From meeting the President of the United States to playing college baseball for a Hall of Fame catcher — and getting to know many others in between — Dexter attorney Sawyer Smith has lived a lifetime of experience in his 29 years.
Smith’s journey started when he was recruited to play college baseball for Palm Beach Atlantic University in West Palm Beach, Florida by Hall of Fame catcher Gary Carter.
“How could I refuse the athletic-scholarship offer to be coached by one of the all-time best at my position?” Smith said. “I still remember calling Carter to accept. He was a big factor in my decision to play for the Sailfish.”
Smith also was pleased that PBAU was a Christian college — and it also didn’t hurt that it was close to the spring training home of the St. Louis Cardinals. “We actually played our home game season-openers at the Cardinals Roger Dean Stadium in Jupiter,” Smith said. “It was an all-around great deal. Sadly, Carter passed away my sophomore season, and I was recurrently struck by injury.
“The last at-bat of my baseball career though, I doubled with a line-drive off the left-center wall. My family was there to see it happen. It was a sweet swing I can still feel, and a good way to close the sports chapter.”
However, when one chapter closed for Smith, another one opened — as Palm Beach County is a traditional for national politics, especially during a presidential election year.
“I pounced on opportunities around me and networked the best I could,” Smith said. “The result ended up being that I connected with many Republican contenders for President that year and even met Donald Trump a few times at his Mar-A-Lago estate in Palm Beach. It all exploded from there and I soon found myself shaking hands with heads of state — not just in the U.S., but presidents and prime ministers of foreign nations as well.”
From there, Smith founded PBAU’s Young Americans for Freedom chapter and interned for U.S. Congressman Allen West and Senator Marco Rubio as he finished his bachelor’s degree in finance in 2014. After he graduated PBAU. the Young Americans for Freedom hired Smith as a program officer to advance conservative thoughts and values on college campuses nationwide. He moved to Arlington, Virginia and traveled all over the country, including making a trip to The Reagan Ranch or “Rancho Del Cielo” in Santa Barbara, California.
After a year of working for the YAF, Smith moved to Waco, Texas, and began pursuing a master’s degree in journalism at Baylor University, where an article of his about Taya Kyle (the widow of Chris Kyle of “American Sniper” fame) was published by Newsmax Magazine. Smith also covered the 2016 presidential election.
While at Baylor, Smith met his future wife, the former Leeza Edmundson of Poplar Bluff — and his time at Baylor also prepared him for his current career as an attorney.
“Back in junior high, I became infatuated with reading John Grisham novels and I read them all in short order,” Smith said. “I actually came home one day and told my parents that I wanted to be a lawyer. They made me write it down on notebook paper and we still have it today. That was 15 or more years ago.”
Smith’s legal career began in high school when then-attorney Rob Mayer allowed him to answer the phone and file some papers as a part-time job at his law office in Dexter. After graduating from Mississippi College of Law in 2020, Smith recently passed the bar exam and now works as an associate attorney at Mayer Law Office and (now) judge Rob Mayer swore Smith in as an attorney.
“I simply love my community, my state, and my country,” Smith said. “I will serve them all with ethics and zeal in the legal profession. May God always bless our nation and keep the U.S. Constitution the law of our land. Amos 5:24 ‘Let Justice Roll!’”