And we’re back with Broad + Liberty’s Candidate Spotlight Series! Each week, we reach out to candidates all across the Commonwealth up for election to public office — an equal number of Democrats and Republicans; incumbents and challengers. We ask one question per week about public policy pressing to you. Those answers are shared on our website every Wednesday through Sunday.

Earlier this week, we featured responses from our nominees for U.S. Senate. Today, Pennsylvania’s nominees for U.S. Congress weigh in with our fourth question. Stay tuned later this week for responses from our candidates for Governor and Lieutenant Governor!

If you are a candidate for public office in Pennsylvania and would like to participate, please reach out to lsattler@broadandliberty.com.

This week’s question: The cost of gas and groceries have risen significantly for PA families. What are your specific plans to lower these prices? Will you encourage our state’s energy production to lower the cost of shipment for products on which our economy depends?

Broad + Liberty thanks the following candidates for participating in our series. Please click below to jump to the response from your district’s candidate!

• Christian Nascimento (R), Running for U.S. House, District 4
• David Galluch (R), Running for U.S. House, District 5
• Guy Ciarrocchi (R), Running for U.S. House, District 6

Christian Nascimento (R), Running for U.S. House, District 4

Gas and groceries are essential services for families, and misguided policies have exacerbated the global supply chain issues we are facing, driving prices up. The price of fuel — which impacts anything that needs to be delivered or distributed, like groceries — is impacted directly by a lack of strategic energy policy. 

I would support increased domestic energy production, while supporting a common sense, strategic approach to transitioning to alternative fuels. This would increase the supply of fuel, driving prices down.

Christian Nascimento’s opponent, Madeleine Dean, did not respond.

David Galluch (R), Running for U.S. House, District 5

As the son of a single mother, I know what rising costs are doing to working families across the commonwealth, especially in PA-05. Having to pay an additional $5,000+ for essentials like gas and groceries is crushing the average household. Furthermore, many families cannot find basic essentials like baby formula. To make life affordable again for Pennsylvanians, we must restore fiscal discipline, strengthen our supply chains, onshore manufacturing, and expand our domestic energy production soon. We must also encourage the growth of quality jobs and economic opportunity for working families so they can stand on their own with dignity.

The Biden Administration, with the help of allies like my opponent, Congresswoman Mary Gay Scanlon, has put its vision of “reform” above the needs of average families. In doing so, they have stymied our domestic energy production, leading to higher costs, supply crunches, and uncertain futures for both domestic consumers and those employed in the energy sector. 

Pennsylvania has more natural gas than Saudi Arabia. Across our nation, we possess vast reserves of energy. Instead of leveraging them to increase supply and bring down costs over the short-term, this administration has sown uncertainty by withholding drilling permits, canceling the Keystone XL Pipeline and other projects, maintaining misaligned regulations, and opting to import oil and gas from foreign producers that is dirtier than that produced domestically. Lastly, we have exhausted an alarming portion of our strategic oil reserve that is meant for emergencies, not for political expediency.

Pennsylvania’s Fifth District, like many regions across the country, has seen its productivity-enhancing employment move overseas in recent decades. The city of Chester is a great example of this. Once known as a manufacturing hub of the Greater Philadelphia region, major industries like shipbuilding, steel, and others have departed. Revitalizing these industries, as well as careers outside of those that require a four-year degree, is essential to returning stable employment and economic well-being back to our region and commonwealth.

David Galluch’s opponent, Mary Gay Scanlon, did not respond.

Guy Ciarrocchi (R), Running for U.S. House, District 6

Lowering gas prices to reduce inflation is job number one. Biden, Pelosi and Chrissy Houlahan have stifled America’s energy industry, crippling our economy, creating the highest inflation in nearly 50 years, and nearly tripling gas and energy costs.

They seem unwilling or uninterested in fixing it. I will. The good news is that the solution to lower energy costs, lower inflation, creating family-sustaining jobs and cleaner air is all under our feet right here in America. By reversing Biden’s extreme anti-energy policies, we can begin to recover.  By encouraging American oil and gas, we can lower the price at the pump — that will lower transportation costs, which will lower the cost of our groceries, clothes and everything we buy.

Restart the KeystoneXL pipeline, reissue the permits to explore and extract oil in the Gulf, speed up and modernize the permitting process, and force the Biden administration to end its harmful, unrealistic policy of telling American energy companies that the administration’s policy is to end fossil fuel use in five years.

By focusing on increasing American energy, we can increase production now and in the future, make America energy independent and lower energy costs. This will lower inflation — the cost of making and shipping food and everything else. And it will make our nation safer by making us energy independent.

Guy Ciarrocchi’s opponent, Chrissy Houlahan, did not respond.

Broad + Liberty is a nonprofit media endeavor dedicated to sharing voices and stories that are shut out of other media outlets. @BroadAndLiberty