Democrats running for governor have
less than two months to stand out in
a crowded field.
How'd they do that at the state
party convention?
And we run through developments and
lawsuits involving voter rolls,
legislative maps, and false
electors.
This is Inside Wisconsin Politics.
I'm Sean Johnson here with Anya
Venwengtindonk.
Let's try that again, Anya.
I'm Shawn Johnson here with
Anyavenwengtononk and Rich
Kramer in Eau Claire.
Hey gang. Hey Sean.
Hey Sean So I think it's
fair to say, Anya, that this
campaign, this primary campaign,
will not be won or lost by what
was said in the room at the
Democratic state convention.
But I still think these are
interesting because you have all
seven candidates there.
They're under the same set of rules
in terms of how long they can speak,
the same audience.
Okay
What is the end of
I just ramble like that.
Perfect. 17 and a half.
Am I supposed to not say hey Sean?
I don't know what I'm supposed to
do. I think you can let it.
I would yield to the control room if
they have, but I think there
was, you could just nod as well.
Just the nod?
That's what that meant?
OK. I wasn't sure.
I mean honestly, we could just do it
that way forever as far as I'm
concerned. The question is, what was
it like?
Democrats running for governor have
less than two months to stand out in
a crowded field.
How'd they do that at the state
party convention?
And we run through developments in
lawsuits involving voter rolls,
legislative maps, and false
electors.
This is Inside Wisconsin Politics.
I'm Sean Johnson, here with Anya van
Wegtendonk and Rich Kramer in
Eau Claire. Hey gang.
Hey Sean.
So Anya, I think it's fair to say
that this primary campaign is
not going to be won or lost
based on what happened in
the room at the state party
convention over the weekend.
But you did head all seven
candidates there.
They were under the same set of
rules speaking to the same group of
democratic activists.
What was it like?
Yeah, you know, I say this with all
due respect.
Normal people do not attend state
party conventions, right?
These are like the most diehard
Democrats, the most diehard
Republicans who go to that
convention.
And so these are the people who are
like the most energized about
their party and are going to be the
ones to hopefully, you know,
bring in their fellow
but like less excited Democrats.
And so I think that was kind of the
vibe of the speeches that you were
getting from the gubernatorial
candidates, which is that they were
trying to appeal to this.
Base, right, the most kind of
committed Democrats possible,
and also make the case
not only that they should stand out
in the seven-person primary going
into August, but that they are also
most sort of best positioned to
beat Tom Tiffany in November.
And so those are kind of two
different arguments that you need to
be making, the one that makes you
most appealing to Democrats, and
then the one that make the most
appealing, to kind of your average
Wisconsinite.
And there was a lot of kind of
threading of that needle while also
trying to get excitement.
So it was definitely a little bit of
a dance going on, but that I think
was kind of the overarching theme.
What common threads stood out
to you. I mean, like what was
a theme
that stood out in all the speeches
or at least most of them.
Yeah, so kind of too.
So the Tom Tiffany theme and also
by extension, Donald Trump, right?
A lot of trying to tie the two of
those together.
But then affordability was kind of
the word of the day.
The theme of the convention was
reclaiming the American dream.
And each of the candidates talked
in either broader or more
specific terms, sort of depending on
the candidate about what they would
do to basically put more money in
people's pockets, lower prices,
make things more affordable in
Wisconsin.
So, Rich, you and I were not at
this convention, although we
had a chance to listen to these
speeches later. We'll set out to
you.
Well, Anya already
mentioned it. There was a lot of
talk about Donald Trump and the
chaos in Washington from his
administration.
That's according to these Democratic
candidates.
And it's pretty obvious
why they would focus on
the president.
And his popularity rating
is pretty low in
polling.
So it seems like they're
hoping that Trump will be a
liability for Tom Tiffany as
they as they move forward
in this campaign.
And also, there's only one
Republican in the race, so they're
able to focus their attacks on one
person.
Meanwhile, you know, Tom Tiffany
doesn't have to worry about trying
to stand out among Republican
competitors in his primary,
or in a primary.
So that's what stuck out, but there
was some other things that
stood out. In terms of like the
closest thing to criticizing
other Democrats, seemed to
come from.
State Senator Kelda Royce,
and she just basically said the
party cannot afford to
to pick a nominee that
Would put a Democratic trifecta
that is the State Senate State
Assembly and the governor's office
in jeopardy so
no names were named but
people might be able to Infer
who or how many
you know people she might have been
talking about And of course there
was a number of like pretty bold
promises from some of these
candidates as well
That that did that criticism
did jump out to me.
There was another one I think you
could argue from Francesca Hong
saying that when you go out
on the campaign trail People
can detect BS.
We're not gonna say the word because
family show here guys, but she
was essentially
without name and name saying
The other candidates aren't as
authentic as me is the way
that I heard it I'll tell you one
other thing that kind of stood out
to meet upon
first review of the speeches,
I went away thinking, these
felt like general election speeches
a little bit.
I mean, this is a primary where
they're almost gonna have to,
some of them are gonna have to get
negative if they want to climb the
ladder and be the party's candidate.
And even the criticisms
we just mentioned, Rich, weren't
exactly super negative.
And the messages, I could absolutely
imagine them.
In a general election campaign
against Tom Tiffany.
But they are, Anya, they're trying
to win this Democratic primary
among a smaller group
of voters right now.
Right, but it is this balancing act
where, as Rich said, right, they are
going for a trifecta.
And that was another big theme of
the weekend, is this idea that
Democrats really think that they
could take over all three chambers
of government. And so they need
to try to distinguish themselves.
And most of them don't have that
kind of, you know, statewide
visibility. So they are still trying
to get just like baseline name
recognition, which is important for
a primary, but then also not do
anything to harm other Democrats,
because, you know, if you have sort
of a one in seven chance, and I know
that's not exactly how statistics
work. Uh, but something like
that. And so you don't move forward.
You don't want to have weakened your
party. You don't want to be giving
Tom Tiffany sort of free fodder for
your opponent opponents.
And so I think that we will see a
little bit more maybe of those
veiled attacks, but in
a way that's more aimed at sort of,
uh, uh holding themselves up
rather than necessarily going
negative at this point, because
Tom Tiffany, as Rich mentioned, uh
is sort of in a field by himself.
He technically has an opponent, but
more or less he's the presumptive
nominee. And so he's not gonna get
weakened in a primary, so they need
to be very careful themselves.
It can't work against you in a
primary, particularly a Democratic
primary, to go negative where
you have voters who have kind of
that same idea that like, look, the
goal is November.
Stop fighting and show us how you're
different.
Rich, anything to jump out at you
there and what Ani was just
mentioning?
Well I wanted to to kind of
go back to when when she mentioned
the
you know the slights and the
the electability and all that stuff.
One of the candidates you know early
on even before he announced
Mandela Barnes former lieutenant
governor former state representative
he
during his speech he
let me go back
before he got in the race some
Democrats were publicly saying,
well, he lost in 2022,
you know, we don't need that again.
But during his speech, I mean, he
brought that up.
And he said, Well, that's why I'm
more experienced.
I've been through this came within
one point, percentage point of
Ron Johnson in 2022.
That's why have the experience that
and the other resume
stuff that he's got.
So I just wanted to mention that.
Yeah, there was a lot of
conversation about electability,
which, again, I think speaks to
trying to signal that they could
beat Tom Tiffany in the fall.
And so you had, for example,
Fran Hong pointed to the fact that
she's, if not the most far
left candidate, certainly among
them, and the fact that some
people have brought that up as a
liability against her.
As passionate as her supporters are,
her opponents are sort of equally
passionate. And she talked about,
well, actually, I am part of a
legacy of Wisconsin progressives
who were elected.
So rather than that being a
liability for me, that actually
makes me more electable because
people are excited about someone who
doesn't bring BS.
And David Crowley as well,
he pointed to the fact that there
has never been a
black candidate who has won
statewide office.
And he says that everywhere he goes,
people ask him, can a black man
become governor in Wisconsin?
And he said, well, I can, for the
following reasons. And so he named
that sort of elephant in the room as
a way of also drawing attention to
his record.
And so again, just kind of the way
that the candidates are trying to
distinguish themselves, not just on
their own terms, but also for what
they can deliver in November.
And there was a straw
poll at this convention, Anya.
And I feel like it's kind of
fun to talk about, but we should say
1,000 grains of salt here for this
poll, because this is not a
scientific poll.
The margin of error would be,
look, I'm not qualified to calculate
it, very high.
Charles Franklin would have a lot to
say about this one.
He would say, don't pay attention to
straw polls, would be my guess.
But you had all these Democrats in a
room, and if they wanted to, they
could go to the booth run by Whist
Politics, which does these at all
the conventions. And and you could
vote for your candidate of choice
among the primary field.
And how did that
resolve?
Yeah, really interesting.
Lieutenant Governor Sarah Rodriguez
came out first.
And again, if Fran Hong is sort of
further to the left, she's a little
bit further to the center.
But then Fran Hong was number two.
And so you kind of have a little bit
of the polls of what the party is
presenting right now.
One who might be doing better in
a primary race, again,
given just sort of the excitement
that's around her, that's Fran Hong.
And then one who perhaps could
appeal to a broader audience, that
is Sarah Rodriguez, who comes from a
more of a business background.
She was a healthcare executive and a
nurse. She flipped a
Republican seat when she ran for the
assembly in the
Waukesha suburbs.
And so you have these two different
models and it kind of looked like
Democrats a little bit split among
them.
So I want to throw some caution at
the poll here, the straw poll.
I was just looking back at the 2018
straw poll when you had even
more candidates running for
governor, depending on when you
mentioned them.
You probably are aware of this by
now or have heard it or seen
it recently, but that year,
Kelda Royce won the straw pole.
She went on to finish third in the
primary, a distant third, but she
won it overwhelmingly at
convention.
Do you happen to know where Tony
Evers placed in that straw poll?
This is the beginning of our quiz
section here, guys.
Tony Ebers placed third.
He had 91 votes
compared to Keldroys, 184
that year.
Right behind him were Andy
Gronick and Dana
Wachs.
They have something in common.
They both dropped out of the race by
the end of June that year, so the
convention was in June 2nd, I think,
and they were dropped out by the
21st.
20 seconds, so.
Right, so again, appealing to quote
unquote normal people versus
appealing to the most kind of
revved up Democrats who follow every
kind of twist and turn about that.
So it doesn't necessarily translate
to what a general voter or general
audience is interested in.
And there's also a certain amount
of campaigning you can do
in the room with these things.
You can say, hey,
get over to that desk that's run by
Wisp Politics and I think you should
really vote for us.
You can bring your people along.
Bring your people.
Absolutely.
And I'm sure some of that went on at
this convention.
So okay.
I did want to play a little game
with you two since we
have you here.
Would that be okay?
All right, sure ready
You have no choice, right?
We're recording a live show here.
So I was just looking back
through these speeches and through
the benefit of being
able to look at the transcript
and the number of times that certain
words were mentioned in these
things, you can see
kind of who hit themes really hard.
So the first one I looked for was
Trump.
Who said Trump the most?
Anybody want to hazard a guess?
Rich, you go first.
I'm gonna say...
Might have been Joel Brennan
All right, all right.
Rich, you win,
buddy. You got Sarah Rodriguez and
Mandela Barnes are right up at the
top there. Mentioned him six times.
Joel Brennan after them.
And then everybody mentioned Trump
at least once.
But Rodriguez and Barnes,
kind of hitting to my ear similar
themes in those messages, too.
They sounded like maybe they were
running a little bit of a November
campaign or a
safer message in their speeches.
Okay, how about...
Tiffany and that
to be clear nobody mentioned the
Truman Capote book that was adapted
into a movie and later You know
celebrated in a song who mentioned
Tiffany Tom Tiffany the most
Gosh, I'm just stuck on that dad
joke now.
I was, I'm proud of that one, you
know.
That song, by the way, in my head
all the time. And I hated it when it
came out, but the beauty of
nostalgia.
Although I'm
gonna vote Roy's well
if for this there you go.
There you go
We gotcha.
Kel DeRoy's, how about you?
Who mentioned Tiffany the most?
Uh, Mr. Hughes.
All right, good, good guesses.
Everybody. Sarah Rodriguez was, uh,
tops and Tiffany mentions, uh
followed by Joel Brennan, Mandel
Barnes and Keldroys mentioned.
And once David Crowley, Missy Hughes
and Francesca Hong didn't even
mention Tom Tiffany in this thing.
Was I there at all?
It was kind of interesting.
No, I mean, I think it's, it's the
kind of thing you assume that you
heard a bunch of people say, and
then you can go back and look and
realize, well, they didn't actually
mention that specific guy.
I have, I predict whoever wins this
primary though, will mention him a
lot in TV as between now and
November.
Okay, how about this?
We've got a Democratic governor
right now, and a lot of these
people have worked with or for this
Democratic governor.
Who do you think might have
mentioned Evers a few times?
Rich, what do you thing?
Well, I would say it'd
have to be someone that worked
within the administration or
alongside them.
So that narrows it down to
four people, I wouldn't
say Brennan.
Yeah. Okay.
Anya?
I think it was also Brennan, he also
made a point of saying, fix the darn
road, he seemed to be really
tying himself to the heavers.
It was Mandela Barnes, Tony
Evers' former lieutenant governor,
followed by Joel Brennan, his former
DOE secretary, followed by Sarah
Rodriguez, his current lieutenant
governor and Missy Hughes, his
former WEDEC CEO.
No mention of Tony Eivers by
Francesca Hong, Kel DeRoy or David
Crowley.
So Tony Eover's back there taking
notes. Like, I see you.
I see. OK, one more.
One more, I promise.
And this is a little different.
You got a chance at this convention
to differentiate yourself.
One way is you can just tell these
delegates, I'm different.
Who said only candidate
as in I'm I'm the only candidate.
Oh, I know this one.
Okay, let's hear
Fran Hong said I am the only
candidate who proposes a moratorium
on data centers.
And free childcare.
And you are correct, Anya.
She mentioned it four
times.
This was interesting to me, Rich.
Kel DeRoyce was there.
She mentioned a couple times.
Her message was,
I'm the only candidate who's been a
legislator. I got bills,
is basically what she was saying.
And then David Crowley, the only
candidate who has executive
experience. And nobody else used
that turn of phrase.
Big grain of salt for that one too,
which is very unscientific, but
I find it fun to run through that
stuff.
Unscientific, but you probably made
a spreadsheet. I did make a
spreadsheet
You're doing right.
Yeah, it made it a lot easier for me
to list those things real quick.
So we want to move on real quick to
some legal developments this week.
A few small legal developments in
big cases.
Rich, first, let's start with there
was this decision by the
state Supreme Court to hear an
appeal in a redistricting case,
congressional redistricting, case.
Is this a big deal or
an incremental step?
It's pretty incremental.
So these are about the congressional
maps. There's two of them that have
been two of these appeals of
these cases challenging the
congressional map as gerrymandered
for various reasons, various
types of gerrymandering.
And it sounds exciting that
it's made it to the Supreme Court,
but all they're doing in both
situations is they will
be deciding whether or not these
three judge panels they appointed
were correct in
how they dismissed these
challenges and those panels
essentially said they
dismiss them because they don't have
the authority to overturn the
maps which were put
in place by the supreme court and a
lower court cannot overrule a
higher court like that so
what i've been told is that that
probably means these will go back
through the court system back to the
lower courts and work their way up
but the supreme court justices will
have to decide whether or not these
gerrymandering claims can even move
forward.
Um, so that's a big question,
but in short, it doesn't mean
there's, it likely doesn't mean that
there's going to be any new map
before the 2026 election.
There's just not enough time.
Okay, and lightning round here, you
had a case you covered on voter
rolls. What happened there?
So the federal government, the
Department of Justice, wants to get
unredacted voter registration
information from Wisconsin,
and that includes, you know,
driver's license numbers and Social
Security numbers, the last four
digits.
The elections commission hasn't
provided that.
They've given a different list
that's publicly available, but
essentially the case was dismissed
last month in federal court.
It's being appealed.
The DOJ is appealing it to
the 7th circuit.
But again
It will take a while and
there's been other examples of this
around the nation where the DOJ has
been losing these cases
One of those we'll have to keep an
eye on. And then Anya, the false
electors case in Wisconsin,
what happened there?
They pleaded not guilty
to 11 counts of felony
forgery, including Wisconsin's
own Jim Troupis.
He's also trying to get the case
moved out of Dane County Circuit
Court, and so that case continues
to unfold.
All right, thank you both for
keeping an eye on those.
That's all the time we have for
today. Thanks for joining us.
Our colleague, Zach Schultz, will be
back in a few weeks.
This has been Inside Wisconsin
Politics. Be sure to follow us on
PBSWisconsin.org, WPR.org
YouTube, or wherever you get your
podcasts.
I think that's it.