Mitchell Berman
Democratic
About
Mitchell Berman, 40, is an emergency room nurse in Franklin, Wisconsin, and a resident of the Town of Raymond. He has worked 23 years in health care, including a decade caring for veterans at a Veterans Affairs hospital. He grew up in a working-class family in rural Wisconsin, worked three jobs to put himself through college as a first-generation college student, and is a union nurse who has been a Teamster and a member of the Wisconsin Federation of Nurses & Health Professionals and National Nurses United. He won the Democratic primary on August 11, 2026, with about 44.1% of the vote, defeating Peter Burgelis, Lorenzo Santos, and Miguel Aranda.
Positions on the issues
Supports restoring Affordable Care Act subsidies and reversing Medicaid cuts; lowering prescription drug costs including Medicare negotiation of more drugs and a $35 insulin cap; creating a public option; prior-authorization reform; and staffing standards set by bedside nurses (per bermanforcongress.com/priorities).
Supports raising the federal minimum wage, expanding the child tax credit, lowering child care and housing costs (including Low-Income Housing Tax Credit expansion and down-payment assistance), preventing private equity from buying single-family homes, and investing in clean energy and grid reliability (per his campaign priorities page).
Pledges not to take corporate PAC money; supports overturning Citizens United, ending dark money with full disclosure, banning stock trading by members of Congress, the president, and vice president, and imposing ethics rules on Supreme Court justices (per his campaign priorities page).
Supports the PRO Act to protect the right to organize, federal contract and tax incentives favoring companies that hire in local communities, apprenticeship and skilled-trades expansion, and opposing subsidies for corporations that move jobs overseas (per his campaign priorities page).
Supports protecting reproductive freedom, stating health care decisions belong to patients and their doctors; supports funding rural maternity care and fixing Medicaid reimbursement rates that lead hospitals to close OB wards (per his campaign priorities page).
Supports increased investment in VA staffing and mental health care and opposes VA privatization; supports passing the Richard Star Act. Opposes cuts to Social Security and supports lifting the cap so high earners pay in on all income (per his campaign priorities page).
Experience
- Emergency room nurse (currently at Ascension Hospital, Franklin; formerly at a Veterans Affairs hospital)
- VA hospital nurse for about a decade; 23 years total in health care
- Union member: Teamster (college), Wisconsin Federation of Nurses & Health Professionals, National Nurses United
Campaign funding
FEC/Ballotpedia, as of March 31, 2026: raised $426,672; spent $286,071; cash on hand $140,601. Post-primary reporting (Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Aug 2026) put his general-election cash on hand at about $151,643, far below Steil's $6.3M+. He publicly pledges not to accept corporate PAC money. OpenSecrets industry-level donor data for Berman's 2026 campaign was not retrievable; most itemized FEC donors were individuals.
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