Trustee Sean Dumais' complete response to Wausau Pilot reporter

A recent hit piece was posted by Wausau Pilot against myself, Ken Charneski,  and two other conservative candidates for Village Board, cited little more accusations and disparagement by our political opponents. As long as they can find someone to say something advantageous to their political ideology, the reporter can print what was said, with apparently no obligation to determined whether or not what was said is true. The terms used by our political opponents - "Racist", "bigot", "homophobe" and other false accusations were abundant and unrestrained.  My full reply to the reporter giving the truth of the matter, is posted on this site, and below in this post is Trustee Sean Dumais' full interaction with that same reporter. 

   Given the information that he had available, it is clear to me that the Wausau Plot reporter wrote the article with the intention of dishonestly affecting the outcome of the Village election.

   Notice the wide disparity between the information the reporter was given by Mr. Dumais and myself, and based on fact, and how little of those facts the reporter chose to use in his article in favor of the pure animosity-driven negative opinion used in most of the article. 

   I believe that for a representative form of government to work effectively, the voting public should become knowledgeable at identifying when news reports are not news reports, but instead are highly biased, and in this case being merely negative political campaigning and disparagement of conservative values being put forth under the guise of a news report.  

   Here are Mr. Dumais' very candid and informative answers to the reporter, introduced by his comments on social media.

It appears that the growing political rhetoric in our Village is once again exceeding anything I would have ever imagined. I usually do not try to campaign on social media or allow myself to be drawn into these debates amongst people that just want to stir some sort of drama but with today's “news” article in the Wausau Pilot where they used my words to make it sound like something I didn’t say, I am going to post my email to them right here for everyone to read my actual answers.

    I have nothing to hide from anyone and the fact that public opinion continues to get swayed by incorrect or skewed “reporting” and social media comments is very sad. We are adults, I don’t understand why adults can not act like adults and respect one another instead of playing big time politics in our community. Below are my emails with the reporter for everyone to see and make their own decision about what was reported. 

 

Hello Mr Jayshi,

Here are my answers to your questions Sir:

Q) Another campaign material uses words like "queerer", "browner", "witchier" and "transgender". Are you aware that many see these terms as racist and vilifying minority communities. Do you endorse the use of these terms? 

 A) Yes, as a minority that was raised in Los Angeles during some of the biggest racial tensions and riots, I am very aware that people find these words offensive and I do not endorse these words being used by anybody. The context of this question insinuates that these words were used by whomever created your attachments to describe a certain race or gender when in fact these were references to the picture of a person holding a sign with those words on it from the Community for All Facebook page. The attachments you attached to this email lack that particular picture and my understanding was the messages received did in fact have that third attachment as part of it. 

 

Q) Some elected officials in Kronenwetter have said it is "offensive rhetoric against constituents that may be of a different race or sexual orientation." Would you please comment on this?

A) I would agree that this may be misconstrued as offensive rhetoric against constituents if it was falsely presented with the spin that those were a candidate's own words and feelings but I again point out these were not any candidate's words or views, they were references to a Facebook post owned by the group supporting these "elected officials in Kronenwetter" as you termed them.

    I also find it ironic that an organization that states it is for all, and on their own FB page have only minority groups listed is only endorsing the three white males in the race and can still get the media to spin things like this with zero fact checking. There is only 1 female running in this race and only 1 minority (me, I am half Mexican) and we are the two being thrown into this targeted political agenda under the guise that we somehow support these divisive words and phrases. 

 

Q) The material speaks of family values, and seems to imply only white people have family values and that people with different sexual orientation and people from other races have no family values. Do you agree with this kind of message?

   A) Again, I believe this question is being asked in a skewed manner. I don't know where the implication that only a certain race, gender, or sexual preference has family values could be derived from this statement. I believe the statement was that a specific organization, Community for All, is "openly hostile to traditional family values". To answer the second part of your question, I do not believe that your race, creed, color, or sexual preference solely determines if you have more or less family values, so no, I do not agree with the skewed question.

 

Q) You were arrested for alleged failure to pay child support and a “willful failure to make regular payments as ordered, and failure to seek work" (per the court). How does this square with family values? 

    A) First, I would like to thank you for being the first reporter to even think about asking me about this instead of running with your own narrative. You are correct, I was arrested on that charge. There is far more to the story than what the media is sensationalizing simply because drama gets far more clicks than the truth does. I will give you a quick summary answer.

    My now almost 21-year-old daughter, whom is in college and lives on her own, has been and always will be my world. She came to live with me right before the time Covid hit so our legal process to cancel me paying child support got put on the back burner as the courts were only taking serious criminal cases. Later on, when court reopened there was back support plus interest due that never got put on pause or canceled by the courts due to "lack of staff". 

   This is in litigation currently so I can't go too much into further specific detail. Prior to these events I never missed a child support payment, which were about $900 a month, not the $200 being spread in the media, as well as I paid for everything in my daughter's life. She has had a credit card in my name since she was 10 and whatever she wanted or needed I paid for. I also raised two bonus children as my own and paid for their care in the absence of their fathers' child support. 

   So, to answer the question about how this "squares with family values", I value my family more than anything on earth and it is very offensive that the media perpetuates any narrative other than that and that people who don't know me jump right on board and make horrible comments, send threatening letters to my home, and harass my significant other for something they know nothing about.

 

Q) The campaign material says Aaron Myszka, Ryan Leff and Scott Dauel are newcomers to the Village. How or why being a newcomer is a problem? Do you endorse this kind of targeting of election rivals?

   A)In and of itself being a newcomer is absolutely no problem at all. The Village is a diverse community and needs representation for all of its residents. I believe the point that attachment was making was that if all three of the new candidates were elected the Board would only have one Trustee that has lived in the Village for a prolonged period of time (Trustee Eiden) so the board would lose pretty much any representation of the long-term residents. 

   As to me endorsing the targeting of individuals for political reasons, I believe you can listen to any Board or Committee meeting that I have ever been a part of and you will answer your own question. I detest political positioning and attacking others to make yourself look better. If my track record of doing what is best for my community isn't good enough to stand on, then that is because I didn't do my job. I will never endorse the bureaucratic "I'm the lessor of two evils" nonsense nor the continued relentless barrage of personal attacks that happen at almost every single Board meeting between trustees more focused on pushing their own views than working cooperatively to reach an agreement.

    Spirited debate is the cornerstone of democracy and is good for solving issues, personalized attacks and political positioning is poisonous and destructive all at the tax payers expense. 

 

-If I had something additional to tell the residents of the Village, it would be I am not a politician. I am not going to have signs and flyers out or bang on people's doors after they get home from a long day of work or flood their social media feeds with catchy phrases and emotional feel-good stories. What I will do is use solution-based processes to guide my decision making and leave the politicking to others. I take the privilege of serving my community seriously and I do my best to research the subject matter and vote for what is best for our community, not an ideology or alignment with another trustee or group.

    I played a key role in guiding the Village through the post employee exodus, I fought for better equipment and wages for our public safety departments and I have pushed the Board for more accountability. We are a nonpartisan body so this enormous push to bring partisan or social issues to the forefront of the election shouldn't even be relevant. Our Village is a wonderful place to live and I would like to keep it that way

 

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Follow up email:

Thank you for your response, Mr. Dumais.

I believe you are referring to the attached picture, the first one (file: CFA website). Please correct me if you meant any other picture.

I'd appreciate some clarification to your response. Are you saying you support part of the content of the campaign material (file name: KVB campaign material) but not all? Here's why I am asking this. The three pictures were sent out to voters together. Two of them I shared with you earlier today. Taken together, it gives the impression that the three candidates support the message titled "Kronenwetter Election - Facts You Should Know." This material has this sentence: "This group is openly hostile to traditional family values, and seeks to displace them with queerer, browner, witchier and transgender ideals." (bold emphasis mine.) There are many who see this as bigotry.

In your reply to me, you wrote: "The context of this question insinuates that these words were used by whomever created your attachments to describe a certain race or gender when in fact these were references to the picture of a person holding a sign with those words on it from the Community for All Facebook page." Can you explain what you mean by this? Are you saying someone created this material and distributed without your knowledge but at the same time targets the three election candidates against whom you, Mr. Charneski and Ms. Hoffman are fighting?

 

My response:

Correct, your attached picture is the picture I was referring to in my previous email as missing.

As far as supporting the contents of the flyer goes, it is the authors opinion. I myself saw this information for the first time yesterday. I know ABSOLUTELY nothing about the CFA other than the venomous and degrading comments their members make on social media about anyone other than the candidates they support, myself included. I have never interacted with this organization or any member of its leadership that I am aware of. I support the authors freedom to express their opinions yes, I NEVER have nor will I ever support bigotry of any sort whatsoever from anyone. 

   The picture on the CFA Facebook appears to be self proclaiming they (or at least the member in the photo) is/are claiming they themselves are the words you put in bold and very proudly. The sign also stated they are going to “watch the dinosaurs die out” which can also be taken as age discrimination. I myself have not done any research into the CFA because prior to their attacks on me I didn’t even know they existed so I am unable to give you any fact based opinion on them. I don’t know if the author of this flyer has done research on them or not.

   The parts of the flyer I do know are true, so I guess that can be as interpreted as supporting, are that Mr Myszka and Mr Dauel are in fact newer members of the community and friends of Trustee Vedvik, this is openly put out on social media for anyone to see Also that the political climate of the Village (I have lived here 15 years) had a major change with Trustee Vedviks initiatives as evidenced by the last two elections being the only elections in Village history requiring primary’s.

   This content was created and distributed without me yes, I have had many citizens ask for my signs to which I reply I do not have signs. A few have said they would like to get my name out there so I am making the assumption that one of these citizens authored the flyer but I do not know this to be fact. To be clear, I do not feel I am “fighting” anyone. I view my running as trying to continue to give to my community, not fight anyone. This perception of political alignments has been thrust upon me since the first day I ran for office. I was told on social media that I “am the company I keep” stating I was aligned with Trustee Charneski because he supported me for running based on his interactions with me on the APC. 

    Until I ran for office I had never met Trustee Charneski and I had never met Ms Hoffman until the candidate forum we attended this past month and she is my neighbor. The three you claim I am fighting, and technically it should be four because Ms Hoffman is running for my seat as well, are running as a unit because they are all friends of Trustee Vedvik and were recruited by him so yet again I somehow get a label attached to me and put into a category by default.

    I currently hold the position of Trustee, they are running to remove me from office, I do not need any political alignments to boost myself. Now many of the people that support Trustee Charneski also support me based on my voting history and many of the supporters of the new candidates don’t like me based on social media rhetoric. I fear Ms Hoffman will also be drug into being labeled as a “side” as well because as I said before this is a nonpartisan position yet somehow partisan issues are controlling the narrative and if her intentions are to serve her community as mine are then she will unfortunately have to battle that labeling as I do.

To be crystal clear, I have taken 2 oaths in my life. One to my country in which I swore to protect ALL members of this country, not only the ones who share my view point or race, against all enemies. The second was to my Village in which I swore to uphold the laws and do what’s right. Neither of these oaths were based on anything other than a person being a part of my country and community so trying to insinuate that I support bigotry, hate, or racialism is just plain lies. I take my oaths seriously and will not placate to political rhetoric simply to get voted in. I will leave the political games to those that want to play politician. I spent far to much of my adult life in countries where people wanted to kill me because of the flag I wore on my sleeve and would kill their own citizens if they had a different view point for me to worry about a few keyboard warriors with nothing better to do with their time than attack others and spread nonsense.

I hope this answers your questions. If not feel free to ask anything I missed.

***End emails***