Keeping tabs on governor’s race
It’s still early — the 2018 election for governor in Wisconsin is not until, well, next year.
But Democrats vying for the chance to take on two-term Republican incumbent Scott Walker are lining up.
Here’s a quick look at the PolitiFact files for the three most visible candidates. They have paid staff and organized campaigns.
Their files are small at this early stage, but will grow in the months leading up to the primary election Aug. 14.
(If you see something we should fact check on any of the gubernatorial candidates, let us know: PolitiFact@journalsentinel.com.)
Tony Evers
The state schools superintendent and Madison resident is the lone statewide elected official to have launched a gubernatorial campaign. We fact checked him twice during his most recent re-election campaign, in 2017, and once previously.
A study of where teachers apply to work found that “less than 5% wanted to work in rural Wisconsin.” Our rating: False. The study found that schools in cities, suburbs or towns all draw more interest than rural districts, but Evers badly overstated the case. A total of 45% of teachers in the study showed interest in rural vacancies.
“Wisconsin’s graduation rates have grown to over 90%” since Tony Evers became state school superintendent. Our rating: Mostly False. By the traditional measure — graduation in four years — Wisconsin’s rate is one of the best in America, but still below 90% using one approach. Using the other, it topped that mark — but before Evers even took office.
Meanwhile, the extended-year graduation rate (graduating in five or six years) provides an element of truth to the claim.
A private school tax break in the Wisconsin state budget is “the most generous in the nation.” Our rating: Half True. Evers made this claim in 2013. At that time, the tax break was among the most generous — for parents with multiple children attending a private high school, for example. But depending on various factors, it wasn’t necessarily more generous than other states.
Andy Gronik
The businessman who lives in the Milwaukee suburb of Fox Point and is a political newcomer has been fact checked twice since announcing his campaign.
Says Scott Walker “has taken money away from internet expansion in our state.” Our rating: Mostly False. In 2011, Walker’s first year in office, the state returned $23 million to the federal government — though the decision is not as simple as Gronik portrays it. Since then, Walker’s office has increased funding for broadband development grants.
Price tags aside, the data available on rural coverage put the state’s reach on par with Minnesota — which spent tens of millions more in the same time frame — and in the middle of the pack of neighbors Illinois, Iowa and Michigan.
Wisconsin is “dead-last in creating new businesses” for “three years in a row.” Our rating: Half True. Gronik was correct when citing the 2015, 2016 and 2017 rankings from the respected nonprofit Kauffman Index on Startup Activity. But that index, while it takes into account what portion of a state’s businesses were created in a given year, also considers two other variables. So, it supports Gronik’s statement only to a point.
Conversely, Wisconsin ranked between 29th and 34th for 2014 through 2016, according to the latest figures from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics. Those rankings are based strictly on the percentage of a state’s business establishments that were created in each year.
Dana Wachs
The lawyer and state representative from Eau Claire has been fact checked once, in 2016.
Says Scott Walker’s “listening sessions” are “invite-only and excluding the press.” Our rating: True. We found that as Walker traveled Wisconsin to meet with residents, he asks various people, including Democratic lawmakers, for suggestions on who to invite to his listening sessions. But the sessions are not open to the public or to the press, only to people who are invited.
Other potential Democratic challengers include Sheboygan businessman Kurt Kober; Madison Mayor Paul Soglin; Milwaukee attorney and former state party chairman Matt Flynn; Sen. Kathleen Vinehout of Alma, Jefferson County District Attorney Susan Happ; and campaign finance and ethics activist Mike McCabe.