Tyler Kampf, Democratic candidate for Maricopa County Sheriff, previously worked for the Phoenix Police Department as a shift commander, gang enforcement sergeant, and homicide detective. He is a fifth-generation Maricopa County resident and has over 20 years of law enforcement experience.
Kampf’s resume includes work at the International Justice Mission, a nonprofit organization that fights human trafficking. He served as the group’s head of investigations for eight months in Ghana.
Kamp won the primary against current Sheriff Russ Skinner. In the primary, Mr. Kamp sought to portray himself as an outsider who could reform the sheriff’s office and build on the successes of former Sheriff Paul Penzone, a Democrat who resigned a year before the end of his term. The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors appointed Mr. Skinner to complete Mr. Penzone’s term.
Kamp pledged to revamp the company’s recruiting efforts, specifically targeting women and veterans, while also focusing on retention. Primary voters said they like Kamp because he comes from outside the sheriff’s office and doesn’t have the baggage associated with the sheriff’s office.
Kampf said Penzone is using the advisory board to build relationships with the community and improve relations with Latinos and other groups who have lost trust in the sheriff’s office. I admired that. He said he believes in an empathetic approach to law enforcement.
“As a sheriff, you have to have empathy for your organization and your community,” Kampf said during a recent debate. “We need to understand what their perspective is. Once we understand that, we can provide better public safety for everyone.”
Sexual harassment accusations against Kampf surfaced
ABC 15 reports The show, which aired in July, described an internal investigation that found Kamp had sexually harassed female police officers, based on public records from his time with the Phoenix Police Department. Ta. The report also said Kampf was suspended for one day in 2014 “for unauthorized access to a confidential law enforcement database without a legitimate criminal justice purpose.”
Kamp asked voters to look at his entire “body of work.” He said he is proud of his long career in law enforcement.
Who is supporting Tyler Kampf?
Kump’s website includes members of the Phoenix and Mesa city councils, Tempe Mayor Corey Woods, the American Letter Carriers Association AFL-CIO, and Mike Crawford, who is running in the Republican primary for sheriff. Support from is posted. Crawford cited Kampf’s honesty and integrity as the reason he decided to support the Democratic candidate.
“We have the same goals,” Crawford said. “It’s about protecting everyone in Maricopa County and making sure people feel safe where they live. People will invest in communities where they feel safe. And now Maricopa County Sadly lacking.”
Phoenix attorney David Brown donated to Kamp’s campaign, saying he was impressed by Kamp’s background, including his work with the Phoenix Police Department and his work against human trafficking in Africa.
“I’m very concerned that this Republican candidate is a repeat of Joe Arpaio’s reign of terror,” Brown said. “That’s why I support Mr. Kampf, in addition to the fact that he is clearly far more qualified.”
Mr. Arpaio was first elected as Maricopa County Sheriff in 1992 and was ousted by Penzone in 2016. His time as sheriff is remembered for this “tent city,” an open-air prison that Penzone vacated, for forcing inmates to wear pink underwear, targeting Latino immigrants, and eventually being arrested by a federal judge. found that the sheriff’s office illegally profiled drivers based on their perceived race and ethnicity.
Kampf changed his party affiliation from Republican to Democratic in December 2023, according to the Maricopa County Recorder’s Office. Mr. Kump first registered as a Republican in 1995. But Maricopa County Democratic Party Chair Patty O’Neill said positions like sheriff go beyond partisan politics.
“When we met Tyler, we were really impressed with his resume,” she said. “We think he is an excellent candidate to follow in the footsteps of Paul Penzone.”
O’Neill pointed out that Penzone also comes from the Phoenix Police Department and was a registered Republican before becoming a Democrat.
O’Neill said the sheriff’s race is very personal to her.
“I’m half Mexican and half Guatemalan,” O’Neill said of Kump’s Republican challenger, Jerry Sheridan. “My community was under attack during the Arpaio era, and Sheridan was his No. 2. ” he said. “We can’t go back to the days when we were hiding in the shadows.”
What are Tyler Kampf’s priorities if elected?
In a recent debate with Sheridan, Kump said his responsibility as sheriff is to provide protection and safety to the community.
“Increase staffing, attack the fentanyl pandemic, and graduate from court-ordered reforms that have cost county taxpayers,” Kampf said, citing costs related to the Melendrez racial profiling lawsuit that has now begun. We will achieve this by doing so.” Under Arpaio. By the end of August, those costs had totaled about $279 million since the case began in 2008, according to Maricopa County records.
Both Arpaio and Sheridan were found in civil contempt for failing to comply with Snow’s orders in the case.
Penzone took over the case when he took office in 2017. During his seven-year term, he failed to fulfill all of the judicial orders aimed at reforming the sheriff’s office and eradicating racial profiling.
Kampf said full compliance with Melendrez’s order will be a top priority for his administration. He called the lawsuit “the best and worst thing to ever happen to the sheriff’s office.”
The best reason for this is that he exposed abuse and corruption in the Sheriff’s Office more than a decade ago, forcing the Sheriff’s Department to divert resources it could have put into the jails and streets to comply with court orders. He said the worst reason was that he had to use it.
Mr. Kamp said he would not defy the federal judge’s order, unlike Mr. Sheridan, who declined to say whether he would do so in the future.
Mr. Kampf said salary increases should be considered to encourage recruitment. He is proposing a 4-5% salary increase each year.
Here’s where to contact the reporter: jjenkins@arizonarepublic.com.
