>> The Democratic primary for governor starts to get
negative, and one candidate turns to national live
streams to raise money. Not everyone is happy about it.
This is inside Wisconsin politics.
I'm Shawn Johnson here with Anya van
Wagtendonk and Rich Kremer
in Eau Claire. Hey, gang. >> Hey, Shawn.
>> So I want to start this discussion with a simple
question. I think a lot of people probably associate
political campaigns with negative attacks.
Candidates run for office, they attack their opponents.
So, Anya, I'm wondering why is it noteworthy that here
in the middle of summer, we have overt negative attacks
in this Democratic primary? >> Yeah. You know, I think
for the last couple weeks, months, there have been
some snipes, what I might call sort of a Midwestern,
nice approach to trying to get negative. This was the
first week that we got, you know, a press release from
a candidate explicitly saying, my opponent has
done something bad. I am going to do something great.
And that was Mandela Barnes calling out Sara Rodriguez,
a former lieutenant governor, calling out a
current lieutenant governor over donations that she
received while she was in the Assembly and
essentially trying to to suggest that she is viable,
that he is not. So making an issue of this in a much
more explicit way. So a little bit of a shot across
the bow, six weeks out from the midterm to really kind
of start to make these more explicit points.
>> Rich, I think this kind of pales by comparison from
attacks you would see in national politics right now,
for sure. And in past Wisconsin campaigns. Have
you seen anything like this yet this summer?
>> Not really. I mean, it's it's as Anya mentioned,
these these have been pretty mild. And I guess if
we're thinking about, you know, boneless buffalo
wings, these would be the ranch and the, the blue
cheese type of attacks that we've seen thus far. We're
starting to get into the actual, you know, Frank's
redhot kind of territory. But even still, it's pretty
tame. And what I was thinking about is the
earlier veiled criticisms that we heard, like during
the Democratic convention or something, most people
aren't really tuned in to this race yet. That is your
regular voter. But the people that might be
getting these communications from the
candidates could be, you know, fellow politicians
looking to endorse one of the six candidates in the
race could also be messaging out to money
groups or donors. I mean, that's speculation. But
really, unless you're really tuned in, you
wouldn't be able to connect the dots between some of
the attacks we've seen until this moment between
the candidates when they're talking about electability
or first time politician, etc. You'd really have to
do some homework to find out. And now it's, it's a
little more blatant, right? >> So you would have to
know like a convention, for example, when Kelda Roys
says, we can't have anybody without experience stepping
in here at this time, she's, you know, we kind of know
who she's referring to, but she's not saying it.
Francesca Hong saying, you know, voters can detect BS.
I don't know, I suppose she could be saying that about
everybody but her. But this is like a candidate against
another candidate. So I guess I'm wondering, what
does it say about Mandela Barnes and Sara Rodriguez
right now that the attack is coming from Mandela
Barnes against Sara Rodriguez? And by the way,
she responded in kind. >> Absolutely right. It was
kind of a forceful exchange of words. So then her
response was, essentially, you ran for Senate and lost.
I ran for lieutenant governor and won. And so
again, them's fightin words. That's a little bit not
quite Midwest nice. So I think it tells us a couple
of things. One, it says that Sara Rodriguez is
considered to be a serious contender, right? You don't
need to take down somebody who has nowhere to come
down from. Another thing is that Mandela Barnes is
really trying to make utility rates a kind of
central platform. And so using this particular thing,
donations around utility rates is also a way to kind
of draw attention to himself. And then I think
the third thing is, you know, voters are pretty
checked out, even though, again, we are less than six
weeks away from the primary, absentee ballots have
already started being sent out. But there's like a way
that these candidates need to be drawing contrast
between themselves in a crowded race where there's
not super strong distinctions, right? On the
sort of the major issues, they're relatively unified.
And so this is also a way of like distinguishing in
terms of lanes. So he didn't go after, for
example, Francesca Hong, who is a little bit more on
his wing of the Democratic Party, he went after
somebody who's a little bit more moderate. And so it's
a way of, I think, again, trying to draw starker
distinctions between lanes in this race, not just
between individual candidates.
to make sense of the lanes in this race. I mean, I
kind of have a sense of it, but I wonder if they are
feeling it out too. And that is kind of the way I
read it too, is that Mandela Barnes probably
win over the Francesca Hong supporters necessarily, but
those Rodriguez supporters, they might be my people.
>> 1 in a crowded primary, you're fighting over the
same voters. You're fighting over Democrats,
right? And so you also, it's the kind of thing
where a few thousand votes can be the difference
between winning and not. It's more competitive in
certain ways than a general. And so like the contours of
what competition looks like in the primary is also
going to look different. >> Rich.
>> And this kind of reminds me of something I heard
from a campaign strategist back in 2022. This was the
Senate race between Mandela Barnes and Ron Johnson. Ron
Johnson's polling numbers, you know, approval ratings
weren't super high. And this this person who was a
Republican campaign consultant, said Johnson
doesn't need to improve his numbers. He just needs to
hurt and bring down the numbers of Barnes. So in a
primary like this, that might be part of the
calculus. Like if someone seems to be whether it be
from internal polling or whatever, getting some
ground in your campaign doesn't like that. Try to
knock them down a bit. >> So I guess I wonder if
this is kind of uncorking the bottle, so to speak,
you know, like, is this going to be the new norm
now that a fight started? Is it okay for Democrats to
say, well, you know, I didn't start it, but but I
got to finish it now, or they or they see sort of
the urgency of the primary coming up. And, and if they
want to stand out, do they have to attack? Is there
any signs that that's happening?
>> Well, it's a little bit of a calculation because,
you know, on the one hand, negative attacks can get
you more attention if you're kind of sassy on
social media, that tends to resonate a little bit more.
But at the same time, you don't want to weaken fellow
Democrats terribly because ultimately they're going to
go up against, presumably, Tom Tiffany in November for
what is going to be a close race, like a general
election in Wisconsin is always going to be close.
And so you want to kind of weaken your opponents
across the finish line, but not so much that you kind
of leave your entire party susceptible to potentially.
Tom Tiffany, picking up what you've already said
and running with it. >> Rich, what do you think?
>> Yeah, it's it's, I agree 100%. And I mean, no matter
who the Democratic candidate is, it would be
surprising if the entirety of the party doesn't try to
rally around them, because this race is pretty
critical for them as they're they're hoping, you
know, the best case scenario would be a
trifecta where they win the state assembly, state
Senate and keep the governorship. So maybe
that's also why the attacks have been kind of mild. But
whoever it is, that bad blood will likely magically
disappear, at least publicly after the August
primary. >> So, Anya, there was a
story that you covered this week involving Francesca
Hong fundraising strategy here. It was at the end of
the fundraising period, by the way, where she went on
a couple of national livestreams to raise money.
Tell us about who she talked to and why is that
significant? on Monday. One was Mike
from PA, who's sort of a progressive streamer
aligned with the Democratic Socialists of America. He
has a pretty big following. And then she went on with
Hasan Piker, who's arguably one of the biggest
political streamers online, and he's become something
of a kingmaker or perhaps attempted kingmaker on the
left of American politics. And he's appeared with a
number of DSA aligned or sort of leftist politicians.
And so she went on with him. It was about an hour and a
half appearance. It was a sort of fun and chatty.
They talked about politics, but they also ate Korean
food and they talked about merchandise, and they
talked about whether they should erect a statue of
Scott Walker for people to walk around and slap when
they have big feelings. So it was this really, you
know, it's a very different kind of appearance than
might occur sort of here on PBS Wisconsin or. But that
was this kind of approach to, according to Francesca
Hong meeting, different types of voters, more
disaffected voters, the type of people who keep
these streams going, again, perhaps very different
voters than our, our, our audience. But at the same
time, Hasan Piker has said numerous very controversial
things in the past, things about Israel in particular
that has offended some Jewish communities. And so
there's also been a response. She ended the day
having raised about $92,000 from those two different
streams. Hasan Piker has said now he's going to come
out to Wisconsin and campaign with her. But at
the same time, there's been this kind of pushback from
fellow Democrats and others saying, why would you
appear with somebody who has said X, Y, Z in the
past? >> And and so like you did
see some attack there from David Crowley kind of like
saying you should just you shouldn't go on here. Right?
I mean, essentially, yeah. >> He said those comments
are beyond the pale. And, you know, I should perhaps
specify what they were. So he has said, for example,
nine over 11 was deserved. And he says that he was
referring to this idea that America's foreign policy
actions have consequences. And then again, a number of
his comments about Israel and Zionism has has sort of
been seen as conflating Jewish American Zionists,
this kind of thing. And so I spoke with, for example,
Ann Jacobs, who's the co-chair of the Jewish
Caucus of the Wisconsin Democratic Party, who was
really kind of appalled by the fact that Francesca
Hong would go alongside this person and said that,
you know, should Hong received the nomination in
November, she feels like she's going to have a lot
of work to do to bring Jewish Democrats kind of
into the ballot box to make sure that a Democrat can
still win. And again, you know, I reached out to the
Hong campaign for comment and they said, essentially,
we are willing to meet with just about anyone to share
our vision if we don't go on these types of platforms,
that creates a vacuum that conservative messaging can
instead go to. So they're trying to create this sort
of big tent. Some of the concern from other
Democrats is who all should be in the big tent.
>> And how much did she raise in a day?
>> $92,000, $57,000 from Hasan Piker or from that
stream. >> And, you know, for
somebody who's watched those streams, they kind of
know what to expect for somebody who doesn't. It's
a bit it's a little busy on those streams, is it not?
>> Yeah. As a, you know, a public radio girly, I will
say it was a little bit stimulating to have that
kind of thing going. But I think people who are
younger than me like this is how they are getting a
lot of their, their news and information. And again,
in this kind of funny, cheeky way.
>> All right. What do you think, Chad? I don't know.
Is that how it's done? >> Right, fam?
>> Rich, rich Kremer, what are Republicans saying
about this appearance there by Francesca Hong?
>> They're saying a lot. They're they're framing it.
As you know, this is the entire Democratic Party
lurching to the left towards these what they
call dangerous ideas and comments. So they've
they've been very critical of Hong. But again, they're
conflating this to to try to say that all Democrats
are essentially Hasan Piker fans and they support
everything that he's ever said, which is obviously an
exaggeration, but that seems to be the way you do
it in politics when you're trying to bring down the
other side. >> And we'll get a sense in
the middle of July, July 15th, or when fundraising
reports are due for the first half of this year. So
you'll see not only that fundraising, but everybody
else's fundraising up through that point. And,
you know, you'll get a real sense of who's got a
formidable campaign right before the campaign wraps
up. Essentially, we're going to be in a very
compressed primary campaign here. Rich Tom Tiffany, the
Republican candidate for governor, is had the
benefit of not having a real contested primary on
his side. And he's getting a correspondence now from
the president of the United States about disaster
declaration. What happened there?
>> It was really interesting. So President
Donald Trump used his his personal social media site,
Truth Social to announce that Wisconsin has been
approved for around $22.5 million in disaster relief
aid. This is tied to the storms that we saw earlier
this year, big time flooding, other kinds of
damage that really hit local governments pretty
hard. So he made this announcement, which is not
unusual, but he didn't mention Governor Evers once.
In fact, he said that the first call that he made was
to Tom Tiffany, who he also mentioned I endorsed, and
he kind of re-upped that. Trump also essentially
applauded every Republican in the congressional
delegation and didn't mention a single Democrat
from Wisconsin, even though Governor Tony Evers and
people like Tammy Baldwin and the rest of the
delegation sent letters in May asking for this
assistance, they were asking for $27 million. So
it almost seemed like the president was treating
Tiffany like he's already the governor. And that that
Evers is already kind of an afterthought. So that was
that was pretty interesting to see.
>> And the Evers administration essentially
doesn't know the details, at least when you talk to
them. They didn't know the details of the funding. You
reached out to the white House press office and had
a series of questions for them about the details, and
they had a very brief response to you.
>> That's right. I wanted to I asked, you know, when
might this money be coming? What type of aid? Because
there's aid from the from FEMA that goes to
businesses or governments or individuals. I so those
were the questions I asked, and they just said, we
refer you to the truth, which means to the
president's post. So they didn't have any additional
information. >> All right. So we had two
very big Supreme Court decisions, US Supreme Court
decisions this week, which were national news. But I
think it's fair to say there are some Wisconsin
angles in there. First, this this birthright
citizenship decision. Rich, I think this was widely
expected that the court would rule against
President Trump's executive order and say that
birthright citizenship is protected by the US
Constitution. But there are Republicans, and I mean
noteworthy Republicans in Wisconsin who are saying,
we got to do something about this.
>> Yeah. To to to borrow Ange's term, big feelings.
There were big feelings from some Republicans in
Wisconsin. Congressman Derrick Van Orden basically
said that the Constitution's 14th
amendment was aimed at guaranteeing citizenship to
freed slaves and not for children of illegal
immigrants. He said the ruling undermines the
integrity of American citizenship, and that
Congress has to do something about it, with it
being declared unconstitutional, at least
the executive order. It's kind of unclear what that
would look like. Congressman Toni WHEDA,
another Republican, said that, you know, this
amendment wasn't intended for what it's being used
for today. There's all this talk of birth tourism,
where the idea is that people that are pregnant,
you know, women that are pregnant from other
countries come here, have a baby strictly so that they
can get that child citizenship automatically.
One of the more, I guess, aggressive comments came
from seventh Congressional District Republican
candidate Michael Alfonso. He's the son in law of
Shawn Duffy, the U.S. transportation secretary.
He talked about how his newborn baby can trace her
ancestry, quote, back to before the Revolutionary
War, and that the ruling essentially is telling
people that children like his are not equally as
American. To quote Chinese spies, anchor babies. So a
lot of a lot of thoughts coming from some on the
right. >> And Ana there was this
other Supreme Court decision involving national
parties and how much they can raise and spend. You
said it would export the Wisconsin model. What do
you mean? Wisconsin, since about 2015,
we have had a rule on the books that says that our
state political parties can raise and spend as much
money as they want in political races. You've
actually reported on the fact that this was a
Republican law, that in recent years, Democrats
have made very good use of, in particular, in our
enormous Supreme Court races. Right? Democrats,
for example, for the election of Janet
Protasiewicz, spent $10 million on that campaign
and that sort of unleashed these floodgates. Well, now,
as of this Supreme Court decision, this will be the
case at the national level, at the federal level. So
the national political parties RNC see these kinds
of organizations. They can spend as much as they want
on these races in coordination with campaigns.
And so essentially, it's doing away with a major cap
on campaign finance regulations that, you know,
people I've spoken to have said, as in Wisconsin. So
now we'll go the nation. >> Yeah. And I know the
Wisconsin law. Everybody thought for sure this is
going to help Republicans. It ended up being helpful
to Democrats here. We'll see what happens with this
change at the national level.
>> And opened the floodgates for us to have
record breaking, expensive elections. It seems like
every year. all the time we have for
today. Thanks for joining us. Our colleague Zac
Schultz will be back next week. This has been inside
Wisconsin politics. Be sure to follow us on PBS
wisconsin.org. WPR.org, YouTube, or wherever you
get your podcasts.