Member Profile - Patricia Presti

“I have provided for CAGW in my will because I want my children to live in an America that is free, strong, and honors the sacrifices of those who came before us, which will only happen if our government is based on fiscally solid ground,” said longtime CAGW President’s Club member Patricia (Patty) Presti when she joined the J. Peter Grace Legacy Society in 2018.

A lifelong resident of St. Louis, Mo., Patty learned as a girl to value the liberty and economic opportunity that America affords its citizens when she visited then-communist Bulgaria on several trips with her father, a Bulgarian immigrant. She recounts how miserable the Bulgarians were under communist rule, with soldiers on the corners of the cobblestone streets and long lines at the grocery stores, while the government was exporting goods to subsidize its leaders’ luxurious lifestyle.

Avoiding a similar fate for America has motivated Patty to support CAGW’s mission to promote limited, transparent government and hold elected officials accountable so that they don’t become so “seduced by the fame and power that come with public office that they use our hard-earned dollars like Monopoly money to keep special interest groups happy and to ensure donations for their reelection campaigns.”

With her husband Michael Presti, a gastroenterologist, Patty has raised her two children to share her values, while maintaining her civic engagement. She has served as a member of the St. Louis County Special School District Board of Education and works to help elect fiscal conservatives to local and state office.

“It’s because of CAGW’s work that I am hopefully optimistic for the future of our country,” explains Patty. Each and every time that CAGW President Tom Schatz has called me to thank me for my President’s Club donation, my thoughts are the same: ‘I should thank you, because CAGW is watching out for me and my family.’ I donate as much and as often as I can and look at it as an investment in my children’s future.”