Mike Castle
Congressman, Delaware

“Mike Castle is one of the most important voices for centrists on either side of the aisle,” said former U.S. Rep. Tom Davis (R-VA), President and CEO of Main Street. “In 1998 he was one of the co-founders of Main Street. Mike co-founded Main Street to promote thoughtful leadership in the Republican Party, to serve as a voice for centrist Republicans and to partner with individuals, organizations and institutions that share centrist values.”

“Year after year, and on issue after issue, Mike Castle has brought a pragmatic, results-oriented approach to governing,” said Davis.

“If we are going to end the hyper-partisan culture that has poisoned the legislative process in Washington, then we need more leaders like Mike Castle,” concluded Davis.

Representative Mike Castle (R-DE)

Representative Mike Castle is a former Deputy Attorney General, state legislator, Lieutenant Governor and two-term Governor of Delaware, who is currently serving ninth term as Delaware's lone Member in the House of Representatives.

Castle is the ranking Member on the Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary and Secondary Education which has jurisdiction over pre-school through high school education, including vo-tech education. Some of Castle's priorities include obesity prevention and child nutrition, Head Start and the recruitment of highly qualified teachers. Mike Castle also serves on the House Committee on Financial Services, which has jurisdiction over banking and the securities and insurance industries. In this capacity, Castle has authored legislation to protect sensitive data to shield consumers from identity theft, is working to ensure the viability of low income housing programs, is examining the impact of Sarbanes-Oxley on corporations and is studying ways to help more consumers have access to the credit they need. He is also the sponsor of legislation which would require a study on the hedge fund industry and make recommendations regarding hedge fund disclosure requirements.

Among Castle's other priorities are rail and port security, environmental protection, Amtrak reform, immigration reform, medical and diabetes research, ethics and lobbying reform, reducing the price of prescription drugs, protecting Delaware's beaches, deficit reduction and implementing his vision to turn the Chesapeake & Delaware Canal into a recreational area for biking, hiking, fishing, and running.

Mike Castle was born and raised in Wilmington, Delaware where he currently lives with his wife Jane. He is a graduate of Tower Hill School, Hamilton College and Georgetown University Law School.

Health Care Reform

Like many of his colleagues, Republican and Democrat, Rep. Castle is committed to increasing access to quality health care coverage, and reducing skyrocketing costs. Rep. Castle was disappointed that H.R. 3962 fell short of meeting these goals, and voted against the bill.

Rep. Castle believes that if we had focused on the many shared bipartisan goals, we could have passed a health reform package that took common sense steps without making financial commitments that this country is unable to afford. Such items include:

• Requiring insurance companies to end the practice of denying care based on pre-existing conditions and health status;

• Limiting abusive lawsuits;

• Supporting our Community Health Centers and safety nets;

• Purchasing insurance across state lines, encouraging state and regional exchanges to facilitate purchasing and increase transparency, and portability from job-to-job;

• Small Business pooling and Tax Credits;

• Affordability of prescription drugs;

• Eliminating the $60 billion in Medicare fraud each year;

• Rewarding efforts to prevent common disease and promote wellness;

• Enrolling those who qualify into existing programs like Medicaid and SCHIP;

• Tax benefits for needy individuals for help purchasing insurance. Unfortunately, the bill that passed the House will create new government programs costing over $1 trillion, paid for from tax increases and cuts to Medicare. Independent analysis, from the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, shows that these reforms will actually result in higher costs for patients and increase the federal debt.

Providing coverage to all Americans will not happen overnight, however Rep. Castle favors an incremental approach that expands access to health care coverage, contains costs, and limits government involvement should be at the forefront of lasting and meaningful reform. He also believes that any health care reform should include provisions that provide for increased prevention and wellness programs that could reduce many health care costs, often by preventing illness or disease before they take hold.

TARP Spending Oversight

Rep. Castle is the author of an amendment to pending Financial Services legislation that would prevent any expansion of powers given to the Federal Reserve -- aside from simply serving on the Financial Stability Oversight Council -- until the Government Accountability Office performs an audit of the Federal Reserve Section 13(3) emergency activities taken as a result of the financial crisis.

The TARP program placed the American taxpayers on the hooks for $700 billion, but at least the strings were attached to improve oversight and accountability of this program, such as the Congressional Oversight Panel, the Special Inspector General to TARP, and Government Accountability Office studies. However, GAO is not even permitted to review the $2 trillion expenditure of the Federal Reserve.

The purpose of this amendment is to require more Transparency of the Federal Reserve before they are given the expanded authorities provided under this Act.

It is unimaginable that we could allow this federal agency to continue to throw more money into the financial system until we have a sufficient report from an independent agency on the effectiveness of their past activities.

As currently written, the underlying bill expands the Fed's powers to:

• regulate all systemically significant “identified financial holding companies";

• require “identified financial holding companies” to “sell or otherwise transfer assets or off-balance sheet items to unaffiliated firms;

• to demand reports from any financial company for the purpose of assessing the extent to which the firm or any of its activities “pose a threat to financial stability”;

• give the power to place a critically undercapitalized “identified financial holding company” into bankruptcy.

• and supervise the activities of over 450 thrift holding companies previously regulated by the Office of Thrift Supervision.

The Republican Main Street Partnership (RMSP) is dedicated to promoting and building a pragmatic, thoughtful, fiscally conservative, and inclusive “Governing Majority,” where political debate is encouraged to promote solutions to improve the lives of all Americans. Embracing the full spectrum of center-right ideologies and values in order to build coalitions, RMSP is the largest organization of elected leaders who are in the mold of Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, and Ronald Reagan. For more information on RMSP, visit our website at www.republicanmainstreet.org.