At first glance, the Democratic gubernatorial candidates’ near-unanimous opposition to Governor Evers’ $1.8 billion deal with Republican legislative leaders may have seemed surprising. Democrats, after all, are nearly always in perfect lockstep on major policy pushes. However, one thing is even more important to them than uniformity of opinion: Giving billions of dollars of your money to their friends.
Evers’ deal doesn’t allow them to do that, and they’re furious. To Dem candidates Francesca Hong, David Crowley, Kelda Roys, and Joel Brennan, that money was theirs to spend, not Evers’. Clearly, each of them thinks they will be Wisconsin’s next governor, and each of them likewise feels entitled to the projected $2.2 billion surplus.
To them, Evers—a lame duck—negotiating a way to give a sizeable portion of it back to taxpayers is a betrayal of their political futures, especially given how the past two Democratic US presidents ushered in their terms.
Barack Obama’s first legislative achievement was a $1 trillion stimulus that provided far more political paybacks than shovel-ready jobs. Joe Biden was willing to subject the country to record-high inflation to pass his own $1.9 trillion giveaway to state and local governments.
Political patronage is the lifeblood of Democrat politics, and the current crop of would-be leaders want it hooked to their veins. They wanted the ability to spend Wisconsin into a deficit by rewarding every last crony who gets them elected. That surplus money means power, and they believe Evers robbed them of it.
Worse yet, he isn’t using it to grease any skids; he let Republicans con him into giving most of it back to the taxpayers. That simply won’t do—not when elected Democrats know so much better than the unwashed masses how to spend their money.
