President Obama compared Republicans to family members that you want to relegate to the back burner as he campaigned against Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker yesterday.
Obama met donors at a DNC fundraiser at a Milwaukee sushi restaurant first for a $16,200-per-plate nosh. He then headed to North Division High School for a rally with Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mary Burke.
Walker only holds a less than 1 percent lead over Burke in the latest Real Clear Politics polling average.
The Dems also got some celebrity help from former West Wing star Bradley Whitford, addressing the crowd of more than 3,500.
“She’s been an amazing candidate and I think it’s really important race to repudiate the union-busting, access-to-health care-resisting agenda that’s going on here. It doesn’t feel like Wisconsin,” the actor and Madison native said.
“Look at him,” Whitford said of Walker. “He’s scared. He looks nervous. He has that look of a control freak losing control.”
He added that a “Democratic disease” is “apathy around midterms.”
“There are two undecided people in the entire state and they are bipolar,” Whitford quipped, according to the White House pool report. “So for both sides, it is all about getting out the vote.”
Obama told the crowd that “Republicans are patriots, they love their country just like we do.”
“But they’ve got some bad ideas. That doesn’t mean that we don’t appreciate them as Americans,” the president continued. “I’ve got family members who have got bad ideas — they’re still part of the family, but you don’t want to put them in charge, right?”
“So like a broken record, they just keep on offering the same worn-out, tired theory of the economy that has already shown itself to undermine the middle class. You give more tax breaks to folks at the top. You start cutting investments in things like education. You kind of loosen up regulations and rules on big banks and credit card companies and polluters and insurers. You make the safety net a little thinner for folks who fall on hard times. We’ve tried these things the last decade and we know they won’t work. We know they don’t work.”
At this point, Obama was interrupted by an immigration-reform protester.
“The young lady is expressing her concern about immigration and the fact that we don’t have a comprehensive immigration bill. The problem is she should be protesting the Republicans who are blocking it in Congress. That’s what she should be doing,” he said. “That’s what she should be doing. Because I’m for it. Because I’m for it.”
Obama tried to stoke turnout, noting “Democrats lost the governor’s race in Wisconsin by just 10 votes per ward” four years ago.
“So don’t let anybody tell you your vote doesn’t matter. It’s just not true. It is an excuse,” he said. “Don’t let anybody stand in your way. Unless you’re registering on Election Day, you can vote even if you don’t have photo ID. Don’t let anybody mislead you.”
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