Evergrain’s Rae Starts Write-in Campaign to Inspire New Generation

Douglas Rae, 24, the owner of the Evergrain Bread Company on High Street in Chestertown said he entered the race for Maryland’s First District to Congress to represent a generation of Americans largely ignored by a majority of older politicians. He said his generation will be burdened with the decisions being made  by politicians who are generally disconnected from young adults.

“I represent an entire generation that is going to be left holding the bag on all the decision being made today,” said Rae, who is running “unaffiliated” as a write-in candidate. “I’m hoping to give voice to a generation that is not being heard.”

He said the only way the US will be able to shore up its obligations on Social Security and Medicare and balance the budget is to scale back expenditures abroad.

He said he wants the programs that taxpayers have paid into to be solvent and available when Americans retire. “And if that means spending $350 billion less to upgrade nuclear weapons over the next decade, that’s perfectly fine with me.”

“Social security is going to run out as far as my generation is concerned,” Rae said. “We’re not even looking at Social Security being around in my time, not with the current way things are being handled in Washington. So we don’t need to be sticking our noses in international issues that divert our attention and our resources offshore.”

He said a focus on “domestic prosperity instead of international policing would help put [our fiscal house] in order and spur economic growth.”

Carrying a mixed bag of what is considered ultra-liberal and ultra-conservative views, Rae says the polarization of the two major parties is a complete waste of time and results in ineffective government.

On his liberal side, Rae supports widely available contraception, supports a woman’s right to choose, up until the point where a baby could live healthy outside of the mother, and he rejects Vice Presidential Candidate Paul Ryan’s plan to privatize health care.

“You can’t make people’s health and well being a first priority in a for-profit health care system,” he said.

He supports same-sex marriage and holds firm that the government has no right to weigh in on the personal decisions and choices of citizens.

Rae is also not a big fan of privatizing social security.

“I believe in the separation of church and state and I also believe in the separation of corporations and state,” Rae said. “I don’t want this country to become a company.”

But Rae parts ways with the Democrats on the monolith of tax and regulatory burdens that discourage small business growth and entrepreneurship.

Rae has a serious fiscal conservative bent, which focuses on accounting for every penny of government revenue and expenditures—as he must to operate his bakery.

He said the level of taxation should be just enough to fund the domestic commitments that taxpayers have paid into and maintain an adequate national defense—but the tax and regulatory burdens on small business should be scaled back to help sustain small businesses and inspire the creation of new ones.

He said the tax and regulatory burdens at the state, local, and federal level are major impediments to starting and operating a small business.

“The burdens are significant at every turn,” Rae said.

Rae says he doesn’t expect to win the First District but he wants his candidacy “to inspire more young people to get involved” because of the disconnect older leaders have with the younger generation.

“Things are developing so rapidly and the older generation is fundamentally disadvantaged to adapt quickly enough and foresee the issues 10,20, and 50 years down the road that my generation will have to deal with.”