Aisha Farooqi is running for Michigan's 11th District on Medicare for All, abolishing ICE, and getting corporate money out of politics.

The only woman in a crowded MI-11 race, Aisha sits down with Breaking the Meta for an honest, unscripted conversation about who she is and what she'll actually fight for. A child of immigrants who came to the U.S. from Pakistan in 1993, she grew up in Detroit Public Schools — including a semester with no textbooks, where a teacher paid out of his own pocket — before becoming an attorney, legal aid lawyer, and juvenile prosecutor.

We get into the issues mainstream coverage skips: the affordability crisis and the friend who "eats organic" because she can't afford cancer care, the war with Iran she calls illegal, the erosion of due process, the gutting of the Voting Rights Act, and why she refuses money from AIPAC, corporate PACs, and utility PACs. She makes the case for being called a public servant — not a politician — and lays out her day-one priorities: Medicare for All, lowering the cost of living, universal childcare, ending the tariffs, strengthening the Department of Education, expanding the Supreme Court, and abolishing ICE.

Breaking the Meta platforms the grassroots and independent candidates the legacy press overlooks. Hard conversations, evidence over narrative, dignity for everyone.

— CHAPTERS —
(auto-fill from the Chapters section below)

— FIND AISHA —
Website: AishaforCongress.com
Instagram: @aisha_for_congress

Jason Pearce is the Democrat running for Texas District 4 against Pat Fallon in 2026 — and he spent just $1,500 to nearly pull it off.

🔗 Support Jason: pearcefortexas.com

Jason Pearce sat down with Breaking the Meta to talk about his run for Texas's 4th Congressional District: why he left his job last October to campaign full time, the affordability and education fights voters keep raising, his plan to ban stock and crypto trading for elected officials, and why he believes this is the most important midterm in U.S. history.

We get into his backstory, bankrupt at 13, dropping out of college over debt, working 90-hour weeks, and how a kid raised in a far-right household became the most progressive candidate on the Texas ballot. Plus: the $1,500 campaign that nearly beat a fully funded opponent, and what he'd do in his first days in Congress.

Breaking the Meta platforms the grassroots and independent candidates mainstream media ignores. Hard conversations when necessary, fighting the status quo, and the belief that everyone, regardless of race, religion, gender or identity, deserves rights, respect, dignity and safety.

#TexasPolitics #Election2026 #BreakingTheMeta #JasonPearce #TexasDistrict4 #GrassrootsCampaign

Across Georgia, dozens of races have no Democrat on the ballot at all. Bob Herndon is out to change that—one unwinnable district at a time.

In 2022, 51 Republicans in the Georgia state house ran completely unopposed. This cycle, Fighting 50 cut that number to 22. Executive Director Bob Herndon sits down with Mike to explain how a group that started with five people on a Zoom call now backs 70 candidates—and just notched its first win when Eric Gissler flipped a red seat by 289 votes.

We get into the detention center with no water, the candidates using "states' rights" against the people who coined it, the special election in Marjorie Taylor Greene's backyard, and why a guy who got arrested by his own party might be the best thing to happen to Georgia Democrats.

If you've ever been told your vote doesn't matter, this one's for you.

Support Fighting 50: https://fighting50.org
Adopt a candidate through Circles of Support at the link above.

— SUBSCRIBE for more conversations with the grassroots candidates mainstream media ignores. We're here to break the two-party stranglehold on American politics.

#BreakingTheMeta #Fighting50 #GeorgiaPolitics #GrassrootsDemocracy #FlipGeorgia

Fail at your job, you get a performance plan. Shavonne Hedgepeth says Congress should too. A grassroots run in Maryland's 4th District (MD-04).

Shavonne Hedgepeth works in capital planning at Metro by day and is running for Congress in Maryland's 4th by night — a "pragmatic progressive" who refuses to promise things a freshman can't deliver. In this episode she breaks down the real pain points in District 4: federal workers destabilized by shutdowns, a healthcare desert with one primary-care doctor per ~2,000 residents, housing thousands of units short, and residents in Bowie drinking brown water from a pipe flagged five years ago.

She lays out an accountability model most candidates never offer — a 12-member constituent council she'll meet with quarterly and a public constituent dashboard so you don't wait until election season to see what she's done. We get into why she won't run on lowering gas and grocery prices ("that's lying to you"), her day-one priorities, where U.S. foreign-policy trust went, and why she thinks her own party needs an audit.

Her platform: Medicare for All, abolishing ICE, restoring public education funding, ending Citizens United, taxing billionaires — built district-first.

▶ Support the campaign / learn more: https://voteshavonneforcongress.com/

Breaking the Meta interviews the grassroots and independent candidates mainstream media overlooks — no PAC money, accountable, working to break the two-party stranglehold on American politics.

Georgia House District 120 candidate Suzanna Karatassos on healthcare, Medicaid expansion, childcare, and Georgia's $5.15 minimum wage.

In this episode of Breaking the Meta, Leila sits down with Suzanna Karatassos, a Democrat running for Georgia House District 120 in the Athens area — a heavily gerrymandered seat spanning Clark, Barrow, Jackson, and Oconee counties.

A SCAD graduate and political content creator, Suzanna left a 17-year career in the apparel industry to run for office after the 2024 election. She lays out why healthcare is the number-one issue at every door she knocks, why Georgia still hasn't expanded Medicaid, and how the state sits on a $15 billion surplus while families work three jobs and still can't pay the bills.

We get into:
— Why Georgia's minimum wage is still $5.15 an hour
— The $700-per-person corporate subsidy vs. $30-per-person SNAP gap
— Universal childcare and the declining birth rate
— A real plan to help veterans navigate the VA
— How a deep-red seat next door flipped blue in just six weeks

Support Suzanna's campaign: https://suzannaforstatehouse.com
— Volunteer (open to out-of-state supporters)
— Donate
— Find her socials linked at the bottom of her page

———

Breaking the Meta is an independent political podcast platforming the grassroots and independent candidates mainstream media overlooks. We're here to break the two-party stranglehold on American politics — skeptical of concentrated power, pro-dignity, and independent of both corporate media and party machines.

👉 Subscribe and hit the bell so you never miss an interview: @breakingthemeta-podcast

#GeorgiaPolitics #Election2026 #Athens #Medicaid #GrassrootsPolitics #BreakingTheMeta

Denise Slipy is a first responder running for Minnesota Senate District 6 — and she's winning over Republicans. Rural healthcare, ICE, and common sense.

Denise Slipy never planned to be a politician. A reserve police officer and first responder from the Brainerd Lakes area, she stepped up after the seat opened unexpectedly — won her community's endorsement, took the special election in April, and hasn't stopped since.

In this conversation she lays out what rural north-central Minnesota is actually facing: hospitals on the brink of closing, a constituent whose insurance jumped 40%, soybean farmers watching their crop rot in the silo, and the real economic fallout of ICE raids on small towns and family dairy farms. She also makes the case for why "common sense" still belongs in St. Paul — and why she believes accountability means you only have to put up with her for four years if she gets it wrong.

🔗 Learn more about Denise: https://Slipy4Senate.com
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Breaking the Meta is about breaking the status quo — having the hard conversations and fighting for the idea that all people, no matter their race, religion, gender, or identity, deserve rights, respect, dignity, and safety. We platform grassroots and independent candidates the mainstream won't.
These candidates don't take PAC money. They want to be held accountable. What they need is visibility — so if this resonated, the best thing you can do is share it.

👍 Like, subscribe, and hit the bell so you don't miss the next interview.
#BreakingTheMeta #DeniseSlipy #Minnesota #SenateDistrict6 #DFL #RuralAmerica #2026Election #GrassrootsPolitics

What does a Justice of the Peace actually do — and why is it one of the most important votes on your 2026 ballot? Marine veteran Will Robertson ("Sergeant Rob") sits down with Mike Winson to break down the court most people ignore, and why it matters now more than ever in rapidly-growing Denton County, Texas.

From an infantry machine gunner at Camp Pendleton to Marine security guard postings in embassies across Bangladesh, Tokyo, Paris and three missions in Africa, Will shares how seeing the world firsthand reshaped the conservative worldview he grew up with — and why he traded a Congressional run for a local seat where he believes he can make a real difference.

We get into:
-What a Justice of the Peace really handles — evictions, truancy, small claims, the "people's court"
-Why Denton County's explosive growth is driving an eviction and truancy crisis
-How school vouchers are draining district funding
-The case for nonpartisan local justice — no R or D required
-Will's own brush with a JP as a teenager, and how compassion changed his life
-America's standing in the world, USAID, and the cost of broken trust abroad

Breaking the Meta sits down with grassroots, independent candidates who don't take PAC money and don't have millions behind them — the people fighting the status quo who just need visibility. If you're in Denton County or know someone who is, share this one.

Learn more about Will:
🌐 Robertson4ForTX.com
📷 Instagram: @RobertsonForJustice4
🎬 TikTok: @SergeantRob

Yes, his last name is Epstein. No, he's not related. Rob Epstein is running for Georgia State House District 23 — and his story is more interesting than the name.

A 30-year tech leader turned political first-timer, Rob lost his wife to cancer in May 2024, retired, prayed on what came next, and felt called to run in one of the reddest pockets of Cherokee County. In this conversation we get into:

→ Why a self-described non-political guy felt called to run
→ Separating Christ-followers from Christian nationalism
→ Georgia's 55%-investor-owned neighborhoods and the housing crisis
→ Why his Day One bill would ban corporate money in Georgia politics
→ Ranked-choice voting and ending Georgia's expensive runoffs
→ Medicaid expansion and the $17B surplus Georgia is sitting on
→ How the Latino vote is shifting after ICE due-process failures
→ What accountability really looks like (hint: it's showing up)

Rob's website: https://robepstein.org

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
ABOUT BREAKING THE META
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Breaking the Meta is an independent political podcast hosted by Mike Winson, focused on the grassroots and independent candidates the mainstream media won't cover. Hard conversations. No corporate gatekeepers. The belief that every person — regardless of race, religion, gender or identity — deserves rights, respect, dignity and safety.

🔔 Subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/@breakingthemeta-podcast
💬 Share this video with one voter in Georgia. That's the ask.

#RobEpstein #GeorgiaHD23 #BreakingTheMeta #Georgia2026 #CherokeeCountyGA #DownBallot #ChristianNotNationalist

Lauren Pinkston is running for Tennessee Governor as a true independent. She's never registered with either party — and she has a plan.

In this episode of Breaking the Meta, Mike Winson sits down with Lauren Pinkston — counter-trafficking researcher, PhD in community development, mother of four, and lifelong Tennessean — to talk about why a state that votes deep red is actually one of the lowest-turnout states in the country, and what it would take to bring people back to the ballot box.

We cover:
• Why Tennessee was dead last in voter turnout in the last midterm
• What happened when Lauren's own state representative hung up on her
• A day-one open-source accountability tool for all 33 senators and 99 reps
• 0% job growth in Tennessee over the last two years and who's actually paying for it
• Tennessee is losing 10 acres of farmland every minute — and her underground data center proposal
• Why one Tennessean is considering getting pregnant just to qualify for healthcare
• The "trafficking of health data" Lauren says no one is talking about
• Being a Christian who is "staunchly in defense of separation of church and state"
• Conscious Conversations: the in-home gatherings replacing rallies
• Why bringing a Republican and a Democrat to dinner is on her day-one agenda

Lauren's pitch isn't progressive or conservative. It's a posture argument: that the two-party fight has replaced problem-solving, and that Tennessee is full of principled people who hate both of their options. Whether you agree with every policy or not, this is a conversation worth your 30 minutes.

🔗 Learn more about Lauren's campaign: pinkstonfortn.com

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
ABOUT BREAKING THE META
Breaking the Meta is an independent political podcast platforming the grassroots and independent candidates mainstream media overlooks. Every district deserves a choice. No PAC funding. Hard conversations when necessary.

🎙 Subscribe: youtube.com/@breakingthemeta-podcast
📬 Want your candidate featured? Reach out via the channel.

#TennesseeGovernor #IndependentCandidate #BreakingTheMeta

he grew up in a birther household. Now Heidi Sinsley is running for NC House District 69 against Dean Arp → https://sinsleyfornc.com

Heidi Sinsley is the Democratic candidate for North Carolina House District 69, a Union County seat held since 2013 by Republican Dean Arp — one of the legislators responsible for North Carolina still operating on a 2023 state budget. She's a young attorney, a new mom, and the daughter of Christian nationalist parents who built her career fighting for the people the system ignores.

In this interview she breaks down what Union County voters are actually telling her at the door (affordability, healthcare, property taxes, the NC DMV mess), the day-one bills she'd file as a freshman legislator, why she wants the largest intern program in the state, and why rural Democrats keep getting starved of resources.

SUPPORT THE CAMPAIGN
Website: https://sinsleyfornc.com
ActBlue: search "Heidi Sinsley"
Socials: search "Sinsley for NC" on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X