Q&A with Bob Harvie

Democrat Bob Harvie is eyeing a Southeast Pennsylvania congressional seat held by Republican U.S. Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick for nearly 10 years. Harvie, a Bucks County commissioner and former social studies teacher, could be Fitzpatrick’s most formidable opponent yet as the GOP faces political headwinds entering the midterm election cycle. 

Pennsylvania’s 1st Congressional District, which includes Bucks County and part of Montgomery County, is one of several Republican-held seats in the commonwealth widely viewed as toss-ups. In an interview with City & State, Harvie discussed the importance of his race in Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C., as well as the affordability issues and attack ads that are defining the contest. 

The following conversation has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.

PA-1 has been the Democratic Party’s white whale for about a decade. Do the potential implications of this race – both locally and nationally – make it that much more important?

I’ve certainly heard the “white whale” term too. To me, it really is just about trying to do what I can to help the people of this district. I’ve always considered myself a public servant, from 26 years as a classroom teacher to local government to being a county commissioner. Right now, there are a lot of people hurting. It’s a lot of people who are just angry at what they think is a government that doesn't care about them and an economic system and political system that just tilted away from the everyday working-class family. There’s a lot of work we have to do to get this country back where it needs to be, and so that’s really my core focus. I understand people are excited about flipping the seat, but to me, it just really comes down to how we can make government work again. 

You mentioned your background as a social studies teacher. Do you think part of the issue with trust in government comes back to whether and how kids are taught about civics and how government should work?

The schools I taught in always taught civics; I was department chair for 20 years, so I oversaw the curriculum. But I do know there are schools that have gotten away from civics. Social studies educators have for years talked about the fact that we’ve moved away from using social studies to help kids understand critical thinking skills, the ability to differentiate facts from opinion, and also just understanding how their government is supposed to work. I certainly think we need something at a national level focused on civics education. 

I used to tell my students I was answering questions that they hadn’t started asking yet when you’re 15, 16, 17 years old. Teachers can show them how something that happened a century ago affects their lives, or how things going on in Washington can affect their lives. But there are politicians who enjoy the fact that people don’t understand how basic things work – they like to play around in those gray areas and hope people don’t notice.

We’re at a time when many are looking for something different out of the Democratic Party, particularly leaders in Washington. How do you balance that with your place in the party when speaking with potential voters? 

I’m born and raised a Democrat, my parents are Democrats and my grandparents are Democrats. I joke about the fact that I was born and raised in Bristol Borough on Roosevelt Street, so my political philosophy was determined by birth. But I have also been very clear, since even before I decided to run for Congress, that the Democratic Party has really lost its way. It’s lost touch with the people it used to rely on and who used to rely on it – working-class and middle-class voters who trusted the Democratic Party for decades to protect the right to unionize, to make sure they could get an honest day’s pay for honest day’s work, to be taken care of when it came to things like Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid. And to have a government that cared about keeping your food safe and keeping you safe on the job – all the things that made the American dream a reality. We need to get back to that. I was glad to hear (U.S. House Minority Leader) Hakeem Jeffries, when he was in the district a couple weeks ago with Gov. Shapiro, talk about the priorities for when we take back the House, which is focusing on those economic issues, focusing on the minimum wage, on healthcare, on how we can make life more affordable again for people. 

What does the word “affordability” actually mean to you, based on the conversations you’ve had during town halls and door-knocking? 

Right now, in the past three weeks or so, it’s come down to heating and oil. There’s a good chunk of people who live in Bucks County and in homes that have oil heat and they’ve shifted over to it in the past couple of weeks. I’m hearing from people who’ve told me (that heating costs have) doubled; one person told me it went up about 70%. That’s really what’s hitting right now. People worried about healthcare, especially since the Affordable Care Act tax credits were eliminated – and that’s something that Brian Fitzpatrick voted to eliminate. 

On healthcare, how would you prioritize access and affordability?

We definitely need to reinstate those tax credits and make them permanent for people. We need to negotiate with pharmaceutical companies to check prices. When we talk about people skipping a pill once in a while just to try and make them last because they can’t afford prescriptions as often as they’re supposed to get them, that’s a serious problem. 

I think we do need to allow people 55 years and up to buy into Medicare. That would increase accessibility for some people and also help stabilize that system because you’re going to get people who are going to be younger, and you need healthier people involved, not just people who are constantly using (insurance coverage). We need to attack the middlemen who get in the way of everything and jack up prices, pharmacy benefit managers and the middle steps in health insurance companies, where the first thing they do is deny you. 

I’m lucky enough to be pretty healthy. But a couple of years ago, I faced an injury, and the doctor told me: “I really need to get you an MRI, but you’re not going to be allowed to get one until you do physical therapy for a couple of months.” We both knew physical therapy wasn’t going to do anything, but the insurance company required that hoop to jump through, which cost me money and time and didn’t really help alleviate the problem. That’s getting in between a patient and their healthcare provider, which is something that health insurance companies should not be doing.

Going back to trust in government – or lack thereof – do you feel there’s a general consensus that people want to see checks, such as stock trading bans or term limits, put in place?

Cost definitely is one issue that comes up, but corruption is up there just as much. In all honesty, people just feel that their government isn’t their government anymore and that this is not a government of the people, by the people, for the people anymore. 

I’m a patriot, and was raised to love this country. I know this government and our society exist because we trust each other, and because there’s supposed to be a feeling that the government is there and will have your back. Right now, there are far too many people who just feel completely forgotten and ignored, and that if you don’t have enough money, you’re not going to be able to get the government to do anything that you want it to do. 

Yes, overturning Citizens United is huge. As is banning stock trading – and I would expand that to not just members of Congress, but also members of the executive branch, elected and appointed, and federal judges and Supreme Court justices. I also think we need to do actual campaign finance reform. We need to ban partisan gerrymandering. We should make sure that when someone serves in Congress, that they don’t just jump to a lobbying job, going from six figures to seven figures. I have a problem with that, too.

How does the concept of government accountability and lowering costs translate when speaking to Democrats, Independents and Republicans?

I think the trust in government cuts across every angle. I don’t think you’re going to find a plurality of people in any party who are going to say they absolutely 100% trust the government. I see that as a bipartisan issue as well – and that’s something certainly we’ve seen here as county commissioners; I’ve had an over 90% bipartisan voting record. One of the first things we focused on were issues regarding transparency in county government. We passed very strong whistleblower laws. We also focused on things like raising the minimum wage for employees of the county government. We have paid parental leave, so you can walk and chew gum at the same time. I think people expect results; they expect a government that is going to get things done.

The attack ads this campaign cycle have reached another level, and your race is no exception, with Fitzpatrick’s campaign continuing to call on you to release the files related to an FBI investigation in Falls Township years ago. What are your thoughts on these ads?

It is 100% a distraction. It’s 100% a distraction because they know they don’t have a record to run on. Brian Fitzpatrick’s been in office for 10 years. How can he pretend that he hasn’t had everything to do with what’s happening right now? They know if they stay in power, then things won’t change. So a vote for me really is a vote for the majority. It’s a vote for change. 

They don’t want to talk about the issues. They don’t want to talk about the Epstein files or affordability or the war in Iran or tariffs, so they’re trying to distract people, and we know it’s not working. In fact, we know in this district it’s backfiring because people are angry that their 10-year incumbent congressman isn’t talking about things he’s done to make their lives better or his ideas on how to make people’s lives better. All he’s doing is attacking me, and it’s also not working because I’m not an unknown quantity. There are literally thousands of people – young people, although I guess some of them aren’t that young anymore – who I taught, and their families, who know who I am. I’m born and raised in this county; I was a local elected official. I’ve been elected twice in this county. He’s never faced a countywide elected official before. Some people have asked: ‘How are you going to get Republicans, moderate Republicans and independents to vote for you?” My answer has been: “They already have” – it was twice as county commissioner, and they see that they’re getting good government here. We really do need change in this country, and we’re not going to change what’s happening to Washington until we change who we send to Washington.