Two candidates hailing from opposite geographic ends of the 7th Congressional District are seeking the Democratic nomination to succeed Rep. Mike McIntyre in the U.S. House.
One is Jonathan Barfield, a New Hanover County commissioner and real estate agent. The other is Walter Martin, a private investigator and retired Smithfield police officer.
The winner will face the winner of the Republican primary — David Rouzer, Woody White, or Chris Andrade — and Libertarian Wesley Casteen in the November general election. McIntyre, a nine-term Democrat, did not seek re-election.
The district, which stretches from Johnston County, at the eastern edge of the Triangle, to the southeastern coastal counties of the state, is considered to lean Republican. McIntyre, the Democrat, narrowly defeated Rouzer, the Republican, in 2012 by 50.1 percent to 49.9 percent. Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney won the district that year by 20 points.
Barfield considers jobs and economic development the top issues in the campaign. “We’ve lost a number of jobs in the district over the last few years,” Barfield said. He said officials have been working hard to get more funding for broadband Internet service, and trying to restore funding for inland dredging and replenishing sand on the beaches.
As for the economy, Barfield wants to expand efforts at offering incentive packages for businesses to expand or locate in the area.
For Martin, the top issue is ending the bickering in Washington. “What I think is the most important issue for the American people is for the citizens to get control of their country back,” Martin said. “They’re more worried about the Democratic and the Republican parties, and not worried about the business of the people. The elected officials are toeing the party lines.”
Martin said he felt economic recovery would be further along if the nation’s leaders didn’t spend so much time arguing.
“In your household, if a husband and wife constantly bicker and complain, they will not get anything accomplished,” Martin said. “If we ran our businesses that way, we would fail.”
Martin said it took four years to pass a farm bill, and leaders have been working on immigration reform for six years. “We’ve always known that if we solved those two problems, we would increase your jobs,” he said. Instead, Martin said, leaders have been fighting and haven’t accomplished anything on those fronts.
Both candidates expressed support for the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, although both also said the law could use some tweaking.
“There are so many people that I know of that are self-employed and just can’t get affordable health insurance,” Barfield said, adding that before the passage of Obamacare, self-employed Realtors sought changes in the law so that they could take advantage of more affordable group health plans.
Barfield also noted that local hospitals in New Hanover County had to write off more than $40 million in indigent care costs. He said he expected the health care law to be a “moving target.”
Martin said he would listen to Congressional Budget Office analysis of the effect of the law regarding its effect on businesses. “You would have to assume that legislation like the ACA would affect some businesses worse than others,” Martin said. “But we also know that what we were doing wasn’t working.”
Martin added that it makes no sense to throw away the investment that has already been made in the new law. “I hear people say that they would just repeal it,” Martin said. “No business person throws away their investment.”
Martin continued. “Is the ACA perfect?” he asked rhetorically. “It’s a step. If we need to improve on it, let’s do that.”
Barfield said he had mixed emotions about revelations of metadata collection by the National Security Agency. “You don’t want the government that much in your business,” Barfield said. “My gut based on what I have heard and read, is that’s something that will probably be done away with in the short or long term.”
Martin, drawing on his law enforcement background, said it appears that the NSA has gone “overboard” in some areas. “We need to make sure that they have oversight, that we’ve got eyes and ears watching what they’re doing,” Martin said.
Martin said that, like Edward Snowden, who leaked thousands of classified national security documents to media outlets, he also had occasion to possess confidential information. Unlike Snowden, he said, “I was never able to convince myself that I needed to break that confidence because I needed to leak information.”
Both candidates say they have no qualms with the executive orders that President Obama recently issued when Congress has failed to act on legislation he proposed.
Barry Smith (@Barry_Smith) is an associate editor of Carolina Journal.