deserve. >> Reporting from Madison.
I'm Zach Schultz for "Here& Now".
>> Notwithstanding our efforts to bring you the
positions of the candidates for state, Supreme Court
and governor in our weekly reporting on issues in the
races, a new Marquette Law School poll this week shows
two thirds of voters are undecided between judges
Chris Taylor and Maria Lazar in the April 7th
election for Supreme Court. Likewise, in the large
field of Democratic candidates in the lone
Republican in the race for governor, which will be
narrowed in an August primary, the poll shows no
runaway leader, with most candidates not well known
by voters. Poll director Charles Franklin joins us
now. And thanks for being here.
>> So what does it say about voter engagement,
when roughly 66% of your respondents don't know
enough about the two Supreme Court candidates
less than two months away? >> Yeah, I think it's first
of all, it is unusually low engagement this year. It's
not nearly as high as it was a year ago or in the
gubernatorial races as it was in, say, 2018 or 2022.
So we do seem a little less engaged right now. Some of
that is that the advertising has not really
kicked in in the Supreme Court race compared to
where it was a year ago. This time, only 6% said
they'd heard or read a lot about the Supreme Court
race a year ago. That was 39% at this same time in
February. So I think those things will pick up. But
we're getting started a bit slower than we did a year
ago. >> I'll say in the
governor's race, most of the eight major candidates
between 52 and 82% who took your poll have not heard
enough about them. Of course, former Lieutenant
Governor Mandela Barnes is a little better known. But
should anyone take stock in this kind of poll number at
this point. >> I think the stock you
take is the disengagement that all of these
candidates have work to do, introducing themselves to
voters. Mandela Barnes is the best known by a good
bit, followed by Tom Tiffany, followed by Sarah
Rodriguez on the Democratic side. But all of them have
the chance to introduce themselves to voters over
the next however many eight months it is seven months
till the primary, but that will take time. And often
we see that in primaries people don't really tune in
until June. >> On the issues which you
also pulled on. Data centers, as we all know,
are a hot topic right now. You looked at how people
viewed the cost benefit analysis of them. Your
results show respondents from all parties think the
costs outweigh the benefits, but who wins the day here?
Public opinion or moneyed interests?
>> Well, moneyed interests are certainly important,
and the development of these centers is an
economic priority for a whole industry. But the
public has not been convinced. I think the
proponents of data centers have failed to convince the
public that those benefits are real. People recognize
that technical jobs and tax revenue for communities are
important benefits, but they look at water usage as
a big concern cost. They also are concerned about
electricity. Maybe surprisingly, the second
biggest cost people point to is developing AI and
saying we shouldn't develop artificial intelligence. So
there's a real need to communicate with voters
about what those benefits are or the the critics end
up with the upper hand on this. And we've seen a big
movement away from data centers since October. When
we first asked. >> On immigration, the way
its enforcement has rolled out is not favored, with
44%, just 44% approving and 5,456% disapproving, do you
think? But for the Minneapolis surge and the
shooting deaths by the Border Patrol of two people,
these numbers would look different.
>> I think that the events that have been going on in
Minneapolis have certainly tilted independents away
from the way they view ICE Republican approval of ICE
is still quite high in the 7070 plus percent range,
80% actually on ICE. But Democrats are deeply
negative. More importantly is independents. Now three
quarters are negative about ICE.
>> Then there's the issue everyone is talking about.
That is property taxes versus school funding. Your
poll results show 60% of registered voters prefer
reducing property tax, while 40% would rather
spend more on public schools. Now, you have been
pulling on this for for years. Is this newly
resonant? >> Now it.
>> Is, but it's been building for a long time.
We've seen this trend move. We've done, I think it's 26
polls on this since 2012. This is the biggest ever
that say property taxes are more important. 60 to 40.
We saw a big majority saying schools were more
important in 2015 to 2019, but those trends have moved
in opposite directions. Property taxes are really