Bob Brooks, the president of the Pennsylvania Professional Fire Fighters Association, said he is running for Congress to bring the perspective of a working-class American to Washington. “We need to change who’s representing us and who’s making the rules and the laws,” Brooks told the Guardian. “I think we need more everyday people down there, because everyday people are the ones that are struggling.”
Brooks, 41, began working at age 10 as a paper boy and later held jobs as a dishwasher, prep cook, pizza deliverer, bartender and truck driver before becoming a firefighter in 2005. He also ran a snow-removal and lawn-care business and coached baseball. He was elected president of his local firefighter union in 2005, then rose to lead the state association in 2021. Brooks said his early union work taught him how to negotiate contracts and handle grievances. “Every day, I get to do what I love, and that’s fight for my members, fight for their healthcare, fight for their working conditions and fight for better pay,” he said.
He handily won the Democratic primary last month after encouragement from Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and U.S. Rep. Chris Deluzio, a Democrat from western Pennsylvania. The general-election race is rated a toss-up by the Cook Partisan Index, which notes a +1 Republican lean but calls Mackenzie “one of the most vulnerable House Republicans in the country.”
Mackenzie, first elected in 2024 after defeating Democratic incumbent Susan Wild, received nearly $1.1 million in backing from Americans for Prosperity, a political action committee backed by the Koch network. The incumbent has an 8% legislative voting score from the AFL-CIO and has been endorsed by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Brooks has endorsements from centrist and progressive elected officials, including independent Sen. Bernie Sanders.
Brooks said he helped push for the Social Security Fairness Act, signed in January 2025, which expanded benefits for firefighters, police officers, teachers and other public workers with pensions. He also helped secure a Pennsylvania state law providing mental health benefits and protections for first responders.
On policy, Brooks is advocating for measures to address the affordability crisis, including rescinding Medicaid cuts, enacting Medicare for All, banning private equity firms from buying homes, reforming labor law and raising the minimum wage. He said the first step is stopping the Trump administration’s agenda, including tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans. “We need to stop the derangement, the things that are going on right now in Washington,” Brooks said. “Ryan Mackenzie, he just keeps voting for it.”
Brooks said his campaign refers to Mackenzie as “the arsonist.” “An arsonist would start a fire, and then 15 minutes later the thing’s burning, [and] he calls the fire department,” Brooks said. “Mackenzie starts the fire by making a bad vote and then, two weeks later, he runs a bill to counter the bad vote.”
In a statement, Mackenzie rejected Brooks’s characterizations and attacked his background. “Bob Brooks is a conman, fraudster, and dumpster-fire candidate,” Mackenzie said. “Brooks is running for office for the same reason he has done everything else – to serve himself and follow orders, just as he did as a union boss.” He accused Brooks’s consultants of dressing him “up as a work-class everyman.”
Brooks framed the race as a choice between a union leader who has fought for working people and an incumbent allied with corporate interests. “It appears, not just to me but to my unions and, quite honestly, to everyday people, that Washington doesn’t give a damn about us,” Brooks said. “Only 2% of Congress is from the working class, compared to 60% of our country.”