Elon Musk is trying to buy a Wisconsin judge

This Schimel guy is really a piece of work; take a look.

Wisconsin elects its Supreme Court judges. Right now, the court leans toward Dems -- that is, in support of abortion rights for women and against a Republican plan to disenfranchise half of Wisconsin voters by corrupt gerrymandering. Electing Susan Crawford holds the line.

The Wisconsin Democratic Party is probably the most effective state party apparatus in the country. If any Dems can go up against Elon, it's WisDems. Our small donations can still help get out the vote in this April 1 election. Voting has already begun. 

I've contributed; if you can, you should too.

News to celebrate

The state of Wisconsin continues to demonstrate how organized Americans struggle to get their country back when the popular will is derailed by an authoritarian faction in power. Former Republican Governor Scott Walker thought he'd killed off the state's public service unions way back in 2011, a vital element of a gerrymandering and broadly repressive project that sought to move the closely divided state permanently into GOP control. And for some years, it looked as if he'd succeeded. 

But Wisconsin unions and Wisconsin Democrats never gave up.

From the Associated Press: 

Unions score major win in Wisconsin with court ruling restoring collective bargaining rights

MADISON, Wis. — Wisconsin public worker and teachers unions scored a major legal victory Monday with a ruling that restores collective bargaining rights they lost under a 2011 state law that sparked weeks of protests and made the state the center of the national battle over union rights.

That law, known as Act 10, effectively ended the ability of most public employees to bargain for wage increases and other issues, and forced them to pay more for health insurance and retirement benefits.

Under the ruling by Dane County Circuit Judge Jacob Frost, all public sector workers who lost their collective bargaining power would have it restored to what was in place prior to 2011. They would be treated the same as the police, firefighter and other public safety unions that were exempted under the law.

Of course one court ruling doesn't mean the struggle is over. There will be an appeal to the Wisconsin state Supreme Court. But diligent grass roots organizing has won, at the ballot box, a court less friendly to Republican arguments. The justices have overturned the Republican gerrymander of the state legislature; over several electoral cycles, Democrats finally have a chance to make their policy preferences heard at the state house. 

Last year, Democrats elected a pro-choice justice to the state's highest court, changing the balance there. Another judicial election comes along on April 1. If the Dems can win that one, the unions will once again be able to work in a state that was synonymous with enlightened liberal government before the Koch brothers-funded Walker seized the reins. 

When we fight, we win. See WisDems for more. 

Photo is from a Bay Area solidarity rally in 2011.

Hell yes, grassroots campaigning still counts!

In campaign postmortems, there's the usual angst-filled punditry out there that says nothing the Dems did, and especially nothing the grassroots did, mattered at all. 

Bull-bleep. As the season geared up, I described what we were going to see as a "hot and cold running volunteer" election and I stand by that. Vast numbers of people turned out to do the difficult job of direct voter contact in various forms. That's what happens when people really care and/or feel truly threatened.

And their efforts show up in the results. Where there wasn't much of a Harris-Walz campaign -- in the reliable blue states which saw only national ads and online media -- the shift toward Trump from 2020 was in the 6 percent range. Lots of Dems and Dem leaners didn't vote. But in the battleground states where money was invested and activism thrived, the shift was closer to 3 percent. Still too much obviously, but quite different. Yes, there was a red tide coming in, but some places Democratic (and small "d" democratic) activism came much closer to stemming that tide.

Ben Wikler, chair of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, sent out an informative message which aims to describe what party efforts, including at the grassroots, meant in his state. Some of what he saw:

... The shift here was just one quarter the size [of the national deficit]: a 1.5% swing from 2020. Not because Trump was weaker here than elsewhere, but because we were stronger.

Thanks to tens of thousands of heroes—our candidates, the campaign, party infrastructure, allies, and volunteers—we persuaded and turned out even more voters for Harris than we did for Biden in 2020. We lost Wisconsin by just 0.9%—the smallest margin of any state in America.

2024 was a high turnout year, second only to 2020 nationwide. But in most states, turnout went down slightly. In Wisconsin, overall turnout went up—by 1.3%, the most in the country. 

He describes the configuration of forces, groups, and miscellaneous people who made up the Wisconsin campaign: 

... Roughly 100,000 volunteers this year took part in the fight in Wisconsin.

The presidential campaign in Wisconsin and the WisDems core team worked together, hand in glove, on a constant basis. That integration was the product of years of work, relationships, and strategy. It was also made possible by the powerhouse Coordinated Campaign. ...

Every one of the 100,000 people who volunteered, including tens of thousands who knocked on doors and made phone calls in Wisconsin this year, helped Tammy Baldwin win Wisconsin, helped make huge gains downballot, and helped ensure that Harris came closer to winning here than any other battleground state.

The middle class built America, and unions built the middle class. ... Enormous thanks to all the groups involved in mounting an absolutely blockbuster field and communications operation in Wisconsin. 

Elections rely on a three-legged stool: the candidate campaigns, the party and volunteers—and allied groups. ...

Wikler's picture of the three-legged stool may be particular to Wisconsin. He heads one of the most effective Democratic parties in the country. In much of the country, especially bluer states, the three legged stool of progressive campaigning probably looks more like 1) candidates and party infrastructure of varying quality; 2) union workers where such exist; and 3) para-campaign and civil society groups like Seed the Vote, the ACLU, and enviros who've internalized that they have to play in elections to survive. 

But whatever organizational form that the wider democracy campaign assumes in the future, it will demand what Wikler enjoins:

... we organize in every corner and every community in Wisconsin, year-round.

Under-recognized is that the experiences and connections made when literally millions of people are activated in a campaign changes many of the people who participate. As legendary California organizer Fred Ross asserted: 

No good organizing is ever lost.

The period ahead may seem bleak, but there are a hell of a lot of us, we've seen each other, and we can get organized and feisty.

We vote our moral injuries

A twitter comment from a Helen Kennedy has me reflecting:

I think Dobbs is this generation’s Iraq war. The first time a right is taken away is searing.

There's something in that. Mostly we just live our lives. But external events can jar us into extremely enduring political alignments. 

For my generation, early Boomers, that event was the immoral, futile war in Vietnam -- and the military draft. War bad; pols who constrain war, good. (The Democrats were weak reeds here until years later.)

There may be citizens for whom the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Russian empire had similar valence. But is what is experienced as a distant triumph of similar enduring weight to what is felt as moral injury? That's an honest question. I don't know.

For sure, G W Bush's Iraq war scarred a generation. "Bush Lied; Millions Died!" went the chant. Only partially accurate, but heartfelt.

And now, Dobbs/abortion prohibition on top of Donald Trump, MAGA racial and gender hatefulness, climate denial, and guns galore ... these are generational moral injuries to many young people coming up these days. 

Given a means to say "no", they will throng to it. The Washington Post provides a granular account of how young people were organized to vote in the recent judge election, giving WisDems an astonishing winning margin for their candidate.

“The incredibly personal threat posed by the Wisconsin abortion ban…meant that in an election that normally has almost no resonance among young people, in this election, campus wards were packed,” [Ben] Wikler [Democratic Party chair ] said. But more broadly, the issues of democracy and personal freedoms also brought students out in big numbers.

“This generation of young people are primed to participate in the electoral process,” Mike Tate, [lead organizer,] said. “They simply need to know how to do it.”

Democrats flooded state campuses with local student organizers who tabled daily -- only moving inside when temperatures dropped below 35. They made sure students planned for the election, knowing when, where, and how to cast their ballots. Many new voters need information and support with these simple mechanics; there's a fear to be overcome of somehow doing it wrong or embarrassing themselves. 

All this organizing was cheap -- at least in election terms. The two candidates together spent $37 million on campaigns -- mostly TV ads. The Democratic campus organizing cost just $1 million.

Would that the entire Democratic Party would join WisDems in recognizing that diligent organizing, especially among young citizens, is where our future can be ensured.

Let's enjoy this for a day or so ...

 

The election of an abortion rights-defending state judge in Wisconsin yesterday marks another step in Democrats reclaiming majority power in the states of the upper Midwest.

Citizens of Wisconsin have proved repeatedly that in statewide elections they will vote for Democrats they find attractive. The state legislature remains rigged by a Republican gerrymander: Dems get over 50 percent of the state vote, but GOPers occupy almost two thirds of the seats thanks to uncompetitive district lines. Next up for Wisconsin: re-electing Democratic U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin in 2024.

Michigan did Wisconsin one better: because it was possible put a citizen referendum on redistricting on the ballot and win it, gerrymandered districts were redrawn to be more fair. Democrats not only elected a powerful majority in the state legislature, but also an energetic, all-women, team to statewide offices. In 2024, Michiganders will fill an open U.S. Senate seat -- it's early but the likely Democratic nominee looks to be another woman.

Meanwhile, Dems shored up majority power in Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Illinois over the last two years. 

Might Ohio be next? Looks awfully hard, but pro-choice Ohioans are working to put a reproductive rights referendum on the ballot. It remains to be seen whether they'll be able to navigate a legal minefield laid out by their opponents. Ohioans for Reproductive Freedom need all the help they can get.

Note to the Democratic Party: struggling for abortion rights is a political winner. Get with it!

Anti-abortion extremism

I'm not going to make this blog "all abortion rights all the time" but I'm tempted. This is a terrific Democratic ad from Wisconsin publicizing the extreme position taken by the Republican candidate from governor. 

I sure wouldn't give this guy the time of day. Republican are like pursuing dogs that caught the car -- and the car is threatening to run over them. Michels is also a major donor to homophobia.

Abortion rights also alienate voters from Republicans here in Nevada where I'm working the campaign:

81 percent of Nevada Latino voters think abortion should be legal, personal beliefs aside

The survey, conducted from July 20 to Aug. 1 by Mi Familia Vota and UnidosUS, found that 81 percent of those surveyed opposed taking the choice of abortion away from others. The same poll found that only 25 percent believed religious leaders should tell their members which candidates and policies to vote for, and the rest opposed that practice.

Our canvassers find they can move people at the doors from saying "abortion is sin" to saying that -- yes sometimes abortion is necessary and the woman should make her own decision. Dobbs is forcing people to think through the hard choices life forces on us.

2022 Elections: Senate contests Democrats should and must win

In many states, Republican gerrymanders make it hard for Democrats to win a fair share in state legislatures. For example, Democrats, including Governor Tony Evers in 2018 and Joe Biden in 2020, won the majority of all Wisconsin votes. But the state legislature is completely controlled by Republicans. Their dominance is bolstered by geographical sorting, rural and urban, as well as gerrymandering. In some states where this pattern prevails, Democrats can be quite competitive statewide and so have opportunities to win or hold onto U.S. Senate races. 

Here's a run down of the most competitive states.

• Georgia: Incumbent Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock, elected to a short term in 2020, will be running against Trump-cult adherent and Georgia football hero Herschel Walker. Since Walker is pretty close to certifiably nuts, violent, the acknowledged father of four children by four different women whose paternity he at first concealed, and a serial fabricator, this shouldn't be much of a contest. But that assumption disregards the heft of college football in the Peach State. Warnock has been a strong voice for voting rights and for the people of Georgia.

• Pennsylvania: This open Senate seat attracted a wild cast of characters in both party's primaries. TV-doctor Mehmet Oz won the Trump endorsement and squeaked through for the GOPers. Apparently he actually lives in a mansion in New Jersey which may not go down well with Pennsylvania voters. John Fetterman, the Democratic Lieutenant Governor, is a 6'7", tattooed, shorts wearing, giant straight shooter, a bit of a breath of fresh air in the staid political class. Let's hope he can overcome some health challenges.

• Wisconsin: Republican Ron Johnson, the Senate's dumbest anti-vaxxer and an apparent Trump co-conspirator who tried to prevent the 2020 transfer of power to Joe Biden, is up for re-election. If Dems were not so well organized, as the sitting Senator, he'd probably be a shoo-in; the primary for the Dems is late, August 9 and the winner may have a shot in a state usually quite evenly divided.

• Arizona: Incumbent Democrat Mark Kelly will face off against one of several Republicans to be chosen on August 2. The leader among them, a man who needs another vowel, sitting Attorney General Mark Brnovich, figured out his own advancement meant he had to support Donald Trump's Big Lie against his own Republican election officials in this battleground state. Trump has endorsed Blake Masters, a hard right libertarian and tech-bro Peter Thiel protege, who wants to privatize Social Security.

• Nevada: Incumbent Democrat Catherine Cortez-Masto is running for a second term. Her opponent is Adam Laxalt -- whose own family considers him an unworthy usurper of a proud Nevada name -- a far right wingnut and failed governor candidate. Not going to be easy for Cortez-Masto though; the Democratic registration advantage in the state is declining.

• North Carolina: This open seat is an attractive long shot prize for Democrats as their nominee for the state's other Senate seat only lost by 1.8 percent in 2020 while Trump won the state. The sitting governor is a reasonably popular Democrat, so Dems see a chance. Democrat Cherri Beasley, a former judge of the state Supreme Court, is running against Republican Ted Budd, a Congressman who doubles as a gun range owner. Early polls give Beasley a chance to pull this one out.

• I'll be watching also New Hampshire, Ohio and Missouri where the vagaries of electoral contests might shake up Senate prospects -- though probably not, as party polarization is such a strong force.

2022 elections: governor contests that Dems need to win

Republicans are pushing hard to win races for governor this year in states where support for the two parties hangs on a few votes. And Democrats are doing everything they can to win, block, or hold governor's offices in the same states. These states deserve governors who give a damn about the well-being of their residents -- Democrats usually care more for that work. But furthermore, who holds these offices will matter in 2024 if there is another close national election and GOPers are running around screaming that the vote was "stolen." We're seeing all too much of what that can be like. A Democratic governor can help shut down a lot of bullshit.

So here's a rundown of some of the most critical governor races in 2022.

Arizona: Donald Trump has a favorite in the August 2 primary: GOPer Kari Lake, a Phoenix TV anchor. Lake is leading in the primary polls. She has advocated jailing Democratic Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, her opponent in the governor's race, so as to overturn the 2020 vote count. 

“Frankly, I think she should be locked up,” Lake told the crowd in Cave Creek, which responded by starting a Trumpian chant of, “Lock her up!”

Her campaign could not explain what crime she's charging Hobbes with. Lake asserts that, if she had been governor, she would not have certified Joe Biden's 2020 Arizona victory.

Pennsylvania: Republicans have nominated one of the most looney-tunes characters around in the Keystone State. According to the Washington Post, Doug Mastriano is an insurrectionist who has been subpoenaed by the January 6 investigation. There's video showing him crossing Capital police lines, though what else he did inside is not known.

He’s a first-term state senator who was relatively unknown — until Trump lost the 2020 presidential election, in large part by narrowly losing Pennsylvania to Joe Biden. ... [He] rose to prominence in the aftermath of the 2020 election by falsely claiming Trump won the state. Mastriano also helped commission an unauthorized audit of voting machines in a rural county ...

The Democratic Party nominee for Governor is the state’s attorney general, Josh Shapiro. The winner will get to name Pennsylvania's secretary of state, the official who oversees elections.

Michigan: Democratic governor Gretchen Whitmer has been a stalwart supporter of the rule of law against right wing mob pressure. Dogged by pushback against public health rules and mask mandates, she was even the intended target of a militia plot, according to the FBI. Two conspirators convinced a jury that they were just being blowhards (seems likely a role they know well); two more are awaiting a second trial.

Well known Republicans aspiring to run against her made a mess of their campaigns, hiring paid signature collectors who made up false voters on their papers. So their names will not appear on the August 2 primary list which now consists of a smaller field of also-rans.

GOP hopefuls who qualified for the Aug. 2 primary ballot include a conservative media personality, two COVID-19 lockdown protesters, a pastor and a wealthy businessman. 

None has held an elected office before but are seeking to bring a fresh perspective to Lansing and unseat Whitmer, who has built up a big campaign war chest as she seeks re-election to a second term.

Let's hope Whitmer can overcome whoever comes out of this odd scrum.

Wisconsin: The Republican frontrunner in the August 9 primary was former Lieutenant Governor Rebecca Kleefisch who fully supported Trump’s recount requests based on baseless claims of election fraud in 2020. That wasn't good enough for Trump; he liked construction executive Tim Michels better. He dropped an endorsement in his inimitable style. Here's why Trump liked Michels:

"Wisconsin needs a Governor who will Stop Inflation, Uphold the Rule of Law, strengthen our Borders (we had the strongest borders in history just two years ago, now we have the weakest!) and End the well-documented Fraud in our Elections," read a written statement from Trump ... "Tim Michels is the best candidate to deliver meaningful solutions to these problems, and he will produce jobs like no one else can even imagine."

The Democratic incumbent governor of Wisconsin is Tony Evers. Dems are aiming to re-elect Evers to preserve some honesty and sanity in state government.

Nevada: Democrat Steve Sisolak was elected governor in 2018 and has done a creditable job during a pandemic that crashed the state's vital hotel, casino, and restaurant industries. For months, Nevada had some of the nation's worst unemployment.

Trump offered a late endorsement to Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo who prevailed in the Republican primary held June 14. The former president wanted a high profile win by backing the guy who was already leading the GOP field. The race between Sisolak and Lombardo is expected to be close.

Georgia: Democrat Stacey Abrams is taking on incumbent Republican Governor Brian Kemp in a re-run of their 2018 contest. This will be a very tough race, possibly turning on some of the restrictive election laws Kemp has signed. In case you have forgotten, Georgia is the state where GOPers made it illegal to give out water to people waiting in line to vote.

There's nothing easy about any of these contests.

Secretaries of State: a cascade of dangerous Republican crackpots

In most states, an elected Secretary of State administers elections; it's a lot of work and relatively low profile. For example, here in California, that's incumbent Shirley Weber who is running to stay in the job in November.

This year, in states that are expected to be battlegrounds between Dems and GOPers, some mighty sketchy kooks are trying to implant themselves in the system in anticipation of their Orange God/King (h/t Charlie Sykes) running in 2024. It's not pretty and it's dangerous. (Not all the members of this gallery of rogues have yet won their primaries, but the outlook is clear.)

Here's a rundown:

Arizona: The presumptive Republican nominee (primary August 2) is Mark Finchem. His website (I'm not linking to these nutjobs) declares:

Since my very first election, I knew something was very wrong with our elections process. Major defects such as chain-of-custody of ballots, hidden contributions, and expensive unnecessary technology have contributed to the decay of public confidence in our elections. Then on November 3rd, 2020, the unthinkable happened: Americans witnessed real-time reallocation of votes from one candidate to another, broadcast on national television.

Finchem is not only a QAnon believer, he was present at the January 6 Capitol insurrection. It's not clear whether he was among the mob breaching the building. He's Trump-endorsed, naturally.

Two normie Democrats, Reginald Bolding and Adrian Fontes, are running to oppose Finchem in the primary.

Michigan: The incumbent Secretary of State, Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat, is seeking reelection despite death threats when Biden prevailed in 2020. Kristina Karamo is the presumptive Republican nominee.

... the Oak Park Republican skyrocketed to fame in conservative circles after claiming she witnessed fraud at Detroit’s absentee counting board while working as a poll challenger in November 2020. ... Karamo referred to herself as an “anti-vaxxer,” opposed the teachings of evolution in schools, likened abortion to human sacrifice and said LGBT people and those who have sex outside of marriage “violate God's creative design” and are indicative of a culture of “sexual brokenness.”

Michigan GOPers and the Donald think she's their kind of gal.

Nevada: Silver State Republicans joined the Secretary of State clown car in the June primary, nominating Jim Marchant for the office. The Nevada Independent reported:

Marchant

Telling Republicans their votes haven’t counted for diddly-squat due to rampant fraud, then asking them to go cast a ballot, seems a bit counterintuitive for a “get out the vote” campaign. And yet, among at least some Republicans, that has been the message during much of the 2022 primaries. In February, Republican candidate for secretary of state, Jim Marchant, told a crowd in Reno that their vote “hasn't counted for decades.”  

“You haven't elected anybody. The people that are in office have been selected. You haven't had a choice,” Marchant said.

Trump likes this guy too. The normie Democrat running for the open office is Cisco Aguilar.

Georgia: Brad Raffensberger, the Republican incumbent Secretary of State, unexpectedly won his May primary to keep to his office over a Trump-endorsed challenger. He withstood Trump's pressure to "find 11,780 votes" to defeat Biden in 2020. Death threats followed. He is favored to keep the job, however a state law since passed removed the position of state election board chair from the Georgia Secretary of State's duties. He no longer has as much power as he did in 2020.

Senator Raphael Warnock and governor candidate Stacey Abrams will have to win indisputably in fall 2022 to overcome the obstacles state Republicans have erected to free and fair voting.

Pennsylvania: They don't have an elected secretary of state to run elections in Pennsylvania. The job is appointed, so the issue of who runs the 2024 election will be determined by who wins the governor's race this fall. State Republicans have nominated a real doozy. Doug Mastriano is another insurrectionist who has been subpoenaed by the January 6 investigation. There's video showing him crossing Capital police lines, though what else he did in not known.

He’s a first-term state senator who was relatively unknown — until Trump lost the 2020 presidential election, in large part by narrowly losing Pennsylvania to Joe Biden. ... [He] rose to prominence in the aftermath of the 2020 election by falsely claiming Trump won the state. Mastriano also helped commission an unauthorized audit of voting machines in a rural county ...

Wisconsin: In this very contested state, elections are administered not by an elected official, but by a bipartisan regulatory agency, the Wisconsin Elections Commission. This supposedly neutral agency has been the location of complicated infighting over false Republican assertions that the 2020 election was fraudulent. UpNorthNews reported on the commission and former Attorney General Bill Barr's recorded testimony to the January 6 commission:

In a video played Monday during the second public hearing of a special congressional committee investigating the January 6, 2021 insurrection, former President Donald Trump’s attorney general Bill Barr laughs and scoffs at claims that cell phone data proves there was voter fraud in Wisconsin in the 2020 election. ... 

[In response to these claims] Wisconsin Elections Commission (WEC) member Ann Jacobs mentioned [in a meeting] that the drop box at one Milwaukee library is directly below an apartment building—filled with digital pings from cell phones, laptop computers, tablets, and other devices from people not physically using the drop box. 

In February, Assembly Elections Committee Chair Michelle Brandtjen (R-Menomonee Falls) turned the committee’s time over to a presentation from someone convicted of fraud who was claiming numerous irregularities with the state’s voter database. Only a week later did Brandtjen schedule time for WEC Administrator Meagan Wolfe and Technology Director Robert Kehoe to refute the baseless claims. 

“Making unverified, fantastical claims without consulting real election officials has the effect of diverting lawmakers and the public from tracking real issues in need of improvement,” Kehoe told the committee. “That could end up causing real harm to Wisconsin elections.”

Wisconsin election administrators will face constant pressure so long as Republicans are making false assertions about voting.

Wisconsin: back to basics against kleptocracy and authoritarianism

A friend, knowing I was supporting workers in a progressive campaign to keep a Democratic governor in Wisconsin in 2022, found The Fall of Wisconsin: The Conservative Conquest of a Progressive Bastion and the Future of American Politics  by Dan Kaufman. Perhaps the 2018 book had ended up in a "Little Free Library"? She passed it along.

It's depressing, but I'm grateful.

This journalist, originally from the Badger State, lays out the story of how Wisconsin became a kind of tightly-walled right wing preserve, more like Victor Orban's Hungary than I could have imagined.

Donald Trump's victory [in 2016] may have shocked the Clinton campaign and media pundits, but the result merely heralded the final stage of Wisconsin's dramatic transformation from a pioneering beacon of progressive, democratic politics to the embodiment of that legacy's unraveling. ... Throughout the twentieth century, Wisconsin led the country in devising ... progressive legislation that aided the vast majority of its citizens. ... If conservatives cannot tolerate a state that offers what Wisconsin once did, what kind of future is there for the American citizen?

Kaufman is thorough and devastating. His approach is thematic:

• He describes how Scandinavian immigrants brought a communitarian ethos to their new home; these settlers were instinctive abolitionists, appalled by the Fugitive Slave Law of 1854 which empowered slavers to chase their "lost property" to free states. They founded the Republican Party at Ripon, Wisconsin that year.

• In the latter 19th and early 20th century, Robert "Fighting Bob" LaFollette Sr., governor from 1906 to 1925, articulated a bold vision for his democratic, farmer, labor coalition:

The purpose of government, [LaFollette] believed, was to alleviate economic suffering, foster equality, and encourage active citizenship to preserve American democracy.

• But a contemporary Republican governor Scott Walker (in office 2011 to 2019) managed to do away with all that.

• With his Republican buddies in the legislature, he succeeded in outlawing collective bargaining and the union shop in the public sector. (Not including the police unions, of course.) The complacency and anti-Black racism of the established union leadership didn't help Walker's opposition. 

• Walker managed to shut tribal people and environmentalists out of the process of giving over parts of the state for oil pipelines. 

• The local Dems and some unions sought, unsuccessfully, to recall Walker. The national Democratic Party under Obama's designates didn't assist. As Californians have reason to know, when a recall fails, the surviving office holder is cemented in place. (See Difi and Gavin.)

• Walker's Republican buddies then enacted a Koch Brothers-designed legislative program to weaken unions, shrink public services, and eviscerate higher public education. They gerrymandered the state legislature so GOPers have a death grip on state law-making, despite not winning a majority of the statewide vote.

• Even the election -- statewide -- of Democratic governor Tony Evers in 2018 didn't reverse the tide as that legislature stripped the governor's office of many of its powers.

• Joe Biden did win Wisconsin in 2020 -- when all those cheeseheads turn out, Dems can still win.

All is not lost in Wisconsin. Kaufman's book dates from 2018 and is an important description of how democracy has been overthrown in one state while a pretense of rule of law endures. But Wisconsin Democrats are fighting back. The Wisconsin Democratic Party is one of the most activist anywhere, carrying on grassroots base organizing, in and out of season. For our Future WI is a coalition project of unions and nonprofits meeting citizens where they are and organizing a progressive civil society base.

In Wisconsin, it's not enough to mourn -- progressives are also organizing.

2022 election preview -- because democracy is on the line

The media refer to 2022 as "an election year." In fact, and probably to the detriment of citizen engagement with democracy, every year is an "election year" somewhere and in many places at some level of government. 

This is a federal midterm election year during which we'll vote on all 435 members of the House of Representatives, one third of the Senate, and a slew of state governors. It is also a year in which the candidates of the Irresponsible Party -- a nice label for Big Lie-promoting Republicans, don't you think? -- will be seeking revenge for losses in 2020 and to win power going forward. And the history of midterm elections under a new president says they'll have the wind at their backs.

The purpose of this post is to lay out some context for the contests we're all going to live through, as much for my own understanding as any reader's, though perhaps some might find this useful. So here goes:

Gerrymandering: Because 2020 was divisible by 10 and the Census Bureau somehow completed a plausible count of us all as required by the Constitution, states are reapportioning the districts in which we vote for state reps and Congress. Republicans control all branches of government (state legislatures and governors) in 23 states; Democrats in 15; and others are divided. State laws about reapportionment allow for many variations on how districts are drawn, but who is in power has a lot to do with the results, mostly.

In a general way, the predominance of Republicans in many state governments would promise that Congressional maps would grossly favor Republicans. And in some places (looking at you, Tennessee) they do, so far in the process. And in a few Democratic Party controlled states like Illinois, Dems are shoring up their advantages in Congressional seats. But the best-informed observers including Dave Wasserman at the Cook Report and many others don't see Republicans creating many aggressive gerrymanders. Rather,

... Republicans don’t appear likely to gain a significant number of seats through redistricting. Instead, they’ve taken up a new strategy: make red seats redder.

If this is correct, it should seem familiar to Californians. In 2000, the state legislature approved what amounted to an incumbent protection gerrymander: though Dems predominated, they largely made their own members and sitting Republicans invulnerable to challenge for a decade. Only one Congressional seat (won by Democrat Jerry McNerney in the northern Valley) turned over during the '00s, despite growing Democratic margins among the electorate. The sense they'd been disenfranchised encouraged Californians to adopt our current independent Citizen Redistricting Commission to do the job. (We still get mostly Dem Reps because we are mostly Dems.)

Elections for the House of Representatives: Decades of gerrymandering and voluntary self-sorting by political preference mean that hardly any Congressional races are really competitive. As of today, the Cook Political Report points to a measly total of 13, nationally. Some others may develop because of local circumstances or candidate quality. But unless you live in or to next to one of these competitive districts, your political attention is better paid to other offices. 

Elections for Governor: Though Republicans have ridden decades of smart gerrymandering to control of many state legislatures, in quite a few of these states the electorate statewide is closely divided. These are mostly "battleground" states in presidential years. And electing Democratic governors to four year terms in 2022 will help protect an honest vote count in 2024 if the Reps try again to override the decision of the voters. 

States where elections for governor are critical and where volunteer help and any available cash might be of assistance include:

• Georgia: the inspiring Stacey Abrams will again be on the ballot. This will be very tough, but never count that brilliant organizer out. 

• Nevada: Incumbent Democrat Steve Sisolak will be seeking another term. 

• Pennsylvania: Attorney General Josh Shapiro is the consensus Democratic candidate. A slew of Reps are running in a primary on May 17.

• Wisconsin: Incumbent Democrat Tony Evers will face whoever wins the Republican primary on August 9. There are at least two well-funded contenders, both Trumpy. Wisconsin has the best organized Democratic Party in the country. 

• Michigan: Incumbent Democrat Gretchen Whitmer will try to hold on for another term. A Black Detroit police chief, Jame Craig, is one of the leading Republican contenders; these will face off on August 2. 

• Arizona: the governor's office is open as the incumbent Republican is termed out. Secretary of State Katie Hobbs probably leads the Democratic aspirants, while Republicans have a slew of choices including QAnon and Trump-loving news anchor Keri Lake. The primary is August 2. 

• Another governor's race I'm watching: in Maine, Trumpish former governor Paul LePage wants to take back the job from incumbent Democrat Janet Mills.

Then there are the Senators. Again, Democrats are quite competitive statewide in places where Republican gerrymanders keep them out of power in the state legislatures.

• Georgia: Incumbent Senator Raphael Warnock looks to be taking on Trump-cult adherent and Georgia football hero Herschel Walker. Since Walker is pretty close to certifiably nuts, this shouldn't be much of a contest, but that assumption disregards the heft of college football in the Peach State.

• Nevada: Incumbent Democrat Catherine Cortez Masto will seek a second term. Her likely opponent Adam Laxalt -- who his family considers him an unworthy usurper of a proud Nevada name -- is a far right wingnut and failed governor candidate. Not going to be easy for Masto though; the Democratic registration advantage in the state is declining.

• Pennsylvania: This open Senate seat has attracted a wild cast of characters in both parties, including the 6'7" tattooed Democratic Lieutenant Governor John Fetterman and, among the Reps, TV-doctor Mehmet Oz. Fortunately the primary is in May, so we'll get a look at the real shape of the contest here fairly early in the year.

• Wisconsin: The Senate's dumbest anti-vaxxer, incumbent Republican Ron Johnson, is up for re-election. If Dems were not so well organized, as the sitting Senator, he'd probably be a shoo-in; the primary for the Dems is late, August 9.

• Arizona: Incumbent Democratic Senator Mark Kelly will face off against one of several Republicans to be chosen in August. The leader among them, a man who needs another vowel, sitting Attorney General Mark Brnovich, figured out his own advancement meant he had to support Donald Trump's Big Lie against his own Republican election officials in this battleground state.

• North Carolina: This open seat will be an attractive prize for Democrats as their nominee for the state's other Senate seat only lost by 1.8 percent in 2020 while Trump won the state. The sitting governor is a reasonably popular Democrat, so Dems see a chance. There's a wide field of Dem and Rep candidates running in a June 7 primary (date subject to all sorts of litigation over House seat boundaries; North Carolina is Republican Congressional gerrymander ground zero.)

• I'll be watching also New Hampshire, Ohio and Missouri where the vagaries of electoral contests might shake up Senate prospects -- though probably not, as party polarization is such a strong force.

Whew!!! Gonna be a tough year -- and as much Democratic Party success as can be won matters desperately to the preservation of some remnant of U.S. democracy.

Those of us who care need to pick the most plausible contests and be ready to donate and work.

Finally, if figuring all this out is just too much, and you have some cash, consider supporting Swing Left's national fund which prioritizes smartly for us.