Jacqueline Abernathy

Where do I stand on the issues?

I believe in and support the policies and platform of the American Solidarity Party. Below are some key issues of the platform that affect Texans.

Life

• I oppose violence towards human life, except when absolutely necessary to halt an imminent threat to other human life. For this reason, I oppose virtually all abortion, euthanasia/assisted suicide, capital punishment and the destruction and/or exploitation of human embryos.

• Abortion is the intentional destruction of human life and I support legislation to protect unborn children from this violence. Pregnancy is a unique situation where two lives of equal value and dignity must be respected, but protecting a child’s right to live free from violence is not at odds with protecting women’s rights to the same protection. I oppose the false narrative that supporting the right of our children to exist means harm to women, as if unborn children are adversaries and we must choose a side. Women and children coexist peacefully without one having life-or-death power over the other. While tragic, circumstances exist where pregnancies must be ended early for the safety of women. While most of these threats occur at later stages when children survive premature delivery, some situations require earlier intervention that ensures the baby cannot survive such as with an ectopic pregnancy or when life-saving treatments like chemotherapy cannot be delayed. Protecting unborn children from violence in situations without these concerns does not threaten women when these circumstances do exist. All efforts must be taken to protect all life so legislation reflects the reality that sometimes hard choices must be made.

• Euthanasia and assisted suicide is a desperate act of self-destruction that targets humans at their most vulnerable. It inhibits access to necessary medical care, since killing is almost always cheaper than caring. Euthanasia in all forms must be prohibited.

• Capital punishment is no longer necessary to protect innocent human life. Rather, there is significant evidence that Texas has executed innocent people in spite of the time and expense associated with maintaining this barbaric practice. Texas laws are arbitrary and discriminatory as well, without much concern to feign fairness. The death penalty must end.

• Human life conceived via artificial reproductive technologies deserves legal protection. I oppose the dangerous practice of storing embryos, treating children as property to “donate” for use by others and any/all research that exploits and destroys human beings in their earliest stages.

• Texas must enact constitutional and legal measures establishing the right to life from conception until natural death. These measures specifically include a constitutional amendment clarifying that there is no right to abortion, as well as laws that prohibit or restrict abortion. Because human life begins at conception, the intentional destruction of human embryos in any context must end.

Healthcare

• Federal and state governments should collaborate to guarantee universal healthcare by diverse means, including single-payer initiatives, direct subsidization of provider networks, subsidized education for medical professionals willing to work in rural areas, support for cost-sharing programs and mutual aid societies, home care grants, simplified regulation, and the easing of restrictions on the importation of prescription drugs.

• I support efforts to help prevent the tragedy of suicide, including universal access to affordable mental-health care and the destigmatization of mental illness.

• Health policy must include protections for those with preexisting, chronic, and terminal conditions. We must include those who have no means to save for an emergency, people at every stage of life from prenatal care to hospice care, and people who find themselves in need of medical assistance while away from their home network.

• Pregnancy, childbirth, and neonatal care should all be fully covered by all healthcare plans so that no family needs to worry about the expenses of bringing a child into the world.

Family

• States must repeal no-fault divorce laws, which effectively undermine the permanence of marriage. At the same time, it is vital to continue efforts to prevent and prosecute domestic violence.

• In opposition to the commodification of children and the reproductive process, gestational surrogacy contracts and sperm banks should be prohibited. Adoption and fostering should be encouraged as a redemptive alternative, but with the understanding that the separation of children from their biological parents is never the primary goal.

• I support greater funding for our child welfare system and oppose the politicization of CPS as a weapon in current culture wars regarding gender identity. Directing CPS to investigate loving families of transgender children as child abusers for decisions they have made regarding how they address their child’s gender dysphoria is perhaps the most sadistic form of government overreach.

• Texas should allow public funding for services that promote stable, healthy marriages and the flourishing of children, even when such services are provided by religious institutions with religious values.

• Workplace accommodations for parents, including paid parental leave, flexible scheduling, and affordable child care should be available to as many families as possible. Further, no family should be forced to have two full-time incomes just to survive, and thus policies subsidizing child care by parents staying at home should be enacted. Funding and services should also be provided to encourage families to care for elderly and disabled family members at home without being impoverished by lost income. This could include preferential housing options, tax credits, and respite care.

• To create a more pro-family culture and strengthen the social fabric of neighborhoods, I favor efforts to make public spaces child-friendly, encourage outdoor play, and reform legal and administrative practices that unfairly penalize parents for giving children a reasonable degree of independence.

Education

• Responsibility for the education of children resides primarily in the family. Families should be free to home-school their children or send them to public or private schools.

• Public support of both public and private schools should be an option, with a preferential option for economically disadvantaged students and an emphasis on making teaching a well-paying occupation.

• Teachers should be free to design their own curricula within general parameters set by local authorities. The state has no business restricting academic freedom and inhibiting lessons about history which accurately inform students of our racist past as a society and the enduring impacts of slavery, Jim Crow and other oppressive systems. Standardized testing should not be the most significant factor in measuring the success of students and schools.

• Local school systems should reconsider the overuse of technology in the classroom.

• Texas should increase public investment in higher education, resulting in a reduction of tuition at public institutions. To improve the consistent quality of higher education, for-profit educational enterprises must be more strictly regulated. The government should consider proposals for partial forgiveness of student loans, along with more opportunities to work off debt. Out-of-control education costs and predatory student loan practices mean that bad faith debt should be forgiven and protocols modified to prevent this injustice from continuing.

Civil Rights

• Racial discrimination has stripped ethnic minorities of their wealth and limited their eligibility to work, ability to own property, educational access, and voting rights at the individual and community levels. I recognize the particular forms of exclusion suffered by African Americans, Latinos, Asian Americans, and Native Americans. These historic injustices should be addressed through reparative and restorative means, such as economic grants and policies which incentivize investment, job-training, and hiring in minority communities, and by continuing dialogue between communities and local governments regarding minority concerns. I oppose attempts to stifle honest dialogue through restrictions on Critical Race Theory application in public and private settings as well as attempts to limit books on controversial topics in public schools and libraries.

• Disability rights remain a significant concern throughout Texas. Government agencies working with the disabled must ensure that financial benefits are applied fairly and consistently. They must also make more efforts to incorporate the disabled into work or volunteer programs, depending on individual circumstances. I oppose withholding federal funds for those with disabilities or social security survival payments in order to reimburse state agencies, such as in the case of foster children.

• I advocate for laws that allow people of all faiths to practice their religion without intimidation, and we deplore secularism that seeks to remove religion from the public sphere. I am committed to the “free exercise of religion” guaranteed by the First Amendment, which should not be limited to “freedom of worship” that merely exists in private and within a house of worship.

Criminal Justice

• Criminality is complex, the result of a culture that does not respect human life, the breakdown of traditional social institutions, institutionalized racism, and a prison system that promotes social alienation, recidivism, and deprivation. Federal and state governments must seek to address the causes as well as the effects of criminal behavior. I believe that preventing and punishing crime is an essential public service. I oppose the privatization of law enforcement and penal institutions.

• As public servants, law enforcement officers should be supported and held to the highest standards of professionalism. I support strict accountability for the use of lethal force.

• I am alarmed at the increasing rates of conflict between police and communities and call for local governments to institute measures that will increase transparency and trust between law enforcement and the communities they serve, including the use of body cameras, civilian review boards, and expansion of community policing.

• I believe that our court system systematically disfavors the poor. I call for an increase in state-level funding for our public defender system, and an end to cash bail, court fees, and programs that allow records to be expunged in exchange for paying higher fees.

• Mandatory sentencing requirements, especially for non-violent criminals, must be overturned.

• I believe that prisons are designed for dangerous criminals. I oppose the imprisonment of those who are simply mentally ill, homeless, or too poor to pay fines.

• I believe that our prison system should be focused on restoring lawbreakers to their community. We support increased funding of programs meant to prepare prisoners for life outside the prison.

• Drug addiction remains a social harm. It is vital to find ways of ending mass incarceration while not removing all laws against drugs and other vices.

• Laws against prostitution should focus on removing those participating from the cycle of exploitation, mandating penalties primarily on those who buy sex or arrange for its purchase. Closely tied to this is the need to aggressively combat human trafficking. It is also vital to recognize the social costs of pornography, which is inseparable from human trafficking, the promotion of pedophilia, and rape. Therefore I support laws which criminalize the production and sale of pornography and deny categorically that pornography is protected speech.

Immigration/Border Security

• I believe in welcoming the foreigner and oppose efforts to paint immigrants as dangerous or threatening to Texas.

• I support a path to citizenship for “Dreamers” brought to the United States as children and advocate reasonable accommodations for unauthorized immigrants without a criminal record who seek permanent residency.

• There must be a variety of bridge-building efforts between communities and newly-arriving immigrants, including offering lessons in civics and English for immigrants. I favor a generous policy of asylum for refugees from religious, political, racial, and other forms of persecution. Asylum claims should be evaluated with a view to integrating refugees into American communities.

• The federal government along with Texas has the responsibility to implement safe, secure, and orderly borders. Texas need reforms to protect migrants and to respond to unplanned refugee influxes with humane facilities adequate to house people and families in distress. At the same time, Texas must make our border areas safer for those who patrol them, live near them, or desire to cross them by aggressively targeting the trafficking of humans and narcotics.

Economy

• Our goal is to create conditions which allow single-income families to support themselves with dignity.

• I support policies that encourage the formation and strengthening of labor unions. Efforts by private entities to use public power to prevent union activities or to retaliate against workers who organize for their rights ought to be resisted at every level.

• I call for the repeal of corporate welfare policies, for shifting the tax system to target unearned income and reckless financiers, and for changing regulations to benefit small and locally-owned businesses rather than multinational corporations.

• I support mechanisms that allow workers to share in the ownership and management of their production, such as trade guilds, cooperatives, and employee stock ownership programs.

• I advocate for social safety nets that adequately provide for the material needs of the most vulnerable in society. These programs need to also help the most vulnerable find a path out of poverty by providing them with the tools they need in order to fully participate in their communities with dignity, and not trap them as subsidized labor for private interests.

Civic Life

• All elections should be held using either a ranked-choice system or approval voting. Voter registration should be easy, and laws attempting to restrict voter registration deserve opposition.

• Access to impartial information on candidates and ballot initiatives should be easily available in public print and broadcast media.

• Independent and minor-party candidates for public office shall have fair and equal access to ballots. This right shall not be infringed by burdens such as exorbitant voter signatures and filing fees.

• I believe that local governments are most competent to solve community-based problems. In keeping with the principle of subsidiarity, there should be more autonomy of local governments from state governments wherever possible. There should be legal accountability of higher levels of government to lower levels.

Environment

• We must all take personal and familial responsibility for stewardship of the environment. We must teach habits of conservation to our children both at home and in our schools, and we must put them into practice ourselves.

• Local governments should consider the health of the environment along with human solidarity when considering business development strategies, housing strategies, and other key decisions. As one example, transportation planning should look for opportunities to reduce our carbon footprint, while enabling access to affordable public transit, especially for those unable to use or afford private vehicles.

• Even in urban settings, there is much we can do to build a healthier environment. I oppose neighborhood policies that incentivize chemical-saturated lawns, or forbid outdoor clotheslines. I oppose the use of street lights so bright that they disrupt natural circadian rhythms or migration patterns.

• We must make every effort to ensure that no home in America lacks access to clean drinking water in the home and fresh foods in the neighborhood.

• Subsidies for reckless oil and mineral extraction (such as “fracking”) must be eliminated and replaced with funding for research into renewable sources of energy, such as solar, wind, and nuclear power. At the same time, Texas needs more economic development initiatives, such as job retraining and direct family aid, in those regions adversely affected by the transition to planet-friendly fuels and modes of production.^[2]