Kimberly Smith challenging Pope for 80th District Assembly seat

“You cannot create heaven by giving people hell,” says Kimberly Smith. “That’s why I’m running.”

Smith, who is challenging longtime incumbent Sondy Pope for Wisconsin’s 80^th District Assembly seat in the August 11 Democratic Primary, says the old way of doing things at the capitol isn’t working. Gridlock and partisan bickering are rendering lawmakers vastly ineffective and leaving people on the margins of society vulnerable and at-risk. She believes it doesn’t matter how progressive legislators are if they are unable to get new policies all the way to the governor's desk. 

And while Smith’s politics are progressive, she says working with Republicans - not against them - is the key to true reform. 

“I think we’ve lost the art of understanding the opposition,” she says. “We’ve lost the art of relating to and empathizing with people we don’t always agree with.”

“Republican and Democrat are titles that mean nothing,” says Smith. “I’ve met pro-choice Republicans and pro-life Democrats.”

Smith says the public – including those in her own party - has grown “complacent” when it comes to government representation. 

“There should be five or six people next to me, running for this seat,” she says. 

On issues of racial inequity and inequality, in particular, Smith says far more needs to be done. 

“We’re not getting anywhere,” she says. “The black community is suffering because the Democratic establishment is voting along party lines and not making any progress.”

Smith, who is biracial, says she has personally experienced the public’s will to improve conditions for all of its citizens. A recent Black Lives Matter rally she attended in the Village of Mount Horeb was a perfect example of this collective desire, she says. 

Smith is 41 and currently lives in Oregon. She remembers Mount Horeb from her days as a student athlete. 

“I played a lot of sports in Mount Horeb,” she says. “Basketball and soccer.”

She says the recent rally, which was attended by hundreds of citizens representing a variety of racial and ethnic backgrounds, including both Democrats and Republicans, was inspiring. 

“I was at that rally, and it really was profound for me,” she says. “I got called the N-word for the first time in my life in Mount Horeb, when I was a kid. I stole the ball from a girl, playing soccer, and she said it. My teammates told me afterward, and I remember how nobody really did anything about it. It sort of wasn’t a big deal. That was 30 years ago, and it was amazing to see how things have changed now.”

Smith says her generation, having experienced an analogue childhood and a digital adulthood, is well positioned to bridge the gap between young and old, and to see the ways social media helps - and harms - people’s lives. 

“Our generation is in a unique position. We’re not Gen Xers and we’re not Millennials. We’re Xennials. And we’ve watched the way media has changed,” she observes. 

Smith gives several examples of ways Democrats and Republicans can find common ground. She goes into detail about her desire to work with Republican lawmaker, Rep. Shae Sortwell (Two Rivers), on criminal justice reform. Sortwell, along with Rep. Shelia Stubbs (D-Madison) and Sen. Latonya Johnson (D-Milwaukee) also introduced AB 899 at a press conference on Feb. 13. The bill is designed to eliminate “arduous regulations” on hair braiding that often prevent young people of color from doing business. 

“That’s the kind of stuff I want to do,” Smith explains. “That’s one example.”

“Shae is really amazing,” Smith says. “We butt heads about a lot of things, especially about race, but I admire and respect him so much.”

“I’m not going to vote along party lines,” she says. “That’s not my nature. I’m going to do my research, because the trick is knowing what’s going on.”

“I want a relationship that’s beyond cordial,” Smith continues. “I want to work in tandem with people.”

Smith was born in Madison and later moved to McFarland. She is married and has three children. 

“I moved to McFarland at 8 when my mom had a stroke that left her unable to care for myself and my newborn sister. Her brother and his wife raised me,” she says. 

For 13 years, Smith was a massage therapist and owned her own business. She then attended MATC to study business administration.

She says it was a class she took in college that first opened her eyes to modern, and postmodern, matters of race. “It awakened me to things I didn’t know about white supremacy and racism. I started reading books about it - like The New Jim Crow, Medical Apartheid and The Color of Compromise - and I decided I couldn’t sit on this any longer.”

Smith says she hopes to “unleash human capital” in Wisconsin.

“These are humans who should be working and engaging in society,” she says of marginalized citizens. 

With many issues, Smith points out that she can see both sides because she has experienced both sides. She raised children as a single mother – “I got to make all the decisions on my own,” she says – and now she is parenting as part of a larger family unit. “Doing it collaboratively is a different experience,” she says. She has experienced life as a person of color, but also says she has enjoyed privilege because she grew up in a white family. 

She speaks in a calm, measured tone, but when asked if she has worked actively to sound unflappable, she bursts out laughing. 

“Oh, I’m definitely flappable,” she says. 

She says she is also “resilient.”

“You can grow from the trauma you experience, or you can struggle from it,” she states. “I’ve chosen to do the work and heal.”

Smith says her life experience has prepared her to work as an effective lawmaker, although campaigning is a new experience. 

“I’m not a politician. I have no idea what I’m doing,” she says with another laugh. “I just want to tell my children that I didn’t sit back. I want to try to make things better. I want to be an advocate for people.”

She calls her Primary opponent, Rep. Sondy Pope, of Mount Horeb, who has held her seat for nearly two decades and fended off challenges from both the left and the right, “a juggernaut.” Smith has been going door-to-door, knocking and then takings several steps back in order to “get to know voters as a distance” during the lengthy COVID-19 pandemic. 

“If I’m going to get past Sondy, I need to engage with people,” she says. 

If she does get past Pope, she will run in the General Election against Mount Horeb resident Chase Binnie, a Republican. If she defeats him, she will head to the capitol and get to work. 

“I think the toughest part won’t be sitting through committee meetings,” she reflects. “The toughest part will be nurturing relationships, and that’s the most important part.”

Smith is hesitant to stake out how she would vote on every single issue at the capitol, because most will be nuanced and complex. She hopes voters will elect her based on her judgement, her desire to do research, and her willingness to work across party lines, rather than on a single platform issue. 

“We really need to do the work to learn the history,” she says. “And if we can’t see how we are operating now, how can we fix things?”

“What I’d like to be is an advocate for people who don’t have lobbyists at the capitol,” Smith says. 

She says she wants to help people on fixed incomes with the burden of rising property taxes, and she wants to “take care of things that burden the black community.”

While racial issues are a core element of her platform, Smith says a collaborative approach – rather than one based primarily on shaming or political tribalism – will be the most productive way forward. Smith, like so many people, has grown weary of the toxic fabric of social media arguments.

“I found myself in this place where I was spouting vitriol,” she recalls. “I realized in order to change the world, I had to make progress and stop acting like that. I have always thought that, ‘Be the change you wish to see in the world’ thing was so cheesy, but I’m starting to think it might also be true.”

“Now I don’t really want to argue with people on Facebook,” she adds. “I usually ask people to call me, so we can actually talk.”

“A lot of people in this district are already very receptive [to positive change],” she says. “With them, it’s not about talking about how bad things are. It’s just about working together to fix it.”

“It’s about showing people action and giving them resources,” she continues. “People don’t want to be told what they did wrong. They want to be shown how they can help. People are helpers.”

Smith says there is common ground to be found in Wisconsin. People just have to chart a course for it, rather than bickering and blaming the other side of the aisle for a lack of progress, she says.  

“I’ll give you an example,” she says. “People are up in arms about having to vote in person, and people are up in arms about voting by mail. For black people, it’s been a tough couple centuries. There were poll taxes and things like that to limit voting rights. So for me, going to the polls on election day is special. I, personally, want to go to the polls. But some people don’t. So how about this: Don’t worry what your neighbor is doing; let’s do both. If you want to go to the polls, go. If you want to vote by mail, do that.”

“We need to empower each other to do what’s best for the community,” she concludes.