You're listening to Civic Media.
You can tune into any of our live shows on any radio station across the state with the Civic Media app.
Find us in your phone's app store and listen anytime,
anywhere.
You're listening to Mornings with Pat Craiglow powered by Up North News.
Now, for my Lake Mesota studio, here is the founding editor of Up North News, Pat Craiglow.
One more hour from the Lake Wissoda Studio before we start a little road trip for the next few days.
Looking forward to joining you as I do a little bit of traveling here.
But from up here in Chippewa Falls, it's nice to have you along across the Civic Media Radio Network on this Wednesday morning, first day of October.
First day for some big news up here in the 7th Congressional District.
Tom Tiffany, the incumbent Republican Congressman has decided to run for governor.
That has opened up this congressional district.
It's an open race right now, and people are beginning to position themselves for a run on the Democratic and Republican sides, and we will be breaking a little news about the seventh congressional district, 2026 election coming up, starting less than a half hour from now, 8.35.
So you're going to want to come on back and hear what we have to say about the big news up north.
We've got Earl Ingram standing by as well.
tell us about the what's going on podcast that he can get you at civicmedia.us.
First note that we'd love to have you sign up for our Up North News daily newsletter.
Head to UpNorthNewsWI.com.
Click subscribe in the banner on top of the homepage.
In today's edition, there's a link to my story about the the new backdoor abortion ban that is in place.
Planned Parenthood has stopped providing abortion services at least temporarily in Wisconsin.
Because it turns out that in Donald Trump's big bloated boon
there's also a provision in there that halts all Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood, even for their non-abortion health services.
And that's going to take away a lot of funding for things like, you know, basic physicals and blood tests and STD screening and early detection of cancer and all the many, many things that Planned Parenthood does.
So it's being challenged in court, but until then,
Essentially, you have a backdoor abortion ban in place in the United States, at least here in Wisconsin from Planned Parenthood, and details you can find over in our newsletter again, up on newswi.com.
And in our Sunday morning newsletter, our question of the week is about the government shutdown, which started overnight at midnight.
And how does this thing end?
Do Democrats cave in and just accept all of these massive cuts that Republicans want?
or do they use their leverage and win the restoration of some of those cuts, either with the president caving in or with Republicans and Democrats coming up with something together and even overriding a Donald Trump veto?
So where's this thing going?
What's your best guess?
That's our question of the week and you get the first look at it by signing up for our newsletter up north news wi.com at 809 Let's welcome in Earl Ingram from the what's going on podcast and you can get that over at civic media Dot us and we'll talk more about what's on the show But certainly some of the other matters that are happening not the least of which are some of the cuts that come from Trump's big bloated boondoggle Earl.
Good morning.
How are you?
I'm doing fine, Pat, are you?
I'm doing fine as well, but, you know, we explained in the last hour, again, we just talked about cuts to Planned Parenthood.
We've talked about cuts to training special education teachers.
We've talked about cuts to deafblind students.
Again, all in the name of attacking DEI, because apparently helping special education kids and helping kids who are deaf and blind is...
somehow special treatment.
And you've you've got experience with some of these things that are going to be cut as well.
Well, thanks again, Pat, for the opportunity.
But my wife and I have treatment foster parents.
We took in a disabled child 22 years ago, who was born with half a brain who requires 24 hour care.
That young boy that we took in is now 24 year old man.
who still requires 24 hour care.
He will his entire life.
He doesn't have the capacity to live on his own.
And so through Medicaid and some programs inside of that, it helps us in trying to offer this young man the best quality of life that he can possibly get.
He could be institutionalized.
which is one of the reasons why they created programs to give these special people an opportunity at the best possible lives they could have.
And right now, under the big, beautiful bill, there are major cuts that are looming to many of these programs.
And I just don't think people are really aware of the impacts.
of the big beautiful bill and what is coming down the pike and so if you you know are fortunate enough that you don't have to be involved with Medicaid and those kinds of things then count yourself as being fortunate and lucky but there are many people who that's the only lifeline that they have and and our nation ought to be ashamed of itself if we allow
These kinds of things to happen to people who are already up against it because of through no fault of their own being born In the manner that they have been
Well, and that's the that's the thing here is we're not talking about preference
based on somebody's condition, we're talking about dignity, based on somebody's condition, and making sure that, you know, they have either the opportunity to live, the opportunity to be healthy, the opportunity to be educated.
There's nobody that's giving them some kind of an extra advantage.
These are the things that we would
we think we would like to do if it was happening right in front of us, you know, right on the street corner.
But thankfully, these folks don't have to live on a street corner when we have programs like these that can take care of them.
And so it just it defies any easy explanation.
It's either a lack of caring and compassion for folks who have disabilities.
And or it is such an immense sense of greed that you will
literally, you know, take money, take food off people's tables to pay for tax cuts for the very well off and hope that those benevolent billionaires will somehow take care of you.
I don't know if I feel like it's one or the other.
It feels like a little bit of both, Earl.
Well, what has been characterized as a handout?
And so and so when people hear a handout, right away without knowing anything about it,
They've been led to believe that they're just takers.
And so they've put this group of people, disabled people in the category of takers.
And it's dreadful to think about where we're going with this.
There's nowhere else to turn.
So what do we do?
We cast these people out and those of us who have dedicated our lives to
taking on a tremendous responsibility to try to give people, as you stated, so well dignity in their lives.
So those of us who, again, who are doing this work, we're going to be left to kind of handle this on our own.
I think it's just nonsensical.
That's putting it mildly.
We're talking to Earl Ingram.
You can learn more about the what's going on with Earl Ingram podcast at civicmedia.us slash shows.
I want to say one more thing about this whole notion of handouts.
And we may have touched on this previously, but I think it bears repeating because I always use the example of Ronald Reagan's so-called welfare queens and talking about waste, fraud, and abuse.
And we're hearing that again this week, all the waste, fraud, and abuse that's out there.
Waste, fraud, and abuse are already
illegal or against the rules.
There are already ways to sniff it out, to deny benefits, to prosecute people.
So if you really believed that something like that was going on, you'd go after those folks.
And I admit, it only takes one person, one example of somebody abusing the system for other people to get cynical and think, oh, everybody must be living high off the hog that way.
There's always going to be people that try to game the system.
But this is just the worst case of throwing the baby out with the bathwater because you
you don't like how a couple of people benefit from this program?
Well, if you want to talk about waste, fraud, and abuse on the grandest level, look at our military budget.
You know, and there's no comparison with the dollars that are being abused and wasted on that level.
Then there are with people who are in these other programs.
You know, the other thing I want to talk about quickly and one of the latest podcasts is the street takeovers and that are taking place across this nation and what they are for people who aren't aware is they at two, three o'clock in the morning, a group of young people think it makes sense to organize and pull into some of the busiest intersections of our city.
and basically just have a party at three o'clock in the morning with cars, powerful cars, doing donuts, fireworks, drinking, smoking weed, and doing all sorts of illegal things.
Three, four hundred people gathered.
They do this thing via the internet, and you know, it's more than what cities can handle.
And so we had a discussion about that on the latest podcast about what is it about the generation that thinks this makes sense.
And so I had a discussion with my producer who is from the generation of young people who are doing these kind of things to try to get an understanding of what their mindset really is.
Well, I hope that he was able to shed some light on it because look, we all go through that age range and we all do things that we look back on and think they were a combination of rebellious and stupid.
But it takes it to a different level when you're endangering people by doing what you do on city streets and in intersections, especially with law enforcement that is already running on tight budgets and everything.
So again,
I don't pretend to know what the alternatives are on this, but I don't know that it's something you just hope, you know, hope everybody gets tired of it and moves on to something else.
It's a bigger problem than that, it seems.
Well, you know, you kind of told me about influencers and at the root of all of it is influencers.
And so this is the insanity of it.
People do this to get people to follow them.
then they become famous people for being influences, whatever that means.
But it certainly doesn't make any sense.
No, but it goes back to, I mean, from the earliest days of television, everybody wants to be on TV, everybody wants to be on a screen, and they're willing to go along with
pretty much anything.
And I tell you one of the words in the social media era I wish had never come along was challenge because we always hear about the blank challenge.
And next thing you know, somebody's either ingested too much of something and died, or they've engaged in some kind of an extreme selfie.
and they've died, or, you know, whatever influencers are doing to attract crowds now that can lead to, again, disruptions of lives, and, you know, much worse.
So I'm looking forward to the discussion that you're having.
It's part of the What's Going On with Earl Ingram podcast.
Get the details over at civicmedia.us.
Click on shows and you'll learn more about it.
Earl, I appreciate you bringing some insight to this very much and to the budget cuts as well and look forward to chatting with you next week.
Thanks for the visit.
Always great to talk to you.
Thank you very much.
Again, the What's Going On with Earl Ingram podcast, you can find it at civicmedia.us slash shows.
A local news update is coming up next for some of you.
Others will catch my conversation with Melissa Baldoff for our weekly climate check and talking about the Trump administration making a big investment this week in green energy.
No, no, and going back to coal.
Yeah, for real.
I'm Pat quite low.
This is the Civic Media Radio Network.
You're listening to Civic Media.
Stay up to date on the latest news and information for your local community and Wisconsin by signing up for our free email newsletter.
Visit civicmedia.us slash email to get started.
Civic Media has a new daily newsletter chock full of links to show highlights and news headlines and more.
It's on Substack.
You know, where all the cool kids are gathering now.
So head over to civicmediatoday.substack.com
and get subscribed there.
I think at Substack, you can also get to Dan Schaeffer's Reconbobulation area.
You can search my name on there too and see that, yeah, I've got a Substack.
I haven't done anything with it in over a year.
I've got this job that gets in the way, but rest assured, one of these days, I'll join all the rest of the cool kids in posting regularly on Substack, including Civic Media with Civic Media today.
Let us jump into this week's climate check with Melissa Baldoff.
It's one that
Again, when I saw the headline the other day, I knew right away, send this one to Melissa.
How are you this morning?
Yes.
Well, yeah, before we get to my story, you've got the story of with a shutdown.
I mean, the only people that are working who are federal government employees are basically, you know, essential workers.
You've got the military, you've got the TSA and others, they're not getting paid, but they still have to work where everybody else has to either go home without pay or might even get laid off permanently.
And there is a climate slash energy connection to the shutdown as well.
Yes, I'm sure that folks are going to be absolutely shocked to learn that while the Interior Department is cutting its workforce because of the shutdown, two-thirds of the staff from the National Park Service and the Secretary's office, the Bureau of Land Management, however, has determined that workers who are processing drilling permits for oil and natural gas and coal mining operations
Those folks are essential, so they're still going to work to really bolster our commitment to fossil fuels.
Sure.
It just feeds right into the story out of the White House this week.
Forget drill baby drill.
It's mine baby mine.
As Trump officials offer a plan a $625 million plan to boost coal production, including opening 13 million acres of federal land for mining and eliminating pollution limits.
And already in this age of Trump, several utilities
have already agreed that at least 50 coal burning units are gonna continue operating past your scheduled closure date.
So like it or not, Melissa, when people voted for Donald Trump, they voted for a return to the age of coal.
Congratulations, America.
You did it.
And, you know, it's just really disappointing to see.
this bailout really to an industry that other countries around the world have recognized is doing a lot of harm.
And instead of letting the science and the market dictate where we're going,
With our energy production with our economy and everything points to clean energy renewable energy Being not only the best for the environment for our health, but the best for the economy You know, we know that wind and solar are incredibly inexpensive efficient and reliable sources of energy You've got you know, the Trump administration doubling down to you know offer up, you know a bailout essentially for
uh wealthy oil and gas companies right to this uh you know dirty fossil fuel industry and we know that um you know this is going to be this is I mean like this is something he promised them right this is what he promised these uh donors to him these energy executives that he was going to do everything he could for them and you know here he is um he is making this investment in the coal industry while
We ignore investment and opportunity in in renewable energy and we'll have that impact of You know these coal plants including including one, you know, not too far away from me in Oak Creek that Earlier in the summer had announced that they would delay the retirement by a year and you know, it just makes you makes you wonder With these signals from the federal government from the president will
Utility companies say hey, you know, maybe we'll push it out even further Because they know that they can make money that way.
Yeah, I mean if you've got the pro polluters in power They're gonna do what they do best
But meanwhile, like you said, other people made the decision to go in a cleaner direction and folks who catch our daily history lesson will remember that yesterday marked the one year anniversary of the United Kingdom going coal free.
The whole United Kingdom closed up its last coal fired power station one year ago yesterday and has operated without coal for a year without any issues or problems whatsoever.
And it's a place where we can get to in this country if we want to.
But instead, you've got, you know, a president who keeps describing this black combustible rock as, quote, clean, beautiful coal, either calls it clean coal or clean, beautiful coal.
And that's garbage.
But that is, again,
The man knows his marketing, and he's trying to convince people that coal is somehow clean and beautiful, which is why we do segments like this, Melissa, to give people, I don't know, a little reality.
Yeah, that's the public service we're providing here, making sure that folks know just how terribly this administration is botching this.
what you know what a real embarrassment we are on the on the world stage when we should be we should be thinking um you know how can we catch up to uh the UK as quickly as we can in this
and
And instead, we've got we're going to up the mining, which is linked to air pollution, water contamination, black lung disease and coal miners is going to make a comeback.
Oh, yippee.
Melissa Baldoff, thank you for the update.
I wish it was happier, but we got to get the news out there.
Thank you very much.
Have a great day.
You too.
Bye.
All right.
Some big news out of the seventh congressional district up north.
We'll tell you all about it in about five minutes.
You're on the Civic Media Radio Network.
The decision by Congressman Tom Tiffany to run for governor means there will now be an open race for Wisconsin's seventh congressional district, which takes up a good chunk of the northern third of Wisconsin.
It was represented by Dave Obie for 40 some years.
Sean Duffy after that and Tom Tiffany currently, but with him running for governor, it opens it up with Republicans and Democrats talking amongst themselves about
who should be running and who could serve as the next member of Congress from up north.
One of the people who's been doing a lot of talking about that, a lot of traveling, connecting with people, is actually a former legislator from the Baraboo area, but who relocated to northern Wisconsin a number of years ago.
And I mean, if you want to know about the North Woods, you got to talk to a guy that really knows woods and nobody knows the woods like Fred Clark.
He is a senior forester.
He has served as a senior forester with the Department of Natural Resources as an ecologist with the Nature Conservancy.
He's been a consulting forester.
He has served on the Wisconsin Council on Forestry, the Wisconsin Council on Tourism, briefly on the State Natural Resources Board.
He knows a thing or two.
about how to make sure that the North Woods is good for business, is good for tourism, and is good to our resources.
And maybe it's time that the North Woods is good for representation in Congress as well.
So Fred Clark joins us now to tell us more about what's happening in the seventh.
Fred, good morning.
How are you?
It really is.
And so, I mean, nobody understands the task ahead like you, and I'm sure that other people have expressed interest in this as well.
But where did you ultimately come down on your own decision about what to do in the 7th District?
You know, I spent a good part of this summer with some friends just traveling the 7th Congressional District.
And most of your listeners know it's a huge district.
This is about a third of Wisconsin, our entire North Woods, parts of 26 counties.
And we just wanted to, after talking among ourselves and following all of the drama coming out of Washington, we just decided to get on the road and try to put a pulse on what people were thinking about and talking about.
We went to Marshfield and to Warsaw and Merrill and...
Tomahawk and Rhinelander and Hayward and Spooner and Webster and Hudson had a lot of conversations with a lot of people to figure out what what concerns are sort of rising to the top for the communities around northern Wisconsin.
And what people are looking for out of representation.
And this is at a time when Congressman Tom Tiffany was basically missing in action.
He was not holding public events.
Some of these really momentous decisions like the big
Billionaires bill that came out of Washington that he voted for He simply wasn't willing to stand up and account for himself in public and we learned a lot from those trips and and it really helped me after a lot of thought make a decision that I think the time is right To stand up and make the case for a new representation in Congress in northern, Wisconsin
So you're in
All right.
You've done some of the prep work already.
There's a website up, clark4wi.com, again, clarkforwi.com, where people are going to learn more about you and more about the issues.
I gave a bit of an introduction that stressed your forestry roots, but you did serve a number of years in the legislature.
And so tell us a bit more about your time there and the priorities that you brought to Madison that you'd now like to bring to Washington.
You know, for many years, I lived in Barabu, at Townsend Salk County, north of Madison.
From there, I ran a forestry consulting and contracting business.
In fact, one of my very first jobs, my first year in business, was marking timber up here for the Shawamigan-Nicolay National Forest.
But in that work, I just became more and more involved in conservation as well as community leadership.
In 2008, I took a long shot and ran for the state assembly seat that includes the communities of Barabu and Portage and Montello, perfect farm and forest country.
I'd never had a political background before, but
Again, it was an opportunity for me to learn more and provide service to an important community that really meant a lot to me.
I won a Republican health seat.
I did that with a lot of crossover of voters from Republicans and Democrats who knew that it was time for a change and that they could trust me to help represent their values and their interests, even if we didn't agree on every issue.
And I learned a tremendous amount from that effort.
The most important one being, if you're elected as a representative, it's your job to represent everybody.
It doesn't matter how they voted.
It doesn't matter if they agree with you on everything, but there are lots of issues at home that we all have to work together on if we're going to be successful.
And I took that to heart, and I'll take it to heart for Northern Wisconsin.
It certainly seems to be a message that would resonate right now in what is now the ninth hour of a shutdown of the federal government brought about by an unwillingness by the majority party to negotiate, even though they need democratic votes to get anything done.
So I'm sure with this shutdown, people would be asking, what would you do differently?
What traits would you bring that might make it less likely that we see government shutdowns?
Yeah, you know the choice of Democrats right now is a very tough one But I don't fault them for standing up when you look at that just the brutal impact on middle-class people across this country from a single policy of removing the Subsidies for the Affordable Care Act that's going to affect health care for millions of people This is really their only point of leverage right now, but fundamentally
We've got to re-look at how we budget and run the federal government.
There is simply no reason that we should be going through this shutdown drama every four years when the parties can't agree on the most basic responsibility, which is how to run our governments.
So I think we need to re-look at the principles and procedures for federal budgeting.
And that's the most basic thing we should be expecting from our Congress.
We expect that from our state legislature.
And for the most part, we get it.
Do the basics of funding then extend to putting a priority on things like health care rather than billionaire tax breaks?
I guess what I'm saying is, you know, right now, the Democrats in Congress are saying
Look, negotiate with us if you need our votes, because we think you've gone too far in these health care cuts.
And if you want our votes, they've got to be restored or paired back.
And Republicans are even refusing to negotiate.
I don't think I have to go very hard to find out whether you think Congress should be taking more of its energy on providing for people's health care than providing for tax cuts for the rich.
You know healthcare wasn't perfect a year ago.
We still had a long way to go to Provide the opportunity for basic healthcare for everyone regardless of income But the big beautiful bill as the president like to call it is Has a massive across-the-board impact on on both the Medicaid cuts.
They're gonna affect healthcare for the most
the people who need it the most, as well as the Affordable Care Act subsidy removals, which is going to increase healthcare premiums by up to 75% or more for many people that are on the exchanges and the Affordable Care Act.
That's the most massive transfer of wealth to billionaires that's ever occurred in the history of our federal government and our federal budgets.
No, it's not acceptable.
And no, Democrats should...
No one should be voting to support a budget that that fails Americans so badly and broadly.
We're talking to Fred Clark, former state assembly rep, who is now the Democratic candidate for Congress in the seventh congressional district all across the northern third of Wisconsin here.
And let's get to the district itself and the things that
Proper representation can do for it.
You've got an entire platform based on rebuilding the rural economy around you know our lakes and our forests and our towns and we know that Tom Tiffany as a congressman and prior to that in the state legislature had the the primary goal of getting mines
operating in Wisconsin and expanding development that way.
Okay, that's one mindset is mining and development.
Where's yours in terms of making sure that the rural economy across Northern Wisconsin can be vibrant during your time in office?
So let's just look at what we have here in the north, the forest, the lakes, the rivers, the
farms that make up this kind of piece of our world.
You know, this is iconic Wisconsin, when the Department of Tourism wants to sell Wisconsin to other state visitors, the North Woods is one of the major places that they go.
If we want to maintain that, which also means maintaining the quality of life and the clean water and the clean air and the outdoor spaces that make this place what it is, we have to invest in that.
from an economic development standpoint, we can chase big mines, big holes in the ground.
We can chase massive international businesses that we think are going to plop down big data centers and create jobs.
But I think time after time and a lot of effort and experience has shown that you get a
better bank for your buck by investing in local communities, local businesses, the sort of small and medium-sized businesses and the small farms and the forestry enterprises that are the bulk of employment and economic activity in northern Wisconsin, that's where we need to be making our investments.
And as a policymaker, that's where I would absolutely reinvest and increase our investment to make sure that the businesses that are already here are able to thrive.
What about in terms of the trade war that Donald Trump has imposed on this country and on this economy, ostensibly, to rebuild or help out American manufacturing?
To what degree do you feel like that is the right track or wrong track?
Oh, if you talk to farmers today throughout the Midwest, but including in Wisconsin, the trade war and this sort of ever-changing tariff war that
especially with China right now, is gonna be a punch in the gut for farm producers.
If you're growing soybeans right now, you may have had a bumper crop this year and nowhere to go with it because China stopped buying American soybeans this year for the first time in a long time.
And there simply are not markets for what we're producing today as we get near harvest time.
And farmers have paid
their own dollars in these checkoff funds for decades that have gone into marketing programs to help establish these markets.
They're being wiped away by a tweet from our president who decides with almost no evidence that we're going to just start these tariff wars.
It's hugely disruptive.
We're all going to be paying for it.
The problem is that we've had a
Congress that has abandoned its duties as a co-equal branch of government to provide some oversight, some guidance, and things like that.
And so I want to talk to you after the break about the role that you think Congress should have if Democrats were to take control in the midterms for the second half of President Trump's term.
What are the things that could be done if
If not working with the president, then at least putting forth, you know, a better slate of ideas than what we've seen and the damage that has been done to the economy right now.
We're talking to Fred Clark, former state assembly rep, who is also now a candidate for Congress in the seventh congressional district here up north.
We'll have more with Fred Clark and some final news and notes from Lake Rosota coming up in just a bit.
Again, remember, you can follow my work over at UpNorthNewsWI.com.
This is the
Civic Media Radio Network.
Remember, you can follow up north news on social media.
We are on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Blue Sky, and the Dumpster Fire, formerly known as Twitter, where we've put the note that Fred Clark is a candidate for Congress.
Now, the former state assembly rep is running in the seventh congressional district up north, and we've been going over some of the issues that
Led Fred to decide to make this run for Congress, which will be an open seat now with Tom Tiffany running for governor and We left off Fred talking about the Constitution talking about the rule of law talking about a Congress that you know for all of our lifetimes
even when it was of the same party as the president, still curbed any presidential excesses and provided some guardrails.
And now we're seeing just a complete abdication of that oversight.
How do you envision the role of Congress?
First, if you were to win the majority next year in the second half of a Donald Trump term, but frankly, even if there were a Democratic president, talk more about your philosophy of what a member of Congress should actually be
All of us ought to take some time to read the Constitution.
I re-read it again this summer and doesn't take long to do, but the founders of this country, the framers of the Constitution envisioned this sort of three-part government with the judiciary and the Congress and the executive branch being co-equal branches of government.
Congress actually,
has should have most of the power in that relationship around how we run the federal government.
And this year, our Congress has failed in most of that responsibility.
You know, one is to budget funds for programs that are passed into law, along with the funding to support them.
And the executive branch has a responsibility to fulfill those programs.
This this administration has
failed to do that.
In fact, they've killed off entire programs that were constitutionally, or excuse me, congressionally authorized.
That's wrong.
Congress should stand up to oppose that.
This president's use of tariff power, which is only supposed to be an emergency authority for the executive branch in creating this wild tariff war that changes daily depending on
what the president may have had for breakfast in the morning.
It's insane.
It's making it impossible for businesses to invest with any stability of where their investment is gonna return.
And Congress has not stood up to stop that.
I think what we have right now are especially Republicans in Congress are basically run and scared.
They're afraid to stand up.
They won't even...
Oppose this administration on some of the most basic things because they're afraid of being tweeted at or Attacked by by this president.
It's almost like you have to take a loyalty test to be in the Republican Party today And that there's nothing more un-American than that.
Oh, it's it's not almost I mean, we're we're just flat out right there at this point now there there is also the notion of border security and immigration which are
two things that are related, but they're not joined at the hip.
You need to work differently on one than on another.
And for example, in Wisconsin, we have such a reliance on migrant labor, especially on our farms, but also manufacturing and a host of other areas.
And so when you've got a president with just a flat out anti-immigrant agenda, how do you address that while at the same time,
you know, acknowledging that there is always room to improve security at our borders.
And it's so unfortunate that it's been been beat into a political hot potato.
And we absolutely need security at our border.
And we need to be making smarter investments about that because a wall is not of an effective form of really stopping illegal immigration.
we can do that.
And we need a aggressive, active role for federal law enforcement to go after lawbreakers, especially criminals.
There's no question that that needs to be a priority.
But what's happening right now is that this administration and an entire segment of the Make America Great Movement are demonizing immigrants across the board.
That is really harming hardworking honest people who have come to this country to do important jobs that we need done because businesses need to hire them They're supporting our economy, but importantly, they're also supporting families back home and and to see good honest hardworking people who want to be here legally hauled off of the streets and taken away without due process or in many cases deported in
countries that aren't even their home country.
That's morally wrong and it's not making us safer.
We're talking to Fred Clark here and just looking at some of the comments that have come in from PJ.
The US border is 1500 miles away from Wisconsin.
Let's worry about what's happening here in Wisconsin first.
Adam says I hope to see Fred Clark at the Three Lakes Fourth of July parade next year.
Tony says please represent me.
Joe on the text line and Superior says Argentina is getting a $20 billion bailout from the Trump administration and taking our soybean market from American farmers.
So literally take
making our farmers lunch money.
there's more than a little bit of work that's going to be done, Fred, if you're able to capture this seat next year.
Again, depending on who all gets in, there may be a primary next August to the general election in November of next year with an open field for Democrats and Republicans alike.
But you've made the decision to get in, you've outlined where your positions are on some of the issues.
And I don't doubt we'll be having a lot of conversations between now and election day, Fred.
Thank you very much for joining us to make your announcement here on
program.
You bet,
All right, sounds good.
And you can learn more about Fred's campaign at clark4wi.com.
That again is clark, f-o-r-w-i.com.
And of course, it's got the Facebook page and everything else.
And we'll continue to monitor this new race in the 7th Congressional District here up north.
I'm Pat Krightlow, hoping you enjoy the rest of your Wednesday as we get started with the month of October already.
Hard to believe.
Anyway, I'll be on the road tomorrow.
I'll be checking in from new locations as I make the annual Tour of Daughters coming up.
So I'll see you tomorrow morning from up north or somewhere 6 a.m.
tomorrow morning.
The national news cycle never stops, but it can be hard to find news about your local community.
Civic Media is dedicated to providing quality local and state news coverage across Wisconsin.
With the Civic Media app, you can get notifications about local stories that matter to you and your community.
Find the free Civic Media app in your phone's app store and choose notifications from the menu to tell us what kind of news you want to hear about.
