Dan Osborn

Biography

Dan Osborn was born on March 29, 1975. He is a U.S. Navy veteran and industrial mechanic who served as president of BCTGM International Union Local 50G. He ran as an independent in the 2024 U.S. Senate race in Nebraska, outperforming expectations. He is again running as an independent in 2026 and has received the endorsement of the Nebraska Democratic Party.

Professional background

Industrial mechanic; President, BCTGM International Union Local 50G

Military service

U.S. Navy veteran

In this race

• Pete Ricketts (Republican)

Issue positions

Healthcare (Policy)

Osborn does not endorse Medicare for All. His plan instead expands Washington’s role inside the existing system, including protecting Medicare and Medicaid and reversing the Working Families Tax Cuts bill. Osborn’s agenda, however, would increase the federal deficit and undo the tax cuts implemented by the 2025 reconciliation law. CBO estimates that permanently restoring the expanded premium-tax-credit structure would increase deficits by $350 billion over 2026-2035. But the subsidies could also weaken price discipline by insulating enrollees from premium increases and channeling more federal money through insurers. Despite claiming he wants to increase aid to rural hospitals, he opposed the Working Families Tax Cut bill, which set aside $200 million for rural health care for Nebraska. He opposed the largest investment in rural health care in recent history. — "𝗕𝗼𝘁𝘁𝗼𝗺 𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲: Osborn claims to support rural healthcare but opposed the largest rural healthcare investment in American history. Instead, his healthcare platform favors federal rules and spending without a full price tag or a clear plan to protect innovation and taxpayers."

Taxes (Policy)

Osborn’s tax program promises to lower rates on wage income and small businesses, implementing permanent federal income-tax exemptions for tips and qualifying overtime. Osborn also wants to raise or eliminate the Social Security taxable-wage cap. His middle-class emphasis is politically attractive, but the pieces do not yet form a complete tax plan. The Tax Foundation estimated a broad overtime exemption could cost more than $1.5 trillion over ten years. Osborn’s guardrails and limitation to federal income tax reduce, but do not eliminate, that concern. Removing the Social Security payroll tax cap would expose all wage income above $184,500 to the 12.4% OASDI payroll tax, split between employer and employee and would mean a significant tax increase for higher-earning professionals and small business owners. However, since Social Security benefits are calculated as a percentage of lifetime contributions, high earners would also receive substantially larger benefit payouts — meaning the policy could represent both a significant tax increase and a significant benefit windfall for higher-earning professionals and small business owners. — "𝗕𝗼𝘁𝘁𝗼𝗺 𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲: Osborn supports tax increases but his plan is not fully outlined. His platform offers visible tax relief to hourly workers, financed by a large upper-income payroll-tax increase and unspecified savings which would unequally hit high-earning professionals and small business owners."

Environment & Energy (Policy)

Osborn’s environmental platform is thin. He promises clean air, land, and water, defends a landowner’s right to lease private property for solar generation, and opposes special utility deals that make households subsidize power-hungry data centers. He has not endorsed a Green New Deal, a national renewable mandate, a fracking ban, or a rapid fossil-fuel phaseout. That restraint fits Nebraska, where 2024 electricity generation was 43% coal, 32% wind, and 16% nuclear; energy-intensive agriculture and industry make the state one of the highest per-capita energy users. Private solar leasing can diversify farm income, and charging large new loads for the infrastructure they require can protect ratepayers. — "𝗕𝗼𝘁𝘁𝗼𝗺 𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲: Osborn is moderate in rhetoric and pro-property-rights on solar, but his energy agenda is too incomplete to judge effects on Nebraska rates, reliability, ethanol, or farm regulation."

Immigration (Policy)

Osborn has supported mass amnesty for illegal aliens and has championed “meaningful immigration reform,” using immigrant labor to fill Nebraska jobs, and providing illegal aliens with tax-payer funded benefits like Social Security. Osborn has been critical of the Trump administration’s immigration policies and criticized ICE conduct in Minneapolis, saying the agency should follow consistent, common-sense law-enforcement standards. Under Biden, nearly 400,000 illegal immigrants attempted to cross the border in a single month, with millions in total entering the United States. CBO estimates the immigration surge under Biden’s watch imposed a direct $9.2 billion net cost on state and local governments in 2023, chiefly for schools, shelter, and border security. New reporting shows it also increased home prices in the United States. — "𝗕𝗼𝘁𝘁𝗼𝗺 𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲: Osborn comes across as tougher on the physical border than many Democrats, but in reality he supports mass amnesty for illegal aliens and supporting them on the taxpayer’s dime."

Public Safety (Policy)

Osborn’s published position is to ensure Nebraska police and first responders have adequate resources, while requiring ICE to meet ordinary “protect and serve” standards. He supports the Second Amendment alongside gun-safety education and narrowly described red-flag laws, and he supports legalizing medical marijuana. Osborn gives no position on qualified immunity, federal consent decrees, cash bail, sentencing, fentanyl penalties, police staffing grants, or due process for red-flag orders. However, he is endorsed by several far-left “defund the police” radicals. After three Omaha police officers were shot in 2025, Osborn did not address the issue. — "𝗕𝗼𝘁𝘁𝗼𝗺 𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲: Osborn is pro-police in stated policy, but his history does not show that he staunchly stands with police. His platform on this issue is scarce, and voters are being asked to trust broad assurances where detailed safeguards and crime legislation should be."

Economy & Labor (Policy)

Osborn backs the PRO Act, a $12 federal minimum wage, noncompete restrictions for ordinary workers, targeted tariffs, and limits on private-equity purchases of homes and farms. These measures could strengthen worker bargaining and small-producer competition, and targeted tariffs pose less inflation risk than blanket levies. CBO’s $12 minimum-wage scenario estimated higher pay for about five million workers but roughly 300,000 fewer jobs in an average week, with small firms and low-productivity workers bearing more risk. Regarding the PRO Act, Heritage notes that the bill would preempt state right-to-work protections and broaden employee classification, changes with particular significance in right-to-work Nebraska. One estimate says the legislation would be funded by a $2 trillion tax hike and would cost businesses $47 billion each year. — "𝗕𝗼𝘁𝘁𝗼𝗺 𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲: Osborn’s agenda would federalize Nebraska labor rules, raise compliance costs, and risk fewer entry-level and independent-contracting opportunities."

Democracy & Campaign Finance (Policy)

Osborn campaigns on overturning Citizens United by constitutional amendment, banning congressional stock trading, barring corporate PAC money, and imposing congressional and Supreme Court term limits. His anti-money message, however, has a credibility gap. AP reported that outside groups spent nearly $20 million to benefit his 2024 campaign, despite his rejection of corporate PAC checks. Additionally, major pro-Osborn PAC funding has been linked to the liberal dark money network surrounding Sixteen Thirty Fund and liberal donors. It also found that only six of 181 people giving more than $1,000 during one late-October reporting window lived in Nebraska. FEC filings show Osborn and his wife received roughly $120,000 and $246,000, respectively, in campaign or affiliated-PAC compensation across the 2024 and 2026 cycles. The campaign defended Megan Osborn’s organizing work, and lawful payment for bona fide services is not itself misconduct. — "𝗕𝗼𝘁𝘁𝗼𝗺 𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲: Osborn offers serious ethics reforms, but his dependence on supportive outside spending and the speech risks of reversing Citizens United complicate the clean-government brand."

Foreign Policy (Policy)

Osborn’s foreign policy remains sparse and increasingly noninterventionist. In 2024 he called Hamas a terrorist organization and said Israel’s response to October 7 was justified. In 2026 he accepted an endorsement from A New Policy PAC, an anti-Israel group advocating major changes to U.S. policy toward Israel and the Palestinians. Osborn has criticized the U.S.-made weapons used against Palestinian civilians, opposed an open-ended Iran war, and said Iran must not obtain a nuclear weapon. He also insists Congress should decide on war. — "𝗕𝗼𝘁𝘁𝗼𝗺 𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲: Osborn lacks the detailed alliance, deterrence, and defense framework expected of a senator voting on war and national-security budgets. Voters should seek answers to where he stands on America’s principal adversaries, allies, defense budget, and existing commitments."

Sources (Reference)

◆ Healthcare
• Dan Osborn Campaign — Growth and Fairness Plan
• Congressional Budget Office — Budgetary Effects of Permanently Extending Enhanced Marketplace Tax Credits
• Heritage Foundation — Six Reasons Congress Should Not Make Temporary Obamacare Subsidies Permanent
• Sen. Pete Ricketts — Rural Nebraska Healthcare Funding Announcement

◆ Taxes
• Dan Osborn Campaign — Protect Our Paychecks, Social Security, and Healthcare
• Tax Foundation — Analysis of an Overtime Tax Exemption
• Social Security Administration — Contribution and Benefit Base

◆ Environment & Energy
• U.S. Energy Information Administration — Nebraska State Energy Profile

◆ Immigration
• Semafor — Interview with Dan Osborn on Immigration and Labor
• U.S. Customs and Border Protection — U.S. Border Patrol Records Zero Releases for Eighth Consecutive Month
• Congressional Budget Office — Effects of the Immigration Surge on the Federal Budget and the Economy
• Congressional Budget Office — Immigration and the Federal Budget
• New York Post — Reporting on Immigration and Housing Prices

◆ Public Safety
• National Republican Senatorial Committee — Criticism of Osborn’s Response to the Omaha Police Shootings

◆ Economy & Labor
• Congressional Budget Office — Effects of a $12 Federal Minimum Wage
• Heritage Foundation — Analysis of the PRO Act
• House Committee on Education and the Workforce — PRO Act One-Pager

◆ Democracy & Campaign Finance
• Dan Osborn Campaign — Drain the Swamp Plan
• Washington Free Beacon — Reporting on Osborn Campaign Donors
• Fox News — Reporting on Osborn Campaign and Family Compensation

◆ Foreign Policy
• Jewish Insider — Reporting on Osborn’s A New Policy PAC Endorsement
• Dan Osborn — Public Statement on Israel and Gaza
• Dan Osborn — Public Statement on Iran and War Powers