About

My WRITING

Since starting my blog on Medium.com in 2017, I’ve gained 1,200 subscribers. About 1,000 people find my articles each day, and two of my articles are top Google search results for their topic. I’ve written on contract for Mark Bittman’s online magazine, Heated, and one of my articles has reached over 160,000 people. Medium has twice featured me on the front page of their site.

I write about politics, food, the environment, the internet, and the intersection of these. I believe that even in a flooded media landscape, there is still room for independent, creative voices willing to bring a new twist to a topic. This belief is what inspired me to write my most popular articles like, “How Politicians Get Away With Lying, As Explained By A Magician,” and “George Orwell, Donald Trump, And Getting Away With Murder.”

At the end of 2018, I began writing on contract for the Mahomet Daily Newspaper. I covered the Mahomet-Seymour School Board race, which quickly became very competitive. I continue to write pitches and provide my services as a freelance writer.

My Activism

I started my environmental activism in college as part of the Political Action Committee of the Students for Environmental Concerns (SECS). We hosted an expo during Earth Week where I presented on the benefits and drawbacks of a carbon tax. The next year, I was elected co-Chair of the Political Action Committee, and we hosted environmental town halls with four candidates for U.S. Congress in the Illinois 13th District.

In 2018, when I became a candidate for office, I helped form a coalition of groups like Common Cause UIUC, the Illini Democrats, SECS, CU Indivisible, and the Public Interest Research Group to break records for student turnout in a midterm election.

More recently, as the Illinois Organizer for FairVote, I built a coalition of pro-democracy groups to introduce SB 2267, which now has three sponsors on it in the Illinois Senate and one sponsor ready to introduce a matching House bill. In one week, 250 people emailed their representatives asking them to cosponsor the legislation.

Before our coalition existed, no ranked choice voting bill had ever gained a cosponsor in Illinois.

My politics

The common wisdom is that politics are divisive — but I haven’t found that to be the case. Every person that sets foot in the political realm has a choice. They can use their influence to further divide us, or they can build bridges.

As a progressive-minded college student running for office in my conservative hometown, I had to learn how to make connections where others might not bother. I talked to corrections officers about the need for racial justice. I talked to farmers about about agricultural runoff. And I talked to tax-fatigued Illinoisans about the need for a progressive income tax. It was never easy, but it was always worthwhile and fulfilling.

We can let our problems divide us or unite us. I’m working towards unity.

MY Credentials

I graduated from the University of Illinois magna cum laude with a B.S. in Food Science and Human Nutrition and a Minor in Environmental Sustainability, receiving Dean’s List recognition each semester. For two consecutive semesters, I was awarded the Fred S. Bailey scholarship for civic engagement. On admission, I was awarded the Jonathan Baldwin Turner scholarship, and later was awarded the Solon Family Scholarship and the Justa Kuebler Memorial Scholarship.

I have experience using software like NationBuilder and Votebuilder. My writing has given me skills in researching, and fact checking. With FairVote and the Illinoisans for Ranked Choice Voting, I wrote email blasts to large lists of supporters to get them to take action, and I have a combined following of around 3,000 followers on non-personal social media accounts that I grew from nothing without an advertising budget.