Save Samuels Responds: This Is a Hostile Takeover and They Just Admitted It

The Board thought a last-minute letter packed with spin and threats would shut this community up.

They were wrong.

With just days before the election, four members of the Warren County Board of Supervisors released a letter packed with lies, legal gaslighting, and raw political desperation.

Supervisors Butler, Cook, Jamieson, and Stanmeyer aren’t “negotiating” with Samuels Library. They’re not “protecting taxpayers.” They’re laying the legal groundwork to steal a 225-year-old public library, rip it from the nonprofit that built it, and hand it over to a for-profit corporation they refuse to name. And they’re doing it while smearing anyone who gets in their way.

What This Really Is

Samuels has a 30-year lease. It’s not a vendor, and it couldn’t legally bid on the County’s RFP. The whole process was a setup from the start.

Samuels has done everything the County asked, including submitting a detailed, line-item budget starting in October 2024 and providing monthly updates ever since.

They accuse Samuels of hiding assets, while promoting a vendor that won’t give a line-item budget, won’t comply with FOIA, and hides behind “proprietary” protections.

Samuels was already under oversight through a 2023 agreement. The Board of Supervisors broke the law to create a second board and packed it with their book-banning friends.

This isn’t about accountability. It’s about control.

They Think You’re Stupid

And they’re not subtle about it.

In their letter, they repeat “a smart person would ask…” like some backhanded script, as if anyone who questions them is just too dumb to understand.

Patrick Pennefather says Warren County residents aren’t smart enough to work in a data center. Thomas McFadden Sr. wrote in the Royal Examiner that the solution to Warren County’s problems is for “well-educated Catholics” to take control of public institutions.

The contempt is out in the open.

They mock the public for asking questions. They mock Samuels for defending itself. They mock you for believing this place belongs to the people who live here.

They’ve called concerned citizens “alarmists.”
They’ve dismissed conservative Republicans like Hugh Henry as too “simple.”
They’ve treated working-class residents like they don’t matter.

They’ve lied about Hugh Henry and data centers, knowing full well his platform is about local control, not industrial sprawl.

Now they’re accusing Samuels of hoarding public property, with no proof, no ruling, and no legal standing.

This isn’t governance. It’s a rigged operation run by outsiders trying to seize what they could never earn.

They didn’t grow up here. They moved from the city, bought houses, and started dismantling what makes this place home.

They came here to take over. And when we pushed back, they called us dumb.

What’s Really Happening in Warren County

Today, there were no EMS units available. Boats had to be launched for a river rescue, while strokes and seizures were being called in across the County, and volunteers were the only line of defense.

That’s how much they care about this community. That’s what happens while everything else gets defunded, delayed, or ignored.
They’re scheming to hand our public library to a for-profit company.

But this community is the one that built it.
Not the 1.25 percent.
Us.

They’re afraid of Tony Carter, not because he was on the board during the EDA scandal, but because with 28 years of institutional knowledge, he sees right through their playbook — and they know it.

The Real Endgame: LS&S

They want to hand our library to LS&S, a private company that refuses to give a line-item budget, hides behind “proprietary” protections, and isn’t subject to FOIA.

The price tag? Over 600,000 dollars in taxpayer-funded legal fees. All to break a lease and seize a library that wasn’t broken.

Even local attorney David Silek called this what it is: malfeasance.

The Choice Is Right Now

The Republican primary this Tuesday, June 17th will decide whether Warren County falls completely under the control of this faction or whether the people take it back.

If you want to save your library, vote for Hugh Henry and Tony Carter.
If you want transparency, fight the ones hiding everything.
If you’re tired of being lied to, talked down to, called stupid, and treated like you don’t matter — this is your moment.

They started this fight behind closed doors, and now they’re doing everything they can to keep the public shut out.

Patrick Pennefather says nobody in Warren County is qualified to work in a data center. That’s who’s running — someone who thinks you’re not good enough for real jobs or real opportunity.

He and Cameron Williams don’t think for themselves.
They parrot what they’re told.
They posture, repeat, and perform because that’s what puppets do.

They’ve lied, manipulated, and rigged every process they could touch.

And now they’re scared.

Good.

Vote like everything depends on it. Because it does.

About Save Samuel
Save Samuels Library PAC is an independent organization and is not affiliated with Samuels Public Library. All activities, communications, and representations made by Save Samuels Library PAC are solely our own and do not reflect the views, policies, or endorsements of Samuels Public Library or its staff.