A Conversation with Dr. Robbie Goldstein
on his background as an infectious disease doctor, COVID, and challenging one of the last anti-abortion Democrats
This is the full version of our interview with Dr. Robbie Goldstein, candidate for Massachusetts’s 8th congressional district.
Primaries for Progress had the opportunity to speak with Dr. Robbie Goldstein, who is challenging conservative Rep. Stephen Lynch in Massachusetts’s 8th congressional district. The 8th is a solidly Democratic district which includes parts of Boston, affluent suburbs to the south of the city, and industrial cities and small towns further south; according to a recent poll, released after this interview was conducted but before it was published, Goldstein only trails Lynch 32% to 39%.
PFP: First, tell me a bit about yourself--why you’re running, how you got here.
GOLDSTEIN: I’m a physician, I’m an infectious disease doctor. I got here because I want to help people live a healthy life, and I want to care for communities. It’s the work I’ve been doing for all my adult life--it’s why I went to medical school, it’s why I went into internal medicine, it’s why I specialize in infectious diseases, it is the program I built [at Massachusetts General Hospital], the Transgender Health Program--it’s all been about helping communities, and helping people live a healthy life. When I started the Transgender Health Program, honestly I was surprised at what I was able to accomplish when I invested in doing the right thing and I worked really hard to lift up a community that had been left out. It gave me a lot of hope and a lot of inspiration that I could do even more if I kept working hard. I spent a good amount of time, about two years, thinking about what that means, thinking about what is the next step after I established the Transgender Health Program, and with the help of my husband and a lot of great friends and advisers, I made a decision that I was ready to jump into public service--knowing that it was still going to be about helping people, still about investing in communities, but it was going to be...a different scope, a different scale. The decision to run for Congress was because the issues my patients tell me about, everything that they’re facing, those issues require change at the federal level. I knew that I had to get into Congress, get to the House of Representatives, to get on the floor to actually make sure that their voices are heard and we can address the issues that they’re facing.
PFP: So in your own words: why are you running, and how do you make that case to voters when they ask that question?
GOLDSTEIN: I make the case by saying that this is a district, the 8th congressional district here in Massachusetts, that has changed dramatically in the past 20 years. It’s a district that’s looking for new representation, it’s a district that’s looking for change, and in particular, it’s a district that is looking for someone who really believes in and talks about Democratic values. Someone who talks about reproductive justice. Someone who understands the importance of our fight for racial justice. Someone who can have a conversation around healthcare, and bring in experience and expertise, and can make sure we actually live out that belief--that truth--that healthcare is a human right, and not a benefit for people who can pay for it. The argument to the voters is that this is a reliably Democratic district, with a Democratic constituency that is looking for a Democrat to run, a Democrat to represent them, and a Democrat to make sure that their voices are heard.
PFP: That flows nicely into my next question: clearly you have issues with the incumbent. How, exactly, do you think he doesn’t fit those Democratic values? Where do you think he’s fallen short?
GOLDSTEIN: I think if you look back in 2001, when he was first elected, I do think he represented the district of 2001. In 2020, he no longer represents [the district]. He is pro-life, and this district is overwhelmingly pro-choice. He voted against the Affordable Care Act, and this is a district that cares about healthcare expansion. He has stood against the LGBTQ community, and this is a district that has stood up for and really supported the LGBTQ community. He has really done little in [the] way of racial justice and policing reform in his 20 years, and this is a district that came out in force over the past few months to loudly and proudly say Black Lives Matter and we must address what’s happening in the police system. So on every major issue that is facing this country, he no longer represents the majority of people in this district. He no longer is speaking for these communities.
PFP: This is a two-part question--what has the reception been first from voters, and second from people involved in the Democratic Party, especially elected officials, because I’ve heard from other candidates challenging incumbents that the responses from those two groups are wildly divergent.
GOLDSTEIN: Let me explain them both to you. From the voters, what we hear is a resounding “Yes, we want change. Yes, it is time for a new representative in this district.” From all parts of this district--and it’s a very diverse constituency, with folks down in Brockton, people in the South Shore of Massachusetts, people out in the western suburbs--but from every corner of the district, people are resoundingly saying, “Yes, we want change. We want someone who represents us.” And the more they learn about Congressman Lynch’s record, the more they come on board with our campaign, because they truly do want someone who is standing up for reproductive justice, someone who is standing up for healthcare expansion, someone who is talking about race and equity in all of the policies that we put out. I will say that from elected officials across the district, and across the state, from the Democratic establishment, I don’t think the answers are all that different than what we’re hearing from constituents within the district. I will say that we are about to roll out some additional endorsements that are gonna come from folks within the Democratic Party that will show that the Democratic Party here in Massachusetts is also looking for change in the 8th congressional district, and is looking for a representative that fits better with the Democratic Party, someone who stands up for progressive values. We have certainly gotten endorsements from elected officials, our first endorsement was from [state] Representative Nika Elugardo (D-Boston) here in Massachusetts, we’ve been endorsed by state Senator Julian Cyr (D-Truro), who represents the Cape and the Islands [Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard, and Nantucket]. I believe that we will roll out even more elected support for this campaign. It is not a shock to these folks in elected Massachusetts politics that Stephen Lynch is a bit of an outlier in a congressional delegation. And when I have those conversations, they agree that his policies, his beliefs, have really stood opposed to the rest of the congressional delegation for much of his twenty years in office.
PFP: I was also going to ask about--how do you see the campaign fitting in with--there have already been three Democrats who’ve lost renomination to Congress so far this year. Do you see your campaign fitting in with those, as well as with the campaigns that were ultimately unsuccessful but challenged representatives with records fairly similar to Representative Lynch’s, like Jessica Cisneros[‘s challenge to Rep. Henry Cuellar]?
GOLDSTEIN: Absolutely, this is a campaign that shares a lot of similarities with the progressive wins that are sweeping across the nation. In particular, I look to Marie Newman, Dan Lipinski, and that race, to show that someone who no longer represents the Democratic Party, like Dan Lipinski, was primaried out of his seat by someone who was talking about the issues that matter to progressive voters. [Someone who] was talking about [reproductive] choice, was talking about gun violence, was talking about equality and racial justice--was talking about the same things I’m talking about. Looking at Marie Newman’s path to victory, there are a lot of similarities to my path to victory. I think that’s also shared with folks like Jamaal Bowman and Jessica Cisneros. I think it’s certainly shared with a large number of candidates across the country. But I think there’s something unique about our race. And that is that not only is there a progressive wave that’s sweeping the country, there’s also a doctor wave that’s sweeping the country. Cameron Webb, a physician in Virginia, won his primary [for the Democratic nomination in Virginia’s 5th congressional district]; Hiral Tipirneni, in Arizona, won her primary [for the Democratic nomination in Arizona’s 6th congressional district]--there is the added piece that I’m a physician, talking about progressive policies, at a time when we need medical expertise and to move a progressive agenda forward. I think that combination is really helpful.
PFP: I was also going to mention that other medical professionals have found success--Cori Bush is a nurse, and that was a prominent feature of her campaign this time. Way down in the weeds, in a New York Assembly race, a powerful incumbent lost to a woman [democratic socialist Phara Souffrant-Forest] who ran on, in part, her experience as a nurse.
GOLDSTEIN: I think we need, broadly, across the spectrum, we need healthcare providers, because these are the folks who are running into the fire of COVID-19 every day and facing what this country is dealing with. There’s an added piece too, where having an infectious disease doctor--this is truly my lane. How we think about COVID-19, how we think about pandemics, how we think about public health--it has resonated with voters. How great would it be to have an infectious disease doc in Washington, who can talk about this with some authority, and can make sure we’re moving forward with the right policies and plans.
PFP: Does your background as a doctor inform your policy positions, particularly on healthcare?
GOLDSTEIN: Every part of my platform, and every policy, is informed by being a doctor. It is informed by my experience with a healthcare institution, and knowing that it’s a broken system; it is informed by the stories my patients tell me at every visit; it is informed by every time I am on clinical service at the hospital and I have to experience some piece of healthcare. Every time I take care of somebody, I realize not just that it’s really, really challenging to access healthcare in this country, but that food security is healthcare, housing is healthcare, transportation is healthcare, environmental justice and climate change are all related to healthcare. I think I have a very unique perspective to see that, because I sit in a room one on one with a patient, and I hear about the fact that they couldn’t take their medicine because they don’t have enough food to take with their medicine three times a day. And until I figure out the food security piece, I’m never going to be able to control the other part of their health.
PFP: So how has the pandemic, specifically, affected how you campaign? I know it’s uprooted every single campaign in this country, incumbent and challenger, so what has that looked like for you?
GOLDSTEIN: In some ways it looks totally different from what any traditional campaign would look like, and in other ways it is exactly the same campaign. This has always been a campaign about grassroots, relational organizing. Getting out and meeting people, and having that excitement spread from person to person to person. While we can’t do that with door-knocking, we can’t do that with house parties and backyard events, we are doing that with Zoom and Google Hangouts. We are doing that with text messages and phone calls and apps on our phone so that we can connect with people. We’re taking the same spirit of a grassroots campaign, and we’re just doing it in a socially distant, physically distant, safe way. I think that this campaign, in some ways, has the added burden of having an infectious disease doctor who is the candidate; I’m very clear that we’re not going to do anything that will risk anyone being exposed to COVID-19. But I think it also gives us--we’ve thought about this longer, probably, than anyone else; I started talking about COVID in January. I started talking about how we were going to respond in late January, early February, before the rest of the country really became consumed [with the pandemic.] So we’ve been thinking about this longer than most, and I think we’ve done a really great job in making sure we still connect with people.
PFP: So what is your view of the country’s response to COVID--at the state level, at the local level, at the national level. How do you think we’ve done?
GOLDSTEIN: Not well. I don’t think that’s a surprise to anyone in this country, right? We’ve passed 5 million infections, we have over 150,000 people who have died, the number of people dying each day continues to be incredibly high. We as a nation have failed in our response. We have an opportunity to do better, and I think we can and hope we can. But from the beginning, we had a federal government that was slow to respond, and didn’t get testing out to the states that needed it. Didn’t get PPE released. Most of that was because the federal government didn’t have the public health infrastructure that it needed to do all of that work. The failure of the federal government meant states were scrambling to figure out things that the federal government should have done. And so the state response was delayed, and the state response was, in many ways, held back, because they didn’t have that partner in the federal government. And that trickles down to the cities, and the municipal governments, and whether they have what they need. This has been a seven-month tragedy that our country has had to go through. And at almost every step, you can trace it back to the fact that the federal government just hasn’t had the expertise that it needed to push forward with policy, hasn’t had the urgency that it needed to push forward with policy, hasn’t had the leadership that it needed to make sure that policy gets passed and pushed down to the states and municipal governments.
PFP: Since the presidency of Ronald Reagan, pretty much to this day, there’s been a trend of austerity and budget cuts--for example, New York was infamously forced to cut Medicaid (note: only because Andrew Cuomo refused to tax the rich) in the middle of this pandemic, and other states have had to make similar, very horrible decisions both during this pandemic and in the decades before. Do you see that as contributing?
GOLDSTEIN: Yes. Yes. I 110% feel that our failed fiscal policy and our budget cuts over the past thirty years have put us in a place where this has been such a terrible response and such a difficult experience for everyone. Just to name that specifically, and give you a very clear example: the Affordable Care Act, which is an amazing piece of legislation--and I’ll take the moment to note that Stephen Lynch is one of two Democrats left in the House who voted against that piece of legislation--but a piece of legislation that not just expanded healthcare coverage, but set aside billions of dollars in funding for public health. It explicitly said that we should invest above and beyond where we are already investing, to make sure that we were prepared for a pandemic or for a national emergency. Over the past ten years, once Republicans got control of the House, and then [even more] once President Trump came in, in 2017, we saw year after year of cuts to the public health carveout of the Affordable Care Act. And those budget cuts resulted in us shuttering offices at the CDC, pulling funding from the National Institutes of Health, closing parts of the National Security Council that were focused on our emergency preparedness. Those budget cuts meant that when the pandemic hit, we didn’t have the personnel, we didn’t have the stockpiles, we didn’t have the expertise, we didn’t have the resources to deal with the pandemic. It is a real life-or-death matter that we made those budget cuts.
(Note: there are actually three Democratic ACA no votes left, counting Dan Lipinski--but as he lost his primary, it will drop down to two in January of 2021: Lynch and Minnesota Rep. Collin Peterson. That is, of course, unless Robbie Goldstein unseats Lynch.)
PFP: Has the pandemic changed or reinforced your belief on any policies?
GOLDSTEIN: It’s amplified everything. It’s amplified every policy. In November, when I launched the campaign, we were talking about the need for public health infrastructure. In November, we were talking about the egregious measures that pharma goes through to make sure that they can price their drugs incredibly high. In November, we were talking about racial injustice in every aspect of our society. COVID-19 amplified that message, right? It showed us that we don’t have the investment in public health. It showed us that a company like Gilead could charge $4,000 a treatment course for a necessary medication to treat COVID-19. (Note: it’s actually $3,120 for private insurance programs in the United States, which is still an exorbitant and extortionary price. It is, of course, cheaper elsewhere--though $2,340 for a five-day course of treatment is not exactly cheap in absolute terms--and Gilead directly names the American private insurance system as a reason why. The US government even gets the cheaper international price; the reason most Americans pay a premium is the added layer of cost associated with private insurers.) It showed us that there is racism in our healthcare institutions, and that Black and Brown individuals in this country are more likely to [contract] COVID-19 and to die from COVID-19. All of a sudden, the message of the campaign--it was like on steroids, right? It was so loud and so clear to everyone, and not just us who were saying it on the campaign trail.
PFP: If you do defeat Congressman Lynch in the primary, this is a heavily Democratic district and you will all but certainly be headed to Congress. If you do get there, what would your first policy priority be?
GOLDSTEIN: Obviously, I want to push forward with the progressive agenda, and we’re going to have a great opportunity with what I believe will be a Democrat in the presidency, a Democratic Senate, and an expanded Democratic House majority. I think we’re gonna see us push forward with healthcare expansion, with the Green New Deal, with an infrastructure package, with further work when it comes to racial justice. The thing that I wanna do, the bill that I wanna submit to the floor of the House, the piece that I’ve been dreaming of since the day that I launched the campaign, is a bill that fundamentally redesigns the Food and Drug Administration, and ensures that the FDA has the authority it needs to control drug pricing, which is gonna help us with healthcare access and healthcare costs; that the clinical trial process has an eye towards equity, and make sure that women and people of color and older people and younger people and everyone who may benefit from a [medical] intervention has the opportunity to experience that intervention, and to be a part of that process. I would like to make sure that the Food and Drug Administration does what it’s supposed to do, rather than what pharma wants it to do.
PFP: You’ve referenced Black Lives Matter and the recent protests. Have you attended any protests?
GOLDSTEIN: I have. I have. As protests and rallies and vigils have swept the nation, and a huge number of them were happening across the district, certainly all across the city of Boston and down in Brockton, I’ve been to a number--some that were silent vigils, others that were peaceful protests; some that were thousands strong, some that were dozens strong. It was an opportunity for me to get out there and to listen. I took that as the number one goal of those. I wasn’t there to campaign, I wasn’t there to shake hands--certainly not to shake hands, during COVID-19--I was there to listen, and to learn, and to make sure that...what I was talking about on the campaign trail reflected what people were really pushing for. I’ve had a lot of opportunities in that process to listen to the folks that are really making a difference, all across Massachusetts and all across the country.
PFP: Where do you think you differ from the congressman on issues of racial justice and policing?
GOLDSTEIN: I’d almost say “where don’t I differ?” He was a sponsor of the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, but in a recent forum that we had between the two of us, he thought that that was really enough, that that was a monumental bill and it was really enough to address the racism in policing. I have made it very clear that I wanna end qualified immunity at the federal level and the state level; he’s voted to extend qualified immunity to parole officers. I’ve made it clear that we need to make sure that there is a [guarantee of] medical care for those that are detained by police, [so that] at any point if someone says, “I can’t breathe,” “I’m not well,” “I need help,” that person has the help that they need. That’s a bill that Congressman Lynch has not cosponsored. I think the bigger difference between us, though, is that I see this push for racial justice in policing [as part of] a much bigger issue. We cannot forget that the police officers on our streets were taught in our public education system. We can’t forget that they grew up in the housing that has been built around this country. We can’t forget that they have been part of a system that is racist. And until we address racism in all of those other aspects of society, it’s never gonna improve the racism that exists in policing. Congressman Lynch just doesn’t see that. He doesn’t see the importance of an eye towards racial justice--an explicit eye towards racial justice--in every bill that comes out of Washington.
PFP: Let’s circle back to the FDA redesign--
GOLDSTEIN: Be careful, because I could go on for hours.
PFP: That’s okay! You mentioned drug pricing controls, but what beyond that do you think an FDA redesign would look like?
GOLDSTEIN: Well, the FDA right now has this very narrow scope. It is supposed to safely bring a drug to market. And we haven’t really given them the ability to say that--that safety is just the bare minimum. We also need to talk about efficacy. We also need to talk about price and cost. We also need to talk about--are we pushing forward with drugs and devices that actually treat the illnesses that we need treatments for, instead of this...process that happens where [manufacturers] all pile on into these small areas [of treatment.] We need to make sure that the FDA can look at equity in the way that drugs come to market. So many of the drugs that are developed, so many of the clinical trials that happen--even though there are guidelines around this, talking about gender equity and racial equity in clinical trials--so many drugs come to market with very lopsided, very racist clinical trials that come out. A really, really great example of this is what happened in pre-exposure prophylaxis. So, to give you the brief story here, for pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) for HIV (a drug taken by HIV-negative patients at high risk of contracting HIV to reduce their risk of contracting HIV), for much of the past ten years, we’ve had a drug branded as Truvada, generically known as tenofovir disoproxil fumarate emtricitabine. So that drug was on the market for a long time. Gilead, the manufacturer, decided they were gonna quote-unquote upgrade the drug--and I take offense to that term of upgrade--and upgrade it to something that they branded as Descovy, generically known as tenofovir alafenamide emtricitabine. When they did the clinical trial for Descovy, they did a clinical trial that excluded women. They did a clinical trial that excluded a portion of our population that has 40% of new HIV infections here in the United States and nearly 50% of new HIV infections globally. The FDA should’ve had the authority to say to Gilead, “You can’t do that. You can’t do a clinical trial that excludes half of the world’s population.” But they didn’t have that authority. And therefore they were presented with data--they were presented with a decision [to make]: is this a safe drug? Does it have some amount of efficacy? And they made a decision very narrowly on safety and efficacy. I think that’s wrong. I think that our federal government and our Food and Drug Administration and our drug development process should care about equity, and should make sure that we talk about women and men and gender, we talk about Black and white and Brown, we talk about all of these issues when we’re bringing drugs to market.
Sorry to go into the weeds.
PFP: No, no, no. I love it when candidates do this. It makes interviews much more interesting. (note: I really do love it when candidates get down in the weeds on specific issues!) So is there anything else that you want to emphasize, or feel that we missed, or you just want to reiterate or hammer home, about your campaign, about the district, about your policies, about anything?
GOLDSTEIN: Yeah, the one thing that I’ll add is that this is a race that is very winnable for this campaign. We are running in, as you’ve said, a safely Democratic district. I am running on the issues that matter to the voters of this district. I am having the conversations that people want to have all across this district. And this is also a district that does not like its current representative. It’s not a district that has strong support for its current representative. There just hasn’t been that other option. There hasn’t been a viable campaign or candidacy that’s come forward. I’m hopeful and cautiously optimistic that people are beginning to recognize that, as we’ve built momentum over the past two months. People are recognizing that there’s an opportunity here, and we can do this, and we will hopefully be victorious on September 1.