Fiscal issues top priority for Senate candidate, retired math professor

Friday, April 27, 2018

Jack Heidel

McCOOK, Neb. — Republican lawmakers aren’t doing anything to deal with the ballooning national debt, and it will only get more difficult to deal with in the future, a retired University of Nebraska at Omaha math professor said.

Jack Heidel, a Republican who is running for U.S. Senate, pointed to incumbent Sen. Deb Fischer, who although she did vote against the omnibus bill, had already voted to raise the debt limit.

“That’s why I’m running,” Heidel said.

The national debt is a problem now, but will become a disaster once interest rates increase, which they inevitably will, he said.

It will be possible but difficult to solve problems with Social Security and Medicare, he said, using actions such as raising the age limit for full Social Security benefits to prevent depletion of the trust fund, which will be depleted in 15 years at the current rate.

But it’s imperative to “get the free market working” to provide universal health care, through methods such as premium support as proposed by outgoing House Speaker Paul Ryan, using payroll taxes to provide premium subsidies on a sliding scale. He said he does not support a single-payer system.

Heidel said he favored the federal government providing Medicaid through fixed block grants to the states, which can better control costs.

Describing himself as a “fiscal conservative and social moderate,” Heidel said America’s 2.7 percent unemployment rate indicates we have a labor shortage, Heidel said, calling for a “sensible, temporary guest worker” program, and continuation of the DACA or Dreamer program.

He said he generally agrees with President Trump that China is a “bad actor” when it comes to international trade, but favors actions to increase fair trade.

A Cedar Rapids, Iowa, native born in 1939, who served in the Navy, Heidel holds a doctorate in mathematics and taught in Tennessee and Iowa, retiring after teaching at UNO from 1984 to 2017.