A Wisconsin RINO who appears to have a penchant for “sexually explicit” material — and a connection to a trans porn site — has dropped out of the Badger State governor’s race.
Whitefish Bay businessman Bill Berrien, who also had a past dalliance with the disastrously kinky election method known as ranked-choice voting, quit Friday following reports linking the candidate to several “sexually explicit accounts” on social media. He apparently connected to said accounts through the platform Medium, where he followed Jiz Lee, a “trans” sex peddler, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported earlier this week.
Berrien reportedly followed “publications” on Medium such as “Sexography,” which bills itself as “An inclusive place for people to talk about and explore #sexuality from all orientations, cultures, and perspectives.”
‘Very Intellectually Curious’
Announcing his decision to leave the race, Berrien said his campaign was “gaining traction” until “the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel published this week two articles clearly targeted to force me out of the race.”
It’s all a misunderstanding, the former candidate claimed after his connections to many of the “sexually explicit social media accounts” were reportedly scrubbed. He’s a “very intellectually curious” guy. He said he listens to podcasts and is “constantly trying to take in new information, trying to learn something new.” To that end, Berrien said he follows more than 5,000 people across many platforms, subscribes to more than 100 newsletters, and has liked “perhaps 20,000 different articles or postings.”
“I thought it was a strength to read very widely and show a broad intellectual interest,” Berrien wrote in his farewell. “[T]he media cherry-picked a handful of individuals and written articles that came across my feed that I then followed (without the faintest clue as to an author’s lifestyle choices!) 6 or 7 years ago …”
“Lee, the trans porn star … has been on Medium since 2015 and has 1,500 followers,” the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported. Lee only has one post on Medium from 2015 titled “Ethical Porn Starts When We Pay for It,” an article for which Berrien reportedly expressed support on the platform. Lee’s Medium page currently “directs people to [his] personal website,” which is updated “fairly regularly.”
Berrien’s campaign officials confirmed to the Journal Sentinel that the former candidate set up his Medium account in 2018 but used it “rarely” since 2019. However, his spectrum of learning apparently took Berrien to “Polyamory Today,” a forum that celebrates multiple sexual partners, presumably outside their primary relationship.
On Tuesday, Lee, who “identifies” as nonbinary, posted an angry message on Bluesky above an article on Berrien.
“It’s okay to follow trans porn stars. It’s okay to read articles about sex and relationships. What’s not okay is the hypocrisy of backing forceful legislation that restricts what people, trans and otherwise, can do with their own bodies. That is shameful,” scolded the porn pusher.
‘Politics Today’
Berrien blamed “politics today” for his departure from the race. He concluded he does not have a “path to the nomination.”
But the well-read Republican had more troubles in his 11-week campaign than nasty social media follows.
Berrien, owner and CEO of a Milwaukee-area contract manufacturing company, had a difficult time connecting with the Badger States’ grassroots conservatives — maybe because he is a phony. He campaigned on his credentials as a Navy SEAL hunter of war criminals, who, Berrien said in his adios, were almost as dangerous as running for political office.
“As a result of our politics today, I cannot focus on the issues I know will turn Wisconsin around. I have come to the conclusion I do not have a path to the nomination,” Berrien said in the statement.
He has clung tightly to his support of President Donald Trump, the MAGA movement, and family values — and of course, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and other leftist corporate media outlets have hammered that questionable political link.
Berrien had dumped a hefty sum into a race that won’t be settled until next summer, with an ad barrage introducing the political “outsider” to Wisconsin voters. Those ads portrayed Berrien as the ultimate MAGA crusader.
“But the actual Bill Berrien adamantly backed Nikki Haley, not Trump, in last year’s GOP primaries. Haley comes from the opposite wing of the GOP as Trump. She’s an anti-tariff, military interventionist globalist firmly planted in the Bush/McConnell/Cheney wing of the Republicans,” wrote Milwaukee conservative podcast host Mark Belling in an August column.
As Belling noted, Berrien couldn’t bring himself to back Trump against the old man who nearly destroyed America. The “MAGA” manufacturer blasted Trump on national TV for the president’s “anti-science” approach to Covid, Belling added.
Ranked-Choice Voting Fetish
“But wait, there’s more. Berrien for the last several years has been a member of a centrist Wisconsin political group that has been pushing ranked-choice voting in Wisconsin,” Belling wrote.
The election method ranks up there with trans porn. Pushed hard by leftists who have found “common ground” with spineless RINOs, RCV turns traditional voting on its head. As Justin Haskins explained in The Federalist last year, voters rank a slate of candidates for each office, from most preferred to least. The candidate who receives more than 50 percent of the vote in the first rankings wins outright. If no one reaches at least 50-plus 1, the winnowing process begins in additional voting rounds, throwing the least popular candidate out until a competitor hits the majority threshold.
“Under ranked-choice voting, a candidate who receives the most first-preference votes can and often does lose the election,” Haskins wrote.
The confusing system often squeezes out actual conservatives, particularly anti-establishment conservatives.
“For example, in states with RCV systems and large Republican populations, such as Alaska, liberals vote for a Democrat as their first preference and then choose the most liberal Republican they can find as their second preference,” Haskins wrote. “If a conservative Republican fails to surpass the 50 percent mark in the election, the less popular ‘moderate’ Republican wins with a coalition of Democrats and a minority moderate Republican voter base. Conservatives end up left out in the cold.”
Leftist groups have poured millions of dollars into pro-RCV ballot issues in several states.
Although Berrien has since claimed he has put his ranked-choice voting proclivities behind him, the Journal-Sentinel reported Berrien registered in support of RCV at a Wisconsin legislative hearing in January 2024.
Belling wrote that Berrien’s record shows him to be a centrist leaning “slightly” to the right while identifying as a Trump conservative.
“Berrien apparently wants to be governor so badly that he is masquerading as somebody he is not,” the longtime Milwaukee talk show host wrote in the August column.
Maybe Berrien is a trans-Republican. No matter — Bill Berrien is no longer in the Republican race for Wisconsin governor.
Matt Kittle is a senior elections correspondent for The Federalist. An award-winning investigative reporter and 30-year veteran of print, broadcast, and online journalism, Kittle previously served as the executive director of Empower Wisconsin.
