Scott Walker: What's next for GOP's new supernova?

After the high-stakes recall election, national Republicans assess the Scott Walker effect, ranging from his policies to the prospect that he might appear on a Romney ticket.

|
Andy Manis/AP
Gov. Scott Walker (R) of Wisconsin holds his first cabinet meeting at the State Capitol Wednesday in Madison, Wis., after beating Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett in a recall election. Governor Walker is flanked by Chief of Staff Eric Schutt (l) and Lieutenant Governor Rebecca Kleefisch.

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker is promising unity in his state following a big win in a contentious recall election this week, as national Republicans assess the impact that a charismatic, seemingly unflappable young governor – an instant star – could have on GOP party fortunes.

“He automatically became one of the most sought-after speakers after Tuesday," says Al Cardenas, chairman of the American Conservative Union, a leading conservative activist and think tank in Washington. "He’s an incredibly valuable resource to the party, the Mitt Romney campaign, and to our future.”

Governor Walker – the first governor in US history to beat a recall campaign – is clearly an overnight sensation for the GOP, having pushed through hard-nosed reforms that eliminated the state’s $3.6 billion deficit without raising taxes or requiring massive layoffs. He campaigned on a platform of making tough decisions on how government is structured, including retooling the relationship between the state and public sector unions.

Besides eliminating collective bargaining rights for most public employees, he reduced take-home pay to cover pension contributions, and required higher health insurance premiums and co-pays – the kind of fiscal rejiggering the national party says is crucial to finally getting serious about ballooning deficits and resetting mismanaged spending priorities.

Mr. Cardenas says conservatives appreciate his success, because they see it emboldening executives in all branches of government – from town mayors to state leaders – to confront budget reform on similar terms.

“They’ll say 'if Scott Walker can do it, I can do it’ to bring fiscal sanity to these communities. The Scott Walker race just added five exclamation points to this trend,” Cardenas says.

No one but Walker knows the extent of his ambition outside Wisconsin. Since Tuesday’s victory, he says his priority is encouraging bipartisanship among the divided House and Senate in his state, including inviting everyone to a beer and brat summit this summer.

“The ball is in his court,” says Geoffrey Peterson, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin in Eau Claire. “How far he decides he wants to move up in his party, either as vice president or run for a Senate seat, I think it’s certainly in the cards. He’ll certainly will get the support of the party"

Romney, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, has yet to announce a running mate, which makes it tempting to speculate on Walker’s chances of getting the nod.

That might be a misstep as this point in Walker’s career, considering he is just a year and a half into his first term as governor, says Dennis Goldford, a political scientist at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. Picking Walker would “undercut Romney’s main narrative about [President] Obama, which is he was too inexperienced and untested” to become president, he adds. 

Instead, the wisest strategic move – if Walker is even considering a run for national office – is to remain Wisconsin’s governor for at least a second term. From Franklin Roosevelt to Bill Clinton, the surest step into the Oval Office is through the governor’s mansion and not necessarily a US Senate seat, Mr. Goldford says, primarily because of the skills required for both positions.

Voters “have tended to go with people with executive experience. The best thing to do for himself is try to be seen as a governor who gets things done and who can get reelected with high majorities,” Goldford says.

The danger of overhyping Walker so soon after his recall victory is that he could just as easily follow down the path of other Republican Party could-have-beens like Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal or former Vice Presidential Nominee Sarah Palin. If Walker wants to remain politically relevant for the long-term, says Christina Greer, a political scientist at Fordham University in the Bronx, N.Y., he needs to have opportunities to show voters outside Wisconsin that he can handle the national spotlight.

Republicans need to “see how Scott Walker deals with the prime time stage,” Ms. Greer says. “In many ways this election was about Wisconsin, but we will see if he is able to really stay on message during the national campaign in campaigning for Romney or the GOP.”

There remain potential pitfalls. The first is the ongoing “John Doe” investigation into Walker’s tenure as Milwaukee County Executive. The probe involves current and former aides, six of whom are already charged with crimes including embezzling money from veterans groups and illegally campaigning on public time. The investigation has been ongoing since May 2010 and has yielded 15 felony charges; five people close to Walker, including his deputy chief of staff, are currently awaiting trial.

Walker is not yet charged with wrongdoing, although he has transferred money from his campaign into a legal defense fund.

“If it turns out he’s really connected to it, he may very well be a one-term governor” and his viability as a national player will end, says Peterson.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Scott Walker: What's next for GOP's new supernova?
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2012/0607/Scott-Walker-What-s-next-for-GOP-s-new-supernova
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe