While it may seem early, the 2026 race to unseat incumbent Congresswoman Chrissy Houlahan (D-Chester) is already underway.
Martin “Marty” Young hopes to secure the Republican nomination to challenge Houlahan, who has begun sending fundraising emails calling Young “a wealthy Republican businessman.”
Young, 54, is much more than a businessman.
He grew up in West Chester, attended West Point, and served as an infantry officer until injuries cut short his combat career. After Sept. 11, Young returned to the Army, serving as a chaplain.
“As an exchange student to Russia and Ukraine, I watched the Soviet Union collapse under Ronald Reagan’s leadership,” Young said. “So, joining the military was a calling.”
He is now a lieutenant colonel in the Army National Guard. One of his duties is helping bereaved families who come to Dover Air Force Base to witness the dignified transfer of their deceased loved ones.
“One of the greatest honors of my life has been greeting our fallen heroes when they return to Dover and ministering to their families. It is a sacred duty and one of the reasons I continue to serve in the Army National Guard,” Young said. “It is a solemn reminder of the cost of our freedom and the responsibility we have to protect it.”
After leaving active duty, Young earned a master’s degree in operations research from Georgia Tech and an MBA from NYU’s Stern School of Business. He is an expert in corporate restructuring and is now a senior managing director with M3 Partners.
Guy Ciarrocchi, a Republican commentator who ran against Houlahan in 2022, praised Young.
“Marty Young is an experienced engineer, veteran, and business executive—identical to Chrissy Houlahan, except Marty didn’t make his money off of a sneaker sweatshop in China,” said Ciarrocchi. “Marty is focused on practical solutions to real problems affecting our families and nation. If elected, he’ll do what Houlahan promised to do—yet has failed to do in four ineffective, partisan terms.”
Young convinced his wife, Sandy, to move back to West Chester from New York. They are raising four children, ages 11 to 18.
“Pennsylvania has always been home, and we came back home,” he said. “My parents still live here. My kids go to school here. And our roots are pretty deep here.”
His paternal great-grandfather helped found Philadelphia’s Chinatown. His mother, an immigrant from Portugal, taught in Philadelphia public schools and later at West Chester East and Henderson high schools as a substitute teacher. His father is a chemical engineer at DuPont.
“I have traveled and lived in many places around the world, but Chester County has always been home,” Young said. “It is a special place, worth protecting for generations to come.”
When asked by DVJournal what he meant, Young explained:
“I went to West Chester Area schools…I graduated from East. It was always what I would describe as moderate, centrist, commonsense Democrats and Republicans getting along and developing reasonable solutions. It was a place where you could raise a family easily.
“You have a friend in Pennsylvania—that ethos, right?”
Young said running for Congress was not a “long-time desire.”
“It’s something that evolved over the last number of months. Where we live, we’re all ready for something different.” And Houlahan, he added, even though she claims to be moderate, “when you look at her voting record, it’s very far left.”
“I have friends I graduated with from East High School who now serve as police officers throughout Chester County,” Young said. “They were deeply let down when Chrissy Houlahan voted to take away qualified immunity. That vote wasn’t just out of step with the commonsense values of our community—it sent a message to the men and women who protect us that Washington won’t stand with them when it matters.”
“When you look at her voting record, it doesn’t seem congruent with the moderate, centrist culture we have in Chester and Berks counties.”
With his background in the military and business, Young believes he will not face a learning curve if elected to Congress.
“I can bring forth practical solutions, and that’s what’s really needed,” Young said. “A lot of things that are going on right now are not sustainable.”
He said record spending and bureaucratic inefficiency have been building over the last 50 years. Another problem, he argued, is that Congress has ceded too much of its power to the president.
“If we don’t start fixing this now, certainly in my lifetime it won’t be fixable,” Young said. Healthcare, he added, is one example of an extensive, complicated system that nobody seems to be trying to fix.
“The hospital closings we’ve seen here in Chester County are a symptom of larger problems created by decades of bad laws,” Young said. “From the 1997 Balanced Budget Act to changes in the 340B program and the rise of pharmacy benefit managers, career politicians and lobbyists have built a healthcare system that now consumes 18 percent of our GDP. And almost no one is happy with it. Ross Perot warned about this in 1992, when healthcare was 12 percent of GDP. Thirty years later, the system is even more broken.”
“Congress needs to do its job, and it really hasn’t done its job in a long time,” Young said. “It needs people who can actually do the job. And I don’t see that right now.”