Colton Kratky

Colton Kratky was born in Fort Worth, Texas. He served in the U.S. Marine Corps from 2013 to 2019. He was homeschooled for high school. He earned an associate degree from Tarrant County College in 2011 and attended Angelo State University. His career experience includes working as an IT professional.[1]

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Who are you? Tell us about yourself.

Colton is a Marine veteran living in Monticello. When he finished active duty with the Marines in 2019 he moved to Minnesota to be closer to his wife's family. He fell in love with the area and has greatly enjoyed visiting the local parks and fishing in the lakes and rivers. Colton has also been passionate about working with his church's youth and children's ministry and helping them to understand Christ. He has worked in IT for over a decade and worked both the customer service side of IT as well as the technical portions of it.

When Colton found out he was going to be a father in 2022, he realized he needed to do more to make a future better for his son and all future generations. He had always had a thought in the back of his mind about running for office, and this was the catalyst that pushed him to see that thought become a reality.

Please list below 3 key messages of your campaign. What are the main points you want voters to remember about your goals for your time in office?

We need to do a fundamental reform of our funding. Specifically around education, healthcare, and supporting our community. There is enough money in the budget to take care of the needs of Minnesotans, but it's not getting the people that need it the most. The students, teachers, nurses, patients, doctors, homeless, etc. We need to streamline our funding to get to them instead of lining the pockets of big corporations and insurance companies.While large sweeping reform can get a lot done quickly, it is difficult to judge everything that will come out of it. We need to use small bills, making small changes over time to truly enact change. While the unexpected can always occur, i.e. 2020, we should do everything we can to plan and prepare for what new legislature should do. This takes work, planning, and compromise to accomplish, which I believe are must have skills in the legislature.We should do everything we can to simplify our laws, budget, bills, and processes. Any Minnesotan should be able to easily find information on what the government is doing, how they are doing it, and why they are doing it. Currently, that process is difficult to follow and takes pulling information from many sources to see the full picture.

What areas of public policy are you personally passionate about?

I am passionate about education, healthcare, community support, and government accountability. I am also passionate about personal freedom. As Americans we should all be able to do what we want as long as we are not impacting someone else negatively.

What characteristics or principles are most important for an elected official?

While in the Marines we learned an acronym for leadership traits, JJDIDTIEBUCKLE.

- Judgment

- Justice

- Decisiveness

- Integrity

- Dependability

- Tact

- Initiative

- Enthusiasm

- Bearing

- Unselfishness

- Courage

- Knowledge

- Loyalty

- Endurance

I believe these traits should also be embodied by any elected official and used to guide their actions.

What do you believe are the core responsibilities for someone elected to this office?

The core responsibilities of an elected official is to increase the quality of life for their residents. How to do this is viewed differently by different elected officials and I believe that is a good thing. When you have differing views, opinions, and backgrounds all working together, you can realize much better options then if you were working in an echo chamber.

What legacy would you like to leave?

I would like to leave a legacy of caring and laughter. I want people to remember me as someone who wanted to help others and bring humor where it was needed, as well as instilling those wants into others. Someone that I looked up to was always making the people around him laugh, he even managed to do it at his own funeral, and he was always trying to help those around him. I hope to emulate that sort of legacy.

What is the first historical event that happened in your lifetime that you remember? How old were you at the time?

September 11th was the first historical event I remember. I was 9 years old and in the 4th grade. The teacher put the live feed up on the computer in the room. I didn't fully understand what was happening at the time or the impact it would have on our nation and my life.

Do you believe it’s beneficial to build relationships with other legislators? Please explain your answer.

I believe it is vital. If someone is not willing to build relationships with other legislators, especially those not in their party, then they are doing their residents a disservice. Even if an elected official one by a large margin in their district, there are still people there that don't think the same way they do. So, they should reach across the aisle and work to figure out legislation that works for as many people as possible.

Tell us your favorite joke.

What organizations or individuals have endorsed your campaign?

MN DFL

VoteVets

FairVote Minnesota

Jeanne Heindricks

What are your views on financial transparency and government accountability?

Any citizen should be able to easily find and understand what the government is doing with their tax payer dollars. It should not take a data engineer weeks to pull together information for basic items like education funding.