- Mike Thurow: I'm Mike Thurow.

I'm running to serve Wisconsin's 6th Congressional District in the United States Congress.

I'm not a politician.

I'm a union fire captain and a father of four, born and raised right here in the 6th Congressional District.

For the past 13 years, my job has been to show up when things go wrong.

And it's that job, my work as a firefighter, that drove me to run for office now.

You see, every day I report to work to help my fellow Americans, often on their worst day.

And every day, I see our politicians on both sides of the aisle continue to leave them behind.

Sure, they show up for the people with the big checks.

They show up when the camera's on.

But the things that are really squeezing families across this district?

They're nowhere to be found.

I got sick of waiting for someone else to show up, so I am, because, excuse the pun, but the house is on fire.

We are over $40 trillion in debt.

We're ensnared in yet another foreign war, and we have monopolies in every sector of our economy, raising prices, delivering worse products, and pushing down wages, all while sitting on record profits.

They get the deal, and you get the bill, and we're all left to suffer the consequences.

We feel it at the grocery store, at the gas pump.

We feel it when our health insurance premiums go up again and again.

We feel it when a new data center is approved in our backyard against an outcry from the local residents.

This isn't the free market working.

This is market power being abused.

It's the reality we all live in, in an economy that's been built for the few.

The same old parties won't fix the problems that they both created.

Different votes will.

I'm running not as a Democrat or a Republican, but as an American-- an American offering, for the first time in a long time, an off-ramp from a broken two-party system filled with lawyers, businessmen, and career politicians who have left us behind.

We're all sick of the dysfunction in Washington.

We're all sick of getting to the polls and picking between two bad options.

Now, somebody will tell you a vote for an independent is a wasted vote.

I would say a wasted vote is one more term for someone who does not show up for you.

You don't have to leave your party to do this.

But on this one race, I'm asking that you see this beyond red versus blue.

It's a working father versus a broken two-party system.

I don't take money from special interests.

I don't answer to any party leaders.

I answer to you, because here's the thing I learned in the fire service.

When the call comes in, you don't get to pick who to save.

You don't ask how someone voted.

You show up and you do the work.

That's what I'm offering to do for you.

To show up and do the work.

My name is Mike Thurow.

I'd be honored to have your vote.

Thank you.

- Elizabeth Fitzgibbon: My name is Elizabeth Fitzgibbon,