Click here to read the full piece in the White Mountain Independent.

As a veteran who served this country for 13 years, I take the call each of us has on our lives and the responsibility that comes with those callings seriously.

I took up the call to join the Navy the week after 9/11, and like many Americans, I believed it was my time to step up to serve and give back to this country. I knew that was a pivotal moment in our history and that the next generation needed to answer the call for the good and future of the nation.

Over the course of 13 years, I served on five wartime deployments, three to the Middle East with SEAL Team 3.

Following my service in the Navy, I harnessed my military background and life experience to start a small business with my wife, Jen, that employed and gave back to veterans across the country.

After some time in the private sector, I felt the call to begin serving my country in a new capacity.

My wife and I prayed for direction and felt that the Lord was pulling me towards the fight in our nation’s capital. For too long, I had watched elected politicians promise one thing on the campaign trail and then get to Washington and put their own selfish ambitions and desire for earthly glory before their commitments to their constituents.

It doesn’t take a professional political pollster to figure out that people in this country are sick and tired of being sick and tired.

The American people know that the leadership in DC isn’t working with their best interests in mind. Selfish politicians are happy to prioritize their ambitions and greed, selling out the people they’re supposed to advocate on behalf of.

Our government should be by the people, of the people, and for the people, but has been twisted beyond recognition to cater to grifters willing to suck up to lobbyists and sell their souls to special interest groups.

When I decided to run, I committed to actually representing the residents of Northern Arizona, to make sure their voices weren’t steamrolled by the status quo of this corrupt town, as had been the case for far too long.

Over the past nine months, that objective has been more and more difficult to achieve due to the leadership of my own party.

The people who sent me to Congress to represent them were largely opposed to having Kevin McCarthy as Speaker to begin with, which is why I never voted for the former Speaker back in January.

The former Speaker perpetuated the establishment status quo for nine months by breaking key promises and failing to fight for meaningful change, instead folding to Democrats and the Biden administration.

Just as they did in the debt ceiling fight, leadership sided with Democrats this past weekend to fund Biden’s budget — a budget that directly fuels the witch hunt against President Trump, leaves our border wide open for invasion, and empowers the federal government to impose their destructive cultural agenda on our nation.

Congress had a chance to deal a massive blow to the status quo and failed.

On Tuesday evening, I, along with seven of my Republican colleagues, voted in favor of the motion to vacate the Office of the Speaker.

My constituents sent me up here to fight for them, not to run with the herd. I promised to use every single tool at my disposal to break the wheel of incompetency that has routinely crushed the will of the people.

I am prepared to vote for a Speaker that agrees.

We’re $33 trillion in debt in this country. Congress is doing future generations of Arizonans a huge disservice by governing through reckless spending bills that saddle our children with absurd amounts of debt.

We owe it to our kids to protect the American dream by making the tough, uncomfortable calls now. That’s leadership.

I’m not here to play the game and permanently cement myself as a lifelong politician. I’m here to fight for the soul of our country and the prosperity of our children. If I lose because of the stances I’m taking, then so be it.

As long as I’m serving in Washington, I will keep the will of the people of Arizona’s Second Congressional District at the core of my votes.

Click here to read the full piece in the White Mountain Independent.

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