Alex Balekian, Congress District 30 candidate, 2024 election questionnaire

Ahead of the November general election, the Southern California News Group compiled a list of questions to pose to the candidates who wish to represent you. You can find the full questionnaire below. Questionnaires may have been edited for spelling, grammar, length and, in some instances, to remove hate speech and offensive language.

MORE: Read all the candidate responses in our Voter Guide

Name: Alex Balekian

Current job title: Intensive Care Physician

Political party affiliation: Republican

Incumbent: No

Other political positions held: None

City where you reside: Glendale

Campaign website or social media: Alexforca30.com

Californians will decide on a proposition this November that would scale back some of Proposition 47, a 2014 voter-approved measure that reduced penalties for certain theft and drug offenses. What is one way the federal government could help states like California balance criminal justice reform with enforcing the law? (Please be specific with your proposal, and keep your answer to 200 words or less.)

Criminal justice reform has been an abject failure with maneuvers such as zero bail, and stiffer penalties are needed. However, progressive DAs may choose not to enforce the laws even though they are on the books. In Congress, I would make it a federal crime to steal from a small business with fewer than 100 employees so that small business owners have some recourse by contacting the DOJ to prosecute criminals if the local DA refuses to do his/her job.

Recent efforts to expand the federal deduction for state and local taxes, called SALT, have failed. What changes would you like to see, if any, to SALT? (Please keep your answer to 200 words or less.)

Families and homeowners were hurt when the 2017 Trump tax plan capped SALT deductions at $10k. Because SALT deductions benefit families and stimulate private home ownership, I would like to see the SALT cap increased or eliminated entirely.

President Joe Biden has called for an overhaul of the U.S. Supreme Court, including mandatory ethics rules. What reforms, if any, do you believe the Supreme Court needs, and how would they be enforced? (Please be specific with your proposal, and keep your answer to 250 words or less.)

I do not support packing the Supreme Court simply because one side disagrees with its decisions. Ethics rules for reporting conflicts of interest should be mandatory for all branches of government, and term limits should most certainly be placed on House Representative and Senators first before they are even considered for Supreme Court Justices.

Should there be an age limit imposed on presidential candidates? What about Congress or Senate? If so, what is that limit?

No age limits; term limits would ensure that entrenched politicians do not become octogenarians who die in Congressional office as if they were monarchs.

Would you support legislation that protects women’s access to in vitro fertilization and other fertility treatments nationwide? Why or why not? (Please be specific in your answer, and limit your response to 200 words.)

As a physician, I believe that beneficial treatments should be available to those who choose to access them. However, the government should not compel public or private insurers to cover the treatment because that would drive up costs for everyone and jeopardize the widespread availability of low-cost, high-value basic preventative care.

The Republican Party’s platform, following the summer convention, calls for the “largest deportation effort in American history.” Is this something you support? If so, what would such an effort look like? If not, how would you assuage concerns about border security? (Please be specific in your response, and keep it to 250 words or less.)

We need a transparent, points-based immigration system that ranks applicants based on certain criteria (e.g. younger able-bodied people; those with job skills that the country needs; those who can speak English). Our current cycle of illegal-entry-then-amnesty does not work; my points-based system would allow no-fault application to undocumented immigrants, who would then be deported to their last country of transit to wait out their turn on an easily-viewable rank list. To create respect for the points-based system, we would have to increase DHS hiring to secure the border with more CBP and ICE officers so as not to reward line-jumpers.

Cost of living is high on the list of concerns among voters, particularly among younger people. What is one bipartisan proposal you have to alleviate concerns about high prices or cost of living? (Please be specific in your response, and limit it to 200 words.)

Energy policy affects the cost of many goods (due to high price of fuel for transportation) as well as utilities. Electricity prices in Glendale, Burbank, and LA have skyrocketed because these cities have mandated all-electric devices and limited/eliminated fossil fuels in the generation of that electricity. This has resulted in higher demand with limited supply. We mustn’t jump from cheap-and-dirty to clean-and-pricey. We should ease high prices by allowing more domestic drilling and increasing fossil fuel use while investing heavily in research to discover cleaner, renewable energy sources that can be brought to market practically, efficiently, and at lower cost.

Californians continue to point to housing affordability as one of their top concerns. What is something the federal government could do to lessen the financial burden people feel, whether that’s with renting or buying a house? (Please be specific in your answer, and limit it to 200 words or less.)

The number one expense for a new homebuyer is the interest on the loan, and the loan interest rate is driven by government fiscal policy. Renters will also have to pay higher rent to a landlord who is trying to cover his/her baseline loan costs. Our uncontrolled government spending has resulted in higher inflation and higher interest rates to try to rein it in. The most effective way for government to decrease inflation is to eliminate deficit spending. Fiscal responsibility is my mantra, and I will NEVER vote for a budget with deficit spending so long as we have a national debt. I don’t care if it’s a Republican or Democratic budget.

What do you see the federal government’s role as in helping local municipalities tackle homelessness? (Please be specific in your answer, and limit it to 200 words or less.)

This is my signature piece of legislation. As a physician, I know that we haven’t solved the homelessness crisis because we haven’t diagnosed or treated the underlying mental illness and drug addiction. This is not simply a housing issue.1. Reopen the federal mental hospitals for the severe mentally ill; we have learned from the abuses that have occurred in the past. They should be hospitalized because they lack medical capacity; get them the treatment they need until they are better and then discharge them to outpatient clinics close to their family support system.2. Disband the tent cities and reunite the drug addicted homeless with their families, which are often across state lines. The medical literature shows that family-based therapy has better outcomes in drug addiction and mental health compared to non-family therapy. From Congress, I can transport people across state lines and give their home states federal dollars to hire therapists and set up addiction programs.3. Fund DHS to intercept drugs coming into our country via Mexico and the ports. The homeless cannot expect to remain sober if drugs are flooding their neighborhoods as a daily temptation.

After Tesla chief executive Elon Musk shared an AI-generated video purporting to be Vice President Kamala Harris’ voice, Gov. Gavin Newsom vowed to enact legislation to make it illegal to manipulate someone’s voice in an ad. What is something the federal government could do to protect people from deep-fakes, or false AI-generated images, videos and audio? (Please be specific in your response, and keep your answer to 200 words or less.)

I am always skeptical when people want the government to make laws to make things better. Government rules and regulations often create unintended loopholes or consequences that actually worsen the problem. Perhaps Congress could require that all AI-generated content have a watermark of some sort. The determination of when this would be required and the enforcement would be difficult.

In the end, I always believe in personal responsibility, and I think it would be more reasonable for government to teach people how to spot fakes and phonies rather than doing the filtering for them. Government can be there to support people’s decision-making but not supplant it.

What is one local infrastructure project you would push to secure funds for in the federal budget? (Please be specific in your answer.)

I would secure federal funds to bury electrical lines in fire-prone areas; the cost quoted by PG&E to bury electrical lines in these areas was approximately $6B. For comparison, we have wasted $26B on homeless housing. If we are to build the cities of the future with all-electric components, then we must mitigate the fire risk that comes with powering those cities. This maneuver would help the entire state by lowering the cost of home insurance due to wildfire risk.

What is one environment or climate policy you’d champion if elected? (Please be specific with your policy proposal, and keep your answer to 200 words or less.)

I would diversify and bolster our energy grids so that they can withstand the high energy use during summer heat and winter cold or during storms (both CA and TX have had embarrassing power outages that have paralyzed their large cities). This would include relying on diverse energy sources like fossil fuels, nuclear energy, and solar/wind; we could pivot quickly among the different sources based on our situation.

I would start focusing on measurable, meaningful outcomes to determine when we should scale back on fossil fuels. “”Our children’s future”” is a meaningful outcome, but not measurable. “”Ozone particles”” are measurable, but not meaningful. “”Childhood asthma hospitalization rate”” is both meaningful and measurable, and we could increase our fossil fuel use to ease prices while still tracking the hospitalization rates; if there is a clinically significant increase of 10% in the hospitalization rate, then we could decrease our fossil fuel use and justify the increased energy costs by pointing to the asthma rates.

What’s the No. 1 song on your playlist while you’re on the campaign trail?

Padam Padam by Kylie Minogue