VOTE411 Voter Guide

Like me, my mother was a survivor. After I went to college, she shared a painful truth with me. She was raped as a young teen and had an abortion in a room in the back of a local bar. She had no rights or say over her own body. When one of my sisters got pregnant at the tender age of 13, she was denied an abortion by our father despite abortion being legal. Her life was turned upside down and didn’t end well. Women should have the right to make healthcare decisions with their doctors. Protecting worker’s rights including a living wage, collective bargaining, quality benefits and the right to unionize is critical to supporting the middle class. Good union labor allows workers to provide for their families. In order for Missouri to grow globally, we have to expand childcare, raise salaries for educators, support public education, provide paid family medical leave, improve our infrastructure, protect family farms, and protect the right to vote. Supporting our justice system is critical.

Supporting women’s reproductive freedoms including birth control and IVF by introducing or co-authoring legislation to protect these rights. Even if we are successful with the ballot initiative for reproductive freedom, the Republican Party will do everything they can to overturn the will of the people just as they have done with Medicaid expansion. They do not believe women have a right to plan their families or to choose not to have one. This effort is more about women not having equal rights in society and this I will fight for everyday. This will not be an individual effort but rather one in which I along with others will need to work across the isle to insure women have equal standing when it comes to their choices and family planning. Women shouldn’t have to be in a health crisis to get proper health care and that is what is happening in this state. Attached to this will be expanding child care and the provision of family medical leave.

I would like to focus on 4 areas, Education, Agriculture, Infrastructure, Health.

Affordable health care and a visit of the funding formula for education. We can do better with rural health care and can find ways to better educate in our rural schools.