Ohio Democrat Tim Ryan’s Presidential Campaign Focuses on Working Families

Candidate: Tim Ryan

State of Residence: Ohio

Campaign Website: https://timryanforamerica.com

Short Bio: Tim Ryan is a tireless advocate for working families in Ohio’s 13th District. He was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2002 and was sworn in on January 3, 2003. Successfully reelected seven times, he is now serving in his eighth term. Congressman Ryan currently serves as a member of the powerful House Appropriations Committee which controls the expenditure of money by the federal government.

Ryan serves as co-chairman of the Congressional Manufacturing Caucus and remains a leader in the fight to strengthen America’s manufacturing base and reform U.S. trade policies. The House Manufacturing Caucus examines and promotes policies to help American manufacturers find trained, educated workers, continue to lead the world in developing new industrial technologies, operate on a level playing field with their foreign competitors, and obtain the capital they need to thrive. Ryan is the leading advocate in the House to impose sanctions on unfair Chinese currency manipulation.

Ryan’s primary focus remains on the economy and quality-of-life in Northeast Ohio. He works closely with local officials and community leaders to advance local projects that enhance the economic competitiveness and help attract high-quality, high-paying jobs.

He is a dynamic leader in the House and speaks out on issues of particular concern in Northeast Ohio. He is a champion of efforts to make college more affordable, revitalize America’s cities and improve the health and well-being of American families and children. His work on these and other issues has garnered the attention of the national media.  He is the author of A Mindful Nation: How a Simple Practice Can Help Us Reduce Stress, Improve Performance, and Recapture the American Spirit and The Real Food Revolution: Healthy Eating, Green Groceries, and the Return of the American Family Farm.

Ryan has also served in the Ohio State Senate where he spearheaded efforts to establish a state-based earned income tax credit, to standardize community school data reporting, and bring college students into the debate over higher education funding.

Before his election to public office, Ryan served as President of the Trumbull County Young Democrats and as Chairman of the Earning by Learning program in Warren, Ohio. He began his career in politics as a congressional aide with the U.S. House of Representatives in 1995 and later served as an intern for the Trumbull County Prosecutor’s Office. Ryan holds a law degree from the University of New Hampshire School of Law (formerly the Franklin Pierce Law Center), studied abroad as part of the Dickinson School of Law’s International Law Program in Florence, Italy, and graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science from Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio.

Ryan was born on July 16, 1973 in Niles, Ohio and currently resides in Howland, Ohio with his wife Andrea and three children. [Official Congressional Bio]

Fun Fact: He is a proponent of meditation and wrote a book about it titled, “A Mindful Nation,” in 2012. [Countable]

On the Issues

Health Care: Ryan has supported single-payer health care and the Affordable Care Act, he said in a Face the Nation interview in April. [Axios]

Ryan is a co-sponsor on the 2019 Medicare for All Act to provide universal health care and voted for Obama’s Affordable Care Act. In 2017, Ryan introduced legislation to create a Medicare buy-in option for citizens between 50 and 64 years old. [PBS]

Trade & Agriculture: Ryan has a book called “The Real Food Revolution” on the need for “a new kind of food system — family farm, 21st-century style.” [Axios]

We need to enact federal policies that protect family farms. The numbers don’t lie. Big producers of commodity crops have received billions of dollars in subsidies while the smaller, regional farmers producing diversified specialty crops receive next to nothing. Additionally, 60 percent of these subsidies go to corn and other grains, while only 0.45 percent goes towards the production of fruits and vegetables. This is unacceptable. Government subsidies need to shift away from highly processed foods to not only fresh fruits and vegetables but also organic farming. [Official Campaign Website]

Jobs/Economy/Taxes: Does not support cutting taxes. On The View, he said tax cuts “have been the answer for everything since 1980. And what’s happened since 1980? Average wages have been stagnant, health care costs have gone up.” [Axios]