Why would we want to ask a candidate a question? Don’t we want to know what he want to know what he will do if he is elected?

Do all candidates answer our questions honestly? Unfortunately, the answer is no. Nevertheless, candidates generally answer more truthfully than not. Why? Their answers indicate which voters they want to vote for them. If politician too much alienates the people who support him, that makes it much easier to remove him from office. Therefore, it is worth the trouble to ask politicians questions and to hold them accountable for their answers.

What follows are the questions we included our first candidate questionnaire for the 2021 Election season. When we send our questionnaire to a candidate, we give that candidate three options for each each question. Would they support (S), oppose (O), or are undecided (U) about legislation that would:

1. Restore the death penalty repealed this spring.
2. Emergency rules, regulations or orders expire after 45 days unless the General Assembly takes action.
3. Re-enact criminal penalties for the recreational use of marijuana.
4. Prohibit Dept. Of Health from communicating with children about sexual issues without parents’ consent.
5. Prohibit State from forcing anyone to get a COVID vaccine despite sincere religious objections.
6. Require employers to offer paid sick leave to employees working 20 or more hours a week.
7. Establish Medicaid coverage of undocumented populations during COVID-19 pandemic.
8. Require that hospitals, nursing homes, hospice and assisted living facilities allow patients to receive visits from a rabbi, priest, minister or clergyman upon request during a declared public health emergency.
9. Allow adult protective service workers to obtain protective orders for incapacitated adults subjected to an act of violence, force, threat or financial exploitation.
10. Repeal 2020 legislation allowing coverage of abortion in health insurance plans sold on Virginia’s Obamacare exchange.
11. Require a school nurse in every school building.
12. Require every public school to give parents the option for child to attend school in-person.
13. Offer tax credits for donations to scholarship funds to enable low-income students to pay for private school tuition or curricula for home-schooling.
14. Require family life education curriculum to include viewing a live ultrasound of an unborn baby.
15. Require teacher and principal evaluations to include an evaluation of “cultural competency.”
16. Reduce the total number and type of required Standards of Learning assessments to the minimum federal requirements.
17. Provide State funded transportation services for students attending private and parochial schools.
18. Expand Tuition Assistance grants to undocumented college students receiving in-state tuition rates.
19. Prohibit the carrying of firearms in public spaces.
20. Amend the Constitution to automatically restore the right-to-vote to felons who have served their sentences.
21. Allow the public to obtain inactive criminal investigation files under the Freedom of Information Act.
22. Repeal laws that allow foster care/adoption agencies to place children with persons who share the same beliefs or to place children only in homes with a female and male parent (rather than same sex couples).
23. Expand nondiscrimination laws (and lawsuits) to persons who hire part-time employees to work in the home, including babysitters.
24. Repeal the provisions of Virginia’s Constitution that define marriage as a union of a man and a woman.
25. Add to the Constitution express recognition of marriage between individuals of the same sex.
26. Prohibit the abortion of babies after 20 weeks in the womb.
27. Repeal the common-law crime of suicide.
28. Allocate Virginia’s electoral votes to the presidential candidate who wins the national popular vote, even if not the candidate Virginia voters choose.
29. Forbid construction of power plants fueled by fossil fuels.
30. Reinstate the estate tax (“death tax”).
31. Increase income tax rates to fund school construction and law enforcement salaries.
32. Amend the Constitution to vest the appointment of judges in the Governor, subject to legislative confirmation, instead of in the General Assembly as is currently the case.
33. Decriminalize assisted suicide.
34. Require public schools to permit students to use bathrooms and locker rooms assigned to those with whose gender they identify, rather than those of their biological sex.

We hope for simple answers. However, we understand that some do not consider these simple questions. Therefore, we encourage candidates to explain their answers, and we post those explanations on our website.

Do you want to know how the candidates answer our questionnaire? Then please encourage them to answer our questionnaire. We will send all the candidates running for statewide office (with the exception of the Attorney General) and all the House of Delegates candidates whose districts intersect Prince William County a copy of our questionnaire.