20 | OCTOBER 15 • 2020 

E

ric Esshaki is running 
for the House seat in 
Michigan’
s 11th District 
against incumbent Haley 
Stevens. Esshaki, a Chaldean, 
has a background 
in nursing and 
earned his law 
degree from the 
University of 
Michigan. He 
worked at a New 
York law firm before returning 
home to Birmingham in 2018, 
where he lives with his family.
He told the JN he’
s running 
because “we have politicians 
who care more about advancing 
their own political career than 
they do about talking about 

policies that will actually make 
the lives of Michiganders and 
Americans better.
” 
Here are highlights of the JN’s 
Zoom interview with Esshaki 
(edited for clarity and length).

HEALTHCARE
We need a policy that’
s focused 
on bringing costs down. One 
way is to have more free market 
principles involved in healthcare 
and more competition based on 
cost. I also think we need to get 
back to risk-based premium set-
tings so people can choose the 
plan that works for them. 

COVID-19
All levels of government lacked 

leadership in dealing with 
COVID-19 ... We closed 100% 
of our economy when we knew 
only about 20% of the popula-
tion is at very high risk from the 
virus. Simultaneously, we did 
little to protect that vulnerable 
20%. We need to focus now on 
keeping our economy going and 
continuing to open things up 
safely. 

IMMIGRATION
We need to make legal immi-
gration easier by creating a 
path without current hurdles 
and expenses. I also think we 
need to make illegal immigra-
tion harder, which requires us 
to first ensure we’
re securing 
our border. Prioritization for 
immigration should be given to 
those suffering persecution as 
religious minorities. 

ANTISEMITISM
It’
s important that we treat 
everybody with dignity and 
respect. But there are other steps 

we must take as a government, 
particularly when it comes to 
the boycott movement that we’
re 
seeing on college campuses. 
We should ensure that federal 
contracts and federal funding do 
not go to institutions that pro-
mote racist culture in any way.

RACIAL JUSTICE
No matter who you are or 
where you come from, you may 
have obstacles. But part of the 
American dream is the fact 
that you can overcome these 
obstacles. We’
re doing ourselves 
a huge disservice when we say 
there’
s a couple of bad apples 
in law enforcement, so all law 
enforcement must be that way. 
The notion that we should be 
defunding police when we’
re 
facing civil unrest across this 
country, largely by folks who 
are using race as a pretext to 
advance a political agenda, that’
s 
just wrong. 

More at www.thejewishnews.com.

Eric Esshaki
Republican newcomer in the 11th district 
talks to the JN about his priorities.

SARAH WILLIAMS CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Eric Esshaki

