2020 Candidates: Eric Swalwell

Welcome to our recurring series “Who The Fuck Are All These Fucks?” in which we profile, in brief, each of the 2020 candidates for president. This series is not meant to be exhaustive, and you’re encouraged to look into each candidate on your own.

NAME: Eric Michael Swalwell Jr.
AGE: 38
CURRENT JOB: Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from California’s 15th District
PREVIOUS JOB: City councilor
DOES THIS MATTER?: He might be elected president in the 2040s, so I guess it’s good to know who he is, but he’s not going to be the nominee

Eric Michael Swalwell Jr. was born on November 16, 1980, in Iowa. His family, unaware that he wanted to be elected president someday, took him out of Iowa and moved him to Dublin, California.

Dublin is a city in Alameda County; originally called Amador, the growing number of Irish immigrants to the area earned it the nickname “Dublin” and eventually it stuck. Dublin is one of the fastest-growing cities in the country, owing in part to its close proximity to San Francisco, Oakland, and San Jose.

Dublin is also where the Mythusters accidentally launched a cannonball through someone’s house. The famed Alameda County bomb disposal range is located in Dublin and has been featured on the show more than fifty times.

The city’s Old St. Raymond’s Church is a National Register of Historic Places-listed landmark. Located at 6600 Donlon Way in Dublin, Old St. Raymond’s Church is known for it’s New England-style Gothic Revival design, which is somewhat unusual for California and was the product of Irish immigrants who came west from cities like New York and Boston. Old St. Raymond’s is no longer used as a church and is instead owned by the city, which rents it out for community events and private functions.

As far as I can tell, West Dublin/Pleasanton is the sole Bay Area Rapid Transit, or BART, station in Dublin. Dublin originally had no station. West Dublin/Pleasanton is what’s known as an “infill” station, meaning it was added to the line after the line had already started operation. The station seems to have been created in part to boost transit-oriented development; its $106 million construction cost was funded through private investment and through transit-oriented development programs.

In 2018, Dublin was ranked #7 in Money‘s coveted “Best Places to Live” list.

This series is part of Our Long National Nightmare, an Owl Line recurring series funded by supporters on Ko-Fi.

The cover image for this article was taken by JD Lasica and is available under a Creative Commons license.