dennis baker
I Want to Tell You About My Values
I’m a native Oklahoman who is of Euchee tribal descent and a member of the Muscogee Nation.
I’ve served as both a Tulsa Police Officer and an FBI Special Agent. I have an English degree and a law degree from the University of Tulsa.
I currently practice law in Tulsa where I reside with my wife, Wanda.
That’s my official story – but it doesn’t tell you who I really am. It’s my values that will tell you that. The Oklahoma values I learned growing up in Oklahoma.
Growing Up in Oklahoma
I grew up in small town and rural Oklahoma. My Euchee ancestors arrived in Oklahoma on the Trail of Tears in the 1830s.
When my Dad was a kid he was sent to Chilocco Indian Boarding School. Believe me, Chilocco wasn't the kind of school that prepared you to compete for high earning jobs. Growing up, I watched my family struggle to pay the electric bills or buy propane in the winter. We lived from paycheck to paycheck.
As a kid, I vowed to get an education so I could get a good job to support my family.
That’s why when I talk about my political beliefs I start by saying, “Oklahomans deserve the opportunity to hold a job that pays a living wage so we can afford our own home.”
During high school, I earned extra money hauling hay and picking pecans. I worked at a grocery store in Sapulpa and during the summers I worked for the Sapulpa City Park Department.
This is my favorite photo of my Mom. She’s holding me and left to right are my sisters, Jackie, Sandy, and Jo Lynn.
The Value of Education
I went to the First Grade at Liberty Elementary in Sapulpa. We moved to Okmulgee, and I went to Roosevelt Elementary through the 6th grade.
During the summer, our teachers wanted us reading books. They gave us a chart to list all the books we read and turn in at the beginning of the next school year. That’s how I developed into a lifelong reader.
The Okmulgee Public Library was down the street from our house. I read dozens of books – from Mark Twain to Jack London. Those books transported my imagination all over the world. Any success I’ve had can be traced back to this – reading and public education.
My Mom was a graduate of Sapulpa High School – the first in her family to do that and back in a time when it was a big deal. She taught me the value of education. It was very important to her. She didn’t quit school. That’s the lesson I learned – you don’t quit and you graduate. She made sure I never missed a day of school.
Supporting public education is a priority for me. There is nothing more important to success than an education. We have a lot of work to do to build it back – from public school funding to teacher pay to student achievement.
Finding a Path
I graduated from high school. I had no path to follow to get to college. I’d be the first in my family to even go to college.
That’s where the University of Tulsa (TU) comes in. I can’t thank them enough for sorting it out for me and helping make it financially feasible for me to attend. They looked out for me. We help our neighbors.
While attending TU, I worked summers at the Liberty Glass Plant in Sapulpa. I was a proud member of the Glass Workers Union. My job was to stack crates of glass bottles onto pallets that were then shrink wrapped for shipping.
I also worked at Sears, at a grocery store, and at a gift shop in Southroads Mall.
That union job at Liberty Glass helped pay my way through college. So you can understand why I support unions and why I’ll work to pass the Protecting the Right to Organize Act (PRO Act) that gives workers the right to organize for better wages.
When I finished college, I had a student loan that took me 10 years to repay. And that was back when college was relatively affordable. Another one of my political beliefs is that we should be able to send our children to good public schools and to an affordable college. I’ll work to make that happen.
I Know Tulsa by Heart
I graduated from TU. I wanted a career in public service – it was in line with my Oklahoma values – we help our neighbors. I felt for too long I was the one being helped. I wanted to be the one who was helping. That’s why I joined the Tulsa Police Department (TPD). TPD took a chance on me and for that I’ll be forever grateful. TPD is a professional law enforcement agency and Tulsa should be proud of them.
TPD is where I met my wife, Wanda. Wanda was a Tulsa Police Dispatcher. It was her job to dispatch the service calls to patrol officers. She always said her main job was to make sure those officers got back to their families after every shift.
On one of our dates, Wanda and I went shooting. Yes – a typical Oklahoma date – drive out to the country and set up a few targets. I thought I’d be showing Wanda how to shoot. But on this occasion, Wanda out-shot me. Lesson 1 – Oklahoma women can shoot. When Wanda was growing up, her Dad taught her how to shoot and be a responsible gun owner.
On the Police Department, I worked in just about every part of Tulsa. In Patrol, I’d drive around 100 miles each shift answering calls and helping Tulsans. I had to deal with some bad people, but it’s the good people I remember most. I learned a lot. I know this city and its people by heart. I talk about my political beliefs and say that we all should be able to live in a safe community. I dedicated myself to that as a police officer and I’ll dedicate myself to that in Congress.
A few years into my career with TPD, I started law school at TU. They had a program that let me attend part-time, so I could go to law school while continuing to work at the Police Department.
Wanda and I started a family so this was a busy time for us between kids, work, and law school. But that wasn’t the biggest challenge for us. The biggest challenge was saving for a home, finding affordable child care, and figuring out how to pay our medical bills.
Today, saving for a home, medical care, and child care are even bigger challenges for families. That’s why I support Bills like the Child Care for Every Community Act that will ensure access to high quality, affordable child care. The same goes for health care – we all deserve access to high quality, affordable health care.
Keeping Your Oath
The FBI was my next step after graduating from law school. I started training to be an FBI Special Agent at the FBI Academy located 35 miles south of Washington, D.C. at the Marine Corp Base at Quantico.
The first thing you do is take the FBI Oath of Office. I raised my right hand and swore to protect and defend the Constitution. I gave my word. It’s the same Oath a member of Congress takes. The next thing? You get a copy of the Constitution. That’s how you protect it. You learn it. And we did.
I earned the Academic Achievement Award and the Firearms Proficiency Award. The most fun I had was getting the chance to shoot the FBI Possible Course. I really wanted to be in the Possible Club. The day before I was scheduled to shoot the course, I spent the evening practicing loading and reloading with an inert revolver and dummy rounds. I kept fumbling and dropping rounds. If you dropped a round during the course, you couldn’t pick it up. You had to score 100% - so that meant you didn’t qualify. I wasn’t feeling confident.
But I shot the Possible Course the next day and scored 100%. I was in the Possible Club.
I telephoned Wanda about shooting the Possible – did that erase the fact that she out-shot me? She was preparing to fly out for our graduation and I asked her to bring my handcuffs. The FBI hadn’t issued handcuffs and I couldn’t imagine protecting America without them. Wanda packed the handcuffs but she was temporarily detained by airport security when they found them. She’s never forgiven me for that.
The FBI’s mission is to protect the American people and defend the Constitution. I believe that’s also the mission of a member of Congress. We keep our word and we help our neighbors.
Team Work
After graduating from the FBI Academy, I was assigned to North Carolina's Charlotte Division, Greensboro Resident Agency.
One day after firearms qualification, the Charlotte SWAT Team Leader asked if I’d like to try out for the SWAT Team. Of course I did.
The best thing about SWAT is your team. We all had each other’s backs. I trust them with my life.
Our SWAT Team was assigned to protect the Olympic Village during the Atlanta Olympics. We were there when a bomb exploded in Centennial Olympic Park and killed a woman and injured more than 100 people.
That bomb was later linked to Eric Rudolph and our SWAT Team spent weeks in the Nantahala National Forest in Cherokee County, North Carolina hunting for him. This was the same location where the Trail of Tears began for the Cherokee people.
I spent a lot of time away from home on SWAT assignments. I never fully realized the sacrifices Wanda and the kids were making until a few years ago. I just thought that’s what an FBI family does.
I want Americans to realize that Federal employees aren’t just workers, they’re families. I’ve seen their service and their dedication. When I was the St. Louis FBI Special Agent in Charge, my Agents and support staff worked day and night to help find a child who had been kidnapped. When I offered to bring in additional personnel to relieve them, they didn’t want to go. They refused to quit.
Federal workers aren’t your enemy. They deserve to earn a living wage and have decent benefits. I support the Preventing a Patronage System Act so they can’t be fired for political reasons. I won’t let their wages be cut or the Federal Employee Retirement System be dismantled. I have your back.
We Don't Quit
One night at 2 a.m., someone placed an incendiary device on my FBI vehicle parked in front of my home. The device caught the car on fire but fortunately didn’t explode. The violence that I fought as an FBI Agent was at the door of my home. Now my wife and kids were facing it.
Everyone arrived to help – my FBI office and the police. They had my back. The next day my supervisor asked if I wanted to transfer to another FBI office – maybe get a transfer back to Oklahoma.
I knew my answer. No one was going to run me out of town. I was not going to quit. Growing up in Oklahoma, from as early as I can remember, I was taught that you don’t quit, and you don’t run.
It wasn’t completely my decision. That evening, I told Wanda that we had a chance to transfer. She asked what I wanted to do. I said that I wanted to stay and see it through. Wanda said, “Then we’ll stay.” I can’t imagine how difficult that was because our goal was to get back to Oklahoma but to do that would take years of seniority. But we wouldn’t run, and we wouldn’t use this to skip to the head of the line.
Eventually our lives returned to normal. The bad guys who tried to blow up my Bureau car were brought to justice.
Then came 9/11. I went to FBI HQ in Washington, D.C. to work Counterterrorism. Before I left, a Greensboro Police Officer named Jim Ballance gave me the drawing you see here. When Jim was a Detective, we worked a lot of bank robberies together. The night they tried to blow up my FBI car, after everyone left, Jim stayed outside in his patrol car watching over us. Jim’s presence meant everything to my family and me. Jim had our backs.
In this time of bitter divisiveness in America, we need to remember who we are. We’re a people who don’t run and don’t quit. More than that, we’re a people who have each other’s back.
At the Heart of the Threat
I’m not a politician. But now, maybe I am. I often ask Wanda, “How did we get here? We’re law enforcement. What are we doing?” The other day I told her that I think it really goes back to 9/11.
When the first plane hit the Twin Towers on 9/11, I was at the FBI Office in Raleigh, N.C. When I saw the second plane hit, I knew the FBI would be at the heart of this threat. I decided then that’s where I wanted to be – at the heart of it fighting the extremism threatening America.
I transferred to FBI HQ in Washington, D.C. to work in the Counterterrorism Division on the Usama Bin Laden Unit.
My FBI career took me from there to a Counterterrorism Squad in the FBI’s Phoenix Division, back to FBI HQ in the Inspection Division, then to FBI Sacramento Division as an Assistant Special Agent in Charge.
After a tour as the Special Assistant to the Deputy Director at FBI HQ in Washington, D.C., I completed my FBI career as Special Agent in Charge of the St. Louis Division.
So, 9/11 is one part of how I got here – running for office. It’s about wanting to serve. It's about wanting to be at the heart of the threat. The next part happened on January 6, 2021.
The Best Version of America
Like most Oklahomans, I watched in dismay as pro-Trump rioters attacked our nation’s Capitol from the outside in an attempt to subvert democracy and keep Donald Trump in power. I saw 147 Republicans, working from the inside, vote to subvert democracy by refusing to certify the legitimate results of the 2020 Presidential election. Kevin Hern was one of those voting against democracy. Hern took an Oath to protect and defend America but he didn't live up to it.
That’s at the heart of why I’m in this race.
Oklahoma is at a crossroads. In one direction is chaos and divisiveness. In the other direction is democracy and progress.
Our campaign is a fight against the MAGA extremism dividing our country. This campaign is about the responsible majority putting an end to extremism by voting for Representatives who place America’s best interests above politics. Who pass meaningful legislation that moves our country forward. Who are working to create the best version of America.
This campaign is about Oklahoma values and working to make Oklahoma the best place to live, work, and raise a family.
On November 5, 2024 – we will decide. I’m counting on Oklahoma values.
What I See When I Run
If you’ve seen my social media posts you know I love to run and I love dogs. I’ve met some friendly folks and some great dogs on my runs.
I’ve run three marathons and in every one of them at about mile 18 – I wanted to quit. I mean my body was begging me to stop. But I didn’t, because my Oklahoma values are deeply ingrained. It's why I run – to reaffirm my values.
As for dogs – it’s all about having your back.
I’ll see you on the trail.