The former broadcast journalist’s campaign centers on cost of living.
By Noah Bookstein
Original Air Date: August 14, 2026
Host: For nearly 30 years, Glenn Pearson was an Emmy award-winning TV journalist. Now he is running for Congress, with the endorsements of the Florida Environmental Caucus and the Florida Progressive Caucus. WSLR News reporter Noah Bookstein produced this profile.
Glenn Pearson: As a broadcast journalist, my job was to not make politicians—not make powerful people—comfortable. I would ask questions they would rather not have asked because it makes them uncomfortable. That’s our job. That’s our job as journalists. That would be my job in Congress: to hold the powerful accountable.
Noah Bookstein: Pearson is one of five Democrats running in Florida’s 16th congressional district. Originally from Detroit, Pearson now lives in Ellenton. Pearson is active in the Manatee County Democratic Party. He helped recruit people to run for local office and ran for the county commission himself. In the 20 years since he left broadcasting, Pearson has operated a small business helping seniors and working families navigate Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.
Glenn Pearson
GP: I sit down across the kitchen table from seniors cutting their pills in half, wondering, “How are they going to make it till the end of the month on their fixed income?” We have a system that is broken. It’s rigged. It’s rigged against us in favor of billionaires, the super well connected and big corporations while the rest of us are left behind. I am for Medicare for All—healthcare for all. It should be a right, not a privilege determined by your income or your employer or the insurance card in your wallet.
NB: He signed the Patients Over Profits pledge and considers Medicare for All to be a cornerstone of his platform. On Social Security, Pearson rejects proposals to trim benefits and points to who’s exempt from paying into the system past a certain income.
GP: Right now, they’re saying, “It’s going to go bankrupt soon,” or “We’re going to have to reduce it to only 85% of what recipients are getting right now.” That’s absolutely insane. Why should someone who maybe makes $70,000 or $80,000 a year and every single one of the dollars that they make is taxed for payroll taxes, but then someone else who makes a heck of a lot more does not have to pay that same amount of money on every dollar? What we need to do is raise the cap so that Social Security can remain solvent. We can do that. There’s absolutely no excuse for us not to be able to do it.
NB: With property insurance a top pocketbook issue across the district, Pearson blames the outsized influence of the insurance industry itself.
GP: They are able to write their own ticket. We have to make sure that insurance companies cannot continue to take advantage of the people who have to purchase their insurance. When it comes to our property insurance here in Florida, we have problems because of climate change. We cannot continue to go around not saying the phrase climate change. It’s here. It’s very real. So what can we do to mitigate things like that? We need to make sure that we have construction that can stand up to our increasingly powerful storms. We can do things to make sure that we can bring prices down, but we have to deal with the problems head on and not put our head in the sand and pretend like they’re not there.
NB: Pearson is excited about the potential for clean energy jobs to empower workers and help curb climate change at the same time.
GP: The choice is not about jobs or the environment. Actually, I think that’s a false choice. America can create the next generation of good-paying jobs by leading the transition to cleaner energy. That benefits us all.
NB: He also argues Congress has stopped doing its constitutional job of checking the executive branch, pointing to war powers as a clear example.
Glenn Pearson at a No Kings protest
GP: When it comes to authorizing war, Congress should be up in arms in making sure that this president cannot take us into a sustained war. When it comes to tariffs, that’s the responsibility of Congress. But what has happened? This Republican-led Congress has not stood up to make a difference for the American people. Instead of making a difference for the American people, they’ve confused the word “difference” with “deference.” They defer to power, they defer to wealth, and they’re deferring to this one man, and look at all of us suffering as a result of it.
NB: Pearson lays out an agenda for bringing down everyday costs, starting with housing.
GP: Right now, we have so much luxury construction going on—not nearly enough construction that the average hardworking American can afford. We need to crack down on private equity and institutional investors buying up single-family homes. They drive the prices and they keep hardworking Americans out of the market. We can raise wages by, first of all, working toward a living wage. When’s the last time we actually had a raise of the minimum wage? It’s insane how long that’s taken. We could do so very much more. We need to strengthen our unions and collective bargaining. That’s going to help us as well.
NB: To lower costs and help fund the government, Pearson suggests taxing the ultra wealthy according to a proposal from Bernie Sanders.
GP: I’m intrigued by the proposed wealth tax that I’ve heard from Bernie Sanders—a 5% wealth tax annually. That could do so very much because the super wealthy know how to make it so that they don’t pay anything or virtually any kind of federal tax.
NB: Pearson also says we need to get money out of politics.
GP: The very first thing I would be tackling would be to get rid of Citizens United—get big money out of politics. Why? Because nothing is going to change as long as billionaires, the super well connected and big corporations have an outsized voice that shouts much louder than the ordinary American voter. As long as that happens, we are not going to have Medicare for All. As long as this rigged political system continues, we are not going to see any progress. In order to work toward Medicare for All and to lower prices, we have to get big money and dark money out of politics, full stop.
NB: Pearson says he’s the only Democrat in the race who qualified for the ballot by petition rather than paying the qualifying fee.
GP: I chose to go out and talk to people, and instead of forming my campaign in back rooms, my campaign was formed on front porches—talking to people, listening to them, understanding where they’re coming from—and they’ve chosen to put me on the ballot. I’ve spent a career asking the tough questions, holding the powerful accountable. Now I’m asking the people of Florida’s 16th congressional district for the opportunity to do the exact same thing for you in Congress. The power of the people is always more powerful than the people in power. All we have to do is lock arms and get after it.
NB: For WSLR News, Noah Bookstein.
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