VALPARASIO, Fla.—A 26-year-old Courtland native decided to stop talking about politics and do something about it.

Calen Fretts recently kicked off his campaign for Florida’s 1st Congressional District. The 2003 Southampton Academy graduate and Valparaiso, Fla., resident is running as a Libertarian in the district that stretches from Florida’s western border to west of Tallahassee.

Fretts, who owns a web development company, said he’s running for individual rights, free markets and limited government

“For the past four years, I’ve been active and engaged in politics and I realized the path our country is on is unsustainable,” he said. “If we stay this course, I don’t know if we’ll have the same country when my children and grandchildren inherit it.”

Fretts, who admits to having no knowledge of running a campaign, said it’s been a huge undertaking.

“I didn’t have a big war chest to run a campaign, but I decided to throw caution to the wind,” he said.

Fretts, who moved to Florida in August, is vice-chairman of the Libertarian Party in Okaloosa County. He graduated from Virginia Tech in 2008 with a bachelor’s degree in computer science.

Tom Fretts, owner of Fretts Construction and vice chairman of the Western Tidewater Tea Party, said he thinks his son could do a good job in office.

“He’s well equipped for it,” Tom Fretts said. “He’s pretty good at figuring things out and he’s very analytical.”

Tom Fretts said he and the rest of the family were at first surprised and then excited when they found out Calen Fretts was running for office. This realization was punctuated, Tom Fretts said, when he heard his son give a radio interview.

“I was like ‘wow, this is really happening,’” Tom Fretts said.