Campaign Phone
785-813-7970
Instagram
https://www.instagram.com/colinforkansas/
Personal Biography
I teach business law and negotiation at the University of Kansas School of Business. I have spent more than a decade advising negotiators around the world on how to do better deals in hard circumstances, including major businesses, nonprofits, and even military and diplomatic teams. Before that, I practiced law; I defended family businesses and sued hedge funds and banks. My wife and I live in Lawrence with our son, as well as her mother and sister and a growing mob of pets.
Education
Harvard Law School (JD, 2004); Trinity University (BA in International Studies and Russian, 2001)
Ballot City
Lawrence
County
Douglas
The single greatest challenge we face is the lack of accountability in government. This is an overarching issue that shows up in many ways: congressional support for policies, like tariffs, that hurt their own constituents; incompetent federal officials chosen for their loyalty to their party; and even corrupt leaders enriching themselves in public service.
We fight back by demanding accountability at all levels, from street-level ICE agents to the president. This includes specific policies I've proposed, such as amending 42 USC 1983 to hold federal agents responsible for excessive force and other constitutional violations. But we must also pursue public investigations of misuse of power, such as the weaponization of the DOJ.
In the short term, restoring the Affordable Care Act subsidies to stabilize health insurance markets.
My long-term objective is to create a realistic option for national healthcare, such as Medicare for All. This must be done in a bipartisan fashion; the lesson of the ACA was that one party cannot force through its own solution, even if it is an effective one, because the other party can always undermine it.
A stable and lasting solution must be secured with a bipartisan commitment to its success. The details of such a solution will take years to craft and require experienced negotiators like myself.
The first and most important step would be a return to the 2024 immigration compromise legislation. This bipartisan act would have paired enhanced border security with more, stronger, and more practical pathways to legal residency and citizenship. Donald Trump instructed congressional Republicans to torpedo the compromise in order to have a crisis to run on, but it was a productive step forwards. Since Trump's immigration experiments have lost public support, the compromise is likely to be a realistic next step.
I also support a "civil rights audit" of immigration enforcement during the Trump crackdown, to create a record of violations (including excessive use of force and warrantless searches and seizures).
Ending the tariffs. Every tariff is a tax on importer, making the Trump tariffs one of the greatest tax increases in American history. And our current tariff levels are punitively high, encouraging other countries to impose tariffs on our exports. American businesses and consumers are pinched in the middle of rising costs and lower profits on what they make. Even worse, our tariff levels change chaotically, making it hard for our businesses and our trade partners to plan ahead.
Congress must remove the tariff power from the White House. The founders understood this should be a power reserved to Congress, and returning to that system will dramatically improve affordability for farmers and other workers in the First District.
A public commission demonstrating that our elections are secure and fair. The GOP has diligently spread conspiracy theories about election fraud, when such crimes are incredibly rare and have never been shown to have affected the outcome of a national race.
I have studied and written extensively about conspiracy theories. It is important to document the truth in order to combat them. A bipartisan commission publicly assessing the purported evidence of election fraud would help fight these conspiracy theories.
Citizens United cannot be overturned simply by an act of Congress, but Congress must work to limit the influence of money on politics. For that reason I agreed to join the "Balance and Accountability" caucus when they recruited me--BAC is an alliance of reform candidates who pledge to work to clean up national politics through a moratorium on lobbying, enforceable codes of conduct, and legislating to improve campaign finance standards.
I support reduced maximum donation limits, greater expenditure disclosures, a public financing option for candidates willing to forego fundraising, and a ban on the use of generative AI in campaign communications.
Similar to healthcare, a solution without bipartisan support is likely to be counterproductive in the long run. Past deals have shown that proposals such as secure storage laws, "extreme risk" laws, and closing domestic abuser loopholes can gather such support.
Much of the needed and most effective legislation would have to be done by states. The United States Congress can support state action on gun violence by taking a more active role in drafting model legislation and reserving some discretionary spending for states that meet a minimum quality standard for firearms laws.
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