Xamarin Android project cannot connect to localhost API

Question

I have been working on this problem for quite some time. I've read the many similar posts and their solutions don't help me (many posts are old and stale). I have a new Xamarin project and a localhost API that I am testing to. Initially I installed our production API locally and it doesn't connect. So I created a smaller test API and have had varying results in connecting. Xamarin Android will not connect with a "Failed to connect to localhost:XXXXX" message. I built a WPF project and get the same results. However I can connect to outside public API's (github) with both. I can connect to my localhost with a Windows forms desktop app and successfully get & post. Postman and httprepl both connect locally and successfully get & post. A couple of the other things the other posts suggested are 1) Client handler to ignore SSL - doesn't work, 2) Use the emulator's browser to connect to localhost - cannot connect. (this might be exposing where the problem really is but not sure). Also The debugger seems to be behaving oddly. When the debugger gets to the HttpResponseMessageresponse.... line it rarely makes it to the next line so I cannot inspect the statuscode. The block I have below is in a try/catch and rarely makes it to the catch if the connection truly fails. Sometimes it will be caught at the catch and that's how I get the "failed to connect" message. Another developer here has run the project on his computer and gets the same results/errors on his computer.

                    HttpResponseMessage response = await client.SendAsync(request);
                var Statuscode = response.StatusCode;
                if (response.IsSuccessStatusCode)
                {
                    var jsonbody = response.Content.ReadAsStringAsync().Result;
                    var ResponseBody = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject(response.Content.ReadAsStringAsync().Result);

                }
                else
                {
                    string oops = "Nothing";
                }

I seem to be running out of options and am looking for any advice. Thanks in advance.