| Name: | Caroleene Dobson |
|---|---|
| Party: | Republican |
| City of residence: | Monroe County |
| Age: | 36 |
| Occupation: | Real estate attorney |
| Previous elected offices or applicable experience: | Member of the Alabama Forestry Commission, Board of Southeastern Livestock Exposition |
| Education: | Bachelor’s from Havard University, law degree from Baylor Law School |
| Why should district residents vote for you on March 5: | “I’m the best candidate for three reasons; one, I’m a mother, I’m raising kids here in the district, I’m not at the end of my career or life (and) I’ve got skin in the game. I want this country and this district to be better for my kids. Second, I am a real estate attorney, I have spent over a decade reviewing statutes, drafting legal instruments, I understand how laws are made. And then thirdly, I’m a political outsider; I am not a career politician, I am not running as some sort of ego trip or to position myself for some appointment, I’m running because I want my kids to have a better life.” |
MONTGOMERY, ALA. — Outside of a few years practicing law as a real estate attorney in Texas, Caroleene Dobson has spent most of her life in what is now Alabama’s Second Congressional District in Monroe County. Growing up on her family’s farm just outside of Monroeville, Dobson said she understands the struggles rural communities face in Alabama, particularly amid inflation, and said if elected, she would make lowering costs for everything from goods to gasoline her top priority.
“There are a lot of small towns in the district, and whether you’re in a small city like Montgomery or a small town like Monroeville where I grew up, the economy is a huge problem,” she said.
“You see people struggling to pay for gas and groceries; I know for me and my husband, we’ve got two kids in pre-school, and we’re using money to pay for childcare that we thought we would be able to put aside for a college fund. Standard living expenses, food, gas, electricity have increased by over 20% since 2020, so I think the economy is definitely on a lot of folks’ minds, definitely families, moms, dads that I’ve talked to.”
As to how she would accomplish that, Dobson said it was a matter of reining in federal spending and becoming energy independent.
“If I went to D.C., I would focus on cutting spending and also just balancing the budget; year after year, there are threats of government shutdown because we don’t balance the budget, so we’ve got to be more responsible in our spending,” she said. “I would also push for energy independence; we were almost there back in 2019, but if we are able to be energy independent, then the cost of goods will go down, and obviously, the cost that folks pay at the gas pumps will go down too.”
Another priority Dobson said she would focus on if elected would be to codify into law former President Donald Trump’s ‘Regulatory Bill of Rights,’ an executive order that shifted the burden of proof onto the federal government to prove wrongdoing in the case of a business being found in violation of the law, rather than the business being required to prove compliance. Championed by pro-business organizations, the executive order was repealed by President Joe Biden shortly after taking office.
In addition to codifying the Regulatory Bill of Rights into law, Dobson said she would also like to further deregulation, including further limiting the power of the executive branch of government.
“I think there are a number of small businesses throughout this district, and the government regulation is really killing them, and again, stifling the economy, stifling opportunities here,” she said. “There’s certainly national security, our border, a lot of issues that are of concern, but I think we’ve got to get the economy on a better track in order to really provide a better future for Alabama families.”
As for becoming more energy independent, Dobson argued that increasing domestic energy production would not only lower costs for Alabamians at the pump, but would also help the United States from a national security standpoint.
“We need to explore all avenues of energy sources; renewable and non-renewable, but realizing that we are not yet in a place where we can be all renewable energy,” she said.
“Right now, as long as we’re not energy independent, the folks we’re paying are, for the most part, bad actors. So here we are at the mercy of a lot of countries that are openly, or maybe not so openly, supporting terrorists. So it’s not just an economic issues, really it’s also a national security one when our funds to pay for energy are going to those sorts of nations.”
Furthermore, Dobson said other priorities of hers would be securing the southern U.S. border, fully repealing the Affordable Care Act, all of which she would do for the constituents of Alabama’s Second Congressional District, and not “special interest groups.”
“I don’t owe anything to any special interest groups, I’m doing a lot of fundraising, and that’s from friends and family,” she said.