There was high-profile help, for the candidates for Governor in Wisconsin on Monday. First Lady Michelle Obama took to the stump for Democrat Mary Burke during an afternoon rally in Milwaukee, while earlier in the day, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie joined Republican Governor Scott Walker on the campaign trail in Hudson. The locations couldn’t have been farther apart, but the message was essentially the same: with most polls showing a close race between the two candidates, their supporters will need to turn out every potential vote between now and November 4th.
“If we don’t elect leaders like Mary Burke, who will put people first instead of just fighting for special interests, then we know exactly what will happen. We can’t pretend we don’t know,” Mrs. Obama warned. She urged Burke supporters to keep working to connect with voters. “Tell them that we’ve got just a little over a month until Election Day, and we all need to be as passionate and as hungry for this election as we were back in 2008 and 2012.”
In Hudson, Christie warned supporters that “big government union bosses” want to make an example of the Republican governor, whose signature Act 10 legislation greatly diminished the impact of public employee unions on state politics.
“One of the reasons you go to Hudson is that the rest of the state is not going to hear much about it, said Wisconsin Democratic Party Mike Tate. Hudson is only a half hour east of St. Paul, and in the Twin Cities media market.