About

Local Selection was created by host Brian Hastert in the wake of emceeing a record-breaking community filibuster about who gets heard in our democracy.

The spirit of this podcast is to get people excited about municipal, county, and state level representative government by doing two things:

a) Unpacking how much of the destructive power of America’s racism and patriarchy exists not merely in people’s hearts, but in specific community laws and policies around voting, education, housing, policing, employment, etc.

b) spotlighting the absolute most rad people working to use the power of local level offices to undo those structural oppressors and make their corners of the country more fair, more just, and more equitable.

Local Selection believes there is nothing sexier than fighting to make sure everyone gets heard. If we can’t build a society that honors the life and experience of everyone in your town, we sure as heck won’t get it done at the federal level.

Democracy starts at home.

And #LocalRepresentationIsSexy

I need to confess something: @maureeturnerok was the inspiration for this entire 7-week national road trip. They were elected last fall at age 27 or 28 (Wikipedia is unclear and that is they way Mauree prefers it so no spoilers here!) - and if you ar
Circled back to Nebraska after my loop through the south and was blessed with the chance to sit down with organizer/activist/political strategist @morgann.freeman! We talked about her work in Omaha, what it’s like to find out your activism is b
I was not ready to have the amount of fun I did have in NORTHWEST ARKANSAS. Partly due to the beautiful @crystalbridgesmuseum, but mostly due to the extraordinary efforts of @daisybonilla4ar - a bomb ass social worker who recently ran for a seat in t
Even though I was only in Memphis for a total of 19 hours I still managed to visit two different BBQ places, including @momasbbq where I met with @voteforgabby. We talked about how deeply her Memphis community supported her when she arrived in this c
I tried an experiment while I was in Montgomery: before meeting up with @marche4d3 for our interview I mentioned her to a few strangers I chatted with that morning, just to see what impressions were. The responses were all “oh yeah, I’ve
The #treatstour continues!! My final few hours in Georgia were blessed by an absolutely mind-expanding conversation with @danielforgeorgia - and then what might be my most compelling treat of this whole tour. Daniel sent me to @_atlantabreakfastclub
@nidaallam speaks so eloquently and so powerfully on behalf of a more just, more fair, more truly representative society. I think her voice and vision deserve to be boosted. If you agree, pick a clip and share!
Ep. 12 is up! Meet @nidaallam!! When she was elected last fall to the Durham Board of County Commissioners at 26 years old, she became the first Muslim woman elected to any office at all in the entire state of North Carolina! We talk about a huge ran
Had such an amazing conversation with Doraville, Georgia City Councillor @stephekoontz! We talked about so many things - from her decades of work as an auto mechanic to her history making victory as the first trans person to win a contested election
Had the pleasure of talking with rising superstar of Georgia state politics @bumblebbz about her fight in the Georgia State House to make sure every voice gets heard (sitting in Stacey Abrams’ old seat no less!) and her campaign for Secretary o
This conversation - the one I had with @lilianaforatlanta - is exactly why I came to Atlanta. It is hard to know from a distance who the movers and shakers are in a particular place. But it was not hard once I got here. As soon as I arrived in ATL, l
Y’all, if you have doubts about whether America has what it takes to become a better, more just, more equitable nation - Georgia State Representative @parkcannon58 will make you a believer! We talked about everything from her unlawful arrest af