Coming up on this thursday morning its day four of the confirmation hearing for neil gorsuch to become the next Supreme Court justice. Today well feature several panels of outside witnesses speaking in favor and against judge gorsuchs nomination. Our live coverage will begin at 9 30 eastern right here on cspan3. Representative Claudia Tenney sat down with c span with a profile interview. Shes serving her first tomorrow representing the 22nd congressional of new york. She outlined some of her legislative priorities including the repeal and replacement of Health Care Law and job replacement. Congresswoman, when did you begin your political career and why . Gees, i kind of got into politics not by it wasnt something i planned on doing. I think people are always surprised when i find out that i actually wanted to be an artist and ended up becoming a lawyer. I ran our business and all of a sudden im in politics. I think it started back in 2003. I was running our Family Business and we were anticipating selling it and i actually assisted the former new york city assemblyman and i was selling advertising to any one and everyone that i could sell to because our typical customer were were the locally owned and operated and many of them were being replaced so i turned to politics and was looking every avenue to raise our advertising revenue really is what was going on and when the assemblyman won his race, he asked me if i would be his chief of staff. I dont have time to do that. You could be legal counsel. At the time my father had Catastrophic Health issues. He was in a wheelchair living across the street. He was the Supreme Court justice but he was walking full time. My mother had other Serious Health issues. I was caring for them and running our Family Business and raising my son. The idea of taking on another obligation was something i didnt think i could do. He said, no, i think youre a natural and we can workout your issues but i think youd be a great asset to my team. So i joined in 2003 and i worked for him for about six years and then when he retired in 2010 i ran for the assembly in new york state and i challenged and defeated in a primary so i was running against the establishment from day one and then in 2012 we went through reapportionment and they recreated the longest district created in the history of new york state just for me because i was not really fitting in with the Establishment Republicans and actually had a lot of democratic support, believe it or not and so i was able to win a primary and a general election to retain that seat which was very difficult because the district was so long, it was almost twice as long as the district that i now have in congress and so i felt new york state was getting really frustrated although i like to think that i really stood out as a member and fought corruption. I stood out as an independent voice. I was the first person to call for the resignation of corrupt speaker Sheldon Silver whos now facing a jail sentence. I stood up against the former Senate Majority leader who was a republican and took a position against corruption and tried to stand for the middle class and the citizens that i represented in my district. I just got on this mission of really trying to do the right thing, because quite honestly, i got tired of politicians say they were going to stand for something and not do it. I felt the same way about a lot of the washington politicians so i ran and challenged our former congressman in 2014 in a primary. I lost by a very narrow margin much to my surprised. I was shocked actually because i threw my name in there at the last minute and i had really very little if no funding against one of the wealthiest members of congress and he spent over 3 million. I had about 180 mostly my own money with a very Grassroots Team and i was just shocked at the result and so i wasnt sure if i was ever going to run again but i ended up running in 2016. I faced enormous opposition from the republican establishment. Had to win a primary in a threeway with over 3 million spent against me again and i only raised not much more than i had raised in 2014. I was like this is ridiculous but i ended up winning that. On to the general election i faced another threeway against two selffunding literally both worth at least 100 million each and so much to my surprise they spent almost 12 million combined against me and i was still able to pull it out and so for me its really just trying to do the right thing for my constituents. Ive never run as if i wanted to get relocated. I always run ln if i dont know if it comes from my mother or father, the brutal honest of my mother and my fathers determination to find the positive in a lot of things, just its just driven me to really try to do that and so here i am, you know. Who knows if im a one termer, i dont know. You are here. Where are you serving . I serve on the Financial Services committees and the reason i sought that committee for a couple reasons, number one, i have a history before i ran our Family Business. I was a bank attorney, represented a number of banks and Financial Institutions in my area. I think its a really important industry to give access to credit and banking for especially our smau business owners. Im acutely aware of those needs. What remains of our business. We sold our Newspaper Division of which i ran in 2004 but we still have a pharmaceutical Packaging Company that was started 70 years ago and we want were one of the very fewer manufacturers left in the state of new york especially in my district. So many people have left and we want to try to make new york a better place to do business. We know the Small Business community is where the good jobs are being found and actually in the end create more jobs than some of the bigger concerns that are getting benefits of subsidies and government funding just to stay in new york, part of the symptoms, the paytoplay schemes and fighting that, its something id like to find ways as Financial Services member to try to make it more viable again to bring our Small Businesses back and before the interview i mentioned to you that we once had some of the great businesses. Ibm was founded in my district, ge had a huge presence, Griffith Air Force base, the textile industry was really wellknown along the erie canal. One of the things i showed you was from flat ware from liberty mfg, a number of two young guys, two former oneida employees started whats liberty table top and they produced the only flat ware made in the United States right in my district and of course we would love for the president to use that as the White House White house silver, but were still working on that and actually would like to make sure that everyone understands that there is the ability for industry to come back to new york. We make things really well. The United States is still the best producer of all goods and services in the world and wed like to make sure we continue on that mission. I think that, you know, President Trump is someone whose talked about how important it is to rebuild jobs, to bring back that spirit of entrepreneurship and also just the good working men and women we have in our areas whether theyre in the military, whether theyre producing goods and services, whether theyre firemen, police, we have such a great workforce that we want to bring them back to new york where we see these ca lossal losses in terms of population and industry so thats part of what my mission is. I love to go into my district every week and find people that are making things and contributing to our communities, so its been really exciting and thats part of what the part that gets me excited about being a member and Financial Services gives us the ability to bring back financing and to give us the credit that we need to keep those jobs coming back. Another company is remington. Yes, the oldest continuously running manufacturing facility in new york state though they produce guns obviously for the military for sportsman and also for personal protection. Theyre founded in new york and wed like to keep them there. Theyve had some setbacks here and then. We just recently had some layoffs because the economy is down but we also have a very negative viewpoint from our governor and from some in new york about the Second Amendment so we want to make sure we advocate for our Second Amendment. The other country that i thought i mentioned is reveer copper and brass. Theyre also one of the original companies founded none other than paul revere and that Company Still exists in rome, new york and really good friend of mine is the ceo and hes done it for a number of years. He has huge pride in america, really supports bringing jobs back to our communities and they do fabulous work and have pretty good size business right in rome, new york. So we do have a lot going on in our district. We want to continue to grow it and present our great assets. What are your legislative priorities . Right now we would like to see some kind of change in obamacare. Obviously we would like to repeal it and replace it with a consumer driven model and something that helps our working class and also protects the most needy, and our elderly who lost the rating of medicare to provide funding. We have huge Medicaid Expansion in new york state. We have to make sure that we protect everyone. Im hoping that were going to continue to work on and amend the process thats going on in washington right now on the health care debate. Im glad were debating it. Ive been putting out on my Facebook Page copies of the bill so people can read it before we vote on it. Also plain language explanation of each provision because sometimes im a lawyer but for a nonlawyer to read it, its a little more challenging. Weve done everything we can to make sure the public knows. I remain undecided on the bill right now. Wed like to roll back some of the provisions of dodd frank those are things that really those are some of our legislative priorities. You mentioned your father. New york state Supreme Court justice. Right. John teny. What did did he influence your going to law school or your interest in law and you said his his passion for doing things the right way, making the right choices. What did he tell it to you . How did he inspire you . My father who was somebody really interesting person. He grew up in total poverty in new jersey. There were nine members of his family. He was the first to go to college. Their father was stricken with polio and he was this is the story they tell me. We always have to say were not sure how true it is. He had some kind of debilitating disease. One uncle says it was pollio. My grandfather was born in ireland, nonetheless he was unable to work and he had sort of some cot faith industry they were growing chickens and raising chickens in the house. Needless to say we didnt have chicken in my house my father, no more chicken. The chickfila people probably wouldnt like that. He never had anything and never cared to chase dollars. He just wanted to provide for our family. He was a person that cared about doing the right thing and having integrity. I think he was known for that as a judge. He was also very strong and always said to me, never be victim. Always try fight to the battle. Be willing to lose in order to make sure youre standing for the right thing. And so i think that thats something with me. Ive never feared failure or losing. The victimhood thing i notice that it can hurt people when they it holds them back when theyre worried about when focusing on what the negatives are. Ive been inspired by Holocaust Survivors because theyre so amazingly inspirational. They focus on the people that are helping them and they focus on the positives, not the people that are hurting them or shooting at them. My father was poor and i think that was really inspiration for me. Ive always lived my life thinking about am i going to be living some where eating cat food some where. Im always worried about that. Im always careful about making sure i take care of myself and my family and i think thats part of what i stayed in utica to make sure i cared for my parents. So those things are important to me. I got offered jobs all over the place to leave when i was an attorney and i just thought it was more important to stay with my family, to support my Family Business, to support our community and it was just i had a lot of great opportunities and a lot of privileges and im really honored by them. Ive been very grateful. Congresswoman, thank you very much for telling our viewers a little bit about yourself. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. Thanks. Announcer sunday night on q a. I was off taking pictures in yoe semty with some photographic buddies of mine and in all that time i never watched the Television News program. We never read a newspaper. And i thought this is the way to live and the only way to live this way is to stop writing the column so i dont have to be up to date on all the news. Author and Hoover Institution senior fellow thomas sole who recently retired from the column he had for 25 years talks abouting his life, career and his love of photography. I took my first picture in 1950 pane when the results came back from the drugstore, i was just hooked. And then when i was in the marine corp, the marine sent me to the navies Photography School at Pensacola Naval air station and there i get a professional training in the subject and then when i got out and was going to went away to harvard, i worked for the University News office as a photographer in order to help pay the bills and so it was the perfect job because it was something i could do whenever i had the time. Sunday night at 8 00 eastern on c spans q a. Announcer live now to the Senate Judiciary for the fourth day of the Supreme Court confirmation hearing for judge neil gorsuch. It began with a full