There’s a big divide between Lt. Gov. candidates

When Wisconsin voters choose a governor on Tuesday, they’ll automatically choose that person’s second fiddle — the lieutenant governor who could end up stepping into the top job unexpectedly.

Republican Tom Tiffany’s running mate is David Varnam, a former small-town mayor and one-time staffer at a conservative Christian policy organization. Democrat David Crowley’s running mate, Sarah Godlewski, is a high-profile Democratic politician who has held two statewide offices, one elected and one appointed.

The two have little in common, but each has said they’re hearing from voters who are crossing party lines to back their ticket.

Neither was chosen by the candidate they’re running with. Wisconsin voters pick their political party’s lieutenant governor candidate in the August partisan primary.

Republican David Varnam: Conservative policy advocate

In August, David Varnam pulled an upset in the Republican primary for lieutenant governor, garnering 55% of the vote to defeat the party’s endorsed candidate, Will Martin, who received 45%. Martin had already been making campaign appearances with Tiffany.

The Tiffany campaign did not respond to requests this week for an interview with Varnam.

Varnam’s victory was powered by endorsements before the primary from U.S. Rep. Derrick Van Orden, Wisconsin Family Action and Pro-Life Wisconsin. Wisconsin Family Action campaigns against legislation that protects LGBTQ rights. Pro-Life Wisconsin has supported legislation that would define a fetus as “a person” — outlawing abortion for any reason and opposing exceptions for rape, incest or to protect the life of the mother.

Abortion is one of seven issues Varnam lists on his campaign website. He vows to “stand firm and support protections for unborn children,” citing his past work for Focus on the Family as well as his work as a congressional aide earlier in his career.

The website list also says he favors “protecting women sports” and vows to “keep men out of women’s sports and protect their locker rooms.” In the last several weeks Tiffany has promoted his own promise to prevent trans girls from playing on girls’ sports teams or using girls’ bathrooms and locker rooms.

On education, Varnam promotes school choice and declares that schools must “raise standards, test scores and expectations for our students.” He also supports the rights of gun owners, his website states.

Varnam served from 2012 to 2016 on the city council of Lancaster, Wisconsin, in Grant County, and as mayor from 2016 to 2022. He previously worked as a legislative analyst for Focus on the Family, a national conservative evangelical Christian organization that has opposed abortion rights and condemned civil rights measures covering LGBTQ+ people.

At the top of his issues list, Varnam calls for cutting taxes and highlights his veto of a 40% stormwater fee increase in Lancaster during his mayoral term. He also advocates “right-to-farm” laws that block nuisance lawsuits directed at farms and calls for improved rural broadband and rural road upkeep.

On immigration Varnam advocates working “with President Trump” and ensuring the cooperation of state and local law enforcement with federal agencies to carry out deportations of “criminal illegal aliens.”

Varnam says he supports more law enforcement funding and backs the use of “qualified immunity,” which puts a higher barrier to suing law enforcement officers for their actions. Critics contend the legal doctrine too easily shields police from accountability for violating people’s civil rights.

At an appearance with Tiffany in New Glarus this week, Varnam didn’t dwell on the campaign’s policy positions but instead leaned into a get-out-the-vote message.

He recounted the story of one voter he met last week who told him, “I usually vote Democratic,” but decided to vote for Tiffany and Varnam because they’re both “from rural areas.”

Varnam said he wants to see Christians “vote their values” — identifying them along with hunters and residents of western Wisconsin as “three major groups that don’t vote in a midterm election.”

“We need Christians to be the ones to deliver the victory on November 3,” Varnam said.

Democrat Sarah Godlewski: Political veteran

Sarah Godlewski, who is currently the Wisconsin secretary of state, was unchallenged in the August Democratic primary for lieutenant governor.

Elected state treasurer in 2018, Godlewski was one of several Democrats who sought the nomination to run for U.S. Senate in 2022, withdrawing before the primary that year.

In early 2023, Gov. Tony Evers appointed her secretary of state to replace Doug La Follette, who abruptly resigned just months after he had won his 12th consecutive four-year term.

After Evers announced in mid-2025 that he would not seek a third term, Godlewski decided to forgo running for a second term as secretary of state and chose to run for lieutenant governor instead.

“I wanted to be part of the team that was going to help get things done and stop this two-tier system that the Republicans have been working to create,” Godlewski said in an interview, “which is a system that works for billionaires and the wealthy 1%, and then a system that everybody else can barely survive in.”

Her nomination was a foregone conclusion. But the contest for top of the ticket was the opposite. After more than a half-dozen other Democrats entered the race and four dropped out — including Crowley briefly — the nomination battle culminated with Crowley’s primary victory by fewer than 4,000 votes.

Since then, Godlewski said, she and Crowley have been campaigning together and talking about what they want their work together to look like if they win.

They did a unity tour immediately after the primary that made 20 stops and covered 1,700 miles. In the week leading up to Tuesday’s election, they’re touring the state again, with twice as many stops and covering about 3,000 miles.

“What we are really hoping that Wisconsinites see is that this partnership — that collectively we are going to get things done here for Wisconsin, which I think is really important because when you look at the challenges that our state is facing,” Godlewski said.

“David understands that these challenges are — in order to tackle them and to truly deliver, you need a team, and I’ve made it very clear that I’m going to be a key partner,” she said.

The challenges Godlewski identifies include healthcare coverage, the cost of childcare and addressing public school funding.

On the statewide tour they’re reinforcing the Democrats’ core 2026 election message: that policies from Republicans in the state Capitol as well in Washington under the leadership of President Donald Trump are directly responsible. And they’re tying that same message to the Republican nominee Tiffany, a third-term member of Congress.

At the state level, Republicans “refused to pass legislation that would have funded our public schools,” Godlewski said. In Washington, Trump’s signature 2025 bill — the One Big Beautiful Bill Act — made cuts to food assistance and to Medicaid that will affect hundreds of thousands of Wisconsin residents, she added — “and Tom Tiffany supported that.”

Trump administration policies have also cut off clean energy investments in Wisconsin, which “took away thousands of good-paying union jobs,” Godlewski said.

While it’s been four years since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a national right to abortion, Godlewski said Varnam’s opposition to abortion and LGBTQ rights have escalated the stakes in the election. “I do think this is still a salient issue,” she said of reproductive rights.

Crowley and Godlewski have proposed advocating with lawmakers to pass an amendment enshrining reproductive rights in the state constitution.

The bus tour is putting them in front of hundreds of voters across the state, but Godlewski believes that their message is reaching well beyond the ones that see them in person.

“Tom Tiffany and Donald Trump, their policies are hurting places where oftentimes maybe Democrats haven’t won before, which is why this tour is focused on going everywhere and delivering everywhere,” Godlewski said. “I am having people in these communities seek me out to tell me that they are registered Republicans and they are voting for David and I.”

 Godlewski compared the effort to her successful run for state treasurer in 2018 “as a political nobody from the Chippewa Valley” who got more votes than the other winning Democrats, Evers and Josh Kaul, who got elected attorney general.

“I believe part of the reason I was able to do that was because I showed up everywhere,” she said. “And David has that exact exact same philosophy that we need to go everywhere. We need to show up, meet voters where they are and listen.”