BALTIMORE – House Democrats, hoping to channel the wave of grassroots energy opposing President Trump into significant victories in the mid-term elections next year, are seeing early involvement from one influential group: military veterans.

In the early days of the Trump administration, several House Democrats involved in campaigns say they’ve seen an increase in the number of military veterans interested in running for office next year, motivated by opposition to Trump’s foreign policy.

Washington State Rep. Denny Heck, now in his second cycle recruiting candidates for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said the increase has been “off the charts.”

“I virtually guarantee you we are going to have an unprecedented percentage of our candidates who are veterans,” Heck told RCP in an interview here last week during House Democrats’ annual retreat.

In part, that uptick is due to the work of Rep. Seth Moulton, a second-term member from Massachusetts who served four tours in Iraq as a Marine Corps infantryman. Moulton (in photo above) told RCP he’s been actively reaching out to fellow veterans about considering a run for office and has been contacted by others who are interested.

For the most part, the uptick is attributable to Trump’s election, both because of statements he made during the campaign – including attacking Sen. John McCain for being a former prisoner of war – and his early policy decisions, including the executive order temporarily barring refugees and immigrants from seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the United States.

“The election of Trump has inspired a lot of people to stand up and say, ‘I need to stand up and take part in our government,’” he said. “The bottom line is they see the country as in peril and they want to help."

Moulton said he’s spoken with at least a dozen veterans who are seriously considering running for office – about one-quarter of the more than 40 total potential candidates the DCCC has spoken to in the early days of the Trump administration. He said the conversations are often about their reasons for wanting to run for office, and lessons he learned from his experience. Moulton defeated a nine-term Democratic incumbent in a 2014 primary and won the general election by 13 points before running unopposed in 2016.

Moulton cited an example of the type of veteran he’s been talking to: a fellow ex-Marine who now works in business and has a family with small children, who he said had never considered entering politics until Trump’s election.

“He decided that the risk Donald Trump poses to the country is so great that he should take time away from his family to run for office,” Moulton said.

Two other examples came from Heck, the recruitment chair – who wouldn’t share names or specific district information, not wanting to get ahead of any potential campaign announcements. Both prospects, he said, had worked with Afghani or Iraqi interpreters and were “offended” by Trump’s travel ban, which originally included the type of visas given to interpreters, though it was subsequently amended to allow their emigration to the United States. He said one of the veterans in particular had worked closely with two interpreters in Iraq, both of whom were killed, and had been trying to help another in coming to America when Trump’s travel ban was announced.

Both are in districts the DCCC is targeting – one district that Hillary Clinton won in November, currently served by a Republican in the House – and a second with a GOP member where Clinton lost by fewer than 4 percentage points.

For Moulton, despite the fact he’s working closely with the DCCC, the issue is not solely about partisan politics. Eighty members of the House are military veterans, according to the Committee on Veterans Affairs – 19 Democrats and 61 Republicans. That’s the same number as the previous Congress, and the fewest since World War II.

“These are people who have already done more than enough to serve their country, but it’s inspiring to know that people who have had to put the country before partisan politics or personal gain are willing to serve in politics,” Moulton said. “Those are exactly the kind of people we need.”