Priorities

Too many families in our district are working hard and still falling behind. According to the United Way of the Greater Lehigh Valley, 41% of families in PA-07 struggle to afford the basics: housing, healthcare, groceries, utilities, and child care. Carol will fight for policies that make everyday life more affordable.

Carol will:

• Raise the federal minimum wage and tie it to inflation so paychecks keep up with rising costs. Every American working full-time should be able to afford the basics – period.
  
• Expand middle-class tax credits and roll back tax giveaways for billionaire donors so everyone pays their fair share.
  
• Strengthen the Earned Income Tax Credit so work is rewarded and families keep more of what they earn.
  
• Protect Social Security by lifting the payroll tax cap and ensuring the program is fully funded for future generations.
  
• Roll back harmful tariffs from the Trump Administration that drive up the cost of groceries, home electronics, and home construction.

Working families and small businesses deserve safe, stable, and affordable housing and utilities. As an energy expert and housing access advocate, Carol brings real-world experience to Congress, including helping small businesses cut energy costs through energy audits while working at Lehigh University’s Industrial Assessment Center, and reducing energy bills for seniors and low-income families during her time at PPL.

Carol will:

• Expand and modernize federal affordable housing programs so they reach the lowest-income families.
• Establish the first-ever Office of Tenant Rights at the federal level to educate and protect tenants from predatory landlords.
• Crack down on Wall Street and large corporations that buy up homes and price families out of their own neighborhoods.
• Support incentives for first-time homebuyers, including closing cost assistance, loan incentives, and first-time homebuyer savings accounts.
• Restore clean energy and efficiency incentives that lower electric bills and create good-paying union jobs.
• Protect the Energy Star Program.
• Protect funding for Industrial Assessment Centers, including Lehigh University’s IAC.

Health care should be a right – not a privilege for those who can afford it. Carol has seen what happens when people go without the care they need. She will fight back against the attacks on health care that Ryan Mackenzie and Republicans in Washington are pushing, putting thousands in our district at risk of losing essential coverage.

Carol will:

• Expand access to affordable, high-quality coverage by strengthening the Affordable Care Act and its subsidies.
  
• Extend the Enhanced Premium Tax Credits that make marketplace insurance more affordable.
  
• Allow Medicare and Medicaid to negotiate lower prescription drug prices.
• Fight for a future with universal health care.

As the mother of teenagers and the caretaker for aging parents, Carol understands the challenges of the “sandwich generation.”

Carol will:

• Expand Child Care Development Block Grants (CCDBG) to increase access to affordable, high-quality child care.
  
• Protect Head Start so more children can access early childhood education.
  
• Ensure caregivers can access critical health information with appropriate patient consent under HIPAA.
  
• Support the FAMILY Act to create a national paid leave program providing 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave.
• Restore SNAP and WIC funding cut in the “Big Ugly Budget Bill” to combat food insecurity.

As an energy engineer, Carol knows reliable and affordable energy is essential to families and to our economy. She supports innovation that brings good jobs to our region – so long as it puts communities first. As Pennsylvanians grow more concerned about AI’s impact on jobs, privacy, and electricity costs, Carol is the expert we need to fight for a balanced approach that protects workers and consumers.

Carol will:

• Create a clear federal framework for AI developed with independent experts, workers, and consumers – not just big tech lobbyists.
  
• Protect the right of states and local governments to regulate data centers, energy use, water use, and privacy.
  
• Require companies receiving federal contracts to retrain and support workers displaced by AI.
  
• Strengthen antitrust laws so tech monopolies cannot control the market.
  

Carol will defend the freedoms and civil rights that make our communities strong and our democracy work.

Carol will:

• Protect voting rights by supporting the For the People Act.
  
• Defend marriage equality and advance fairness and equality for LGBTQIA+ people.
  
• Strengthen civil rights protections in policing, schools, immigration, and housing.
  
• Increase oversight so no one is above the law.
  
• Support common-sense gun safety legislation, youth mental health funding, and violence prevention education.

At a time when anti-choice extremists like Ryan Mackenzie are advancing policies that make pregnancy more dangerous and threaten access to reproductive care, Carol will fight to protect our fundamental freedom to make personal health care decisions. She will work to pass legislation that protects women’s health, strengthens our rights, and expands real economic opportunity for families across the Lehigh Valley.

Carol will:

• Fight to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act to close the gender wage gap.
  
• Fully reauthorize and strengthen the Violence Against Women Act.
  
• End workplace discrimination and roll back policies that target women and minority communities in the workplace and military.
• Defend reproductive freedom and gender-affirming care, and codify Roe v. Wade into federal law.

As an immigrant from Colombia, immigration is personal for Carol. She believes we can secure the border while fixing a broken system in a legal, effective, and humane way.

Carol will:

• Fight for bipartisan immigration reform, including legislation like the Dignity Act that creates a fair pathway to citizenship.
• Stand up to the Trump Administration’s targeting of immigrant communities. No one in America should ever fear being detained, disappeared, or separated from their family because of how they look – full stop.

Washington is rigged for the wealthy and the well-connected. Carol is running to unrig the system and put government back to work for everyday people.

Carol will:

• Support congressional term limits.
  
• Ban members of Congress from trading stocks.
  
• End Citizens United.
  
• Ban partisan and racial gerrymandering.
• Strengthen ethics rules for federal officeholders.

As the daughter of union workers, a former workforce development leader, and the wife of a small business owner, Carol knows that strong unions and small businesses are the backbone of a thriving middle class.

Carol will:

• Pass the PRO Act to protect the right of workers to organize and bargain for better pay and safer workplaces.
  
• Invest in Small Business Development Centers and mentorship programs like SCORE.
  
• Expand career and technical education and strengthen pathways from high school to apprenticeships, community college, and good-paying jobs.
  
• Support efforts to reshore manufacturing and strengthen domestic supply chains.
  
• Protect investments in innovation through the CHIPS and Science Act and Inflation Reduction Act.
• Restore key positions eliminated by DOGE at the National Labs focused on research and innovation advancing energy solutions.
• Preserve pro-innovation tax incentives that support research and development for startups and small businesses.