Skagit Peers is an open community board for Skagit County residents to share their perspectives, experiences, and voices. This is your space. Posts from community members will appear here. To submit your own post, reach out via the contact page and we'll get it added.
Welcome to Skagit Peers
Founded in 2021, Skagit Peers is a nonpartisan group of Skagit County Americans who believe our local government must be preserved for our children and grandchildren as a constitutionally governed community. We are committed to protecting the God-given rights and freedoms that allow every citizen to pursue happiness as guaranteed by our U.S. Constitution.
We stand for:
- The Rule of Law
- Real Government Accountability
- Responsible stewardship of the public treasury — spending with the least waste and the greatest benefit for all Skagit residents
Skagit Peers meets every other Tuesday at 15356 Produce Lane, Mount Vernon, WA.
We actively seek and support candidates for local office who share these core principles and are ready to serve with integrity, transparency, and a deep commitment to our community.
If you love Skagit County, value liberty, and want to help keep our local government accountable to "We the People," you are invited to join us.
📍 Next Meeting: Every other Tuesday — July 7, 2026 @ 15356 Produce Lane, Mount Vernon
💪 Together, we protect what matters most for future generations.
For more information or to get involved, email us at [email protected] or message us here.
Skagit Peers — Preserving Liberty, One Community at a Time.
A Better (Square) Deal for a Free People
Last weekend, America celebrated its 250th birthday. Two and a half centuries of self-government is worth celebrating — and worth defending. As we look toward the elections ahead, Skagit Peers believes the best way to defend it is not merely to oppose bad ideas, but to offer better ones. For that, we turn to Theodore Roosevelt.
What Roosevelt Understood About Socialism
Roosevelt opposed the doctrine of extreme socialism without apology. He saw that it ignored personal freedom, stood hostile to religion and morality, and cut against the civilization our founders built. In his view, extreme socialism reduced human life to material distribution — pursuing material gain at the expense of intellectual, moral, and family life. It was, he argued, a form of communism lacking any moral foundation.
But Roosevelt understood something his louder critics missed: many people who called themselves socialists were not enemies of America. They were well-intentioned citizens angry about genuinely unfair business practices. He prided himself on working alongside some of them to win better laws for workers and fair working conditions — while never conceding an inch to the doctrine itself.
That distinction matters today. Many of our neighbors asking hard questions about wages, housing, healthcare costs, debt, and dignity at work are not ideologues. They are frustrated Americans. We reject extreme socialism because it makes people materially dependent on the state. But we must answer those fair questions better than the alternative does. Indifference is not an option — and it is not conservatism.
The Antidote: Social Consciousness and the Square Deal
Roosevelt's answer to class-based socialism was what he called social consciousness — concern for the welfare of the whole community rather than partisan or class division. His governing program was the Square Deal: government as referee, not owner. A regulator of abuses, not a master of society. He worked to curb the power of massive trusts to protect workers and small businesses — not to seize industry, but to keep the playing field level.
A modern Square Deal for our community would look like this:
- Economic fairness without socialism. Restrain monopoly power where it harms workers, consumers, farmers, and small businesses. Support pro-family tax policy. Encourage domestic manufacturing, skilled trades, and energy independence. Make honest work pay through wage growth, apprenticeships, and lower living costs, not permanent dependency.
- Worker dignity without class warfare. We believe in the dignity of work, not class hatred. The goal is not to punish success, but to make sure honest work can support a stable life: enforcement against wage theft, safe working conditions, portable benefits for gig workers, and expanded vocational education.
- Government as referee, not owner. Government should police corruption, fraud, monopoly abuse, and injustice. It should not own industry, purchase land, dictate conscience, replace the family, or become the center of moral life.
Two Constitutional Anchors
Our program rests on two promises written into the Constitution itself.
The First Amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…" Religious freedom protects Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, atheists, every person of conscience. If government can punish one faith today, it can punish another tomorrow. This is common sense in a pluralistic country: the state keeps peace not by favoring one group, but by protecting everyone's right to live according to conscience.
The Fourteenth Amendment: "No State shall… deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." Equal justice is practical, not sentimental. People obey laws, resolve disputes peacefully, and trust institutions when they believe the rules are fair. That means no politically weaponized law enforcement, no two-tier justice, and constitutional rights protected for everyone, not only favored groups.
These two principles reinforce each other. Freedom without justice becomes privilege. Justice without freedom becomes state control. America needs both.
The Numbers Tell Us Where to Work
The U.S. Census Bureau reports that in the 2024 presidential election, 73.6% of the voting-age population was registered and 65.3% voted (see Pew Research Center's turnout analysis, June 2025). Liberty-minded registered voters may turn out at 70–80% in general elections — strong, but not automatic.
People of faith cannot be taken for granted either: one Arizona Christian University estimate found only 51% of self-identified people of faith were likely to vote. Faith should never be a political prop, but people of faith have every right to bring moral conviction into public life — and staying home forfeits that voice.
And the young: Census population estimates put ages 21–35 at roughly 69 million Americans, about 20% of the population. Many are not ideological socialists; they are economically anxious. Our message to them cannot begin and end with "socialism is bad." It should be: You deserve more than dependency. You deserve ownership, affordable living, meaningful work, family, and freedom of conscience. The alternative offers state dependency. Corporate elites offer managed decline. We offer ownership, work, family, faith, and freedom.
The Skagit Peers Better Square Deal
- Protect religious liberty and conscience rights for every faith and for none.
- Restore equal justice under law — one law for all, no weaponized institutions.
- Defend the family as the foundation of society in tax, housing, and education policy.
- Make honest work support a stable life — wages, training, apprenticeships, fair labor standards.
- Fight monopoly power and corporate-government collusion — free markets need fair competition.
- Expand ownership, reduce dependency — homes, small businesses, savings, entrepreneurship.
- Protect children and parental authority — parents, not bureaucracies, raise children.
- Keep government limited, but strong where it must be strong — strong on crime, corruption, and constitutional rights; limited in conscience, worship, speech, and private life.
The Choice
Extreme socialism treats people as economic units. But people are parents, neighbors, believers, citizens, creators, and moral beings. America does not need state control. It needs a renewed Better Square Deal: fair rules, strong families, religious liberty, honest work, equal justice, and opportunity for every citizen.
That was Roosevelt's answer a century ago. It is ours today.
Sources: U.S. Census Bureau voting and population estimates; Pew Research Center, "Voter Turnout, 2020–2024" (June 2025); Arizona Christian University Cultural Research Center.
Skagit Peers — Preserving Liberty, One Community at a Time.
Have Something to Share?
Skagit Peers is a space for every neighbor. Share your thoughts on local government, community life, or the 2026 election — send it through the Contact page and we'll post it here alongside the Skagit Peers community.