Rain didn’t dampen the enthusiasm of a crowd of Mark Neumann supporters who turned out in Fond du Lac Thursday, promoting his candidacy for the U.S. Senate.
The former congressman spoke for more than 20 minutes to the gathering. He hit on a couple of different topics including his belief in the right to bear arms which he says “should be maintained.”
He wants to repeal so-called Obamacare and says religious hospitals shouldn’t have to carry drugs if it’s against their faith: “Barack Obama is out of line when he’s having his folks demand that our religious institutions include abortion-causing drugs in their insurance plans, and Barack Obama needs to be stopped.”
Afterwards, Neumann touted his plan to shrink the federal government beginning with 150 line item entries to eliminate programs. “I’ve actually written a plan of what needs to be done to balance the federal budget, none of the other candidates have done that.”
The event was sponsored by TEA Party Express as part of a statewide bus tour endorsing Neumann. But Wisconsin TEA-partiers want to clarify this out-of-state group doesn’t represent them.
“Tea Party Express is spending thousands in ads and using their bus tour to wrongly promote Mark Neumann as the ‘TEA Party candidate’, essentially undermining the TEA movement in Wisconsin,” said Oriannah Paul of the Sheboygan Liberty Coalition.
The Racine TEA Party says the TEA movement in Wisconsin is split in its support of the Senate candidates. “Regardless of the outcome of Tuesday’s election, we are confident whomever of the four wins the primary election will have combined support from us all,” the group said in a statement.
Former Governor Tommy Thompson, hedge fund manager Eric Hovde, and Assembly Speaker Jeff Fitzgerald are also in the four-way race. The winner of Tuesday’s primary will face Democratic Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin in November to determine will take over the seat of vacating Herb Kohl.
Bob Nelson-KFIZ contributed to this report
