless the process is specified. In other words, candidates need to also provide how they are going to carry out their promises as opposed to just what they are promising along the campaign trail.
We all love to believe life will be easy and everything will work out in the end, but in reality, it’s going to be particularly hard for us here in Orange County to afford a life here. Though the standard of living is much higher here in Southern California, the cost of living is through the roof, and it’s becoming harder and harder for the average student out of highschool afford this area. That’s the bad news, the even worse news is that it’s only bound to get worse under any sort of suggested higher tax plan. Burley began to feel the effects of this as soon as he moved to the area, and he knew that he would have to work himself apart through college. For this reason, Burley began to see a correlation between higher taxes and lower growth, and he began to wonder why we needed more revenue to the government as opposed to repurposing of the money they already have. It’s for this reason many Americans, alongside Burley, find it hard to trust someone like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren whom want to tax more while the money the government is already taking is not being used practically.
While in favor of legal immigration, Burley finds himself against sanctuary policies. Though this is a very polarizing topic in California where 45 out of 58 counties hold sanctuary policies, Burley believes his policies are moderate enough to persevere. While he agrees there is a conversation to be had about giving law abiding illegal aliens a path to citizenship, he doesn’t understand misusing taxpayer money to jail a convicted felon that has no business being here in the first place. While everyone is a human and have both good and bad qualities, are nation still has laws in place against someone illegally entering our country. There is no logical argument to burden the taxpayers with the cost of jailing a criminal shouldn’t be in the United States to begin with.
Our second amendment is perhaps one of the most important rights we have as Americans, and over the years we’ve seen many movements that purpose “amending the amendment.” Luckily, Burley understands how important it is that the American populus remains armed and protected. Over the last 20 years, we’ve seen the gun argument shift from “against all guns” to some guns; in other words, many people want to illegalize what they call “high capacity assault weapons.” The problem with that is that it’s not even a defined term, and even if it was, the statistics don’t support their argument. There isn’t universal agreement as to what “high capacity” or “assault weapon” means. For the sake of argument, let’s say they are speaking specifically about rifles. The majority of gun crimes are committed with handguns, and the majority of the guns used in violent crimes are not legally owned. This means that many of the guns used in crimes every single day were not legally acquired by the criminal who used it. Criminals already disregard the law, so why is it we believe that changing the law is going to stop criminals?
Yes it’s true that there are about 12,000 gun related deaths every year, and if we include suicides the number jumps to about 32,000. However, there are anywhere from 500 thousand to 3 million defensive uses of firearms every year. There are exponentially more lives saved by guns than there are lives taken, and some kind of weapons ban will realistically only make this issue worse than it already is.
Being on the right or not being progressive enough is a death sentence in today’s political climate, and Burley has had extraordinary experiences on this topic during his time at USC. Like many students, he had professors who didn’t agree with him. However, conservative professors are little to none, especially here in Southern California. Across the nation, 38% of universities have no conservative presence at all, and 61% of California State Universities fall under the same category. Regardless of political affiliation, no college student wants to pay through the nose to hear there professors political opinions.
Brian Burley is running this next election cycle, and though I think he is a great candidate this article can’t nearly do it service. Which is why I highly recommend you visit his website to do a deeper dive into who he is and what he stands for. As Americans, we all have a civic duty to vote in order to keep our elected officials accountable. So when you step up to the ballot next year, please keep Brian Burley in mind for representative of California’s 48th District.
