My family’s story, and my wife’s family’s story, is one of the American Dream.  Thanks to the extraordinary mentorship I received from public school teachers, coaches, counselors, and administrators right here in AZ-01, I was able to earn 3 degrees from an Ivy League university (a B.S. from Wharton, a B.A.S. from the School of Engineering & Applied Science, and an M.P.A. from the Fels Institute of Government, all at the University of Pennsylvania) and land a job in one of the most cutthroat industries in the world.  While working my way up to the upper echelons of Wall Street finance, I met my wife, started a family, AND earned my law degree at night.  My family and my wife’s family came to America with fairly little and what we have been able to achieve in just one generation is ONLY possible in this great nation.  We as Democrats must reclaim and restore the American Dream for the next generation and for all future generations.  The American Dream belongs to everyone – and that is exactly who I will fight for in Washington.

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In this crowded primary, I am running against two recent former Republicans, Marlene Woods and Amish Shah.  Marlene was a Republican until 2018 and voted in Republican primaries as recently as 2016.  In 2017, she proudly re-tweeted a pro-life post from staunch anti-choice Senator Ben Sasse; she was previously anti-gay marriage according to her own personal blog where she shared that her position on gay marriage finally evolved.  She and her husband had a history of financially supporting and pushing extreme Republican politicians like Jan Brewer (who passed a draconian abortion law, the most racist immigration law in AZ history, and was anti-union) and Tom Horne (who is literally trying to destroy the public school system as we know it). Marlene and her husband faced legal consequences for misusing state funds in the 1990s when Grant Woods served as Attorney General. Worst of all, Marlene is being funded by election deniers and Schweikert donors. She does not show up to defend her past record; she simply cannot be trusted. Amish Shah was a Republican in 2016 (he registered as a Republican in Arizona that year after moving from New York, where he was not a registered Democrat) and voted in the 2016 Republican Presidential primary, apparently for Donald Trump. He led brutal hearings on gay conversion therapy at the State House and eventually voted for religious exemptions for such therapy as a State Rep.  He not only lobbied against over-the-counter access to contraceptives for women, but also encouraged his fellow Democrats to do the same by pushing to include an amendment that would have limited the available medications for women!  Amish brags about having the backing of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (“ACOG”), but of course does not mention that ACOG is a well-known and prolific supporter of anti-choice politicians, as reported by Time Magazine.  Anyone who voted for Donald Trump and/or does not trust women to make their own healthcare decisions is simply unfit to be our nominee. Finally, Amish does not live in AZ01.