Over the weekend, the Wisconsin Republican Party convention took the expected step of endorsing wealthy business executive Eric Hovde in his bid for the U.S. Senate against incumbent Tammy Baldwin (D). But that move was still controversial.
There are several Republican Senate candidates, most of whom are not well known, and the GOP decided that Hovde was the only one who met party criteria and was allowed to speak at the convention. A key requirement was raising at least $1 million from donors by March 31.
Hovde did speak. At one point, he blasted the news media for writing stories about controversial comments he had made this year or during his previous Senate bid twelve years ago.
“Look, I know there’s many good journalists out there, and try hard. But I’ve been in my campaign for three months. The number of ridiculous hit pieces and the gotcha questions, instead of talking about the issues that matter to the people of the state and country," Hovde complained.
Hovde went on to list those issues as inflation, the economy, health care, and housing. He then directly addressed the dozen or so media in the room, telling them to be fair and balanced.
“Hold me accountable. Ask me hard questions. But do the same to Senator Baldwin. Please!" Hovde said, as many of the hundreds of people in the audience turned and looked at the media while cheering the candidate.
He was not available after the speech for media questions.
What happened next was surprising.
Suddenly, another Senate candidate, Rejani Raveendran, was in front of a floor mic, and a delegate made a motion asking for Raveendran to be allowed to speak.
Convention official and State Treasurer Jon Leiber nixed the idea.
“So, that motion is going to be out of order. In the rules, we passed on the page (Leiber then had to pause while being interrupted by chants to “Let her speak!” ) before he stuck to the rules.
Raveendran, a native of India who became a U.S. citizen in 2015, was very disappointed afterward, criticizing the one million dollar requirement to speak at the convention.
“What is the American Dream? The rich becoming richer? Millionaire becoming billionaire? Or, the poor have the equal opportunity to serve our country?" she said to WUWM outside the convention hall.
In a profile of Raveendran last August when she first entered the Senate contest, the Associated Press described her as a 40-year-old UW-Stevens Point student making her first bid for public office. A single mother of three who will push for eliminating illegal immigration, ending the war in Ukraine, and calling for Congressional term limits.
WUWM asked Raveendran where she differs from Hovde on the issues. Part of her answer was to criticize his past remarks to raise the eligibility age for Social Security to 72 for workers now in their 20s.
“I think that is not right because the Social Security money is not the government’s money. It is the people’s money. [The] government has no right to take that money. You have taken that money from our every paycheck promising you would give that back in our vulnerable situation. Now, you want to raise the age to 72? How many people would be alive? That is my question," she said.
Hovde floated raising the retirement age back in 2012. Over the weekend, his campaign spokesperson declined to say whether the candidate still supports that idea, saying there is plenty of time to talk about issues during the campaign.
A spokesperson for Wisconsin Democrats declined to comment on the GOP convention controversy.
Hovde, Raveendran and the other GOP Senate contenders will face off in the party’s August primary, with the winner expected to take on Baldwin in November.
