Boise Mayor Dave Bieter, a second-generation Basque American, has launched his campaign to run for a third term in office, the Idaho Statesman reported on Wednesday.

Bieter intends to mark the start of his campaign by hosting a re-election party for friends and family at Boise's Basque Center on Thursday. It is reported that local Basque-American band Amuma Says No will provide the music.

So far only one rival candidate has filed against Democratic Party representative Bieter, who has held the post of Boise Mayor since January 2004.

A second generation Basque-American, Bieter is the only mayor in the US who speaks Basque. He is one of the people responsible for strengthening relations between Boise and the Basque Country, and Basque culture in Boise has gone from strength to strength during the last decade.

Although in direct contact with the Basque language and culture since he was a child, Bieter did not learn Basque until he was fourteen. In 1974, he and his family took part in a year-long exchange program set up by his father in Oñati.

According to the Boise Mayor, this program and the direct contact he had with the Basque Country was essential to him: "Without that reconnection, I probably would have not learned Basque," he says.

Bieter hit the headlines in the Basque Country in 2008 when he led a crowd in a resounding cheer of "Gora Obama" during a Democratic meeting in Boise.