Tim Michels Is On His Way to Being the Next Wisconsin Governor

BUCK: Welcome back in to the Clay Travis and Buck Sexton show. We’ve been telling you about some critically important races, including in some places that you may not expect it to be possible for a Republican to be in such good shape. But up right now in the polls, Tim Michels, the governor of Wis… candidate rather – pardon me – candidate for the governor of Wisconsin. He is with us and he’s running quite a campaign. Tim, thanks for calling in.

MICHELS: Hey. Thanks for having me on the show. It’s quite an honor. And yeah, it’s, uh, it’s crazy that this race has not gotten more national attention. Two things. Number one, it’s the most expensive governor’s race in the entire country. And two, boy, if you’d like to tune into a football game and I know politics is much more serious than football, tuning into a football game with less than 2 minutes to go and the score is tied. This is your race.

We’ve been statistically tied. It’s crazy how close all the polls have been, like from a week ago until three or four weeks ago. It was like 47.3 to 47.3. But finally, now, in the last week, we’re starting to see a little bit of separation up a point, up a point and a half. One poll has us up three points. So, we’re headed in the right direction. It’s a crazy, expensive race. We’re going to take out an incumbent Democratic governor and it’s going to be a big win for the people of Wisconsin.

CLAY: We appreciate you coming on and certainly alongside of Ron Johnson. We are continuing to fight as hard as we can to make sure people in Wisconsin make a choice to return some sanity to their state. What are the number one or two issues that you are hearing in particular from voters that you are seeing that the incumbent governor there has failed on, that they want to switch and allow you to be in charge?

MICHELS: Great question. In all over this state from, you know, Superior Wisconsin, which is up by Lake Superior, of course, down to Kenosha, over to La Crosse, by the Mississippi River. Everywhere I go, the number-one issue by far is inflation. People are so concerned. We all know it. Across America, the price of groceries is up. Price at the pump is up. People are very concerned.

It’s not a lot that a governor can do, right? We all get paid in U.S. dollars and we all spend U.S. dollars. And, you know, the federal policy got us into this mess of inflating the currency, thus resulting in inflation. But I’m going to do massive tax reform here in the state of Wisconsin. We’re going to put more money in people’s pockets. Right on the heels. Right on the heels of the economic issue is crime.

And people are very concerned about crime all across Wisconsin, from the inner city of Milwaukee out into the suburbs and up, you know, through northern Wisconsin. We’re at a 30-year high of crime in Wisconsin. And I believe the reason we got here is because of a byproduct of the defund the police movement. We got to this crazy spot in America where less police is better or cops are bad. I don’t buy that for a second.

We’re going to flip the switch. We’re going to back the back the men and women in law enforcement. We’re going to get rid of the catch and release D.A.s here in Wisconsin. And we are going to change the attitude, if you will, of the bad guys, because right now the bad guys are emboldened. They think that they’re going to get away with it. They’re not going to serve their terms.

What do I mean by that? Governor Rivers here in Wisconsin, he made a campaign pledge four years ago that he was going to cut in half the prison population in Wisconsin. And he’s well on his way to doing it. He’s released over 1000 convicted felons on early parole. Some of them, you know, I think about 300 of them are convicted murderers and some of those are cop killers.

Most shockingly, 44 of them are child rapists, released early on the streets of Wisconsin today. That’s the attitude of our current governor. That is not what the people of Wisconsin want. I’m going to back the blue, get rid of the soft D.A.’s and we are going to get rule of law back in the state of Wisconsin once again. And the bad guys are going to know they’re not going to get away with it anymore. They’re going to know that the governor himself, me, wore a uniform, albeit a military uniform, for 12 years on active duty in the U.S. Army as an Army Ranger.

And we’re going to flip the switch on crime here in Wisconsin. And real quick, the third issue that I’m hearing everywhere is education. People know that education today is not working. And I went to public school in Wisconsin about an hour north of Milwaukee, a little farm community. I went to Lomira, K through 12, and it worked for me, but that was over 40 years ago. And today, the numbers in education continue to get worse.

The state’s test here in Wisconsin is called the Forward test. The numbers continue to go down. The national test, the NAPE test, the education scores continue to go down. And our current governor, he spent his entire life, his entire career in education. I have a lot of respect for school teachers, but he probably should have stayed a teacher and not got into administration. He was the head of all education in Wisconsin and now he’s the head of, you know, as governor, he’s the head of the entire state and the numbers continue to get worse.

So, I’m going to do massive tax reform, put more money in people’s pockets. We are going to back the blue. Get rid of soft D.A.s. We’re going to hit crime down in neighborhoods and communities. And we are going to have better schools here in Wisconsin. We’re going to empower parents. We’re going to do universal school choice and put parents back in charge of their children’s education and stop the CRT and get back to the ABCs.

BUCK: We’re speaking to Tim Michels. He’s a candidate for governor of Wisconsin and to our folks listening in Wisconsin on affiliates like Madison’s WIBA am and WISN in Milwaukee, this is an opportunity. You know, we’ve been talking to Ron Johnson. He’s running for Senate. They’re looking pretty good so far. But we could also get a sane individual, a Republican here. We’re speaking of Tim Michels in the governor’s mansion of Wisconsin.

And I’m just wondering, you said it was this is really interesting. I mean, you led with this statistic about the most expensive governor’s race in the country. I’m assuming a lot of the money that’s coming in for your opponent, is it a special delivery courtesy of New York, California and Washington, D.C.? Where’s the money coming from?

MICHELS: Yeah, you got it. It’s all the East Coast, West Coast money that’s coming into Wisconsin. They’re you know, they’re all rallying behind the incumbent Democratic governor because they know that this seat is threatened and that it’s going down. So, the usual suspects, if you will. You know, Steven Spielberg is sending $1,000,000 a week. And, you know, the cast of West Wing is doing a show and they’ve fundraised $1,000,000 in one hour. And, you know, they’re trying very hard here. It’s a crazy, crazy, expensive race.

When my wife and I made our decision to run very early in the year back in February, we were told that there’d be about $35 million spent against the Republican candidate. It’s now up to about $85 million. So, they’re pulling out all the stops, doing everything they can to hold this seat. But the good news is and we’re in…unfortunately, we’re being outspent on the air 2-to-1 right now. But the good news is it’s not having the effect that they want.

We are up a little bit in the polls. We have the momentum now. We’re going to close strong. But it takes everybody in Wisconsin. It takes everybody rallying together when we’re all rowing together, when we’re all working together to do the right thing, to elect a conservative governor who’s not a politician, who’s a businessman, who’s an outsider, who’s made tough decisions in his life, who knows how to make plans, execute plans, solve problems, who’s met a payroll, as we have at our company since for the past 62 years? And who can read a balance sheet and read an income statement that that’s the kind of leadership that we need in government right now.

The problem we have in government at the national level and at state levels is we have all these career politicians in there that have never done anything. Well, we need to get back to the way our founding fathers intended it to be. People from all walks of life take their real-life experience, go to the capital, serve a couple of terms, and then leave and let somebody else come in.

Not have these career politicians that are in there for way too long, that are in way over their head. Like our governor here in Wisconsin. He’s never even run a lemonade stand. And people are frustrated. I challenge people everywhere I go. Are you better off than you were four years ago? And nobody can say they are. With inflation up with crime. Price at the pump is up. Test scores are down in schools. 401Ks are down. People are really frustrated. They’re ready for change. They see in me a candidate who’s going to bring that change.

I’ve been a bold leader my whole life. 12 years on active duty in the U.S. Army as an Airborne Ranger, 25 years helping grow our company – from when my dad passed away 25 years ago – from a few hundred employees to over 8000 today. That’s what people want bold leadership, a problem solver to get things done. And I’m not beholden to anyone. I’ve made a pledge and I’ve stuck to it. Never not taking any money from PACs or special interest or lobbyists. There’s one person on the face of the planet that I’ll be beholden to, and that’s my wife, Barbara, my bride of 27 years.

BUCK: Tim, if people want to help out in this final stretch here, where should they go?

MICHELS: MichelsForGovernor.com. That’s our website. And we have detailed plans on where I stand on all the issues at MichelsBlueprint.com. But MichelsForGovernor.com. Thanks.

BUCK: Thanks so much for being with us. Appreciate you, sir.

MICHELS: Thank you. Have a great day. Bye.