LAST 2 WEEKS IN REVIEW

I’m your Representative in Congress and I write to keep you informed.

• Massachusetts’ healthcare services and Eds & Meds economy under siege
• Supporting detained high-school immigrant in Milford
• $Trump coin & selling off the presidency 
• Anti-Jewish violence on American streets
• 30 years of the Dayton Accords in Bosnia
• Nuclear power & offshore wind in Massachusetts
• Hands-on science instruction in Plainville and beyond
• Meeting with local entrepreneurs in Bellingham
• Memorial Day in Mansfield 

Massachusetts’ healthcare services and Eds & Meds economy under siege

The state of Trump’s Medicaid cuts: House Republicans passed a bill to cut Medicaid, raise health care costs, add $5 trillion to the national debt, and — because it was late at night and the bad ideas pile was growing, so why not — give a billion-dollar tax break to buy silencers for pistols. I voted “NO” on the worst legislation this chamber has seen in decades. Now, the Senate will debate it.

Community health center roundtable: Community health center (CHC) executives from across the MA-04 joined me to discuss potential Medicaid cuts from MAGA's “one big beautiful bill.” CHCs provide cost-effective medical care to all types of patients, from those who have employer-provided insurance to the uninsured. About half their population is covered by Medicaid, though, so they are vulnerable to even small cuts by MassHealth (Massachusetts' Medicaid agency). I am especially concerned about how this could affect health access and outcomes for children, who are 20% of the patient population for CHCs.

CHCs save money and deliver good care. At a time when health care costs are spiraling and frustration with the status quo is mounting, policy-makers should treat CHCs as a keystone solution, by expanding the reach of their primary and preventative care to more patients; stabilizing their funding streams; helping them adopt technology and experiment with different care modalities (like telehealth); and supporting their workforce through greater latitude in recruitment and scope of practice (especially letting pharmacists do more). 

The best social program is a good job: I paid a visit to Crossroads Clubhouse, run by Riverside Community Care, in Hopedale. The Clubhouse supports individuals with mental health challenges in seeking recovery through a combination of work and community. Members gain social and employment skills through Clubhouse programming and transitional support at job sites. MAGA's proposed Medicaid cuts threaten Riverside's model, which has been shown to save money by reducing emergency room visits and other care at high-cost facilities.

Ironically, my Republican colleagues claim that their policies are geared toward increasing work. I agree with the value of work: the best social program is a good job. MAGA's Medicaid policies, however, will cut the legs out from under employment-centered programs like Riverside's, while increasing health care costs for everyone.

An unprecedented freeze on international student visas: I joined Fox News Sunday to debate the Trump Administration’s freeze on international student visas. The administration is upset about Chinese scientists inventing and building in the United States. So… its solution is to send them back to invent and build in China. 

Instead of obsessing over foreign students, MAGA should work with Democrats to fix American education: one-on-one tutoring, trade schools, and a curriculum that prepares patriotic citizens and critical thinkers.

Replacing autism research with made-up AI citations: Also on Fox News, I confronted the Secretary of Health & Human Services for his quackery. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is pulling funding used by Harvard and MIT to study the molecular basis of autism. Last week, he issued a report on autism filled with fabricated scientific notations. This fatuous report bears all the hallmarks of being written by generative AI. Delegating public health to chatbots is exactly the kind of incompetence and unseriousness we’ve come to expect from our Health Secretary.

Accountability for Brad Smith: Months ago, I raised concerns about Brad Smith's self-dealing as the health care lead for DOGE. While his tenure as a special employee of DOGE may be over, Smith continues to profit off Medicare and Medicaid. For the first 100 days of this administration, he also had control over them. Americans deserve answers on that conflict of interest.

Here is what I told STAT News’ Tara Bannow in a terrific investigative piece she just published: 

“Both CareBridge and Main Street Health (his companies) are functionally just low-value, rent-seeking behavior, which is frustrating and part of why Americans are so frustrated with healthcare. But when you couple that with his incredible degree of power over HHS, it becomes, to me, a glaring conflict of interest…

“It became evident that DOGE’s health care portfolio was being run by Brad Smith, and Brad Smith’s [company] is regulated and reimbursed by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). So, he was simultaneously really functioning behind the scenes and profiting from CMS…”

RFK Jr’s right-hand man: Vanity Fair’s Katherine Eban last month wrote a telling profile on RFK Jr.’s chief of staff, Calley Means, a former lobbyist and cofounder of the health benefits company TrueMed. In May, at RFK Jr.’s urging, Donald Trump nominated Means’ sister, Dr. Casey Means, to serve as surgeon general. Together, the Means siblings have become the faces of the MAHA agenda. They are focused on sidelining career scientists to promote health supplements, which is an approach that benefits the business model of TrueMed but does not have scientific evidence to support it.

I told Vanity Fair the following: 

“Their self-designation as oracles of health care gives them license for corruption…. They are out there using tax-preferential dollars for wealthy people to buy saunas, and they are going to turn our entire health care system into one big GNC store.”

“Their self-designation as oracles of health care gives them license for corruption…. They are out there using tax-preferential dollars for wealthy people to buy saunas, and they are going to turn our entire health care system into one big GNC store.”

Supporting detained high-school immigrant in Milford

Standing with Milford: I joined Milford students and residents in solidarity after 18-year-old Marcelo Gomes Da Silva, a Milford High School junior, was detained by immigration officials on Saturday morning while driving teammates to a volleyball practice. He's enrolled in honors classes, serves as a coaching assistant for the girls volleyball team, plays for the boys volleyball team, and is a talented drummer for the school band. He’s been in America since Kindergarten, and his siblings were born here.

This administration has its public safety priorities backward. It pardons cop-beaters from January 6th but detains high-school volleyball players. It makes gun-purchaser background checks harder while pushing for tax breaks to buy silencers for pistols. This reckless behavior does not make the residents of Milford safer. 

Immigration reform should include strong border security, better visa and asylum systems, and pathways to citizenship for DREAMers. Deportation efforts should focus on individuals in jail, not students in school. I stand with the community in support of law and order, and of Marcelo.

$Trump coin & selling off the presidency 

Selling the Trump Presidency to the highest bidder: Just days before taking office, on January 17th, Donald Trump launched $TRUMP, a meme cryptocurrency. Senator Warren and I immediately raised concerns about the conflict of interest and potential corruption.

On May 22, Trump invited the 225 top investors of his meme coin to an exclusive dinner, which included those with strong ties to the Chinese Communist Party. What’s worse are the $TRUMP investors who did not attend—those who want their influence to remain anonymous, to use at a time and place of their choosing. The Senate should update its cryptocurrency bill to expressly outlaw the type of Emoluments Clause violations that the President is committing with $TRUMP.

Should foreign investors be allowed to buy Trump's personal meme coin?

Anti-Jewish violence on American streets

Antisemitic rhetoric fuels antisemitic violence: The murder of Sarah Milgram and Yaron Lischinsky by an anti-Israel fanatic, and now the horrific attack in Boulder where Jews were lit on fire, underscores the urgency in the Jewish community for both left and right to take antisemitism seriously. Anti-Jewish conspiracy is the thread that connects extremists at home and abroad, from the hard left to the extreme right. Jews have been used as a scapegoat for almost every group that pursues power by tapping into grievance. 

I met with Myrieme Churchill, executive director of Parents For Peace (P4P), which helps pull individuals back from extremism, and with the American Jewish Committee (AJC). Both P4P and AJC are using their unique expertise to address and remediate antisemitism throughout Massachusetts. 

They converge in their focus on our public schools: our state's curriculum and pedagogy must reject critical ethnic studies ideology that teaches students to understand power as a zero-sum fight between ethnic groups, as opposed to a public good meant to promote security, freedom, and prosperity for all. Explanations of history and current events based on blaming different ethnic groups are deeply unsettling to Jews and contrary to critical thinking in civics. Education should not define individuals by group, but rather empower individuals to define themselves.  

30 years of the Dayton Accords in Bosnia

Renewing U.S. commitment to peace in the Balkans: As co-chair of the House Bosnia Caucus, I welcomed Denis Bećirović, one of the three elected members of the tripartite Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The President is in the United States for a conference on the 30-year anniversary of the Dayton Accords, which ended the bloodshed and ethnic cleansing in the Balkans and provided a framework for peace and development. 

The Dayton Accords are a hallmark success of U.S. foreign policy, but this peace is under threat by Serbian nationalism and endemic corruption in the region. Milorad Dodik’s ongoing efforts to dismantle the Dayton Peace Accords and undermine three decades of fragile peace in the Balkans are deeply concerning. His turn to Vladimir Putin for support only further destabilizes the region, threatens Bosnia and Herzegovina’s sovereignty, and defies the rule of law. 

The United States and our allies cannot allow these actions to go unchecked. I remain committed to advancing peace and stability in Bosnia and Herzegovina and will continue working with our European allies to counter malign influences and uphold the principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity in the Balkans.

Nuclear power & offshore wind in Massachusetts

Controlling our own energy destiny in the Bay State: I sat down with NBC10’s Matt Prichard to talk about how Massachusetts can lower energy costs. Massachusetts is at the whip end of global markets and national politics – we count on liquefied natural gas from Trinidad & Tobago, hydropower from Canada, and offshore wind that the president is trying to cancel. The price gyrations that result from over-reliance on outside actors are bad for business and families. One part of the solution: more nuclear power for Massachusetts, which is clean, reliable, safe, affordable – and in our control.  

SEED learning: At Don's Diner in Plainville, I met with Sandra Pearl and Elizabeth Bless, scientists and teachers who founded SEED (Science & Engineering Education Development) to offer hands-on science instruction to elementary and middle school students in Massachusetts. We discussed curiosity and experimentation as building blocks for a scientific mindset; the long road back from the school closures in students' academic and social skills; how to better support teachers in the classroom; and how Massachusetts compares in its science curriculum to other states. 

I'm so grateful to Dr. Pearl and Dr. Bless for their years of dedication to science education. I will take their lessons with me as the co-chair of the Massachusetts STEM Advisory Council. Massachusetts should lead the world in science education.

Banning phones bell to bell: Newton South High Schoolers asked me questions about the state of Democrats, social media, and the rule of law at their Civics Day assembly. As always, my favorite conversation with students was about social media: the tension between free speech and making the platforms accountable for torts (Section 230), the economy of endless scrolling, and why I think smartphones should be banned, bell to bell, in the schools. 

Social media isn't going away any more than radio, TV, or the printing press. However, like all previous media, society must evolve new norms, laws, and habits that make social media conducive to truth-seeking, civil discourse, and community building. The digital natives of Gen Z are well-positioned to craft those changes.

Meeting with local entrepreneurs in Bellingham

Bellingham business owners: In Bellingham, State Representative Mike Soter introduced me to two local business owners: Tony Khoury of Khoury Industries (thermal test fixtures) and John Kauker of Antron Engineering & Machine (precision machining). Tony and John told me their stories of entrepreneurship. 

Tony immigrated to America to pursue an education and then contracted with the military to invent new methods for temperature-testing critical components. John and his brother started with two machines in their garage and have built out a factory that follows their 'rule #1' of 'taking care of the customer.' Tony and John are exemplars of risk-taking, free enterprise, and giving back to the community.

Memorial Day in Mansfield 

Memorial Day in Mansfield: I joined veterans, officials, and families in Mansfield for its Memorial Day Ceremony. I was particularly excited to bring my three children (5, 3, and 2 years old), to introduce them to the themes of service, sacrifice, and patriotism.

My remarks below:

Good morning, it’s an honor to join you today in solemn commemoration. I’m especially grateful for the invitation as I was disappointed to not be able to join Mansfield’s 250th-anniversary parade earlier this month.

Mansfield’s incorporation 250 years ago coincided with the shot heard ‘round the world, when American patriots battled King George’s troops here in Massachusetts, launching our War of Independence. The Revolutionary War started in the Bay State, but it ultimately encompassed all the colonies over eight grueling years. Men from Mansfield served and died under George Washington, marching in the Continental Army over the span of the nascent nation. They experienced heat and cold, disease and despair, hardship and fellowship, to fight for freedom and self-government. As Abigail Adams wrote: “posterity who are to reap the blessings will scarcely be able to conceive the hardships and sufferings of their ancestors.”

The Revolution can feel more removed from the modern American experience than later wars, like the Civil War or World War II, not just because of the longer passage of time but also because it was fought before photography. And yet, as America marks the 250th anniversary of the start of the Revolution this year, and as we prepare for the 250th anniversary of our nation next year, Americans from all walks of life should put ourselves in the boots of the common soldiers of the Continental Army, including those brave Mansfield warriors. 

As the Founders would write in the Declaration of Independence, these warriors pledged to each other “our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor” on behalf of ideas that, while self-evident, were not self-defending. That all men were created equal, that freedom was a birthright, were novel and fragile ideas, and they needed a force of arms behind them.

From the Revolution through today, men and women have died for those ideas so that we might live for them. In their memory, we should all pledge to one another, in the words of Thomas Paine, that we are not “summer soldiers and sunshine patriots” who will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of our country.

Question: “I'm extremely concerned about the future of PBS/NPR now that President Trump has decided to eliminate the financial support for these essential programs. I understand that the cost is $1.60 per person per year. That's all! This is NOT where it makes sense to cut funds; it's not even worth it. Can Congress pressure the administration to reverse this decision?”


 - Paula, Rehoboth 

Answer: I agree. DOGE has continually confused ‘cost’ with ‘return on investment’. Gutting public broadcasting at home, or polio vaccines abroad, or medical research & regulation, may technically reduce dollars spent in one budgetary cycle. But it deprives the public of enormous dividends: in trustworthy media, healthier families, and more. The dollars are also small. Even the National Institutes of Health, which is the world’s biggest biomedical funder, is only about 5% of the military’s budget. PBS & NPR are much smaller, still – less money than the Pentagon admits to misaccounting each year in its audits.

Democrats in Congress will pressure the administration to reverse this decision during the FY2026 appropriations process over this summer and fall. I will strongly support funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

You can submit a question for a future newsletter here. Please note that casework inquiries for federal agencies must be submitted to my website here. My casework team will respond to these in a timely manner. 

Onwards,

Jake