The Problem

Healthcare in this country has drifted away from the people it’s supposed to serve. Costs are unpredictable. Bills arrive without warning. Patients delay care because they’re afraid of what it will cost and when they do seek help, they often find themselves navigating paperwork instead of receiving treatment.

In rural communities, hospitals are closing or operating on the edge. Seniors are being forced to make impossible choices between medication and basic necessities. Mental health services remain out of reach for far too many, yet we are quick to blame tragic acts on mental illness without putting forth the effort to beef up those services in all communities. As well, Independent physicians are getting the short end of the stick because they can't negotiate with insurers on anything resembling the scale of large health systems.

Add to all of that almost zero emphasis is placed on promoting health and wellness in our communities by way of nutrition, exercise, and early detection. Obesity, inactivity, and sickness dominate in adult, pediatric, and geriatric demographics while hospitable beds are endlessly filled by patients with preventable and manageable diseases gone awry. The exorbitant costs of prescription medicine make consistent treatment an often all or nothing proposition.

Finally, the cost of medical education is brutal and it’s clipping in advance the wings of would-be doctors, too afraid of being burdened by crippling debt. Emerging healthcare workers must be financially accounted for now if we want to benefit from them as a society in the future.

This isn’t a system designed around patients or a genuine desire to aid lifelong wellness. It’s a system weighed down by bureaucracy, blame shifting, and what I call “pay to live” and “sickness as success” profit models.

My Position

As your Senator, I will focus on one simple principle:

Healthcare should lead to healing, not harm, physically or financially.

That means making care more affordable, more accessible, and more human without forcing one-size-fits-all solutions on the entire country. Decisions should be made by patients and doctors, not dictated by insurance algorithms or buried in administrative red tape. The differences in the health issues and needs of different demographics and between men and women should be accounted for and not dismissed in research or in patient care.

This campaign isn’t about defending one party’s pet causes or bashing another’s plan. It’s about fixing what’s broken, piece by piece.

What I Will Do

Lower Costs Through Transparency
Patients deserve to know what care really costs before they receive it. I will push for real price transparency so families can make informed decisions, plan and budget accordingly, and avoid surprise billing.

Cut Bureaucracy That Delays Care
Prior authorization and excessive HMO red tape are delaying treatment and harming patients. I will work to require faster decisions and reduce unnecessary administrative barriers that sometimes lead to the worsening of a condition or even death while waiting.

Restore the Doctor-Patient Relationship
Medical decisions should be made in exam rooms, not corporate offices. I will fight to put doctors and patients back in the control of care.

Expand Access All Around, Including Rural and Underserved Communities
Too many communities are losing local care. I will support rural clinics, stabilize hospitals, and expand telehealth so geography or lack of long-distance transportation don’t determine whether you receive care when you need it.

Strengthen Mental Health Services
Mental health is healthcare, period. It is just as vital and just as life-preserving, and in some ways, consequential for whole families and communities. I will push to expand access and ensure services are treated with the same urgency and importance as physical care. 

Senior Thriving: Support Seniors with Dignity
Seniors who built this country deserve reliable, affordable care and the gold standard of treatment. I will work to lower prescription drug costs and ensure they can age with dignity, joy, and not financial fear. But, seniors are bigger than healthcare costs, they deserve a quality of life that is thriving, not just surviving.

Military Medical and VA Overhaul: Veterans Deserve the Gold Standard of Care

For citizens who have given years of their lives, and for some who have given their bodies in the name of service, the standard of care at Veterans Hospitals should be more remarkable than deplorable. Yet, frustrations abound with access, referrals, staffing and bureaucracy. Our vets deserve more and so do our military families. I will work to support measures that increase access to the best care, reduces friction between military facilities and the civilian network. 

How I’ll Get It Done

I’m not interested in ideological overhauls that ignore reality or fight against policies just because “the other side” thought of them. I will pursue practical, step-by-step reforms that lower costs, increase access, and rebuild trust in the system.

This means:

• Stronger FTC/DOJ scrutiny of healthcare mergers

• Supporting standardized pricing formats

• Integrating real-time benefit and pricing information into prescribing systemsSupporting personalized out-of-pocket estimates based on a patient's insurance.

• Establishing gold-card exemptions for physicians whose requests are routinely approved.

• Requiring continuity of treatment while an authorization is being appealed.

• Requiring public reporting of approval, denial, and appeal rates.

• Putting a maximum wait-time guarantee on healthcare, between referral to service

• Creating a Right to Timely Care for military families, with a simple, automatic pathway to an approved civilian provider

• Building a portable military-family medical record

• Driving competition where it lowers prices with enforcement against anticompetitive contracting;

• Pushing for transparency around insurer/provider ownership relationships

• Eliminating waste that adds no value to care while increasing friction and frustration

• Making broadband investment in medically underserved areas, increasing the efficiency of useful Telehealth vehicles

• Holding insurers and providers accountable for transparency and outcomes

• Penalizing insurers caught working against their own policy holders

• Allowing independent physicians to participate in value-based purchasing arrangements;

• Simplifying Medicare participation requirements

• Make medical education less financially restrictive

• Supporting increasing residency slots in shortage specialties

• Increasing rural training programs

• Supporting medical-school scholarships tied to service

• Focusing on bettering real patient experiences, not political talking points

This is the healthcare we all have worked for. It’s the healthcare we deserve. The future is wholeness, health, wellness, and fair care. Texas, we have it in us to do better for us.