Walker pushes blockchain technology in 4th Congressional District race | News, Sports, Jobs

Harrison Epstein, Daily Herald

For voters weary of the two-party system, there is a third option. January Walker is running for Utah’s 4th Congressional District race, and the United Utah Party candidate expressed that she is ready to “unseat” incumbent Rep. Burgess Owens.

“I think we know the darker job performance coming out of the two parties. If a person doesn’t, I encourage them to look at the voting records and everything that’s happened in the last 100 years,” Walker told the Daily Herald. “The economy is huge, but even looking at our current representation, how many politicians this election are addressing inflation? They’re campaigning on it, but they haven’t proposed a single solution to fix inflation.”

In 2021, Walker held a listening campaign, speaking to over 1,000 people to hear which issues mattered most to them.

“I built my platform based on that feedback, so everything that’s on the site is Utah-incentive,” she said. “Instead of just saying here are my ideas, it shows what is a priority for you.”

Walker discovered that water, inflation and election security were the highest priorities for the public. She believes her experience from the technology industry enables her to find solutions.

Harrison Epstein, Daily Herald

“I build multimillion dollar products to solve multimillion dollar problems. I feel like the government has multimillion dollar problems and just to be able to take this skill is going to be huge,” Walker said.

Walker’s love for technology isn’t just felt through her campaign, it can be seen.

A personal robot can always be seen with Walker during campaigns, even when he marches in Ephraim’s Scandinavian festival, which she said was a delight for those in attendance. She has left it up to the public to name the bot on the campaign website. For now, she calls it February – because it follows January.

Walker’s answer to addressing inflation, health and identity security issues can be found in new technologies, particularly the blockchain.

“Just from a purely economic point of view, the main reason we haven’t been able to get our government spending under control is because there’s no accountability, they don’t know where the money is going, and they’ve made all these deals over the years,” Walker said. “When you link government spending to the blockchain, we can see where all the money is going, and that suddenly makes it auditable. … Once you take care of all that, you can start cutting expenses and cutting expenses and being more responsible.”

Harrison Epstein, Daily Herald

If blockchain was implemented in government, Walker believes the national debt could be eliminated within two or three decades.

Josh Jay, Walker’s campaign manager, acknowledged that the concept of blockchain may be difficult for some members of the public to accept. He compared the introduction of blockchain to the internet.

“If you look at the Internet, in 2000, people were asking, ‘What is the Internet?’ In 2022, people are asking what is the blockchain,” Jay said. “Even now, I don’t fully understand how the internet works, but I understand the utility. I don’t fully understand blockchain, but I understand the utility, and in 10 years we will all understand the idea of ​​blockchain.”

Walker added that blockchain identity is a future that will protect the average person’s identity, especially from large social media companies and their collections of personal data.

Unlike Democratic candidate Darlene McDonald, who was certain she would debate Owens, Walker does not believe the incumbent will participate in any debates.

Harrison Epstein, Daily Herald

“Based on his current behavior, I don’t think he could handle me in a debate, and I think he knows that, so I don’t think he wants to debate,” she said.

Walker discussed an incident on the 2020 campaign trail for Owens when, at a town hall meeting, he asked a Utah Democratic Party staffer to respect their elders, after he questioned the then-candidate’s finances.

Walker stands out from other candidates because she says her campaign is built on solutions, unlike others.

“I’m sitting here going ‘okay, these are the things that affect inflation, these are the things that we can quickly get implemented to help’, and if Burgess Owens gets in touch today and says, ‘Hey, I hear you have some solutions , “I can put this race aside and put the people first.”

Walker, Owens and McDonald will be on the Nov. 8 ballot for the 4th District. The Fourth District includes all of Utah County west of Utah Lake and south of 400 South in Springville, along with parts of central Utah.

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