WALTHAM — Republican gubernatorial candidate Mike Kennealy has found his running mate — and she comes with a badge, a 34-year law enforcement career, and a track record of suing sitting governors.

Peabody City Councilor Anne Manning Martin announced Monday she is joining the Kennealy ticket as candidate for lieutenant governor, bringing nearly three decades of elected office and a reputation as one of the most unapologetically blunt fiscal hawks in local Massachusetts politics.

Manning Martin currently serves as Deputy Superintendent at the Department of Correction's Lemuel Shattuck Hospital Unit. She has spent 19 years on the Peabody City Council and eight years on the Peabody School Committee before that — 27 consecutive years of elected service in a city where she is a fifth-generation native.

Her motto? "I spend taxpayer dollars the same way I spend my own — only when I have to."

She has often been the lone dissenting vote on spending she deemed unnecessary, earning her a reputation as the fiscal guardrail at Peabody City Hall — the kind of councilor who makes colleagues uncomfortable when budget season rolls around.

"I've spent decades on the front lines in Peabody — enforcing the law, protecting taxpayers, and standing up to Beacon Hill," Manning Martin said in announcing her candidacy. "I don't back down, and I don't look the other way. Governor Healey's policies have driven families and businesses out of our state, undermined local control, made our communities less safe, weaponized the MBTA Communities Act, and sent utility bills through the roof."

But perhaps the most revealing chapter of her career came when the Deval Patrick administration demoted her after she was diagnosed with cancer — and handed her position to someone else with a 35% pay raise. Manning Martin didn't take it quietly. She sued for discrimination and wrongful demotion, took on the full weight of a sitting governor's administration, and won.

It is the same kind of fight-first mentality Kennealy says he wants in the Corner Office.

"Anne Manning Martin is exactly the kind of partner Massachusetts needs. She's tough. She's battle-tested. And she doesn't tolerate nonsense," Kennealy said. "She understands what Governor Healey's failed policies are doing because she hears it directly from the people she serves."

The Kennealy-Manning Martin ticket will campaign on affordability, public safety, local control, and what the campaign is calling a return to "common sense" on Beacon Hill — a direct shot at the Healey administration's record on housing mandates, energy costs, and the migrant shelter crisis that has dominated headlines for over a year.

Manning Martin lives in Peabody with her husband Jack, a retired MBTA electrical engineer, and their rescued Staffordshire Bull Terrier.