Hello, I'm Bruce Conroy and I am Tarek and tonight on Community Conversation to Stephanie Thomas, who is running for Secretary of State. For over the start off of what made you want to run for Secretary of State? The reason I'm running for Secretary of State, I have many, but one of them is I really believe what I learned when I was campaigning in 2018 is that many people are tired of politics as usual. They find it difficult to assess our democracy. They don't know how or they lose faith in the people they voted for. And I think the next Secretary of State has a real opportunity to engage with people, to really go into the community, speak with everyone from town clerks to registrars of voters. But also chambers of commerce, small business development centers, advocacy groups. I really feel that the electorate, if you will, has lost touch with how to engage with government. And I think that is part of the reason we're seeing such distrust in apathy. One thing I talk about a lot is just educating people. I do believe we're at an inflection point. We have always had apathy at the polls, municipal elections. If someone typically gets 30% turnout, that's considered high. That's very troubling. Prior to Trump's election, I think even nationally 60 something percent turnout, I think that's abysmal. And then you take one more factor, which is the lack of civic education. And I can't tell you how many people in a certain generation never had any civic settle. And most people who had it will say they had too little of it. So I think all of those things are creating a reality in our democracy that 10 years from now, I don't think we want to see where that goes. And I think we have spent as a country, indefinitely as a state, putting all of our effort into voter registration and voter expanded voter access, which both are very important. But if you ignore those other pieces, I think we're doing ourselves a disservice because you can have as many people able to vote. But if they don't want to, you can't force them. So I really think the next secretary has an opportunity to hopefully stand up something that could be replicated in other states, because this isn't a Connecticut problem. But something that focuses on civic education and civic engagement, not only just for kids, but for adults as well, because guess what? They vote. And their voice should be heard. I have often said, we don't even know what we want as a nation because enough people don't vote to tell us. And I find that just very troubling and a sign that our democracy is on the wrong path. So I do think that's a differentiator, but to answer your question more specifically, I have a eclectic background, if you will, as a small business owner, as someone who has worked in or for the nonprofit sector for the last 30 years. And now as a legislator, it has created a very robust background that doptails very nicely with the role of the office. And I get excited talking about transparency and efficiency in government. And my masters is in nonprofit management and sort of a sub specialty and organizational development. These are things that I find exciting. My legislative role also has taught me how to navigate Hartford, which I do think is important. And I'll say it here because on the campaign trail, I think people get shiny object syndrome and everything is about sound bites and making it sound sexy. But this job is actually not sexy at all. It's a lot about data and lawyers, answering questions and behind the scenes, management of information. And I think, you know, we always focus on what comes next, but I think actually right now where we are in history, culture, the pandemic, the next secretary has a lot to take on over the next four years, implementing things that we've already passed. Automatic voter registration comes to mind, but we need to sit down with all of these state agencies that we have now enabled to do automatic voter registration, but they're not ready to do it yet. And there's work to be done there. We've just gotten a report back about risk limiting audits and some work we need to do there in the coming years. That needs to be looked at, implemented early voting misinformation. The current secretary has requested an appropriation to hire someone just to deal with that because it's so prevalent in cybersecurity. These are all big issues in and of themselves. So I would just like to say we have to remember both sides of the job. Yes, the visionary side, but there's also the implementation side and better to do a few things really well than a lot of things. Right. I mean, I just spent a half an hour asking you questions about only one part of the secretary's job. I didn't even go into a small business registrations and every other thing that's on your plate once you become secretary of state. I like it. The positive thinking is the way to move through the process. Thank you.