Markets are deemed overpriced if the typical listing price is significantly above the area's typical home value.

Kristi Burke

Biography

Kristi Burke is an artist, muralist, and YouTuber who built a digital platform focused on critical thinking. She has also worked in the beauty industry. Burke presents herself as a non-traditional candidate who intimately understands the economic struggles of East Tennesseans, noting publicly that she rents her home, does not have health insurance, and has worked to climb out of debt.

Platform

Burke’s platform centers on systemic change, corporate accountability, and a direct challenge to a political system she argues prioritizes corporate balance sheets over human dignity. She campaigns as a neighbor and worker rather than a career politician, aiming to shift political power from wealthy donors to working-class residents.

Issues of Importance

• Corporate Accountability and Tax Justice: Enforcing anti-monopoly laws, dismantling corporate influence in politics, and ensuring wealthy corporations and individuals pay their fair share in taxes.
• The Right to Survive: Ensuring that foundational needs like housing, a clean environment, and healthcare are treated as human rights rather than commodities gatekept by wealth.
• Healthcare Protection: Drawing from her personal experience navigating the "pay or pray" system without insurance, she advocates for a system where a single medical emergency cannot cause financial ruin.

Herman Garcia

Biography

Herman Garcia is a Northeast Tennessee small business owner known locally for his food business. He attended the United States Military Academy at West Point, an experience he credits with shaping his views on public integrity, accountability, and leadership. He entered the race out of frustration with long-standing regional issues being overlooked by federal representatives.

Platform

Garcia’s campaign emphasizes accessibility, practical problem-solving, and continuous constituent contact. Noting historically low voter turnout in the 1st District, his platform focuses on rebuilding community connection to the political process and ensuring East Tennessee has active, visible representation in Washington.

Issues of Importance

• Rising Cost of Living: Addressing the direct impact of inflating grocery, fuel, and utility costs on working families and the long-term viability of local small businesses.
• Rural Healthcare and Emergency Infrastructure: Focusing heavily on regional medical shortages, specifically pointing to local clinic closures in the Johnson City area and the critical need for hospital infrastructure in storm-damaged areas like Unicoi County to prevent dangerous emergency transport times.
• Responsible Gun Safety: A proponent of responsible gun ownership who has actively partnered with local gun safety organizations to distribute free gun locks, focusing on safe storage and veteran/community suicide prevention.

David S. Kerr Jr.

Biography

David S. Kerr Jr. is a retired U.S. Marine Corps Master Sergeant who served from 1997 to 2017. His 20-year military career included deployments to Iraq (serving on an 11-man Point of Entry Transition Team) and Afghanistan (working in Civil-Military Operations). Born and raised in East Tennessee, he holds a bachelor's degree and has worked as a mechanic. As a commitment to public service, Kerr has pledged to accept only the median income of the district if elected, donating the remainder of his congressional salary to local children's homes in Sevierville and Greeneville.

Platform

Kerr’s platform focuses on legislative accountability, constitutional integrity, and anti-corruption. He emphasizes a "service-first" leadership model modeled after Marine Corps standards, arguing that representatives should not profit off their public office.

Issues of Importance

• Healthcare Expansion: Advocating for universal healthcare access and robust funding for the Affordable Care Act (ACA). He supports reallocating a portion of the federal military budget toward domestic healthcare infrastructure.
• Reproductive Rights: Strong support for codifying women's reproductive freedoms and healthcare access into federal law. Kerr frequently highlights the severe medical risks women face during miscarriages and high-risk pregnancies under restrictive state laws.
• Voting Rights and Government Transparency: Protecting the right to vote and implementing mechanisms to hold elected officials strictly accountable for ethics violations or self-enrichment while in office.