My first diary was on the U.S. Senate race in Wisconsin. Today we received news that Outagamie County Executive Tom Nelson suspended his campaign. He was upfront and told us that fundraising was an issue. However, it was more about consolidating the progressive base. He did this by endorsing Lt. Governor Mandela Barnes. This comes days after Elizabeth Warren was in Milwaukee stumping for Barnes. Moreover, the Democratic candidates are running for the seat.
Initially, I had Barnes at 38-40%, Lasry at 23-24, Godlewski at 17-19%, and Nelson between 5-10%. That was not to bash any specific candidate but an estimated result of where I think it might be. Barnes has a better shot of grabbing the progressive votes in the Green Bay/Appleton market now that the Outagamie County Executive has dropped out... So we all know Tom will stay involved in party politics. To figure out where he can go, let's look at where he has been.
He first ran for the assembly in 2004 and served in the legislature til 2011. He also served as Majority Leader from 2009-2011. In 2010, Nelson made his first bid for a statewide office 2010 when he ran for Lieutenant Governor under Tom Barret in 2010. We all know the result. Scott Walker and Ron Johnson were elected to statewide offices. In 2011 he defeated former State Treasurer Jack Voight in a race to become the County Executive for Outagamie County and was re-elected without opposition in 2015.
During the election of 2016, Tom Nelson was recruited to run for the U.S. House of Representatives but was unsuccessful in that attempt. Again, he was re-elected County Executive of Outagamie County without opposition, which leads us to the 2020 U.S. Senate race. Tom has a tremendous progressive following, and he can win in counties that don't usually vote for Republicans. So, where does he go from here?
If he runs for Outagamie County Executive again, he will most likely be unchallenged unless Jim Steineke wants to take a shot at it. The other idea will be to run for State Senate. Having Tom Nelson on the ballot in that area may be the trick to winning back the legislature. If he were to prevail, he could be elevated to Minority Leader. The third option is in DPW Leadership. Having Nelson involved with DPW could put more emphasis on Fox Valley than we used to.
The conclusion is that there is a future for Nelson in Wisconsin politics. Just because he bowed out doesn't mean he is giving up fighting for progressive values. This reminds me of when Klobuchar and Buttiegieg suspended their campaigns to endorse Biden. They have a goal, and that is defeating Ron Johnson.