The six current Democratic candidates for Wisconsin governor participated Tuesday in a forum at The Black Business Hub on Madison’s South Side, hosted by Blacks for Political and Social Action of Dane County. They are Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez, State Rep. Francesca Hong, State Sen Kelda Roys, former Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes, former Administration Secretary Joel Brennan, and Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley.
The primary election is scheduled for August 11. The winner will face Republican Tom Tiffany in the general election on November 3.
Each candidate had two minutes to answer each of the six questions. Below are just excerpts from their answers; listen to the full forum here, or search for 365 Amplified on your favorite podcast app:
“How would you protect neighborhoods from disproportionate industrial pollution and severe climate weather impacts?”
- Rodriguez: “We have to make sure that if anybody has a data center coming into their community, regardless of whether it’s urban, suburban, rural, that there’s community input into that process… They have to pay enhanced energy rates to make sure that they are paying not only for the energy that they use but the transmission lines that come to them, as well as any maintenance on the grid.”
- Hong: “I’ve introduced the 2% rate cap bill… I’m the only candidate that supports a moratorium on the construction of new hyperscale AI data centers.”
- Roys: “My plan for data centers has strong state regulations, but will also require an upfront payment on the order of hundreds of millions of dollars for every single data center, and we will use that money to capitalize a public clean energy infrastructure bank.”
- Barnes: “I led our climate change task force, which put together the most comprehensive plan in this state to address the climate crisis… we have to have both equity and sustainability for either of them to work.”
- Brennan: “There can never be the non-disclosure agreements where 97 or 98% of the data center is baked before you have any input into what’s happening… we need to ensure that nobody in this room is paying for the construction, operation, transmission, ultimate retirement to data centers.”
- Crowley: “We need to give the Department of Natural Resources teeth… we can’t even factor in affordability, we can’t factor in pollution when it comes down to what is happening with our utilities here in the state of Wisconsin.”
“Wisconsin has some of the nation’s worst racial achievement gaps. How will your administration address this?”
- Hong: “If we do not fully fund public education, we will not be able to ensure that we are meeting our constitutional obligation to ensure that every child has a sound and basic public education.”
- Roys: “We don’t have an achievement gap, we have an opportunity gap in the state… universal early childhood education, so that every kid gets the same great start, and we’re preventing those opportunity gaps before they form.”
- Barnes: “What we need to do is get rid of poverty first and foremost… make sure that every child growing up in the state of Wisconsin has at least the same opportunities that I have with hardworking parents who are able to provide for me.”
- Brennan: “45 points in my home community in Milwaukee. That’s the difference between white kids in fourth grade and Black kids in fourth grade. It’s the largest achievement gap in the country… The school funding formula we’ve lived with for the last 33 years is not equitable to people around the state.”
- Crowley: “Our mission and vision for Milwaukee County is that by achieving racial equity, we could become the healthiest county in the state of Wisconsin… money in your pocket is health, access to affordable housing is health.”
- Rodriguez: “We have the lowest literacy rate for Black and brown kids almost in the country. That is shameful, and we need to address it. So I have recently put out my Wisconsin Promise, which is how we’re going to fix our educational system.”
“What plans do you have to protect access to the ballot box and encourage civic participation among young people and Black voters?”
- Roys: “You could say that the modern Republican party is built on voter suppression… we also have to make sure that people feel like it matters whether they show up or not.”
- Barnes: “I led a group called Power to the Polls that was focused on civic engagement, a year-round operation. It was the largest independent voter mobilization effort ever in the state.”
- Brennan: “When he says he’s going to nationalize elections in states like Wisconsin… if necessary, we should, like we did in 2020, activate the National Guard — not with their rifles and bayonets and in uniform, but in their civilian outfits — to work alongside all of you who work at the polls.”
- Crowley: “Folks don’t show up until it’s time to vote… you have to build the relationships, but more importantly, you have to allow them to be able to sit at the table and come up with the solutions.”
- Rodriguez: “As governor, making sure that I provide the resources for municipalities to have enough poll workers, to have enough polling places, so that they can get in and out in a reasonable amount of time, is going to be a priority for me.”
- Hong: “It’s imperative that we pass and enact permanent Fair Maps, an independent redistricting commission to ensure that we actually have representation where voters are choosing their politicians, not politicians choosing their voters.”
“How will you increase diversity, equity, and inclusion in state contracting?”
- Barnes: “The first thing that we have to do is hold the wealthy accountable in those tax breaks, in those tax incentives… we need to implement a system of equity that provides resources and grants and support to the diverse chambers of commerce across the state.”
- Brennan: “We invested in CDFIs and in chambers… we have a responsibility to do more of that and to carry that on.”
- Crowley: “We were able to give out $12 million to small businesses. 66% of those small businesses were minority or women-owned businesses. You have to put your money where your mouth is.”
- Rodriguez: “Black and brown businesses do not get access to capital as other businesses do… there is no reason why we cannot split up those [state] contracts into smaller pieces, so that smaller businesses could be able to compete for them.”
- Hong: “This is why we’ve proposed a public bank… where there would be consistent and reliable financing with low-interest loans that go specifically to historically underserved Black and brown businesses.”
- Roys: “I’m the author of the Main Street Bounce Back program, which provides small grants to new or existing businesses to move into vacant retail spaces… at the end of the day, one of the biggest barriers for people starting their own business is health insurance. We have to decouple healthcare from your employment.”
“Wisconsin has some of the highest Black incarceration rates in the country. How will you reform the state carceral system?”
- Brennan: “We have three times as many people incarcerated as [Minnesota does]. They spend $100 less per capita than we do on their criminal justice system. Imagine what we could do with $600 million additionally in the state of Wisconsin.”
- Crowley: “The F is supposed to be for felony, but it stands for forever… we need to strengthen the expungement law that we have on the books.”
- Rodriguez: “We can have equity and public safety at the same time… we have people who are incarcerated today that would not be incarcerated if we legalized and regulated marijuana.”
- Hong: “We must end juvenile life sentencing. No young person in this state should be sentenced to life in prison.”
- Roys: “I have voted against penalty enhancers again and again, even as other Democrats have said, don’t do that… We can divert so many people from incarceration by treating mental health and substance use disorders as the public health crises they are, not as a problem for the criminal justice system to solve.”
- Barnes: “We kicked off the 11 by 15 campaign back in 2011 to help fix Wisconsin’s prison population issues… it’s one that we have to remain and keep a firm commitment to fix.”
“What specific infrastructure investments will you make to combat maternal mortality and racial health disparities in our state?”
- Crowley: “First of all, we need to listen to Black women… expanding BadgerCare as a public health option is extremely important, but it’s not just covering health, it’s about giving comprehensive coverage — mental health, vision, and dental.”
- Rodriguez: “The number one intervention we can do is to make sure that the nurses and the doctors who serve the population look like the people who they serve… the Evers Administration launched one of the first nurse apprenticeship models within the country.”
- Hong: “We absolutely have to expand Medicaid and BadgerCare and invest heavily in a public option… if we do not take on the hospitals and make sure that they pay their fair share, we will not be able to ensure that everyone has access to high-quality health care.”
- Roys: “Doulas are one of the easiest, cheapest, and most effective things that we can do to help women who are about to have a child… I am proud to have authored the first-in-the-nation bill to stop the criminalization of pregnancy outcomes.”
- Barnes: “Alongside the governor, we created the Healthy Women, Healthy Babies initiative… a 30 to 40% child poverty rate also does not bode well for healthy outcomes in our children.”
- Brennan: “You’ve heard it here — three times more likely if you’re a Black woman giving birth to die than if you’re a white woman. That’s not acceptable in Wisconsin… Wisconsin should have expanded BadgerCare a dozen years ago, when Scott Walker had the opportunity to do it.”
Bonus Question
“Can you affirm tonight that Black candidates can win a statewide election? How will your administration lift Black candidates up the ballot?”
- Brennan: “I take you back to 1978 and Vel Phillips, who did win statewide… whoever [the nominee] is, they deserve our full-throated support. They will get it from me.”
- Crowley: “Did anybody ask Senator Tammy Baldwin, ‘Could a lesbian become the first United States senator representing the LGBTQ+ community in the state of Wisconsin?’ It happened… we have to push back against this notion.”
- Rodriguez: “The short answer is yes. Absolutely… Anytime any candidate has asked me to show up to help with them — fundraising, knocking on doors — I have been there to make sure that they were able to be lifted up.”
- Hong: “The person who wins the most votes is the most electable. It is imperative that we elect Black people to statewide office.”
- Roys: “I know absolutely Black candidates can win in Wisconsin, and absolutely can win statewide… I want the best person to win, not to be the first woman governor, to be the first African American governor.”
- Barnes: “If you spent as much time helping me win as asking if I can win, then I can win.”
