Jared Thomas
Jared Thomas (Republican Party) ran for election to the U.S. House to represent Indiana's 4th Congressional District. He lost in the Republican primary on May 8, 2018.
Click here for more information on the May 8 Republican primary. Click here for more information on the November 6 general election.
Biography
Thomas holds a degree in American politics from the United States Military Academy at West Point. He served as a cavalry officer in the United States Army before receiving an honorable discharge at the rank of captain.[1]
Elections
2018
General election
General election for U.S. House Indiana District 4
Jim Baird defeated Tobi Beck in the general election for U.S. House Indiana District 4 on November 6, 2018.
| Total votes: 244,363 (100.00% precincts reporting) | |||
 = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
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Democratic primary election
Democratic primary for U.S. House Indiana District 4
The following candidates ran in the Democratic primary for U.S. House Indiana District 4 on May 8, 2018.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Tobi Beck | 34.6 | 6,467 |
| Veronikka Ziol | 21.1 | 3,938 | ||
 | Joe Mackey | 16.1 | 3,013 | |
| Roger Day | 12.4 | 2,324 | ||
| Roland Ellis | 9.2 | 1,712 | ||
 | Darin Patrick Griesey | 6.7 | 1,249 | |
| Total votes: 18,703 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
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Withdrawn or disqualified candidates
- Sheryl Shipley (D)
Republican primary election
Republican primary for U.S. House Indiana District 4
The following candidates ran in the Republican primary for U.S. House Indiana District 4 on May 8, 2018.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Jim Baird | 36.6 | 29,319 |
 | Steve Braun | 29.5 | 23,602 | |
 | Diego Morales | 15.0 | 11,997 | |
 | Jared Thomas | 10.5 | 8,435 | |
 | Kevin Grant | 4.6 | 3,667 | |
 | James Nease | 2.6 | 2,097 | |
 | Tim Radice | 1.3 | 1,013 | |
| Total votes: 80,130 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Campaign finance
The table below contains data from FEC Quarterly April 2018 reports with information on all funds raised and spent since the beginning of the 2017-2018 campaign cycle on January 1, 2017. It includes only candidates who had reported at least $10,000 in campaign contributions as of March 31, 2018.
Campaign themes
2018
Ballotpedia survey responses
- See also: Ballotpedia's candidate surveys
Jared Guy Thomas participated in Ballotpedia's candidate survey on April 6, 2018. The survey questions appear in bold, and Jared Guy Thomas's responses follow below.[2]
What would be your top three priorities, if elected?
| “ | 1) Term Limits |
” |
What areas of public policy are you personally passionate about? Why?
| “ | After spending nine years in the military, national security/defense are very important to me, and I feel that I can provide an experienced, veteran voice for those policy debates. Term Limits/Campaign Finance/Fiscal Responsibility. I view all three of these as indicators of a broken system that long ago strayed from what was originally intended for our representative democracy.Cite error: Invalid <ref> tag; invalid names, e.g. too many[4]
|
” |
Ballotpedia also asked the candidate a series of optional questions. Jared Guy Thomas answered the following:
What do you believe are the core responsibilities for someone elected to this office?
| “ | Service to District. Service to State. Service to Country. Partisan politics and bitter divisiveness are destroying our country. This office was intended to be a servant's position--a volunteer's position. We need to start electing representatives whose loyalty to this nation transcends any loyalty to political parties, lobbyists, and special interest groups. We need to elect more veterans. My campaign set a goal from the very beginning: visit the homes of at least 30,000 Hoosiers and spend less than $50,000. Instead of promising voters that I would do things differently, I'm attempting to prove to them that I'm already doing things differently during the campaign. Americans want representatives that are willing to fight for them and fight to win their vote. I'm listening to the people I intend to represent. I'm learning from them. As a younger candidate, I'm not here to tell them: "This is the way the world works." I'm here to represent them. I'm here to serve them. Above all else, the core responsibility of an elected representative is to be a servant leader.[4] | ” |
| “ | The political elite have built the walls around our nation's political process so high that few are even willing to attempt to scale them. My campaign has been about tearing them down entirely. I don't care who raises the most money. I don't care who secures the most endorsements from the establishment. Voters shouldn't either. I want the legacy of my entire district to be "we did it." We broke the game. We stood up to the political elite. We tore down the walls. We rallied behind a candidate willing to commit to just six years in office. We rallied behind a candidate that said from the very beginning that hard work and high character trump millions of dollars every single time. This campaign has been about me connecting with the district that raised me. When my time is up, I want people to look back at my brief run of political service and say: "That guy got it. That guy actually listened to us. That is what a servant leader looks like."[4] | ” |
| “ | I own a massive American flag that takes up an entire wall of my living room. This particular flag was flown over the Capitol Building on the day that I graduated from the United States Military Academy at West Point--May 26th, 2012.[4] | ” |
| “ | As a 28-year-old, I obviously get the “experience” question quite a bit. Here’s the thing… I have seen what “experience” gets us in politics, and I’m not impressed one bit—you shouldn’t be either. “Experienced” politicians continue to get “sucked in” to the mess of Washington, D.C., and they continue to forget about us back here at home. They continue to bow down to lobbyists, corporations, and special interest groups. They have proven themselves incapable of thinking for themselves, and they have proven that their only purpose in Washington is to find a way to continue to get re-elected over and over again. I believe so passionately that we need fresh faces and new ideas from a younger generation of leaders.[4] | ” |
| “ | Term limits are absolutely essential for the preservation of our representative democracy. Time and time again, our elected leaders prove their ineptitude and we continue to send them back to Washington. Those we have trusted to represent us have proven to be career politicians, beholden to special and personal interests instead of to their constituents. Politicians in Washington demonstrate more interest in campaigning for re-election than they do in creating actual change. I will support legislation that finally establishes term limits for our country’s career politicians.[4] | ” |
Campaign website
Thomas listed the following issues on his campaign website.
| “ |
Term limits National security Veterans issues Jobs & Economy That said, Indiana sets the standard for sound fiscal policy in the United States with an AAA credit rating and an actual budget surplus. While other states are raising taxes to keep up with mounting debt, Indiana continues to make smart financial choices. Put simply, we need to replicate this model for the rest of the nation. A welcoming tax environment and less regulation will incentivize businesses to move to Indiana, and hardworking Hoosiers will keep them here. I support Governor Holcomb’s “Next Level Roads Plan.” As the “Crossroads of America,” Indiana should lead the nation in quality, maintenance, and efficiency of infrastructure, and the federal government should support us in that endeavor. Infrastructure initiatives also provide the opportunity to create jobs for Hoosiers that need them, and I intend to support legislation that does exactly that. Agriculture Justice & equality America has left behind, outsourced, and drained economic opportunity (both in Rural America and in our inner cities) in favor of foreign workers. We are witnessing a decimating opioid epidemic, a breakdown of family structure, and conflicts with law enforcement in cities throughout the country. Providing new economic opportunities is the first and most important goal that our government should be working towards. Innovating—just as Hoosiers continue to do—is how we will bridge that gap and find the solutions to our current economic challenges. In order to get there, the best thing government can begin to do is reduce the strain on job producers with burdensome taxes and unnecessary regulations dictated from Washington. As a country, we also need to take a good, hard look at the way some of the laws created in the mid-1900s regarding housing, education, and the justice system in general, are still negatively impacting large groups of Americans today. Opioid epidemic Patients are over-prescribed and under-educated. This problem, of course, dates back to some false advertising by "Big Pharma" when pain pills first began being actively prescribed. One recent study found that only 62% of patients were even instructed about pain management strategies that did not involve drugs. Shockingly high numbers aren't even aware of the addictive nature of the drugs. Furthermore, while our country’s talented, caring, and dedicated doctors are now well-aware of the problems posed by opioid prescription, this wasn’t the case until fairly recently. Decades ago, one doctor performed a study on only patients under his care in his hospital. He carefully monitored their dosage and concluded that a negligible number of patients under carefully supervised care showed signs of addiction. This was one sentence in one report. A renowned medical journal published that one sentence. It was accepted as gospel. It made its way into every single medical textbook, and was taught to every single medical student for multiple decades. Perhaps one of the quickest fixes in terms of prevention, is to ensure that patients with musculoskeletal issues are referred to a physical therapist as opposed to seeing a primary care physician (who doesn't specialize in that area and may be more inclined to prescribe drugs for pain management as opposed to therapy). The military employs many physical therapists, and we were almost always referred to one for therapy before drugs were even considered. We can take this one step farther by removing the need for a physician's referral and allowing patients direct access to physical therapists. This is unfortunately only one aspect of the problem, however, and we still need to find a way to get our brothers and sisters that are currently addicted back on track and healthy. Governor Holcomb takes this complex and challenging issue extremely seriously, setting a goal for treatment facilities to be within one hour of every single Hoosier. As with so many other initiatives, Indiana is leading the charge to combat this issue and to implement the creative measures necessary to solve this problem. We also need to tackle the corporatization of the black tar heroin trade and find a "best practice" for attacking that complex issue. The vast majority of the heroin peddled in this country comes from just one city in Mexico: Xalisco, Nayarit. This is a three-part problem: 1) Opioid Addiction Prevention 2) Opioid Addiction Treatment/Recovery 3) Combatting the flawless corporatization of the heroin trade” 2nd Amendment That said, those affected by the tragedies our country has faced are tired of hearing mere condolences. They want action, and these extremely complex and emotionally-charged issues cannot be solved by Republicans or Democrats alone. Issues like this one require the complete cooperation of both parties, as this affects all of us. One of the unfortunate aspects of this debate is that the overwhelming majority of responsible Hoosier gun owners feel vilified in times like these. Hoosiers that practice safe gun ownership—using their guns for sport and for home defense—are being attacked as viciously as the deranged individuals that commit these atrocities. The vast majority of Hoosiers have done no wrong and have committed no crime. They have merely exercised their Constitutional right to bear arms. Given these recent tragedies, now is not a time to step away from this challenge. I believe there is a way to protect the American public—especially our children—by reviewing, revising, and enacting sensible gun laws (such as expanding and enhancing our background check programs), while still preserving our 2nd Amendment rights. This cannot end with a simple review of our gun laws, however. We need to undertake an education campaign that works with our communities to arm them with the information necessary to identify the warning signs of individuals who may be on the verge of committing these atrocities. We need to work to destigmatize mental illness and treat it for what it is—a disease. We need to work with our medical communities to provide them with the resources necessary to effectively treat people with mental illness. We need to work with our schools to ensure they are safe places for our kids to grow physically and mentally. Our teachers, guidance counselors, and administrators need to receive continual education to recognize and respond to at-risk groups within the student population. We need to effectively deal with bullying, and help foster a school community that seeks to reduce the chances for individual students to become isolated and radicalized in their thinking. This complex issue requires a societal approach that includes so much more than gun laws. Elected leaders should not be hesitant to tackle this problem. We must do something now—the future of our country and the safety of our children demand action. Abortion However, the landmark case of Roe v. Wade made abortions legal across this country and gave women the right to choose. In Indiana, we took this decision in stride, and set our sights on helping as many women as possible choose life. Our focus has shifted to sex education and pregnancy prevention, and our state legislators have ensured that women seeking an abortion are well-informed about all other options available to them, such as adoption. Our informed consent brochure shows a fetus at various stages of a pregnancy and explains the risks and complications that sometimes come with an abortion procedure. Finally, abortion providers in Indiana are required to offer the mother the opportunity to view an ultrasound and listen to the child's heartbeat, if possible. As a result, Indiana's abortion rate has dropped for eight consecutive years, down to 7,277 in 2016 compared to 16,505 in 1980. Statistics show that abortion rates in countries where abortions are illegal are relatively the same as in countries where they are legal, indicating that banning the procedure does very little to prevent women from seeking it. Additionally, the mortality rate of mothers receiving abortions in countries where it is illegal is significantly higher. Indiana acknowledges the pro-choice ruling of the United States Supreme Court, but remains committed to leading the way in the effort to fight for the rights of the unborn by empowering women to choose life. So will I. [4] |
” |
| —Jared Thomas for Congress[5] | ||
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms Jared Thomas Indiana Congress. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
- United States House of Representatives
- Indiana's 4th Congressional District election, 2018
- Indiana's 4th Congressional District
Footnotes
- ↑ Jared Thomas for Congress, "About," accessed March 10, 2018
- ↑ Note: The candidate's answers have been reproduced here verbatim without edits or corrections by Ballotpedia.
- ↑ Ballotpedia's candidate survey, "Jared Guy Thomas's responses," April 6, 2018
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
- ↑ Jared Thomas for Congress, "Issues," accessed March 10, 2018
