U.S. Congressional District 19 covers a portion of the Texas panhandle from north of Lubbock down to Abilene. For ten years, the district has been represented by Congressman Jodey Arrington.
Arrington is not running for reelection and there are seven other candidates hoping to earn the spot to represent the Republican party in the November general election.
KTTZ in Lubbock and KACU in Abilene have partnered to provide in-depth interviews with the candidates. KACU attempted to reach out to candidate Ryan Zink, but did not get a reply before deadline.
Coming from Hawley, James Barbee is a former electric supervisor at Abilene Christian University, a small business owner, and serves on a variety of boards and committees.
You can find interviews with other District 19 Republican candidates here.
Early voting runs Feb. 17-27 and Election Day is March 3.
The following transcript has been edited for clarity:
George Levesque: With seven candidates in the race for Texas 19th Congressional District, there's a good chance the top vote-getters will end up in a runoff.
One of the candidates in this crowded field is Hawley’s James Barbee. He's a former electric supervisor at Abilene Christian University, a small business owner, an active community member, serving on a variety of boards and committees, and he joins us in the studio today. Mr. Barbee, thank you for your time and thank you for running.
James Barbee: Thank you for having me.
George Levesque: One of the unique proposals from your campaign, compared to other campaigns, is eliminating the income tax and replacing it with a flat sales tax. Tell me why you think that's important.
James Barbee: Because right now we're punishing hard working American people and taking their money away from them, and we're not taxing anyone else. It's time to spread the burden out across the entire population. We have people in this country that are here illegal and we have people visiting this country. England has something that's called a VAT, a value added tax, that they do. And if we spread this out, we can give the taxpayers a lot of tax relief, and that's what we need to do. It's time to quit punishing people for being hard working citizens.
GL: Are you hearing from people out there that they're just upset with the way income taxes work?
JB: I don't know so much ‘upset,’ I just think that people are tired of the burden. It's just not right to punish hard working, fiscally responsible citizens. Now, you have to remember when it's income tax, we're not just talking about you working. My plan also gets rid of any tax on your Social Security. It'll take care of any tax on any kind of retirement plan that you have. So my goal is, once you hit 65 years of age, that you don't have to pay any more taxes. And my healthcare plan means your healthcare will be free. So no more taxes on any of your retirement stuff, and no more paying for your healthcare. You paid in your whole life. It's time for us to have the American Dream that we promised.
GL: So you're talking about a universal healthcare? Is that just for people over 65–?
JB: It’s not – I hate it when – I hate that term 'universal healthcare,' because when you do that, first thing pops into people's head is socialism, okay? My plan takes Medicare and extends it as a healthcare insurance that you would purchase, just like you would from any other health insurance company.
GL: So it is purchased?
JB: That's right! If you're under the age of 65, you'll pay for it just like any other healthcare plan. But we're going to put it in, not at the 200% increase that you've seen now, there'll be a lot less than that. I'm hoping rates that were back before Obamacare came about, and what that'll do is force the other healthcare insurance companies to come down on their rates, because if they don't, they won't be able to compete.
GL: Let's talk about the Farm Bill. You're from Hawley, that is obviously very much a farming community. It does more than just spend money on agriculture, let's focus on that piece. What would you like to see out of the Farm Bill, specifically for people in West Texas?
JB: The main thing I want to see, because we're using the farmers’ product as a bargaining chip in a world stage. Now, I agree with Trump's tariffs. We've needed Fair Trade throughout the world for years, and we've been at a deficit to everybody else for years. So what I want to do is implement a plan that says if you're going to use the farmers’ product as a bargaining chip, you have something – subsidy that kicks in automatically if it drops below a certain rate to keep them from losing money.
GL: Sid Miller, we had him on the show just a couple of weeks ago, Texas Ag Commissioner, he talked about doing something to regulate AI data centers, specifically because of the damage he says is done to farmland. Would you support something like that?
JB: That's private property they're buying. And, you know, I'm not for government getting into private property owners. Now, I do think that the AI centers are going to affect the City of Abilene tremendously, infrastructure wise, and it's a concern, but my concerns are more along the lines of water and electricity, and I think we might need to do some regulation there. But I'm not for getting in to the point where we're telling property owners that they can't sell their property to whoever they want.
GL: We were just talking about medical coverage. Let's circle back to that. Hospitals and doctors, they say that Medicaid reimbursement is too low. It's really hard to recruit providers to rural areas. Do you have any specific ideas on how to help these smaller rural areas, Anson, Stamford, that sort of area.
JB: Well, with my healthcare plan, you won't have this problem anymore. So my healthcare plan takes care of just the numerous things. I can't find – I've been asking people ‘Find something wrong with it,’ and they really can't. That's why some of my opponents have tried to say it's socialism. It's not, it's capitalism. It's just putting – we're going to make the government finally start earning their money instead of just taking your money away from you. That's a new concept. They haven't done it 250 years now. And they'll start earning their money. Well, what will happen is, what do doctors tell you? The reason your healthcare insurance is so high is because they have to pay malpractice insurance and other types of insurance. We have something called the Department of Justice that has 100,000 people in it, and these people don't work all that hard. It's time for them to go to work. I propose taking the Department of Justice and backing the healthcare system and the doctors that are willing to be part of our healthcare plan, so that they can lose some of the cost they have right now and then those Medicare costs that are coming into them won't be too low, because they won't have the expense of the of the insurances that they have to buy.
Insurance is hitting us on both sides. It's hitting you and I for our insurance, and it's hitting the doctors in the healthcare industry on the other side. Plus the government's taken and stuck in what they call PBMs, which is Pharmaceutical Benefit Managers, they're like a middleman for people on Medicare. And those people are becoming extremely wealthy themselves off of our tax dollars. It's time to end – it's a corruption deal. They're sending the money out to these people. And if you don't know, 1/3 of Congress is invested in healthcare, and then 93% of incumbent congressmen are receiving campaign finance from the healthcare industry. And so it's going to be a hard – you know, they don't want to fix your health care, because if they do, they lose money. So it's going to be a push to get it done, but that's what needs to happen. I tell everybody, it's a big money laundering scheme. They take our tax dollars and send them out, but they wind back up in the congressman's pockets when it's all said and done.
GL: Let's talk about immigration. ICE out there on the streets, they were in LA, they've been in Minneapolis recently. Goodness gracious. Right now, the Democrats are trying to stall some funding for the Department of Homeland Security to try to get some reforms done. Are you comfortable with the way ICE has been acting in Minnesota?
JB: Well, I don't blame ICE with what's going on in Minnesota. I blame the governor and the mayor of that city is what's what's happening. As a politician, you can't have this civil unrest, and you can't tell people it's okay. What you're seeing is not peaceful protest. What you're seeing is literal rioting and civil unrest. I mean, I grew up in a law enforcement family. My dad was a judge, a city marshal before that. My granddad is a deputy sheriff. I still have family members that are involved. I've got a cousin that's a county judge in Eastland County. The chief deputy over there is my cousin. People want to blame the officers for what's going on, but I tell everybody, until you have a family member, strap on a gun at night and leave your house and not know whether or not they're going to come back. You can't criticize police officers.
GL: You say – you know, and I'm not, ‘you say’ – you come from a family of law enforcement officers. But did any of them go out there and wear a mask all the time, did they not have their names on their badges so they could be identified?
JB: That was – that’s a different time. I mean, I still have people that are involved, but they're not going out trying to round up criminals, cartel members. And we have to remember, the cartels come in – the last four years, they've sent people into this country, and these people believe in revenge. So when they find out your family, they don't have to get you necessarily. They can take one of your kids or your wife or your mother or father or something like that. I understand that they want to hide their identity for that reason. I'm not necessarily pro-mask. I don't like that, but I don't know, how else you keep these cartel people from finding out the identity of the officer if you don't.
GL: How did you view Jodey Arrington? How did he do as this representative?
JB: I think Jodey Arrington was okay, but he… I'm tired of raising this debt ceiling. My number one deal is, let's get rid of the $40 trillion worth of debt, and the $1.6 trillion worth of over spending our revenue every year. And he was part of that. He was okay with raising the debt ceiling, and I'm not. Because if we keep raising our debt ceiling, eventually all the benefits to our elderly and our veterans and everything else are going to be gone. They'll be gone because – and I'm not the only one saying this. Elon Musk scared to death about it, because he knows when the government hits the bankruptcy button, he loses a bunch of money, just like we do. It's my biggest fear, that if we don't do something now, that in 10 years, we're all going to lose big, and so that's the only reason I'm here. I had an uncle that taught me civics in high school, and he said, ‘If you have the ability to help your country, you have the obligation.’ So that's why I'm here.
GL: James Barbee, thank you for joining us today.
JB: Yes, sir, thank you.
GL: James Barbee is one of seven men running to become the Republican nominee for the Texas 19th Congressional District. The winner of the primary will face Democrat Kyle Rable in November. I'm George Levesque.