ANALYSIS: The Formidable, Union-Busting Scott Walker Finally Enters the Presidential RaceWalker may have the best chance of the conservative candidates to knock Jeb Bush out of the lead.By RACHEL ALEXANDER
July 13, 2015
Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker waited until Monday after the state legislative session ended to finally officially enter the Republican race for president. The 47-year-old candidate made the announcement from his hometown of Waukesha. He enters the race near the top, averaging second in polling only after Jeb Bush in the primary.
The son of a Baptist minister, his family moved to Wisconsin when he was age 10. He attended Marquette University but did not finish his degree, dropping out to briefly work for The American Red Cross. Walker began his political career in the Wisconsin State Assembly, serving from 1993 to 2002. While there, he gained a record as a fiscal conservative who was tough on crime, an advocate of welfare reform and strongly pro-life. He was considered one of the more conservative members of the Assembly. Walker next became Executive of Milwaukee County from 2002 to 2010, and fulfilled a pledge to give back part of his salary while in office.
He reduced the number of county employees by over 20 percent and turned a $3.5 million deficit into a surplus.Walker won three gubernatorial elections in the Democratic-leaning state beginning in 2010, including surviving a recall election. The state of Wisconsin has not voted for a Republican presidential candidate since Ronald Reagan in 1984. Walker ran for governor on a platform of reducing state employee wages and benefits to help pay for various tax cuts. In 2011,
he introduced the "Wisconsin budget repair bill," which required public employees to contribute more to their pensions and health care plans and also eliminated most collective bargaining. It would save the state $300 million over the next two years. Consequently, a recall effort led by public employee unions was launched against him in 2011. Protests against Walker went national, and all 14 of the Democrat senators fled the state for Illinois in order to avoid giving Republicans a quorum to pass the bill. Walker held firm, and a slightly modified version of the bill was finally passed, which successfully withstood legal challenges. By taking on the unions and winning, Walker became one of the most popular Republican governors in the country.
During his first term as governor, he also turned the state's $3.6 billion budget deficit into a surplus and cut taxes by $2 billion. Over 100,000 jobs were created. He turned down a $810 million award from the federal Department of Transportation to build a high-speed railroad line from Madison to Milwaukee, saying it would cost the state too much money to operate. The Cato Institute rates him a B on fiscal issues.
For the most part, his record on social issues has been excellent. He supports abstinence-only education in the public schools, opposes embryonic stem cell research, supports voter identification at the polls and says he would like a bill like Arizona's SB1070 to combat illegal immigration.
However, he's had a few mishaps on conservative issues over the past couple of years. Last fall, Walker designed an abortion ad where he said he supports legislation that "leaves the final decision between a woman and her doctor." In 2013, he said social issues "shouldn't be the centerpiece" of political campaigns. "He's not well known within Washington, D.C., with social-conservative leaders," said Tony Perkins, the head of the Family Research Council.
Walker said on Fox News recently that he opposes amnesty, but then went to New Hampshire and said he supports granting citizenship to 11 million illegal immigrants. He tried to explain the two different positions later by saying he wanted to secure the border first, then he would naturalize the 11 million. Back in 2006 he supported comprehensive immigration reform bill with a path to citizenship.
When the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the state's same-sex "marriage" ban eight months ago, Walker was complacent, saying, "I think it's resolved," and "For us, it's over in Wisconsin." The Pulse 2016, which tracks the presidential candidates on issues, rated Walker an F on how he reacted to the Indiana religious freedom bill controversy. He didn't defend the bill, but instead responded with vague remarks about balancing various competing interests.
However, Walker is now taking the opposite approach of his main nemesis, Jeb Bush, running to the right during the primary instead of a more moderate campaign focused on winning the general. As a nondenominational evangelical who is married with two children, he has swung back to the right on same-sex "marriage," declaring after the Supreme Court's decision two weeks ago, "I believe this Supreme Court decision is a grave mistake." He called for a federal constitutional amendment prohibiting the federal government from defining marriage, which would leave it up to the states. In contrast, Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio did not go that far. As governor, Walker offered only token opposition to Common Core, but now he is speaking up against it.
Can he Knock off Front-Runner Jeb Bush?
Walker is widely expected to win Iowa, and Bush is expected to win New Hampshire. An impressive 82 percent of Republicans in Iowa say they support Walker. The billionaire Koch brothers like him. It is his 14th campaign, and
he is a powerhouse when it comes to campaigns, getting so involved himself that he doesn't bother hiring a strategist. The New York Times observed, "Mr. Walker's hands-on approach to his political operation in Wisconsin bordered on the obsessive, judging from a trove of emails from his time as Milwaukee county executive, and as a candidate for governor, that was released as part of a lawsuit."
He's already talking confidently about selecting Marco Rubio as his VP running mate.Walker appeals to the conservative base, which means he's splitting up their support with nine other candidates considered conservative. Bush only has to share the moderate wing of the party with three or four candidates. As long as a large number of conservatives remain in the race, and Walker continues running to the right, it will be difficult for Walker to surpass Bush. Walker might be able to draw in fiscal conservatives who are social moderates, given his earlier record on social issues, but with the socially moderate-to-liberal Donald Trump throwing a monkey wrench into the race, that won't be easy either.
Walker may be able to successfully argue he is the only top tier, fiscally conservative can-do governor in the race, and with the Republican Party's historical preference for governors in their presidential primaries, that could prove a powerful calling card. The media savvy former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee can be expected to counter any such effort and flank Walker's right on social issues. Walker would have to then counter by further shoring up his social con bona fides and working to brand Huckabee a fiscal moderate. If Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal or former Texas Gov. Ricky Perry get traction, that also could complicate Walker's efforts.
In the end, Bush stands as Walker's biggest obstacle, but the former Florida governor also may present Walker with his best argument to the conservative wing of the party. If Walker can convince the conservative base they need to quickly settle on one conservative governor with a strong track record of reining in big government " him" in order to neutralize Bush, he may have himself a path to the nomination.
https://stream.org/formidable-union-busting-scott-walker-finally-enters-presidential-race/
