Merion West Interview: Austin Petersen

Missouri Senate candidate and libertarian activist Austin Petersen joins Merion West to discuss trade, immigration and his decision to run for Senate as a Republican.

Austin Petersen, who recently declared his candidacy for the 2018 United States Senate race in Missouri, joined Merion West’s Nikhil Sridhar for an interview on July 10th.

You went from someone who was studying musical theater to a volunteer on the Ron Paul campaign to the founder of the publication The Libertarian Republic. Soon after, you were finishing second place in the Libertarian Party presidential primaries. Can you tell us a bit about this journey?

I didn’t go to law school. I didn’t go to an Ivy League school. I wasn’t planning in my life to try and lord over everyone. A lot of times you see these politicians, and it’s like they’re climbing the ladder from one position to the next just trying to get power. I never sought power because I just wanted to live my life and chase my dreams.

I was in New York City doing some media work, and I was certainly enjoying my career in the arts and media. But I noticed that as my career started to pick up and my income started to pick up—so did my tax bills. So I paid attention to the Republican debates at the time. This would have been around 2007; I watched Congressman Ron Paul in the debates, and I realized how that man exemplified what I stood for and everything I believed. So I started to volunteer for Ron Paul, and then it was all downhill from there you might say.