Arkansas First. Arkansas Always.

For the past year, I’ve been meeting people all across Arkansas.
Lately, I’m meeting a lot of people who only recently heard my name.
That’s fair. I’m not a career politician.
When the Talk Business & Politics - Hendrix College poll showed me leading the race for the U.S. Senate, folks noticed.
People outside Arkansas see that poll and talk about flipping a Senate seat. I understand why that matters to them. But that’s not why this race matters to me.
I live here. I chose to raise my son here. My family has called Arkansas home for six generations. Arkansas needs a Senator who puts our state ahead of a political party, big donors and his own ambition.
At a West Memphis town hall, a woman - a farmer - asked me a question. She said she liked what she had heard, but she had concerns about Democrats outside the state. She wanted to know what would happen once I got to Washington. Would I become a “good Democrat”? Or would I still be Hallie, the woman she met that night at the Mayor Joyce Ferguson Civic Center.
I like women who farm. When your livelihood depends on dirt, weather and markets outside your control, you don’t have time for nonsense. Direct questions deserve direct answers.
So here is mine. When I cast a vote in the Senate, I’m going to ask one question: Does this make life better, safer, and more affordable for the people of Arkansas?
If the answer is yes, I’m for it. If not, I’m against it. I don’t care whose idea it was, which party gets credit or if somebody in Washington gets mad.
For me, it’s Arkansas first. Arkansas always.
What does that mean?
1. Make it affordable to live and work in Arkansas. 
Everything costs too much. Families feel the pinch of tariffs and high oil prices everywhere from the grocery store to the gas pump.
People who work hard should be able to build a good life. Washington shouldn’t make it more expensive for our families just to score political points. Arkansas’s Senator shouldn’t ask us to absorb the cost of Washington’s trade wars. Or literal ones.
2. Don’t send Americans to war without a good reason.
America should defend itself decisively. And no president, regardless of party, should be allowed to commit American troops to an indefinite war without a clear mission, accountability to the American people and Congress doing its job.
Tom Cotton has spent more than a decade pushing for war with Iran. Now American families are paying the price with the lives of our service members, and Arkansans are paying higher fuel costs that make everything more expensive. Enough is enough.
3. Insurance cards aren’t healthcare.
Insurance only works if you can afford the premium. An insurance card doesn’t matter if there isn’t a doctor nearby.
My opponent voted to end the enhanced subsidies that helped Arkansans afford Marketplace coverage. He voted for changes that put coverage for Arkansans on ARHOME at risk. And he voted for Medicaid cuts that put patients and rural hospitals in even greater danger.
I don’t accept that’s the best we can do.
4. If family farms can’t survive, rural Arkansas can’t either.
The last full Farm Bill expired in 2023. Since then, Washington has been holding farm policy together with chicken wire and duct tape while family farmers are getting squeezed.
Arkansas leads the country in farm bankruptcies. We are losing farms and entire rural communities. Tom Cotton voted against the Farm Bill.
Twice.
5. Remember who signs your paycheck.
Public office is a public trust. When I am elected, I will put my assets into a qualified blind trust because Arkansans should never have to wonder why I cast a vote.
My opponent voted to keep powerful political spending hidden. Now his allies are pouring millions into attack ads telling people that if I dare question his policies or votes, I’m scary. That’s his brand of politics. I get it.
But after 14 years in Washington, if Tom Cotton made life in Arkansas better, why isn’t he promoting that? Farmers understand something politicians sometimes forget: eventually, you have to produce something. At harvest, there is either a yield or there isn’t. He has failed to produce for this state.
We need a Senator who puts Arkansas first. Arkansas always.
Hallie Shoffner is a wife, mother, sixth-generation Arkansan, row crop farmer and small business owner running for U.S. Senate.