EDITORIAL: Endorsements for U.S. House of Representatives

Behold the brave Nevada men and women running for Congress, a body that’s as popular as the stomach flu. Americans are quite unhappy with federal lawmakers and the federal government in general. Accountability starts with elections. With that in mind, the Review-Journal offers the following endorsements for the U.S. House of Representatives:

In Nevada’s 1st Congressional District, which encompasses much of the urban Las Vegas Valley, Democrat Dina Titus is seeking re-election against Independent American Kamau Bakari, Libertarian Richard Charles and Republican Annette Teijeiro. Rep. Titus, a former state senator and UNLV professor, is seeking her third overall term in the House; she was elected in the 3rd District in 2008 but lost her re-election bid in 2010.

In her first term representing the newly redrawn 1st District, Rep. Titus has been out front in demanding better performance from Veterans Affairs and less intrusion from the National Security Agency. She’s pushing the Federal Aviation Administration to speed up the process of allowing commercial use of unmanned aerial vehicles, which would benefit Nevada, one of a handful of states authorized for drone testing. And her office is incredibly effective at constituent service, helping residents navigate the federal bureaucracy. But Rep. Titus supports an economically harmful increase in the minimum wage, stands by her vote for Obamacare, supports the climate change alarmism that underpins costly, subsidized green energy and doesn’t think the IRS targeting scandal is much of a scandal at all.

Ms. Teijeiro, a bilingual physician and 38-year resident of the valley, understands that Obamacare bolsters bureaucracies while giving patients less choice at higher costs; says a lower corporate tax rate will spur job creation; criticizes the gun-free zones “criminals and psychopaths will never respect”; and says “anyone who says Social Security and Medicare are solvent … doesn’t do math very well.” The Review-Journal endorses Annette Teijeiro for Nevada’s 1st Congressional District.

In Nevada’s 3rd Congressional District, which includes the valley’s western and southern suburbs and southern Clark County, Republican Joe Heck is seeking a third term against Democrat Erin Bilbray, independent David Goossen, Libertarian Randy Kimmick and independent Steven St. John.

Rep. Heck, a physician and brigadier general in the U.S. Army Reserve, builds consensus and works across party lines to address solvable problems. He supports pro-growth economic policies, such as corporate tax reform. “We need to get past the stick and look at the carrot,” he says. He understands that Washington will go broke without entitlement reform, and he backs foreign policy that leads instead of follows. Ms. Bilbray, a political consultant and daughter of former Rep. Jim Bilbray, fails to see the disconnect between her policy positions. She says the financial security of the middle class is her focus, but she supports a job-killing $15-per-hour minimum wage and she opposes fracking, which has reduced energy costs and supports more than 1 million middle-class jobs. She wants a balanced federal budget but won’t support changes to the federal entitlements that will drive future deficits. Rep. Heck has the intellect, integrity and experience Washington desperately needs. The Review-Journal endorses Joe Heck for Nevada’s 3rd Congressional District.

In Nevada’s 4th Congressional District, which comprises the northern valley and northern Clark County, as well as the state’s southern rural counties, Democrat Steven Horsford is seeking re-election against Independent American Russell Best, Libertarian Steve Brown and Republican Cresent Hardy.

Rep. Horsford, Nevada’s former state Senate majority leader, has been an effective lawmaker in his first term. He serves as co-chairman of the Congressional Interstate 11 Caucus, which is advancing a direct highway connection between Las Vegas and Phoenix. The planned highway is the state’s most important economic development project, a commercial corridor that ultimately will link Canada and Mexico. Rep. Horsford won passage of an important bill to transfer thousands of acres of federal land to Yerington to spur development around a copper mine, and he sponsored legislation (which stalled, unfortunately) to transfer additional federal land to Las Vegas and North Las Vegas for economic development while creating the Tule Springs Fossil Bed National Monument in the northern valley. Rep. Horsford acknowledges that the federal tax code is holding back job creation, and he wants a lower corporate tax rate as part of tax reforms.

Mr. Hardy, an assemblyman, construction company owner and former Mesquite city councilman, says his priority is balancing the federal budget without raising taxes. But, like Ms. Bilbray in the 3rd District race, he doesn’t want to reform Social Security or Medicare — and he wants to preserve military spending to boot. Good luck making that pencil out. We like Mr. Hardy’s positions against the ever-expanding reach of the federal government, but on the campaign trail, he has been prone to saying things that divide people, not unite them. The Review-Journal endorses Steven Horsford for Nevada’s 4th Congressional District.