Last week, Saily Avelenda sat alone in her quiet backyard in West Caldwell, New Jersey —her husband at work, her two young sons at school—and, glued to her phone, watched her story go viral.

That morning, WYNC had broken the news: New Jersey Congressman Rodney Frelinghuysen, one of the most powerful Republicans in Congress, sent a form fundraising letter to a board member of the bank where Avelenda had worked. The conservative agenda was under attack by “organized forces,” it warned. At the bottom, in a handwritten note, the congressman added, “P.S. One of the ringleaders works at your bank.”

That “ringleader” was Avelenda, senior vice president and assistant general counsel at the Lakeland Bank, at its headquarters in Oak Ridge, New Jersey. After the election, she had helped found a grassroots group, NJ 11th for Change, that was publicly urging Frelinghuysen to meet with his constituents in a town hall.

Avelenda first saw the letter in March, when her boss came into her office and showed it to her. He asked her to describe her involvement with the group, and to write a statement explaining the situation for the bank’s CEO. In April, after six and a half years at the bank and a recent promotion, Avelenda resigned.

The story had one nagging loose end: Avelenda had not been fired. She had left.

Then the WYNC story aired, and Avelenda’s phone started to ring. She spoke with a reporter from The Washington Post, one of the first of 14 interviews she fielded that day. A video she filmed that day for NowThis Politics has accrued 1.15 million views.