Nick Hart: “You’d better get involved or else you’ll get somebody like me.”
If Nick Hart is elected mayor of Madison he says there will be a “reckoning.”
“If I can trick 20,000 people into voting for me and I become mayor — y’all are fucked,” says Hart, a 39-year-old stand-up comedian. “I’m a teachable moment. You better get involved or else you’ll get somebody like me.”
This isn’t Hart’s first rodeo. He placed a distant third in the 2011 mayoral primary against two heavyweights: then-mayor Dave Cieslewicz and current mayor Paul Soglin. Hart says his last run — in which he received less than 2 percent of the vote — accomplished “absolutely nothing.”
But he’s running again because he’s still dismayed at how few people vote in local elections. During the last mayoral race in 2015, 22,000 (12 percent of people registered) voted in the primary and 54,247 (29.6 percent) voted in the April general election.
“You can’t be a progressive city and have only like 20 percent of the city vote in local elections. How are we progressive? It’s not even close,” says Hart. “I want to make it more difficult for the status quo to keep going. That’s one reason why I’m running. If I’m going to say people should get involved in politics, I gotta do it, too. Fuck voting. I’m running.”
Hart is one of seven candidates who has filed to run for mayor in 2019. The other declared candidates are former Alds. Brenda Konkel and Satya Rhodes-Conway, Madison racial equity coordinator Toriana Pettaway, River Alliance of Wisconsin executive director Raj Shukla, former Madison school board member Michael Flores, and Ald. Maurice Cheeks. In July, Soglin announced that he would not seek a ninth term in office. So far, Hart is the only candidate who has previously run for the city’s top post. The filing deadline is Jan. 2.
“I don’t understand why there aren’t 50 candidates running,” says Hart. “It’s not hard. You only need 200 signatures to get on the ballot.”
Hart grew up in Spartanburg, South Carolina, and has a degree in sociology from Lander University in Greenwood, South Carolina. He moved to Madison in 2003 and has been a full-time comedian for the past eight years. In 2017, he won Madison’s Funniest Comic Contest at Comedy on State and was a top three finalist in the Seattle International Comedy Competition. In July, Hart reached a career milestone when he performed his beloved “scallions” bit on TBS’ Conan.
That recent success is, in part, why he thinks he might have an edge in the mayoral contest.
“I’m the only one with a TV credit. What have they done? Oh, you’ve been on the city council. I’ve been on national TV, dude. That was a goal of mine for nine years and I made it happen,” says Hart. “I also need a job. One that pays six figures sounds pretty good.”
Hart says trends in local campaigning make him more qualified to run for office than his background may let on.
“Mo Cheeks. He has the best name in the race. I don’t know anything else about him. But watching him on Instagram and on social media, it’s like watching a comedian getting you to come out to one their shows,” says Hart. “If that’s where politics is going, I can do that. Glad-handing the locals. Smiling. Waving. Politics is show business. That’s the business I’m in.”
Hart says his run isn’t a publicity stunt. At a comedy showcase he organized and headlined at the Brink Lounge on Sept. 14, he didn’t mention his campaign during an hour-long set. He did gripe about the popularity of unicycles in Madison (calling them a gateway to stilts).
Hart admits he’s unsure of what the mayor actually does.
“I guess I’ll find out. Doesn’t the city council or someone pretty much run things? Does the mayor do anything?” wonders Hart. “I do have a genuine interest in the process. I’d like to know more but, like a lot of people, I just don’t. I can only learn by doing it. I might make an ass of myself but there’s no better way to learn than by jumping in.”
Hart thinks there’s a dearth of imagination in local governance. He has some “out-of-the-box” policy ideas that he thinks will prompt real change. One example: he thinks the police should operate more like the fire department.
“We don’t need patrols. Put the [police] in station houses, let them play ping pong until there is a call. So unless there is a problem, they can stay out of our business,” says Hart. “I don’t know how we could ever implement that but if there is a place that could, it would be this town. [The police] literally drive around to issue tickets so they can continue to drive around and issue tickets.”
Despite results from the recent Best-Tasting Water in Wisconsin contest, Hart also doesn’t understand why “nobody in Madison seems to notice that the tap water tastes bad.”
“It’s not Flint,” Hart says, “but it’s not good.”
The comedian is not interested in swaying voters who are supporting other candidates. He’s focused on engaging the 70 to 80 percent of voters who typically don’t show up for February primaries.
“I want to tap into something that isn’t being tapped. The rest of us. I didn’t vote for mayor in 2015 and I ran for mayor in 2011. I didn’t care. Most people don’t care,” says Hart. “That’s why we got to mix it up. Like, how do we get drinks cheaper? Who’s focused on that?”
As the election nears, Hart intends to start a campaign podcast and interview his opponents, which he thinks will get more people to participate in local government.
“[My campaign] has been strategizing about which group of the population we can exploit. Maybe the bar scene? I don’t think those people are involved in municipal politics at all. With so many candidates, even if you got 2,000 people to vote that otherwise wouldn’t — that may be enough to win. God help us,” says Hart. “I was just telling my campaign manager, we’re going to need a contingency plan. For what? In case I win.”