California congressional candidate, former Brooklyn prosecutor on mission to 'defend the American Dream'

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California congressional candidate and former prosecutor Matt Jacobs is on a mission to defend the American Dream. 

Jacobs, who is running to represent California's 26th District in Ventura County and parts of northern Los Angeles, believes the concept of the American Dream has been passed down through generations in his family, touching his father and uncle and eventually himself. 

Jacobs' grandparents, who were born in Poland, survived World War II and the Holocaust before immigrating to New York with "no money, no family" and no knowledge of the English language. His grandfather worked as a tailor for decades before eventually opening up his own tailor shop. His grandmother was a laundrywoman and a seamstress.

After studying international relations and security law at Princeton University and law at New York University, he realized the best way to use "that skillset and service in the country was as a prosecutor in the counterterrorism space."

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Jacobs, now a father of three, began his career as a prosecutor in Brooklyn working crimes-against-children and child trafficking cases. He recalled one defendant — a child trafficker — who branded 12 and 13-year-old girls with gun tattoos on their faces. He then moved to the Organized Crime Unit, where he focused on Russian organized crime, before eventually being promoted to the National Security Unit, where his job was to "investigate and prosecute high-level terrorists that our military or allied militaries captured after 2008."

Jacobs, his wife and their three children (Credit: Matt Jacobs)

One of his most high-profile counterterrorism cases was that of Ibrahim Suleiman Adnan Adam Harun, an Al-Qaeda operative from Niger who killed two U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan and conspired to attack a U.S. embassy in Nigeria in the early 2000s.

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"I spent my career prosecuting some of our country's worst enemies and most dangerous criminals, and … I loved every second of that job, I never wanted to leave it. But the reality is, while I was spending the 16, 18-hour days focused on individual bad actors, it felt like the far left was taking this country in a very dangerous direction," Jacobs said. "And so I decided to leave that job and run for Congress in my hometown here in Ventura County, California. And my mission writ large is just to defend the American dream."

Jacobs also believes the American Dream is still alive and well today, despite the insistence from some pundits and politicians that the dream is dying or no longer achievable for certain people.

Courtroom sketch of me delivering the opening statement at the 2017 trial of Adnan Ibrahim Harun. (Credit: Matt Jacobs)

"[I]t drives me crazy when I hear the far left saying that the American dream is dead or not accessible to certain people because I know it's alive and well My family's proof of it. … That's how I grew up — very proud and grateful to be an American wanting to give back."

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Ventura County, home of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, has been represented by Democratic incumbent Julia Brownley since 2013. But Jacobs believes it's time for change, particularly as voters express concerns about education in the wake of COVID-19 school shutdowns; the economy and record-high prices at the gas pump and in grocery stores; and rising violent crime in traditionally safe neighborhoods. 

Jacobs criticized Los Angeles District Attorney George Gascon for "effectively legalizing crime" in LA County, where about 7% of the 26th District is located. 

Matt Jacobs (Credit: Matt Jacobs) (Matt Jacobs)

"He's putting the interests of criminals before the well-being of victims, law-abiding citizens and society generally," Jacobs said. "And the tragedy is that criminals have received that message. And they don't respect invisible county lines. So what we're seeing here are skyrocketing crime rates, smash and grab lootings, home invasions, burglaries, follow-home [robberies], murders even. There was a carjacking and pistol-whipping in a nice part of our district — a place where you'd go out on a date with your spouse. And these are crimes that we just haven't seen before."

The portion of LA County in the 26th District is "very safe, historically," but is currently seeing "an uptick in these scary, violent crimes are making it such that crime is not an abstract issue anymore to a lot of people in middle-class communities in this district," Jacobs said.

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Jacobs argued that the solution to crime in LA County and elsewhere in California is to "stop demonizing police" and implement programs like the Justice Department-backed "Project Safe Neighborhoods," which brings local law enforcement, prosecutors and community leaders together to target local crime.

The Ventura County Deputy Sheriffs’ Association, Ventura County Professional Peace Officers’ Association  and National Latino Peace Officers Association have endorsed Jacobs' candidacy. The candidate raised $850,000 in 2021, making him the Republican fundraising leader in his district.