 Hi, welcome to the All Things LGBTQ Interview Show where we interview LGBTQ guests who are making important contributions to our communities. All Things LGBTQ is taped at Orca Media in Montpelier, Vermont, which we recognize as being unceded Indigenous land. Thanks for joining us and enjoy the show. Welcome to All Things LGBTQ. I know you're a friend of ours, you've been along before. And so welcome to the show again. And Brenta Churchill is running for District Franklin 6. And can you tell us what area that's in so people will know? Sure. It's the southeast corner of Franklin County. I call it delightfully the BFF, which is Bakersfield, Fairfield, and Fletcher. It's largely rural, a lot of dirt roads, and a great farming community overall. And when you re-in, did you think, oh, this is going to be a breeze, or were you really worried about whether you would get elected? And now you are the Democratic candidate from that area? I am. I didn't have an opponent in the Democratic primary, so that made it a little easier to not have to spend a huge amount of time worrying about whether I'd get a primary vote. My only opponent is the incumbent representative, and he won last time because he had no opponents at all. We're going to put up a little bit of a fight on this one, and I'm hoping to carry the district in November. And how has your response been in your neighborhood? Do you have a little? Yeah, thanks. That's a great question. I'd have to say that there's been a lot of support in Bakersfield. Even Republicans have told me they're voting for me. My neighbor who's died in the wall, Republican, said, I voted for you in the primary and I'm going to vote for you in the election, and he said, I want you to carry an honest message into Montpelier. So I figured that was a mandate from my neighbor, which made me feel really good. I did do well in the primary, which is not a primary, but kind of like a straw vote. And a lot of Democrats did turn out in Bakersfield, and I got some write-ins from Republicans, which was surprising. So I'm pleased to say that I get to represent the Democratic Party in November. But yeah, it's been good so far. And what about your opponent? Are your values kind of really, you know, what are you bringing to this that he hasn't or thanks to that too? Yeah. Yeah, one of the things that my opponent has done is voted pretty much in lockstep with Governor Scott. So he voted and was with all the vetoes that the governor wrote. The most important one that he voted against was a woman's right to choose what was an amendment number five. But no, it started with 22. He voted against it three times. And then in the last one, he might have realized that he was headed to trouble because he abstained from the vote. And I think that's the same as voting. No, he chose not to vote at all. So I'm glad that he did that because I think it's easy to talk about the issues. Another one is the the bottle bill as a merchant. He voted against it. And with all due respect, I think most people would rather have clean highways and pay a nickel on an initial deposit. I'll build team provisions to to pick up a lot of the containers that are not. No, I do not have deposits on them right now. It raised it to 10 cents to help fund it. And of course, he voted no and it didn't pass. But I feel confident that if we have a have a majority in the House and the Senate, we'll be able to get that passed. So that from an environmental standpoint is very important. If there was a tax credit involved, he voted no for it. Child tax credit. My families brought a lot of people brought their kids out of unfortunate or less funded scenario. And I think the child tax credit was an important bill. Fortunately, it did pass with a majority of the House and the Senate. These are good things that I think I would have supported, but he did not. So basically his voting record may may be what helps me the most. I certainly had I'm sorry. Say again, how are you reaching your neighbors and and letting them know about your platform? Have you gone to schools or do you knock house host? Do you have help? Yeah, that's that's also a good question. One of the things that I think I've been fairly relaxed on is getting out a lot. I've been to public functions. I've been to some ice cream socials and concerts. I did a kickoff at the Fairfield Community Center back in in May and basically been circulating among people and getting out to meetings and talking with people. I haven't been to schools yet. We have a great school district of one school. Bakersfield Elementary is is the school in town and they just started school again. So haven't been doing much with the schools. Fairfield has Fairfield Center School. And I think I'll have strong support with the teachers. I'm very supportive of education. And public education is a cornerstone for our kids and growing up. And it's it's really a anchor in our community. So we've got Fletcher Elementary too. So I've got three three elementary schools that I'll be visiting at some point in time. Hope to have some meetings with farmers in the near future. Well, I'm gonna see if I can get a forum together where myself and the Senate candidates can go and talk to talk to the farmers. I have some friends who worked for the state that are helping out with the farmers crowds. And I've got a couple of good allies, including some endorsements from from people who are farmers. So I'm I'm fortunate to know a lot of people. That's been a good thing for me. Yeah, and is your opponent attacking you on any levels or is it just or is it a smooth kind of, you know, let's be nice to each other kind of campaign? I think we both adopted the let's be nice take the high road thing. He hasn't said anything. I haven't seen anything in the press yet. I have seen some things. No, really, I haven't. I apologize. Haven't seen anything and we're we're going to be positive. I got some pieces going into front porch forum and social media this week. We're going to ramp up my endorsements are are many, including Christine Hallquist and the former principal of Fairfield Center School is a strong advocate for me as well. She's gone on to nursing. She left a high pressure job to go into a very. Yeah, another high pressure job. So she's doing well and thriving, which is nice. I think the school has its own pressures, which has been something that she she endured and did well and and then just decided that she wanted to take off in a different direction. That's OK. We've got a farmer or two that are going to do for me. I've got a Republican that's actually going to endorse me. And I've got some community leaders, including Craig Mitchell, who said he would put out an endorsement for me, which is great. So I'm going to work on those. I'm going to try to get those out this out the door this week. You follow my web page, which is voterenddichurchhold.com. You can see it. You can see them there. We'll also try to make some splashy splashy things on the other media on social media as well. So I've got some great folks that work with me. Any bumper stickers? I have little three by five bumper stickers. I wanted unobtrusive. I wanted things that I could stick on places and they actually stand out. I'll send you a picture if you want to use it to show my campaign sign. My campaign signs, a little artist added some color to it by putting some swoosh on the mountains in orange and yellow and some along the ground. So they got really, really quick and they're very popular. So I hope to have them out. I told people, let's put them out after Labor Day. People are really tired of looking at all the primary signs. Even after the primary, I took them and put up a couple strategic places so where they get a lot of traffic. But we're currently offering signage in my district. If you get a $5 contribution, you'll get a sign. So it's a nice way to do it. So Brenda, on a final note, did you wake up some morning and say, oh, I'm going to get into politics? Because I know you were an activist first, I think. And you got into, I believe, politics through activism. And so am I right about that? Was it progressive for you when then you thought, well, I can really do some good here in the legislature? Because I know you were, like I said, you were an activist before getting involved in the political scene. So can you tell us a little bit about that, like how you progress to where you are now? Yeah, the evolution of my political career is pretty interesting. I think that going back over a decade, as I got a little older, I realized that there were some important issues going on for our community. And I began work at the Pride Center, just going to different things and being part of meetings and learning about what the issues were. And then when I went to retire, I was looking, I was actively looking for things to do. And I think you'll remember the meeting that I was at when we formulated the LGBTQI Alliance. And I foolishly raised my hands and said, Keith, I'll help you. It was actually a pinnacle moment in my direction where I was headed. And it wasn't very long after that that I was retired. I started growing up at the State House with Keith. And activism is a blend of politics and being able to be in the right place at the right time, which I seem to have had some good luck with doing, starting first with the bathroom bill and moving towards the third gender on driver's licenses and IDs. And it just kind of snowballed from there. I testified for a lot of bills across a lot of different issues, minimum wage being a strong one, health care being another. We got kind of paused a little bit when I worked with Christine Hawquist to try to make her governor of the state of Vermont. And boy, oh boy, did that give me a crash course in campaigning and politics. And I got to know many, many people, made a huge amount of contacts. That continued after the election was lost. In fact, that next day, I called the governor's office and my contact there said, so can we get back to work now? And it was very, very rewarding that he said, absolutely, let's schedule a meeting. So we got right in to see the governor. And that's, I think, one of the hallmarks of the activism and the work that Keith and I did at the State Houses. We forged alliances with house leaders, with Senate leadership, with executive leadership, with different departments like the Vermont HRC, the Attorney General's office. And all these contacts remain close to me. We've been in tight communication because mostly we have Democrats running for those offices again. And I think that's a wonderful thing. So I've been very pleased to be part of really what's gonna be a wave of Democrats taking over the State House. I certainly hope, and across the country, I hope. I think the abortion ban has really activated a lot of people who may not have been that interested to all of a sudden start getting interesting. At least that's my hope anyway. I agree. I think it's gonna be a good turnout at the polls. Vermonters should know everybody that's here in this, that's in Vermont. You're all getting mailed ballots by the end of September. You have the opportunity to vote in less than four weeks. I think that's a key part of our rights and freedoms is to vote. So regardless of who you vote for, I hope you get out and cast your ballot for your candidate of choice. But do some studying, do some diligence and find out who your candidates are. Ask friends, ask people who are active about their stances. It would be a good thing to have a record turnout this fall. So Brenda Churchill, we're rooting for you. And if we could vote for you, we would. But, and we're looking forward to going to the celebration party after. It'll be big and I'm absolutely certain that while you can't vote for me, you can contribute, go to my webpage and read about me. And hopefully we'll be able to have enough money to fund some postcards and get out and do some more contacts. I think I owe you guys t-shirts, isn't that right? Yes, but we can wait. And we'll wear them on the show when we get them. Oh, there you go. Yeah. So Brenda, thank you so much for coming on. I appreciate your activism and your hard work and diligence. And you've been a great friend and person working for all of us for a long time. So thank you. I appreciate that. And thanks to you and Keith and Anne as well. It's been great knowing you and your strong advocates and you keep people informed. I think that's a really important part of our community because people are taking information in so many different ways. But going on and looking at your podcast and your online presence, phenomenal. That's just phenomenal. So thank you for what you guys do as well. Well, thank you. And we will talk to you before then and hopefully you'll get into this area and we can meet up in person. So take care, good luck and be well. Thank you. Looking forward to seeing you. Hi everybody. I'm here with Josie Levitt who is a well-known person around the state. She moved here in 1996. This is her second appearance on the show. When we talked three years ago, I learned that she's originally from New York City, that she got her BA at Columbia College and a degree from Teachers College. Since she's been in Vermont, she's been part owner of the Flying Pig Bookstore and has been a comic and storyteller on the circuit for a while. But now she has a new incarnation that we're here to discuss and celebrate. So welcome Josie. Thank you. It's great to be here again. It's great to have you back. As people who are in the know politically already know, Josie is a candidate for state representative for the Grand Isle West Milton District. This is a new development in your life. But in our conversation before we take time, learned that it's almost an outgrowth of your ongoing political activism. Yes. May I ask you, when you were in New York, did you do anything political? You know what's interesting? Now that I'm working with Act Blue and there's a take action group, I am occasionally channeling my very early activists, self, which was when I was working for Act Up as a volunteer and gay men's health crisis at the height of the age crisis. So periodically I'm like, I need to talk to someone at Act Up and no one gets it. And I'm just like, oh, sorry, wrong people, wrong decade. None of you are queer. You don't know what I'm talking about. So yeah, it goes back a long time. And I didn't run for office in New York or anything, but I was definitely active politically because too many of my friends were dying. You know, and I was right, I graduated from college in 87 and sort of walked into the height of the age crisis and I was at Columbia and, you know, I just friends of mine were just, I mean, just getting so sick and so many friends I knew died. And I mean, I lost every single male friend I had before 1991 and that was just, that was brutal. And just feeling that sort of powerless, I felt like I had to do something. So I started at Gay Mental Health Crisis as a volunteer and then I would do Act Up as well and sort of combine the two because I was doing direct volunteer service with Gay Mental Health Crisis because I was helping guys get hooked up with Social Security Disability Insurance. And I was walking them through the process and then Act Up, we were just making a lot of noise and getting people to notice like, people are dying, something big needs to happen and you all need to actually pay attention. And it's not just gay people who are dying. It's a lot of marginalized people were clearly affected by the HIV and AIDS crisis. And then it took a big long break. You know, I moved to Vermont. Okay, I didn't take, I did take a huge break because my ex-wife and I moved to Charlotte. We opened the Flying Pick bookstore. And then within two years, I was on the Planning Commission. And then in Charlotte, yeah. And I realized that really wasn't for me but it took me four years to realize that because it was a four-year term and I thought, well, I'll stay. And then I joined the Rescue Squad and I was on the Rescue Squad, the Charlotte Volunteer Rescue Squad for six years and the last two I was chief. Oh, yeah. And that pretty much spoiled me for like, just after being chief, I didn't wanna do rescue anymore because it was just too many type A personalities. And I just, I found I didn't like it ultimately because I didn't get a lot of call volume. So, and I felt like I was waiting around for something to happen to my neighbors. And I started to really not enjoy that. And then I started teaching comedy. So I went from the sort of medical love that I have in my life to the creative love. And the minute I stopped doing rescue comedy just flew out of me. So I needed to not have anything else to let my creative life blossom again. And now I'm in Grand Isle. And you've been in Grand Isle five years. Five years. And I started going to development review board meetings over the last summer because the Lake Champlain Transport Transportation Company, the Ferry, they go out of Grand Isle and 25 hours a day to Platsburg, which is fine. But they wanted to build a 30,000 square foot maintenance facility, 275 feet away from where we pull our water. And I got really involved in that. And I saw how few people were involved in local boards. And then I started going to select board meetings and I was not happy with what I was seeing. And I had applied for an open spot on the select board. And I gave a killer interview. I thought I did great. And they picked a guy who had just lost the election for select board. And I thought, now this feels a little bit, now I'm not gonna say rigged, but a woman had stepped down, she had resigned and they replaced a woman spot on the select board with a man who had just lost his fourth election in a row for select board. Which tells me folks maybe didn't want him as a select man. And I thought, well, this is bull. And so I decided I'm gonna run because I was angry, I was pissed. And then I went to every single select board meeting from September until now. And I realized five people are making really big decisions. And who's on your local boards really matters. Can you give me an example of some of the things that the select board decides? Well, one of the things they decided, and this was before me and this is one of the things that made me decide to really run as well is concerned citizens as they say, there were 150 people put in a request for action, which is not the same thing as a petition, but they asked the select board to basically do three years to re-audit the audits for three years. And the select board agreed to it and they spent $60,000 to re-audit the audits. It wasn't a forensic audit. And we just spent $60,000 of taxpayer money to be told the audits are now basically done. Oh, by the way, your auditor didn't do anything wrong. Neither did your town clerk or your treasurer. And I just thought, wow, where's the oversight? Where are clearer heads? Why aren't they prevailing? And this town, I love my town, but in this like all towns, there are factions. There aren't political. They're more sort of old-time, what families lived here of the longest. And, oh, you're new and someone even on front porch form said, at that point, I've only lived here four years and someone put on front porch form, we should mandate that you have to live here at least five years before you can run for office. And that was a direct dig in me. And I was like, you know, seriously guys? And, you know, I'm running for office because no one else is. And I won handily by like a two to one margin. So I feel pretty good about that. And the nice thing is the way the select board meets, we meet on Mondays, which are nights that I'll always be home should I win the state house. So I'm gonna do both at the same time. And I'm not gonna step off the select board. And I'm getting asked that a lot when I doorknock and people are very surprised that I'm gonna do both. And I always answer with, I honor my commitments and my commitment is to my town. And now my commitment is to my town and also now to my counting as a state rep. And being on the select board will better inform me as a rep and I'll be able to bring back real concrete examples of issues that we're struggling with that we need Montpelier's help with that maybe we haven't had in the last two years because we haven't had reps who live on the island. And that leads me to my next question. How did you happen to throw your hat in the ring for state rep? Okay, I threw my hat in the ring very late because I didn't want to do it. I didn't think it was appropriate for me to do it partly because I haven't lived here five years. I'm on the select board. And I thought, you know, someone else should do it. I didn't, it felt like hubris if I had done it and I'm not that kind of person. And I didn't think I could. And I kept waiting, you know, the petition period and I was checking almost every day with the town clerk going, has anyone put in a petition? And she said, no, no one. And then the petition period came and went and not one Democrat had their name on the ballot. So it was basically two Republicans and then nothing on the Democratic ballot. And I thought, well, that can't happen because democracy doesn't exist without choices. And I thought, all right, fine. So I started really thinking about it and then I talked to my partner and at first she was sort of like, please don't do this, just don't do this. And then my sister-in-law, Tiffany Bloomley is in the state house. I love her, a former guest on the show. She's great, sorry about the dog. Stop barking, sweetie. And we can't hear her. Okay, good. And I called Tiff, actually I called her later. That's not true. I called Missy Johnson first because she lives in South Arrow, she was speaker and I said, walk me through. I said, what's it like being in the state house? Because honestly, and I'll be perfectly blunt, I was afraid I was gonna be totally bored because I'm like, how much change can I actually affect? And how much of my time am I gonna be spent being frustrated, spending hours and hours a day in meetings? Because I don't particularly enjoy that. And she walked me through the whole legislative calendar and I thought, okay, this sounds good. I can do this. And I said, do I need to be in my pillier? Do I need to stay over three nights a week? She said, no, stay over one night, make it intentional. And then you can drive home and say, okay, that's good because I didn't wanna be away from home that many nights and because I wanna be with my partner. And then I just talked to a couple more people. I talked to Joe Cronowski, the speaker of the house and she was lovely. I talked to Mike McCarthy. Everyone really gave me a lot of time and a lot of information. And then it was what Keisha Rom said when I reached out to her because we're friends and I said, Keisha, what difference does one more Democrat make? And she explained about how many veto override votes we'd missed by one vote. And she also said, one more Democrat is one less Republican taking up space in a committee room and slowing things down and making it harder for us to reach our agenda. And I was like, okay, I'll do it. And then we ran a writing campaign and I had a lot of amazing help from this group we have out here called Take Action. And these folks were stunningly helpful. I don't think we would have been able to do it without them. And my partner's a graphic designer. So she and Tiffany actually designed my lawn sign because after she found out I was gonna run, we had this long talk about it. And the next day she sent me like five, no, like eight different versions of lawn signs that she had designed and they were all great. And then my partner at least just tweaked one and it's wonderful, it's a beautiful thing. And so people have been just really helpful. People are very excited and now we have choices. So Karen and I also, cause Annie had to step out. There was a woman who was also on the writing campaign and she, we both won our nomination obviously. And she, her boss said after she won, you know what, you can't do this. You can't be both. So she had to step off and not accept the nomination. And then Karen Ames got the second nomination through the committee work and our names are on the ballot. And it's actually really cool because it's Karen Ames, Josie Levitt, Michael Morgan, Andy Parity. So we're the top two, which is nice. And then does that matter? God, I hope not, but it might. So, you know, I'm learning a lot and the Democratic Party has been enormously helpful. And there are a lot of people out here who have been, I'm moved almost every day by how generous people are with their time and their talents. What's your platform? What are the key points? Oh, the key points are, I'm totally in support of reproductive liberty. I know, right? Seriously. Affordable housing, we need to see a lot more of that. We need to do something to mitigate climate change because Vermont is actually of all the New England states, the one that's the only one that's failing to meet the standards. I didn't know that. Yes, it's funny. I learned that in my VPurg interview and VPurg just endorsed me as a candidate yesterday, which was as my first, I've never gotten endorsed before and I'm really happy that it's them. And we talked about, the other thing is clean heat standard and how do we help people who can't afford to do the things they need to do to make their home more energy efficient? How do we support that? And I'm also on the board and a volunteer at our local food shelf. And I see so many people who work, who have kids or who are seniors on a fixed income. And also, since March when I started, the number, our volume has doubled, literally doubled because inflation, gas prices, and now we're getting people who are very, they're terrified. And I asked a couple of people last week, I'm like, why do y'all look so spooked? And this woman said, because we now we're thinking about how we're gonna pay to heat our house because everyone knows that the heating oil is very, very expensive right now and it's only gonna get worse. And they're trying to figure out how am I gonna do both? And people last year made choices of heat my home or have dinner. And that should not be, absolutely. And the other thing I really care about is how can we have paid family leave? How can we address the complete lack of childcare, affordable childcare in this state? And the flip side of that is, how can we also pay childcare providers what they deserve? None of these people should be making minimum wage. They're taking care of children. That's the most important thing a person can do in a lot of ways is take care of someone else's child and help educate them. And they're getting $15 an hour. That's crazy. And I'm reminded of my old English teacher in high school said, you can tell what a society cares about by what they pay people. And as a teacher back then, he said, and this is not sliding sanitation workers at all but he said the sanitation worker gets paid three times what he got paid as a teacher. And so people don't value education. And how do we make it affordable for families that came to Vermont during the pandemic? I mean, not all of them are wealthy, but how do we, and also how do we keep people in their houses but just cause eviction now, people are losing their leases left and right for no reason and there's no place for them to go. There is like the rental stock just in Grand Isle County is not existent. As far as I can tell, it's like a house here, maybe a house here. And how do you then address the investors who are buying up homes to turn them into Airbnb's? And we have a lot of those out here because this is a great Airbnb place in the summer. And then what do you do when you take some of that housing stock off the market and why your house is so expensive? And I have a dear friend who's a farmer out here. She's an organic farmer. She can't afford to build a house right now. She has some money and it went from being 300,000 to build a house before COVID. Now it's like 650,000 to build a 1500 square foot house. She's like, I can't afford that. Yeah, I know. I can't afford that. So we need to address the inequities and we need to slow down some systems that are going way too fast and we need to remember, especially in Grand Isle County where we don't even have a bus. We have no public transportation out here. We have one bus in Alberg that goes to Alberg just one. If you wanna go on the bus in Grand Isle County it takes two and a half hours to go to Burlington. And it's twice a day you get a shot at it. That's crazy. And that means you have to have a car. Right, and so many of my food shelf clients, and I talk to them a lot and I'm just, it's like, how's it going? And everyone has said I am one car repair away from being homeless. And then they went and closed our courthouse for a long time during the pandemic. And then we had a really fight and that's one thing that the previous select board did very, very well as they fought hard with Doug DeSavito, our state's attorney to keep our court, to get our courthouse back open because we need one here. We shouldn't always be asking people to go to St. Albans or Burlington, especially for domestic violence cases where you need to file a relief from abuse order. If someone's paying attention to how many miles you're putting on your car and they see, oh, why'd you go, why are there 75 miles on this car all of a sudden? Then it's just gonna trigger more questions and more violence and more abuse. So there are things, how can I say this? Grand El County is a unique county because we are the only county in Vermont that does not, it is the only landmass we're contiguous with is Canada. You, the only way you have to want to come to Grand El County, you don't just happen to drive through it on your way someplace else. It's an intentional thing, but because we don't connect to any other part of Vermont, we're often forgotten because people are like, what's Grand El County? We're not even on the map, drawn the right way. You know, if you look at state maps of Vermont, we should be a little island chain and we're connected and we're not. So anyway, that's one thing. Anyway, so, you know, yes, go ahead. Let's step back and why'd you move to Grand El County? I'll give you the short version. I moved to Grand El County because in 2018, I got breast cancer and I was in the middle of treatment and on my infusion weeks when I felt really bad and I wasn't, at that time I was working at the Pride Center, I was always off on infusion weeks and I was working from home, but I would spend time on Zillow looking at houses on the water because my partner and I had spent some time at different places on the water. And just like, I really, the water, being on the water relaxes me and it slows my very busy, busy brain down. And then this house popped up on Zillow. And I thought, oh my God, I got to go look at this house. And I had started looking at other houses. You know, I started, well, what about this house or, you know, on Crystal Lake? And I was looking at different things and then this house popped up and everything about it, I just loved. And so in the middle of radiation, I bought a house because why not? Why not move in the middle of cancer treatment? Sure, great idea. And so that's how I came here. Well, you put beautiful pictures up on Facebook. You know, I face East and I'm an early riser and one of the things, I did two things with photography. The first was for the first, I guess maybe it was the second year that I lived here. Every morning at 717, I would take a picture from the same spot. So when you could see sort of how the sun tracked and how it was different. And then when COVID started, I took a sunrise picture every day for a year and a half because I just thought people needed it. And all I would say was Monday, Tuesday because people were also like, what day is it? You know, in the beginning of COVID, we're all just saying we're hemmed in. We're all just, you know, we're sort of locked down. And I thought, let's give somebody, let's give people something pretty to look at. And I found it very soothing. And so now if I have a particularly pretty day and I'm up early enough, I will take a picture just because it's beautiful. I know. And it is relaxing even for the viewer. I have a friend who lives in New Orleans I'm up by who does something, you know of Storks and Crocodiles, Egrets and Ducks. That's lovely. I know it's really soothing for the viewer here. I've had people ask me now, like, are you gonna make a card line or a calendar? I don't have time in another world and another iteration of my life, maybe, but I enjoy it. And I know it gives so many people pleasure and people who are, you know, it's not about like, how many likes am I getting? Cause who cares? But people I run into are like, oh my God, your picture today was beautiful. I'm like, cool. You know, I have no idea who's looking at them. And I just, I like doing that. And it's if I can spread a little tiny bit of joy in a world that feels completely chaotic and on fire. And if you're queer, it feels starting to feel a little threatening. I would say. You know, I just, I'm trying to make it better. So that's partly why I'm running for office is to make sure that queer folk don't get, can I swear? Oh, sure. That queer folk don't get shit on again. And there's already enough violence. You know, there's such an uptick in hate crimes. We had some hate crimes out here on the islands where people were burning progress flags. So they almost took somebody's house down because they set the flag on fire and they were stealing flags. And I thought, this is really close to home. Yes. And this is heinous and hateful. And there's no reason for this. So if I can be in the state house and work with people like Taylor Small and Tiff Bloomley and really work to protect the LGBTQ plus community in Vermont, sign me up. You know it. So are you, as you continue on your journey, are you gonna still keep telling jokes and be a comic and storyteller? Yes, I am. And the funny thing is, you know, door knocking is inherently, it's really hard. You know, when you go and you have your little pamphlet and you go and you knock on people's door because I can see them hiding behind a wall in their house where they think I can't see them. I'm like, there are three cars in the driveway. There's a dog barking. So clearly somebody's home. No one has a doorbell. So the material, what I'm trying to say is it's writing itself. My first day door knocking, I got bitten by a dog. I'm like, awesome. This is great. This is fun. But also again, it's like when I went through cancer treatment, going through something that's challenging and I find door knocking very difficult, but knowing I can talk about it later makes it easier. Because if I have a bad exchange with somebody, I can write about it. And then I sort of discharge the bad feeling and try and find the good. You know, my whole motto is, you can have a shitty day or a funny day. It's the same day. You know, it just depends on how you want to look at it. And the other, the cool thing about door knocking though, is when I actually get to talk to someone who's nice and is kind enough to just want to talk to me, it's almost like I'm doing crowd work at a comedy show because I have to be really quick because sometimes they'll throw me a curve ball of a question and I'll have to think, you have to really think on your feet. You have to be really quick. And also I'm realizing if I can make somebody laugh about something about the political climate or the political scene, they're gonna remember me. Because every time you make somebody laugh and you have a shared laugh, you've created a little tiny community. Even if it's just you and I laughing or a whole room, people remember the laughter. And if I can use that to my advantage as a politician, that can only help me. And I have several shows lined up. I'm doing a show right after the election down in Bellas Falls. And then Emerge Vermont has asked me to do something after the election, just to sort of, everybody get in a room and just relax. Like we're not campaigning, the election's over and just let's have some fun. Were you involved with Emerge in this? Yes, well, I kind of, I missed the boat on Emerge training for running for state office because I wasn't planning on it. But I did take, they had a great one-off workshop on how to run for select board. And that was enormously helpful. And Elaine Haney, their director, I pretty much did everything she told me to do. And I ran, it was a good campaign. She was enormously, it was great. She really helped me. And I learned a lot about politics and how you run a campaign, which is a little bit like starting a comedy show in a way, like what are your component pieces? What's your plan? Sort of, what's your set list? And then how are you gonna bounce off of that? And how are you gonna be sort of flexible and spontaneous but also stick to what you know you have to do? And another commonality I was thinking is that you have the, both campaigning and in comedy, you have the opportunity for exchange. Yes, very much so. Because when you were last on the show, you said the difference between comedy and storytelling is that comedy, you have some back and forth with the audience where storytelling is more. Storytelling, you're not supposed to have. And I find that it's easier now for me than it used to be, but I still, I like that exchange. And I think being a comic who really enjoys crowd work has made campaigning easier for me. I mean, one guy, it was like the third door I knocked on and I knock again and it's the screen door I'm knocking on, then the other door is open. And I'm like, well, somebody's home because the front door is open, but you never open a dorm. You just don't do that. And out comes this man who's shirtless wearing kind of shorty shorts. And he's like, can I help you? I'm like, oh my God. And I was like, you are not my people. And I said, yes, my name's Josie Levitt. I'm running for state house. And he's like, I don't like politics. And I said, neither do I. And I immediately got his attention. He's like, what? And I said, nobody likes politics. I said, but here's why I'm running. And that worked. That, and I don't think he's gonna vote for me because I think, you know, whatever. He's a Republican, like very conservative Republican. And he said that, but he did take my materials and he said, you know what? Thank you for hanging in there with me. I was like, all right. And I said, thank you for letting me talk to you. And I really appreciate that you didn't just slam the door in my face and you didn't just turn around and say, I don't like politics and just walk away. And so we had a, we wound up having a really great exchange. And I'll take that for a win. You know it. Yeah. Josie Levitt, this has been delightful. We wish you the best. Yes, and thank you so much. I love talking to you. It's so much fun. I did hope. Yeah, the feeling is mutual. And I hope you win. And thank you. Me too. Me too. Yes, all right. Josie Levitt, vote for her. Thank you. Thank you for joining us. And until next time, remember, resist.