Alec MacGillis finds it “difficult to envision how Walker would broaden his party’s national appeal beyond the same shrinking pool of voters that Romney drew from”:
Unlike Mitt Romney, or, for that matter, John McCain, he is beloved by the conservative base, but he has the mien of a mainstream candidate, not a favorite of the fringe. His boosters, who include numerous greenroom conservatives in Washington and major donors around the country, such as the Koch brothers, see him as the rare Republican who could muster broad national support without yielding a millimeter on doctrine.
This interpretation of Walker’s appeal could hardly be more flawed. He has succeeded in the sort of environment least conducive to producing a candidate capable of winning a national majority. Over the past few decades, Walker’s home turf of metropolitan Milwaukee has developed into the most bitterly divided political ground in the country—“the most polarized part of a polarized state in a polarized nation,” as a recent series by Craig Gilbert in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel put it.
If that isn’t enough to bring Walker fans down to earth, maybe this news will:
Prosecutors say Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker is at the center of a “criminal scheme” to coordinate fundraising with conservative groups across the country, according to documents revealed on Thursday.
The documents were unsealed Thursday by order of a federal judge as part of a lawsuit that sought to block a secret state investigation, known as a “John Doe probe,” into the 2012 gubernatorial recall elections, which the incumbent Walker won. In the filing, the prosecutors say Walker, his chief of staff Keith Gilkes and another top adviser illegally coordinated with national conservative groups and national figures including GOP strategist Karl Rove. Rove’s assistant said he was traveling Thursday and couldn’t comment.
Philip Bump maps the alleged coordination. Andrew Prokop doesn’t expect charges anytime soon:
Overall, the documents released Thursday provide new information on the case prosecutors sought to make, and what evidence they initially had. But they don’t indicate any new substantive development in the investigation. Until prosecutors get permission from both federal and state courts to use the documents they subpoenaed, charges seem unlikely to be filed.
Chait ponders the political consequences:
The announcement by prosecutors in Wisconsin raises several disconcerting possibilities for a prospective Walker candidacy. The worst possibility is that he will be convicted of running a criminal scheme. A second, less-bad possibility is that he will avoid prosecution, perhaps by Republican judges who see the first Amendment as carte blanche to violate any and all campaign finance laws. This would still create an extended legal battle in which Walker’s name is associated with the “criminal scheme,” a phrase combining two terms which each have a highly negative connotation to most voters. This sort of coverage has caused Christie’s poll numbers to tank even without (yet) facing criminal charges.
The Dish 