LAST 2 WEEKS IN REVIEW

I’m your Representative in Congress and I write to keep you informed. I wish everyone a Happy Juneteenth.

• Protecting posse comitatus: the military should not be used for law enforcement or politics
• What Congress must decide – striking Iran’s nuclear sites. What’s agreed: Iron Dome for Israel
• Probing corruption & conspiracy of healthcare executives in the Trump Administration
• Both parties must reject hate crimes & political violence 
• Milford teen free from ICE detention
• Questioning the Secretary of Energy on GOP cuts to wind, geothermal, and nuclear power
• Awards at the U.S. Capitol 

Protecting posse comitatus: the military should not be used for law enforcement or politics

Lieutenant in Twentynine Palms. 2012

Trump is putting Marines in an unfair position: As a former Marine captain who commanded infantry at Twentynine Palms, I know the Marines sent to Los Angeles deserve better than Donald Trump’s corruption and Pete Hegseth's incompetence. In an op-ed in The Washington Post, I outlined how these Marines are trained for urban warfare abroad, not crowd control at home. 

Here are excerpts from my op-ed: 

“The president’s deployment of Marines to Los Angeles is not only unnecessary and illegal. It is also unfair to the Marines themselves…

The sergeants and corporals who will be the close-in tactical leads in the city are trained in Military Operations on Urban Terrain. MOUT is not urban policing, which is what the Los Angeles Police Department practices. Instead, it involves cordoning off a section of a city, clearing each building with fire and maneuver, and then controlling lines of fire to suppress the enemy in the next section of the city. The population is treated in accord with the law of armed conflict, not the Bill of Rights. It is combat, not crowd control. Property, public or private, is collateral damage…

If and when a judge agrees with me on the illegality of this order, the battalion commander must immediately return his Marines to the barracks…

Certainly, all people and property should be protected. Protest is legal; rioting is not. Violence or destruction should be met with arrests. The LAPD is well trained and equipped for that mission…

As this president grasps for every political advantage, he is attacking not just the Constitution but also the morale and mission of one of this country’s greatest institutions, the United States Marines.”

Virtual town hall with Protect Democracy: More than 500 constituents joined me for a Zoom town hall on upholding the rule of law. I invited Justin Vail, from the non-partisan, non-profit organization Protect Democracy. Vail shared with us the lessons from authoritarian power-grabs in other democracies. Most important is that would-be dictators in democracies are constantly spending their political capital to test the bounds of public opinion.

Can I get away with this? What about that?

Every time they notch a win, it emboldens them. Every time they get rebuffed, they lose political capital. This is why disciplined, cross-sectoral pressure against the president's 'flood the zone' strategy is so vital. The courts, civil society, state governments, and Democrats in the minority have been beating back the administration on due process, DOGE, and health care. Not every time – but enough times that he is depleting his political capital. This is why Trump is now picking a fight with Los Angeles; whenever he feels public opinion turn against him, he tries to steer the national conversation to immigration.

We must keep up the disciplined, cross-sectoral public pressure, because it works. The deficit in this strategy right now is Congress, because Republicans are sidelining the most important institutional check and balance on the president. Only the midterms can bring Congress back into its constitutional role, by electing Democrats into the majority where we will conduct oversight, investigations, and reforms of this out-of-control presidency.

The expensive birthday party that George Washington would not have attended: Last weekend’s parade was not about the 250th anniversary of the United States Army; it was an expensive birthday party (tens of millions of dollars) for the Dear Leader. 

George Washington refused to politicize the Continental Army at this nation's founding. In 1783, Washington’s senior officers came to him and said, 'We want you to overthrow the Confederation Congress.' (Congress was unpopular then, too.) But Washington refused. 

In the Newburgh Address, the future president was righteous and unwavering: he respected civilian authority over the military. It was one of the great moments in the history of Western democracy. And now we have a president who, clearly ignorant of that history, is trampling on that very tradition. 

Do you approve of the deployment of Marines to Los Angeles? 

What Congress must decide – striking Iran’s nuclear sites. What’s agreed: Iron Dome for Israel

Preventing a nuclear Iran: The conflict between the State of Israel and the Islamic Republic of Iran is fluid. As the situation develops, here are some principles that are guiding me:

• Israel is not starting a war but seeking to end one. Iran began this war decades ago, first with proxy terrorists in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Yemen; then with direct attacks on Israel; and now with a rush to gain the means of nuclear annihilation of the Jewish state. 

• Israel is not asking for U.S. troops and we should not send any, but America is not neutral in this conflict: Israel is our ally and the Iranian regime is our enemy.

• The United States should support Israel’s aerial defense with Iron Dome and ballistic missile defense. Congress has authorized and appropriated this purpose.

• Aerial dominance over Iran is a once-in-a-generation opportunity that Israel and the United States should leverage. If the president believes that U.S. deployment of bunker-busting bombs to eradicate Iran’s nuclear enrichment is feasible and appropriate, he should make that case to Congress with detailed briefings. Only Congress can authorize a strike against Iran.

• The regime of the Islamic Republic is an American enemy, but the Iranian people are not. The United States should support Iranians organizing for freedom, security, and prosperity against the repressive Ayatollah.

Probing corruption & conspiracy of healthcare executives in the Trump Administration

Collecting receipts & preparing investigations: I sent letters calling on the boards of health companies True Medicine (TrueMed) and Main Street Health to provide information regarding conflicts of interest surrounding their founders’ roles as special government employees overseeing health policy for the Trump administration: Calley Means of TrueMed, and Brad Smith of Main Street Health.

Mr. Means currently serves as a White House Advisor and as a Special Government Employee detailed to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. As a leading policy-maker behind the Trump Administration’s “Make America Healthy Again” (MAHA) initiative, Mr. Means has significant influence in both regulation and legislation. 

Mr. Smith served as the head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) until his reported departure on May 29, 2025. In this position, Mr. Smith was reportedly the primary official responsible for planning and implementing the major reduction-in-force (RIF) at HHS.

In these letters, I raised concerns that, as special government employees, neither Mr. Means nor Mr. Smith were required to recuse themselves from their private business interests or obtain ethics waivers. In these letters I cited concerning instances of self-dealing:

• Mr. Means’ TrueMed creates partnerships with businesses to sell health and wellness products, many of which are not FDA-approved. TrueMed offers  “letters of medical necessity” (LMNs) that enable patients to use pre-tax dollars from their Health Savings Accounts (HSA) to purchase these products. The Executive Order establishing the MAHA commission ordered health agencies to promote this application of HSAs, ultimately suggesting increased revenue for companies like TrueMed. The ‘One Big, Beautiful Bill’ also promotes the use of HSAs. 

• Mr. Smith’s Main Street Health’s biggest investors are regulated by or transact with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), including the largest Medicare Advantage Organizations (MAOs): UnitedHealthcare, Centene, CVS Health Ventures, Elevance, and Humana. These MAOs benefited from the Administration’s reduction in oversight and increase in reimbursement, as well as from Mr. Smith’s ability to win favor with CMS by protecting personnel from RIFs

I called on the boards of TrueMed and Main Street Health to explain the apparent conflicts of interest involving their executives and the steps they took internally to prevent self-dealing, as their founders gained control over our nation’s public health agencies.

Removing our nation’s leading epidemiologists from the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program: Purging scientists from the panel that advises on immunizations is the next step in RFK Jr.'s attack on vaccines. Now, he'll move to add autism, or other conditions, to the table of injuries for the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. RFK Jr. campaigned on the claim that "no vaccine is safe and effective," and now he's governing to steamroll the development, distribution, and adoption of vaccines in the United States. Contagious disease will spread as a result. 

I have successfully initiated one bipartisan oversight effort of RFK Jr. regarding drug-pricing, and will seek to build on that effort to push back on the Secretary’s conspiracy and quackery, and to insulate scientists from politics. It is an uphill effort because congressional Republicans have thus far been unwilling to challenge the administration’s public health fiascos.

Both parties must reject hate crimes & political violence 

Standing in bipartisan solidarity against antisemitic violence: On Sunday, a brick with ‘Free Palestine’ written on it was thrown through the window of The Butcherie, a kosher grocery store in Brookline. I visited with the grocery store’s owner to express my support along with State Senator Cindy Creem and Brookline State Representative Tommy Vitolo, whose statement in response was a model of political leadership against hate. Jewish Americans are everywhere seeking firm, bipartisan actions against the onslaught of antisemitic incidents.

The Speaker and Minority Leader led a vigil on the Capitol steps, which I joined, for Sarah Milgram and Yaron Lischinsky, two Israeli Embassy staffers murdered by an anti-Jewish terrorist. I also joined the Newton chapter of Run for Their Lives, the same organization that was targeted in Boulder. The next day, in Washington, I met with the leadership of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations and then voted for two resolutions condemning antisemitism and anti-Jewish violence. 

Across these engagements, from Brookline & Newton to the Capitol, the most critical theme was the imperative for members and leaders of both parties to condemn anti-Jewish incidents from within their own partisan ranks.

Heightened political violence and hate crimes: The political terrorism that took the lives of Minnesota Speaker Emerita Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark is a tragedy and a warning. The demonization and conspiracy in our discourse must stop. Everyone must condemn hate, extremism, and violence.

I mourn for Melissa and Mark, and for their two children who must bear this horrific loss. I am keeping State Senator John Hoffman and his wife Yvette in my thoughts as they are treated. The gunman must face the full measure of justice for this despicable act.

Milford teen free from ICE detention

Our immigration system is broken: Marcelo Gomes Da Silva, the 18-year-old Milford High School student detained by ICE on his way to volleyball practice, was released after six days. I joined Marcelo upon his release as he spoke about the conditions of his detention. I then inspected the facility for myself alongside Congressman Seth Moulton. The facility is designed for short-term processing and is not suitable for a six-day detention.

There are about 12 million individuals in America without documentation. Even under the administration’s objective of deporting 3,000 of those individuals every day (not clear that’s feasible), the arithmetic is clear that not even a third of those individuals could be deported this term. Hence, prioritization. Focus on lawbreakers and persons who threaten public order. An honors student who came to America in kindergarten should not be targeted.

Our broken immigration system is failing immigrants, law enforcement, and the American taxpayer. Unfortunately, rather than work with Congress to fix it with bipartisan reforms that have broad support, this President continues to demonize immigrants like Marcelo to distract from his failure to lower prices for Americans.

Focus on national immigration reform, not DC ‘gotchas’: I voted against a series of bills regarding immigration, policing, and voting in the District of Columbia. Since Congress has more control over the District of Columbia (DC) than over the states, Republicans often use DC governance issues to nationalize local issues. If I were a DC city councilor, I would have opposed some of the measures that the city has adopted regarding immigration, policing, and voting. I am not, however, a city councilor in DC; I am a congressman from Massachusetts. Congress should focus on national immigration reform measures and let DC govern itself. 

Questioning the Secretary of Energy on GOP cuts to wind, geothermal, and nuclear power

Unlocking nuclear, geothermal and wind energy: I questioned Secretary of Energy Chris Wright during a hearing before the Energy Subcommittee, pressing him on the GOP’s proposed cuts to wind, geothermal, and nuclear energy in the “One Big Beautiful Bill.” Targeting the wind industry with permitting moratoriums because the president dislikes wind turbines off his golf courses is the kind of capricious policy that deters investment and undermines U.S. energy dominance. Secretary Wright and I agreed on the importance of geothermal and nuclear, and he sided with congressional Democrats over Republicans on the importance of the Loan Programs Office and tax credits for these two vital energy sectors.

Congressional Art Competition: Congratulations to Emily Nie, a junior at Newton North, who won this year's Congressional Art Competition for students in the Massachusetts Fourth. Emily came to the Capitol with her mother for the national event, and I spoke to her about her art and her plans after high school. I look forward to seeing Emily's artwork in the congressional hallway as I walk to votes over the next year.

The Congressional Award: The Congressional Award is a non-partisan charity founded by Congress in 1979 that aims to recognize and promote excellence in young people. I was pleased to meet with Medfield's Arianna Fowler, a recent Harvard graduate, who earned a gold medal through community service as a geriatric center volunteer and through achievements in physical fitness and personal development. I'm proud of Arianna and wish her the best as she applies to medical school.

PBM Accountability Project: With allies across the country, I've been battling the pharmacy benefit managers, which are the middlemen of drug-pricing, owned by the health insurers. There has been real progress – but so much more to do to lower Rx drug prices, promote innovation, and take on the monopolies at the heart of health care. I was proud to receive the PBM Accountability Project’s 'Accountability for Middlemen Award' and am committed to continuing the fight.

Question: “How can I as an individual support the Build America Caucus or assist you as a member of that caucus?"


 - Susan, Seekonk

Answer:  I was a founding member of the Build America Caucus, which is focused on expanding the supply of housing, energy, medical care, and other social goods in order to reduce their prices. An economic playbook that only regulates supply and subsidizes demand will lead to inflation. Think housing. Zoning and permitting laws restrict supply. Housing vouchers subsidize demand. The confluence of these programs leads to housing inflation that is crushing the middle class. States and cities must focus on building more housing to lower the price of housing, which means reforming land use, parking, and permitting laws. Vouchers, mortgage subsidies, and other demand-side programs are still important to expand access, but they must be complemented by increased supply to have the intended effect.

One of the best ways to support these aims is to get involved with local housing politics and policy. Show up to town meetings and advocate for multi-family housing; walkable, mixed-use development; accessory dwelling units; an end to parking minimums; and reforms listed in the Unlocking Housing Production report.

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