[2] Burdick is a native of Portland, where she graduated from Woodrow Wilson High School.

In the 2017 Legislative Session, she joined with Republican Sen. Brian Boquist, R-Dallas, to sponsor Oregon’s Extreme Risk Protection Order (ERPO) law.

Oregon's ERPO is a tool to help prevent suicide and other harmful behavior by removing dangerous weapons from people in crisis.

Similar to Washington's Extreme Risk Protection Order – a ballot measure that passed statewide with about 70 percent of the vote in November 2016[5] – Oregon's ERPO allows a process for keeping deadly weapons away from a person found by the court finds to be at risk of suicide or being a danger to others.

In the 2018 Legislative Session, Burdick supported the passage of House Bill 4145, which strengthened Oregon's gun control laws by aligning the definition of a domestic violence conviction under Oregon's Unlawful Possession of Firearms statute with the definitions of domestic violence found elsewhere in Oregon law, effectively closing the loophole for when there is a dating relationship.