Black Candidate Has Cops Called On Her While Campaining In Wisconsin Neighborhood

Sheila Stubbs says she's knocked on thousands of doors in Madison, Wisconsin, in her 12 years as a county supervisor and has never had a problem in the community.

But last month, someone called the police while she was campaigning for a seat in the Wisconsin State Assembly -- because they thought she was a drug dealer.

 

Stubbs is the only African-American on the 37-member Dane County Board of Supervisors.

 

The incident happened August 7, although Stubbs is just talking about it publicily now. It occurred when she was visiting voters in a predominately white neighborhood on the west side of the city. She was wearing a name tag, carrying campaign literature with her picture on it and had a "walk list" with the names and addresses of potential supporters.

 

Her mother was following behind in their car, along with Stubbs' 8-year-old daughter.

 

"I had knocked at approximately six doors and some of the future constituents were home, and those that were home, I talked to for about 10 minutes ... because they were excited that I stopped by," she said.

 

Stubbs had been on the street for about 20 minutes and was talking to a resident when a police officer arrived.

 

"I happened to look over and I see this police officer had pulled up behind my car," Stubbs said.

 

She ended her conversation and excused herself, so she could see what was going on. Stubbs introduced herself to the officer, who told her police had gotten a call from someone who thought Stubbs was a drug dealer.

 

"And I'm like, 'a drug dealer! Are you serious, they think I'm a drug dealer? No!" she said. 

 

Stubbs says she showed the officer her name tag and campaign fliers, but she didn't seem satisfied until Stubbs showed her the walk list with the addresses of the houses she had visited. 

 

"When I showed it to her. She was like, 'Oh my gosh, I'm really sorry. I'm really sorry this happened to you,'" Stubbs said.

 

You can read the full and complete story by clicking here. 

The sad part despite this lovely lady showing proper identification all the way down to her campaign list, the police officer still didn't believe her. Stubbs says she plans to meet with the Madison police chief about the episode.

 

"I was angry and outraged and embarrassed that it happened to me -- in Madison, Wisconsin, it happened to me? And my daughter had to see me go through this," she said.

 

She took a day off from campaigning to work through her feelings and comfort her daughter, who didn't understand why the officer didn't believe them.

 

Stubbs said she told her daughter that incidents like this are why she was running.