Campaign Site: http://www.bowles2004.com/

He built two successful North Carolina financial-services companies. He was Director of the nation's Small Business Administration. He served as White House Chief of Staff under President Clinton. As White House Chief of Staff, Erskine took a salary of just $1 a year.

Erskine and his wife Crandall have been married for 33 years. They have three grown children, Sam, Annie and Bill. Family has always come first for Erskine, and family led him into public service. Erskine lost his father, Skipper, and his sister, Martha, to Lou Gehrig's Disease. His two sons suffered from juvenile diabetes. Erskine saw first-hand why health care is essential for all families.

He and Crandall helped found the ALS center in Charlotte , the first of its kind in the region. He became president of the national Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, where he led a restructuring of the foundation's finances that enabled it to significantly increase support for research to find a cure.

Erskine was appointed to head the Small Business Administration in 1993. He reorganized the agency, increased the number of loans to small businesses and cut the agency's inch-thick loan application to just one page.

In 1994, he was appointed Deputy Chief of Staff at the White House. He was credited with bringing order to a chaotic staff operation. Erskine coordinated the federal government's response to the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995.

As White House Chief of Staff, Erskine played a key role in negotiating a balanced budget between Democrats and Republicans in 1997. It was the nation's first balanced budget in 30 years. Erskine was praised by both sides as an honest, trusted negotiator.

At the SBA and at the White House, Erskine served on the National Economic Council during one of the strongest economic booms in the nation's history. As Chief of Staff, he also served on the National Security Council, which oversees defense and security issues. He played a lead role in creating the Hart-Rudman Commission, which warned of terrorism's threat to America .

When Erskine left Washington toward the end of 1998, then-Governor Jim Hunt asked him to chair the state's Rural Prosperity Task Force. The Task Force pushed for high-speed Internet access to the entire state. It also led to creation of a Rural Economic Opportunity Fund to provide capital to small businesses.

Erskine's experience makes him ideally suited to serve in the United States Senate. He will be a strong, independent, respected voice for North Carolina – a Senator who sets politics aside and puts the people of North Carolina first.