Daniel Biss
Progressive
Democrat
N/A
Illinois
Current Position: Mayor of Evanston
Running For: House Representative - District 9
Policy Positions
Economic Policy
- Against corporate tax breaks for multinational corporations that outsource jobs; supports ending corporate welfare
- For implementing a wealth tax on billionaires and ultra-millionaires
- For rolling back Trump tax cuts for highest earners and eliminating Trump tariffs
- For closing the carried-interest tax loophole for hedge fund managers and private equity executives
- For taxing capital gains at the same rate as wages for those earning more than $1 million per year
- For raising the corporate tax rate and closing offshore profit-shifting loopholes
- For reinstating and expanding the IRS Direct File program to all 50 states
- For capping child care costs at 7% of family income and building a nationwide public child care system
- Against unilateral presidential tariff authority; supports requiring congressional approval for tariffs
- For reducing Pentagon spending and shifting resources toward diplomacy, humanitarian aid, and global development; supports sunsetting outdated AUMFs and requiring congressional approval for future military actions
- Against any cuts to Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid; for reversing the Big Beautiful Bill's cuts to Medicaid
- For expanding Social Security benefits by $200/month, paid for by applying the Social Security payroll tax to incomes over $250,000
- Against Trump and DOGE cuts to VA staffing and services; for ensuring VA hospitals are adequately staffed and funded
Business & Labor
- For restoring federal antitrust enforcement and updating antitrust laws for the 21st century; supports unwinding anticompetitive mergers and setting clear market share thresholds
- Against hedge funds and private equity firms buying up residential properties; supports the End Hedge Fund Control of American Homes Act
- For capping credit card interest rates
- For passing the PRO Act to make it easier for workers to unionize and hold union-busting companies accountable
- For expanding sectoral bargaining and requiring worker representation on corporate boards of large companies
- For banning captive audience meetings (mandatory anti-union employer meetings)
- For raising the federal minimum wage to $17 per hour, indexed to inflation
- For banning algorithmic rent-setting and penalizing hedge funds and private equity firms that buy up single-family homes
- For regulating Big Tech, including breaking up Amazon, Facebook, Google, and Apple; taxing digital advertising; banning addictive design features for children; mandating algorithmic transparency; cracking down on bots, deepfakes, and election interference; and developing responsible AI policy
- For expanding job training programs for veterans and streamlining professional licensing for veterans using military-acquired skills
Health Care
- For Medicare for All (single-payer universal health care system)
- Against Trump/Republican Medicaid cuts and ACA premium support reductions; supports reversing these cuts
- For expanding Medicare's power to negotiate prescription drug prices and capping out-of-pocket drug costs
Education
- For tuition-free public college and capping student loan interest rates
- Against book bans and curriculum censorship; supports preventing use of federal funds for censorship in public schools and libraries and protecting academic freedom
- For increasing federal investment in public schools, increasing Title I funding, rebuilding aging school infrastructure, and encouraging states to adopt more equitable school funding formulas
- Against dismantling the Department of Education; for reversing Trump administration cuts to the federal Department of Education
- For increasing teacher pay through federal incentives, guaranteeing collective bargaining rights for all teachers, expanding public service loan forgiveness for teachers, and increasing the tax deduction for school supplies
- For holding charter schools to the same standards as public schools and requiring charter schools to allow teachers to unionize and bargain collectively
- For guaranteeing art and music education for all elementary school students
- For federal investment in student mental health counseling in schools
- Against book bans; for federal support to school districts fighting book bans in court
- For tuition-free two- and four-year public colleges funded by federal investment, and for expanding Pell Grants to cover cost of living
- For increased federal investment in community colleges, trade schools, apprenticeships, and job training programs
- For congressional legislation forgiving student loan debt for the vast majority of borrowers, expanding public service loan forgiveness, and reversing Trump's changes to student loan programs
- For protecting veterans from predatory lending and cutting off GI Bill funds to for-profit colleges that fail to provide quality education
Environment
- For a Green New Deal; supports rapid transition to clean energy, repealing fossil fuel subsidies, and creating a polluter-pays climate superfund; took the No Fossil Fuel Money pledge
- Against new fossil fuel infrastructure; supports reinstating and expanding climate provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act rolled back by Trump
- For restoring EPA authority to regulate carbon emissions and reversing Trump-era EPA cuts
- For rejoining global climate agreements including the Paris Accords and increasing international climate aid
Civil Rights
- For abortion rights; supports codifying abortion rights into federal law in all 50 states, protecting access to mifepristone and misoprostol, ending the Hyde Amendment, funding Planned Parenthood, and protecting access to birth control and IVF
- For LGBTQ+ rights; supports passing the Equality Act to ban discrimination based on sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity; banning conversion therapy nationally; and protecting access to gender-affirming care
- For expanding veterans' mental health treatment access, fully funding veterans' homelessness programs, and reversing the Trump administration's elimination of mortgage relief for veterans
Voting Rights & Democracy
- For banning stock trading by members of Congress; pledges never to trade stocks while in Congress
- For a small-donor matching system for congressional elections (Government by the People Act)
- Against partisan gerrymandering; supports federal legislation banning it and banning mid-decade redistricting
- For fully restoring the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and federal oversight of voting laws in states with histories of voter suppression
- For overturning Citizens United via constitutional amendment to ban unlimited corporate money in campaigns
- For abolishing the Electoral College in favor of a national popular vote
- For banning members of Congress and senior staff from immediately becoming lobbyists after leaving office (ending the revolving door)
- For requiring presidents and vice presidents to place assets in a truly blind trust
- For codifying a binding code of ethics for the Supreme Court, including disclosure requirements, a complaint procedure, and banning federal judges from owning individual stocks
- For 18-year term limits for Supreme Court justices
- Against presidential immunity for criminal actions; supports passing the No Kings Act to eliminate it
- For restoring and expanding voting rights; supports reinstating the Voting Rights Act, passing the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and the For the People Act, and banning voter intimidation
Immigration & Foreign Affairs
- For a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; supports lasting ceasefire, surge of humanitarian aid into Gaza, official U.S. recognition of a Palestinian state, and diplomatic negotiations excluding Hamas from government
- Against Iran obtaining nuclear weapons; supports stopping Iran through diplomatic means rather than military strikes
- For supporting Ukraine with military and humanitarian aid; supports Ukraine's right to self-determination and holding Russia accountable through sanctions and war crimes investigations
- For abolishing ICE; supports replacing it with targeted enforcement against violent criminals, human traffickers, and terrorists without mass raids or deportations of families and workers
- For a path to citizenship for DACA recipients; supports passing the American Dream and Promise Act
- For protecting asylum rights; supports speedy processing, access to legal representation, and fair hearings for asylum seekers
- Against the Trump administration's withholding of university funding for ideological reasons and deportation or visa denial of students for ideological reasons; for protecting academic freedom
Public Safety
- Against Trump's use of foreign prisons and Guantanamo Bay for immigrants; supports shutting down immigrant detention facilities
- For repealing the Second Amendment; supports empowering all levels of government to enact gun safety laws without constitutional limitation, along with universal background checks, a federal assault weapons ban and high-capacity magazine limits, red flag laws, safe storage requirements, and ending gun industry legal immunity