E. W. Jackson, the Republican candidate for lieutenant governor of Virginia, said he opposes emergency federal aid in the case of natural disasters during his unsuccessful bid for U.S. Senate last year.
In response to a question regarding the role of government “in helping folks following predictable natural disasters,” Jackson replied: “I don’t think that the federal government has much of a role at all constitutionally, at all.”
“I think as a constitutional matter the federal government doesn’t have a whole lot to do with that,” he continued, lamenting that “we’ve turned the federal government into a kind of God and you turn to the federal government for everything.”
“We don’t need the heavy hand of federal government stepping in every time something goes wrong,” Jackson said. “I don’t think there is any constitutional authority to do it.”
