Blaze orange-clad hunters at the Shooting Sportsmen-endorsed Milford Mills Hunting Lodge chatted in the lead-up to one of the most sought-after monthly presentations statewide – the 5 Riders event. Next week, it will feature a Hillsdale College presentation on the Constitution, and last month, it featured a moving presentation on human trafficking by Jamie Counsell.
February’s presentation featured myself as well as Ken Dragotta of True the Vote, both of whom’s full speeches will be posted on the 5 Riders page. We focused the linked segments and the outline below on the parts of the speech of most interest to members of the Wisconsin Faith & Freedom Coalition.
Photos: To be clear, the hunts here are for pheasants – it takes a couple of days to drive to the nearest polar bear like the one over my shoulder in the first photo. In the second photo, I document just one example of Soros-backed candidates and liberal political machines such as the one built through the late Harry Reid in Nevada and how they split the conservative vote.
Offense and Defense
Despite the clear focus on the “defense” of stopping voter fraud, the presentation stressed the need for conservatives to also be on “offense” and get people out to vote. We included the clip of my long-time data partner Matt Braynard, who spent much time documenting illegally cast ballots in 2020 but also stressed at a previous joint appearance that in Wisconsin, the much bigger problem was the existence of 520,000 conservatives who chose not to vote – conservatives he knows by name and address.
Here in Wisconsin, we know that only the Chicago Bears would try to win with no offense.
Christians Not Voting
A big reason I agreed to run the Wisconsin Faith and Freedom Coalition were the internal estimates that in 2022, only 52 percent of church-going Evangelicals voted, compared to 70 percent of other voters.
Inspiration to vote can be found when we focus on issues on which 75% of Americans are conservative. In the video, we post a slide on these issues–protecting women’s sports, Voter ID, and a secure border to stop drugs and crime.
Introducing Faith and Freedom
It was encouraging to see 5 Riders attendees holding up their phones . . . to capture the QR code on the video introducing our campaign to register 21 million Christians to vote. The good news is that 80 percent of Christians who register do go on to vote in the next election. In addition, our national affiliate is working to hire 10,000 canvassers in June and then get them trained and out knocking on 10 million doors–including hundreds of thousands in Wisconsin.
The presentation also displayed our voter comparison handouts, noting that they are all 501c3 compliant and so can be distributed in churches. We highlighted the outreach efforts of National FFC Hispanic Leader Nilsa Alvarez, who in 2022 completed transformed politics in Miami-Dade.
Giving Candidates Principled Leeway
We did cover the need to never compromise on principle, but at the same time, consider compromise if it is the only way to win approval for very good (even if not perfect) legislation.
Sometimes the path to your ultimate goal will require some intermediate compromise. Having first protested outside a Planned Parenthood as an 8-year old in the 1970s, no one was happier than I to see the Dobbs decision finally overturn Roe v. Wade. But even as a Congressional Chair for the National Right to Life state affiliate 30 years ago, I would argue that once Roe was overturned, pro-life candidates would need leeway to allow exceptions for rape and incest. It was a matter of forward progress versus none.
In the speech last week, I expressed my profound respect for legislators who feel they cannot make any exceptions when pushing for a pro-life law, but also asked for understanding toward those who feel they are pushing for the strongest law possible in a given area. For example, the strongest bill that could pass in Georgia was the “heartbeat bill” with an exception for rape and incest as long as it was reported to police, but in Wisconsin, the only pro-life bill with any chance to be considered is one lowering the threshold from an ultra-liberal 22 weeks–and the liberal Governor has vowed to veto even that.
The Left Has Internal Problems Too
And yet with all the internal differences among conservatives, we asked attendees to remember that the left has internal problems too–starting with their position on Jewish babies being killed by Hamas and extending to liberal mayors pressuring national liberals to close the open border.
Thanks for watching the video, and thanks for getting involved!
