Wisconsin recall vote is telling, but of what?

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker's decisive victory in Tuesday's recall election is a blow to the state's Democratic Party and its union allies and a spur to officials in other states who want to challenge the pension benefits of public-employee workers.

By Morry Gash, AP

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker speaks to supporters at his victory party on Tuesday in Waukesha, Wis.

By Morry Gash, AP

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker speaks to supporters at his victory party on Tuesday in Waukesha, Wis.

However, even top officials of Mitt Romney's presidential campaign caution against over-reading its meaning for November's presidential elections, saying it demonstrates that the Badger State is competitive but not that Republicans can count on it.

On the other hand, neither can Democrats — though President Obama now leads in polling there.

There is "no doubt" that Romney is the underdog but the state is "very competitive," Walker said on ABC Wednesday, fresh from his victory over Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett. He said the country is "hungry for leaders who are willing to stand up and say it like it is and tell people what they are going to do and then mean it."

White House spokesman Jay Carney dismissed November implications from Tuesday's vote. "I certainly wouldn't read much into yesterday's result beyond its effect on who's occupying the governor's seat today in Wisconsin," he told reporters aboard Air Force One Obama headed for San Francisco.

Surveys of voters as they left polling places show a tighter race in Wisconsin for Obama this year than his easy 56%-42% win over Republican John McCain in 2008, but he still leads Romney by 51%-44% and is preferred over him on handling the economy.

Still, Wisconsin is one of several once-solidly Democratic states — Pennsylvania and Michigan are others — that are viewed as battlegrounds this time. All three voted Democratic in the last five presidential elections.

"I do think it's in play, and that's telling," Ed Gillespie, a senior adviser to the Romney campaign, said today at a breakfast with reporters hosted by Bloomberg News. But he said the outcome reflected state issues and candidates and wasn't "a proxy fight" for Obama and Romney.

"It would be foolish for any Democrat to take these states for granted," says Democratic pollster Mark Mellman. (He was a strategist for a state Senate candidate in Wisconsin whose victory Tuesday tips control of the state Senate to the Democrats.) "But there's not a lot of vulnerability here for President Obama. The same exit polls that had Barrett losing by six points show Obama ahead of Romney by similar margins."

Beyond the presidential race, the results show a willingness by voters even in Wisconsin, the first state to provide collective bargaining rights to public employees, to curb the cost of their benefits. Voters by 52%-47% approved of recent changes in state law that limited the ability of public workers to collectively bargain over pay and benefits.

And in California on Tuesday, voters in San Diego and San Jose overwhelmingly approved initiatives that would cut pension benefits for municipal employees as part of an effort to balance city budgets that are in the red.

Walker's victory "will have a huge impact on how a lot of states deal with their looming insolvency," predicts Republican strategist Steve Schmidt. If the governor had lost, it would have had "a huge freezing effect" on efforts to curb public employee benefits.

Veteran Democratic strategist Robert Shrum agrees that there is "obviously a real sentiment" to curb retirement benefits for public workers. "People have a sense the pension benefits are very generous and need to be scaled back or public employees need to contribute more," he says.

Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO, sought to put the best spin possible on the outcome.

"Last night's results were not what we had hoped for, but this was not the end of the story but rather the beginning," he told reporters Wednesday. "We knew a recall election would be tough, and we knew that we would be outspent. In the end, though, the best funded politician in state history spent more than $50 million to hold onto his office, but he could not hold onto a majority in the state senate."

One more lesson from Tuesday: Voters are leery of replaying elections. Six in 10 Wisconsin voters said recalls were appropriate only in cases of official misconduct. Those voters supported Walker by more than 2-1.

Only three governors have faced recalls in U.S. history. Walker was the first to survive.

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No Recall

For disappointed Democrats, seduced by early exit polls into a vain hope that the union-busting Wisconsin governor Scott Walker might actually be recalled from office late last night, the good news is that some of their pre-election spin still holds up. Yesterday’s recall vote is not necessarily a bellwether for the general election, not necessarily a sign that Mitt Romney can win a slew of purple states, not necessarily proof that the country is ready to throw in with Walker’s fellow Wisconsinite Paul Ryan on issues of spending and taxation.

But neither is it anything like good news for liberalism. We are entering a political era that will feature many contests like the war over collective bargaining in Wisconsin: grinding struggles in which sweeping legislation is passed by party-line votes and then the politicians responsible hunker down and try to survive the backlash. There will be no total victory in this era, but there will be gains and losses — and the outcome in the Walker recall is a warning to Democrats that their position may be weaker than many optimistic liberals thought.

To understand the broader trends at work, a useful place to turn is Jay Cost’s essay on “The Politics of Loss” in the latest issue of National Affairs. For most of the post-World War II era, Cost argues, our debates over taxing and spending have taken place in an atmosphere of surplus. The operative question has been how best to divide a growing pie, which has enabled politicians in both parties to practice a kind of ideologically flexible profligacy. Republicans from Dwight Eisenhower to George W. Bush have increased spending, Democrats from John F. Kennedy to Bill Clinton have found ways to cut taxes, and the great American growth machine has largely kept the toughest choices off the table.

But not anymore. Between our slowing growth and our unsustainable spending commitments, “the days when lawmakers could give to some Americans without shortchanging others are over; the politics of deciding who loses what, and when and how, is upon us.” In this era, debates will be increasingly zero-sum, bipartisan compromise will be increasingly difficult, and “the rules and norms of our politics that several generations have taken for granted” will fade away into irrelevance.

It’s useful to think of Obama’s stimulus bill and Walker’s budget repair bill as mirror image exercises in legislative shock and awe.

This is a perfect encapsulation of what’s happened in Wisconsin these last two years: Walker and the Republicans used a narrow mandate to enact unexpectedly dramatic public-sector reforms, and the Democrats responded by upping the ante significantly, with mass protests, walkouts by state legislators and finally a recall campaign. A similar story could be told about Barack Obama’s Washington, in which a temporarily ascendant Democratic Party pushed through sweeping spending bills and social-compact altering health care legislation before unprecedented Republican obstructionism ground the process to a halt. In fact, it’s useful to think of Obama’s stimulus bill and Walker’s budget repair bill as mirror image exercises in legislative shock and awe, and the Tea Party and the Wisconsin labor protests as mirror images of backlash.

At both the state and national level, then, the two coalitions are aiming for a mix of daring on offense, fortitude on defense and ruthless counterattacks whenever possible. The goal is to simultaneously maximize the opportunities presented to one’s own side and punish the other party for trying to do the same.

That’s obviously what the organizers of the recall hoped to do to Walker – to punish his union busting and spending cuts as thoroughly as House Democrats were punished in the 2010 mid-term elections for the votes they cast on the health care bill and the stimulus. The fact that the labor unions and liberal activists failed where the Tea Party largely succeeded sends a very different message, though: It tells officeholders that it’s safer to take on left-wing interest groups than conservative ones (the right outraised and outspent the left by a huge margin in the recall election), safer to cut government than to increase revenue, safer to face down irate public sector employees than irate taxpayers.

A similar message is currently being telegraphed by the respective postures of the two parties in Washington. The House Republicans have spent the past two years taking tough votes on entitlement reform, preparing themselves for an ambitious offensive should 2012 deliver the opportunity to cast those same votes and have them count. The Senate Democrats, on the other hand, have failed to even pass a budget: There is no Democratic equivalent of Paul Ryan’s fiscal blueprint, no Democratic plan to swallow hard and raise middle class taxes the way Republicans look poised to swallow hard and overhaul Medicare. Indeed, there’s no liberal agenda to speak of at the moment, beyond a resounding “No!” to whatever conservatism intends to do.

That “No!” might still be enough to win Barack Obama re-election. But November 2012 will just be one battle in a longer war, and the outcome in Wisconsin suggests that the edge in that war currently (and to some extent unexpectedly, given the demographic trends that favor the left) belongs to a limited government conservatism. The Democrats threw almost everything they had at Scott Walker, and it wasn’t nearly enough. And when you fail in what is essentially a defensive campaign, it makes it that much more difficult to get back on offense.

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Recall of the Wild

In The Conversation, David Brooks and Gail Collins talk between columns every Wednesday.

Gail Collins: David I’m really sad about the results from Wisconsin. I can’t find a silver lining. You and I totally disagree about what this vote means, and my analysis is much more depressing.

Although I am kind of excited about the fact that we’re so opposed. You’re generally so reasonable, it’s hard to have a real knock-down fight.

David Brooks: As Sonny Liston said to Cassius Clay, “Bring it on.” It’s O.K. to have a knock-down disagreement once in a while. I’ll just start out by noting that a lot of Democrats agree with me on this one. Scott Walker won easily in Wisconsin, a state that went for Barack Obama by 14 points last time and will probably go for him again (if you believe last night’s exit polls, though I don’t see why any of us should since they also suggested that the recall vote was close).

Gail: You see the recall as a test case on whether the public will make the hard choices when it comes to reducing our debt. I saw it as a test of the current Republican strategy of putting all the sacrifice on the backs of the un-wealthy. Announcing that public employees have to get fewer benefits and lose their power to negotiate isn’t a hard choice if you happen to be the party that does not benefit from much union support.

Andy Manis/Getty ImagesA group sang a union song at an election rally in Madison, Wis.

David: I’m not sure what you mean by less wealthy. These particular public employees were receiving benefits and pensions far above those received by the median earner in Wisconsin. But this is a national problem. In state after state, from New York to Illinois to California, the lavish over-promises made to public employees are squeezing budgets, making it harder to fund schools and social programs and all the rest.

These promises weren’t a Robin Hood venture. Quite the reverse.

Gail: The issue here wasn’t whether the public employee benefits should be cut. Walker campaigned on that when he ran for governor and he won. But he never mentioned eliminating the unions’ collective bargaining power – it was, as he said in what he thought was a private conversation with a big-bucks Republican, his “bomb.” 

David: Now, as I wrote in my column the other day, I think Walker should have taken a whack out of a Republican group, too. It takes more than one governor to bring fiscal sanity, and that means you have to construct a long-term agenda that will be followed by both Democrats and Republicans. You need bipartisan buy-in.

Still, I have to give Walker credit. He did do the hard thing. The proof that it was hard was that he had to go through this whole recall effort. Not many people are willing to do that. It took guts.

Gail: Gutsy maybe, but not admirable. This is a Wisconsin version of what we see in Congress. The Tea Partiers happily slash away at programs that their voters don’t care about and pretend they’re being heroic. They take on special interests, but only the ones that support their opponents. That’s not calling for sacrifice. That’s just raiding the enemy camp when nobody’s home but women and children.

David: There are some similarities between what’s happening in Madison and what’s happening in Washington, but I would put them differently. Both in Wisconsin and on the national level, the most expensive subsidies go to the middle and upper middle class, not to the poor. On the federal level it’s Medicare. Retirees receive two or three dollars in benefits for every dollar they have put into Medicare. Their grandchildren are involuntarily paying the bill, or will be.

Strong special interests protect that benefit. Somebody has to take them on.

But this is not about poverty programs or income distribution.

Gail:   I would kind of like to believe this is a country where average people can retire to a comfortable, though far from opulent, old age. But as I said, there’s not much disagreement that something’s got to give on pensions. The question is whether all the giving comes from one side. It’s true that Walker has balanced his state’s budget. But so has Andrew Cuomo in New York. Both states are going to have to make more changes to stay in the black, but to me what Cuomo has accomplished is way more impressive. He got giveback from the unions by negotiating with them. Right now, we’re in a pretty good mood in New York, for New Yorkers. At least — unlike some states I could mention — we don’t have any instances of people running over their spouses in an attempt to get to the polls.

David:  In this case I’m with you. Walker was needlessly partisan and confrontational. I’ve spoken to several other governors, and the lesson they’ve learned is that you have to take on the sort of interests he took on, but you don’t have to be so absolute about it. I’ve gone back and forth about whether he should have settled for benefit cuts without going after the public employee unions’ collective bargaining powers.

The benefit cuts alone would have passed easily. On the other hand, the fact that states across the country face similar problems is a sign that the bargaining balance is out of whack. Private sector unions have a normal check on their ambitions that public sector unions don’t have. They don’t have to worry about bankruptcy and they get to elect management. F.D.R. understood all this when he called the idea of strikes by federal employees “unthinkable and intolerable.”

Gail:  It’s unfortunate that most of what’s left of organized labor is in the public sector. But crippling the union movement, wherever it’s based, is bad for the country. Labor in general provides a critical counterbalance to the power of big business on all sorts of issues not directly related to their own members’ benefits. And of course, the big point of this for Republicans was to take out a critical Democratic support group.

David: If Walker had lost, no leader anywhere would have wanted to take on an entrenched interest to reduce debt. It would have been ruinous to our fiscal future. And I don’t see this as a verdict on organized labor as a whole. I’ve come to the conclusion that we somehow need to strengthen private sector unions, even as we restrain the public sector ones.

Gail: I’m going to hold you to that thought in the future. Meanwhile, how do you think this translates for President Obama? Do you think he should have given more help to the recall folks? All he did was send out a couple of tweets, but I’m not sure I blame him for not going up there to campaign. The people the Democrats needed to rally weren’t really his base. I guess you could argue that he should have shown more moral courage, but I’m still giving him some cred for the same-sex marriage thing. You can’t expect more than one principled stand per quarter from any elected official.

David: Nearly a fifth of the people who said they backed Obama voted for Walker. If Obama really thought Walker was wrong, it was coldhearted opportunism not to campaign. I hold out hope that Obama, in his heart of hearts, knew how bad it would be if Walker was recalled, for debt control issues everywhere.

Gail: I’m usually the one defending the president, but I don’t think you can attribute this to his passion for debt control. As far as the effect on his re-election goes, I don’t think you can turn this into a presidential race predictor. It may be contrary to the commentators’ creed, but I still think it’s too early to turn things into referendums on Obama’s chances. There’s a long, long time from June to November. But I am totally bummed out that this is going to encourage the Republicans in Congress to think they can continue their you-sacrifice-I’ll-posture campaign for the duration.

David: I don’t know if it predicts anything or not. Many people are writing that it doesn’t, but they don’t have a clue either.

The nice thing about Wisconsin is that voters got to see if the sky was falling before they had to vote. They looked at their schools, which are now saving money on health care and such and devoting more to education. They decided that the scare stories were not coming true. And this is in what is, presidentially speaking, a Democratic state. Voters in San Diego and San Jose, overwhelmingly Democrats, made the same call on Tuesday when they approved serious pension reforms. They are not fools.

Gail: We will agree to disagree intensely on this one. But your side definitely won the day. Alas.

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Democrats reject GAB's proposed recall timeline - msnbc.com

MADISON, Wis. (AP) -- Democrats oppose a timeline that would put any primary for Gov. Scott Walker's recall election on May 15 with the general election on June 12. Those dates were recommended Friday by the head of the state elections board. They are two weeks later than is required now and any extension would need approval by a judge. Democratic attorney Jeremy Levinson calls the requested extension "totally unreasonable and unnecessary." Levinson says he will fight against the additional time in court. Representatives of Walker's campaign and the Republican Party did not immediately return requests for comment. Government Accountability Board director Kevin Kennedy says there is no way the board can finish its review of the roughly 1.9 million signatures seeking the recall of Walker and five others any sooner than March 30.

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Wisconsin Democrats running first recall ad: ‘Walkergate’ - Washington Post

???initialComments:true! pubdate:02/27/2012 11:24 EST! commentPeriod:14! commentEndDate:3/12/12 12:24 EDT! currentDate:2/26/12 7:0 EST! allowComments:true! displayComments:true!Posted by Rachel Weiner at 11:24 AM ET, 02/27/2012

The Wisconsin Democratic party is releasing its first ad in the recall campaign against Gov. Scott Walker (R) Monday.

“Walkergate” compares a John Doe investigation into current and former Walker aides to the Watergate scandal, juxtaposing news clips about the probe with coverage of the 1970s Nixon scandal.

Petition signatures to recall Walker were filed earlier this year, in response to legislation that eliminated collective bargaining rights for many public employees. Those signatures have yet to be certified, but a recall election against the governor is likely to take place later this year.

As that fight goes forward, prosecutors are investigating four aides and appointees of Walker’s from when he was Milwaukee County executive. Two Walker appointees have been charged with embezzling funds intended for veterans; two aides were charged with illegal fund-raising.

“There are many similarities by Watergate and Walkergate,” said Wisconsin Democratic Party Chairman Mike Tate on a conference call with reporters, saying Walker “has given a blizzard of contradictory statements about what he knew and when he knew it.”

Walker says he is not a target of the probe, but he has hired two defense attorneys and is meeting with prosecutors.

Former Dane County Executive Kathleen Falk and state Sen. Kathleen Vinehout have already entered the Democratic primary to take on Walker.

Democrats would not disclose the amount of money being spent on the “Walkergate” ad, saying only that it’s a rolling buy in multiple markets.

Walker Press Secretary Tom Evenson said the ad was full of “lies and distortions” and that the governor “immediately addressed any issues of misconduct when brought to his attention. ... The character assassination being conducted by Madison Democrats and big-government union bosses in this ad shows they are grasping at straws.”

Walker has been airing ads since the recall petition drive kicked off last fall; he has already raised and spent millions. The political action committee Americans for Prosperity, funded by the billionaire libertarian Koch brothers, has already put hundreds of thousands of dollars into ads supporting the governor.

A recent poll showed Walker leading all likely challengers.

Nia-malika Henderson 

Felicia Sonmez 

Dan Balz 

Sandhya Somashekhar 

Robert Barnes 

Philip Rucker 

David A. Fahrenthold 

Ed O'keefe 

Melinda Henneberger 

Felicia Sonmez 

Carol D. Leonnig 

Glenn Kessler 

Philip Rucker; Dan Balz 

Rachel Weiner 

Eric Yoder 

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Battle lines stark as Wis. recall push nears end (AP)

MILWAUKEE – Sonja O'Brien heard from the hecklers outside the Potawatomi casino as she collected signatures in a final push to recall Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker.

One man yelled at her for forcing the state to spend millions on a recall election. A woman told her she was annoying. And Jack Bublitz, a 75-year-old retired banker, said Democrats would never collect enough names.

"You're not going to do it! You're not going to do it!" Bublitz yelled at her.

But O'Brien figured these naysayers were relatively civil compared to most days over the past two months in what has become a bitter brawl to oust Walker from office. Now the fight is about to move from the streets to the courtroom.

Democrats want to wind up the signature drive this weekend and get the names to state election officials by Tuesday's deadline. GOP legal challenges are almost certain to follow.

The signature campaign has been a microcosm of a political landscape that remains toxic and highly divided a year after the Republican governor introduced his plan to strip almost all public workers of their collective bargaining rights.

"These people are being ridiculous," Bublitz said as he hurried inside the casino. "We elected Walker. Let him serve out his term."

O'Brien, a 57-year-old data technician, shrugged it off.

"We're making history," she said, clad in boots and a parka and armed with two homemade "Recall Walker" signs and a pair of clipboards. "It feels good to empower the people."

Walker argued he had to crack down on unions to balance the state's $3.6 billion budget deficit. But Democrats saw it as a doomsday attack on unions, one of their crucial constituencies.

Thousands of demonstrators protested at the Capitol around the clock for three weeks. The Senate's 14 minority Democrats fled the state in a futile attempt to block a vote on the plan, which Walker eventually signed into law last March.

Democrats have been itching for payback ever since. They ousted two Republican state senators in recall elections last summer, narrowing the GOP's edge in that chamber to just one vote. Now they've set their sights on Walker, Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch, and four more Republican state senators. They need 540,208 signatures against Walker and the same against Kleefisch to trigger separate recall elections.

That figure was on the minds of the dozen or so volunteers in the Madison recall field office Friday. Petition circulators trickled in, handing over yellow and white lists of names. The volunteers scoured the paperwork, searching for mistakes ranging from sloppy handwriting to January signatures dated 2011 instead of 2012.

"It's been full-tilt boogie here for the last two weeks. It's like Santa's political workshop," said volunteer Alan Ginsberg, a retired Madison teacher. "There are few things I've done in my life that are as satisfying as this operation."

The recall effort has intensified the already rigid battle lines. Republicans have decried the recalls as a frivolous power grab that the state can't afford. Democrats maintain Wisconsin can't take Walker for another three years.

A Wisconsin Public Radio/St. Norbert College poll released the same day as the recall signature drive began two months ago found 58 percent of respondents think Walker needs to go, which was up from 47 percent in April. "Recall Walker" signs line yards in Madison, the state's capital. Wisconsin roads are full of vehicles with bumper stickers supporting Walker or calling for his ouster.

In the early days of the signature drive, Walker's supporters vented their anger. In Madison, someone pulled up to a drive-up signature station, grabbed a paper with three signatures on it and ripped it up. Someone anonymously started a Facebook page imploring people to collect petitions and burn them.

The rancor forced state election officials to make an unprecedented call for calm. Then their estimate last week that a statewide recall election would cost $9 million sparked a new round of outrage from Republicans.

State GOP spokesman Ben Sparks said Walker did what he promised he would — make tough decisions to fix the state's finances.

"The Democrats are forcing this completely baseless and expensive recall on Wisconsin families," Sparks said. "Basically, this entire recall effort has been a completely politically driven effort."

Things didn't get brutal outside the Potawatomi casino Wednesday, but passions ran high.

As O'Brien and Karen Hartwell, an unemployed volunteer from Muskego, shivered on public property across the street, a parade of people said they'd already signed a petition. But Michele Corrao, 65, of Grafton, lit up when she saw O'Brien.

"Give me that baby," she said, reaching for O'Brien's clipboard. "I'm dying to sign."

One man berated O'Brien for helping force an election that could cost millions. O'Brien countered the expense would be less than the costs of a new law forcing Wisconsin voters to show voter IDs at the polls.

"We need voter ID because you people are crooked," the man shot back as he stomped off.

The volunteers weren't fazed. In fact, they said, the detractors this day were unusually mild.

"When they're in their cars, that's when they call you blankity-blank-blank," Hartwell said.

Democrats said in December they had collected 507,000 names but have refused to provide any more updates. They want to collect 720,000 signatures, nearly 180,000 more than they need, to ensure the recall withstands GOP court challenges. Sparks said the party has built a statewide network of volunteers to verify signatures, the first step toward a challenge.

Nevertheless, Democrats have scheduled parties around the state this weekend to celebrate.

"Whether or not we reach our internal goal of 720,000 signatures ... this has represented a great victory for democracy and the working people of Wisconsin in the face of a well-financed and totally dishonest corporate agenda run from afar," state Democratic Party chairman Mike Tate said.

Hartwell seemed relieved the drive was almost over. She was clearly suffering from her own personal recall fatigue.

"I've done my part," she said. "I've been out in the rain, in the bitter cold, and I'm done."

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Will Wisconsin Republican Gov. Walker Be Ousted in a Recall? (ContributorNetwork)

ANALYSIS | Wisconsin Democrats are attempting to oust Gov. Scott Walker as result of the messy debate over unions earlier this year. They are emboldened by recent recall elections and an Ohio referendum, but history shows it won't be so easy.

The Dairy State was treated to a fight over proposed new government powers to curtail union rights. We saw the spectacle of Democrat politicians fleeing the state to avoid a vote, Republicans going the extra mile to drag them back, and protesters disrupting the state capitol in a preview of "Occupy Wall Street." The GOP got its legislative victory, but Democrats struck back. Two Republican legislators (Dan Kapanke and Randy Hopper) were recalled in special elections. In other states, two more Republicans were booted in recall elections in November, while an anti-union measure was slammed by Ohio voters.

Democrats hope to bag their biggest prize: Scott Walker himself. The recall movement kicks off less than a week after the November election. Polls show several Wisconsin Democrats (Russ Feingold, Tom Barrett) would beat Walker in an election. But Democrats may well fall short.

Hopper and Kapanke may have gone down to defeat, as did Russell Pearce and Paul Scott, but not all recall elections are successful. Analysis of the National Conference of State Legislatures data reveals that such a strategy has only worked 17 times against state legislators. In 15 cases, it didn't. This includes several GOP state legislators in Wisconsin this year (and a few Democrats in the state, as Republicans retaliated unsuccessfully).

Recall supporters point out that other politicians have been ousted, but that list includes only two governors: Republican Lynn Frazier in North Dakota in 1921 and Gray Davis in California in 2003. Many other attempts to dump governors, mayors, and municipal politicians have fizzled.

On many occasions, petitioners have tried to oust Federal officials (mostly for political reasons rather than any real malfeasance) without success, as the Constitution has no such provision (though the Founding Fathers kicked around the idea).

Recalls bids have a spotty record at best. When enough petitions are gathered, the ousting rate is barely 50 percent, and that doesn't include failed court challenges or cases where organizers couldn't muster the minimum number of petitions. And while Walker may have higher disapproval ratings and less popularity than Feingold and Barrett, a slight majority doesn't support a recall at this time. So even though Democrats are on a hot streak, they have their work cut out for them in a recall effort against Walker.

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Dems plan midnight launch for Wis. governor recall (AP)

MADISON, Wis. – Political foes hoping to recall Republican Gov. Scott Walker over his moves to significantly curb union rights in Wisconsin planned a late-night rally and early morning pajama parties to officially kick off the effort.

More than 100 events were planned across the state Tuesday to begin collecting the more than 540,000 signatures required to get a recall election on Wisconsin's ballot next year. Supporters have until Jan. 17 to turn in signatures.

Walker came out swinging, running his first television ad in reaction to the recall during the Green Bay Packers' Monday night football game. The 30-second ad features a school board member from Waukesha speaking in support of the governor, followed by Walker talking directly to the camera.

"Wisconsin's best days are yet to come," Walker says in the ad. "It won't happen overnight, but we are on our way."

Walker's campaign manager Keith Gilkes said the ad was running in all Wisconsin markets except Milwaukee and would be up for at least a week.

Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefsich and at least three Republican state senators also will be targeted for recall next year. Two GOP state senators lost their seats during recall elections this summer.

"I fully anticipate there will be signatures collected in every single Wisconsin county tomorrow," said state Democratic Party Chairman Mike Tate. He said he hoped to collect at least 600,000 signatures by the deadline.

The recalls organized by Democrats, labor unions and others, are largely motivated by Republicans' adoption of a Walker-supported law that effectively ended collective bargaining rights for most public workers. Wrangling over the law earlier this year spurred protests that grew as large as 100,000 people and motivated all 14 Democratic state senators to flee for three weeks in an ultimately vain attempt to stop the proposal.

Walker said Monday he remains focused on fulfilling his campaign promise to grow jobs by 250,000 by 2015, when the term he was elected to last year ends. He defended his record and said voters were ready to move forward and didn't want to get stuck in an endless campaign cycle.

"We've made a lot of progress," he said. "It's a new day in Wisconsin."

Governors have only been recalled from office twice in U.S. history, in North Dakota in 1921 and in California when voters removed Gov. Gray Davis from office in 2003.

Walker recall organizers hope to tap ongoing anger over the collective bargaining law and build on momentum from last week's vote rejecting a similar law in Ohio. Wisconsin doesn't allow for a referendum challenging its law to be put on the ballot, so opponents targeted Walker and the three state senators.

"Any recall attempts filed will be nothing more than a shameless power grab by the Democrats and their liberal special interests, and will not deter Republicans from moving the state forward under responsible leadership," Republican Party spokeswoman Nicole Larson said Monday.

One Tuesday march and rally is planned for outside Walker's private residence in the Milwaukee suburb of Wauwatosa. Organizers said they would gather petition signatures on the lawns of Walker's neighbors. In downtown Madison, a Democratic state lawmaker planned to circulate the petitions in his neighborhood near the Capitol.

This summer nine state senators — three Democrats and six Republicans — underwent recall elections spawned by their position on the collective bargaining law. Two Republican incumbents lost, leaving the GOP with a narrow one-vote majority in the state Senate. Republicans also control the Assembly.

The three Republican state senators being targeted for recall by the Democratic Party this time around are Van Wanggaard of Racine, Pam Galloway of Wausau and Terry Moulton of Chippewa Falls, according to Tate. All three defeated Democratic incumbents in 2010.

"I can't be distracted by what they're going to do," Wanggaard said. "If this is going to happen, it's going to happen. We're going to work hard to stay."

Galloway and Moulton had no comment.

Republican Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald said he has not ruled out Republicans running as Democrats on the ballot to force a primary election and prolong the process, as was done in the summer recalls. He also said he expected to be targeted for recall, but would wait until when signatures are returned in January to decide whether to go after any Democrats.

But he said others not operating with support of the party may file their own recall petitions sooner.

The Senate races will be fought in their current legislative districts, not under new boundaries set to take effect with the November 2012 elections. Republicans redrew the district maps earlier this year as required every 10 years when new Census data is released.

The new lines are generally more favorable to Republicans, making it more urgent for Democrats to target the incumbents before those boundaries take effect.

The Wisconsin Republican Party announced Monday that it was launching a website to gather details about potential fraud related to recall petition circulation. Party executive director Stephan Thompson encouraged people to submit videos, recordings, photos and other incident reports that he said would be reviewed by party staff as well as retired law enforcement officers.

One Wisconsin Now director Scot Ross said his liberal group also would be closely monitoring the recall process to dispel misinformation and make sure the work of those legally seeking signatures isn't impeded.

Democrats do not yet have an announced candidate to take on Walker should enough signatures be collected to force an election. The earliest such an election could occur, without any expected delays in verifying the signatures or legal challenges, is March 27. Most expect any election would be later in the spring or in the summer.

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Arizona recall vote energizes Democrats (AP)

By JERI CLAUSING and PAUL DAVENPORT, Associated Press Jeri Clausing And Paul Davenport, Associated Press – Sun Nov 13, 8:54 am ET

PHOENIX – Last week's recall election defeat of the Republican legislator who wrote Arizona's tough anti-immigration law and the seating of Democratic mayors in Phoenix and Tucson have given Democrats renewed hope for picking up the state in next year's Senate and presidential elections.

Combined, the outcomes underscored the diversity of voters in what many view as a conservative state even though voters here are split nearly in thirds among Republicans, independents and Democrats.

The Democratic Party argued that Tuesday's recall of state Senate President Russell Pearce was evidence of a broader shift to the left that will reverberate in 2012.

"For the first time in 20 years, we will have Democratic mayors of Tucson and Phoenix," state Democratic Party Chairman Andrei Cherny wrote in an email to supporters. "And for the first time in American history, a state legislative leader - the most powerful politician in Arizona - was recalled from office. These are victories for all Arizonans - ones that six months ago would have seemed all but impossible."

"A year from now, when we are looking back on Election Day 2012, we will point to last night as where things turned around for our party and state," he added.

Republicans dismissed Tuesday's results as coming from an "abnormal election" funded by out-of-state interests upset by Arizona's 2010 enactment of the groundbreaking immigration enforcement law known as SB1070.

"They thought this proved a point. It didn't," said Arizona GOP chairman Tom Morrissey. "It will all be undone in the next election. It was a power grab by the left. They won a battle, they have not won the war by any means."

But the rhetoric, new polls and the emphasis being put on Arizona by the Democrats and President Barack Obama's campaign indicates that the state — which on the surface appears solidly red with its two longtime Republican U.S. Senators, a GOP near-sweep of statewide offices and one of the country's most conservative legislatures — is heading into the 2012 elections solidly purple.

In the 2008 presidential race, Arizona was a given for home-state candidate John McCain, the Republican nominee.

And while Republican Gov. Jan Brewer was an easy winner in 2010, Democrat Janet Napolitano twice ran gubernatorial races in the last decade.

"I think that some on the East Coast don't put us there," said Cherny. "But every indication is we are there. The Obama campaign has said Arizona is at the top of the places they are looking at to compete very hard."

In 2012, Obama spokeswoman Ofelia Casillas said, the state will play a "critical role" and has been among the battleground states where its grassroots movement, Organizing for America, has been active. The campaign has also recently hired a Mexican-American regional field director and a Mexican-American fellow who is focused on reaching out to the Latino community.

Those efforts may find fertile ground in a state where Hispanics make up nearly 30 percent of the population.

A recent Rocky Mountain Poll from October showed Obama either about even or apparently ahead of three Republican presidential contenders: Herman Cain, Mitt Romney and Rick Perry.

The same survey also found that only 38 percent of the state's voters call themselves conservative. Thirty-four percent consider themselves moderate while 28 percent call themselves liberal.

"The impression of Arizona as a majority conservative state is more a reflection of gerrymandering and the historically superior strength of conservative forces in getting their voters to the polls," the Behavior Research Center said of the ideological splits.

Indeed, neither party holds a majority of the state's voters. Republicans hold a slight lead with roughly 36 percent of registered voters while roughly 33 percent are independent and 31 percent are Democrats.

The Behavior Research Center pollsters said the recall of Pearce, whom they called "the most powerful conservative voice in state government," may be a "harbinger of what can happen when voters in the center organize to get out their vote and make their election preferences felt."

Organization and appealing to mainstream voters more interested in solving problems than championing extreme politics and hot-button issues like immigration are the focus of the Arizona Democratic party, Cherny said.

In that vein, their hopes in the state's 2012 race for U.S. Senate may have been bolstered last week when Richard Carmona officially entered the race for the seat now held by retiring Republican Jon Kyl. The former surgeon general under President George W. Bush was aggressively recruited by Democratic leaders who hope he will appeal to the state's moderate and independent voters.

Carmona describes himself as a fierce independent and notes that Republicans in the past had also recruited him to run for office. He'll face lesser-known Don Bivens, an attorney and former state party chairman, in the primary, while U.S. Rep. Jeff Flake and businessman Will Cardon will battle for the Republican nomination.

Morrissey, the state Republican chairman, said Tuesday's vote only provides his party's activists with an incentive to work harder. And there's reason for optimism, he said.

"In the wake of all this we still face the same problems: immigration, jobs, education, the economy. It all happens to be tied together," Morrissey said.

___

Clausing reported from Albuquerque, N.M.

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Democrats Hold Their Ground In Wisconsin Recall Votes (The Atlantic Wire)

Wisconsin Democrats, at least, didn't lose any more ground last night in the state's recall elections. Sens. Jim Holperin and Robert Wirch (pictured) held on to their seats and kept the the Republican majority in the Senate to a 17-16 margin, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported. The recall elections--which lost their drama when GOP won four of six elections last week--were seen in part as a referendum on labor organizing efforts in response to the controversial anti-union legislation that Gov. Scott Walker signed amidst large protests earlier this year.

Related: Wisconsin Republicans Keep the State Senate in Recall Vote

But even though Democrats failed to take the Senate, the Sentinel notes, "the narrower [GOP] majority would make it tougher to win approval of controversial legislation, such as stricter abortion restrictions or tougher penalties for illegal immigrants." Which led the Democratic party chairman, Mike Tate, to spin the result into a moral victory (Via National Journal): "[The recall elections] forced Walker and the GOP to pay public lip service to moderation and bipartisanship for the first time since they took power in January. All of these facts show that voters gave Democrats the overall victory in this summer's historic senate recall elections."

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Democrats win in latest Wisconsin recall. Is state a little less red now? (The Christian Science Monitor)

Republicans in Wisconsin’s Senate will retain their razor-edge margin over Democrats in the wake of a special recall election Tuesday.

Voters allowed two Democratic incumbent senators to retain their seats, meaning Republicans have just a one-vote majority in the Senate, 17 to 16. That's a narrower margin than before this month's spate of recall elections. Expectations are that it will push Gov. Scott Walker (R) toward a legislative agenda that holds greater appeal for Democrats or that is handled more sensitively than the so-called “budget repair billâ€

The reshuffling is expected to make it more difficult for the Republican majority to pass controversial legislation such as stricter restrictions on abortion rights or harsher penalties for illegal immigrants.

RECOMMENDED: What Wisconsin says about labor unions' clout in America

An earlier recall election, held Aug. 9, dashed Democrats' hopes of seizing control of the Senate, but it did roll over two Republican seats in their favor. For Republicans, that represented a retrenchment from their gains of the 2010 midterm elections, which swept them into power in both houses of state government and the governor's office.

Both Democratic senators up for recall Tuesday managed double-digit victories. With 95 percent of precincts reporting in District 12 by midnight, Sen. Jim Holperin (D) defeated Kim Simac, a tea party organizer, 55 to 45 percent. In the District 22 race, Sen. Bob Wirch (D) defeated Jonathan Steitz, a corporate attorney, 58 percent to 42 percent, with all precincts reporting.

Senator Wirch’s district represents Kenosha and much of the area in southeast Wisconsin close to the Illinois border. Senator Holperin’s district lies in the northernmost area of the state alongside Green Bay.

Two weeks of recall elections gave both parties an opportunity to declare victory.

In holding their majority, Republicans claimed that voters were less than thrilled to recast votes for state senators they fully supported all along. They also said voters rejected the idea that kicking out their Republican senators served as a de facto referendum on Walker’s legislation, which Democrats portrayed as hostile to public-sector unions and the middle class.

For their part, Democrats claimed they succeeded in creating a Senate that will be less of a rubber stamp for Walker's policies. They also said the closer margin will help to give Democrats their voices back just in time for the 2012 national election cycle.

Telling the Associated Press that Tuesday’s recall election “fundamentally changed the face of power in the Wisconsin legislature,” Wisconsin Democratic Party Chairman Mike Tate suggested that, “at the end of this historic recall effort, Democrats have the momentum.”

Republicans are casting the recall process as “political games” by embittered Democrats, according to Republican Senate majority leader Scott Fitzgerald. “Democrats need to start working with the other side of the aisle, not just moving on to their next recall target,” Senator Fitzgerald said in a statement released Tuesday.

That next recall target is decided: Walker. Mr. Tate and other Democratic leaders have already said they plan to begin efforts this summer to remove Walker from office when he becomes eligible for recall in 2012.

However, the public’s appetite is small for another recall election of a state official, even though Walker has lost some support.

Public Policy Polling, a Raleigh, N.C., polling firm that often works for Democrats, reported Monday that 50 percent of Wisconsin voters oppose recalling Walker, with 47 percent in favor. The findings reverse those in May, when 47 percent of voters opposed a Walker recall and 50 percent were in support.

Because Walker’s approval ratings have been sliding, the growing opposition to his recall probably has more to do with voter fatigue about the process itself.

Some 53 percent of voters disapprove of Walker’s performance. If a recall election were to take place between the current governor and former US Sen. Russ Feingold (D), Mr. Feingold would be the preferred choice for 52 percent of voters, compared with 45 percent who would vote to keep Walker in office.

In a statement, Public Policy Polling Dean Debnam said “a Scott Walker recall is still in the realm of possibility,” but added that “Democrats really might need Russ Feingold to run if they want to knock” Walker off the ballot.

Walker may survive a recall if he tailors more bipartisan issues, like job creation, to independent voters. “It will be nearly impossible [for Walker] to win Democratic voters back, but independent voters currently leaning against him probably could be convinced to come back to his side if the next six months are less divisive than the last seven months,” says Charles Franklin, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.

The Republican whom Democrats are expected to cajole and not criticize is state Sen. Dale Schultz, considered the single moderate in his party. Senator Schultz was the only Senate Republican to vote against Walker’s “budget repair bill,” and many Democrats have suggested that his vote is so valuable that he is first in line for any back-room negotiations that may take place once the Senate reconvenes this fall.

Time will tell whether Schultz ultimately serves as a lynchpin for more bipartisanship in the Senate, says Mr. Franklin. He will be sought after by Republicans, too, for potentially persuading moderate Democrats to vote for bills pushed forward by his own party.

“He’s certainly getting a lot of love and attention from a lot of people. Whether or not he’ll fulfill the role Democrats want him to fulfill” is less certain, Franklin says.

In Wisconsin, voters are about evenly divided among Democrats, Republicans, and independents. “All evidence says [Wisconsin] is still a purple state,” says Franklin, which means it is likely to be among the swing states that decide the national election in 2012. “The underlying complexity of the electorate remains fairly closely divided,” he says. With so much hanging on Wisconsin next year, “a cliffhanger is the most likely outcome.”

RECOMMENDED: What Wisconsin says about labor unions' clout in America

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Wisconsin's historic recall elections wrap up this week (Reuters)

By James B. Kelleher James B. Kelleher – Mon Aug 15, 12:55 pm ET

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Wisconsin's series of recall elections concludes on Tuesday when voters go to the polls in two state Senate districts where Democrats are being forced to defend their seats.

No matter who wins, Republican Governor Scott Walker and his Republican allies will retain control of the legislature, where the battle over public workers' union rights was waged earlier this year with public protests, legislative maneuvering and court challenges.

Republicans have managed to keep control of the state senate -- 17 to 16 at last count -- because Democrats failed to unseat three Republican state Senators in the key round of six GOP senate recalls last week. But Democrats did pick up two state Senate seats formerly held by Walker allies.

To many Wisconsin voters, especially Republicans, the special elections have been, as 70-year-old Wade Ellingson of Fond du Lac put it, "a waste of time and money."

Nevertheless, Tuesday's two final votes, like the seven before them, will be watched closely.

Two Democrats who opposed Walker's anti-union bill and even fled the state for weeks in an unsuccessful effort to prevent a quorum and delay passage -- Jim Holperin of Conover and Robert Wirch of Pleasant Prairie -- will be defending their seats.

"As always in Wisconsin politics, one has to give the incumbent an edge," said Mordecai Lee, governmental affairs professor at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee.

"It is likely the two Democratic incumbents will win their recalls -- but it is not a slam dunk," he said.

Holperin seems to be in the tighter race. His rival is Kim Simac, founder of the Northwoods Patriots, a Tea Party group.

Though Simac is a political novice, the district has leaned Republican in the three years since Holperin was elected.

READING THE TEA LEAVES?

Inside Wisconsin, Tuesday's votes will again be seen as a referendum on Walker's Republican policies since his election last year. It may also give Democrats who hope to recall Walker next year a sense how such an effort might turn out.

Outside the state, pundits will be seeking more clues to what 2012 holds in the national elections.

In Wisconsin, not only have Republicans kept control of the state Senate by the slimmest of margins, the limits they wanted to impose on public workers are now state law.

Walker fought for the curbs, which severely diluted union bargaining power and also make public workers pay more for healthcare and pensions, saying they were needed to help Wisconsin close a $3.6 billion budget deficit.

Democrats cried foul, pointing out that public workers already agreed to steep benefit cuts. They called the effort as union-busting, designed to hobble organized labor -- a major source of Democratic Party financing -- ahead of 2012.

The fight thrust Wisconsin into the national spotlight, igniting massive pro-union protests and political fights that led to the recall efforts against six Republicans who backed the union curbs and three Democrats who opposed them.

On Tuesday, analysts will be watching turnout carefully, since the key issue of senate control --- and a possible legislative block on Walker's conservative agenda -- is settled.

Analysts say Democrats may be less motivated to turn out to vote. Tea Party activists, meanwhile, appear more energized by the recent fight in Washington over the debt ceiling, seen as a clear victory for conservatives in the budget-cutting concessions agreed by President Obama and Democrats.

The nine Wisconsin recalls are historic. Until this summer, there had been only 20 state-level recall elections in the 235-year history of the United States.

Reflecting the national spotlight Wisconsin drew over the winter as Walker and his allies battled state Democrats, a tidal wave The money poured into the campaigns has been something for the record books, too.

Mike Buelow, research director for the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, estimates that candidates and outside groups spent as much as $37 million on the recalls.

That amount is "really astronomical for Wisconsin," he said -- more than double the amount spent on state legislative races last year when 116 seats -- not nine -- were up for grabs.

With the recalls acting as somewhat of a rehearsal for 2012, experts say the spending could be a harbinger of record outlays next year.

"This is the first major election of 2012," said Joseph Heim, political science professor at the University of Wisconsin, La Crosse, "and one of the things we saw here was huge amounts of money."

(Additional reporting by David Bailey and Mary Wisniewski, editing by Barbara Goldberg and Peter Bohan)

(The following story corrected the governor's name in second paragraph)

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Democrats hold seats in Wisconsin recall elections (Reuters)

RHINELANDER, Wis (Reuters) – Two Wisconsin Democratic state senators beat back Republican challengers on Tuesday in the last of a series of recall elections triggered by a fight over collective bargaining rights for public sector workers.

Both Democrats and Republicans were claiming victory on Tuesday in a series of nine summer recall votes in which Democrats unseated two incumbent Republicans but fell short of winning control of the state legislature.

Democrats had hoped to win a majority in the state senate following a fierce battle with Governor Scott Walker and his Republican allies earlier this year over public workers' union powers that involved mass protests, legislative maneuvering and court challenges.

"This was a political Rorschach test in that anyone can read anything into the result," said Mordecai Lee, a University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee governmental affairs professor and former Democratic lawmaker. "Politically, it was a draw."

He expected the results would embolden Democrats to try to recall Walker, which would require a half a million signatures just to schedule an election. "By November, we'll know if they're pursuing it seriously or not."

The Democrats who successfully defended their seats on Tuesday, Robert Wirch and Jim Holperin, were among 14 Wisconsin state senators who left the state in an attempt to prevent passage of an anti-union measure earlier this year.

Holperin beat political novice and Tea Party activist Kim Simac by 54 percent to 46 percent, according to WisPolitics.com. Wirch beat Republican lawyer Jonathan Steitz by 58 percent to 42 percent.

Overall in the recall elections, a total of three Democrats and four Republican incumbents kept their seats, while two Republicans were unseated.

CONTROL OF SENATE

Republicans managed to keep control of the state senate -- 17 to 16. But state Democrats point out that one Republican state senator, Dale Schultz, voted against Walker's curbs on public sector unions. They argue that the balance of power actually shifted away from the conservatives.

"The state Senate as now constituted would NOT have approved Walker's extreme, divisive assault on the middle class and working people," Democratic Party of Wisconsin Chair Mike Tate said in a statement.

Brad Courtney, chair of the state's Republican Party, congratulated Simac and Steitz for mounting what he described as well-fought challenges.

"Wisconsin now emerges from this recall election season with a united Republican majority who has beaten off an attack from national unions and special interests and emerged steadfastly committed to carrying forward a bold job creation agenda," Courtney said in a statement.

Holperin told supporters in Rhinelander that he hoped the recall results would signal a change in Wisconsin politics.

"I do hope (these recalls) signal a new era of what I hope is a more moderate approach to public policy in the state, starting with the governor," he added.

Governor Walker fought for the union curbs, which restrict the bargaining rights of public workers and also make them pay more for health care and pensions, saying they were needed to help Wisconsin close a $3.6 billion budget deficit.

Democrats cried foul, saying public workers had already agreed to steep benefit cuts. They called the effort union-busting, designed to hobble organized labor -- a major source of Democratic Party financing -- ahead of the 2012 elections.

The fight thrust Wisconsin into the national spotlight, igniting massive pro-union protests and political fights that led to the recall efforts against six Republicans who backed the union curbs and three Democrats who opposed them.

Until this summer, there had been only 20 state-level recall elections in U.S. history, and the money poured into the recall campaigns has been something for the record books.

Mike Buelow, research director for the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, estimates that candidates and outside groups spent as much as $37 million on the recalls.

With the recalls acting as somewhat of a rehearsal for 2012, experts say the spending could be a harbinger of record outlays next year.

(Writing by James Kelleher and Mary Wisniewski; Additional reporting by Jeff Mayers; Editing by Jerry Norton and Cynthia Johnston)

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Fake Democrats face real ones in Wis. recall primaries - Post-Bulletin

Fake Democrats face real ones in Wis. recall primaries

MADISON, Wis. — Isaac Weix thinks he can win a Democratic primary for state Senate on Tuesday, even though he's not campaigning and he's not a Democrat.

Weix is one of six fake Democrats running in recall elections under a move organized by the state Republican Party to delay the general election for a month. The Republicans got members of their party to run as Democrats, giving the real candidates a challenger for Tuesday's primary.

All six Republican incumbent senators have no challengers and will advance to the Aug. 9 general election. That means the primaries won't offer any clue whether the voter anger that spurred the recalls will translate into big wins for Democrats.

If Democrats pick up three seats, they will control the Senate and be able to block Walker and the GOP's agenda. Democratic losses would further embolden Republicans as they defend the collective bargaining changes that led to the recalls to begin with.

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Fake Democrats raise few funds for recall primary campaigns - Wausau Daily Herald

MADISON -- Fake Democratic candidates running in recall elections in order to give Republican incumbents more time to campaign have raised almost no money for the effort, reports filed with the state showed Wednesday.

The candidates, prompted by the state Republican Party, ran simply to force a primary and thereby delay the general election by a month in hopes of giving GOP incumbents more time to campaign.

Six Democratic primary elections are scheduled for Tuesday, with the winners facing the targeted Republican incumbents Aug. 9.

Five of the six fake Democrats whose reports were available Wednesday raised just $4,200 -- with nearly all the money coming from the Republican Party to help pay for copies and postage related to their filing as candidates.

A report for the sixth fake Democrat, James Smith of La Crosse, was not posted on the Government Accountability Board website by midday Wednesday.

While the protest candidates lie low, the legitimate Republicans and Democrats are raising tons of cash.

The six Democratic candidates combined have raised more than $1.5 million and had nearly $1 million in cash on hand. The Republican incumbents collectively raised about $2.4 million and had about $893,000 in cash on hand.

Four of the Republican incumbents raised more than their Democratic challengers, but two had less cash on hand entering the final weeks of the campaign.

The reports submitted Tuesday to the Government Accountability Board show incumbent Sens. Rob Cowles of Green Bay and Luther Olsen of Ripon face the biggest financial challenges.

In the 10th District, Olsen raised $107,000, compared with $227,000 for Democratic challenger state Rep. Fred Clark of Baraboo. Clark had $163,000 in cash on hand, compared with just $71,000 for Olsen.

In the 2nd District, Cowles raised $101,000, compared with $177,000 for Democratic opponent Nancy Nusbaum. She had $134,000 in cash on hand, and he had just $62,000.

Democrats need to win three seats to gain majority control in the Senate, giving them the power to block the Republican agenda. Three Democratic state senators also face recall elections. Their latest financial disclosure reports are due Monday.

Other Republicans facing recall elections are Sens. Alberta Darling of River Hills, Randy Hopper of Fond du Lac, Dan Kapanke of La Crosse and Sheila Harsdorf of River Falls.

In the 10th District, fake Democrat and hardware store owner Isaac Weix raised just $450 beyond a $750 in-kind contribution from the state Republican Party. He faces Democrat Shelly Moore in Tuesday's primary, with the winner moving on to face Harsdorf.

Four other fake Democrats -- Otto Junkermann, Gladys Huber, Rol Church and John Buckstaff-- all reported just a $750 contribution from the state Republican Party with no other
money raised or spent.

Junkermann faces Nusbaum on Tuesday, with the winner moving on to face Cowles. Huber is running in the 8th District against state Rep. Sandy Pasch, with the winner moving on to face Darling.

Church is running against Rep. Fred Clark, with the winner moving on to face Olsen. Buckstaff faces Democrat Jessica King on Tuesday with
the winner taking on Hopper.

The other protest candidate, Smith, is running against Democratic state Rep. Jennifer Shilling, with the winner facing Kapanke.

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Recall elections certified for 3 Wis. Senate Dems (AP)

MADISON, Wis. – A Wisconsin state board has voted to let July recall elections be held against three Democratic state senators who fled the state during a divisive debate on collective bargaining rights for public workers.

Opponents of the recalls argued Wednesday before the Government Accountability Board that widespread fraud in collecting signatures warranted invalidating the signatures.

The board rejected thousands of signatures, but not enough to disqualify the petitions. They voted to certify recall elections for Sens. Dave Hansen of Green Bay, Jim Holperin of Conover and Bob Wirch of Pleasant Prairie.

The senators were targeted for the positions they took on Republican Gov. Scott Walker's proposal taking away collective bargaining rights from most state workers. Republicans pushed through the law, but the state Supreme Court is weighing an appeal.

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Recall elections certified for 3 Wis. Senate Dems (AP)

MADISON, Wis. – A Wisconsin state board has voted to let July recall elections be held against three Democratic state senators who fled the state during a divisive debate on collective bargaining rights for public workers.

Opponents of the recalls argued Wednesday before the Government Accountability Board that widespread fraud in collecting signatures warranted invalidating the signatures.

The board rejected thousands of signatures, but not enough to disqualify the petitions. They voted to certify recall elections for Sens. Dave Hansen of Green Bay, Jim Holperin of Conover and Bob Wirch of Pleasant Prairie.

The senators were targeted for the positions they took on Republican Gov. Scott Walker's proposal taking away collective bargaining rights from most state workers. Republicans pushed through the law, but the state Supreme Court is weighing an appeal.

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