With President Barack Obama’s approval rating hovering around 41 percent, Democrats will have a tough time this election cycle. On the other hand, the GOP is still recovering from some infighting and needs to find a cohesive message to pitch to new voters. Here are three things to watch for this summer in the 2014 Wisconsin election cycle:
1) Gov. Scott Walker’s campaign:
Walker has skyrocketed to the national stage, and his re-election bid this summer will put him even more in the spotlight. Democrats will be pouring a lot of money to try and out-seat him. His re-election bid will consist of a pretty simple message of, “Are you better off than you were four years ago?” Ironically this was a similar tenant of Obama’s re-election bid in 2012, which ultimately proved to be pretty successful. Jobs will be the center point of this race, and with unemployment down to less than 6 percent, Walker will work to highlight his efforts to create jobs in Wisconsin. With tuition frozen, taxes down and unemployment lowered, Walker should have a pretty easy time explaining how Wisconsinites are better off than they were four years ago.
2) The 6th District Primary:
Representative Tom Petri is retiring after 35 years and three candidates have already arisen in the Republican primary. The 6th Congressional District, located in the Eastern part of the state, includes the cities of Fond du Lac, Sheboygan, Oshkosh and Manitowoc. The three Republicans that have declared so far are Joe Leibham, Duey Stroebel and Glenn Grothmann. It’s hard to say if there will be a favorite in this election. Stroebel and Grothmann will probably end up splitting the “tea-party” vote which could give room for Leibham to sneak in to win the primary election Aug. 12. Liebham currently represents a state Senate district that is right in the middle of the 6th Congressional district, giving him a slight edge in name recognition in the area. Stroebel, only having served for three years in the State Assembly, has chided Grothmann and Leibhman as “career politicians.” Grothmann has been known to say some outlandish things in the past and will probably say some more this time around to establish himself as the most “conservative” candidate. This primary will be well covered in the state media and will for sure produce a few interesting sound bites from the candidates.
3) Mary Burke vs Brett Hulsey:
Recently retiring Democratic State Representative Brett Hulsey has announced his candidacy for governor. Hulsey has a rich history of headline-grabbing incidents including an incident in August 2012 when Hulsey was charged with disorderly conduct after he flipped a 9-year-old boy off an inner tube. Since his announcement, Hulsey has managed to grab headlines for his primary challenge of the party-appointed Mary Burke. While the Burke campaign would love to ignore Hulsey, if the media keeps writing about him, Burke will have to respond at some point. For example, this past weekend Husley protested the Republican Party of Wisconsin state convention by handing out KKK hoods. His wild, strange behavior and willingness to confront Burke will for sure be something to watch over the summer. Husley has hit Burke hard on her inability to commit to overturning Act 10 and on her work to ship jobs overseas while she worked at Trek.
With those three events, the summer of 2014 will create an exciting environment come next fall. Make sure to keep up with all that’s happening with Republican politics this summer by following our Facebook and Twitter.
