The Daily Signal - Virginia Woman Gives $150K Lottery Winnings to Three Nonprofits

Episode Date: September 18, 2025

Last week Carrie Edwards of Midlothian won $150,000 from the Virginia lottery because she matched four of the first five numbers plus the Powerball number on her lottery ticket on the Sept. 8 drawing. This week Edwards took that money and gave it all to three charities.  The Association for Frontotemporal Degeneration, an affliction that took her husband, Shalom Farms, a non-profit farm and food pantry service and to the Navy-Marine Corps Relief Society, which provides financial, educational and emergency assistance for active-duty service members, veterans and their families. Gillian Gonzalez from the NMCRS tells us more about what they do and why it was important for Mrs. Edwards to make that gift. Keep Up With The Daily Signal   Sign up for our email newsletters:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.dailysignal.com/email⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠     Subscribe to our other shows:    The Tony Kinnett Cast: ⁠https://megaphone.link/THEDAILYSIGNAL2284199939⁠ The Signal Sitdown: ⁠https://megaphone.link/THEDAILYSIGNAL2026390376⁠   Problematic Women:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠https://megaphone.link/THEDAILYSIGNAL7765680741⁠   Victor Davis Hanson: ⁠https://megaphone.link/THEDAILYSIGNAL9809784327⁠     Follow The Daily Signal:    X:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠https://x.com/intent/user?screen_name=DailySignal⁠ Instagram:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.instagram.com/thedailysignal/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  Facebook:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.facebook.com/TheDailySignalNews/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  Truth Social:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://truthsocial.com/@DailySignal⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  YouTube:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/dailysignal?sub_confirmation=1⁠    Subscribe on your favorite podcast platform and never miss an episode. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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We'd love to talk, business. Thanks for listening to this bonus episode of the Daily Signal podcast. I'm your host, Joe Thomas, Virginia correspondent for The Daily Signal. Before we dive into today's interview, I want to thank you for tuning in today. If you're a first-time listener, The Daily Signal, brings you fact-based reporting and conservative commentary on politics, policy, and culture. And I hope you join our band of regular listeners to our podcast. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe and also take a little bit of.

moment to rate and review us wherever you get your podcast. You can find additional content at DailySignal.com. Now, let's get started with today's conversation right after this. Last week, during the Powerball Mania, a Virginia woman won $150,000, and certainly not as eye-catching as the billions of dollars that were up for grabs. But when Carrie Edwards won the money, She announced to the Virginia lottery folks that she was going to divide it three ways. And one of the beneficiaries of the $50,000 gift was the Navy Marine Corps Relief Society with branches all over Virginia and important to her to the point where she wanted to make sure that they had this support to help with their financial, educational, and emergency assistance to active and veteran families. And joining us from the Navy Marine Corps Relief Society is Jillian Gonzalez. Jillian, thank you for taking some time out and telling the story of the Navy Marine Corps Relief Society to us and why it was so important to this family to give this gift.

For this opportunity, this is wonderful. Yeah, Navy Marine Corps Relief Society is blessed to know Carrie Edwards and her family. her father served in the Navy and was a lifelong supporter of the organization. And when he was still with us, he would always ask for birthday presents and Christmas presents from his kids to be a donation to us rather than gifts to him. Well, that's that choice. So the family has a very long history with us. So. So.

And if you know Carrie, you know that when she got the money, what she could do with it would be the first thought that she had. So it's incredible to know that there are people out there that support like that. So talk about your mission and why this was and why it engenders that kind of passion amongst both Ms. Edwards and her father before her. Absolutely. So Navy Marine Corps Leaves Society was founded in 1904. And predominantly we assisted widows and orphans back then. So obviously there was no life insurance. there wasn't any benefit to the family if a service member passed away, you would just pass the hat.

So we were created in 1904. We got a third of the proceeds from the gate of the Army Navy game. I would love to know what that brings in nowadays, but we got $9,000 back then, and that's what we started with. We are there to provide financial stability and well-being for sailors, Marines, and their families, and that's on active duty and then those that have served 20 years or more and have retired. In addition to providing financial assistance, and that may be in the form of a grant or an interest-free loan. We also have a visiting nurse program. We've got nurses around the world that can provide great resources to service members. My second child was born overseas.

that can be daunting to be a long way from home. Sure. Depending on where you are, maybe not speak the language in the hospital that you're delivering your child in and just having that little piece of home with one of our nurses being able there, being there to help you. It goes a long way. So it really is soup to nuts. It's active duty. It's retired.

And in all different places. And that to me is a wonderful benefit to the servicemen and women in the name. Navy and the Marine Corps. You said it started in 1905. What was it that made it start was the impetus for starting it then all those years ago, kind of before we even started to find ourselves embroiled in world conflict and all? Absolutely. So it actually, it was a conversation started in the 1800s, and it took about 100 years to come through fruition. Wow. There was a need. There was a couple of incidents on ships where there were mass casualties. And that was when people realized that, you know, we need to do something.

This isn't a single incident or a couple of people that were injured. There were, you know, 20, 30 people that were killed. One was an incident where a boiler blew up. And there were many fatalities, unfortunately. But that was when we realized we needed to take care of the families. So just like today, you know, we have life insurance. They didn't have anything like that back then. And you can only pass the hat so many times when you've got a mass casualty.

Oh, gosh. So we were founded initially to take care of that. We see, and unfortunately today, our mass casualty event seems to be Siemens, Marines, soldiers of all types dying at their own hands. I'm sure that's put a whole new kind of challenge into the Navy Marine Corps Relief Society, Jillian. So this money must go to help that quite a bit as well. I think if you look at divorce rates and, unfortunately, suicide rates, a lot of the stresses on a marriage on someone's life are financially related. So if you come in to see us, we do offer financial education. we'll sit down and look at your budget.

Our field officers, I can't praise them enough. They are incredibly compassionate. They're non-judgmental. We've been around a long time. You're not going to come in with something that we haven't seen before. And they're going to sit down and talk you through what you can actually afford. It's unfortunate that in this day and age, things are expensive. And your pay may or may not cover all of your friends.

bills, especially if you're moving every couple of years. So we're just there to be able to help them through whatever situation they're going through. And, you know, that may be an interest-free loan or a grant that we're going to provide assistance. A lot of times people come in and they really just need to learn how to manage their finances. A lot of the young folks that come in don't have that financial education. So we're kind of that first touch for them. Jillian Gonzalez from the Navy Marine Corps Relief Society. The story goes a young lady in Virginia. Carrie Edwards won $150,000 in Powerball.

And of course, everyone tuning in Powerball, it's billions of dollars. But she managed enough of the matches. I think it was the first five digits and won $150,000 in divvied up three ways. And one of the beneficiaries was the Navy Marine Corps. Relief Society. So, Jillian, I appreciate you talking about the mission overall, and it certainly it is now understandable why Ms. Edwards and her dad were so passionate about helping where, you know, where this meets the road. You talked about financial issues. Is reentry something that you see a big, where somebody finishes, you know, a 20-year career and then is struggling to find that place to fit in

in society and that sort of begins the journey into having financial problems? Thank you, Joe. That's a great question. Most of the people that come through a door are active duty. Oh, really? More than 50 percent. Yeah, more than 50 percent are going to be E4 and below. So, you know, they're on their first tour. Ten to 15 percent of the people that come through the door are going to be retirees. Part of that is geographic. We have offices on 15. 52 bases around the world. Okay. So they might just not be near one of our offices.

But predominantly the folks that we're helping are the junior enlisted. And where is your office in the Commonwealth? Is it Northern Virginia? Are you down Hampton Roads? I can see points of, you know, inflection where either would be the right place to be. Sure. So headquarters are in Arlington, Virginia. our footprint.

We're in Portsmouth in the hospital. We're on Norfolk. We're at Oceania. We're at Little Creek. So you have a lot of places where people could... We have a lot of places. We also have thrift shops in a lot of those locations. So if people are looking for gently used items,

all of the proceeds go straight into our mission. Great. That's another little fun fact about us. We run a stream of thrift shops, which are all located on base. Well, and that gives an opportunity, especially if people are moving a lot. But also the community then can also help out that way as well. So active duty, 50% active duty.

A lot of young families, I imagine, you know, E4 and below you're talking about if maybe still single, but, you know, many of them just starting out in families, Gillian? Oh, absolutely. you know, whether it's you just got married and you're getting your first apartment or, you know, you're expecting your first child. So, you know, if you're expecting your first child, we have a budget for baby class. You can come in and sort of go into what your new child's going to cost you. And that's whether it's your first baby. It might be your fifth baby.

It's still going to affect your budget in some way. Yes. So you can come in for that. And then, of course, obviously, we have all the gently used items that. our thrift shops as well. So where do people find you online if somebody's listening to this and saying, gosh, I really would love to help that out and didn't know about it? How can they find you to make a contribution to volunteer to help maybe in some way, shape, or form? I have a lot of friends who I know do financial counseling. I don't know what your intake is on that or if you need help there. But I imagine you need financial support just like Ms. Edwards made. So how do people find you online? line. Absolutely. So we are at n-M-C-R-S.org. So the initials of Navy Marine Corps Relief Society, n-M-C-R-S.org. The donate button is right there. If you want to mail a check, the address is there. We take donor-advised funds. We have lots of different ways that people can donate.

And, of course, you mentioned volunteers. Thank you so much for bringing that up. volunteers are our backbone. We are a very small cadre of staff when you look at the fact that we have a global presence. We have about 2,500 volunteers around the world, doing everything from answering phones, doing the actual casework with the people that come in for financial assistance, teaching the financial education. They actually run our thrift shops for us. They're 100% volunteer run. So there's a lot of opportunities out there. And we can work on base access if someone doesn't have access.

Well, as the expression in my old neighborhood goes, thanks for looking out, Jillian, and for everyone there. And again, thanks to Ms. Edwards. And anyone who makes that contribution, and it was notable enough to make the newswires that she had done this. And hopefully it brings more folks to make contributions to the Navy. Marine Corps Relief Society. It's N-M-R-S dot org, right? N-M-C-R-S. Oh, and I'm sorry. I left Corps out. I'm sorry. I'm going to get an email full of people saying, Joe, how could you leave the word core out of there? Well, I didn't. Can't forget the Corps. You can't forget the Corps. Now, you don't run into any issue where, you know, a Marine doesn't want to hear from a Navy guy, you know, because I know I get

that all the time. At the end of the day, we're all part of the same family. I know. And that's what you mentioned, the Army-Navy game. And one of the best traditions in America is when everyone comes down to the field after the game. And because they're all going to be off in theater, perhaps somewhere together. And it doesn't make a difference. Everyone needs to have each other six.

and I appreciate that what you do there, Julian, and thanks for taking some time to tell us the story. Joe, thank you so much for the opportunity to share what we do with your listeners. That'll do it for today's show. Don't forget to hit that subscribe button so you never miss out on new episodes from The Daily Signal. Every weekday you can catch top news in 10 to keep up with the day's top headlines in just 10 minutes. And every weekday afternoon catch Victor Davis Hansen's thoughtful analysis. for the Daily Signal. If you like what you hear on this show, would you take a minute and leave us comment?

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