Beth Macy didn’t intend to run for Congress, but the Virginia Democrat has raised more than $1 million in the recent quarter and says rising inflation, the war in Iran, and concerns over health care cuts compelled her to shift from participating in protest rallies outside incumbent Rep. Ben Cline’s headquarters to running against him for the House.
If fundraising is any indicator, the race for U.S. House in Virginia’s 6th Congressional District is heating up. Federal data show that Cline, her Republican opponent, raised $1.44 million through the second quarter. Quiver Quantitative estimated that Democrats have outspent Republicans in the district by more than half a million dollars so far this election cycle.
“I wanted to write another book or maybe become a master gardener,” the Democrat candidate and nonfiction writer said at a book on Sunday in Staunton. “I have a nice life.”
Macy said she had “no idea” she was going to run for office when she wrote her most recent book “Paper Girl,” released in 2025. “There are about 15 things I wouldn’t have put in it [if I knew],” she quipped.
According to Macy, her decision came in 2025 when Cline voted for the “One Big, Beautiful Bill,” which led her to question its impact. “The Medicaid cut that is coming [because of the law] is going to be deadly,” Macy said. “300,000 Virginians are going to lose their health care.”
In an interview with the Daily Signal, Macy outlined her plans for what she wants to get done if elected on Nov. 3.
“I’ve already promised that I would sign on to co-sponsor Medicare for all,” Macy said.
She said she also hopes to serve on the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs and to introduce legislation to provide evidence-based drug treatment in prisons and jails, which she wrote about in one of her books.
“When people with addiction come out of prisons and jails, and their addiction hasn’t been treated, they are 70 times more likely to overdose and die,” Macy said. “It’s still the No. 1 killer of people in their 20s and 30s.”
She added that some local counties in Virginia operate successful programs to treat prisoners before they are released, and Macy wants to find a way to implement these programs at scale nationwide. “It would save lives. It’s just the right thing to do,” she said.
As a Democrat, Macy disagrees with the overall direction of the country under the Trump administration, especially the ongoing conflict with Iran.
“I think we need to negotiate a peace in that war. I think the war was started as a distraction from the Epstein files, and now we’ve got distractions from the distraction, because the war is going so badly,” she said, adding that inflation triggered by the war and by the administration’s tariff policy is being felt in the 6th District,
“People need relief. They’re in a lot of pain, and so I’m trying to meet them in their pain, not their politics,” Macy added.
The Democrat said her strategy has involved doing town halls with local farmers and veterans because she knows she has “to reach the middle” if she hopes to win in November. At one event an Augusta County, Macy said a farmer told her that “people either see the light or feel the pain.”
“They’re feeling the pain, and we just have to help them connect the dots with that in a non-judgmental, big-tent way,” she told The Daily Signal. “So that’s what I’m trying to do.”
The Daily Signal reached out to Cline’s campaign for this article but did not receive comment by publication time.
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[ H/T The Daily Signal ]
