$342,245 to Deliver to 402,000 Voters, or $1 Million for 181,818? That Was Easy

The Executive Summary from the Wisconsin Faith and Freedom Coalition’s 2nd Annual Board Meeting includes the following three topics, with greater detail provided below the photo of Eric and Sharon Hovde at our Pastors’ breakfast before the Board Meeting with one of our two new Board Members, Pastor Michael Larson. Glad to have so many Pastors to pray for the nation as so many are affected by the NC storms, LA fires and now plane crash in DC.

WIFFC: $0.85 per voter reached vs. $5.50 for other groups
The first topic to cover from our Wisconsin Faith and Freedom Coalition’s Annual Board Meeting this week is that our total state and national budget of $342,245 resulted in 402,000 voter comparisons being delivered by canvassers to targeted voters. This rate of $0.85 per voter is a tiny fraction of other canvassing efforts, which resulted in 181,818 pieces of literature for every $1 million donated to other groups—about $5.50 per voter reached.

WI Supreme Court Race Focus Turns to Flipping Congress
The second topic is a leaked memo indicating that two of the three major issues in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race on April 1 seem focused on flipping Congress from Republican to Democrat. If successful, this could have the same impact as 2018 when the focus shifted from passing new legislation—like the Laken Riley Act this week—to two years of impeachment investigations of President Trump. 

With ActBlue asking voters to support the liberal candidate due to her professional work to try to remove Voter ID requirements, voters should be aware that in the 16 states with no Voter ID requirement, Democrats hold 164 of 206 seats (80%), meaning they only need to win 54 of 229 (24%) in Wisconsin and the other 34 states which require at least some ID. The new memo, attained by the New York Times, indicates that liberal donors are being asked to donate to the liberal Wisconsin State Supreme Court race in order to flip two Wisconsin Congressional seats from Republican to Democrat, meaning they would need to pick up only one more seat anywhere in the country to take control of Congress.

Election of Board Members
The third topic is the election of our Board Members and bios of two new members,including Pastor Michael Larson, pictured below with Eric and Sharon Hovde at our Pastors’ breakfast.

How We Reached 402,000 Targeted Voters at a Mere 85 Cents Each

After accurately predicting Trump’s 312-226 win across all 50 states, I also believe (based on the feedback we received while distributing our literature) that–even though we do not endorse candidates–if we had not raised $222,751 for our program, Kamala Harris could have won Wisconsin. Had we raised another $100,000, Hovde would be a U.S. Senator today. This is not to diminish the contribution of other groups.

In 2024, we spent a total of $222,751 on our voter outreach program. This covered EVERY DOLLAR SPENT, from John Pudner’s salary as President, to payments other team members,  to accounting and legal, travel reimbursements, housing for a few field leaders, and incentive payments to canvassers beyond the base pay they were provided by National Faith and Freedom. National also contributed by negotiating incredible deals on paper for 10 million comparison pieces, printed here in Wisconsin, and most canvassing compensation. 

When all was said and done, the total cost for national and state efforts was $342,245—an average of just 85 cents per targeted voter reached with literature. This was the best price I’ve seen for literature distribution since our lit for Dave Brat reached voters for about 17 cents each in 2014. In that case, campaign manager Zachary Werrell slept in a cot in campaign headquarters for a few hours at night and then supplied and trained 200 volunteers to hit 25,000 targeted doors to overcome Eric Cantor and his $5 million warchest.

The $5.50 per door hit, paid by most donors in 2024 to other organizations, was also needed to be fair to thousands of conservative canvassers, given how Bidenomics had inflated the cost of living. However, the real difference is that through the experience of myself and Northeast Field Director Randell Johnson, we were able to expand grassroots outreach beyond just paying for every door hit. 

For example, we directed the field team to get literature and instructions to churches so they could play a vital role by displaying our comparison pieces on screen during sermons and distributing them as congregants left. In certain areas, our comparison piece became the go-to literature to fill gaps when other organizations ran out of theirs–or when they just felt it was a better handout for a particular audience. Additionally, the left’s attempt to imprison the Presidential nominee before the election created powerful motivation on the right; so, too, their use of terms like “gender affirming care”–which ironically encourages youth not to affirm their gender but to question and deny it–as marketing for the multi-billion dollar sex change industry.

While we are not likely to replicate this 85-cent-per-voter efficiency, it was a great example of how we find ways to stretch dollars in a way that groups who never had to run all volunteer efforts. But whether it’s 85 cents or an all paid effort that costs several dollars, we always get a much higher Return On Investment than the standard which can play out in cost savings or the addition of personalized handwritten notes on every piece of lit given to voters.

Emerging Issues in the Supreme Court Race 

There are three critical issues emerging in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race that it will be important for us to get to voters in the coming two months:

  1. Flipping Congress: According to reports from the New York Times and Milwaukee Journal, Susan Crawford’s appeal to a group of donors put together for her by Democratic donor Reid Hoffman (who has contributed more than $14.5 million to the Wisconsin Democratic Party) suggested that electing her as Supreme Court judge would help flip a couple of Congressional seats to the Democrats. Her campaign’s email headline read, “Chance to put two more House seats in play for 2026” as the reason to elect her to the State Supreme Court. Meanwhile, Crawford’s campaign has claimed that Brad Schimel is the partisan one due to his previous role as a Republican Attorney General.

  2. Throwing Out Voter ID: Crawford’s professional work for the League of Women Voters to eliminate Voter ID laws stand in contrast to Schimel’s stance, which supports maintaining Voter ID. If Crawford wins, it could result in a 4-3 decision overturning Voter ID laws. As noted in the executive summary above, Democrats win 80 percent of all Congressional races in the 16 states with no Voter ID law.

  3. Late-term Abortions: Crawford’s campaign ad prominently featured her stance on abortion, which could be a key issue for the Supreme Court. A state judge has made Wisconsin’s abortion law more liberal than 45 of 47 European countries, allowing late-term abortion up to 22 weeks. Conservative members of the Assembly have pushed to allow Wisconsinites to vote on limiting abortion to 14 weeks, making this an important issue in the race.

If Crawford were to win and shift the U.S. Congress from Republican to Democrat, it could open the door to impeachment proceedings against Trump like in 2018. The average of the recent Harvard and Economist polls show that 36 percent do not approve of Trump’s efforts, and 19 percent of those who watched his first speech thought it was negative. Those voters might prefer Crawford’s election to lead to impeachment proceedings rather than pass legislation supported by Trump.

Meanwhile, 53 percent do approve of Trump’s efforts since taking office, and 60 percent of those who watched his first speech thought it was positive, so those voters might vote for Brad Schimel to guard against overturning Voter ID and gerrymandering the Wisconsin in hopes that Congress would instead continue to focus on passing bipartisan legislation like this week’s Laken Riley Act, which even garnered support from a dozen Democratic U.S. Senators. 

Our focus is not on particular parties winning elections, but on urging conservatives to get involved in promoting common sense policies — such as criminal deportation and protecting children (and our tax dollars) from the multi-billion dollar sex change industry’s maneuvers.

Governing Board Election and Annual Meeting Highlights

The key business of our Annual Meeting was electing the Governing Board. Last year, we introduced our first three Board members: Nicolet Bank Founder Bob Atwell, former Green Bay Packers Chaplain Arni Jacobson, and former Ron Johnson Hispanic outreach and Field Director Camille Solberg. This year, we are pleased to welcome two new members: Paula Quinn and Pastor Michael Larson whose bios below will be added to the Bio Tab. The Board then elected the following officers:

  • Chair: Arni Jacobson (to remain as Chair)

  • President: John Pudner (non-voting)

  • Treasurer: Anna Nichols (non-voting)

  • Secretary: Mari Ruh (non-voting)

Board Member Bios (also added to https://wisconsinffc.com/bios/)

Rev. Michael C. Larson:
Rev. Michael C. Larson, Pastor serves as parish pastor at Luther Memorial Chapel & University Student Center in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In addition to preaching and teaching, he provides spiritual care to Milwaukee area university students and international visiting scholars. Michael has an interest in the intersection of faith and politics, and the church’s role in promoting the public good in accordance with natural law and our founding documents. He received a BA in Communications from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (2007), and a Masters of Divinity from Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, Indiana (2011). God has entrusted to Michael and his wife, Kristina, six children and four foster children. His commitment to these children has prevented him from continuing to run 50 mile ultra marathons, which led to fun discussions after our board meeting with former Speaker John Gard, who has coached high school cross country teams to state championships. However, Michael still enjoys bow hunting, trail running, and old movies. (John Pudner encouraged him to add one new movie to his list, since he and Kristina are doing the same Lord’s work as the inspirational Pastor and wife in the recent movie, Sound of Hope: The Story of Possum Trot.) 

Paula Quinn:
Paula Quinn is an example of someone who prioritized her faith and family before venturing into politics. After raising her own children, Paula–a former college athlete–became active in local politics when she saw the liberal agenda infiltrating schools. In April 2022, she stunned the political world by defeating incumbent Douglas Brahm, who seemed invincible due to being the fire chief for years in Lisbon, a Village in Waukesha County. The election proved how important it was to vote since if just one of Paula’s voters had not shown up, she would have lost. Following her victory, Tim Michels recruited her to run operations for his gubernatorial campaign, which achieved the second-best total of 26 challengers running for governor that year. We saw during those months why Paula was so successful in business operations, as she coordinated the incredible influx of requests for signs, literature and speaking appearances, and organized who on the team would fulfill each request. We know she will be just as valuable as our newest voting Governing Board Member.

Pictures: Luke Farwell, our Director of Pastors’ Outreach and Co-Pastor of First United Presbyterian Church in De Pere, leads Tuesday’s sold-out Wisconsin Faith and Freedom Pastors’ breakfast.

Last photo: Atwell insisted that the photo at the top make it clear Pudner was wearing Air Jordans, which were necessary because of a foot injury while walking for miles in DC during inauguration week in dress shows. After Atwell left, the rest of the attendees stayed long enough to use the Nicolet Bank corporate lobby for a group photo. In addition to the Board Members in the top photo, the additional people in this photo from left to right are: WIFFC State Director Spencer LaVerde with his Mom and fiance, (Pudner, Solberg, Larson, Ruh), former Speaker John Gard, (Jacobson) and Northeastern Director and veteran of national conservative efforts Randell Johnson.