Candidate Spotlight: Natalie Cashen

Democratic candidate for Vermont House, Chittenden-Franklin district (two seats)

Natalie Cashen is new to politics, having only recently decided to run, and she doesn't see herself as a politician. "I'm just a person that wants to help," she says. She does bring an unusual résumé to the race: a neuroscience degree, a master's in pharmacology, and years of manual labor, from road paving to solar panel installation.

Cashen grew up in what she describes as poverty, moving between Rhode Island, Rochester, New York, and Texas, often after evictions. Her father was a jazz musician who later became a professor, and her mother worked in the medical field. She remembers going to school unsure whether she would have lunch, and says friends shared snacks and a kind lunch lady passed along leftovers.

At 18, she came to Vermont and lived in a tent in Waitsfield and Warren, taking odd jobs: hand-mowing a ski mountain with a scythe, cutting firewood and building a fence for an 82-year-old stranger who offered work, and making flavored nut butters. She returned to Texas for a neuroscience degree at UT Dallas, where she also volunteered with Habitat for Humanity. She later came back to Vermont, earned a master's in pharmacology, and worked in research at the University of Vermont.

Affordability, Seen Up Close

Affordability is the heart of her campaign. Cashen says the biggest pressure on families is the combined cost of everything: housing, taxes, groceries, health care, child care, transportation, and heat. She wants to look at the whole household budget. On health care, she supports stronger oversight of hospital prices and insurance rates, lower prescription drug costs, and more access to primary and preventive care.

Her own story adds a layer. After an injury at work required surgery, Cashen says UVM's leave policy ended her employment before she had recovered enough to be released to work. She says it's the kind of story voters rarely hear because campaigns focus on politics.

On housing, Cashen wants to expand affordable and workforce housing, make construction easier, and bring vacant and underused properties back into use. She also wants to broaden Vermont's job market. She says there are few options for people with science degrees outside of UVM, which pushes younger Vermonters to leave once they're ready to buy a home. She wants to attract smaller companies that fit Vermont's values and pay well, citing Beta Technologies as the model. She says Vermonters don't want data centers, especially AI data centers. She describes her goal as "responsible growth" and says she wants to listen to people on both sides of the growth debate.

Food, Farms, and Families

Cashen sees food security and farm security as linked. She supports connecting food assistance to local agriculture, having schools and public institutions buy from Vermont farms, and making sure farmers get a fair price. She wants to protect 3SquaresVT and universal school meals, especially with federal funding in question. "Children should be able to focus on learning without worrying about whether they'll have enough to eat," she says.

Listening Across Party Lines

Cashen is running as a Democrat in a district currently represented by two Republicans, Reps. Tony Micklus and Kase Long. She says the campaign has been refreshingly civil, and that she has been treated with respect by her opponents. She says she doesn't always fall in line with what's expected of a Democrat and agrees with them on a number of topics. To voters who don't usually vote Democratic, she says: get to know me. "At our core, we want the same things," she says.

Beyond the Campaign Trail

Cashen and her boyfriend have always given their pets voices. The funniest moment she remembers involved her late dog Tonka's voice and a bedroom joke too silly to explain. Their household now has dogs Archer and Lana, an older cat, and 10 rescue rabbits, most with pun names like Stevie Bunder and Attila the Bun. She says they keep taking in animals, including a hospice rabbit that plays with an 85-pound pit bull.