Press Release
Evan Queitsch promises to be a reform leader
11th District Republican candidate promises
repeals, cuts and reforms
Newark, DE, January 21, 2012: In a speech before dozens of supporters and leaders of Delaware’s Senate Minority Caucus and the Republican Party of Delaware who braved a snow and ice storm to stand with him, Evan Queitsch formally announced his candidacy for the State Senate in the 11th District. In his speech to supporters, he promised to restore fiscal responsibility by shrinking government, promoting private sector job growth and cutting taxes. He also promised reforms in education including consolidating school districts, ending models that lead teachers to teach to tests and allowing student spending to follow the student wherever the parents choose. He promised a new and aggressive focus on job creation that means cutting taxes across the board, incentivizing the hiring of Delaware workers, targeting growth areas like Wilmington and Newark that have been hit hard by the economic downturn and reducing the harmful effects of regulations like Obamacare, the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative and the Renewable Portfolio Standards. Finally, Evan called for a more open and transparent government. He called for General Assembly and Committee Meetings to be streamed live and podcast on the internet to bring the government to the people. Evan promised to lead the effort himself by offering that if he could not find the money to make the stream and podcasts revenue neutral, he would pay the difference out of his own legislative salary. He promised to meet monthly with his constituents and to author the bill that would prohibit state employees from holding public office.
Evan also addressed Governor Markell’s State of the State speech and took the Governor to task for playing loose with his facts and for his plans to expand government intervention in education. He closed by saying, “I don’t desire the prestige, the recognition or the power of the office. I don’t yearn for the extra salary and I don’t need the constant badgering of the special interest groups. I want to serve the people of the 11th Senate District, my friends and neighbors who are currently so underserved in Dover. I want to bring reality back to Dover. See, unlike many of those who make our laws, I’ve lived the average life. I know what it’s like to lose your job and struggle and to wonder how you’re going to put food on the table. In 2011, I lost my job due to budget cuts. I found myself on the unemployment line. I know the feeling. I also know that we are blessed to live in a nation and in a state where opportunity exists even when it shouldn’t. We live in a nation where people are always dreaming and where those dreams give others a chance to grow and continue their dreams. I want to go to Dover to represent you, the everyday Delawarean who is the hero of this American story. The men and women who everyday make the extraordinary happen by doing what they do best, deserve someone representing them who believes in them. I’m running to serve, not to be served.”
-End-
Below is a transcript of Evan’s speech. The video will be posted on his campaign website www.evanqforde.com later this month.
I’d like to tell you a little bit about who I am and what I believe. I was born and raised in Delaware. I grew up in North Wilmington, I graduated from Mount Pleasant High School in 1998 and I joined the U.S. Marine Corps in 2000. My father was a superintendent for a major commercial construction company and he taught me the values of hard work, honesty and commitment to duty. My father and my grandfather were history buffs and they instilled within me a deep respect for the history and the foundations of America. My mother taught me the values of love and diligence. She taught me that no mountain was too high to climb and I suppose that’s why I chose such a tall one this time. I was stationed at Camp Lejeune North Carolina on 9/11 and I volunteered to deploy in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003. I am proud of my military service and it taught me so much about life, about who I am and about whom I should be. I am married to a wonderful woman who moved with me into the 11th Senate District 5 years ago. We have 4 beautiful children ranging in age from 9 years old down to 17 months. We have attended Love of Christ Church in Bear for the last year and we strive every day to let our faith guide us to be more kind, generous, understanding and responsible.
Like many people, I have made mistake in my life but I work every day to make sure that I correct them, that I make fewer of them going forward and that I learn from them. Every day presents new challenges and it is through the strength of my family and my faith that I draw the ability to carry on. I believe that sometimes, we are simply SUPPOSED to do things whether we want to or not. George Washington is a perfect example. He was a reluctant servant. See, he had no desire to be the nation’s commanding General. In fact, he begged them to find someone else to do it. But when the call came to serve his country, and make no mistake, were a country long before we made it official, he served. After he had returned home and was prepared to be finished with public service, he was again called to unite the nation and again he did so reluctantly. The answer to the question, “Have I not yet done enough for my country?” was no, you have not. Until 2009 I was just a husband and a father. I went to work every weekday as a IT consultant, I came home to the family each night, I enjoyed sporting events and I only followed the news enough to be informed about what affected my life directly. In short, I was the average American who just wanted to go about my life and be left alone. 2009 changed that.
I became more informed and aware after the 2008 election about the direction of the country. Having grown up surrounded by history buffs, I knew that direction was not in keeping with our history and so I went back and I read and I studied the founders and their writings. I looked back across our history and found both good and bad but still I knew the direction we were heading in was wrong. I studied both George Washington on the good side and Andrew Jackson on the bad side. I joined other citizens in creating Founders Values, a group of concerned and educated citizens who seek to educate children and the electorate on the original principles of our Founders and on the foundational principles of our nation. We held town hall meetings, forums, debates, and brought in speakers from all over the country to discuss the issues of the day as well as those original founding principles.
It became clear that those of us who believe in the values of our founders had to be willing to stand for them and that our current group of legislators in Dover and Washington are out of touch. I looked at elected officials like Senator DeLuca who holds a job in the legislature AND in the executive branch at the Department of Labor, who has been the primary sponsor of much of the legislation that has led to so much of the economic troubles in Delaware and who simply does not believe in open and transparent government. Kevin Wade said at his announcement that if Senator Carper had done his job, he wouldn’t have been standing there and I submit that the same is true here. If Senator DeLuca had performed his job of representing the people of the 11th District, I would not be compelled to challenge him.
I realized that folks like that were corrupting our government and our state. I saw the massive growth of government and how that just didn’t jive with the way our nation was created, to be a land where the PEOPLE made things happen, not governments. I saw our education system falling apart and more than 30% of our children not graduating from public schools. I saw our state and our national finances going completely out of control. I knew that it was time to act.
So today, I announce my candidacy for the 11th State Senate District seat. It’s time to return this seat to the people and fix the problems Delaware faces. Here’s how we are going to do it:
1.) Restore Fiscal Responsibility
We’re going to reduce spending and limit the size of our government. We’re going to cut taxes and regulations to stimulate private sector growth and we’re going invest in companies that invest in Delaware.
2.) Fix Education
In this district alone we spend more than $15,000 per student per year and only 69% of them actually graduate. We’ll consolidate our school districts from 19 down to 4, one for each county and one for the city of Wilmington and we’ll localize our schools to put parents more in control. We’ve got to start teaching our kids HOW to think not WHAT to think and stop forcing our teachers to teach to tests. Finally, we have to institute a voucher system that will let the parents have full control over their child’s education. These things will reduce costs, improve results and bring teachers and parents together.
3.) Enable Job Creation
More than 30,000 Delawareans are out of work and if you spend any time talking to the people, you’ll find that those who are underemployed or chronically unemployed is more than double that number. We’ve got to cut taxes to spur growth in the private sector. We’ve got to cut corporate taxes, personal income taxes, gross receipts taxes, capital gains taxes and can we please abolish the death tax? We’re going to invest in companies that invest in Delaware. Delaware workers are among the best in the world and we saw that with Chrysler and GM whose plants were closed not because of the quality of the work but because of the fault of the company and union leaders to make sound business decisions. Unfortunately, open ended tax credits, especially in New Castle County often lead to as many workers coming from New Jersey, Maryland and Pennsylvania as from Delaware. That’s fine, companies should be allowed to hire whomever they want, but let’s incentivize Delaware companies to hire Delaware citizens. We’ll incentivize companies to use existing infrastructure and rebuild target growth areas like the College Square Shopping Center and the City of Wilmington where help is desperately needed. We’ve got to reduce regulations and that’s why I will work with my colleagues in the legislature to author, sponsor and promote a bill that will repeal the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative and the Renewable Portfolio Standards that cost us millions of dollars with zero benefit to our state. Since we already meet the standards of the RGGI, we spend tens of millions of dollars on other states who fail to meet them. Finally, I’ll work with legislators like Representative Hudson to opt Delaware out of Obamacare. We have the right as a state to do that and I will make sure that we do.
4.) Demand Open Government and Transparency
Finally, we’ve got to have an open and transparent government. We have a small state but still our citizens cannot take off every Tuesday through Thursday to spend the day in Dover. We’ve got to podcast or stream the General Assembly and Committee meetings online to bring government to the people. In fact, being in Information Technology, I can tell you that the cost is minimal and if I can’t find someone to pay for this to make the cost neutral to the taxpayers, I will pay for it out of my own legislative salary. It’s that important. We also have to post simple text copies of legislation alongside the legal text bill. Simply, you shouldn’t have to be a lawyer to read the laws of the land. Also, unlike Senator DeLuca, I will not be an unaccountable legislator; I will hold meetings with my constituents every month. Finally, I will write the bill that prohibits state employees from holding public office and that prohibits those who receive state funding from serving on money committees.
Let me now turn to addressing a couple of things from Governor Markell’s State of the State Address. First, he said that legislators “worked together to confront the unsustainable long term costs of state employee pension and health plans, saving more than $480 million over the next 15 years.” That sounds impressive until you break it down and I did. Over 15 years, $480 million breaks down to $32 million per year on an annual budget of $4 Billion or more. Markell just a few sentences later ate up more than half of those savings with his $21.7 million Medicaid increase and if you include his $13 million bike trails, our state is back in the red by $3 million. I don’t believe that this administration or the Democrat leadership understand how to actually save money. He also said that he did not want to return to the schools that we had twenty years ago. Finally, something we agree on. Yet, while Governor Markell wants to tighten the government grip that strangles our education system and shuts out parents, I would like to return to the schools of 220 or 120 years ago when we were world leaders in education, when we produced the students that led the Industrial Revolution and the Roaring 20’s and when parents controlled nearly every aspect of their child’s education.
People ask me, “Why do you want to be Senator?” The answer is “I don’t.” Now, that’s not to say that I don’t want to win or replace Senator DeLuca. I certainly do and I’m here to win but I don’t desire the prestige, the recognition or the power of the office. I don’t yearn for the extra salary and I don’t need the constant badgering of the special interest groups. I want to serve the people of the 11th Senate District, my friends and neighbors who are currently so underserved in Dover. I want to bring reality back to Dover. See, unlike many of those who make our laws, I’ve lived the average life. I know what it’s like to lose your job and struggle and to wonder how you’re going to put food on the table. In 2011, I lost my job due to budget cuts. I found myself on the unemployment line. I know the feeling. I also know that we are blessed to live in a nation and in a state where opportunity exists even when it shouldn’t. We live in a nation where people are always dreaming and where those dreams give others a chance to grow and continue their dreams. I want to go to Dover to represent you, the everyday Delawarean who is the hero of this American story. The men and women who everyday make the extraordinary happen by doing what they do best, deserve someone representing them who believes in them. I’m running to serve, not to be served. I hope you’ll join me and I look forward to working with you to make Delaware better. God Bless all of you, God Bless Delaware and God Bless the United States of America.
Evan also addressed Governor Markell’s State of the State speech and took the Governor to task for playing loose with his facts and for his plans to expand government intervention in education. He closed by saying, “I don’t desire the prestige, the recognition or the power of the office. I don’t yearn for the extra salary and I don’t need the constant badgering of the special interest groups. I want to serve the people of the 11th Senate District, my friends and neighbors who are currently so underserved in Dover. I want to bring reality back to Dover. See, unlike many of those who make our laws, I’ve lived the average life. I know what it’s like to lose your job and struggle and to wonder how you’re going to put food on the table. In 2011, I lost my job due to budget cuts. I found myself on the unemployment line. I know the feeling. I also know that we are blessed to live in a nation and in a state where opportunity exists even when it shouldn’t. We live in a nation where people are always dreaming and where those dreams give others a chance to grow and continue their dreams. I want to go to Dover to represent you, the everyday Delawarean who is the hero of this American story. The men and women who everyday make the extraordinary happen by doing what they do best, deserve someone representing them who believes in them. I’m running to serve, not to be served.”
Below is a transcript of Evan’s speech. The video will be posted on his campaign website www.evanqforde.com later this month.
I’d like to tell you a little bit about who I am and what I believe. I was born and raised in Delaware. I grew up in North Wilmington, I graduated from Mount Pleasant High School in 1998 and I joined the U.S. Marine Corps in 2000. My father was a superintendent for a major commercial construction company and he taught me the values of hard work, honesty and commitment to duty. My father and my grandfather were history buffs and they instilled within me a deep respect for the history and the foundations of America. My mother taught me the values of love and diligence. She taught me that no mountain was too high to climb and I suppose that’s why I chose such a tall one this time. I was stationed at Camp Lejeune North Carolina on 9/11 and I volunteered to deploy in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003. I am proud of my military service and it taught me so much about life, about who I am and about whom I should be. I am married to a wonderful woman who moved with me into the 11th Senate District 5 years ago. We have 4 beautiful children ranging in age from 9 years old down to 17 months. We have attended Love of Christ Church in Bear for the last year and we strive every day to let our faith guide us to be more kind, generous, understanding and responsible.
Like many people, I have made mistake in my life but I work every day to make sure that I correct them, that I make fewer of them going forward and that I learn from them. Every day presents new challenges and it is through the strength of my family and my faith that I draw the ability to carry on. I believe that sometimes, we are simply SUPPOSED to do things whether we want to or not. George Washington is a perfect example. He was a reluctant servant. See, he had no desire to be the nation’s commanding General. In fact, he begged them to find someone else to do it. But when the call came to serve his country, and make no mistake, were a country long before we made it official, he served. After he had returned home and was prepared to be finished with public service, he was again called to unite the nation and again he did so reluctantly. The answer to the question, “Have I not yet done enough for my country?” was no, you have not. Until 2009 I was just a husband and a father. I went to work every weekday as a IT consultant, I came home to the family each night, I enjoyed sporting events and I only followed the news enough to be informed about what affected my life directly. In short, I was the average American who just wanted to go about my life and be left alone. 2009 changed that.
I became more informed and aware after the 2008 election about the direction of the country. Having grown up surrounded by history buffs, I knew that direction was not in keeping with our history and so I went back and I read and I studied the founders and their writings. I looked back across our history and found both good and bad but still I knew the direction we were heading in was wrong. I studied both George Washington on the good side and Andrew Jackson on the bad side. I joined other citizens in creating Founders Values, a group of concerned and educated citizens who seek to educate children and the electorate on the original principles of our Founders and on the foundational principles of our nation. We held town hall meetings, forums, debates, and brought in speakers from all over the country to discuss the issues of the day as well as those original founding principles.
It became clear that those of us who believe in the values of our founders had to be willing to stand for them and that our current group of legislators in Dover and Washington are out of touch. I looked at elected officials like Senator DeLuca who holds a job in the legislature AND in the executive branch at the Department of Labor, who has been the primary sponsor of much of the legislation that has led to so much of the economic troubles in Delaware and who simply does not believe in open and transparent government. Kevin Wade said at his announcement that if Senator Carper had done his job, he wouldn’t have been standing there and I submit that the same is true here. If Senator DeLuca had performed his job of representing the people of the 11th District, I would not be compelled to challenge him.
I realized that folks like that were corrupting our government and our state. I saw the massive growth of government and how that just didn’t jive with the way our nation was created, to be a land where the PEOPLE made things happen, not governments. I saw our education system falling apart and more than 30% of our children not graduating from public schools. I saw our state and our national finances going completely out of control. I knew that it was time to act.
So today, I announce my candidacy for the 11th State Senate District seat. It’s time to return this seat to the people and fix the problems Delaware faces. Here’s how we are going to do it:
1.) Restore Fiscal Responsibility
We’re going to reduce spending and limit the size of our government. We’re going to cut taxes and regulations to stimulate private sector growth and we’re going invest in companies that invest in Delaware.
2.) Fix Education
In this district alone we spend more than $15,000 per student per year and only 69% of them actually graduate. We’ll consolidate our school districts from 19 down to 4, one for each county and one for the city of Wilmington and we’ll localize our schools to put parents more in control. We’ve got to start teaching our kids HOW to think not WHAT to think and stop forcing our teachers to teach to tests. Finally, we have to institute a voucher system that will let the parents have full control over their child’s education. These things will reduce costs, improve results and bring teachers and parents together.
3.) Enable Job Creation
More than 30,000 Delawareans are out of work and if you spend any time talking to the people, you’ll find that those who are underemployed or chronically unemployed is more than double that number. We’ve got to cut taxes to spur growth in the private sector. We’ve got to cut corporate taxes, personal income taxes, gross receipts taxes, capital gains taxes and can we please abolish the death tax? We’re going to invest in companies that invest in Delaware. Delaware workers are among the best in the world and we saw that with Chrysler and GM whose plants were closed not because of the quality of the work but because of the fault of the company and union leaders to make sound business decisions. Unfortunately, open ended tax credits, especially in New Castle County often lead to as many workers coming from New Jersey, Maryland and Pennsylvania as from Delaware. That’s fine, companies should be allowed to hire whomever they want, but let’s incentivize Delaware companies to hire Delaware citizens. We’ll incentivize companies to use existing infrastructure and rebuild target growth areas like the College Square Shopping Center and the City of Wilmington where help is desperately needed. We’ve got to reduce regulations and that’s why I will work with my colleagues in the legislature to author, sponsor and promote a bill that will repeal the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative and the Renewable Portfolio Standards that cost us millions of dollars with zero benefit to our state. Since we already meet the standards of the RGGI, we spend tens of millions of dollars on other states who fail to meet them. Finally, I’ll work with legislators like Representative Hudson to opt Delaware out of Obamacare. We have the right as a state to do that and I will make sure that we do.
4.) Demand Open Government and Transparency
Finally, we’ve got to have an open and transparent government. We have a small state but still our citizens cannot take off every Tuesday through Thursday to spend the day in Dover. We’ve got to podcast or stream the General Assembly and Committee meetings online to bring government to the people. In fact, being in Information Technology, I can tell you that the cost is minimal and if I can’t find someone to pay for this to make the cost neutral to the taxpayers, I will pay for it out of my own legislative salary. It’s that important. We also have to post simple text copies of legislation alongside the legal text bill. Simply, you shouldn’t have to be a lawyer to read the laws of the land. Also, unlike Senator DeLuca, I will not be an unaccountable legislator; I will hold meetings with my constituents every month. Finally, I will write the bill that prohibits state employees from holding public office and that prohibits those who receive state funding from serving on money committees.
Let me now turn to addressing a couple of things from Governor Markell’s State of the State Address. First, he said that legislators “worked together to confront the unsustainable long term costs of state employee pension and health plans, saving more than $480 million over the next 15 years.” That sounds impressive until you break it down and I did. Over 15 years, $480 million breaks down to $32 million per year on an annual budget of $4 Billion or more. Markell just a few sentences later ate up more than half of those savings with his $21.7 million Medicaid increase and if you include his $13 million bike trails, our state is back in the red by $3 million. I don’t believe that this administration or the Democrat leadership understand how to actually save money. He also said that he did not want to return to the schools that we had twenty years ago. Finally, something we agree on. Yet, while Governor Markell wants to tighten the government grip that strangles our education system and shuts out parents, I would like to return to the schools of 220 or 120 years ago when we were world leaders in education, when we produced the students that led the Industrial Revolution and the Roaring 20’s and when parents controlled nearly every aspect of their child’s education.
People ask me, “Why do you want to be Senator?” The answer is “I don’t.” Now, that’s not to say that I don’t want to win or replace Senator DeLuca. I certainly do and I’m here to win but I don’t desire the prestige, the recognition or the power of the office. I don’t yearn for the extra salary and I don’t need the constant badgering of the special interest groups. I want to serve the people of the 11th Senate District, my friends and neighbors who are currently so underserved in Dover. I want to bring reality back to Dover. See, unlike many of those who make our laws, I’ve lived the average life. I know what it’s like to lose your job and struggle and to wonder how you’re going to put food on the table. In 2011, I lost my job due to budget cuts. I found myself on the unemployment line. I know the feeling. I also know that we are blessed to live in a nation and in a state where opportunity exists even when it shouldn’t. We live in a nation where people are always dreaming and where those dreams give others a chance to grow and continue their dreams. I want to go to Dover to represent you, the everyday Delawarean who is the hero of this American story. The men and women who everyday make the extraordinary happen by doing what they do best, deserve someone representing them who believes in them. I’m running to serve, not to be served. I hope you’ll join me and I look forward to working with you to make Delaware better. God Bless all of you, God Bless Delaware and God Bless the United States of America.
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