Yonkers Insider: 2020 Election: Candidate Profile: Sammy Ravelo, Democrat for US Congress, 16th District - Primary Day - June 23rd.

Samuel "Sammy" Ravelo was born in Santo Domingo, the capital city of the Dominican Republic, to working-class parents. His father was a small business owner and his mother was a pharmacist.  

Sammy is the third born of six brothers and sisters. Due to the economic and political uncertainties in the Dominican Republic, and the desire to give her children a better life, his mother decided to permanently move to the United States. Sammy arrived in New York on a travel visa, he overstayed, and was then sponsored for permanent residency by his mother.

Sammy attended Walton High School in the Kingsbridge section of the Bronx. After graduation, unable to afford College, he worked a variety of jobs such as bagging groceries at the neighborhood supermarket and pumping gas at the local service station. In 1988 he received his permanent residency and began his  career of public service by joining the United States Navy. In the Navy, Sammy served with distinction in the Persian Gulf War.

After completing his military service Sammy returned to the Bronx and enrolled in Bronx Community College. While in school he joined the New York City Police Department as a Police Cadet. Sammy developed his leadership skills over 25 years in the NYPD, rising through the ranks and retiring and a Lieutenant in 2018.

While serving in the New York City Police Department, Sammy directly confronted many of the challenges facing communities all around United States. Upon retirement, Sammy knew his work in addressing these challenges was far from over and he is running for Congress as a continuation of his lifetime of public service.

In Congress, Sammy will be a leader in confronting the scourge of gun violence, our ineffectual immigration policy that creates an underground economy and forces people into the shadows, and the devastating opioid crisis.

Sammy will bring new energy to transform an economy that does not work for everyone by combating income inequality, improving education quality and affordability for all Americans young and old, and making quality healthcare affordable to everyone.

Sammy will get to work for the people of New York by working to overhaul disastrous housing policies that hurt poor and working-class New Yorkers, fund vital infrastructure projects, and combat the current and future impact of climate change. 

Sammy is the father of two sons, Sammy Jr and Kevin, whom he raised in the Morris Park neighborhood of the Bronx.

After seeing that our elected officials are not representing the people that elected them, and the need to fix a broken Washington DC, Sammy Ravelo has decided to continue to serve and run for the people of Yonkers, New Rochelle, Mount Vernon and North Bronx.