On recall, Barrett has only himself to blame
On the night of June 5, 2012, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett stood on a stage in front of a group of bitterly disappointed campaign supporters. Barrett was conceding defeat in a statewide gubernatorial recall election that had garnered national attention and gripped the state for nearly a year.
Barrett gushed that over the previous 16 months, Wisconsin had seen democracy “come alive.” He complained that his state is now one that has become “deeply divided,” but expressed hope that both sides could one day come together.
Perhaps lost on Barrett was the fact that Wisconsin was “divided” because public union apologists utilized the unprecedented tool of a recall election to settle a simple policy difference. Were Gov. Scott Walker’s public union reforms controversial? Sure they were. But the ill-considered recall effort drove an ax right through the middle of the state, splitting friends and families.
And of course, Barrett took part in the whole charade, hoping to ascend to the governorship less than two years after he had lost to Walker the first time. In doing so, he helped set the precedent that recall elections could be used to pull elected officials out of office for standard political differences.
It is particularly ironic, then, that Barrett now faces a recall effort to strip him of his mayoralty. A group named “Save Our City. Milwaukeeans Can’t Wait” has filed paperwork to recall Barrett — its members need to collect 51,000 signatures in 60 days in order for the recall election to move forward. The recall is believed to be a joint effort of both the Original Black Panthers of Milwaukee and the local firefighters union.
It was the Democrats who learned the hard way back in 2012 that the public winces at the capricious use of the recall. An exit poll on the day of the recall suggested that 60% of state residents only approved of using the recall tool in the case of misconduct.
That’s why the current attempt to recall Barrett is just as absurd as the attempt to recall Walker was five years ago. The mayor was elected to a fourth term little more than a year ago, earning 70% of the vote. Even if the city went through the expense of holding an entirely new election, Barrett likely would sail to victory, as he has done four times since 2004.
Certainly, Barrett has given his critics enough to criticize. He has become the quintessential big city “caretaker” mayor, comfortably living in the Re-Election Zone — accomplishing just enough to give voters a reason to vote for him but not proposing anything meaningful enough to give voters an excuse to oppose him.
His city’s homicide rate spiked sharply in 2015 and has roughly stayed there, and the graduation rate for black students in Milwaukee has dropped to just over 50% — but Barrett is content to simply wave his hand and blame state government for the city’s ills, hoping more people pay attention to the Bronze Fonz’s new blue pants.
Yet none of these reasons are enough to boot Barrett from office a year into his latest term.
That doesn’t mean, of course, that one can’t take a small bit of delight in Barrett finally having to face the recall monster that he helped birth in his laboratory. Being pals with Frankenstein is fine enough when he’s on your side, but soon enough the pitchfork-wielding townspeople turn and come for you.