Political experts address the implications of the Wisconsin Primary
‘Weirdly, by not winning big enough in Wisconsin, Sanders has a steeper climb’
Two political experts who recently accessed the implications from the Wisconsin primary election Tuesday, argued that the victories by Bernie Sanders and Ted Cruz are not the important take-aways.
Slate’s Chief Political News Analyst Jamelle Bouie and UW-Madison political science Professor Berry Burden offered their conclusions at a post-election review on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus. Bouie said the lines at the polls were what interested him the most about this election, and he attributed the lines to the newly enacted Voter ID Law.
“I find it deeply troubling that there possibly could be thousands or tens of thousands of people that won’t be able to vote this November because they don’t have access to an identification card,” Bouie said.
Burden agreed that the Voter ID law could be to blame for some of the lines at the polls, but what surprised him the most was the high voter turnout. According to Burden, Wisconsin’s voter turnout was about 49 percent, which is higher than any other state except New Hampshire. It was the highest turnout for a primary in Wisconsin since 1972.
“Forty-nine percent is higher than just about all of the states turnout in the 2014 general election,” Burden said.
Burden also thought Governor Scott Walker’s impact on the election results on was interesting because Walker was a major issue for both Democrats and Republicans.
Trump criticized Walker, and Burden speculated that this probably hurt the New York businessman because Walker is well-liked by many of the state’s conservative Republicans. Sanders promised voters his platforms were the opposite of Walker’s, and he used Wisconsin Democrat’s disapproval of Walker to rally support, Burden said.
“I don’t think it was a policy issue that was driving the results. I think it was the governor on both sides,” Burden said. “His [Walker’s] name may come back up as a potential running mate.”
Burden and Bouie made their predictions about the election and what will happen if the primary goes to convention. Bouie doubts Sanders can gain enough support to secure the nomination.
“Weirdly, by not winning big enough in Wisconsin, Sanders has a steeper climb,” Bouie said.
Bouie said he believes that even if the Republican primary goes to convention, Trump will still be the nominee because there would be too much public outrage if the candidate with the highest number of delegates did not win.
“If Trump wins the nomination he will not win the general election,” Bouie said. “People tend to forget just how large the population is and how few Trump supporters there actually are.”
“Trump is three times more unpopular than the least popular nominee in any recent election,” Bouie said.
Burden does not believe that Trump will be the nominee, because he cannot gain enough delegates or win the convention. Cruz is the most likely candidate, but anything can happen, Burden surmised.
“I think Cruz is the most likely candidate, but it’s not a sure thing. Paul Ryan’s name comes up repeatedly. Although, he says he’s not interested he said that about being Speaker of the House; he might be persuadable,” Burden said. “I don’t think John Kasich is out of the question.”
There was no consensus as to who the 2016 presidential nominees would be, but everyone agreed this election is an interesting one.