× Expand Cliff Hyra, a Libertarian running for governor, announces his candidacy at the corner of West Broad and North Jefferson streets. (Photo by Stephen Clatterbuck)

Libertarian Cliff Hyra began his campaign for Virginia governor Thursday morning on a downtown street corner before a small group of reporters and sign-wielding supporters.

Hyra, 34, is a Virginia Tech alumnus and patent lawyer by trade who lives in Mechanicsville with his wife and three children. He is a first-time candidate for office who last month qualified to appear on the November ballot alongside Republican Ed Gillespie and Democrat Ralph Northam. At the kickoff event, Hyra cast his two opponents as self-interested and pitched himself as a viable alternative for voters dissatisfied with the establishment candidates.

“I think the other candidates, unfortunately, have their focus not entirely on what’s best for Virginia but a lot of on what’s best for themselves as professional politicians looking ahead to their own careers,” Hyra said. “If you want to enact meaningful change, I think I’m the only choice, the only alternative to the two establishment candidates and establishment parties.”

Richmond magazine sat down with Hyra after the event to discuss how he will sell the Virginia General Assembly on legalizing marijuana, why he doesn't support Medicaid expansion and how he plans to challenge Gillespie and Northam come November.

The following is an edited transcript.

Richmond magazine: What do you see as the biggest problem facing Virginians in 2017?

Hyra: I think there are multiple problems, but the biggest issue is the economy. I think that’s the foundation. We’re not in a recession anymore, but growth is not as good as we would like ... We haven’t had tax reform in many years. Taxes are too high on incomes that are too low. There are many people who are doing well and many people who are not doing so well. I think it’s really important to make some changes to catch up some of those communities and some of those people who aren’t doing so well but have potential for growth and to help them raise the standard of living across the board.

RM: You’ve said your tax cut proposal is “10 times bigger” than the one proposed by Republican Ed Gillespie, amounting to about $3,000 per household. Can you explain how you deduced that figure?

Hyra: My plan is simply to exempt the first $60,000 of income from the state income tax … If you look at the median family income in Virginia, it’s right around $60,000. The median family is not going to be paying any income tax under this plan, it just eliminates it. You take the total tax bill for the average family, that’s how much they’re saving. You take Gillespie’s plan, he’s talking about a 10 percent reduction in every rate, and, of course, that’s not guaranteed; it’s contingent on some revenue triggers and what not. It’s very easy to compare his with mine. Mine eliminates the tax. His cuts it by 10 percent, so mine would be 10 times as big for the average family.

RM: Your platform on your website says you support an “innovative health care system.” What do you mean by that?

Hyra: In general, when I speak about innovation, mostly I’m referring to adopting best practices that have been tried in other states, so not feeling hidebound or stuck with what we’ve been doing in the past , but if there’s a new change or twist that’s been picked up in other places and it’s been shown to be effective, let’s implement that for Virginia also. We’re sort of limited, unfortunately, in health care because the federal government controls so much of that. There’s only so much that you can do on a state level. The one thing I’ve hammered is this certificate of public need, because that’s one thing the federal government at one time mandated; basically nobody had it before the 1970s, but then the federal government said ‘you have to have that or we’re taking all your money away,’ so every state had it. At some point, they repealed that requirement and so states started dropping it, so we have a fantastic, natural experiment where we have about half the states that don’t have any certificate of public need laws. We can say pretty conclusively that the effect of that law is only to benefit the existing providers. It’s bad for the consumers. It increases cost and reduces access, and it’s really the existing hospital systems that are lobbying against that, so that’s the sort of state regulation that ... we can innovate and adopt something that’s proven to work that’s going to make things better in at least a small way.

× Expand Hyra talks with supporters while launching his campaign. (Photo by Stephen Clatterbuck)

RM: What’s your position on Medicaid expansion?

Hyra: I don’t support Medicaid expansion. I think we’ve seen already the difficulty, which is that the federal government is sort of a poison pill. They cover a lot of the costs now, but they’re already talking about taking away that funding, so once you make that change it’s really hard to pull it back. I’d like to move toward more of a free health care system and put more of the tax dollars back into people’s hands so they can make health care decisions for themselves. In Virginia, long-term, fiscally, looking at the budget, there are some concerns, definitely, as far as pensions and some of these bigger programs, and I don’t think right now is the time to take on that fiscal obligation.

RM: The General Assembly has sort of been tiptoeing slowly toward a decision on whether to decriminalize marijuana. What would be your sales pitch to the General Assembly to decriminalize or legalize marijuana?

Hyra: I think we’re moving slowly, but surely, in that direction — very slowly. But I think eventually we will get it. The sooner the better. My pitch is, we’re wasting a lot of money for no reason. We’re spending $25,000-plus per year to put someone in jail for using marijuana. We have 40,000 people who are arrested each year for drug charges and 60 percent of those are for marijuana, which is something that’s legal in 29 other states and the District of Columbia. We know the constituents want it. There have been a series of polls and some have shown more than 85 percent of people in Virginia want some form of legal marijuana. … I would push the fiscal aspects of it and the justice aspects of it. You’re putting somebody in a cage, making their lives much more difficult. You’re affecting their families and their ability to obtain a job and education. It’s not just affecting them. It affects everyone here in Virginia. Just because someone looks different than you or lives in a different area than you doesn’t mean what happens to them doesn’t matter or affect you.

RM: You told Bearing Drift you believe you can build on Robert Sarvis’ showing in the 2013 gubernatorial race. How do you plan to peel voters away from the two major party candidates, and what areas in the state do you think you can be most successful?

Hyra: The most important thing is just getting the message out as widely as I can and reaching as many people as possible. There are a lot of people who are natural Libertarians, natural third-party voters, independents, moderates, who are looking for a third choice. I don’t necessarily need to give them a hard sell. There are a lot of people who aren’t happy with the candidates out there. I hope that when people see my ideas and the substance behind them, and the lack of substance presented by some of the other candidates, they’ll recognize I have the best platform. As far as who we’re targeting, we have a lot of information about who voted for Sarvis in 2013, who voted for Gary Johnson in the last presidential campaign, so we’re definitely trying to focus our efforts, just in the interest of efficiency, on the places where support was really high. We have some places where there was 20 percent support. But we want to spread our message as widely as we can, because we know there are people everywhere who are receptive to our message.