Amy Chai
Amy Chai (Republican Party) is running for election to the U.S. House to represent Connecticut's 1st Congressional District. She declared candidacy for the 2026 election.[source]
Biography
Amy Chai was born in Detroit, Michigan. She earned a bachelor's degree from Johns Hopkins University in 1985, an M.D. from the Indiana University School of Medicine in 1989, and graduated from University of Michigan Medical School in 1992. Her career experience includes working as a doctor, homeschooler, published author, lecturer, ghostwriter, and volunteer worker.
Chai has been affiliated with the following organizations:[1]
- ASAM
- ABIM
- ABPM
- Connecticut Counseling Centers
- The Presbyterian Church
- NAMI
Elections
2026
See also: Connecticut's 1st Congressional District election, 2026
General election
The general election will occur on November 3, 2026.
General election for U.S. House Connecticut District 1
The following candidates are running in the general election for U.S. House Connecticut District 1 on November 3, 2026.
Candidate | ||
 | John Larson (D) | |
 | Luke Bronin (D) | |
| Ruth Fortune (D) | ||
 | Jillian Gilchrest (D) | |
| Jack Perry (D) | ||
 | Amy Chai (R) | |
| ||||
 = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
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Endorsements
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2022
See also: Connecticut's 3rd Congressional District election, 2022
General election
General election for U.S. House Connecticut District 3
Incumbent Rosa L. DeLauro defeated Lesley DeNardis, Amy Chai, and Justin Paglino in the general election for U.S. House Connecticut District 3 on November 8, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Rosa L. DeLauro (D) | 56.8 | 137,924 |
 | Lesley DeNardis (R) | 40.7 | 98,704 | |
| Amy Chai (Independent Party) | 1.7 | 4,056 | |
 | Justin Paglino (G) | 0.8 | 1,967 | |
| Total votes: 242,651 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Democratic primary election
The Democratic primary election was canceled. Incumbent Rosa L. DeLauro advanced from the Democratic primary for U.S. House Connecticut District 3.
Republican primary election
The Republican primary election was canceled. Lesley DeNardis advanced from the Republican primary for U.S. House Connecticut District 3.
Campaign themes
2026
Ballotpedia survey responses
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2022
Amy Chai completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2022. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Chai's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.
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- Put the UNITED back in the States by putting PEOPLE over politics, and solving wedge issues
- Your viewpoint is a civil right. I will sponsor the Viewpoint Discrimination Act to add "Viewpoint" to the Civil Rights Act
- I will bring transparency, integrity, and civility back to America, and work to restore trust in the democratic process
Parents have a right to the education that they want for their children. Full stop.
I WILL solve the literacy problem (achievement gap) for underserved communities. I will NOT contribute to the "cronyspend" that wastes federal dollars and actually MAINTAINS the achievement gap. Our inner cities deserve REAL change and this will solve the school to prison pipeline (When these patients are in my clinic, their lives are often truly destroyed. SHAME on the system. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure)
I will REPLACE the Green New Deal (top-down cronyspend) with a "Green Future Initiative," a comprehensive plan that trusts Americans to have fun and work together to build local sustainable solutions instead of punishing poor people for driving to work.
I want to TRUST BUST the media. We must restore the independent journalist.
Bowling alone, by Robert Putnam
San Fransicko, by Michael Shellenberger
Better Capitalism, by Knowlton and Hedges
Consent of the Networked, by Rebecca MacKinnon
Can Democracy Survive Global Capitalism, by Robert Kuttner
What Happened to You, by Oprah Winfrey and Bruce Perry
The Bible
This must be bolstered with honesty, integrity, and willingness to listen.
I am extremely trustworthy. My word is literally my bond.
I do not actually care about cash money. I am not motivated by money, but rather by how interesting and satisfying a problem can be. I also solve problems in my spare time at night after work.
REPEAT
The representative is about representing the PEOPLE. This is not the same as representing the special interest of a corporation or a political power play or a financial goal for re-election. The PEOPLE. I cannot stress that enough.
The last line is the story of my entire life.
The one I am thinking of was:
"Oh where, oh were have the covid funds gone?" To the tune of "oh where oh where has my little dog gone."
But that way is the dinosaur way. It is the way of the last century and the age of the political machines.
We need to restore trust in each other and we need to work out some normative values. This must be transparent and explicit. We must learn to sit with our differences. We must learn to reach out to each other to find the areas where we disagree.
I also would like to be in the Select Committee for the modernization of Congress. Like I said, we are still using last century's political machines and they do not work in the 21st century.
I also strongly support ranked choice voting and campaign finance reform.
My patients often say, "thanks for treating me like a human being" because literally nobody sees them or treats them as though they are even human. People say "good riddance" when they are dead. I feel sick.
Democrats are blue
Neither party
Gives a (crap) about you!
For example: 1 million sent on pre-school literacy. This ends up saving 7 million on jail costs and drug rehab costs. Your net return is 6 million.
The full monetary impact both positive and negative must always be estimated.
Then the outcome measures must be analyzed.
Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.
Campaign website
Chai's campaign website stated the following:
| “ |
Freedom What rights are most important to you? Early Americans believed that life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness were important. When the Constitution was written, your rights became even stronger. The Bill of Rights was truly revolutionary. But not everyone had the rights they deserved. From the 14th Amendment, all the way to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, your freedoms have grown in America. But people will always try to discriminate. It is just what people do naturally. That is why I want to enhance your freedoms even further, with the Viewpoint Discrimination Act. As an update to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, the VDA will prevent your employer from firing you because of your personal views. What right could be more civil than the right to think your own thoughts?
You may have noticed that America is very diverse. Every ethnicity, every religion, and every language has found a home in the United States. You may also have felt that American politicians like to use our differences against us. If they can get us to fight each other, then we won’t notice that they are taking away our power and serving their own interests. One example of this is in voting and elections. The left argues about voter access to the polls. The right argues about transparency of the election process. Both of these are very important issues. But while ordinary people argue over these divisive topics, they don’t seem to notice that neither candidate is worth voting for. Both sides lose. That is why I want to give Americans back their power and unity with the Enfranchise America Act. This act will maximize voter access and maximize election transparency first and foremost. But neither of those things will matter without good candidates worth voting for. That is why the EAA will include campaign finance reform and ranked choice voting. This will help to increase the power of the center and decrease the power of the extremist fringes who currently control the parties on both sides.
I cannot enforce tolerance. But I can model it. I pledge to listen to everyone, and do my utmost to create fair solutions to problems in our nation. Even for people who disagree with me. It is okay to disagree. I do not want to represent a party, I want to represent you. I believe that the role of government is to work together to create solutions that work as well as they possibly can for as many people as possible. I have very strong values. I will never compromise my values. But I understand that other people hold values as well, and if we expect to move forward, we will need to tolerate disagreement over very fundamental issues.
Knowledge disparities exist. Knowledge is power. Therefore, power disparities exist. The future is technology and science. Education in technology and science is being dumbed down in underserved communities. All children can learn, and should be encouraged to do so. Math is a civil right. Freedom of thought leads to innovation. STEM education makes innovation possible. America needs to be the leader in freedom of thought and the leader in STEM education in order to maintain the edge innovative edge in the global marketplace. Parents are the main driver of successful education for children. Parents must be involved and active in the education of their children. Therefore, parents must be given transparency and choice in education for their families. I fully support parental choice in education. I would also support curriculum development for a minimum standard of practical science and technology literacy. I also support open access.
I would like to present a better option for America than the “Green New Deal.” The Green New Deal looks to the past for answers. It looks to big government spending and big government mandates. I believe that those are not ideal solutions for an increasingly complex future. I would like to provide infrastructure support to regions (such as New England) to create their own networks of innovation called, “Sustainability Zones.” These zones would have the ability to close the loop in the event of an emergency or natural disaster with locally sourced and secure supplies of food, energy, and medicine as well as a secure, “local server” based regional communication network. Declining towns could serve as new hubs for regional growth in production and distribution. Local governments would work from the ground up to create sustainability solutions that meet local needs and support local entrepreneurs to innovate for a greener, healthier, locally based economy. I would like to give Americans the opportunity to invest their tax dollars in environmental research of their choice. In return, they would have the first choice to invest in IP that results from the type of research that they choose to support. This would involve open access to grant funding peer review to taxpayers. Hopefully it would spur more interest in innovation and solutions that can be brought to production. I would like to develop small grants for communities who wish to work on projects to solve local environmental problems. Citizens who are able to implement solutions would qualify for tax breaks. I would like to implement evidence-based policy. This means that debacles of spending on failed projects and cronyism would be minimized.
There is a crisis of mental health in America. Most of our social problems, criminal justice problems, the addiction epidemic, homelessness, and health problems—including the obesity epidemic—are directly related to the mental health of our communities. Our failure as a nation to address mental health prevention and treatment is extremely expensive for taxpayers as well as for families. We waste billions of dollars and we allow the destruction of hundreds of thousands of lives every year. We need to expand addiction treatment to the Medicare age group. We need to invest in dual diagnosis supportive communities. We need to expand access to mental health treatment. We need to create a framework for the prevention of mental health problems. Mental health is not a place for ideology. It is a place for evidence. All policies must pass the evidence test.
I believe that we need to tend first to our own nation. Just like the message that we hear prior to an airplane taking off, we must attend to our own oxygen before assisting others. I believe that the purpose of an elected representative is to represent the people we have sworn to serve, not to represent foreign interests. I believe in secure borders. I do not believe in “regime change” abroad or proxy wars. I believe in a strong defense force, and would prefer not to deploy it. I support nations that are free and democratic. I believe that the US should become an example for the world once again. Freedom, unity, and innovation should come to mind when people think of America. Totalitarianism, “Social Credit,” and sectarianism will not compare favorably to these American ideals. It should be clear from the above statements that I am not a globalist.
We are printing too much money and borrowing our children’s future. We need to stop. Devaluing our currency in a time of decreased availability of commodities is creating runaway inflation. This hurts the poor the most. The Congress needs to have a cost analysis of every policy. Some things are worth spending money on, such as prevention and innovation. Other things are a waste of money and promote corruption. We need representatives who can tell the difference. We need to eliminate the self-employment tax. It is deeply unfair to people who are working to support their families. Income up to $75,000 ought to be protected from the self-employment tax. We need to implement a tax per trade. People who play the market like a casino are adding nothing to the economy and are simply scraping the cream from the top. Massive trades based on black box algorithms should be discouraged. A tax per trade would not be a burden to typical investors, but would decrease the impact of trades designed to take unfair advantage of brief fluctuations in the market. We need to simplify the tax code for earned income. We need policy that will support the middle class and the ability of families to live securely. The government should not be looking at our bank accounts. It should be looking at wire transfers out of the country, though.[2] |
” |
| —Amy Chai's campaign website (2022)[3] | ||
Campaign finance summary
Note: The finance data shown here comes from the disclosures required of candidates and parties. Depending on the election or state, this may represent only a portion of all the funds spent on their behalf. Satellite spending groups may or may not have expended funds related to the candidate or politician on whose page you are reading this disclaimer. Campaign finance data from elections may be incomplete. For elections to federal offices, complete data can be found at the FEC website. Click here for more on federal campaign finance law and here for more on state campaign finance law.
See also
2026 Elections
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ Information submitted to Ballotpedia through the Candidate Connection survey on August 2, 2022
- ↑ Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
- ↑ Doc Amy Chai for Congress, “Issues,” accessed October 7, 2022
