Meet
Congresswoman
Yadira Caraveo
For Dr. Yadira Caraveo, becoming a pediatrician, an accomplished legislator, and a fighter for middle- and working-class families in Congress started with a dream: her parents’ dream.
Yadira’s parents came to Colorado from a small town in Mexico, looking for a better life. They didn’t have much education or much money, but they knew hard work and caring for others are the values that build strong communities and family. They raised their four children with those values — on a construction worker’s pay in the Adams County home where they still live. All four were able to go to college and graduate in the span of a single generation, an incredible testament to the American Dream.
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Yadira had big dreams as well, knowing from an early age she wanted to help people as a doctor. She attended public schools in Adams County, received a degree from Regis University, and continued on to medical school at the University of Colorado.
She chose to be a pediatrician in Adams County, but with 65% of her patients’ families on Medicaid, Yadira quickly understood that helping children required more than what she was able to do as a doctor. Too many families she saw were falling through the cracks, struggling with rising health care and drug costs, child care, limited job opportunities, and high housing costs.
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Determined to help families in every way she could, Yadira became a state legislator and quickly gained a reputation for taking on tough fights – standing up to corporate bullies and entrenched special interests, and working with anyone to get things done.
In the legislature, Yadira took on big drug companies, forcing them to lower the cost of prescriptions and helping pass a first-in-the-nation cap on the price of insulin. She also worked to expand funding for preschool, ensure all Coloradans have access to paid family and sick leave, protect renters from eviction during the pandemic, and drastically limit the toxic pollution endangering our kids’ health and our planet.
Now in Congress, Yadira is taking the fight to special interests, and even her own party leaders, to do what’s right and to lower costs for Colorado families.
Yadira voted with Republicans and Democrats to pass a bipartisan tax cut through the House to expand the Child Tax Credit for Colorado families. And she is pushing to allow Medicare to negotiate lower prices on more drugs and she is working with both parties to increase transparency into hospital prices.
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Because of the devastation to our communities she saw firsthand as a doctor, Yadira passed a bipartisan bill into law to fight the fentanyl epidemic, broke with her party leadership to support tougher penalties for fentanyl offenses, and is helping lead a bipartisan effort to crack down on fentanyl trafficking.
Every day in Congress, Yadira continues her commitment to the Colorado families she saw as a doctor and meets every day as their representative – working to lower health care costs, address the high cost of housing, combat climate change, and protect a woman’s freedom to choose.
And every day in Congress, Yadira is driven by the same values her parents taught her and her siblings — to work hard, always finish what you’ve started, and to jump in to help without being asked.
Yadira still lives in Adams County, not far from her parents, and her life is still filled with large family gatherings of relatives near and far, lots of food cooked with love and togetherness, support, a little teasing from her brothers, and endless conversations with her sister.
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