In Their Own Words – Legislative Agenda

Question 2: If elected to Congress, what are your first term legislative goals and how do you plan to achieve them? What committee assignments will you seek?

Salaam Bhatti

Introduce bipartisan legislation to turn benefit cliffs into benefit slopes. Currently, recipients of SNAP and TANF face a benefit cliff. For example, they can lose hundreds of dollars a month from these programs when they gain only a little extra from a raise at work. It doesn’t make sense economically to take that raise. We can introduce legislation that reduces the public benefit by a dollar for every dollar in net income the recipient gains, allowing the cliff to turn into a slope instead and truly help thousands of our neighbors get out of poverty. In my advocacy before Congress, I found this to be a bipartisan issue that we can solve through legislation.

Make health care affordable through funding ACA subsidies and reducing costs of prescriptions. I’d bring doctors, nurses, medical and nursing school administrators to the table to create a plan to open more medical and nursing schools and lift caps to increase enrollment in current schools to meet today’s needs. I will immediately begin crafting legislation for Congress to retake tariff and war powers.

Committee assignment preference: appropriations, agriculture

Tim Cywinski

I call myself a “Reformist Democrat” because I want people to know exactly what I stand for. My first-term focus will be on reforms that unlock progress across multiple issues — because if we don’t fix how our system works, we’ll keep falling short no matter how strong our policies are.That starts with meaningful ethics and anti-corruption reforms — including reducing the influence of big money in politics, strengthening transparency, and restoring public trust. A key part of that is advancing my Democracy Dollars plan, which would give every eligible voter publicly funded vouchers they can contribute to federal candidates of their choice per election cycle. It’s a way to amplify everyday voices and make campaigns less dependent on wealthy donors, so candidates are incentivized to engage with communities instead of corporate and large donors.

Alongside that, I would prioritize legislation to lower costs for families — particularly around energy, healthcare, and essential goods — while strengthening accountability for Big Industry and Big Tech so communities aren’t forced to bear the burden of unchecked development. Education is also a core priority. As the son of an educator, I’ve seen how critical strong public schools are to entire communities. That means investing in teachers, strengthening public education, and expanding access to opportunity so every student has a fair shot. In terms of committees, I would seek assignments where I can be most effective on both systemic reform and district priorities — particularly Oversight and Accountability and Education and the Workforce, and I would also be interested in Energy and Commerce. I plan to approach legislating the same way I approach organizing: build coalitions, stay grounded in community input and focus on delivering real results for real people.

Elizabeth Dempsey Beggs

My first legislative priority is restoring accountability in government. I would support legislation banning congressional stock trading and strengthening campaign finance transparency so public service is never used for personal profit. Accountability also means ensuring that officials who violate the Constitution or commit fraud face real consequences, including investigations, impeachment proceedings, and appropriate legal accountability when necessary.

Second, I want to focus on affordability and economic stability for families. That includes policies that lower healthcare costs, strengthen public education, expand broadband infrastructure in rural communities, and support workforce development so young people can build careers without leaving the district. It also means lowering taxes on working families, creating more family-centered tax deductions, and closing loopholes that are exploited by ultra-wealthy individuals and large corporations.

Third, I want to improve access to services for veterans and military families. Too many veterans still struggle to navigate benefits systems that are overly complex and outdated. This is especially true for rural communities and for older veterans who served decades ago and now face barriers accessing the care and support they earned.

In terms of committee assignments, I would seek to serve on the House Armed Services Committee because of my military background and my understanding of national security and the importance of strong ethical leadership. I would also seek to serve on the House Ethics Committee to help advance accountability and campaign finance reform.

Achieving these goals requires coalition building. Effective legislation comes from working across party lines where possible while remaining firm about core principles like accountability, fairness, and protecting democratic institutions. I also recognize the realities of governing in the short term. While long-term reform is essential, every policy I propose includes actionable steps that can improve people’s lives immediately while also building toward broader structural change.

Jason Knapp

My first-term priorities are lowering costs, protecting healthcare, and defending our democracy from Trump’s abuse of power.

On costs: I’ll introduce or co-sponsor legislation to crack down on corporate price gouging — particularly in groceries and housing — using the FTC’s existing authority as a model and pushing to expand it. I’ll push to expand the child tax credit, support antitrust enforcement against monopolies that have killed competition in healthcare, agriculture, and retail, and fight to extend the prescription drug negotiation provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act to more drugs faster.

On healthcare: No one should lose coverage because of who they are or where they live, and no one should go broke because they get sick. I’ll defend Medicaid, Medicare, and the ACA against cuts, fight to lower the Medicare eligibility age, push for out-of-pocket prescription drug cost caps for all Americans — not just Medicare recipients — and hold insurance companies accountable for coverage denials through stronger enforcement mechanisms.

On democracy: I’ll introduce legislation to ban all federally elected officials, Cabinet Secretaries, and their immediate family members from trading individual stocks. I’ll push to overturn Citizens United through whatever legislative vehicle is viable, support the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, and introduce or co-sponsor a War Powers Resolution enforcement mechanism that requires Congress to actually vote before any sustained military engagement.

I know no single member passes legislation alone. I’ll build issue-specific coalitions the way I built them in the military — finding common ground, being direct about what I need, and staying focused on outcomes over politics.

On committees: I’d seek Armed Services, where my 21 years in the Navy, Pentagon service, and NATO experience would let me contribute from day one. And Natural Resources, because the coastlines, waterways, and fisheries of this district are livelihoods — and the flooding and climate threats bearing down on this community are already here.

Ericka Kopp

My first term legislative goals are to impeach Donald Trump, abolish ICE, and establish universal healthcare. I will achieve these goals because I am not alone in advocating for them. I am one of 120 Courage Candidates endorsed by Citizens’ Impeachment who represent 34 states across the country. Impeaching Trump brought us together, and together we’ve voted on progressive policies that we will all advocate for as a group. All of my first-term goals are policies that at least 2/3 of the Courage Candidates agree to support.

Regarding committee assignments, I would love to serve on the House Oversight Committee. That committee focuses on accountability, a cornerstone of my platform and one of the main reasons I’m running for Congress. Beyond that, I would also like to serve on the House Committee on Veterans Affairs to help veterans and reduce barriers to their access to the VA.

Lewis Littlepage

As a first term Congressman, my immediate goal is to help the people of Virginia.  We have real problems here that need to be fixed.  Number one in anyone’s life is jobs.  Virginia has the largest concentration of military installations in the world and that means jobs.  My first pick would be the House Armed Services Committee.  This committee is key to shipbuilding contracts, military readiness contracts, defense research and jobs.  In Virginia we have Naval bases, Army bases, Coast Guard bases, Air Force bases, Marine bases.  These are all top employers.

It is also important to be on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.  This committee is responsible for and controls our ports and waterways.  It decides projects such as flood control, bridges, roads, and Army Corps of Engineers projects.  These projects are necessary to protect our coastal communities from flooding.

I would also like to serve on the House Agriculture Committee.  I spent many summers growing up at my grandmother’s general store and Post Office in Truhart, King and Queen County.   Virginia began as an agricultural state and continues to produce as such.  We have many small family farms that need a voice in Washington.  The House Agriculture Committee handles Farm Bill programs, crop insurance, rural broadband which is still missing from much of our district, and USDA loans.  These are things important to Virginians.

Virginia has one of the largest veteran populations in America.  As a veteran, I need to serve on House Veterans Affairs Committee which oversees the Veteran Administration hospitals and clinics.  There is not a single VA hospital or clinic in this entire congressional district, leaving veterans who have earned the right to good medical care by protecting us, with none.

Shannon Taylor

Shannon Taylor’s campaign indicated that they are waiting until the redistricting issue is settled after April 21st before completing questionnaires.

N4C will add her answers when they are received.

Mel Tull

My first-term focus will be straightforward: lower costs for families and expand access to good-paying jobs. I will focus on four actionable priorities at the federal level:

1. Expand workforce training and trade education.
   • Increase federal funding for apprenticeship programs, trade schools, and career & technical education.
   • Expand Pell Grants to cover short-term certification programs tied to high-demand jobs.
   • Support partnerships between community colleges, unions, and local employers.
2. Lower the cost of housing and childcare.
   • Incentivize local housing development to increase supply and reduce costs.
   • Expand tax credits and federal support to make childcare more affordable and accessible.
3. Strengthen small businesses and job growth.
   • Cut unnecessary federal red tape that slows hiring and expansion.
   • Expand access to capital for small businesses and startups.
   • Support domestic manufacturing and resilient supply chains.
4. Reduce everyday costs, especially healthcare.
   • Allow Medicare to negotiate more prescription drug prices.
   • Increase competition to bring down healthcare costs.
   • Invest in reliable, affordable energy to lower utility bills.

My committee priorities would be: Ways and Means, Energy and Commerce, and Education and Workforce. On all of these I could directly impact costs, jobs, and economic opportunity.

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