Thank you, Delegate Fluharty. It’s been an honor to call Shawn my friend for the past 14 years now. Despite working on Capitol Hill and being active in politics my entire life, I have never met an elected official with more—how should I put it?—intestinal fortitude than Shawn Fluharty. We are lucky to have him fighting on our behalf in the Legislature.

Thank you also to Mayor Williams for making the trip from Huntington to be with us tonight. No mayor in West Virginia has given me more inspiration for how to approach my position in Wheeling. What Steve has been able to do in Huntington over the past decade is nothing short of remarkable. And there is not a candidate in the race for Governor who has anywhere near the executive experience that he brings to the table.

And while we’re on the topic of those running for statewide office in West Virginia, let me also thank Teresa Toriseva for joining us tonight. Like Delegate Fluharty, she is a fighter. I have seen firsthand what she is capable of in the courtroom and I have zero doubts about her ability to represent us as our Attorney General.

Let me also thank Dan Milleson and his family for opening up this terrific new space for us. A few short years ago, this building sat vacant after Berry Supply had shut its doors. But where others saw a liability, the Millesons saw an opportunity. And with this investment they have changed the conversation about the future of our waterfront. Because of the success of this endeavor, there are several other potential investments on this very block that are being actively considered.

Thank you also to Dean Connors for volunteering his equipment and time to be our “sound guy” tonight. In the past decade, Dean has purchased, rehabbed, and rented out five historic buildings in our downtown and is very much part of the renewed vitality we are seeing in Wheeling.

And I would be remiss if I did not also thank my wife Cassandra for making not only this event but also my very life these days possible. For much of the past month she has been not only my unofficial campaign manager but also my planner, my dietician, my life coach, and, yes, the mother of our beautiful son Harrison—all while holding down a full-time job.

And thanks to all of you for coming. And for those of you who brought your children. It was important to us that our events in this campaign be kid-friendly. For most of the time I have been alive, West Virginia’s most precious export has been its youth. The upcoming elections are—fundamentally—about the West Virginia that we leave to them. If you look at that Mayor Williams has done in Huntington and what we’ve done here in Wheeling, you will see a patient and deliberate strategy to make our respective cities a place where young people can see their future.

For me, much of this campaign is personal. I have seen the struggle that so many of our neighbors face each and every day. I have seen firsthand what it’s like to be a family living paycheck to paycheck. My first six years were spent living in the same style singlewide trailer that outsiders often associate with West Virginia. I saw the sacrifices my family had to make on my behalf. And I remember reaching the age of maturity here in Wheeling and seeing few opportunities for advancement. And like so many West Virginians of my generation, I left with no plans to return.

But as fate would have it, I eventually found my way back to West Virginia. And I have had the incredible honor of getting to serve as mayor of my beloved hometown of Wheeling for nearly 8 years now. I have approached being mayor the same way I will approach this campaign—with a hands-on, pragmatic, forward-thinking mindset. I look forward to taking this approach to the United States Senate on behalf of you and your children.

As a young man I saw firsthand what is possible in a Senate operating as it was designed. While working for Senator Byrd in the 1990s, I saw a Democratic President work with a Republican Congress to do something that sounds unthinkable today—actually balance the federal budget. How did they do it? With an approach that sounds equally implausible today: with both sides making critical concessions.

Look, we live in divided times, and I am under no illusion about how difficult the path ahead will be—particularly if I am elected. But more than anything else, I think it is my experience as a mayor of a city seeking to reinvent itself that has prepared me for this journey.

I want to be respectful of your time tonight—and there ‘s still a lot of food to eat—so let me just touch on three issues that will be central to my campaign. I will do everything I can to make myself available for questions later and in the days ahead. And while I do not anticipate being in Wheeling much over the balance of this campaign, I am happy to report that our campaign office will be open at 1310 Market Street as of Monday.

Ok, so on to the issues—although, in fairness, my first issue really isn’t so much an issue as it is a cause. I’m 52 years old, and one constant I have noticed over the course of my life is the squeezing and shrinking of the American middle class.

During this time, we have seen income inequality rise to levels not seen since the 1920s. The historians in this room will remember how that decade ended.

We cannot continue down this path. Not only because it is morally wrong for so much wealth to be concentrated in the hands of a select few, but also because democracies tend to descend into either dictatorships or anarchy when too many of their citizens see no path to improving their lives.

We have heard endless campaign slogans about the American Dream over the years, but the gap between that dream and the reality in our economy continues to widen.

Politicians on the other side typically talk about the American Dream in the context of free market capitalism. And their rhetoric usually sounds as American as apple pie. But when you look at their policies in practice, you find that they typically only believe in this “free market” as it applies to the middle class and the poor. Our tax code, bankruptcy courts, and history of bail outs has ensured that when it comes to billionaires and “too big to fail” corporations, what they really mean is capitalism for profits and socialism when it comes to losses.

Anyone here know the most difficult type of debt to get discharged in bankruptcy? Hint: It’s not the type of debt that billionaires typically use. Instead, it’s student loan debt.

And student loan debt is something I know personally very well. I financed 100% of my college and law school educations personally. When I graduated law school at the age of 30 I had over $200,000 in accumulated student loan debt. I had a choice: Pursue a career in law where I could make the biggest difference, or one where I could make enough money to repay those loans before I turned 40.

For better or worse, I chose the latter route and was able to extinguish my debt by the age of 38. But that came at a personal cost. I found myself in an unsatisfying career for which I had no passion.

The good news—for me at least—is that my frustration ultimately led me back to West Virginia 15 years ago. Aside from marrying my wife, it’s the best decision I ever made. And I have been able to make up for lost time by being so involved in my community here.

But how many others who began their lives with significant student loan debt are still stuck in careers living out someone else’s dream? How many have fallen through the cracks or seen their credit scores ruined by missed payments?

Look, to be very clear, I am not running to wage class warfare. I have good friends across the entire wealth spectrum and don’t mean to present these arguments in an us versus them context.

I just want to do everything I can to ensure that we have an economy that works for everyone, not just those at the top.

I want us to invest in early education, child care, and public health.

I want us to respect the value of labor and the unions that have fought so hard for those providing it.

I want a federal tax code that aligns with the traditional American value of fairness—not one that rewards those with the highest paid lobbyists.

I want to protect programs like Social Security and Medicare that help ensure middle class Americans a comfortable retirement.

Nothing in this list is radical or beyond our capacity as a nation. In fact, we showed in the mid-20th Century that we are a nation capable of rising to unchartered heights when we invest in ourselves. We showed that with a fairer tax system, strong labor unions, and educating an entire generation of veterans returning from the second world war, that we could create the largest and most vibrant middle class the world had ever seen, build a nationwide Interstate system, put men on the Moon, and become the envy of the free world.

Everyone of us in this room who has ever had a social media account has seen someone they know—maybe a friend, maybe an acquaintance, maybe someone close—who has gotten sick and turned to the Internet for help. It’s 2024. We are the richest country on Earth. But for too many of us, getting seriously sick means entering the Go Fund Me Society.

We have talked about our children here tonight, but think for just a moment what it must be like for those children who see those desperate pleas online. We teach them in school that if they study hard and get good grades, anything is possible. But we’re delivering them the only advanced economy on Earth where getting really sick can equal bankruptcy.

The problem here is not a lack of resources. We spend more money on health care than any other country on Earth. But we are not getting the best health care outcomes. It’s not even close.

And here in West Virginia, we remain at or near the bottom in every major health metric.

Part of the problem is what we prioritize. We have a health care system that does not incentivize health.

Why? Because there’s far too much profit to be made by treating you if you are sick. And by making you dependent on drugs upon drugs—and then more drugs to offset the side effects of the first set of drugs—and so on for the rest of your life.

We hear much these days about the opioid crisis, but not nearly enough about how it started. It started because the health care system cared more about profits than it did in actually healing people. If you have a chance tonight, just ask Mayor Williams what that crisis has wrought in Huntington.

I lost my father a few months ago. He was 79, but in my opinion he died a decade or more sooner than he should have. I watched his journey through the health care system. I saw him go from a very spry 50-year old to a decidedly unhealthy 70-something diabetic who could barely walk and who depended on a dozen or so medications to get through each and every day.

Now, I know his doctors urged him to change his lifestyle. But let’s not kid ourselves here: In the health care system we have, there is not a lot of money to be made on healthy people. My father had excellent health insurance throughout his decline—including over a decade on Medicare. And he got out of that health insurance excellent medical treatment and far more economic value than he had ever paid into it. But his health went from good to bad to worse to a hospice facility.

While we do a pretty good job of providing affordable health insurance for our seniors and for those of limited means, the fact remains that too many Americans are caught in a world where affordable health insurance is unattainable.

Now, there has been some progress in this regard. Tens of thousands of West Virginians have been able to secure health insurance thanks to the Affordable Care Act.

Look, this issue has become personal to me. And if given the honor of being your next Senator, I will do everything I can to put the health back in health care and make Go Fund Me medical treatment pleas a thing of the past.

Staying on the topic of health care, let me turn now to an issue that has taken on a heightened significance in light of recent judicial and legislative decisions. And that’s the right of women to make their own reproductive health care decisions. A right that the women of this country—including this state—had guaranteed for nearly half a century by the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling.

But two years ago, in the blink of an eye, that all changed. First, we had the Supreme Court decision in Dobbs that overturned Roe and for the first time in history actually took away a Constitutional right.

Shortly afterwards, the West Virginia Legislature and Governor practically tripped over each other in a race to enact one of the most regressive restrictions on women’s reproductive rights in the nation.

And just like that, the reality for West Virginia women of child-bearing years changed dramatically.

Look, the media would have you believe this is the most divisive issue in the country. But the truth of the matter is that we have seen a newfound consensus emerging.

When given an opportunity to be heard directly on this question, American voters—including those from deeply red states—have overwhelmingly called for a return to the Roe v. Wade framework.

Now, I certainly recognize that for some, this is a deeply emotional and heartfelt issue. But as I see it, Roe v. Wade represented a thoughtful and tested effort to balance the views on both sides of the issue.

Roe was founded on a Constitutional right of privacy, and it basically provided as follows:

•  It gave women the absolute right to make decisions as to whether to end a pregnancy in the first trimester.

•  It allowed States to impose some reasonable restrictions on those rights in the second trimester.

•  But by the third trimester, it allowed governments to impose very significant restrictions except in cases involving the life or health of the mother.

As far as I am concerned, Roe v. Wade had it right. It trusted women to make the most intimate of decisions respecting their own bodies and their own families. It kept the government out of the examination room when women were meeting with their doctors in the early stages of pregnancies.

And if I have the chance to be your next United States Senator, I would advocate for legislation to codify the Roe v. Wade standard as the law of the land.

But I would also do something else that is very important.

I would make sure we are doing everything we can at the federal level to ensure that there is no shortage of resources available for those children who are actually born. Resources like a permanent child tax credit that lifts families with children out of poverty. Universal child care. A compassionate foster care system and adoption networks. And so on.

If we can nudge the focus on the unborn towards the born, we will find far fewer reasons why women would choose to terminate pregnancies in the first place.

OK, so in closing, it is important to note that everything I am talking about tonight starts here. In gatherings like this. With people like you in this room coming together to engage in this effort. People who are invested in our collective future. And your children. Because remember, this is ultimately about the country that we leave to them.

Let me just say how much I appreciate those of you making the effort to be here tonight. This campaign will go as far as you propel it. Many of you have made contributions, and for that I am deeply grateful. Others have volunteered your time and energy to spread the word about this campaign and connect me with people across the State. If you haven’t already done so, there is a sign-up form on our website where you can indicate how you would like to help. There’s also a survey that will help us identify those issues most important to you.

And on my end, I will commit to each of you that I am putting everything I have into this effort. In the days ahead, I will be meeting with and listening to voters like you in all 55 of West Virginia’s counties. And I pledge to you that I will run a campaign that appeals to our hopes and aspirations and not to our fears. Just as I have done as mayor, I will never shy away from engaging in the consequential questions and issues of our times. And I will hopefully make you proud as the next United States Senator from our beloved state of West Virginia.