My Take Tuesday: On the Hill for the Profession

This morning, I found myself walking the halls underneath our nation’s capitol building —not as a tourist, not as a spectator, but as a veterinarian.

Today is the American Veterinary Medical Association’s legislative fly-in, and I am here alongside colleagues from across the country advocating for the issues that shape our profession and, more importantly, the animals and people we serve.

There’s something humbling about being in Washington, D.C. The buildings are imposing, the pace is relentless, and the decisions made here ripple far beyond these walls. They reach exam rooms, dairy barns, research labs, classrooms, and kitchen floors where a beloved dog rests its head.

Veterinary medicine lives in all of those places.

I had the opportunity today to meet with legislative staff representing Utah’s senators and members of the House. These conversations matter more than most people realize. Policy is often written far from the exam table, yet it directly affects access to care, workforce sustainability, student debt, food safety, public health, and the future of rural veterinary medicine.

We spoke about shortages in the veterinary workforce—especially in food animal and rural communities. We discussed the financial realities facing new graduates. We emphasized the essential role veterinarians play in safeguarding the food supply, protecting public health, and advancing biomedical research. And we talked about the human side of this work—the emotional weight, the responsibility, the calling.

Because veterinary medicine is not just a profession. It is infrastructure.

When a zoonotic disease threatens, veterinarians are there.

When the food supply is at risk, veterinarians are there.

When a family says goodbye to a beloved companion, veterinarians are there.

Yet too often, our role is invisible in policy conversations.

That’s why this fly-in matters.

Advocacy doesn’t always look like protest signs or podium speeches. Sometimes it is sitting across a conference table, telling real stories about real patients, real producers, and real communities—and helping decision-makers understand the downstream consequences of the laws they craft.

I was struck today by how receptive many of these staff members were. They asked thoughtful questions. They listened. They wanted to understand. That gives me hope.

Because the future of veterinary medicine will not be shaped solely in clinics and hospitals. It will also be shaped in committee rooms, in appropriations bills, and in conversations like the ones we had today.

We owe it to our profession—and to the next generation of veterinarians—to be present in those spaces.

To speak.

To explain.

To advocate.

As I walked out of those meetings, I felt a familiar sense of responsibility. The same one I feel when I step into an exam room. The understanding that I may be one small voice, but the moment still matters.

Today, that voice carried the concerns of practitioners, students, producers, pet owners, and communities across the country.

And that is My Take.

N. Isaac Bott, DVM