Does Evers Have a Chance?
Progressive Insurgent or Republican Establishment?
“When he had the opportunity to actually stand up for our kids… Tony Evers was nowhere to be seen,” said Mark Morgan from the Republican Party of Wisconsin. This attack on Tony Evers’ — the Democratic candidate for Wisconsin Governor — stance on a teacher who was fired for viewing pornography on school is a bastardization of Evers’ actual actions and is the perfect example of the rhetoric used by both sides. Tony Evers does have a slight advantage in rhetoric, but it is unclear whether this will lead to success in the general election.
In order to determine a victor, we must understand the electorate of Wisconsin. We can basically divide the electorate into farmers, teachers, industrial workers, and small and large business owners. These groups can generally be designated as liberal-leaning and conservative leaning. Teachers and industrial workers lean liberal while the business owners lean conservative and the farmers are largely-swing votes. Tony Evers, despite the conservative-leaning elements, seems to be able to capture enough farmers with his rhetoric to win the election.
The first issue which he succeeds on is healthcare. Evers frames government-provided healthcare as the state caring for its children, the citizens. This is effective at including all citizens into the group which will be covered. Healthcare would benefit teachers and unionized industrial workers who often rely on the government (specifically Obamacare and BadgerCare) for their health services. Farmers also fall under this group because of the economic downturn in the agrarian industries that was sparked by the trade war with China and uncertainty with Mexico and Canada. By appealing to helping the citizens with the government, Evers directly beckons to those groups and pulls swing farmers to his side.
On education, Evers again leads Walker. While Walker advocates for many of the same things that Evers does, his positions changed after Evers announced his own plans to deal with education. Evers went so far as to call Walker a “joke” for basically plagiarizing Evers’ education plan in a form of ad hominem attack. Walker is also still hated by many for his passing of Act 10 in 2011 which effectively destroyed teachers unions and harmed industrial workers. Evers, on the other hand, has the ethos of being the state Superintendent of Education. His plan to boost spending on schools to be ⅔ provided by the state government is popular amongst many lower to middle-income people. His nation-as-family metaphor of the government providing for the citizens is very effective to the industrial workers and teachers who often work with students in public schools. Those opposed are again the business owners who do not want to see an increase in taxes. Evers again appeals to a wide range of bases here.
Finally is the economy. Scott Walker is presiding over a strong economy, however, federal decisions have weakened the agricultural economy and has weakened Walker’s ethos on this issue. While Walker is running on a campaign of even lower taxes, Evers is countering that with a slightly unorthodox pledge to raise them. However, because of what Evers tax increases would go to fund (e.g. more school funding, education, and highly popular infrastructure projects), Evers and Walker are neck and neck on this issue. Walker again may be able to appeal to enough farmers to tip the swing vote in his favor.
While there are not a predominance of metaphors used in this race, the rhetorical strategies are nonetheless interesting for their straightforwardness. It is that straightforwardness which may very well determine the race. Evers plans are designed to gain the confidence of middle and lower-income people who are not seeing many benefits from their government other than menially lowered taxes. While Walker has created a strong economy post-2008 Depression, there is room for the role of the state to grow and I believe that Wisconsinites will at very least almost accept this. I predict that Evers will win because of his ethos on education and his straightforward plans minced with minor nation-as-family metaphors.
I now write a day after the election and only about ten minutes after Scott Walker conceded to Evers. It does appear that Evers’ rhetoric managed to reach a wide range of voters, however, without an accurate analysis of specific demographics it is impossible to know whether the specific groups involved here handed him the election. That being said, a cursory glance at the results indicate that at least industrial workers and some farmers were convinced by his rhetoric.
