Steve G. Parsons

His campaign website calls for eliminating trade tariffs, which it says raise prices and cost American jobs.^8,9

1. Lower or remove most tariffs
2. Targeted tariffs on some countries or goods
3. Broad tariffs on most imports

His campaign website says the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement added regulations that raised car prices, and describes protectionism, through trade deals or tariffs, as a cause of inflation and job losses.¹⁰

His campaign website says the Federal Reserve should drop the goals Congress gave it in 1977 (maximum employment, stable prices and moderate long-term interest rates), focus on keeping the banking system sound, and be sharply limited in its ability to create money, such as by a rule tying money-supply growth to economic growth.^8,11

His campaign website calls for cutting federal spending and says nearly every federal agency should be cut or eliminated, with a transition plan for each.^8,12

1. Increase overall federal spending
2. Hold overall spending near current levels
3. Cut overall federal spending
4. Cut spending enough to balance the budget within 10 years

His campaign website says the tax code's problems can be solved with a flat tax, which it says would allow the IRS to be eliminated.¹²

1. Replace the current income tax with a single flat rate or a national sales tax
2. Cut rates further, including the top rate
3. Keep current rates
4. Raise rates on high incomes only (for example, above $400,000)

His campaign website calls for cutting what it describes as $181 billion a year in corporate welfare, including grants, loans and tax breaks for businesses.^13,14

1. Expand breaks for investment, research and hiring, such as larger research credits for small businesses
2. Keep current business tax breaks
3. Cut back many of these breaks and use the money for lower tax rates, deficit reduction or other priorities

His campaign website lists the Department of Education among the federal agencies to cut or eliminate and says the Constitution gives the federal government no authority over education.¹²

1. Close the department and move or end its programs
2. Shrink it and give states more control over federal school money
3. Keep the department and its programs, or expand it

His campaign website says rules on transgender athletes in sports should be set by the states, not the federal government.¹²

1. Require teams based on sex at birth
2. Let each state decide
3. Let schools or sports organizations set rules case by case
4. Teams based on gender identity

His campaign website lists FEMA among the federal agencies to cut or eliminate, saying its spending has grown sharply and that it subsidizes wealthy people in high-risk areas.^12,14

1. Shift most disaster costs and response to states, and shrink or close FEMA
2. Keep FEMA's role, with changes to speed up aid
3. Expand FEMA's funding and role, including more help preparing before disasters

His campaign website calls for cutting the bureaucracy around green cards and work visas, granting more of them to fill job openings, and adding immigration staff paid for by an expedited-review fee.^8,15

1. Admit more immigrants, such as by adding work visas or clearing family backlogs
2. Keep green cards and work visas near recent levels
3. Admit fewer immigrants than in recent years
4. Pause most new legal immigration for a time

His campaign website says federal welfare and safety-net programs should be limited to citizens.^8,15

1. Let some immigrants without legal status qualify too, such as children or longtime residents
2. Let refugees, people granted asylum and other lawfully present immigrants qualify along with citizens and green card holders
3. Keep the 2025 limits, under which mainly citizens and green card holders qualify
4. Limit benefits and services mainly to US citizens

His campaign website calls for ending the rule that requires many undocumented immigrants to leave the country for three or ten years before applying to enter legally, and for a clearer path to permanent residency for longtime immigrants.^8,15

His campaign website calls Social Security a failed program but says Congress has an ethical duty to work harder to avoid cutting retirement benefits, and favors options such as investing the trust fund in index funds, expanding personal retirement accounts and letting people voluntarily leave the system, rather than raising taxes.^8,14

His campaign website says drugs should be legalized as much as possible, that any drug laws should exist only at the state level, and that treatment is more cost-effective than prison for drug users.^6,16

His campaign website says the U.S. should stop being the world's charity, noting that it gives aid to 169 countries, including some it also sanctions.^8,17

1. Restore or increase foreign aid, including programs cut in 2025
2. Keep foreign aid near its current level
3. Cut foreign aid further or end most of it

His campaign website says current levels of U.S. military spending and overseas commitments cannot continue and that the U.S. should stop acting as the world's police.¹⁷

1. Increase military spending
2. Hold it near current levels, adjusted for inflation
3. Cut military spending

His campaign website describes NATO and other U.S. defense treaties as entangling alliances and questions what the U.S. gains from its commitment to defend small member countries.¹⁷

His campaign website calls for ending the war with Iran as a step toward lowering inflation.⁸

His campaign website says the Renewable Fuel Standard and other federal biofuel policies should be eliminated, leaving the choice of fuels to companies and consumers.¹³

1. Expand biofuel use, such as by allowing E15 sales all year
2. Keep the current requirements
3. Lower the requirements or end the Renewable Fuel Standard

His campaign website says the U.S. should eliminate its sugar subsidies and quotas, which it says keep U.S. sugar prices about double those in the rest of the world, and, in its account of his October 2026 debate, says much of the money in federal farm programs goes to the largest farms and points to New Zealand, which ended farm subsidies in 1984.^13,18