- May 3, 2024
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Editor's note: Candidates responses have not been edited for grammar and are presented as received.
JACK ACHENBACH
BIO INFO
Age: 29
City/town of residence: Orlando
Family: Jack is currently dating his super awesome girlfriend Jennifer who has been the rock behind his entire campaign. They live together in Orlando with a plump orange tabby cat named Poppy. Poppy is tough to please, but she loves chasing crumpled up paper balls and breaking the rules.
Education: Jack Achenbach is a Registered Dietitian currently working with the Osceola County School District where he oversees the health and wellness of its 7,600 employees. He has also worked as an in-patient hospital dietitian during the Covid-19 pandemic and as a chef in a variety of culinary experiences such as in fine dining restaurants and with the Philadelphia Eagles. Jack first earned a Bachelor's degree in culinary nutrition from Johnson and Wales University and then went on to complete a Dietetic Internship from Montana State University. Jack now holds a Master of Science degree in Nutrition and Exercise Science from Lipscomb University and a Master of Business Administration from Johnson and Wales University.
Qualifications:
U.S. REP DISTRICT 10 Q&A (DEM)
What are the key differences between you and your opponents?
There are ten Democratic candidates running for Florida’s 10th congressional district.
1. Corrine Brown is a former politician who was convicted in May 11, 2017 on 18 of 22 corruption charges ranging from mail fraud to filing a false federal tax return. Unlike Corrine Brown, Jack Achenbach has no interest in defrauding Americans. Additionally, Brown entered the 2022 Democratic Primary 48-hours before the qualifying deadline by cutting a $10,000 check, while Jack Achenbach has been fighting for Orange County starting in June of 2021 and qualified by collecting 3,131 out of 2,568 required petition signatures. While claiming that constituents wanted her to run, Jack was put on the ballot by the people rather than by cutting a check.
2. Khalid Muneer previously ran, and lost, his run for the position of Orange County Property Appraiser in 2020 and has now decided to try his hand at running for the U.S. House of Representatives. Unlike Muneer, Jack Achenbach has never run for office before and cannot stand career politicians that hop from race to race searching for a win. Muneer, like Corrine Brown, entered the Democratic Primary 48-hours before the qualifying deadline by cutting a $10,000 check. Yet at the same time, Muneer claims to be adamantly against politicians with “bags of money”, despite having the ability to cut himself a $10,000 check most Americans, like Jack Achenbach, could never afford.
3. Alan Grayson is a career politician who is beholden to no district in particular, having run for countless seats in the state of Florida. Jack Achenbach has no interest in career politicians and even supports term limits and reducing the pay of our political leaders to no more than what they were making prior to holding office. Jack believes that running for office should not be a lottery ticket to a better lifestyle and believes that our representatives should be held accountable to do their jobs rather than allowing them to hide behind the work of others just to collect a paycheck.
4. Randolph Bracy is another career politician who seems to be trying to make the big bucks off of the good people of Florida. When speaking to the public, Bracy touts that he has already achieved, as a state rep, anything other candidates suggest and yet the people of Florida continue to be unhappy and rally against what the State lawmakers are doing in Tallahassee. Bracy is also willing to step into another district to win an open seat, rather than continuing to represent the people he lives and works with. Unlike Bracy, Jack is a regular guy willing to listen to the needs of the constituents rather than bragging about his many supposed accomplishments.
5. Unlike Terrance Grey, Jack Achenbach has outlined his top policies and how he would actually plan to implement them in a realistic way. Grey, despite his affinity for public speaking as a pastor, does not seem to have a plan for office as evidenced by his sparse website and lack of vision. While, Jack may not be in Washington yet, he understands that you have to go into it with realistic ideas and be willing to work with others to make those ideas a reality as evidence by his thirty-plus policies on his website.
6. Similar to Mr. Grey, Teresa Tachon, despite being an advocate on behalf of teachers, has spent most of the campaign absent from class. Making a rare appearance in the final hours, she also seems to have a one track mind. As a teacher, she primarily focuses on the needs of that demographic when discussing her ideas for the future of the country. While our teachers are important, all Americans are struggling and need to feel that their representatives speak for them rather than a subsection of the population with a very generous union and PAC. While Tachon is correct that we need to take care of our teachers, Jack has done just that as he has worked as a Wellness Specialist for the 7,600 teachers in the Osceola County School District, to care for their health and wellness.
7. Maxwell Frost is a 25-year-old professional activist who, according to his LinkedIn, has never held a real job despite oxymoronically advocating on behalf of hardworking Americans and Union members. Frost has raised over $1.2 million dollars in donations, yet a quick glance at his FEC records shows that nearly 70% of donations come from out of state fueled by Frost’s overuse of data analytic companies, such as Grassroots Analytics, which compiles and sells donor information to help create the illusion of public interest in Progressive candidates like Frost. While Frost claims that his supporters consist of nurses, teachers, and other blue collar workers, the vast majority do not live in or represent the values of District #10 or even those of Floridians at large. Sadly, Frost does not appear interested in representing the constituents of District #10 as evidenced by his hasty public appearances that last long enough to give a quick speech followed by a photo op before running out the door. To make matters worse, when Frost does not attend an event, his representatives are quick to explain that he is busy fundraising in other states which can be substantiated by observing his many travel expenses outlined in his FEC file. Finally, despite touting himself as a “bold change” Frost is supported and endorsed by the very same career politicians who have introduced national stagnation, both socially and politically, that has left Americans distraught, divided, and desperate. Frost’s desire to be, in his own words, “the next AOC” indicates that he is far more interested in being the next political Kardashian than the next visionary FDR. After all, “bold change” does not include advocating on behalf of old and unoriginal ideas that have never grown larger than a call to action for politicians to garner votes and donations.
8. The remaining candidates were able to produce the $10,000 qualifying fee, though they have not seemed to make a large impact on the race either positively or negatively.
What are the values and morals that have guided your life, and how will use them as District 10 representative?
Jack Achenbach is guided by the values of hard work, resilience, and teamwork. When it comes to hard work, Jack started off mowing lawns in his community at the age of twelve, and has since worked for the Philadelphia Eagles, in fine dining restaurants, and currently with the Osceola County School District as a registered dietitian. When it comes to resilience, Jack’s motto is to “always keep moving forward” no matter the obstacles and no matter hard life may become. While we all have our own personal battles, having the strength to put continue forward can get you pretty far. And finally, Jack wouldn’t be where he is today without his team and girlfriend Jennifer. While running for office, Jack and Jennifer saw the importance of helping other candidates overcome the barriers to entry into the political arena by helping to collect petitions, providing marketing consultation, or by connecting candidates with political leaders. And you know what? It worked! Not only were Jack and Jennifer able to help qualify over 10-candidates for their elections but they made countless friends along the way! For all the talk about unity in the political theatre, Jack and Jennifer are making waves!
As District 10 representative, describe how you will work across the aisle.
We began our political campaign by starting a political podcast to discuss politics, current events, and to chat with candidates across the political spectrum. The idea was to challenge our beliefs and to understand different perspectives. Many politically active Americans are caught in a bubble, willfully refusing or unintentionally misunderstanding those who think differently. By starting our podcast to speak across the aisle, we have taken the first steps necessary to humanize our future opposition. Politicians incorrectly assume they can simultaneously attack their political opponents and then go on to draft bipartisan legislation. Given our stagnation as a nation, this is not the case. Creating bipartisan and sustainable legislation starts before the pen hits the paper, it starts with creating positive relationships, even with those you disagree with. As a dietitian, I speak from experience. I could never help a patient achieve positive lifestyle changes if I could not first make a positive connection, but rather repeatedly belittled them
Describe the state of our nation’s economy and what steps need to be taken to improve it.
While politicians bicker over the nuances of economic terminology, lower- and middle-class Americans struggle from inflated prices, declining wages, rent hikes, supply chain shortages, a plummeting stock market, increasing interest rates, and the burden of outsized student loans. In order to combat these issues, Jack Achenbach supports the following measures to help ease Americans’ financial burdens: decreasing gas and diesel prices by investing in our nations energy independence to decrease both gas prices and the subsequent added transportation fees passed onto consumers; eliminating bank overdraft and maintenance fees that unequally burden lower- and middle-income people; creating U.S. jobs by investing in domestic microchip manufacturing and alternative energies, providing land grants to hemp farmers, and legalizing marijuana for commercial sale; decreasing healthcare costs by encouraging cross-state health insurance competition and best price practices to lower prescription drugs to their price provided through Medicare and Medicaid; pursuing a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants to prevent corporations from diluting wages; and decreasing student loan interest rates to ease the financial burden of young Americans entering the labor force.
Define “recession.”
A recession has historically been defined as two quarters of negative economic growth. However, political views will always bend or extrapolate upon definitions to defend or attack positions. This inability to speak a unified political language is having severe detrimental impacts on our political discourse and social unification.
What is your evaluation of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization decision.
Regardless of the decision, the outcome has ultimately shown us that Congress has been asleep at the wheel, deferring our nation’s most controversial issues to the precedent of the Supreme Court, rather than enshrining those precedents in law. Those chiefly responsible for our nations stagnation rest upon Congress who throws their responsibility and the anger of the American people at the Supreme Court.
Describe the state of our education system and what steps need to be taken to improve it.
Statistically, data has shown us time and time again that our educational system and our students are falling behind. Rather than producing viable and competent adults, our public schools are more focused on teaching towards state testing than preparing our children to take on the world. When it comes to K-12 public schools, Jack is currently focused on addressing the following issues: revamping the core curriculum to include subjects such as nutrition, exercise physiology, financial wellness, and other life skills; equally distributing property taxes amongst district schools; and reducing operational costs and waste to improve teacher pay and access to teaching resources. When it comes to higher education, Jack Achenbach believes in lowering interest rates, reformatting interest rates to kick in only if a payment is missed, reallocating past interest payments to pay down principal payments, providing tuition reimbursement for veterans who joined the military after graduating from college, and extending the G.I. bill to cover graduate degrees.
What is the cause of division in the United States, and how can we improve it?
The cause of division in our nation stems from our leadership and from our media institutions. Our leaders utilize fear to garner votes and donations, while our media institutions disseminate fear to garner clicks and advertisement revenue. These behaviors cannot be solved with legislation, rather, they must be solved by electing moral leaders who are not interested in becoming career politicians that rely on your vote to secure their next paycheck and by supporting unbiased local news outlets.
What is your position on the United States’ involvement in Ukraine?
The United States has for a longtime abandoned its allies in their time of need; most recently Afghanistan and Hong Kong. The long-term consequences of which are represented by the dwindling respect and power of NATO globally and the bolstering of enemy states such as Russia and China and alternative markets to the West, for example BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa). Russia’s extended involvement in Ukraine, and the expected Chinese invasion of Taiwan, seek only to further expose the West’s inability to take swift and decisive action against rising powers. Despite the might, influence, and raw military power of the United States, Russia’s nearly six-month campaign in Ukraine is undeterred and the moment to make any meaningful impact to dissuade future conflict has since past.
