MILWAUKEE, WISCONSIN — Texas Senator Ted Cruz dealt a major blow to Donald Trump’s hopes to win the Republican presidential nomination by soundly winning the Wisconsin primary Tuesday night. Trump’s second-place finish means his path to the 1,237 bound delegates he needs to avoid a contested GOP convention in July has significantly narrowed.
Cruz benefited from the endorsement of Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who remains popular with the state’s Republican voters even as his overall approval rating is below 40 percent. At a Cruz campaign stop in Milwaukee on Monday, Wauwatosa resident Kelly Bormann told ThinkProgress that Walker’s endorsement was “absolutely influential” in her decision.
“I had an idea of who I wanted to vote for, but that really solidified it,” Bormann said. “I believe in what Scott Walker believes in. His results are already proven. His endorsement just shows his beliefs are in line with Ted Cruz’s.”
After posing for a picture with Cruz in Milwaukee’s Glorioso Italian Market, she gushed about the candidate. “I definitely think he’s got the right idea about immigrants, the right idea about work, the right idea about jobs. I just think he’s really grounded and has great opinions,” Bormann added. Like many Wisconsin voters, she expressed a distaste for national GOP frontrunner Donald Trump and his policy proposals, including a massive wall on the U.S.-Mexico border.
“I like that [with Cruz] there’s not a wall. I like that he’s in agreement with if you’re born here, you’re here. It’s not black and white like Trump, it’s by situation, it’s what have you done for our country.”
When ThinkProgress pointed out that Cruz has promised to hire Trump to build his border wall, Bormann countered: “I think the wall with Cruz would be different from the wall with Trump. The wall would be forward thinking instead of backward.”
Cruz has also enjoyed enthusiastic backing from Wisconsin’s popular conservative talk radio hosts, who have spent slamming Trump and touting Cruz’s career and personal narrative.
This was effective for voters like Milwaukee native Felix Ramsey Sr., an artist and military veteran, who told ThinkProgress he appreciates that Cruz is a self-made man from a modest background.
“I like what Cruz stands for, which is pretty much that grown men stand up and work for themselves instead of waiting on handouts,” Ramsey said. “If you’re a grown man, you need to get up off your lazy ass and work, period. I see it every day, and it makes me sick to my stomach: grown men who are too fucking lazy to get work. That’s what I can’t stand. When I see Cruz, I see what he did to get where he’s at.”
Ramsey added he had a piece of advice for Trump. “Stay with what you know,” he said. “You’re a good real estate person. Stay in that field. Don’t come into this field.”
Despite the relatively small number of delegates, Cruz went all-in on Wisconsin, bringing in volunteers from all over the country to drum up support for him in every county in the Badger State.
One of these volunteers, Matthew Cronin from North Carolina to Wisconsin, said he was largely motivated by a “loathing” of Trump.
“My number one priority is to stop Donald Trump. He’s a racist. He’s a misogynist,” Cronin said. “There’s nothing conservative about him and there’s nothing principled about him. I deem him a grossly immoral man. The way he talks about women is disgraceful. I’ve got a little girl. He can’t be the president of my country. No way.”
Cronin said he originally campaigned for Marco Rubio, but regards Cruz as “pretty close to what I’m looking for.”
Cronin has been campaigning — first for Rubio, then for Cruz — throughout the South, and said he now fears Trump supporters more than the man himself.
“I had Trumpkins pull guns on me when I was going door to door,” he told ThinkProgress. “They would yell at me, ‘Get off my property,’ and spew racist filth in my face,” he said. “One day, I was in Florida, holding a big sign up at rush hour outside a Rubio event. The Trump people would give me the finger, stop in the middle of traffic, call me spic and wetback and this horrible term ‘cuck’ — someone who can’t be counted on for racial solidarity.”
Though he said he doesn’t agree with him on every issue, Cronin found Cruz’s intelligence and demeanor a welcome contrast to this behavior.
“He’s a normal guy. He’s sincere. He has a good track record. He’s incredibly intelligent,” he said. “You don’t argue cases in the Supreme Court unless you’re good at what you do.”