Paul Fournier

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Paul Fournier
Image of Paul Fournier
Elections and appointments
Last election

June 7, 2022

Education

Bachelor's

Cal Poly Pomona, 1983

Graduate

Pepperdine University, 2003

Personal
Religion
Christian
Profession
Homelessness solutions provider
Contact

Paul Fournier (Republican Party) ran for election to the California State Assembly to represent District 34. He lost in the primary on June 7, 2022.

Fournier completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2022. Click here to read the survey answers.

Biography

Paul Fournier's professional experience includes working as a homelessness solutions provider, and a systems analyst and designer. Fournier earned a bachelor's degree from Cal Poly Pomona in 1983 and a graduate degree from Pepperdine University in 2003.[1]

Fournier has been affiliated with a local Rotary Club.[1]

Elections

2022

See also: California State Assembly elections, 2022

General election

General election for California State Assembly District 34

Incumbent Tom Lackey defeated incumbent Thurston Smith in the general election for California State Assembly District 34 on November 8, 2022.

Candidate
%
Votes
Image of Tom Lackey
Tom Lackey (R)
 
56.5
 
63,840
Image of Thurston Smith
Thurston Smith (R)
 
43.5
 
49,183

Total votes: 113,023
Candidate Connection = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
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Nonpartisan primary election

Nonpartisan primary for California State Assembly District 34

The following candidates ran in the primary for California State Assembly District 34 on June 7, 2022.

Candidate
%
Votes
Image of Thurston Smith
Thurston Smith (R)
 
31.1
 
23,663
Image of Tom Lackey
Tom Lackey (R)
 
29.7
 
22,622
Image of Rita Ramirez
Rita Ramirez (D)
 
26.8
 
20,384
Image of Raj Kahlon
Raj Kahlon (D) Candidate Connection
 
5.3
 
4,063
Image of Paul Fournier
Paul Fournier (R) Candidate Connection
 
4.2
 
3,189
Image of Roger LaPlante
Roger LaPlante (Independent)
 
2.8
 
2,122

Total votes: 76,043
Candidate Connection = 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.

Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team.

Campaign finance

Campaign themes

2022

Ballotpedia survey responses

See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection

Candidate Connection

Paul Fournier completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2022. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Fournier's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.

Expand all | Collapse all

I am a citizen, not a politician. I am a creative problem solver with a technology and business background, and a lifetime of volunteerism. I have had Real Estate and Insurance licenses. I am a lifelong learner. I have worked the last 7 years in the nonprofit sector, with the last 4 focused on helping the homeless restore their lives. My family history in California dates back to the Gold Rush.

Hablo español fluentemente.

I am a passionate and devoted follower of Jesus Christ, active in my church. I believe in the personal dignity of every human being, made in the image of God, and created to accomplish specific, magnificent things for God's glory.

I believe in personal liberty, and personal responsibility for one's own actions. I laughingly refer to myself as "slightly to the right of Atila the Hun". I am a lifelong Republican, though often disenchanted with the Republican party.

I believe the U.S. Constitution and our founding documents to be some of the most inspired writing in the history of mankind. The concept that government derives its power from the people rather than vice-versa is a history-changing concept.

  • Prohibit Medical Tyranny (e.g. mask/vax mandates, lockdowns, business closures, etc.) - For the last 2 years, with COVID as an excuse, we have been in the middle of a 3-alarm fire, and what is burning is the constitution. I will do everything in my power to ensure that no executive, agency or bureaucrat can ever again infringe on our rights as they have during COVID, up to and including a constitutional amendment requiring a 2/3 popular vote to allow any such infringement.
  • Protect Parental Authority (school choice, medical decisions, etc.) - I believe that children are a gift from God, that it is our homework assignment as parents to know our kids better than anyone else on Earth, and to create an environment for them to become who God created them to be and succeed in life. Parents are the educators; schools are the hired help. Early reading, writing and arithmetic are essential, as is vocational education. Further, parents need to be making educational and medical choices for their children - not the state and not the children.
  • Ensure Election Integrity - An election must consist of one vote per verifiably eligible adult citizen, voting voter. That is not what happened in 2020.
Without a doubt, the tyranny of the last 2 years is what gets me out the door - it must end, and it cannot be allowed to return!

  • The ability of executives and bureaucrats to give executive orders
  • Business and school closures
  • Closing of taxpayer-funded facilities
  • Suppression of preventive and early treatments
  • Suppression of research and dissenting voices
  • Destruction of doctor-patient sovereignty.
  • Perverse incentives to hospitals and doctors to produce a COVID diagnosis or death and to use dangerous or ineffective treatments
  • Mask mandates
  • Vaccine mandates - particularly for any vaccine or other medication that has not undergone testing for long-term (i.e. 10-15 years) effects or for which the manufacturer is shielded from liability for damages.
  • Social distancing mandates
  • The use of literally $billions$ of taxpayer dollars to pay for propaganda to gain citizen compliance in all of the above.
  • AND DON'T THINK FOR ONE SECOND THAT IT'S OVER!!!

I am pro:

  • Constitution
  • God
  • First amendment
  • Second amendment
  • Bodily sovereignty
  • School choice
  • Pro-life
  • Pro-human
  • Pro-police
  • Pro LEGAL immigration
  • Pro property rights
  • Pro Trump
  • Water infrastructure
  • Power infrastructure
  • A national bank to replace the Federal Reserve
I am a passionate and devoted follower of Jesus Christ. He would be my ultimate example.

On a more human level, anyone who tries to do his best for God, family and those he meets, and does so with integrity, humility and grace.
I am a creative problem solver, and do my best work in a collaborative environment.

Personal integrity is of utmost importance to me.
I have a great capacity for understanding technical and legal concepts and documents.

I have no desire to manage other people's lives.
Work to fulfill his/her campaign promises. Be open and accountable.
I would like to permanently tie the hands of those who seek to control other people's lives - in particular the violation of citizens' constitutional rights.
The Apollo 11 moon landing. I would have been 8 years old at the time. Like the rest of the world, my family and I were mesmerized.
My first job was delivering magazines. I was probably about 11 or 12 years old. I had it for a year or two.
Right now, 1984 by George Orwell. It's turning out to prophecy.
A business loss that contributed to the destruction of a marriage and the loss of nearly everything I owned created a huge identity crisis for me.
The legislature makes law. The governor serves as first a check and balance, and then as the person responsible for execution of the law.

Executive orders (including bureaucratic rulemaking), which have become so popular of late must be *severely* restricted, with clear statutory limitations and very short time restrictions, with a requirement for legislative and or popular vote confirmation.

Executive or bureaucratic orders which restrict constitutional rights should require a 2/3 vote to confirm, preferably a 2/3 popular vote or minimally a 2/3 legislative vote of both houses. It should be nearly impossible to do what was done during the COVID "pandemic".
* Government overreach and tyranny.
  • Election fraud.
  • Water infrastructure.
  • Power infrastructure.
  • The so-called "Jungle Primary" system.
The only "benefit" that I could imagine of a unicameral legislature would be relative ease of passing legislation. I consider this a negative.
While previous experience gives one a better ability to navigate the system, I believe that a citizen government (including a citizen legislature), where folks serve a short time, and then must go back out into the world and suffer the consequences of their rulemaking, is the correct model.
Absolutely yes! Dialog with people of a different mindset is a healthy thing. Everyone is more expert in something than you.
Ask a divine power to do it. Everything else is too flawed.
As I look over existing standing committees in the California Assembly, here are some that I resonate with.

Accountability and Administrative Review
Appropriations
Banking and Finance
Communications and Conveyance
Education
Elections
Environmental Safety and Toxic Materials
Health
Insurance
Jobs, Economic Development, and the Economy
Military and Veterans Affairs
Natural Resources
Privacy and Consumer Protection
Revenue and Taxation
Rules
Utilities and Energy

Water, Parks, and Wildlife
I have never had an interest in politics. I am running at this time because I feel called. It is my sincere hope that I would never fall in love with politics.
All aspects of COVID-related overreach and tyranny are what motivate me most to run. A personal story related to it:

For the past 3-4 years, I have worked helping to prevent and resolve homelessness. My first client was when I was a volunteer. I'll call him "Joe". Joe was a veteran who had been homeless for about 3 years. He had true psychosis - on any given day he believed he had killed his four living daughters. I received the call about Joe because he used to teach Sunday school at the church where I was the worship leader. Joe was at his core a good man, and I liked him a lot, but he was hard to help. Despite him being a veteran, which would make him the #1 homeless priority, it took me about 7 1/2 months working with the VA, the county and other organizations to get him off the streets. It took another 2 months to get him appropriate levels of case management and medication management from the VA, but once we did, the change was almost immediate. Within 10 days, he was reconnecting with his family, and the community, and anyone who knew him 10 years ago would know him again.

After a few months, Joe was placed in beautiful supportive housing run by the VA, attending group and individual therapy, and doing well.

Then COVID hit, and the "10 days to flatten the curve" hit, which became an excuse for all government entities to cease providing services. Working with the homeless, I couldn't get a replacement ID or Social Security Card or an appointment with the welfare office.

The VA cut off a lot of services, too, including Joe's therapy sessions. After a few weeks with no supervision, he presumably got off his meds, and wandered out his front door, leaving it wide open. He was found a few weeks later face down in someone's driveway, and treated as a John Doe at a local hospital. Eventually he died.

My client and friend died because of COVID tyranny, even though he never had COVID. To this day it makes me furious.
Mostly, lines from movies come to mind:

- The Pink Panther: Clouseau: "I thought you said your dog did not bite!" Hotel Clerk: "That is not my dog."

- Airplane: Barbara Billingsly: "Chump don't want no help, chump don't get no help."
Emergency powers should be extremely time-limited with very strict limits and high accountability and liability. Extension should require MINIMALLY a 2/3 vote of both houses, and extension of those powers past a certain time limit should require a 2/3 popular vote.
Give and take is necessary in the development of solutions. Thoroughly understanding the other person's point of view is critical. However, when I hear the word "compromise," I hear "abandonment of key principles and core values." That cannot be done.

Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.

See also


External links

Footnotes

  1. 1.0 1.1 Information submitted to Ballotpedia through the Candidate Connection survey on May 9, 2022


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