MADISON — After months of speculation, Rebecca Kleefisch made it official Thursday. The former Republican lieutenant governor launched her campaign for governor.
Kleefisch, who served alongside Gov. Scott Walker for eight years in some of the most transformative times in Badger State history, says she’s running because incumbent Democratic Gov. Tony Evers has failed Wisconsin.
“I am running because I am a mom of two girls and I want them to come back to Wisconsin and live their American Dream, to raise their families here one day,” Kleefisch told Empower Wisconsin’s M.D. Kittle on the Vicki McKenna Show. “But that’s not going to happen for any of our kids unless we can promise them we’re going to have safe communities and schools with actual standards that empower parents, and good-paying jobs.”
Kleefisch has led the 1848 Project, a non-profit advocacy organization launched in 2020 to produce and promote “the next conservative agenda.”
She becomes the best-known Republican to jump into the race to date. Other Republicans, State Rep. John Macco, former U.S. Senate candidate and Marine Kevin Nicholson, and Bill McCoshen, lobbyist and former Commerce secretary under Gov. Tommy Thompson, are mulling a run, as well.
Evers, who launched his campaign for a second term earlier this summer, has vetoed a long list of Republican legislation — from election law reform to relief for businesses hit hard by the worker shortage crisis.
Kleefisch has pledged to undue “Tony Evers’ record of failed and incompetent leadership.”
Rebecca Kleefisch is our guest today on this edition of PowerUp, Empower Wisconsin’s podcast.
