Does Sheriff Keith Swank spend too long on ‘X’? Our analysis says not really
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- The News Tribune analyzed Swank’s X posts, calendar and records to assess use.
- Most weekday posts occurred before 9 a.m. or after 5 p.m., outside core hours
- Swank said he considers his use of social media work and uses it for recruiting.
Late in the evening and in the wee hours of the morning, one of Pierce County’s most powerful — and inflammatory — social-media posters puts his fingers to the keyboard, sending off musings on news and politics while firing back at the haters in the replies.
Sheriff Keith Swank posts frequently on the website X, occasionally giving multiple replies in the same minute and not infrequently responding to upwards of a dozen commenters in a day. Some of Swank’s reply guys have suggested he’s wasting the public’s time and money.
Is he?
The News Tribune analyzed a months’ worth of Swank’s X posts to compare against his work calendar and official correspondence. Although he posts prolifically, is known to take shots at transgender people and spout conspiracy theories — a habit that would have led to him being fired from his former job at the Seattle Police Department had he not retired — Swank largely refrains from posting during business hours.
His calendar and a portion of his emails and texts from his official Pierce County account and phone number were released to The News Tribune through public records requests. They reflect a busy schedule and steady oversight of issues within his office. He also has a habit of emailing employees on their birthday and thanking them for their work.
Swank told The News Tribune in an email that he considers his posting on X “sheriff work” and that he uses the platform as a recruiting tool for the Sheriff’s Office. He protested the methodology used to analyze whether he spends too much time online, stating that there are no “normal hours” for cops. He said his work days usually start at 6 a.m., and he stops about 11 p.m.
“I will continue to post on X whenever I feel like it. If the citizens don’t like it, they can vote for my opponent next time,” Swank wrote.
In the four weeks from Sept. 29 to Oct. 24, Swank made 38 posts on X and 142 replies. Of those, 81 percent were sent during the week. About 68 percent of his weekday missives went out before 9 a.m. or after 5 p.m.
The earliest in the day that Swank posted was at 2:09 a.m. on a Monday. In a thread about Swank’s degree from the University of Washington, Swank responded to a commenter who said, “Transwomen are women.” Swank replied: “Follow the real science.”
Although the sheriff works beyond 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. in his 24-7 job, many of his meetings and correspondence come during the day. Just under a third of Swank’s posts during the week were made during normal business hours, representing 35 posts and replies. Twenty-four of those were sent while Swank was out of town Oct. 10-18 in Florida. On the last day he was scheduled to be out, Swank posted a photo to X from the St. Petersburg area.
Swank has previously told The News Tribune he’s never really off the clock. In a recent email responding to a reporter’s request for comment on a ruling in Prosecutor Mary Robnett’s lawsuit against an attorney who has tried to represent him, Swank said he worked on New Year’s Eve into the new year, finishing up around 1 a.m.
More recently, Swank detailed his weekend work hours in multiple emails to The News Tribune. He said he called it a night Friday just before 10 p.m. and was up working Saturday morning by 5:30.
“I’ll be heading out soon to meet some community members to discuss crime in Spanaway,” Swank wrote. “I might put out a post on X later. Will that be on the ‘public’s time’? Am I allowed to have any time for myself today? I’ll let you know when I have a lunch break.”
Swank and other elected officials in the county got a 2 percent pay raise for 2026, bringing his annual salary to $200,770, County Council documents show.
The only time Swank appeared to come close to using social media during a meeting was Wednesday, Oct. 22. According to Swank and his work calendar, he had meetings from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.
“I was able to post on X for a few minutes here and there,” Swank told The News Tribune.
Swank sent seven posts and replies that morning, mostly just before 9 a.m. and just before 10 a.m.
The posts were typical Swank.
After a user told him, “just do your job,” and said the sheriff was using his position to push a political narrative, Swank replied that he would continue to do so and that he was standing up for “people who have not had a voice in decades.”
Later in the morning, Swank speculated on whether recent incidents where truckers carrying too large of loads struck bridges in the state were “acts of terrorism.”
