Over the last decade, Wisconsin has taken a sharp turn to the right, with former President Donald Trump taking the state in 2016 and President Joe Biden just barely scraping together enough votes to win it back in 2020.
However, Politico reports that the overturning of Roe v. Wade has put the Badger State back on a progressive trajectory, best exemplified by liberal judge Janet Protasiewicz's double-digit defeat of right-wing rival Dan Kelly in a state Supreme Court election earlier this year.
Wisconsin Democratic operatives tell Politico that the Republican base's hardline stance on abortion rights has significantly damaged the party in their state, and they don't see that changing in the near future.
"This abortion issue, that’s where they have to be scared to death,” Democratic pollster Paul Maslin tells Politico. “It hurt them everywhere, but it especially hurt them in Wisconsin.”
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Maslin noted that Democrats benefited this spring from a turnout surge in blue areas of the state that he said was "mind-boggling, numbers nobody has ever seen."
On the GOP side, Waupun Mayor Rohn Bishop tells Politico that the recent elections show just how toxic of an issue abortion rights has become for Republicans.
What's more, he thought that it showed that the GOP base had increasingly unrealistic expectations about its demands from GOP lawmakers on total abortion bans.
“We got our butts kicked,” he lamented. “What the Republican base demands and what independent voters will accept are growing further apart."
