By Adam Studzinski

BLOOMINGTON – President Obama said during his State of the Union address Tuesday night he hasn’t done enough to reach out to Congress. That’s something U.S. Rep. Darin LaHood (R-Peoria) called “seven years too late.”

However, it doesn’t mean LaHood didn’t find positives in what Obama had to say.

“Listen, I’m always the optimist. We’ve got one more year left in his administration. He doesn’t have a presidential race to run. This is the opportunity,” said LaHood. “He mentioned three or four things that he wanted to work on that, frankly, I think we in the Congress should look at his proposals and figure out where we can work with him on.”

One item, LaHood said, is lifting the Cuban embargo. He said doing so could help farmers in Central and West Central Illinois.

“Cuba’s obviously a very small country, but trade is important to our farmers. The Farm Bureau, which is based in Bloomington-Normal, they support the lifting of the trade embargo with Cuba,” LaHood said.

LaHood added they could work to find common ground on criminal justice reform.

“What do we do with non-violent offenders? Particularly drug offenders,” said LaHood. “Instead of warehousing them in prison, where we cost a lot of taxpayer money, how do we look at fashioning legislation, passing something into law that protects the public, but also helps rehabilitate people.”

LaHood also believed Congress can work with Obama on poverty issues.

Adam Studzinski can be reached at [email protected].