WAUSAU, WI (WSAU) — The two Democrats vying to unseat Republican Sean Duffy in the mid-term election met in Wausau Thursday for a candidate’s forum hosted by Citizen Action Wisconsin.
Dr. Brian Ewert of Marshfield and Margaret Engebretson, a 21-year veteran of the Navy, Navy Reserve, and Minnesota Air National Guard spent about two hours answering questions from various groups in front of dozens of voters in the basement of the Marathon County Historical Society.
The winner of Tuesday’s primary will face the incumbent Duffy in the November Election. Both candidates took direct aim at the establishment in Washington when it came to issues like health care and tariffs. “The needs of the people here are not being tended to,” said Ewert. “In March, 107 Republican representatives sent the President a letter asking him to be very careful with tariffs. Congressman Duffy chose not to sign it.”
Engegretson said it’s clear that the Affordable Care Act was a step in the right direction, but more needs to be done. “We have some real problems with it. Some people don’t have insurance at all. The costs on the exchanges is astronomical,”she said. Adding that the President and the Republicans haven’t done much to fix those problems. “It’s malfunctioning,” she said.
Ewert says the negative impacts he’s seen in his patients health care plans are the reason he’s running for the seat. Engebretson says she favors a single-payer Medicare for All system.
Both candidates also told stories of how they’ve heard of tariffs hurting Wisconsin businesses. Ewert told stories of a seventh generation dairy farmer that sold his family’s heard of cattle because they just couldn’t make it work anymore and of loggers who have been storing wood instead of selling it due to tariffs.
Engebretson said she talked with a small manufacturer who sold plastic parts to China, however his customers have canceled their orders because they can’t afford to purchase the products anymore due to tariffs.
Hear more from both candidates in the video above.
