Check out the website: https://lenspoliticalnotes.com Look at the recent Political Notes and Len’s Letters on the website:
April 29th Len’s Political Note #723 Tony Evers Wisconsin Governor
2026 General Election
Tony Evers was elected governor of Wisconsin in 2018. Who he succeeded, how his predecessor governed, and how his predecessor affected how Tony Evers governed tells us a lot about Wisconsin and something about America. Tony Evers, now completing his second term as governor, defeated Scott Walker’s effort for a third term. Had Walker been successful he would have been the second Wisconsin governor in history to be elected to a third term.
Scott Walker was the son of a Baptist minister. Walker lived where his dad preached – in Colorado, Iowa, Wisconsin, maybe other places I am not aware of. He graduated from high school in Wisconsin and attended Marquette University, a Roman Catholic school in Milwaukee, where he was active politically, but did not graduate. Scott Walker worked for the Red Cross, ran and lost a race for a state assembly seat from Milwaukee, and moved on to the suburbs where he ran a successful race for the Assembly.
While campaigning, in the Assembly, and subsequently as the elected County Executive, he demonstrated his opposition to welfare in its then current form, his opposition to abortion, same sex marriage, and his general opposition to spending and preference for privatization of public services except for the police. After withdrawing from the governor’s race in 2006, while campaigning vigorously for the Republican candidate, Walker’s political views were displayed state wide.
Scott Walker ran for Governor and won in 2010. Barack Obama’s first mid-term was a very big year for Republicans. Scott Walker promised to create 250,000 jobs by cutting taxes, cutting the salaries of state employees, and by rejecting federal funds for a high-speed train which, he insisted, would go nowhere.
Scott Walker turned those promises into his Wisconsin Budget Repair Bill of 2011 which was passed by the already gerrymandered Republican state legislature. Limiting public employee collective bargaining, requiring contributions to public employee health care and retirement plans while prohibiting union dues deductions from pay, Walker was able to reduce the state budget by $300 million over two years and create a surplus in the state budget instead of a substantial deficit.
Though he had to retreat from extending his anti-union effort to the private sector and had to exempt police and fire from his strictures for public employees, he never eased his opposition to labor. As we call for more vigorous opposition to Donald Trump and remind ourselves that Patrick Henry was right in thinking the US Constitution should have had a less cumbersome way to remove a dangerous president than impeachment, we should consider what happened in Wisconsin.
In Wisconsin, opponents to Scott Walker’s Budget Fix reacted with the fury and defiance that Democrats want their leaders to react to Donald Trump. From the middle of February, 2011 to the middle of June, up to 100,000 people demonstrated occupied the Capitol Building. Demonstrations diminished after the state supreme court ruled that the anti-union legislation was constitutional.
Following the demonstrations, Wisconsin opponents to Scott Walker organized to recall Walker (a Wisconsin constitutional provision that Patrick Henry might have approved). Wisconsin’s recall law requires an opponent. In the 2012 recall vote, Walker defeated the man he defeated in the 2010 election — by 7 points instead of 6. In the 2014 election, Walker defeated Democrat Mary Burke, a Madison School Board Member. by 5 points.
By 2018, Scott Walker had cut billions in state aid for education, set limits on property tax increases, revised requirements for teaching reading and measuring reading success, required a government issued ID to vote, made tribal area gaming nearly impossible, supported alternative mental health approaches for children, created restrictions for women seeking to obtain abortions, finally targeted unions in the private sector and passed a so-called Right to work law. He created a carelessly administered state Economic Development Corporation which distributed $124 million to businesses with little review and little effect and promised $3 billion or more to Foxconn (a Taiwanese company) in exchange for the promise of 13,000 jobs.
There was no reason to expect that Scott Walker would not defeat the apparently mild-mannered Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Evers in 2018. Instead, Tony Evers was elected by a point.
Scott Walker and the Republican legislature went to work after Walker’s defeat. They used a lame duck session to limit the power of the incoming governor. New laws limited the power of the incoming governor to change welfare, health care, and economic policies, reduced early voting, and set some additional limits on the new Democratic Attorney General. The state Supreme Court supported most of these laws, either unanimously or by a partisan 5-2 majority.
During the lame-duck session, Scott Walker nominated and the state senate confirmed 82 appointments. As Tony Evers first term came to a close, the Walker appointees insisted that, despite their terms ending, they could stay in office. The state senate refused to confirm Democratic appointees. And the state supreme court supported the view of the Walker appointees that they could stay in office until a replacement was confirmed.
Tony Evers was the son of a doctor. He earned a BA, MA, and EdD from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. He became governor having been a teacher, an elementary school principal, a high school principal, a school district superintendent, a regional education support agency superintendent, and the state’s elected Superintendent of Public Instruction. The Public Instruction position was particularly good preparation for his new job because the position has relatively little authority over the state’s public schools.
It looked very much like the imbalance of power between the governor and the legislature would make it impossible for Tony Evers to do anything at all. For instance, he incorporated legalization of medical marijuana in his proposed budget in 2019, but it got nowhere with the legislature.
2020 and the Covid-19 pandemic changed the circumstances under which the people of Wisconsin and their representatives lived. In March of that year, Tony Evers declared a public health emergency. He ordered schools to close. He banned public gatherings of more than q0 people and allowed people to leave home only for essential business and exercise. Whether or not those were all the right decisions, he demonstrated a capacity to take charge.
Tony Evers was elected to a second term in 2022 by a three point margin. As he had in his first term, he used the veto effectively, especially using his authority to make line item vetoes. In one budget case, he was able to veto a part of a line to ensure annual increases in education aid for hundreds of years. In another, he ensured a $1 billion increase in revenue by eliminating tax credits for the wealthiest taxpayers. In a later budget, he achieved his promise of a 10% cut in income tax for most payers while keeping the budget as a whole similar to what the Republicans had proposed.
While vetoing several anti-abortion bills, the core issue for Tony Evers second term in office was redistricting the legislature. He worked toward ending the undemocratic gerrymandering Wisconsin suffered from. Republicans had nearly enough seats to override the governor’s vetoes. Using an executive order, he created a non-partisan redistricting commission. Republicans looked to the state supreme to resolve the differences between the legislature’s proposed redistricting and the commission’s. The 4-3 Republican Court responded by stating that the post 2020 census redistricting should be as similar as possible to the previous districts and asked for proposals to achieve that goal. Tony Evers found a way to meet the “least change” standard while being less gerrymandered than the Republican legislature’s proposal. The Court accepted Tony Evers’ proposal only to have the federal courts throw it out.
The Republican legislature’s plan, now adopted by the state court, did not last long. Neither did the Court’s Republican majority. In April 2023 a Democrat was elected to the Supreme Court to create a 4-3 Democratic majority. (Wisconsin judicial elections are held in April out of a now vain hope that they would be non-partisan)
The Court ruled that the “least change” standard had no basis in Wisconsin’s constitution or precedential history and threw it out. Six parties to the lawsuit submitted redistricting proposals to the Court. After Tony Evers vetoed the Republican plan which the state legislature had passed. The legislature, fearing they would get worse from the state supreme court, adopted the governor’s plan which led to slight Republican majorities in the Assembly and the State Senate in the 2024 election.
Tony Evers has not yet announced his candidacy for a third term as governor. Newspapers report that he has signaled his interest in running. Surely, he looks forward to governing with a majority in the state Senate (only half the Senate was up for election in 2024) and the possibility of a majority in the Assembly. His election website is up and running. I urge you to support this ambition and DONATE now and throughout the next 18 months. Mild-mannered appearing Tony Evers has demonstrated how intelligence and quiet toughness can remedy the effect of a gerrymandered legislature.
GIVE MONEY, OF COURSE. GIVE OF YOURSELF AS WELL.
The Trump administration is not normal politics. It is more destructive of Democratic values than was the Scott Walker administration in Wisconsin.
Join peaceful demonstrations. Create your own demonstration. Lawyers in front of courthouses. Call your Democratic Senators and Congress Members. Tell them to be more visible. Call your Republican Senators and Congress Members. Remind them that Republicans used to believe in limited government. Tell them to act as if they believed in limited government, not autocracy.
Give money. Especially now as Trump attacks the Democrats on-line fund raising mechanism. When you donate to Tony Evers and to other Democrats, make a generous additional donation to Act Blue. Help them fight for their existence.
There is a 2025 election you can help with. Virginia elects a governor this November.
Abigail Spanberger is a former Member of Congress and former member of the CIA. The term limited Republican governor cannot run for reelection, but his Lt. Governor, extremist Winsome Earl-Sears is the Republican candidate. While Abigail Spanberger appears to be the favorite in this contest, at this stage she needs our support. DONATE. See Len’s Political Note #705.
And you can stick your oar into New York City Politics. The Democratic Primary, which typically elects a Mayor, is in June.
Adrienne Adams is the Speaker of the New York City Council. She is deeply knowledgeable about City politics and has been a steady figure in the midst of the chaos created by the federal indictment of the current mayor, Eric Adams (no relation), the pause in prosecution to obtain Eric Adams’ cooperation on immigration enforcement, and the withdrawal of the prosecution case with prejudice based on outside counsel’s recommendation that the federal “blackmail” was improper. Help Adrienne Adams win the Democratic nomination. DONATE See Len’s Political Note #722.
We need Democrats to win in 2026. First, let’s protect vulnerable Members of Congress. The six most vulnerable Democratic House of Representatives winners; the ones whose victories were by the narrowest margins, are:
California 13 Former Assemblyman Adam Gray flipped this seat with a 187 vote win. DONATE. His likely Republican opponent is Javier Lopez, mayor of the small city of Ceres. See Len’s Political Note #716
California 45 Attorney Derek Tran flipped this seat with a 653 votes win. DONATE. We do not yet know who his Republican opponent will be, though some are urging Michelle Steel to run to get her seat back. See Len’s Political Note #717
Maine 02 Incumbent Jared Golden retained his seat with a 2,706 win. DONATE. We do not yet know who his Republican opponent will be. See Len’s Political Note #719
Ohio 09 Incumbent Marcy Kaptur retained her seat with a 2,832 vote win. DONATE. We do not yet know who her Republican opponent will be, though some think her 2024 opponent Derek Merrin will run again. See Len’s Political Note #718
Texas 34 Incumbent Vicente Gonzalez retained his seat with a 5,237 win. DONATE. We do not yet know who his Republican opponent will be. See Len’s Political Note #720
North Carolina 01 Incumbent Don Davis retained his seat with a 6,307 win. DONATE. We do not yet know who his Republican opponent will be. See Len’s Political Note #721
Please note. I have used the margin of victory reported in Wikipedia. It is worth remembering that in my piece supporting Marcy Kaptur for election in 2024, I identified the 12 most vulnerable Democrats. Two of those twelve lost.
I have also asked you to begin making regular donations for a few 2026 statewide candidates:
Georgia’s US Senator Jon Ossoff. A former Congressional aide and investigative documentary film reporter. He was elected in 2020 (2021 including the runoff) by a 50.6-49.4 margin. DONATE. See Len’s Political Note #717
Arizona’s Governor Katie Hobbs. A former social worker and secretary of state. She was elected in 2022 by a 50.3 – 49.7 margin. DONATE. See Len’s Political Note #712
Arizona’s Attorney General Kristin Mayes. A law professor and former Republican state Corporate Commission Member. She was elected Attorney General as a Democrat in 2022 by 280 votes, a 50.01-49.99 margin. DONATE. See Len’s. Political Note #714
Ohio’s Democratic Secretary of State candidate Bryan Hambley. An appealing Dr. Smith goes to Columbus running for an open Republican seat. DONATE. See Len’s Political Note #715
Support Democrat Allison Riggs in her effort to stay on the North Carolina Supreme Court. She won the election in November. Her opponent, Republican North Carolina Appeals Court Judge Jefferson Griffin challenged 65,000+ voters who met North Carolina requirements when they registered to vote, but new laws called for additional registration information from them.
The state Supreme Court’s most recent ruling allowed approximately 60,000 votes not to be withdrawn. But the Court required about 5,000 military voters without photo IDs tp “cure” their voter registration (presumably through providing photo IDs). The Court prohibited counting 200 votes by North Carolina voters who had never lived in the state be withdrawn from the voter count (These would include, for instance, children of North Carolina ex-patriots who turned 21 while abroad). This ruling probably ensures Allison Riggs’ victory, but does not end the law suit.
Allison Riggs has continued her lawsuit to preserve the voting rights of members of the military and members of the ex-patriot community. The US Fourth Circuit Court prohibited North Carolina from removing any votes while the appeals process continues. You can DONATE and help Justice Riggs continue with her law suit.
