Metaphor Alert: White House Demolition (Hour 3)

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Hey, good morning.

It is 8.06 now.

Nice to have you back here up north on a Tuesday morning.

It is October 21st.

Coming up, Camp Stevenson from Courier Newsroom joining us from the nation's capital.

Then at 8.35, we will be talking to Dan Schaefer from the Recombobulation area.

About an hour ago, you heard my conversation with State Representative Francesca Hong, candidate for governor.

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A little later, we'll tell you some of the more popular stories of the past week at Up North News's social media feeds, spoiler alert.

A lot of you are interested in following the No Kings protests all across Wisconsin back on Saturday.

That led to some developments in Washington, DC as well.

So Blitz is, you know, scamper right over there right now and talk to Cam Stevenson, Courier Newsroom's political correspondent there, our national correspondent, who his his mint green walls have

have now been, there's an accessory.

There's a very red and white free DC flag.

Cam, good morning, congrats on the redecorating.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I've been officially welcomed and hazed into the DC community.

The free DC movement, I mean, this, that states back to, I mean, the license plates say taxation without representation.

Yeah.

But, you know, now, now you add, you know, troops to the mix and you can see why flags like that are probably getting some new mileage.

Yeah, no, most definitely.

I mean, the idea of free DC, you know, DC statehood, and especially DC independence from the ability for the federal government to send troops here to actively patrol, that idea is stronger than ever right now.

That was a big theme at the No Kings protest in Washington DC over the weekend as the free DC movement was out in full force.

These flags are

all over the place.

And people want independence, not just from a would be king, but independence to be their own, be their own government body here.

And I thought it was great that in your newsletter, below the Beltway, which you can get at Beltway.News or through CourierNewsroom.com, there is something that these three places have in common.

Washington DC, Nepal,

And Madagascar, tell folks what you put in the newsletter about what they all shared.

Yeah, well, it really sparks from a small alert I got from the White House press update team on Friday afternoon, which was that Donald Trump was leaving Washington DC right before the protest started.

And this falls right in line with some protests we've seen in other countries this year in Nepal and Madagascar.

where the authoritarian leaders or unpopular leaders there were confronted with protesters in opposition and instead of facing it and, you know, addressing the public which elected them, they fled.

And that's exactly what Donald Trump did this weekend, is he fled our nation's capital as 200,000 people came here to protest his presidency.

And it wasn't until he was in his safe space in Palm Beach, Florida, in his private resort with his secret service and private security that he began

making fun of American citizens who were exercising their first member right to protest.

Oh, I mean, as we discussed earlier, I mean, and you note in your newsletter, defecating on them symbolically through, you know, an AI video from a fire fighter jet, which has Kenny Loggins very bothered here.

But it was, it was obsessively posting true to his tiny network.

We noted that Congressman Derek Van Orden posted more than 250 times, and by one national reporter's count, that is like the new record for like a 24 or 48 hour period.

Topping, let's see, there was, it wasn't Marjorie Taylor Greene, it was Nancy Mace had the previous record for the most time.

It is an obsession that they have with posting social media, which really says something, Cam, about how

having seven million people take to the streets has a way to maybe get under their skin.

Yeah, well, my first thought is like, geez, man, get a life.

I mean, if I'm spending my weekend just

posting online hundreds of times maybe that's a good sign to go touch some grass go feel the warmth of the of the sun and be around real people uh because you know if there were seven million people protesting uh there were protests all across wisconsin something tells me representative van orden has some of his constituents who he represents

who aren't happy with the administration.

And so instead of being in his own social media bubble that he's apparently creating all by himself, maybe he should talk with these people and figure out what they want so that he could actually come to Washington DC, make compromises with.

Democrats in Congress and reopen the government because that's what he apparently he's just posting online instead of actually governing

a base.

Yeah, he's basically in a bunker at this point, which leads us to another interesting wrinkle that I learned about for the first time in your newsletter.

But it has been mentioned elsewhere.

I just missed it.

But when you are so fixated on, you know, ruling no matter what the people think of you,

There is a tipping point, and apparently from what's been studied, there's a tipping point at the figure of 3.5% of the population.

What is the significance of that?

Yeah, so a bunch of revolutionary scientists and academics have studied peaceful revolutions throughout the course of history.

And what they found is that if 3.5% of the populace

is in an active peaceful opposition to their government.

That is enough to switch that government to, you know, to house the leader, to change the leadership, and to peacefully find a way to democratically change who is running the government and the country.

So in the United States, we have about 340 million people.

So that would be

roughly 12 million people in peaceful opposition.

And we've seen an escalation in numbers throughout the months since Trump retook the presidency, where we were at 3 million people in the spring, 5 million people came out into protest in the summer, and now we have 7 million people coming out just last weekend.

And that's a huge number, and that gets us incrementally closer to that 12 million.

Well, and if people wonder, well, would that grow?

Let me, you know, refer you back to my comments last hour about.

beef farmers who suddenly learned that the guy they might have voted for wants to purchase a bunch of beef from Argentina.

You know, the company or the country, rather, that has now taken our soybean market.

Well, they didn't take it.

You know, Trump basically gave it to them through a trade war with China, and now wants to help his friend, the ruler in Argentina, whose nickname, by the way, is El Loco, you know, buying Argentinian beef.

So do not be surprised if there is some kind of future event with more and more farmers.

talking about how they feel as well.

There just never there's never seems to be an end to the list of constituencies that Trump is ready to cheese off next.

Right.

Well, in that, I think is one of the reasons why they were so actively trying to portray the protest this last weekend as violent antithesis to America,

you

know, because

they aren't gaining any constituency.

Republicans in Congress and the president himself are at the lowest levels of support they've ever seen.

Meanwhile, they are selling our beef, selling our soybeans, selling our agriculture and our livelihood away to the highest bidder.

Meanwhile, they're also finding ways to change the makeup of the House of Representatives so they can have an unfair advantage in Congress, which

universally people don't like.

They don't like when they feel like someone's cheating even if it's someone that they like.

And so all of that coupled together creates this recipe for opposition, which we're seeing.

Well, and that's that's where when when you saw them making such a big deal about a ceasefire last week And I'm not trying to minimize the significance of a ceasefire if it were to hold but you know There's always the need for a little bit of shall we say cautious optimism rather than you know openly campaigning for a Nobel Peace Prize But they probably saw that as one of the few ways he could actually

add supporters as if peace were to hold in the mid east, which it does not seem to be doing now.

So now it's just back to, you know, making making other constituencies unhappy in a town that is shut down right now.

And so it appears that the only people working hard in Washington DC right now are the demolition workers tearing down the east facade of the White House, which got started yesterday, despite a president

promising that his ballroom project would not damage the exterior of the White House, not damage it.

Let's bring in a whole demolition crew, Cam.

That was, I mean, the metaphor of the year yesterday.

Yeah, I don't think we've seen destruction at the White House like that since 1812.

It's, it's something that, I mean, first of all, he promised one thing, another thing happened.

I'm shocked.

But

You know, his administration at least knows that the bad optics of this.

The US Treasury overlooks the White House where this demolition is happening.

Employees after photos were already posted were instructed not to post any more photos of the demolition because it's just like you said, it's very symbolic to see this historic building, the symbol of power in the United States.

demolished so that so that a ballroom could be created.

And one that didn't like, you know, it didn't go through like Congress or anything, it was just, I'm going to do this, I'm going to raise money from my buddies.

You know, I won't tell you what kind of things I'm going to do for them in return.

There is just nothing that isn't shady about this whole notion.

Yeah, I can't get a crosswalk put in my neighborhood without a 90-day commentary period to see if the paint is disruptive to the neighborhood.

But he can bring in bulldozers to a taxpayer-funded home and just tear it down.

it's beyond absurd.

No, and it is, I mean, again, there's so many images of 2025.

But if one of them is is the metaphor for it all, it would be what we saw over on the east facade of the White House yesterday.

We're back to the shutdown and people not getting work done.

That means that a newly elected congressional representative from Arizona has still not been sworn in as the game playing goes on by Republican leadership.

Yeah, Adelita Grajava.

She's the representative elect for Southern Arizona.

It's been, I want to say about a month at this point, where she has not only been elected, her election has been certified, not contested at all.

She has flown to DC and been here waiting to get sworn in, whereas Speaker Mike Johnson has been just moving the goalposts of what

of when he will swear her in you know he said well there's you know there's a shutdown so we can't do it now we want to wait until we can have the whole you know the whole house here to give you a big procession and I can't remember what his most recent thing is but he keeps making things up essentially because

her vote would give the House the final vote that it needs to release the Epstein files that the Department of Justice holds, which Mike Johnson has been explicitly told not to let be released.

The Trump administration does not want that information out.

They want whatever the exact opposite of transparency is into Jeffrey Epstein, and keeping Adelita Grahava is

is essentially out of Congress is the way that they keep the host files from being in the public eye.

Exactly.

Follow all that and more in Cam Stevenson's below the Beltway newsletter, Beltway.News or couriernewsroom.com.

Thank you, Cam.

Appreciate it.

Yeah, any time.

All right, Dan Schaefer from the Reconpopulation Area joins us in 15 minutes.

I'm Pat Critello.

This is the Civic Media Radio Network.

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I'm going to tell you about some of the more popular posts set up with news coming up.

But first, let's touch on a little bit of sports here at 823.

If you missed it last night for

Baseball's World Series, it is now set.

It'll be between the Toronto Blue Jays and the Los Angeles Dodgers.

The Mariners were well on their way to making it to their first ever World Series in last night's game seven of the American League Championship Series.

Then it all came crashing down in the seventh inning when Toronto's George Springer hit a three-run homerun, making the difference.

The Blue Jays beat the Mariners last night four to three.

Let's see the Packers they have their first matchup with Aaron Rodgers since he left the team That means it's a game against the Pittsburgh Steelers.

It is happening next Sunday night kickoff is at 720 You can listen to the pregame starting at 5 p.m.

Sunday on civic media stations in Watoma Park Falls Racine and Richland Center The Badger football team next plays at Oregon this Saturday evening 6 p.m.

Pregame starts at 4 o'clock Saturday

on stations in Amory, Ripon, Wisconsin Rapids, and Richland Center.

The Badger women's volleyball team is now ninth ranked in the country, 13 and three overall, and they next play Friday night out west, taking on Washington.

9 p.m.

is when that match begins on Friday night.

The Badger women's hockey team, still number one in the country, eight and O on the season.

Five of those eight wins have been shutouts, and their next match is set for at home at LaBona Arena in Madison, hosting Minnesota State Mankato.

That'll be both Saturday and Sunday afternoons at two o'clock.

And then finally we've got the Badger Men's basketball team.

These are their exhibition games just ahead of the season opener.

So there's an exhibition game at Milwaukee's Pfizer Forum this Friday against Oklahoma.

Seven o'clock will be the tip-off.

You can listen to the pregame starting at 6.30 on Civic Media Stations in Wisconsin Rapids, Richland Center, and Amory.

Then there's one more exhibition game at the Cole Center next week taking

on Platteville.

And then the season opener is Monday, November 3rd at the Cole Center versus the Campbell University fighting Campbell's.

And if Parker Olson, our producer here knows, he knows anything, he knows his sports teams.

And he knows that Campbell University is the fighting camels.

There are no camels in Bowie's Creek, North Carolina, where there's Campbell University, but that

doesn't

stop them.

No, why would anyone name something?

with logic.

Come

on, especially, especially camel.

They're the fighting camels.

Yeah, sure.

Little little school in private Christian University in Buies Creek, North Carolina, Buies Creek, 5000 students, but still plays division one sports.

And they'll be taking on the Badger Men's basketball team in their season opener, Monday, November 3rd at Cole Center.

Another one of those games you want to listen to because again, you know, David might beat Goliath.

And think just think of what that would mean to the Badgers if after everything with the football team and everything else Well Let's not even go there

the basketball team that has a tendency of like not quite putting away those opponents every now like once a year That's what I'm saying.

They always win but not

as comfortably as you want to.

So maybe you should listen to David and the wife

there.

Yeah.

There's all the more reason to listen to the coverage here on the civic media radio network, uh, coming up across civic media today.

Uh, well, I'll be on with Jane and Greg for matinee on air between nine 11 today.

I'll be popping on about nine 35 and former U S attorney Jim Santel will be on Maggie Dawn show coming up just after four o'clock this afternoon and on nightlight with P Chwaba this evening, coming up at six 30 comedian and hope.

of the Never Not Funny podcast, Jimmy Pardo.

That's at 6.35 tonight on Nightlight with Pete Schwabba.

All right, I was gonna go over some of the more popular posts of the past week here.

And as I mentioned, very quickly, the posts about the No Kings rallies racked up all kinds of views and engagements that included Selena Heller's video from the Eau Claire one where she asked a whole series of people

You know, do you hate America?

No.

Are you a member of Antifa?

No.

Are you a member of Hamas?

No.

Do you have a job?

Yes.

Why are you here?

And then they all explain why they felt the need to show up on Saturday for a whole bunch of different reasons.

And people did enjoy seeing that.

There were also popular posts that just had some of the many posters from all the marches and we've read through some of those previously and obviously they got a lot of engagement.

And then there was a lot of engagement on a video post of Congressman Mark Bocan holding a town hall not in his district but in Derrick Van Orden's district because you know somebody's got to hold town halls in the third congressional district and if the Congressman won't well then Congressman Mark Bocan will go next door and do that and in this particular video he corrects the healthcare misinformation that Republicans are giving as the so-called reason for the government shutdown and Mark Bocan, you know, let's people know what the

actual facts are on all of this.

Now, a big part of the reason Parker for the all of this level of engagement, isn't just comments anymore.

I've noticed so many people, especially from mega world, but not not just them.

But instead of comments, they put memes in as a comment.

I mean, all of all of them sarcastic.

Some of them, you know, just downright

rude or cruel or tasteless or whatever.

And I'm just here to plant the flag that says if you don't have something constructive that you can say in your own words, I mean, initially, I was looking at maybe just hiding those comments because they're, they're pointless, you know, they're just there to agitate people.

But I mean, there's so many of them now that I figure it's just better off to say, Hey, we see them.

It's not original.

So

having

an original thought other than oh, yeah says you and Share that with us.

Let's again much like we want AI to actually, you know cure cancer and not run funny Trump cartoons dumping, you know feces on people How about we make the comment sections for for comments for things that have a really good take on the issue of that particular post?

We appreciate that.

Thank you very much Dan Schaefer from the recombobulation area is up next

Tomorrow on the program, a nice typical Wednesday morning with Eli Bardot, the editor of the Up North News Daily Newsletter.

We'll join us just after the 7 o'clock news.

We will be visited by Earl Ingram to talk about the what's going on with Earl Ingram podcast on civic media Melissa Baldoff will have our client check a climate check rather we'll talk to Jimmy Koska civic media sports director and more that's all coming up tomorrow here between six and nine on mornings with Pat quite low powered by up front news on the civic media radio network Dan Schaefer from the recon population area civic media political editor joins us now as well.

Mr. Schaefer.

Good morning.

How are you?

Good morning, Mr. Creightlow.

Always wonderful to join you here on Mornings with Pat Creightlow.

Powered by Up North News.

You gotta give the

whole thing.

The whole marketing thing.

The

whole thing.

You're right.

The whole

smear.

They

get bad if you

don't give the whole title all the time.

So Dan, thank you for joining me on Mornings with Pat Crite Low, powered by Up North News on the Civic Media Radio Network.

It's like talking about yourself in third person.

That's right.

It's

awkward and yet it's what the people want.

Did you partake in some observing of No Kings Rallys over the weekend?

I did.

I did go to the Milwaukee No Kings rally.

Took some photos.

You can see those photos now at the Reconbobulation area.

Wasn't able to be there for the entire event, but I got there, saw a couple of the speakers, and then made my way through the crowd and kind of tagged along with the march and took some photos and just kind of took it all in.

It was a great experience.

Very peaceful in Milwaukee.

know, lots of people very fired up.

You know, I saw that we had at the Milwaukee one with there was a, you know, presence from some voices that you may hear on the civic media network.

Earl Ingram was the emcee, Maggie Dawn spoke Angela Lang spoke.

So it was, it was a great event.

And, and again,

you know not disruptive which by the way is not just a credit to all the people that showed up and didn't take the bait but frankly it just doesn't sound like a lot of people were out there baiting the crowds I mean we've heard people drove by and gave you know one finger salutes and honked their horns but there was

I would say minimal disruption or counter protesting.

It was just a largely peaceful day of protest, which is about as American as it gets.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

The only thing I saw in Milwaukee, there was one part of the parade route went past like an apartment building and somebody was trying to like drive out of the parking garage and towards traffic.

And it was blocked by the several blocks of protesters.

And I just thought it was funny that the person leaving at that time happened to be driving a Tesla.

So they blocked the Tesla from trying to get out of their apartment downtown.

I did get a little kind of a kick out of that.

Well, yeah, because if it had been a Subaru, you know, the crowd would have parked here.

Come on down.

It's just fine, but they're, they're not doing that for a Tesla by, by no stretch whatsoever.

So yeah.

So we did have, have these rallies that got out there.

And again, just from the standpoint of, of observing it, we talked to camp Stevenson in our last half hour about how, you know, in many places,

crowds were double or even triple what they were for the protests in June, that at the moment, there does not seem to be anything that would indicate the pendulum swinging back toward support for Donald Trump.

If that many more people want to show up this time at a protest, then clearly

People don't show up at these things unless they've got a beef.

There's no George Soros paycheck or anything like that.

These are people that have legitimate gripes or at least concerns about what's happening in the present day.

That's exactly right.

It's a whole lot of people who are very concerned about the future of the country and the present of the country and what has happened over the last nine months since Donald Trump has returned to office.

And, you know, I found it so funny and, you know, predictably, I guess, to a certain extent, Republicans are just like,

you know, saying, uh, oh, well, he was elected.

You don't have a king.

You know, this is an, no kings.

Well, look what he is doing.

He is governing as if he was a king.

Look at what just yesterday at the White House, they're tearing down, you know, part of the East Wing.

It does not seem like he has any plans to leave.

He has his Donald Trump 2028 gift shop merch next to tearing down a part of the White House.

Like it doesn't seem like he has any plans to leave.

And then just look at everything that he is doing as, as president now.

trying to trample over the Constitution, trample over court orders, pretty much sideline Congress entirely, governed by executive order.

Yeah, this is the exact type of thing that we should all be concerned with, the rise of encroaching authoritarianism.

Yes, the monarchy wannabes, if you will, out there.

you know, complacent, compliant Congress that goes along with it.

The only person that was, you know, posting more obsessively to social media than Donald Trump was Derek Van Orden, with reportedly at least 250 posts to Twitter over the course of the weekend, because again, it's not like he's got anything else to do in Congress these days.

But

I mean, I would like to think we are paying our presidents and our members of Congress to do more than obsessively post to social media.

I mean, I can do that, but I haven't been elected to anything.

Well, I saw that one of the one of the guys from that group Midas touch posted something saying that Derek van Orden made 257 posts Saturday and Sunday on X breaking Nancy Mace's record for a weekend and pushing Mike Lee into third all time.

So he's, you know, he's really breaking records out here.

Even Derek van Orden ramped it up this weekend for his for his posts pretty wild.

Yeah, really, really not advertising.

himself as as any, any kind of effective lawmaker at all.

And again, he's towing the company line like Speaker Mike Johnson, I guess Congressman Brian style was on upfront on WISN TV in Milwaukee this past weekend, along with Congresswoman Gwen Moore from Milwaukee.

And again, nobody likes to say, Well, there's nothing new.

The fact of the matter is there, there is nothing new.

In DC, Brian Stiles is still parodying the Republican points.

Gwen Moore is still telling you what's actually happening with the shutdown.

If anything is new...

It's the ongoing number of federal employees and others who are concerned about the lack of paychecks.

I mean, was it in Milwaukee or elsewhere?

They're starting to do food drives for like federal workers, TSA workers, things like that.

That's where

we're

at.

That's where we're at.

And I think you mentioned this on the show all the time.

It's just Republicans could end this pretty much whatever that they want to, right?

I mean, it's and, you know, and I think Republicans are

been really losing the argument on what Democrats are, you know, making this shutdown about, which is extending those health care tax credits.

And I think, you know, we saw some data come across yesterday in Wisconsin about how, you know, the Wisconsin Democratic Party released some information about how high average premiums are going to be going up across the state without these subsidies being in place.

So it's, you know, we're still seeing the standoff, but I think, you know, we had even

Marjorie Taylor Greene last week saying that, you know, this is going to impact people in my district, people in Georgia.

And I think many people, members of Congress are seeing that, like, if Republicans decide not to play ball on negotiating on these tax credits, it's going to be bad for all of their constituents back home.

It's going to be bad for all of them in the midterms.

Yeah, again, there is no, there's no position or talking point from the Republicans that makes Americans go, oh, yeah, I could totally see.

that side of it.

Whereas they're hearing Democrats talking about health insurance cost spiking, they're seeing the spiking and understanding, you know, that's not BS.

And so yeah, you see why public opinion is the way that it is.

So well, let's let's shift gears then back to the state level that you cover so well.

And we'll talk about the governor's race here for a sec, because we we did get a chance to interview Francesca Hong.

We heard that interview back early this morning.

We had killed a Royzon last week.

Of course, more candidates, you know, as we're able to get them on the show here and across the Civic Media Radio Network.

But I wanted to, you know, come back to my question to Fran was about what lane are you in in trying to stand out?

And she embraced the wildcard label like the Uno game.

And she framed it in a way is that the Uno card, the wildcard in Uno,

can change the direction of the game.

And it's like she's trying to shift the conversation, make sure it doesn't drift too far, moderate, I guess, if you'd call it that.

You want to go through and so can we, without trying to pigeonhole, but the lanes that these people are in, if Fran is the, you know, the wildcard lane, where does that put David Crawley and Missy Hughes and things like that?

How would you, how would you kind of describe their lanes?

Yeah, I think there's a couple things going on here with it because I think there's both some

ideological lanes, as you kind of pointed to Francesca Hong being probably with the most progressive candidate in the field for governor that who has announced just yet.

And so I think there will be, you know, progressive, moderate, finding that center, whatever it might be.

I also think there are kind of some regional lanes to examine with this too, because Francesca Hong and Calderois being from Madison, David Crowley being the Milwaukee County executive.

So I think there are some lanes regionally that we should be taking into consideration, too, because I think that's going to be a big part of the primary calculus.

And I do think, unlike the Senate race a couple of years ago that we had in Democratic primary in 2022,

You know, I think this is going to be a race that is going to go all the way to the primary.

I don't think this is going to be one that is going to, you know, have someone emerge as some sort of clear front runner and everybody step aside.

That happened pretty late in the race with Mandela Barnes in 2022.

You know, I certainly could see it happening on the Republican side if Tom Tiffany does land that apparently coveted Trump endorsement.

And, but I think, you know, Francesca Hong could be the progressive candidate.

candidate here, David Crowley, I think he's the only candidate that really has executive experience.

So that could be a part of the lane that he carves out.

You know, if Kelda Roy's as she did in 2018 gets a lot of endorsements from a lot of pro choice reproductive rights groups, you know, that could be a part of her candidacy to and then Sarah Rodriguez, you know, being a candidate that flipped a assembly district from red to blue, she could kind of be somebody who who could be indicative of

those shifts that are happening in the suburbs, especially given her health care background.

You know, I think there are places like, you know, Wauwatosa and Whitefish Bay around Milwaukee that have zoomed to the left in recent years and may perhaps Rodriguez could be a candidate to speak to those types of voters.

Yeah.

And then you've got Missy Hughes, you know, running in the

lane of

business savvy from the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation.

And so yeah, you've got some some

they're bunched up regionally.

But it feels like everybody's got their own little area of expertise that frankly, if you're a voter, I mean, I'm not gonna lie, if I were going into that booth right now, if today were August 11, 2026, I think a whole lot of voters would go, mm, you know, and not come in with a firm.

Yep, this is this is my person right or wrong.

So it's why we're going to hear so much of them over the you know, the next many months here.

And

I think it

themselves

and I think this is this is a strong bench to these these are quality candidates and and I do think that Having this debate about what the future of the Democratic Party a future of Wisconsin is going to be is an important one that we need to have because I think you know Nationally and elsewhere Democrats the brand is the brand is bruised to the brand is not in great shape And I do think we often see in Wisconsin an election here that can preview an election now

So can Wisconsin figure out the path forward and maybe they can lead the way for the rest of the Democrats across the country?

Alicia notes on YouTube.

They are all good choices.

And again, that's why there's going to be so much said between now and August 11th.

And like Dan says, probably have a large chunk of the field stay in it all the way through on the other side of the break.

I'm going to ask Dan about Tom Tiffany and Josh Schoeman on the Republican side and whether there is something to be said for not.

necessarily wanting Trump's endorsement if his ratings continue to fall as we get closer to next August.

That's coming up right after this.

I'm Pat Crightlow.

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All right back now with Dan Schaefer at just about 8.53 on this Tuesday October 21st.

Nice to have you along here.

Let's wrap up our conversation on the governor's race and then we're going to get into some disturbing allegations about how the Department of Public Instruction has handled possible sexual misconduct cases.

So that topic is coming up in just a moment but to wrap up the gubernatorial

nomination discussions.

You've got two candidates in there right now.

Everybody, everybody in quotation marks believes Tom Tiffany is the front runner being a member of Congress, a longtime member of the state legislature prior to that.

Josh Shulman is the Washington County executive and

I think it was last week, I said Dan, that there's no real reason for President Donald Trump to make an endorsement.

If there's just the two candidates, he can let them fight it out to see who can grovel the most, who can love him the most publicly and all that.

But in light of the No Kings protests, I mean, this is a fair question to ask.

Is there something to be said?

for looking at the tea leaves and saying, you know, it's okay if Trump doesn't endorse me, either one of those two, because as we get closer to the August primary, it could be that there's a lane for one of them to say, you know, I'm going to be the one who's independent from Donald Trump right now.

That's a death now in a Republican primary.

But might there be a lane for that by next summer?

It's an interesting question and one to consider because you know Trump's popularity has never been lower than it is right now It's about right now.

It's about where it was, you know following January 6th But I do think that you know, he's he's still so popular within the Republican Party And I think the Republican Party, you know folks Republicans in Wisconsin also recognize that Trump was able to drive turnout

in ways that most other Republican candidates have not been able to do.

He won the vote in the state last year by really driving turnout among a lot of voters who don't typically turn out in every election.

So I think that was part of the calculus and why they really tied themselves to Trump in the state Supreme Court race with Brad Schimmel.

And I think it's why we're going to see candidates continue to do that in Wisconsin because Trump won here and he won here by driving

turnout and I think that is you know whether or not the Trump endorsement is a really a good thing for the general election for Republicans you know that's a conversation that we can we can have around this time next year but I do think that you know in a primary it matters and I think just to the larger calculus of how many votes are going to turn out in next November I think you know he's still

been proven to drive that turnout and I think that's going to be a factor for why Republicans are going to stick with him through the midterms.

So the easiest prediction I will make all day is that the eventual Republican nominee on August 10th will tell you how close they are to Donald Trump.

On August 11th will win the primary and on August 12th will say I am the person who is going to be an independent voice for Wisconsin and I don't need Donald Trump.

That's just my bold prediction for

that.

That's a very sound prediction.

Mr. Cratlow

Thank you.

Thank you.

That's what they pay me to do here almost so now on a much more somber serious topic There was a year-long investigation done by the cap times out of Madison The headline is 200 teachers sexual misconduct and grooming cases were shielded from the public and goes on to discuss, you know, what has been the result of their reporting and yet

from the Department of Public Instruction, you have a statement where Superintendent Jill Underly is demanding a public correction of recent reporting by the CapTimes.

and says that any suggestion that the DPI withholds information from the public is categorically false.

And of course, Republicans who have never been necessarily friendly toward public education have, you know, seized upon this right away.

So like it or not, whatever the facts are or not, you now have politicization of these, you know, alleged terrible cases happening in our schools.

And

Dan, I think this is a topic that more people are going to learn about and it's going to stick with us for a while.

Yeah, I think this is a big story, and I think this is a big deal, and I think we should take it seriously.

You know, this is a year-long investigation by the CapTimes that I'll just quote right from the story here, found that the State Department of Public Instruction investigated more than 200 Wisconsin teachers, aides, substitutes, and administrators from 2018 to 2023 who were accused of sexual misconduct or grooming behaviors towards students.

Information previously

unknown to the public.

So you're right, Republicans did react to this quickly.

They have called an assembly committee hearing.

And like you said, Jill Underly has since, her office has since released a statement disputing some of the reporting.

However, I will note that she refused to be interviewed for this story by the CapTimes, which to me is always a little bit telling.

Like if she's trying to play cleanup or the office there is trying to play cleanup after the fact of a story, it doesn't sit the same way as if you answered these questions to begin with.

So I think, you know, I think Dr. Underly

uh has some I think this is a serious story and I think they have invited her to appear at this assembly committee hearing and if you're not going to respond to reporters if you're not going to respond to journalists you're going to end up sitting for a story like this you're going to end up sitting in front of an assembly hearing and having to answer in a very different way in a very public way and I think that's where she's headed here and I think this is this is a this is a disturbing story in a lot of ways it's it's one that it's a tough read where you know we can't really talk about that much of it

here on the radio, but I would encourage folks to read this one because it's a lot of serious topics, and this is a serious investigative story that we need to take seriously.

And from a press standpoint and a politics standpoint, and I'm not saying this is necessarily a case of it, but there have been plenty of cases where people don't respond.

In essence, they are wishing the story away, and you cannot wish away

a request by a reporter to look into something serious, just because you don't talk to them doesn't mean the story won't get done.

And that's, you know, some folks discover that the hard way.

So again, a serious story that we'll be following for the foreseeable future here.

And you can read more of Dan's reporting, following up on this at the reconpopulationarea.news as Civic Media's political editor.

Dan, thank you so much.

Appreciate your time.

Hope you have a great day.

Thanks, Pat.

Be well.

All right.

Thank you.

Coming up next, Matt Naranair, I will join Jane and Greg at 9.35.

And then of course, we'll have a lot of our regular Wednesday guests coming up tomorrow morning.

I'm Pat Kretlow from Up North News, part of Courier Newsroom, a pro-democracy news network.

We will see you tomorrow morning here, bright and early 6 a.m.

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