On the face of it, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s summer slide in the polls and persistent trouble catching fire with voters is reminiscent of another Upper Midwestern governor’s woes: Tim Pawlenty.
In August 2011, Pawlenty, then the Minnesota governor, surprised pundits when he pulled out of the 2012 race after just a few months. Nobody has put Walker on a campaign death watch, but a flat debate performance and subsequent toppling in Iowa have left some supporters worried.
Walker has slipped into single-digit support in Iowa — falling into fifth place there in the latest Monmouth University survey — and has not found his footing following a quiet debate performance with a series of gaffes and generally awkward answers. That’s a far cry from just a few months ago when he was leading the Hawkeye State.
Like the threat Walker once posed to establishment favorite Jeb Bush, Pawlenty looked strong as an alternative to eventual nominee Mitt Romney in the summer of 2011. But he flamed out following a pair of weak debate performances and dwindling resources.
But ask the man in question about it and he sees more hope for Walker.
“We had a financial and political platform which just had to catch fire early and couldn’t endure many bumps in the road because we were running out of cash,” Pawlenty told CNN in a recent interview. He added that his campaign didn’t have the money and national name recognition that Walker does.
“I think Scott has a fundamentally different structure underneath and that structure is going to buy him time to … get a second or a third look” from voters, said Pawlenty, who has met with Walker but has not endorsed a candidate.
He added that the emergence of super PACs has allowed candidates to stick around longer, even if they’re trailing in the polls.
“The fact of the matter is you can be a fairly low-percentage candidate and still buy time,” he said.
“He’s got the benefit of time,” Pawlenty continued. “But you don’t have endless time.”
Dipping in the polls
Walker got a big boost in the money race with help from his super PAC and another affiliated group at the end of June, putting his tally at $26.2 million. That will help him keep pace with candidates like Sen. Marco Rubio and Sen. Ted Cruz, but still leaves him well behind Bush’s eye-popping $114 million haul.
His campaign has been dogged by missteps on the trail — from saying that discussing a wall on the U.S-Canadian border is “legitimate” to trying to outdo Donald Trump’s tough talk on China to shuffling between three different answers on birthright citizenship.
One Walker fundraiser, who spoke on condition of anonymity to speak candidly about the state of the campaign, said Walker, like Pawlenty, may not be provocative when set against others like Trump and Ben Carson, but he has a strong story to tell. And Walker will prevail if he can tell that story, the fundraiser said.
“There’s no doubt he has had some gaffes that have not helped his cause,” the fundraiser said. “It has not been a good couple weeks. But nothing has ended the game by any means. This thing is way too fluid.”
Iowa key to his candidacy
Iowa remains crucial to the Walker campaign, which staked its hopes on carrying a victory there into other early voting states like South Carolina and Nevada.
Craig Robinson, a veteran Iowa Republican operative and editor of “The Iowa Republican” website, said Walker was in a “free fall” in the state.
He outlined a few problem: Iowa caucusgoers were ready to sign on with Walker in January after his fiery speech at the Faith and Freedom Summit, but his staff wasn’t ready to sign them up. The perception of Scott Walker the outsider and fighter hasn’t matched up to the the candidate who has showed up in Iowa and in the first Republican debate. Politicians, like Walker, are still talking like politicians — carefully and measured — when voters want to hear exciting messages from outsiders like Trump and Carson.
“When they see him on the debate stage, they’re not seeing the candidate they’ve heard about and all been intrigued by, and when those two things don’t match up, they start to look elsewhere,” Robinson said.
When asked about recent struggles, a senior adviser to Walker’s super PAC said he was certain Walker’s record would shine through.
“Governor Walker’s conservative reforms and achievements in a blue state is what distinguishes him from every other candidate and we are well positioned to tell that story not only in Iowa, but in New Hampshire, South Carolina and beyond,” said Brad Dayspring, senior adviser to Unintimidated PAC.
Adjusting his message
Following a flat debate performance last month, Walker began adjusting his campaign message.
The first key change was adding a line knocking Republicans — in Washington and back home in Madison — as he rolled out his health care plan. Then after saying he would end birthright citizenship, he quickly pivoted back to a campaign message saying he would not address the issue until securing the border, and then, a week later, he told CBS that would not end the citizenship privilege.
Walker’s campaign, meanwhile, was subjected to an incisive attack from Trump. The front-runner met with one of Walker’s top fundraisers, Anthony Scaramucci, in New York and then told media that Scaramucci was looking to jump ship. Scaramucci quickly said Trump was wrong and that his loyalty was to Walker, but Trump had effectively put the question centerstage.
Asked about his dip in the polls, Walker attributed it to the “breadth” of the 17-candidate Republican field, but he remained confident.
“In the end, though, I think when people look at the field, they realize there are fighters, fighters, many in Washington who get to win those fights. There are winners, many who have yet to be in the fight. What makes us unique is we’ve done both,” Walker told CNN’s Jim Sciutto last week.
