The Blue Tsunami Swept Doctors and Scientists Into Office
The Blue Tsunami Swept Doctors and Scientists Into Office
Save this storySave this storyWhat do Michigan senator-elect Abdul El-Sayed, South Carolina senator-elect Annie Andrews, Ohio governor-elect Amy Acton, and North Carolina representative-elect Jamie Ager have in common, beyond their victories in this week’s midterm elections?
除了在本周的中期选举中获胜之外，密歇根州候任参议员阿卜杜勒·埃尔-赛义德（Abdul El-Sayed）、南卡罗来纳州候任参议员安妮·安德鲁斯（Annie Andrews）、俄亥俄州候任州长艾米·阿克顿（Amy Acton）和北卡罗来纳州候任众议员杰米·艾格（Jamie Ager）还有什么共同点？
Each is either a doctor or a scientist. And each had the backing of the political action committee 314 Action Fund, which focuses on electing pro-science voices to public office.
他们每个人要么是医生，要么是科学家。而且每个人都得到了政治行动委员会“314行动基金”（314 Action Fund）的支持，该组织致力于将支持科学的声音选入公职。
“We really benefit by having those data-driven, fact-based decisionmakers actually in a position at the governing table,” says Shaughnessy Naughton, a chemist and former congressional candidate who founded 314 Action after losing her race in 2016.
“让那些以数据为驱动、以事实为基础的决策者真正坐在治理决策的桌前，我们确实受益匪浅，”肖内西·诺顿（Shaughnessy Naughton）说。她是一位化学家，也是前国会候选人，在2016年竞选失败后创立了“314行动”。
This cycle, the PAC spent above $30 million donating to and supporting various campaigns, including fundraising for specific races. It raised $3.6 million for pediatrician Andrews in the fight over what had been Lindsay Graham’s Senate seat in South Carolina, for example, and another $3 million for physician Acton’s campaign in the hotly contested Ohio governor race, according to Naughton.
据诺顿介绍，本届选举周期中，该政治行动委员会花费了超过3000万美元用于捐赠和支持各项竞选活动，包括为特定选区筹款。例如，它为儿科医生安德鲁斯在争夺南卡罗来纳州林赛·格雷厄姆（Lindsay Graham）曾任参议员席位的竞选中筹集了360万美元，并为医生阿克顿在竞争激烈的俄亥俄州州长竞选中筹集了另外300万美元。
The organization’s success rate topped 80 percent this cycle for congressional candidates, with 14 of 17 of its candidates in the US House of Representatives winning their races and hundreds of successful down-fallot candidates. Nine of these races flipped seats from Republican to Democrat. Victorious congressional candidates who flipped their districts this year include an oncology nurse-practitioner, a mathematician, a microbiologist, a nuclear engineer, and an agricultural scientist. “It did turn out to be a health care election,” Naughton says.
该组织本届国会候选人的胜选率超过了80%，其17名美国众议院候选人中有14人获胜，此外还有数百名下层选票候选人成功当选。其中9个选区的席位从共和党转为民主党。今年成功翻盘的国会候选人包括一名肿瘤科执业护士、一名数学家、一名微生物学家、一名核工程师和一名农业科学家。“这确实演变成了一场关于医疗保健的选举，”诺顿说。
Richard Frank, the director of the Brookings Institute’s Center on Health Policy, notes that health care workers and scientists have always been part of the makeup of Congress, but not to this degree. “What is unusual,” he says, “is just how many came in one wave.” He sees the spike in this type of candidate as a direct result of the hostility toward medical and technical expertise from the Trump administration. “Science has been under attack,” Frank says. “It’s not surprising that scientists have recognized that, and some of them went out and ran for Congress.”
布鲁金斯学会卫生政策中心主任理查德·弗兰克（Richard Frank）指出，医护人员和科学家一直是国会构成的一部分，但从未达到这种程度。“不同寻常的是，”他说，“在同一波浪潮中涌现出如此多的人。”他认为这类候选人的激增是特朗普政府对医学和技术专业知识表现出敌意的直接结果。“科学一直受到攻击，”弗兰克说，“科学家们意识到这一点，并投身国会竞选，这并不令人惊讶。”
The rise of the science candidate has several causes, according to historian Kristoffer Shields, who runs Rutgers University’s Eagleton Institute of Politics. “Some of it certainly is a reaction to what’s been happening at the federal level, the defunding of a lot of laboratories and scientific exploration,” he says. But he also sees this as a legacy of the pandemic, when many health care workers started thinking about how politics impacts public health.
据负责罗格斯大学伊格尔顿政治研究所的历史学家克里斯托弗·希尔兹（Kristoffer Shields）称，科学候选人的崛起有几个原因。“其中一部分无疑是对联邦层面所发生事情的反应，即对许多实验室和科学探索的资金削减，”他说。但他也将此视为疫情的遗产，当时许多医护人员开始思考政治如何影响公共卫生。
Earlier this year, El-Sayed emphasized to WIRED that his candidacy was focused on public health, noting that the cyclospora outbreak that sickened Americans over the summer likely stemmed from the Trump administration’s choices. “We DOGE’d our whole service that keeps the lettuce safe,” he said at the time, referencing the so-called Department of Government Efficiency directing mass layoffs at the Food and Drug Administration.
今年早些时候，埃尔-赛义德向《连线》（WIRED）杂志强调，他的竞选重点是公共卫生，并指出夏天导致美国人生病的圆孢子虫疫情很可能源于特朗普政府的选择。“我们‘DOGE’了整个保障生菜安全的部门，”他当时说道，指的是所谓的“政府效率部”（Department of Government Efficiency）主导了食品药品监督管理局（FDA）的大规模裁员。
In 2024, 314 Action’s past acceptance of funding from groups with ties to the pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC came under scrutiny. The organization no longer accepts AIPAC funding and supported candidates like El-Sayed who were vocally critical of the Israeli government. Unlike some other political committees that aim to put doctors in office, like the American Medical Association’s PAC, 314 Action specifically focuses on electing Democratic health and science experts; it is forthright about its opposition to the Trump administration’s approach to public health.
2024年，“314行动”过去接受与亲以色列游说团体AIPAC有关联的组织资助一事受到审查。该组织目前不再接受AIPAC的资助，并支持了像埃尔-赛义德这样公开批评以色列政府的候选人。与美国医学会政治行动委员会（AMA PAC）等旨在将医生送入公职的其他政治委员会不同，“314行动”专门致力于选举民主党的卫生和科学专家；它明确表示反对特朗普政府的公共卫生方针。
That so many of these politicians are advocates for the importance of public health and scientific expertise suggests that the election was, in part, a rejection of current health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s MAHA movement, which promotes medical misinformation, including anti-vaccine sentiment. Many of the winning candidates with scientific and technical backgrounds have explicitly discussed how their concerns about the state of health care policy drove them to enter the race. “I am appalled seeing infectious diseases spreading through our communities that we had once declared eradicated,” microbiologist Jasmine Clark, the incoming representative from Georgia, told The Guardian earlier this year.
如此多的政治家倡导公共卫生和科学专业知识的重要性，这表明此次选举在一定程度上是对现任卫生部长小罗伯特·F·肯尼迪（Robert F. Kennedy Jr.）的“让美国健康起来”（MAHA）运动的拒绝，该运动宣扬包括反疫苗情绪在内的医疗错误信息。许多具有科学和技术背景的获胜候选人都明确讨论了他们对医疗政策现状的担忧如何促使他们参加竞选。“看到我们曾经宣布根除的传染病在我们的社区中传播，我感到震惊，”来自佐治亚州的候任众议员、微生物学家贾斯敏·克拉克（Jasmine Clark）今年早些时候告诉《卫报》。
Clark was first supported by 314 Action when she ran for Georgia’s House of Representatives eight years ago. “She was in the first class of scientists that we helped elect in that 2018 cycle and now has made that move up to the federal level,” says Naughton.
克拉克八年前竞选佐治亚州众议员时，首次得到了“314行动”的支持。“她是我们在2018年选举周期中帮助选出的第一批科学家之一，现在她已经进入了联邦层面，”诺顿说。
Shields sees the straightforward communication style favored by doctors and scientists as another asset that has made them strong candidates. Some of this year’s winners are especially direct. In recent interviews, South Carolina’s Annie Andrews has referred to RFK Jr. as her “archnemesis” and promised to hold him accountable.
希尔兹认为，医生和科学家所偏好的直截了当的沟通方式是使他们成为强有力候选人的另一项资产。今年的一些获胜者尤其直接。在最近的采访中，南卡罗来纳州的安妮·安德鲁斯称小肯尼迪为她的“死对头”，并承诺要让他承担责任。
314 Action has also been clear that rebuking RFK Jr.’s agenda is a core part of its goals. In 2025, it launched its Guardians of Public Health initiative to recruit health care experts to run for public office. “We thought it was important to speak directly to doctors and people in public health, like nurses, to say that we have this program and we need you to step up to run, because we have a madman running the Health and Human Services cabinet,” Naughton says.
“314行动”也明确表示，驳斥小肯尼迪的议程是其目标的核心部分。2025年，它发起了“公共卫生守护者”（Guardians of Public Health）倡议，招募医疗专家竞选公职。“我们认为直接与医生和公共卫生从业者（如护士）对话很重要，告诉他们我们有这个项目，需要你们站出来参选，因为我们有一个疯子在管理卫生与公众服务部，”诺顿说。
The push for pro-science public servants isn’t over; 314 Action is starting its next recruitment round later this month.
对支持科学的公职人员的推动并未结束；“314行动”将于本月晚些时候开始下一轮招募。