(Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) — Across the country, Democratic doctors are running for office to oppose Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the Make America Healthy Again movement. Recent polling by 314 Action shows that RFK Jr.’s agenda is not resonating with voters and candidates with backgrounds in science and medicine are preferred by a margin of nearly 6-to-1 over MAHA-aligned candidates.
“Democrats with backgrounds in STEM are uniquely qualified to really lead on a lot of the most important issues of the day, like health care,” 314 Action Executive Director Eric Polyak said. “They just have so much credibility.”
Washington Examiner: “Democrat doctors run anti-MAHA campaigns for midterm elections”
Gabrielle M. Etzel
04/18/26
Key Points:
- Dozens of Democrat physicians and public health experts across the country are running for elected office in this year’s midterm elections in response to the rise of the GOP’s Make America Healthy Again agenda.
- For example, Dr. Annie Andrews is running as a Democrat against four-term Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC). Nearly all of Andrews’s campaign messaging emphasizes her 20 years of practice as a pediatrician, and the health and welfare of children is a central piece of her platform.
- Andrews […] said she started her Senate campaign directly in response to the nomination of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his handling of the measles outbreak in South Carolina, as well as vaccine policy.
- Andrews and more than a dozen other physicians or health scientists have the support of the political action committee 314 Action, which backs Democrat candidates with STEM backgrounds. 314 Action started training and funding candidates for the 2018 midterm elections, with its main concerns pertaining to environmental and evidence-based climate change policy.
- Dr. Richard Pan, also a pediatrician, is running with the help of 314 Action in the Democratic primary on June 2 to represent the greater Sacramento area in the House. As a California state senator, Pan authored one of the country’s strictest vaccine mandate requirements for children, attracting attention from anti-vaccine activists.
- Jasmine Clark, a Ph.D. microbiologist, nursing school lecturer, and current state Georgia state representative, is also running for the House primary against incumbent Democrat David Scott.
- From 2009 to 2011, the 111th Congress only had 16 healthcare professionals in the House and Senate, including medical doctors, nurses, pharmacists, and veterinarians. Today, in the 119th Congress, there are 26.
- At the state level, there is only one currently sitting physician governor, Gov. Josh Green (D-HI), an emergency medicine specialist. But two physicians, Dr. Amy Acton, a pediatrician and preventive medicine specialist, and Dr. Nirav Shah, former Deputy CDC director under the Biden Administration, are running this year for governor in their states with the support of 314 Action.
- Recent polling commissioned by 314 Action, conducted by the left-leaning group Data for Progress, found that voters overwhelmingly trust nurses, doctors, and scientists over Trump administration officials or other public health organizations such as the World Health Organization and the pharmaceutical industry.
- Polyak said he believes the polling shows it’s a “really strong political environment for Democrats” in general, especially those with medical backgrounds.
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