Wisconsin State Superintendent Jill Underly says she hopes she receives the backing of Democratic Gov. Tony Evers if she makes it through Tuesday’s primary.
“He didn’t endorse the last time either when I ran in 2021 when there was a seven-way primary,” Underly said on WISN’s “UpFront,” which is produced in partnership with WisPolitics. “He didn’t endorse them either, so I assume after this, I hope he does, but if he doesn’t, I understand that, too.”
Underly is facing two challengers: Sauk Prairie Superintendent Jeff Wright; and education consultant Brittany Kinser. The top two finishers advance to the April general election.
“I think my lane is a lot of people that are directly connected to the schools,” Wright said. “That’s my hope. It’s a nonpartisan lane.
“The Republicans have a majority in both the Assembly and Senate,” Wright added. “We need to work with them. I am superintendent in Sauk County, which is the most purple county in the entire state, so I can’t get anything done in that community without working with Republicans and Democrats.”
Kinser raised more than three times that of Underly or Wright in the pre-primary period, pulling support from GOP megadonors Dick and Liz Uihlein and Beloit businesswoman Diane Hendricks.
“I feel like everyone’s like, what label can we put on her?” Kinser said when asked if she would consider herself the conservative candidate. “If you want to put me in a box, I guess I’m a moderate, but my issue is improving education, so I will work with anyone, and we have to work with anyone that wants to put kids first.”
Underly has the backing of the state Democratic Party.
Both Wright and Kinser are blasting Underly for changing the state’s testing standards last year, a move also criticized by Evers, a former state superintendent.
“I think there was just some, maybe he needed more information, but I feel like honestly, when we look at it, it is what’s best for kids,” Underly said.
Underly insists the change does not lower the standards, as her critics say, adding she would do it again.
“What I would say is it was a way to help our teachers understand where kids actually are,” Underly said. “The way that the nation’s report card tests is, I guess, standardized is a grade level higher, so that’s what it is. It is a more challenging benchmark to meet nationally than our Wisconsin test.
“Every other state has their own state assessment,” Underly added. “And in the past five years, a lot of states have gone away with grading from the (national) standards.”
Wright said he sees the impact firsthand and would reverse the change if elected.
“I think that it came at the absolute worst time because we were, like many districts, we were just getting out of the pandemic,” Wright said. “And after three years coming out of the pandemic to now also change the standards and make it easier on kids, I think that’s what happened, I mean, it’s easier to get a passing grade now than it was a year ago.
“Lowering the standard right at the time, we’re trying to figure out if our interventions and our changes worked, it made it very difficult for parents to understand the competency of their kids,” Wright said.
Kinser, who also said she would immediately change the benchmark, said the change was the reason she got in the race.
“I was really upset,” Kinser said. “I was like, I can’t believe they did that. It’s not what’s best for kids, and we need to restore those high standards and really focus back on teaching reading, writing and math.”
Also on the show, Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley told “UpFront” he’s pushing Gov. Tony Evers to include $250 million in his budget proposal Tuesday to help build a new county public safety building.
“We know that we have a lot of different competing priorities when it comes down to this state budget,” Crowley said. “But I will tell you when it comes down to this building, if we want to find efficiencies, if we want to save taxpayer dollars, this has to be one of the biggest, generational investments that we have to tackle right away.”
The overall price tag is estimated at $490 million.
“I want folks to know that this particular building serves the entire state of Wisconsin,” Crowley said. “Milwaukee County, we are the largest county in the state of Wisconsin, and we are the only county that actually has individuals from all counties in the state of Wisconsin somewhere within our Milwaukee County jail or going through our court system.
“The costs, we’re not doing this on our own,” Crowley added. “We’re working with many other counties across the entire state of Wisconsin. We’ve been having conversations with the Wisconsin Counties Association to help us tackle the public safety costs for the entire state.”
Meanwhile, Kurt Bauer, president and CEO of Wisconsin Manufactures and Commerce, told “UpFront” there will be “some unknown consequences” with President Trump’s proposed tariffs, the impact in Wisconsin, and the fast-changing developments coming from the White House.
“In 14 years of doing this, I’ve never seen anything like it,” Bauer said. “Each day, it seems like there’s another development, and we have to try and figure out what’s going to happen and how it’s going to impact our members. It’s really drinking from a fire hose right now, and we’re not exactly sure what it all means.”
A recent WMC survey found 56% of Wisconsin business leaders said they oppose tariffs on Canada and Mexico.
“The biggest concern is that Canada and Mexico are our two largest trading partners,” Bauer said. “So we have a positive trade balance with Canada, we want to continue that. We have a long-standing relationship. We are a manufacturing state. We’re an agricultural state. We make things. We grow things. We process them. We want to sell them around the world.”
Within that same survey, about 50% of business leaders said increasing tariffs would have a negative effect on their business, 26% said positive.
“On the one hand, steel manufacturers and aluminum manufacturers in Wisconsin may benefit, but that could have an impact on automotive manufacturing and construction,” Bauer said. “It could be broad-ranging. There will be some winners. There will be some losers.”
Bauer said the reigning sentiment and potential impact at the moment is uncertain, both for business leaders and consumers.
“It’s a moving target, we’re just not sure,” Bauer said. “It’s going to be several months before we truly understand. There will be some unknown consequences, to be sure. I think that by and large, our members are supportive of what the president is trying to accomplish to create a free, fair and reciprocal trade with other nations.”
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