Donald Trump dived into deep-blue territory this week, pitching voters on an issue not often discussed on the presidential campaign trail: school choice.
Trump singled out Milwaukee as the “home of the first and oldest school choice” program.
The former president rallied in another Wisconsin Democratic stronghold — Dane County — Tuesday before facing a smaller crowd in the state’s largest city, where the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program was established in 1990 to give students from low-income families the option to attend private schools.
Trump was introduced in Milwaukee by former Gov. Tommy Thompson, who said he encouraged Trump to visit Dane and Milwaukee counties to drum up turnout in the state known for narrow-margins — 1% in 2016 and 2020 — in presidential elections.
Trump’s visit to Dane County was the first time a Republican presidential candidate has campaigned there since Bob Dole in 1996.
In Milwaukee, the former president declared education is “the civil-rights issue of our age.”
“No parent should be forced to send their children to a failing, government-run school,” he said as he read off proficiency rates of 16% in Milwaukee Public Schools with evident surprise.
The latest National Center for Education Statistics scorecard put Milwaukee Public School fourth- and eighth-grade students at less than 15% proficiency in reading and math in 2022.
The choice of a school-choice event in Brew City may point to the campaign’s hopes to galvanize voters in a traditionally Democratic stronghold on an issue that divides voters.
A summer 2024 Marquette University Law School survey of Wisconsin registered voters found 63% of Republicans and 57% of independents were dissatisfied or very dissatisfied with public schools, compared with 26% of Democratic voters. In Milwaukee, dissatisfaction with public schools overall was 78%.
Trump reiterated his campaign-platform position that his administration would significantly cut the Department of Education and “send it back to the states.”
“Democrats want to keep minority students in government-run schools,” he said before briefly sharing the mic with current and former school-choice students from the panel during his speech.
Trump gave his rambling remarks, which covered most of his campaign talking points along with education, to a crowd of mostly media and panelists in a small theater at Discovery World before taking questions from the press.
While the event was originally open to more attendees, the crowd was reportedly cut due to security and capacity concerns, leaving some Trump supporters confused and disappointed.
Before the event, The Post spoke with would-be attendee Laura Palus, 56, who runs a nonprofit that “supports pregnant women in need.” Palus said of Trump, “I think he’s a great candidate across the board.”
“The economy was so strong under him. I think he’ll bring it back and pare down spending.”
Palus said she likes Trump’s education stance, which she described as giving decision-making power to families and local government versus the federal Department of Education.
Ned Daniels Jr., former chairman of the Forest County Potawatomi, told The Post before entering the venue that he’d traveled from Crandon, in northern Wisconsin, to Milwaukee to “listen to Trump and see what’s on his mind.”
Daniels said he thinks the state of the economy is the top issue in the election for the Forest County Potawatomi tribe — but foreign affairs are important too.
“We need leadership that will jump up and bring an end to rhetoric,” he said. He believes Trump has the “ability to sit down and get something done” with foreign leaders.
“I hope he can remember us,” Daniels said of the former president. “I think he might be the man to move us on.”
Daniels’ wife, Kim, said she used to be a Kamala Harris supporter — “She’s a woman and a minority” — but now supports Trump.
“Harris needs to stand firm on what she says, but she flip flops so much.” Kim Daniels, who is self-employed, said. “I was rooting for her. I was a supporter at the beginning.”
