Wisconsin special elections: Five takeaways in races that saw Democrats win one and GOP win another

Bill Glauber Craig Gilbert
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

There's nothing like election season in Wisconsin, which goes on and on and on.

Tuesday's latest installment saw voters trudging to the polls to decide special elections in the 1st Senate District in the northeast and the 42nd Assembly District north of Madison.

Democrat Caleb Frostman of Sturgeon Bay gives a thumbs up to supporters after he defeated Republican Andre Jacque in a special election for Wisconsin's 1st District Senate District on Tuesday,.

Would the blue wave roll on? The red wall stand firm?

On paper, it was a split decision.

Democrat Caleb Frostman defeated Rep. Andre Jacque, R-De Pere, in the Senate race, while Republican Jon Plumer defeated Ann Groves Lloyd for the Assembly seat.

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester, said on twitter that the Plumer victory was evidence that the blue wave was just a trickle in the Assembly.

But Democrats have to be ebullient. After all, they won a Senate seat they hadn't held since the 1970s. And while they have little shot of winning back the Assembly in November, they do have a chance to flip control of the Senate. 

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As Senate minority leader Jennifer Shilling, D-La Crosse, put it: "The last time the 1st Senate District was represented by a Democrat, Gerald Ford was president, techies were anxiously waiting for VHS tapes to hit the shelves and the Vikings were in a Super Bowl."

The victory in the 1st Senate district comes after Democrats flipped an equally Republican state Senate seat in western Wisconsin in January.

Here are five takeaways:

A good night for Eric Holder

What in the world is former Democratic President's Barack Obama's former attorney general doing playing in the sandbox of Wisconsin politics? Plenty, it turns out.

Fresh off helping Rebecca Dallet win the spring election for state Supreme Court, a Holder-led group successfully sued Republican Gov. Scott Walker to force the special elections. The seats became vacant in December after former Sen. Frank Lasee of De Pere and former Rep. Keith Ripp of Lodi joined the governor's administration.

Expect Holder's group to be around the state in the fall, too, when Walker is up for re-election. Holder tweeted that Walker "obstructed the voters at every turn. But we didn't stop fighting — and we won't."

Candidates and campaigns matter

While the state Senate race fit a national pattern of energized Democratic turnout under President Donald Trump, it was also a reminder of the importance of local factors. The two legislative special elections took place in districts carried by Republican Trump for president in 2016 and Republican Walker for governor in 2014.

But Democrats won the state Senate district, which had bigger Trump and Walker margins. And Republicans carried the Assembly district, which had smaller Trump and Walker margins. Trump won the Senate district by 18 and the Assembly district by 14. Walker won the Senate district by 23 and the Assembly district by nine.

In the Senate race, there was a huge 20-point Democratic swing from Trump’s 18-point winning margin to Democrat Frostman’s 2-point winning margin.

In the Assembly race, there was a modest 6-point Democratic swing from Trump’s 14-point edge to Republican Plumer’s 8-point margin (according to unofficial returns). And Plumer did nearly as well as Walker did in the district in 2014.

Caveat for November

Turnout (in excess of 28,000 votes) was a little more than a third of the size of the last mid-term in 2014 (roughly 79,000 votes). That’s very respectable for a special election in June, but another reminder that the November race for the same state Senate seat will attract far more voters. In a larger turnout race, its underlying GOP makeup will make it more challenging for Democrats to hold now that they have flipped it. But their candidate, Frostman, will also have several months to work the district as a sitting lawmaker.

"Swinging" Door County

Door County, occupying the northeast Wisconsin peninsula that juts into Lake Michigan, played a central role in Tuesday’s Senate contest. Home to Democrat Frostman, it swung by 28 points from 2016. Trump carried it by 3 points for president. Frostman carried it by 25 points Tuesday, winning it 62.6% to 37.3%, for a margin of almost 2,000 votes, according to unofficial returns. (Frostman won the district overall by less than 1,000 votes).

Door also turned out at higher levels than the district as a whole. In the 2016 race for president, Door accounted for 18% of the district’s total vote. In the 2014 race for governor, it accounted for 19% of the district’s vote. But on Tuesday, it accounted for about 26% of the district’s vote, a huge boon to Frostman.

In recent elections, Door County has voted for Trump, Walker three times, Obama twice, Republican Ron Johnson for U.S. Senate in 2016 and Democrat Tammy Baldwin for U.S. Senate in 2012.

Big money rolled in

According to the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, more than $1.2 million was spent on the two special elections by the candidates and outside groups.

Outside groups outspent the candidates by a 2-to-1 margin in the Senate race, where more than $500,000 was spent. But in the Assembly race, where more than $500,000 was spent, it was the candidates who outspent the groups by a 3-to-1 margin.

That's a lot of cash for two races that will be replayed in just a few months time.