The Democratic contest for Vermont state auditor features a Montpelier veteran and a political newcomer who says the little-understood office needs a modern messenger.
Tim Ashe, the current deputy auditor and a former president pro tempore of the Vermont Senate, is competing with Nicholas Graeter, a Williston accounting specialist and digital-content creator making his first run for office. The race positions Ashe’s institutional experience against Graeter’s promise to bring an outsider’s perspective — and a more aggressive communications strategy — to an office whose influence depends largely on whether policy makers and the public act on its findings.
Dan Towle will also appear on the ballot, though he has ended his campaign.
The current auditor, Doug Hoffer, is retiring after seven two-year terms. The position serves as an independent watchdog over state government, examining Vermont’s financial statements and conducting performance audits to determine whether public programs are operating effectively and as lawmakers intended. The office can expose waste, fraud and abuse, but it cannot compel an agency or the legislature to adopt its recommendations. Its principal tools are evidence, persuasion and publicity.
Former auditor and current state Sen. Randy Brock (R-Franklin) described the job more colorfully: Vermont elects five statewide officers, he said, and the auditor’s role is to “protect you from the other four.”
Ashe argues that five years as Hoffer’s deputy have prepared him to lead the office. Before joining it in 2021, Ashe spent 12 years representing Chittenden County in the state Senate, eventually becoming president pro tem. He also previously worked for an affordable-housing developer and served on the Burlington City Council.
Ashe pointed to his work on a 2021 report examining the state employee health plan as an example of the potential for the auditor’s office to influence policy. The report promoted reference-based pricing, a system that ties hospital payments to a benchmark — often Medicare rates — instead of allowing hospitals and insurers to negotiate widely varying prices. Ashe said the idea has since become central to Vermont’s efforts to restrain rising health care costs.
If elected, Ashe said, he would direct the office to examine the overlap between education spending and human services, which can drive up school budgets and contribute to rising property taxes. He also identified housing programs, rural economic development initiatives and programs vulnerable to federal changes as areas ripe for review.
The office should more forcefully publicize recommendations that agencies or lawmakers have failed to adopt, Ashe said, particularly when inaction leaves the state susceptible to flooding, unsafe dams or preventable emergencies.
“We often pride ourselves as a state for how we respond to crises, whether it’s the pandemic or big flooding events,” Ashe said. “But we can reduce the need to have to respond in such comprehensive ways if we spend more on prevention.”
Ashe said his goal is to foster what he called “a culture of excellence” across state government, using audits not only to identify problems but also to encourage agencies and lawmakers to adopt best practices and improve over time.
“We don’t have a badge; we can’t go around and punish people,” he said. “The primary tool that the office has is persuasion.”
Graeter agrees that communication is the office’s central source of power. But he argues that the current operation does too little to present its work to Vermonters, who are unlikely to seek out a lengthy audit report.
Graeter currently works as an accounting specialist for Heritage Auto Group and has experience building audiences for online golf content. He has never held elected office — a distinction he says would ensure his independence.
“The only people I feel like I need to be accountable to is the Vermonter,” Graeter said.
He said he would reorganize the office’s current staffing structure to hire a communications director and pursue a three-part strategy involving traditional news outlets, the office’s long-standing social media accounts, and “new media” such as Reddit and Front Porch Forum.
“An audit that no one hears about loses a little bit of its power,” Graeter said.
He said the birth of his first child in February pushed him toward public service and ultimately to run for elected office. A fourth-generation Vermonter whose mother is the Colchester town clerk, Graeter said he wants young families to be able to afford the kind of life in Vermont that earlier generations enjoyed.
His first proposed audit would examine the Vermont School Safety Center and whether districts have adequate plans for violence, fires and other threats. He would also review overtime in the Department of Corrections, where he worries that staffing shortages can lead to long shifts, higher costs and safety concerns.
Graeter said he would pursue focused audits that would have narrower recommendations rather than attempt to tackle sprawling systems such as health care. While he praised the current auditor’s staff, he cast himself as a candidate of change.
“I’m not a career politician by any means,” he said.
Graeter has also eschewed conventional fundraising, saying he does not believe money should play a significant role in politics. Graeter has raised $525 for his campaign — including $500 he contributed himself — and has received two small donations despite discouraging supporters from giving. Ashe had raised more than $63,000 this election cycle and spent roughly $12,000 as of the July 1 campaign finance filing. Asked about his philosophy on campaign fundraising and spending, Ashe said he is “a frugal campaigner” but declined to elaborate.
The candidates differ less over how audits should be performed than over how the office should choose, explain and promote its work. Both Ashe and Graeter acknowledge that staff in the auditor’s office must adhere to defined government auditing standards, which require that findings be supported by evidence.
Brock, the former auditor, said the next person to fill the role will need relevant oversight experience, a questioning mind and the ability to explain technical findings in plain English. He cautioned against treating agencies solely as targets.
“You’ve got to convince people that you’re not out to get them,” Brock said. The auditor should help state officials improve programs, he added, rather than merely catch them making mistakes.
On the Republican ballot, perennial candidate H. Brooke Paige is running unopposed for auditor — as well as attorney general, secretary of state and treasurer. Paige has repeatedly won multiple Republican nominations and later withdrawn from some races, allowing the party to select replacement candidates. In 2018, for example, he withdrew from five statewide contests after the primary. In 2022, he relinquished the auditor nomination and was replaced by another Republican, Richard “Rick” Morton, then chair of the Windham County Republican Party.
That history leaves open the possibility that the Democratic nominee will face someone other than Paige in November. For now, however, voters in the Democratic primary must decide whom they want to lead the state’s watchdog office as Vermont grapples with rising health care costs, affordability pressures, a transformation of public school governance and shifting federal policies. ➆
Tim Ashe is the domestic partner of Seven Days cofounder, publisher and editor-in-chief Paula Routly. In keeping with Seven Days’ conflict-of-interest policy, Routly neither assigns nor edits stories about this race or about the auditor’s office. Any questions about the policy can be directed to news editor Matthew Roy at matthew@sevendaysvt.com.
This article appears in July 29 • 2026.
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