The US Seventh Congressional District, which encompasses St. Croix County, sees Richard “Dick” Ausman challenging incumbcnt Tom Tiffany, who has held the scat sincc 2020.

Tiffany did not respond to the Journal’s request to fill out a questionnaire. The Elmwood native served in the Wisconsin Slate Senate, representing District 12 from 2013 to 2020. He also served in the State Assembly, District 35, from 2011 to 2013.

Richard “Dick ” Ausmun

Age: 61 Education: Bachelors of Business Administration from UW-Madison Occupation/cmployment experience: Publisher of consumer and busincss-to-business media. I was a leading executive in one of the largest publishing companies in the world; I have also published weekly and daily newspapers.

My publications won numerous state and national awards including The Milwaukee Press Club Award for Best Feature Writing in the State of Wisconsin, and two Jessie H. Neil Awards, considered the Pulitzer Prize of business- to-business publishing.

Political experience: I

have not mil for public office before

Community service: I

dedicated numerous hours to organizations my daughters participated in while they were in school.

Family: I have been married for 34 years; we dated five years before that. Two daughters, both are attending college.

Why are you running for this position? What value would you bring to the table for constituents? Bccausc Tom Tiffany’s votes are hurting people. When you vote against lowering the cost of insulin, against Medicare being able to negotiate prescription drug prices, against the Honoring Our PACT Act to help our veterans with their medical needs due to exposure to toxins and agaiii recently against helping veterans with their hunger and nutritional needs, against expanding rural broadband internet access and rebuilding our roads and bridges, against allowing people access to contraceptives, and you want to privatize Social Security, you are not helping your constituents. The list is much longer than this, and the bills I listed all passed the House with bi-partisan support. In the last Congress (116th) Tom Tiffany missed almost 350% more votes than the average representative, he is not showing up to do his job. I will show up and vote to help the constituents of the Seventh District.

What do you feel is the most important issue to your constituents? Healthcare. 58% of all American debt is medical debt. I believe in a Medicare for all single payer health system.

How do you propose to address funding for public education? Local districts arc claiming they arc facing a “financial cliff” due to being forced to use ESSER funds for operational costs.

I would scale back the voucher system. We should not be siphoning off public education funds to help the elite educate their children in private schools, or folks who would prefer their children to be in faith-based schools.

We need to fund our public schools properly, the ESSER funds were to help with the issues caused by the pandemic, not to be used to cover standard operational costs. We have seen the toll the pandemic took on our kids’ test scores, and there is no political fault here, it was a pandemic. Wc need to support our teachers and pay them well.

Tell us howr you would address inllation concerns and bring economic prosperity to your constituents.

My opponent simply says it’s Biden’s fault and that is nonsense. We were hit by three cataclysmic events: 1) The pandemic which shut our country down and disrupted our businesses supply chains; 2) Employment was decimated with folks losing their jobs and then many deciding to start their own business or retire including truck drivers, law enforcement and front line service workers, and 3) Russia invaded the sovereign nation of Ukraine causing oil prices to spike, and OPEC just recently tightened the screws even more. The Inflation Reduction Act approved more drilling of oil offshore in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska; Tom Tiffany voted against the bill yet moans about Biden begging the Saudis to produce more oil. There has been way too much cheap money flowing through the financial markets (which was great for them) for such a long time and now wc arc paying the price for that. Almost everything is made from fossil fuels and when the cost of oil goes up the cost of almost everything goes up. The great thing is we are figuring out how to make plastics and things from plants vs. fossil fuels and that will help us in the long-term and lessen and eventually end our dcpendcncc on oil and the ability for other countries to hold us hostage to their supply. Working through the supply chain disruptions, more jobs are being brought back from overseas which will help to provide good paying jobs here in the U.S.

Where do you stand on the abortion issue? Why?

I believe wc need to codify a law like Roe vs. Wade to protect a women’s right to choose. Our country’s founders were very faith-based but very insistent that our country be established as secular in nature. We all have the ability to worship when, where and how wc choose, but we do not have the right to impose our religious views on others. A person’s view on abortion is based on ihcir religious views; half of the world does not believe that life starts until after birth. Most folks agree that a woman has a right to terminate a pregnancy until the fetus is viable which is typically 22-24 weeks. After that it is the woman’s decision to make if her life is in danger, or it is determined that should the pregnancy be carried to term, the baby will die shortly after birth or will live in a way that there is not a quality of life. Outside of that, the government needs to butt out.

A woman also has the right to decide who the father of her child will be.

How will you work with colleagues of the opposite party for the good of your constituents? How can compromises be made so legislation that helps Wisconsinites can move forward'? Having put more than 26,000 miles on my truck and bus traveling around this district since May, I learned more than anything people just want their representatives to work together and to compromise to get things accomplished.

I grew up in the Republican Party, however I have been an independent for decadcs, and when I decided to run, I chose the Democratic Party as my values line up with what they represent. My dad's first cousin. La Verne was a Republican and Wisconsin Secretary of the Agriculture, head of the U.S. Farm Administration Bureau under the first President Bush, and a two-term assemblyman. At a family reunion I asked him what he made of the current political situation, and he said this was the first time in his life he didn’t vote Republican for President.

Helped me realize I was not the only one who can’t figurc out where the Republican Party has gone. I will represent everyone in my district regardless of their party affiliation, and will work with whoever I can to move things forward for my constituents.

I will go about getting things done as I did successfully in the business world.

Where do you stand on gun control/Second Amendment rights? I own many guns; I am not here to take away people’s guns. Talking with hundreds of Republicans and Independents al fairs and farm events, basically 99% of us all agree on four tilings that need to be done that will make an immediate impact as to gnn safety. I ) You don’t need more than five bullets in a clip. Rarely when hunting will you take more than one-totwo shots, maybe three. This would give people in mass shooting situations a chancc to fight back or run away. I am open to a permit should one really feel the need for a large clip. 2) Universal background checks.3) Red Flag Laws and 4) When someone purchases a firearm for the first time, they need to take a gun safety course. To not know there is something called a safety, you don’t leave a bullet in the chamber or you walk with the muzzle pointed down, how to store a firearm properly, they are just some of the basics everyone needs to know.

What is your favorite thing about Wisconsin? Being from Wisconsin, I’m a chcesehcad, and everything about its people and the beautiful environment we live in. I was a bass drummer in the UW-Madison Marching Band and the only person anyone will ever meet that has done complete summersaults strapped to a bass drum. I bleed Badger Red. On, Wisconsin!

Is there anything else voters should know about you that would help in their decision-making process? I grew up in Merrill, Wis, When I was seven my dad died leaving my mom with six kids and no insurance or savings. She worked two jobs, wc got food in white boxes from the County Building, she baked and sold bread I delivered around the neighborhood, and she rented out my sisters’ bedroom to a student at the teachers college to make ends meet. She defined my life, make it happen. I empathize with people who arc facing challenges in life and I am doing this to help them.

Tom Tiffany* (R)

Did not respond

Tom Tiffany