State, U.S. candidates answer CJJ questionnaire

Press release from Carolina Jews for Justice-West:

“It is important for candidates to be able to share their positions on important issues and for the constituents in those districts to be informed and know about those positions,” says Ron Katz, board member for Carolina Jews for Justice and the lead of the CJJ-West Democracy Rights work group.

Carolina Jews for Justice (CJJ) is a nonpartisan nonprofit “fighting for a just, fair and compassionate North Carolina.” As such, CJJ cannot and does not endorse or oppose candidates or political parties; however, CJJ is committed to promoting voting and giving people in NC the information they need to cast their ballot.

With the continuing pandemic making it challenging for candidates and voters to easily come together, CJJ-West prepared a brief questionnaire for NC General Assembly candidates running in WNC. Three of the questions addressed:

-Abortion access;
-Retaining public school teachers, and
-Affordable housing.

For candidates running for US House District 11, the three questions addressed:

-Voting rights;
-Climate and energy policy, and
-Antisemitism and oppressions based on race or gender/sexual identity.

The questionnaire was sent out to all candidates for the 9 House and 5 Senate districts in western NC and US House District 11 on July 29th, and each candidate was sent two reminder emails with many getting contacts from constituents or others in WNC encouraging them to share their positions. The result is this Candidate Guide. Very little editing of the responses has been made as CJJ-West wanted voters to be able to read the exact words the candidates shared.

Candidates were notified of a deadline of August 24th. However, an extension was given to August 26th to allow a full four weeks for candidates to have the questionnaire in hand. The goal was to have the Candidate Guide ready for voters near the time when sample ballots would be available. It became available online on September 6th.