Yes, it is cold outside, and the election is still over 10 months away, but we have some heat going on in Wisconsin:
- Republican Mark Neumann put over $1 million of his own money into his gubernatorial campaign. That, along with a reported $974,000 cash on hand number, masks the fact that he did not reach $250,000 outside of his own pocket. Meanwhile, Democrat Tom Barrett reported raising $750,000 since he announced and along with $800,000 from his mayoral campaign, $1.5 million cash on hand, and Republican Scott Walker is expected to announce more than $900,000 raised in the second half of 2009 with around $2 million cash on hand.
- Speaking of fundraising, Senate candidate Dave Westlake has decided to limit his fundraising efforts to sales of blaze-orange campaign shirts and no-pressure donations, prefering to meet everybody he can face-to-face. While it is admirable, it is impossible to meet more than a small portion of the electorate statewide.
- Staying on the Senate race, Terrence Wall has officially jumped into the race after a couple months of touring the state.
- Rebecca Kleefisch announced for lieutenant governor today, joining Dave Ross, Brett Davis, and Ben Collins in the GOP half of the race.
- Despite the only roles of lieutenant governor being serving as a general-election running mate of the governor, being the first in line to fill a gubernatorial vacancy, and having the full authority of governor on any board the governor is entitled to sit that he chooses to fill with the lieutenant, Kleefisch, Ross and Collins have taken more stands on issues on their campaign websites than Barrett. Indeed, Barrett’s website only has donation and volunteer links on it.
