GOP Senate candidates offer contrasting solutions to rising costs and economic challenges

Eliminating income taxes on young people, encouraging companies to hire more Americans, and slashing regulations are among the solutions to affordability problems proposed by some Republicans running for U.S. Senate.

The candidates in the March 17 primary are former state GOP Chair Don Tracy, author Jimmy Lee Tillman II, occupational therapist Pamela Denise Long, attorney Jeannie Evans, real estate management CEO Casey Chlebek and university instructor Cary Capparelli.

Most contenders blamed the Biden administration for the state of the economy during Daily Herald editorial board interviews last week.

Chlebek advocates abolishing property taxes and retirement interest income taxes, as well as lifting taxes on new, small businesses for the first five years.

He also wants to eliminate income taxes for people under age 23 and up to age 26 if they are enrolled in college or married.

“(Let’s) make sure the younger generation has a good start,” said Chlebek, a Lake Forest resident.

Another goal is providing free prescription drugs for seniors, veterans and people with disabilities.

Long, of Edwardsville, contends that mass immigration — legal and illegal — depresses wages and is a major contributor to economic ills.

She supports creating an “Americans First” job plan. It would enhance school choice and vocational programs and tighten the job market so that immigrant labor would be a “source of last resort” for employers. This would include immigrants who are citizens.

But “we can’t assume (companies) will go looking for Americans, we have to incentivize it,” she said.

Chicagoan Capparelli said the key to cutting the federal budget is to find waste.

“Also, excessive tax cuts to the very wealthy should not be extended,” he said.

Capparelli also supports entitlement reforms to help farmers, including disaster assistance, financial aid, low interest loans and government protection from reduced exports caused by “political interference,” he said.

Tracy, a Springfield attorney, blamed Democrats for closing coal power plants, which raises utility bills.

He also supports President Donald Trump’s Great Health Care Plan.

“It will introduce more market competition and different kinds of health care policies to make health insurance more affordable,” Tracy said. “It would enhance price transparency so that people will have a better idea of what exactly these medical procedures will cost, add more consumer choice, and put more dollars in people’s pockets.”

Tillman, of Chicago, said “we don’t have an affordability problem; that’s a made-up word.”

The Trump administration’s Big Beautiful Bill will “put money back in citizens’ pockets,” he contends.

“Before in America, you judged inflation by price of gasoline. Gas is going down. If we give this administration time, the affordability crisis will not be a crisis,” Tillman added.

Evans, an antitrust lawyer from Chicago, advocates slashing regulations to improve market competition.

“The more competition in the market — it’s going to bring down prices,” she said. The Biden administration passed about 12,000 regulations, such as requiring updated refrigeration systems in grocery stores, that raised costs, Evans said.

“I will work with President Trump to remove those regulations that are unnecessary and stifle business so we can bring prices down,” she said.