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POLICY ISSUES

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This campaign launched on March 11, 2025. Since the beginning, we’ve talked about taking a different path to a different outcome. We intend to look at past, current, and future legislation through a lens of restore, reform, and repeal. What has been taken away that should be restored? What in our political system needs to be reformed? And lastly, what legislation has been passed that negatively impacts our country and needs to be repealed?

 

This isn’t your typical campaign, and this isn’t your typical issues section. Our intent when we started this campaign wasn’t to tell people what to think, but rather to listen to their concerns. In response to what we heard, this is our plan to improve the lives of the people we seek to serve. 

Education

Education is the great equalizer. A strong public education system is crucial to set our country up for success in the future through the talent of our younger generations. However, the current administration has taken steps to abandon this core obligation. The Department of Education has been gutted, resulting in increased costs at the state and local levels. Title I funding was cut, Special Education funding was cut, and public schools have been vilified and demonized for over a decade in an attempt to shift more public money into private schools. In rural areas, these cuts have resulted in school boards slashing budgets, with some districts cutting upwards of $2 million in a single year. We ask our educators to do more and more with less and less. There are also significant issues with our higher education system. Tuition costs have skyrocketed, making access to degrees out of reach for many. Many graduates enter the workforce drowning in student loan debt. We also need to address the shortage of childcare options for younger children that puts stress and increased costs on working families.

We believe public investment equals public good. We need to restore federal funding for public education. Furthermore, we believe education as an institution is under attack. There is a movement to privatize EVERYTHING, even the way kids learn. Our educators are overworked, underpaid, and stressed to the breaking point. Our school buildings need maintenance and will need updating. Local taxpayers are carrying the burden while the Federal Government abdicates their responsibility. We believe there is no investment with a better return than funding public education. We also need to address the bloated costs of higher education. Universities should be places of research and learning, not profit mills. This includes expanding access to trade and technical programs, because not everyone wants or needs to have a 4 year degree. The opportunity to earn a degree should not be reserved only for the wealthy—we would miss out on the contributions of so many great minds. We need to empower local cities, counties, and non-profits to find local solutions for local problems. In my work as Rural Rebound Initiative Coordinator for Otter Tail County, we have worked with local stakeholders to develop public-private partnerships to address the childcare shortages so many communities are facing. Federal funding plays an important role in closing the gap on many projects. We can address this issue in a cost effective way that makes sense for each community without sacrificing quality and in the process alleviate one of the stresses working families are facing. Finally, I am a strong supporter of academic freedom and am concerned with the current administration's attacks on what schools and universities are allowed to teach.

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