Leadership rooted in community

About Kathryn Casey Quigley

I did not come to this work through ambition or resume building. I came to it the way most people in Suffolk County do, by trying to build something real in a place I love, a place I grew up, a place where my own parents built a life for their family.

I have always been mission focused, driven to create change for the better in the communities I live. In 2012, I launched an independent school on the North Fork with my sister because we believed education itself could begin with a mission to make the world a better place. We started with one classroom and nine students. Over time, we grew it into a 100 student school serving families across the community, with a real budget, real staff, and real accountability.

That work taught me something critical: Institutions do not grow because of titles. They grow because when you give people a mission, a sense of purpose and community, they show up, organize, and care enough to keep going when it is hard.

That same truth applies to politics.

When I became Chair of the Southold Town Democratic Committee in 2017, Democrats had been out of power here for generations. There was one Democrat in office in the entire town. Not because people here did not share our values, but because the party had stopped organizing like it believed in them.

So we rebuilt it. From the ground up. We recruited new volunteers and candidates, created pipelines, systems and strategies designed to win. We built a new brand, we raised money. We brought people into the room who had never been asked to participate before. We built a committee that reflected the community it served. By 2025, Southold had 14 elected Democrats, the most diverse group of elected officials in the town's history. That did not happen because of luck. It happened because people decided to stop waiting and got to work.

We can do this again. We are ready to all work together to save our Democracy. We know that right now is a make or break moment in America's history.

We know that community building is our path. The only, and most important one. I learned how to do that work as an Obama 08 organizer, and I have spent the years since proving that those tools still work when they are used with respect for local communities. I have managed campaigns, built committees, and communities, organized protests and rallies, and helped create the kind of energy that turns frustration into action.

That is what this race is about.

Suffolk County Democrats do not need more of the same. They need a party that belongs to its members again. A party that organizes year round, not just during election season. A party that welcomes new voices, new candidates, and new energy instead of protecting old structures. A party that wins. A party that brings problem solvers and progress.

That is the work I have already done in Southold. I am ready to do it for Suffolk County.