https://x.com/Swank4America/status/2011975026707480861
Sheriff Keith Swank
@Swank4America
Here is the statement that I was going to read today at the hearing, but the time was cut from 3 minutes to 90 seconds so I had to adjust. I posted the following on the written record.
SB 5974 Statement
In the interest of time, I’ll skip the fake pleasantries and get right to it. Elections have consequences, and I acknowledge that. Democrats have a super majority in the house, the senate, governor, and every statewide executive office. You have it all except the office of sheriff, and once you have control over sheriffs you think you can impose your will on people like me.
Some of my colleagues naively believe that they can come here and reason with you. They think you don’t understand what’s at stake here. They don’t understand you like I do. You know what is at stake, and you are acting on it. You are not dumb, you are evil. But I am not surprised.
You are going to pass this qualifications bill for law enforcement, but you will not hold yourselves accountable. You say, “We have to hold the chiefs and sheriffs accountable because they enforce the law.” That’s just the excuse you use for the low information people that vote for you. If you really wanted accountability, you would have qualifications for anyone who runs for office. You write the laws that we enforce so why should you not have the same qualifications?
I propose that everyone who runs for an elected office go through a background check, a social media review, a polygraph, and a psychological test. Democrats won’t agree to that because you have convicted felons who are elected officials, and you want more.
I represent almost one million people in Pierce County, many more people than any of you do. I wasn’t elected chief of police. Being sheriff of Pierce County is much more than just police work. Citizens reach out to me all the time regarding overreach of the government by you. Some say they finally have a voice because of me, and you want to silence my voice. If I towed the Democrat line, you would not have any issue with me, but since I know what a woman is and I know transgender women are men, you want me silenced. You want to give an un-elected bureaucracy the ability to de-certify me and remove me from office because you don’t agree with my speech.
You Democrats hate President Trump so much, yet you do the very things you accuse him of doing such as imposing these types of controls over other independently elected officials.
Also, just for the record, my deputies don’t wear face masks, but once you pass the law that they can’t, I will not only allow them, but I will also encourage them to do so.
I don’t recognize your authority to impose these controls over me, and when you try to remove me from office before my term expires, thousands of Pierce County residents will surround the County City Building in downtown Tacoma and not allow that to happen. I hope it doesn’t come to that, but I and they are prepared. Are you prepared?
Finally, anyone who votes for this will never have an audience with this sheriff.