Tarantula-Tossing Senate Candidate Turns Her Assault Conviction Into Merch and a New Girl Scout Row

A Minnesota woman running for the US Senate was sentenced on 30 June 2026 to 90 days in a county workhouse over a 2024 attack on a tenant, yet she is selling 'tarantula tosser' merchandise while campaigning for the Senate.

Marisa Simonetti, 32, of Edina, is on the state's November ballot as an independent for the Senate seat being vacated by retiring Democrat Tina Smith. A Hennepin County jury found her guilty on charges arising from a June 2024 confrontation with a woman renting a room in her home. Her candidacy has drawn attention to the relationship between criminal proceedings and political accountability.

What the Jury Decided

Simonetti was found guilty of gross misdemeanour harassment, misdemeanour domestic assault, and disorderly conduct. On 30 June 2026, a judge ordered 90 days in the Hennepin County workhouse with work release allowed, two years' probation, and $1,078 (£805) in fines and fees. The court stayed a separate 364-day workhouse sentence for two years.

Court records describe how, on 20 June 2024, Simonetti intercepted the tenant's grocery delivery, cut off the home's Wi-Fi, and banged pots and pans. When officers arrived, they found pins, tacks, nails, small toys, and a live tarantula scattered down the basement stairwell, along with the dumped contents of a terrarium. The tenant's video captured Simonetti spraying the stairs and shouting about the spider she had just bought.

Turning Notoriety Into a Brand

Rather than distance herself from the spectacle, Simonetti built a brand on it. She calls herself the 'tarantula tosser' across social media and sells themed shirts that she has associated with her political campaigns, a tactic she first used during a failed 2024 run for the Hennepin County Board. In that race she still took almost 32% of the vote after the Republican Party for the 3rd Congressional District pulled its endorsement.

She has framed her legal troubles as persecution. In a statement after sentencing, she said many residents feel the law is weaponised to force compliance and strip people of their rights, adding she would not be bullied out of the Senate race.

A Fresh Row Over Girl Scout Cookies

The candidate's instinct for confrontation resurfaced this year. In a clip she posted herself, Simonetti approached a mother and daughter selling Girl Scout cookies outside an Edina business and repeatedly demanded to know whether they had a permit. The mother, shielding her child from the camera, said the girl was a minor. The video drew heavy criticism online, with commenters calling the encounter needless.

A Second Open Criminal Case

The sentencing is not the end of her legal exposure. Simonetti faces a separate misdemeanour disorderly-conduct charge filed in Edina after a March 2026 incident, a case she is contesting. She has denied wrongdoing throughout.

The open seat has drawn a crowded field, with Democrat Peggy Flanagan, who won the August primary, facing Republican Michele Tafoya in the general election on 3 November. Simonetti, an independent candidate, is betting that infamy travels further than a clean record, testing whether a candidate with a criminal case can monetise her own conduct and still ask voters for a Senate seat.