$665,000 and Kelda Roys raised more than 527,000.

Aside from the race for governor, the state's eight seats in the U.S.

House of Representatives are also up for election this year.

One of those races for the deeply red seventh district in far northern Wisconsin has attracted many candidates in the primary election.

Here and now.

Reporter Steven Potter has this story.

>> There's a lot of motivation to elect people in the seventh district that will be Make America Great Again.

Republicans.

>> The Great North Woods of Wisconsin is known for many things vast forests, abundant farmland, and some of the best lakes and rivers that the state has to offer.

It's also known as a very thinly populated region, but there is something that's become far more crowded than usual.

That's the ballot for the upcoming Republican primary for Congress.

In all, there are five candidates on the ballot for the seventh Congressional District Republican primary election, which takes place on August 11th.

The candidates include a financial planner, an accountant, a public relations executive, a marketing specialist, and a homebuilder.

They're all after the seat being vacated by current U.S.

House representative Tom Tiffany, who's running as the Republican candidate for governor.

While they're all Republicans, each of these congressional candidates has different reasons for why voters should choose them.

Kevin Hermening, the financial planner from Wausau, was one of the Marines taken hostage for more than a year during the Iranian hostage crisis back in 1979.

He's one of the better known candidates in this race.

business owner, a school board member, a community volunteer.

So there are a lot of reasons why that I'm the best qualified to represent the voters here.

>> Another well-known candidate is accountant Michael Alfonso, who lives in Hayward.

He's the son in law of U.S.

Department of Transportation Secretary Shawn Duffy, who held the same congressional seat that Alfonso is running for now.

>> I'm just, you know, an average kid from northern Wisconsin.

I grew up in land o lakes.

I bring the energy of a 26 year old.

I'm at every single county in the in the district.

I'm, you know, representing every voter.

>> Then there's public relations executive and Stanley resident Jesse Ebben, who has farming roots in the district.

>> I am a Christian conservative, a Trump Republican, a proud seventh generation wisconsinite who is committed to getting the government off our back, out of our way of life so that we can flourish and prosper right here in rural Wisconsin.

Rhinelander resident Niina Baum, who owns a marketing agency and was born and raised in the Northwoods.

>> I grew up in the district in Price County on a dairy farm, a small farm with about 25 milking cows.

And there were a lot of small farms in my community when I grew up.

And they all disappeared.

>> And finally, there's Don Rajala, a native and current resident of superior.

He works in home construction I.

>> This is my fourth time running for Congress.

I did it in 2010, 2014, 2016.

I have this time and all this energy Steil.

I'm 58 years old, but I just know I can get out there and represent people.

Congressional District stands out for a few reasons.

First is its size.

As the state's largest congressional district, it stretches across 20 counties and almost 19,000mi!S of northern and central Wisconsin.

The economy here is anchored on agriculture, forestry, manufacturing and tourism.

Politically, however, the area has seen significant change over the last couple of decades, driven largely by redistricting.

The seventh Congressional District is now the most reliably Republican stronghold in the state.

>> They're very Republican.

>> Jacque Weissenburger is the vice chairwoman of the Rusk County Republicans.

>> People here really appreciate the values of hard work, having individual freedoms, being able to live their lives as they see fit.

>> She says.

This race for the seventh Congressional District of Wisconsin has national consequences.

>> There's a very big risk at midterms that the House will turn blue, and I think that it's this particular race itself in the seventh district will be it'll be somewhat of a barrier against that happening.

>> While it's certainly possible that the seventh district could elect a Democrat, and there are three of them on the primary ballot, election experts say that's fairly unlikely.

In the 2024 election, voters of the seventh district chose both Republican Tom Tiffany for U.S.

representative and Donald Trump for president by a 20 point winning margin.

The candidates have been working hard to get voters attention and letting them know that they understand the issues that are important to them, according to recent polling, Michael Alfonso is leading the pack, and Alfonso does have the endorsement of President Trump.

>> We've seen kind of this mortgaging of the middle America, the manufacturing jobs, so that we can benefit the coastal elites.

I don't like that.

When we talk about rising costs, maybe the tariffs contribute to that.

But President Trump understands that this is a short term plan.

We're going to be working to bring back the jobs we lost overseas, right back here to northern Wisconsin.

And then we can start removing the tariffs.

>> Number two in the polls is Kevin Hermening, who has given $1 million of his own money to his campaign.

>> When people decide to call central and northern Wisconsin their home, they're saying to the rest of the state, we'd like you to be involved, but we don't need you to control our lives.

And so it's a big reason that I love living up here because of the individuality and the the willingness of people to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps.

>> Jesse Evans says her priorities center on land, wolves and jobs.

>> A lot of the issues here are a battle of our way of life.

So it's everything we're seeing right now, with solar panels and windmills being targeted to be put on our farmland and the fight that we have to see our rural save, our rural landscape, our family farms from bad energy, bad energy policy.

There's really a big battle to de-list the gray wolf.

We need to make sure that that hunt can be localized right here in our state.

And I work in manufacturing, so making sure that we have good manufacturing jobs, that the government isn't the barrier for keeping those manufacturing jobs, keeping the manufacturers here in the rural communities.

>> For Niina Baum, who's biking around the seventh district to meet voters, she worries about the country's financial future and wants regulation changes.

>> Social Security Trust Fund has been projected to be insolvent in a few years, and if nothing's done about it, it's automatic cuts of about 23%.

That is going to have a huge.

If that happens, that's going to have a huge negative impact on our Northwoods economy.

I'd like to see more zoning deregulation, making it easier, more attainable for people to actually build homes and more cost effective.

And not all of these barriers, like minimum square footage requirements or outdated zoning regulation.

>> Don Raihala Halah wants to make sure local residents maintain local control.

>> I'm a big believer in referendums and referendums.

Stop data centers dead in their tracks.

If.

If a city.

Let's choose Wausau or Superior.

If the citizens want to get together and put out a referendum and stop it, it stops right there because the state has given the power to local municipalities to do that.

>> Just like names on the ballot, there's no shortage of issues in this race.

>> Health insurance.

>> Costs of housing.

>> Loss of a job.

>> Or with Iran.

>> These tariffs.

>> Immigration.

>> Drug pricing.

>> On manufacturing and on agriculture.

>> Tough for small farms.

>> Epstein files.

>> But there's one topic that's on the top of mind for all voters.

The increased cost of everything.

Republicans running for the seventh Congressional District are careful about how they discuss the economy and inflation, and what can be done to bring down costs, Jessi Ebben says it's all about energy.

>> Well, the cost of energy is really the baseline that starts a lot of the inflation.

So the best thing we can do is have good energy policy to really start this.

And that doesn't mean solar or wind.

>> Michael Alfonso blames problems within government programs.

>> So inflation it's a scary one.

It's caused by government overspending.

I think the easiest thing to cut from the federal government is fraud, waste and abuse.

So much fraud in our system, so many people making money off of American taxpayers, scamming them.

If we want to shrink the spending, the easiest place to do it is get rid of the cheats.

>> Kevin Hermening also blames the federal government.

But differently.

>> The government has a spending problem.

Government should not be borrowing for its ongoing costs of operation.

When you do that, you run into, in our case, a $40 trillion debt.

And so the government needs to understand that these are dollars that are intended for our communities.

These are dollars that are best spent by the people who live here, who earn them.

And that could play a big role in bringing down inflation.

>> Niina Baum says pricing problems start with the white House.

>> Something that we've been seeing happen a lot more with the current and past administrations, is that a lot more has been passed through executive order, and I think that creates a lot of volatility, which affects the affordability and the economy.

sure what can be done about inflation, but residents need to do what they can for themselves.

>> If you're going to build a home, be your own contractor, be your own general, you you're going to save 15% right off the bat.

It's going to take a couple of phone calls and maybe a weekend here or there, but be your own contractor.

race.

These candidates will be splitting the Northwoods Republican electorate, and voters here are spread far and wide across the rural district.

That means that it may come down to just a few percent or even a few hundred votes, and each campaign has many miles to cover.

Between now and August 11th.

Reporting from August 11th.

Reporting from