Jeremiah Liend for District 8: Liberty and Justice For All

Hello,

My name is Jeremiah Liend and I’m seeking the DFL endorsement for Minnesota’s 8th Congressional District.

I am pursuing the DFL endorsement because my central goal is clear: Pete Stauber needs to be removed from office. In a moment this urgent, I do not believe it serves the district or the broader cause of justice to divide opposition to Stauber across multiple lanes if there is a viable path toward unity. I have run outside conventional structures before, and I still believe our political system is too often rigid, polarized, and distorted by money, institutions, and careerism. But I also believe that defeating entrenched power requires strategic choices, and at this moment I am choosing to seek the endorsement and work within the process.

This is still not a conventional campaign. I could not commit to a conventional campaign because, like most of you, I work. I work to provide for the next generation of swashbuckling adventurers. When I’m not working or spending time with my family, I harass the Pulitzer Prize for Drama board through my playwriting. That leaves very little time for the kind of full-time, professionally staffed campaign Congress has come to expect. Even if I had that “retired insurance agent” free time, there are no guarantees. The electoral system is still fundamentally broken, designed and leveraged in ways that advantage money, institutions, and professional political machinery over families and working people. Even if I do not prevail, I am running for those families and working people too, trying to give them a voice, representation, and agency in this process. Working people deserve a voice in government, one that is not wholly subordinated to special interests and institutional inertia.

I’ve run for office before, and I’ve seen firsthand what a conventional campaign demands. So this time I am still running according to a few clear promises. This is a funds-free campaign. I will spend no money beyond minimal printing and negligible gas to get to and from public forums, caucuses, conventions, and debates. Accordingly, this campaign will accept no donations. That choice is partly practical, I have no interest in burying myself in campaign finance paperwork, but it is also principled. Money has distorted and degraded every level of our political system, and I refuse to build a campaign that depends on it.

I don’t want your money. I need your attention.

And if the internet decides to get involved, perhaps a little virality.

These ideas, these tactics, and these fixes are the campaign.

If what I’m saying resonates with you, please share this.

That’s how we win.

The Platform is to Fix What’s Broken

We live in the Adjacent States of America, more divided and angry at one another than ever. Decades of escalatory partisanship have pitted one half of our government against the other, eroding the cooperation required for anything resembling functionality. This is not how government is supposed to work. Parties are supposed to be vehicles for coalition, governance, and progress, not permanent engines of mutual destruction.

This divide has been fueled by corporations and individuals who profit from keeping us at each other’s throats by monetizing our conflict. We have a choice then: unite and pull up the nose of our declining republic, or maintain our current trajectory and watch it all plow into the ground.

I’ve run past campaigns on broad ideas. Big theory, little specifics. This time, I’m running on three clear goals. Three laws that would seek to fix some of the biggest foundational cracks in our crumbling republic.

We Fix Citizens United Through Publicly Funded Elections

Money isn’t speech, and if we do not stop letting corporations buy our elections, we will never reclaim this government. The Constitution does not begin with We the Corporations.

We the people must reclaim our vote. I propose publicly funded elections where every candidate gets the same equitable budget to campaign. No PACs. No dark money. No billionaire influence drowning out everyone else. Just real people sharing their ideas and truths with the constituency they hope to serve.

We Fix Presidential Immunity Through Expanded Impeachment Powers

If there is still a government by 2026, we need to make sure the current president, as every president, is not above the law. The Supreme Court decided otherwise, so now we have to fix it. They claim that the power to hold the executive accountable is impeachment, so those measures must be clarified and empowered.

Likely, this means a constitutional amendment, one that demands the immediate forwarding of any unprotected criminal or unconstitutional conduct by a sitting president to Congress for review and impeachment. This isn’t partisan. It is about the integrity of the entire system. Because when one person rises above the law, a republic becomes an empire.

We Fix the Supreme Court Through Term Limits

No more lifetime appointments. It’s a bad idea. It was always a bad idea. It’s not an instant fix, but it prevents us from having a dysfunctional, hyper-partisan court for generations at a time. A judiciary should evolve with its people, not remain an intransigent wall against change.

Why Am I Doing This?

I’m running to do three things. Three problems. Three solutions. Simple, but certainly not easy.

I also want to be clear about how this campaign works.

This is a funds-free campaign. I am not asking for donations. I am not building a paid political machine. I am seeking the DFL endorsement because I believe defeating Pete Stauber requires the strongest possible unified challenge, and I am willing to do the work that process demands. If I earn that endorsement, I will carry this message forward as the endorsed candidate. If I do not, I will have to assess what path best serves the larger goal of removing Stauber and representing the people of this district with honesty and courage.

I’m running under a simple motto:

Liberty and Justice for All.

Not liberty for some.

Not justice for people we agree with.

Liberty and justice for all.

It’s a pledge that many have sworn as stewards of this nation, and now it is time for us to uphold it.

We are living in a moment of extraordinary division. Political polarization is no longer abstract; it lives in our families, workplaces, churches, and schools. We have stopped talking with one another and started talking around one another. We live side by side, but no longer united.

My platform rests on three principles: unity, reason, and accountability.

Unity does not mean uniformity. It does not mean silence or sameness. It means refusing to treat your neighbor as an enemy. It means choosing connection over escalation, especially when it is uncomfortable. We have to come together before political division hardens into something far worse, because once that line is crossed, it is very hard to come back.

Reason matters. Democracy only works if we share reality. We do not need identical opinions, but we do need shared facts, good-faith engagement, and the humility to change our minds when evidence demands it. Reason is not an ideology. It is a civic responsibility.

Accountability is how trust survives. People in positions of power, political, institutional, or cultural, must be responsible for their words and actions. Accountability is not punishment. It is stewardship. Without consequences, bad actors of every persuasion will continue to diminish, disregard, and divide us unchecked.

Outside of politics, I work as the Technical Coordinator for Performing Arts at Bemidji State University. I live in Turtle River with my family. They are the true and only reason I’m doing this. So my children can see that in this moment in history I did not sit quietly, accept perpetual atrocity, and trust someone else to fix it. They and all of us deserve a better, safer, more functional world.

I’m a theater maker, a writer, and a humorist. I’ve spent my adult life helping people tell stories on stages, on screens, in classrooms, and on the page. Art and storytelling are how human beings make sense of chaos. They help us see one another more clearly. They soften hardened assumptions. They create spaces where people can sit together, even when they disagree. Politics alone often fails at that. Art reminds us that we are better than our worst ideas and louder than our cruelest words.

This campaign is not about tearing things down. It is about rebuilding hope in a free and just nation. Slowly, imperfectly, painfully, but together. It is about choosing participation over inaction. Love over despair. It is about remembering that democracy is not something that happens to us. It is something we must actively work to protect.

Liberty and justice for all is an idea worth protecting.

I’m not promising certainty. I’m not promising victory. I’m offering an invitation to step back from the brink, to share reality again, and to remember that the people around us are not abstractions. They are not statistics. They are not enemies. They are our neighbors, our family, and our friends. Our futures are not set. A better world is possible, for all of us.

If you believe unity is still possible, that reason still matters, and that accountability is essential, then I need your help. I need you to share this message, right now, with everyone you know. Write a letter to the editor. Alert the media. Show up to caucuses, conventions, and public events. Help me make the case that this district deserves a candidate willing to speak plainly, think independently, and fight for liberty and justice for all. And if I earn the endorsement and the nomination, I need you in November, choosing hope over resignation and courage over cynicism.

If you believe in this, please share it. That’s the campaign. That’s how we win. Thank you.

Sincerely,