War widow turned activist handicaps GOP presidential race

Flanking the wording on the right is the word "SNIPER."

On the left, the Thunderbird symbol, representing Chris Horton's unit, the 45th Infantry Brigade Combat Team of the Oklahoma National Guard.

Jane Horton met Chris Horton through politics; he hired her to help with a campaign in New York.

After they married in 2009, they moved to be near Chris' hometown of Tulsa.

But after he died in an ambush in Afghanistan, Jane dedicated her life to making a difference in the lives of families who have gotten that dreaded knock on the door, notifying them that their loved one died in the service of their country.

As a result of her involvement in several organizations, she has had a chance to meet all of the current major party presidential candidates, with one exception.

"The only one that I have not met is O'Malley," Horton told KRMG Friday. "I've not met Martin O'Malley."

But she has met Donald Trump on two occasions, as well as Jeb Bush, Carly Fiorina, Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz , Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.

That puts her into somewhat of a unique position to comment on the presidential race, since she's a private citizen and not a politician or journalist.

"It is interesting meeting people, especially with my situation with my husband giving his life for his country, because I get to see a lot of different aspects of people, and I get to see their heart for the military and also how they're going to treat a war widow. I kind of take myself out of the equation and just see the way they would treat someone that's in my situation. I feel like I get to see a lot of people's true colors."

Jane wears, and hands out, those black, metallic bracelets in memory of her husband.

She's not alone.

"A couple of them actually wear Chris' killed in action bracelet every day," she says. "Marco Rubio has worn it for the past 2 1/2years, he's worn it for a long time. I just saw it on him in the debate two days ago, and I also saw him in person, I met with him about a month ago, and he wears that every day. And Jeb Bush wears it as well."

Asked to handicap the race, Jane laughed.

"I haven't actually come out with my thoughts publicly, but I guess I will now because it's us good ol' Okies," she joked. "I was really against having another Bush, because I don't think there should be three people from the same family being president, and we definitely don't need another Clinton. For the past 30 years, I think it is, there hasn't been an election without a Bush or Clinton on the ticket. But Jeb, after meeting him, he definitely started to grow on me. He's very different, he's very smart -- very, very smart. So I did start to like him a lot more after meeting him."

But, she says, after looking at the big picture, one candidate stands out for her.

"I think for the party as a whole, for the Republican Party, I think the best candidate would be Rubio. I think he really showed, especially in the last debate, how strong he is and how much he can fight, and I think that his background is incredible, and I think that the whole package combined... Rubio would be a great candidate."

She went on to say that she likes a lot of the candidates, though there are some she thinks need to go ahead and drop out of the race.

"There's a lot of them that I think have wonderful records and are great people, but I just don't think they're going to be able to beat the Democratic candidate, so I think that our best bet is Rubio."

Horton tells KRMG that eventually, she plans to work on obtaining a law degree.

But meanwhile, she's doing what she believes she was put on Earth to do.