My story
Why I'm Running
What I saw
On April 18th I stood outside Ridglan Farms with hundreds of nonviolent people. Like everyone around me, I treated the deputies with respect and kept an absolute, uncompromising commitment to nonviolence, and we made that abundantly clear. We were there because a Wisconsin judge had found probable cause that the facility was committing felony animal cruelty.
Instead of reciprocity, we were met with immediate escalation to indiscriminate violence. I watched clouds of tear gas bring elderly women to their hands and knees, gagging and choking, snot running down their faces, while I and others moved in to help whoever we could. I watched a deputy reach through a fence to grab a woman who was holding up a single white flower, pull her against the fence, and mace her relentlessly. I was tear gassed myself, more than once, while never raising a hand or even my voice against anyone.
It was entirely one-sided violence, and it was horrifying.
Sheriff Barrett has tried again and again to frame us as violent. But there is no evidence a single officer was so much as scratched. Are we really meant to believe there was a "violent" crowd of more than a thousand people and there's not even a bruise to show for it? Is this the same "violent" crowd I watched deputies stroll through with no riot gear, no fear, not even a hint of concern, chatting and laughing with each other? Give me a f*cking break.
And through all of it, the Sheriff himself was nowhere to be seen.
I also watched sheriff's deputies take direction from private security contractors. Public servants, paid by our taxes, taking orders from the hired guards of a private business our own courts had already found wanting. Our deputies, in effect, serving as Ridglan's private police force. A well-led, respectable department avoids even the appearance of that like the plague, let alone actually carrying it out.
Days later, the Sheriff went on camera with a story. "Preliminary reports," he said, that we had jumped on the backs of his deputies, struck them with their own batons, and tried to take their weapons. The facility's own security cameras caught the worst of what actually happened: one demonstrator took a deputy's baton and threw it into the woods. That is the opposite of an attack, and the footage is public. Even his own office's statement, issued the day of the operation, said no one was seriously injured. He has never substantiated those claims, and he has never corrected them. That is what manufacturing a violence narrative looks like. I stood in the crowd he was describing, and I know what it was and what it wasn't.
How I came to run
That day changed what I was willing to accept from the people who hold power here. I couldn't stand by and do nothing, and I couldn't let Sheriff Barrett run unopposed.
When I found out there were only three days left until the nomination deadline and no one else was in the running, I decided on the spot to run, and I announced my candidacy. I had no plan, no campaign team, no money, no political experience, and almost no time, with roughly 500 signatures needed in under three days. All I had was unrelenting determination and the passionate people of this community. It turned out those two things were enough to get me on the ballot. So here I am.
I warned this would happen
In April, before any of this, I wrote an open letter to Dane County. I had never published anything in my life. I wrote that by branding nonviolent people as violent and promising to "intervene decisively," the Sheriff was playing a dangerous game and raising the risk of harm to everyone, his deputies included. I hoped I was wrong.
I wasn't. You can read what I wrote, and what came after, on Substack.
Why a civilian
Sheriff Barrett will tell you I'm unqualified, that I've never worn the badge. So let me be straight with you. I'm a civilian and a resident. This county is my home, and I am not afraid of him.
Until I stepped in, Sheriff Barrett was running unopposed, and since April 18th the County Board's oversight has been frozen out behind his lawyers. A sheriff no one is willing or able to challenge runs unchecked, accountable to no one. An unchecked sheriff is exactly how you get April 18th.
Wisconsin doesn't require a sheriff to be a career officer, and there's a reason for that. The job is leadership, judgment, and accountability to the public. Those are the things that failed on April 18th. Those are the things I will bring.