About this response & our editorial approach
About this candidate response
DutyStation contacts candidates to ask whether and how they support service members, military families and veterans, and invites them to share their thoughts and priorities. We share their replies here in the candidate’s or campaign’s own words, with minor formatting for readability and correction of obvious spelling mistakes.
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Organized by topic. Email greetings and sign-offs are omitted; campaign contact details appear alongside.
Government shutdown and cooperation
- Keeping the government open is one of the most basic promises Congress makes to the American people, and I oppose a government shutdown in 2027 or in any year. A shutdown is not a strategy. It is a failure of leadership, and its costs fall hardest on the people least responsible for the disagreement: the young service member stationed far from home, the military spouse stretching the household budget, the veteran waiting on a claim, and the defense contractor’s employee who may never see back pay. As the daughter and granddaughter of U.S. Army veterans, I believe our military families carry enough without wondering whether a paycheck will arrive because Washington could not do its job. We watched the 2025 shutdown become the longest in our history, and we saw families in uniform lining up at food pantries and taking emergency loans from credit unions. We have seen more funding lapses since then, and Congress has again extended FY 2027 funding at current levels only through December 11. That is no way to run the most important organization in the world.
- If Democrats win one or both chambers, our job will be to govern, not to retaliate. I will work in good faith with the administration even where we disagree deeply. In practice, that means starting negotiations early, moving the twelve appropriations bills through regular order on time, and keeping lines of communication open with Republican colleagues and administration officials all year, not just in the final week before a deadline. I have led a management and technology consulting firm for more than 25 years, and I know that no organization can plan, hire, or serve its customers well when it lives from one short-term extension to the next. I will also support bipartisan reforms that take shutdowns off the table, such as an automatic continuing resolution that keeps the government funded at current levels when talks stall, so that disagreements are settled at the bargaining table instead of on the backs of working families.
- If a shutdown happens anyway, protecting those who serve and have served will be my first priority. I will fight for permanent law guaranteeing on-time pay for active-duty service members, Guard and Reserve members on duty, and the Department of Defense civilians who support them, so that their pay never again depends on last-minute workarounds or emergency transfers of funds. I will push for guaranteed back pay for federal contractor employees, many of whom are veterans and military spouses. VA medical care is largely protected through advance appropriations, but I will work to close the gaps that remain in claims processing, GI Bill support, call centers, and transition services. And I will make my congressional office a lifeline during any lapse, with expanded casework and partnerships with credit unions, veterans’ service organizations, and community nonprofits so every family in Ohio’s 8th District knows exactly where to turn.
Quality of life
- Those who volunteer to defend this country should never have to choose between their service and their family’s stability, and too many military families are being asked to make that choice today. My priorities begin with pay that matches the sacrifice. The recent raise for junior enlisted members was an important correction, and I will work to make sure pay keeps pace with the real cost of living in the communities where our troops are stationed, not just the national average. That includes restoring the Basic Allowance for Housing to cover the full cost of housing rather than requiring service members to absorb part of it out of pocket and making the Basic Needs Allowance easier to qualify for and use so that no family in uniform has to rely on a food pantry.
- On health care, I will protect TRICARE from cost-shifting that erodes a promise families made their career decisions around, and I will push to fix the access problems families describe most often: long waits for specialty care, shortages of mental health providers both on and off installations, and pediatric and maternal care gaps at smaller bases.
- Childcare is a readiness issue. Long waitlists at Child Development Centers keep spouses out of work and pull service members’ attention away from the mission. I will support expanding center capacity, raise pay and hiring flexibility for childcare staff, and strengthening fee assistance so families can use quality licensed care off installation when on-base slots are full. Military spouse employment is closely tied to this. Military spouses face unemployment rates several times the national average, often because of frequent moves and professional licensing barriers. I will build on the license portability progress Congress has already made, expand remote and portable federal employment opportunities for spouses, and support small business and entrepreneurship programs for spouses who want to build a career that moves with them.
- Finally, frequent permanent change-of-station moves cost families money, jobs, school continuity, and peace of mind. I will press the Department of Defense to give families longer assignments where the mission allows, earlier notice of orders, full and faster reimbursement of moving costs, and real accountability for the household goods moving system, so that a family’s belongings are not lost or damaged and claims are paid promptly.
Veterans’ care
- Our promise to veterans does not end when they take off the uniform, and every delay in care or benefits is a broken piece of that promise. My priority is timely access to care. I will work to fully staff VA facilities by addressing pay, hiring speed, and burnout among clinicians, while keeping community care available when the VA cannot see a veteran within the access standards Congress has set. Community care should supplement a strong VA, not replace it, and it needs better scheduling, faster payments to community providers, and clear information so veterans are not stuck between two systems.
- Mental health and suicide prevention demand urgency. Roughly seventeen veterans a day die by suicide, and many of them were not connected to VA care. I will support same-day mental health access, expanded peer support programs led by veterans, outreach through community organizations and faith institutions where veterans already gather, and safe-storage education programs developed with veterans themselves.
- On disability benefits, I will protect the PACT Act’s expansion of care and benefits for toxic-exposed veterans and push the VA to reduce claims backlogs without sacrificing accuracy, because a fast wrong decision only leads to a longer appeal. I will also support legislation to stop unaccredited “claim shark” operations that charge veterans illegal fees for help they can get for free from accredited veterans service officers. As someone with an MBA in information technology, I will hold the VA accountable for its technology systems, including the electronic health record modernization effort, which must put patient safety, data accuracy, and staff usability first rather than repeating costly rollout failures.
- The transition to civilian life is where many problems begin. I will push to modernize the Transition Assistance Program so it starts earlier, is tailored to each veteran’s goals, and includes a warm handoff to local employers, colleges, housing resources, and veterans service organizations rather than a stack of pamphlets. I will champion credential translation so military training counts toward civilian licenses and apprenticeships, and I will strengthen partnerships between the VA, community colleges, and regional employers in southwest Ohio.
Family housing
- Every family that serves this country deserves a safe, healthy, and affordable place to call home, and no child should grow up in a military home with mold, lead, or broken heating. The investigations into privatized military housing showed that some private companies collected fees and incentive payments while families lived with dangerous conditions, and in at least one case a company pleaded guilty to defrauding the government. That cannot happen again. I will push for full enforcement of the Military Housing Privatization Initiative Tenant Bill of Rights, independent third-party inspections, and a transparent public database of work orders and response times. Incentive fees should be withheld automatically when companies fail to meet health and safety standards, and families must have a dispute process with the right to withhold rent without retaliation and a guarantee that reporting a problem will never harm a service member’s career.
- Accountability must also reach the barracks. Government auditors have documented serious problems in unaccompanied housing, and our junior enlisted members deserve the same standard of care as everyone else. I will support dedicated, sustained funding to repair and replace substandard barracks and family housing rather than letting maintenance backlogs grow year after year.
- Affordability matters both on and off installations. Restoring the Basic Allowance for Housing to 100 percent of local costs, and updating rate calculations faster in fast-rising markets, will help families who live off base. I also bring more than two decades of real estate development and community development experience to this issue. I know how to bring together public land, private capital, and local partners to build quality housing, and I will push for partnerships with communities near installations to expand housing supply that military families, veterans, and civilian workers can actually afford.
Which changes I would pursue first
- My first priorities would be permanent legislation guaranteeing pay for service members and support personnel during any funding lapse, restoring the Basic Allowance for Housing to full value, and tying private housing companies’ incentive fees to independently verified health and safety standards. These are concrete, achievable changes with bipartisan precedent, and each one removes a source of financial stress or physical danger that families should never have to carry.