Who's running to represent western Springfield, Republic in Missouri House?
Missouri House of Representatives District 130 covers the west side of Springfield and Republic. In the primary, only one candidate from each party ran for the seat.
Bishop Davidson, Republican
The incumbent in the race, Davidson grew up as one of nine kids in Republic. Before being elected in 2020, he worked at the Intercollegiate Studies Institute, a nonprofit that promotes intellectual conservatism on college campuses. He started and ran Pelion Learning, based in Republic, which offers private teaching, curriculum development and the CivAcademy, where students learn civics by participating in a mock legislature. At the start of the year, Davidson was selected to lead a special House committee on education reform from which came an expansion of charter schools in St. Louis, St. Charles and Boone counties. Besides education, he is also largely focused on taxation in the legislature. According to his LinkedIn profile, in the summer of 2016 he interned at The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank that most recently was in the spotlight with the creation of Project 2025.
Leslie Jones, Democrat
A small business owner, Jones worked as a certified music therapist for 15 years and has operated Musical Bridges Music Therapy for more than 10 years, according to her campaign website. Since completing her master's degree, she has worked as an adjunct professor on the music therapy staff at Drury University. Jones with her husband and two children lives in Springfield, where she was born and raised. She has also served as a team lead for the Springfield chapter of Moms Demand Action. Some of her top issues include supporting drug treatment courts and diversion programs, expanding Medicaid and adding sexual orientation and gender identity to Missouri's Human Rights Act to protect LGBTQ Missourians from discrimination.
This article originally appeared on Springfield News-Leader: Missouri House candidates running to represent western Springfield
