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Invoice Berrien. Picture courtesy of Berrien’s marketing campaign.
In early July Bill Berrien announced his run as a Republican candidate for governor. He described himself as a former Navy Seal who owns a New Berlin-based manufacturing firm and an “outsider” who would “shake up Madison” like Donald Trump is shaking up Washington.
“It’s time that we hearth the bureaucrats and rent a businessman to repair the issues and take our state again,” he declared.
Berrien, 56, known as himself a Wisconsin “convert” who moved to the state and selected to lift his household in Whitefish Bay.
However exactly when Berrien moved right here, how he acquired his wealth and the way a lot enterprise acumen he has is unclear. The candidate talked about not a phrase about his household or upbringing.
His full identify is Willard Berrien III, son of Willard Hewitt Berrien Jr., also referred to as Invoice, who handed away in March after an extended profession in finance, with firms like Hemphill Noyce & Co., Goodbody, Loeb Rhodes and Lehman Brothers. He remained an avid inventory investor in retirement, his obituary notes.
The Berrien household had a house on the Higher East Aspect of Manhattan, one of the crucial prosperous areas of New York Metropolis, and a summer time dwelling in Quogue on Lengthy Island, a “fashionable resort neighborhood for the rich” for the reason that Nineties, notes one realtor, the place “the tempo of life “is quieter and extra measured than in different elements of the Hamptons.”
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Invoice was an energetic member of the Quogue Discipline Membership, an unique members membership based in 1887 which features a non-public 9-hole golf course, tennis courts, and clubhouse with eating and occasion area, because the realtor described it.
This was a really clubby man. Berrien was additionally a member of the Quogue Seashore Membership, Surf Membership, Yacht Membership, and Quogue Membership, the obit famous. “Deeply dedicated to his neighborhood, Invoice served on the Quogue Public Library Board, together with as its President, and the Quogue Village Planning Board, together with as its Chairman, and was honored as Quogue Affiliation’s ‘Man of the Yr’ in 2007,” the obit famous.
The Berriens had simply two kids and despatched their son Invoice to the very best non-public colleges. He attended St. David’s College on the Higher East Aspect of Manhattan, the place the present tuition is about $64,000 per yr after which went to highschool at Trinity College on the Higher West Aspect, the place tuition is at present round $69,000. In as we speak’s {dollars} the overall value of that schooling can be $788,000.
From there it was on to the Ivy League. Invoice attended Princeton College, simply 80 minutes away by practice, the place he bought a level in politics and added to the right resume by serving as captain of the university’s water polo team.
That seemingly insular life ended abruptly when Berrien was capable of be part of the notoriously robust Navy SEALs and served as a Crew Officer and Platoon Commander, graduating from the Naval Officer Candidate College as a Distinguished Naval Graduate and receiving the ‘Hearth In The Intestine’ Award from their Fundamental Underwater Demolition/SEAL Coaching class, as one description notes.
He then went again to high school, getting a masters in worldwide economics at John Hopkins College (1999-2001) and an MBA at Harvard College (2000-2002). By then he was in his mid-30s and nonetheless hadn’t determined what his profession can be. His LinkedIn profile reveals no job or education for 2 years after the Harvard diploma.
Berrien told WISN he moved to Wisconsin 23 years in the past, however that might have been when he was attending Harvard. The primary LinkedIn merchandise that would place him in Wisconsin is as a World Product Supervisor at GE Well being Care (which has workplaces in Chicago and Milwaukee) in 2004-2005, adopted by a job as chief working officer at Liberty Dialysis Heart, then listed with a house workplace in Washington state however with facilities throughout the nation. Then got here a job as managing director for Artisan Companions in Milwaukee.
However no Milwaukee space deal with reveals up on-line till he bought (in 2009) his Lake Dr. dwelling in Whitefish Bay, with 5 bedrooms and 4.5 loos, for $625,000. He has called himself a “Southeast Wisconsin neighborhood chief, together with 12 years of volunteer-parent-coaching his two sons in youth and highschool lacrosse and serving on the boards of a number of charities.”
In 2012, Berrien bought the small New Berlin-based manufacturing enterprise Pindel World Precision Inc. and made himself the chief government officer. The acquisition worth is unknown however one estimate put its annual income at $16 million and one other analysis estimated it had 75 staff. Given Berrien’s quick profession in enterprise, simply eight years as much as that time, it appears seemingly the cash to purchase the corporate got here from his father.
Berrien additionally calls himself the CEO of Liberty Precision Manufacturing, which was a division of Pindel that has spun off from it. Data on each firms is sketchy. The publication Collegiate Water Polo Affiliation wrote a story quoting Paul Jelacic, vice chairman of business banking at Old National Bank, who mentioned “Invoice has grown a world-class group of superior manufacturing professionals. Pindel actively recruits and hires veterans, and a number of other leaders all through the corporate are veterans.”
A much less enthusiastic review may be discovered at Certainly.com, the place employees on the firm gave its administration a below-average score of three.2 on a 5-point scale.
As a candidate Berrien has made some claims that elevate questions. He touted his fundraising prowess and the $1.2 million he has raised to reporter Matt Smith. Berrien credited the “relationships that I’ve type of traditionally had going again… It’s buddies and donors within the state.”
However 83% of that — $1 million — got here from the out-of-state donors, the Winklevoss twins, fellow Harvard grads famed for his or her authorized dispute with Fb founder Mark Zuckerberg, as Anna Kleiber reported.
Berrien additionally advised Smith he was a constant supporter of Trump. “To type of set the file straight, since 2016, my spouse and I’ve supported Donald Trump in each election — 2016, 2020, 2024,” Berrien mentioned. “Voted for him and financially supported.”
However in a 2020 interview with Fox Enterprise, Berrien mentioned he hadn’t determined whether or not to again Trump, criticizing what he mentioned was Trump’s “anti-science method” to the pandemic. And in 2024 he supported Nikki Haley within the Republican major, giving her $33,200, way over he later gave Trump, as Dan Bice reported.
All of which suggests the life story — and candidacy — of Invoice Berrien is just not fairly the easy story he has been telling voters.
