Donald Trump In the Upper Midwest: The Man Who’s Not on the Ballot
To the Point
KCRW
4.4 • 583 Ratings
🗓️ 25 October 2018
⏱️ 61 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania went twice for Barack Obama. But they gave Donald Trump his Electoral College upset when they had the chance. Would they do it again? Trump’s not on the ballot, but he’ll have a big influence on year’s Midterm elections. Races for Governor and other statewide offices will have echoes in Washington.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hello again, I'm Warren Alney. This is To the Point. It's been almost two years since Donald Trump's upset election in the Electoral College, despite his loss in the popular vote to Hillary Clinton. Three often blue states were crucial to making Trump president of the United States. Now, with the midterm elections, just two weeks away, |
| 0:24.1 | what are potential voters in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania thinking about now? |
| 0:29.6 | Trump, of course, is not on the ballots, but partisan candidates for governor and U.S. senator and the Congress are. |
| 0:36.6 | Can any of the statewide races be considered |
| 0:38.8 | a referendum on Trump's two years in office? If so, is he likely to win or to lose? Let's start with |
| 0:46.3 | Wisconsin, where Craig Gilbert reports for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Great to have you back |
| 0:51.0 | on our show. Nice to be with you. Okay. So what are we seeing in |
| 0:54.2 | Wisconsin, a state that certainly has gone back and forth. You can't call it traditionally |
| 0:58.4 | blue, although it has been from time to time. Yeah, and two big races and two different races. One |
| 1:04.6 | for the U.S. Senate, the Democratic incumbent Tammy Baldwin, has run what most people, most observers would say, has been a pretty |
| 1:12.8 | effective campaign, and she's been leading pretty comfortably in all the public polling. |
| 1:19.2 | The governor's race is a little bit more suspenseful than that. |
| 1:22.8 | A Republican Governor, Scott Walker is running a fourth time for a third term. |
| 1:28.2 | He also had a recall election. |
| 1:30.3 | And this is, I think, anyone even any Republican would tell you is his toughest race yet. |
| 1:36.3 | And it's partly because of Donald Trump, but not entirely because of Donald Trump. |
| 1:39.6 | So is he using Donald Trump as a positive in the race, or you said that he's in trouble because of Trump? |
| 1:46.3 | Is he trying to stay away from him? |
| 1:47.5 | It's interesting. |
| 1:48.4 | Donald Trump is actually coming to Wisconsin. |
| 1:50.6 | He's appearing this week in the sort of center-north part of the state, an area where he did well and where Walker did well in their past elections. |
| 2:00.7 | He's – and Governor Walker will campaign with Donald Trump at that stop. I don't think he really |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from KCRW, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of KCRW and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.