Candidate Spotlight

Karen Hyer

Karen Hyer resides in the Third Congressional district, in Provo, Utah. She brings a wealth of experience to help her address the problems assailing our nation.

She began her career teaching junior high school, something that led her to pursue a doctorate and a teaching and research position at one of the nation's foremost medical centers. There she taught leadership and health policy.

After over a decade, she left teaching at the university to raise her three sons on a family farm where she managed an extensive hunting and ranching operation while also operating a consulting business that worked aiding small businesses across the nation through the Small Business Administration and local Chambers of Commerce.

It was there on the family ranch that she took up the cause of small family farmers as a lead plaintiff against the federal government, winning a rare victory for both the environment and family farmers.

This case and the victory led her to pursue a law degree specializing in environmental and Constitutional law, after which she was invited to teach ethics at Brigham Young University's Marriott School of Management.

Since that time over twenty years ago she has made Provo her home, teaching at Brigham Young University and being involved in numerous international assignments, including teaching business and U.S. Constitutional law in China, a place where she helped found a top law school and an internationally renowned women's institute to address problems of rural poverty. Of note, during her years of service in China, Karen was one of a select group of foreign legal experts who aided in developing the first code of commercial contract law in the history of China.

"My priorities," Karen says, "are to help grow our economy and create jobs; ensure fiscal responsibility so we can get out of debt; and bring ethics to government.

"Our public officials need to quit focusing on partisan politics and the next election, and put their attention on solving real problems for real people.

"We've  reached a tipping point on so many issues. How are we going to solve them if we're primarily engaged in partisan bickering, obstructionism, political games, power struggles and tangents? If we're Americans first, we should be able to engage in a civil, bi-partisan dialogue that's really about solving the issues."

Karen Hyer is married to Paul Van Hyer, professor emeritus of BYU.