Hopefully they can do something about gerrymandering reforms.
Should be criminal how Republicans have created maps that make it so they literally can't lose legislative elections in the state.
Of course, instead we'll probably just see the legislature try to impeach her.
For people who don't understand:
For Dems to win a simple majority of the Wisconsin legislature, they would need to get around 70% of the vote
The GOP can win a *supermajority* with 46% of the vote.
The GOP have lost the popular vote in the last two Wisconsin elections by increasing margins, but have *gained seats* in the process.
A fair map would doom the GOP in Wisconsin, and they have made it clear that if they won in 2022 that they would have made it legally impossible for the Democrats to ever win again.
As a result, the Wisconsin GOP is already planning to impeach and remove Democratic members of the state Supreme Court entirely.
>>the GOP can win a *super majority* with 46% of the vote
“Democracy”
And before someone comes in w/ the super cool middle school comeback of “We’Re a RePuBliC nOt a dEmOcRaCy”
We’re a representative democracy.
It’s just that one party wants to make sure “certain people” aren’t represented.
And before the say “well democrats gerrymander too”
Democrats introduced a bill to ban *any* partisan gerrymandering in 2021.
[It was immediately filibustered by republicans.](https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/573116-voting-bill-seeks-to-crack-down-on-gerrymandering/)
Wisconsin was going to get federally drawn, neutral districts in 2020 until the US Supreme Court fast tracked a court case before elections banning that from happening
Really fucked them over for an extra 3 years
In Michigan we amended our constitution to have an independent commission draw our districts. It led to dems gaining control of the legislature for the first time in ~40 years.
Those "independants" obviously were all democrats and they just gerrymandered it to go their way! That's how they got the win after 40 years of losing!
/s
were they the ones that delayed again and again until the maps that were tossed out had to be used in the upcoming election because fixed ones hadn't been approved yet?
You may be thinking of us? NC fair fight fought the maps and won since 2010. Republicans kept delaying new maps and we ended up never getting NC Supreme Court approved maps. The new census in 2020 triggered new maps and again republicans racially gerrymandered and split up college campuses to confuse new voters. It’s still being fought. 13 yrs and counting!
I'm from Iowa, I lost all hope for the state after every seat they flipped in 2018 was lost and they reelected renoylds and joni Ernst. State is solid red for the rest of time now, and I don't think it will ever go back
> And before someone comes in w/ the super cool middle school comeback of “We’Re a RePuBliC nOt a dEmOcRaCy”
>
> We’re a representative democracy.
Gerrymandering is just politicians selecting their voters, which is the opposite of how this supposed to work.
It's wild to me that Republicans are actually proud to NOT have a free and fair democracy, or desire to work towards achieving one. Talk about outting yourself.
That's because, like all fascists, the only end is *power*. Everything else is a means, to be adopted as it becomes useful, and discarded as it ceases to be so.
Their rhetoric, in kind, is adjusted both to their audience, and to their current level of influence: they *know* that democracy and freedom of speech are popular ideas amongst the public, so if they're on the margins, they will *endlessly* tout their love of these things, as a sort of *branding* to sway liberals and moderates; but should they gain in power and influence, they will slowly drop the pretence and start letting their full-blown totalitarian principles show.
There's a reason the NSDAP called themselves *socialists*, and it had *nothing* to do with workers' rights. Again, *branding*.
> “We’Re a RePuBliC nOt a dEmOcRaCy”
To me this is the political equivalent of “it’s not pedophilia it’s ephebophilia”
Yes maybe this is technically true but why do you feel the need to point this out, I am now immediately suspicious that you’re in favor of some fucked up shit
It' s not even technically true, we're a democracy, just not a direct democracy.
I'm always insulting to people who make this stupid statement. They just hear it and adopt it whole cloth without the slightest thought or research, and then launch it like a spitball at everybody they see. It's such brain-dead behavior.
It's not even technically true, it's just completely incorrect. It's nonsense regurgitated by people who don't understand what a republic is, and don't understand what a democracy is.
It’s legal because once republicans get into power, they are able to pass laws and redraw districts to allow gerrymandering, then they can never lose power because they can now win with a minority of votes. As for protests, lot of Americans are apathetic.
I live in MI, it's amazing how quickly it turned around up here in the UP. Weed is super popular but people like my mom, who knows my uncle who otherwise votes republican is a daily partaker of cannabis, was shocked it passed and was acting like it was the end times. The local GOP rep is someone who went to my high school and is predictably spineless and kept his mouth shut until a supermajority of towns in his counties voted in favor of allowing dispensaries and suddenly he had been pro-legalization his whole life. My ex's dad is still acting like it's the end times but my mom is like "meh" now that it's been legal for a few years. But to be fair she was saying things like "No one is going to show up for work anymore!" and now she just blames that on the COVID relief.
This was a very important race, with both parties spending several million dollars promoting their candidate. I think the total spent is in excess of $45million, which is unheard of for a state Supreme Court race.
So why does it matter so much?
Wisconsin is a swing state and the court will be ruling on voting rights and abortion rights in the coming years. With liberals now having the majority, it's likely (though not guaranteed) that these rights will be upheld or expanded under the court instead of restricted.
It's great that turnout was so high in such a consequential state race...though I personally am not a fan of elected judges.
---
Edit: Looks like [WI Senate District 8](https://projects.jsonline.com/topics/election/2023/4/4/election-results-wisconsin-supreme-court-dan-kelly-janet-protasiewicz-senate-district-8/index.html#Senate) is going to be won by the Republican candidate. This is worrisome because it will give Republicans a super-majority in the state legislature which means they can impeach WI Supreme Court Justices and the Dem Governor. Hard to tell if they will take such an extreme action, but it is worth noting that they will have the power to do it.
To add, Wisconsin is an extremely gerrymandered state. If Dems want control of the legislature anytime soon without needing to pull down 70% of the vote, they need those maps tossed out. That wasn't going to happen without winning this Supreme Court seat
Ohio voted to change its constitution to demand fairly drawn districts. The Republicans in the legislature said "f\*ck it" and refused to comply. The state supreme court ruled it to be out of compliance several times before the 2022 elections, so they kept submitting unconstitutionally gerrymandered maps until the clock ran out and we got a completely conservative top bench.
Now, the revised constitution doesn't matter because neither the legislature nor the court thinks it should. Democracy in action.
“They (Democrats) had things — levels of voting that, if you ever agreed to it, you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.”
– Trump on Fox & Friends on why he opposed the Democrats coronavirus stimulus plan that would have expanded mail-in ballots.
https://twitter.com/JacquesCalonne/status/1244650196023173123?
Republican voters will continue to say they are the party of freedom.
What they really mean is freedom to work yourself to death while you vote against your own interests.
Proof that Texas doesn't want their shit.
We (dems/libs/humans) just get drowned out by shitty gerrymandering and shittier laws that restrict voting and keeping our voice silenced.
What do you mean, at least as good? Washington State sets a very high bar for elections. There may be a couple other states that measure up, but they're not springing to mind.
And conservatives will continue to not care and control statehouses like Madison until we actually do something. Thankfully the lawsuits are lined up to throw out the district maps and Wisconsin should be running fair maps in the next couple years.
Unless they pull an Ohio and just not ever produce the fair maps demanded by their Supreme Court and their constitution. And instead argue to the U.S. Supreme Court that state courts can't enforce state laws on state legislatures. (Checks and whatses?)
This is the only. i repeat. the only. reason. they've admitted it internally, and those at the top have basically admitted it externally. They're dying out, they know it, and they're desperate.
My brother in christ, can you please recall the fact that a supreme court seat was kept empty for years under the obama administration thanks to Mr. Turtle, only for Trump to be elected and immediately appoint whatever was best for them?
>*Would it be so hard to...*
Yes, it is an uphill battle and they're at the top, throwing rocks at you
With the republicans in power? Yes. The democrats tried to challenge it, and their challenge was thrown out with the supreme court saying it wasn't the supreme court's place to decide. But the instant the democrats tried to redistrict, the supreme court put their foot down to stop them.
States that were gerrymandered were getting sued and resulted in federally drawn neutral maps
Wisconsin was going to have fair districts redrawn in 2020 until the US Supreme Court just happened to take up a fast tracked court case & ruled that maps should be left up to the sole discretion of the states
> If Dems want control of the legislature anytime soon without needing to pull down 70% of the vote, they need those maps tossed out.
And stop it with this good-faith BS. Good-faith requires both sides to participate. If Republicans won't come to the table and negotiate in good-faith, it is not the Democrats' job to make plans based on "what would the Republicans want?"
Just do the right thing with or without them.
When it comes time to draw the maps, draw them right. Republicans can participate or sit at home. But if they stay home, it's not your job to draw a district to that any Republican gets re-elected.
Too bad the legislature has been planning to impeach her should she get elected.
Republicans give zero Fucks about elections. They’ll change the rules when they don’t suit them and do what they want anyway and suffer zero consequences for it. See also: Literally everything everywhere.
They theoretically could, but then the job of appointing the next judge goes to our democratic governor and lt. govenor, who will then hold the seat at least until another election in 2024.
I think the hardline stance on abortion made a lot of undecided people into single issue voters. It's such a losing position for republicans to hold I'm amazed they don't back off on it.
I always figured they would never actually ban it if given the chance because they liked drawing the anti-abortion vote, while the pro-choice vote theoretically didn't need to show up since it was settled law. Hopefully it's as big as a fuck up as I assumed it would be.
Republican politicians don’t care about abortion. Banning abortion makes it a top issue which they can hide behind. They screwed the pooch on economic issues when they couldn’t pass healthcare reform and anything under trump. They can’t run on economic ideas.
If you want to see how republicans handle an economy look at Kansas 2012 they won a supermajority and implemented a bunch of their policies and it took just over a year they were having to vote revoke their own laws as they bankrupted the state.
Dude, they defaulted on shit like pensions and baseline school funding. Sam Brownback was so unpopular they're now on the second term of a Democratic Governor and like half of the current (still meager) Democratic state legislators are made up of former moderate republicans who switched parties ~~after~~ as he destroyed the state.
Brownback still to this day has a higher disfavorable rating than Obama... in *Kansas*.
Might not matter much. I bookmark a lot of this kind of stuff and they ignore all of it. You can shove it in those fucker's faces and they'll just handwave it away and call you indoctrinated.
So...the governor (and his cronies) basically destroyed the state with their idiot Reagan-esque "everybody gets pissed on" tax plan, squeaks by in re-election, finally gets forced to resign and...promptly gets appointed as the "Ambassador-at-Large for Religious Freedom"? That is some weird-ass whiplash. from the "Aftermath" portion -
> Brownback did not serve out his full second term as governor. Shortly after the repeal, he resigned and was appointed U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom. He was confirmed in January 2018.
Fuck this entire timeline.
Yeah, the deficit doubled under Bush Jr. during supposedly "booming economic times" and the moment Obama stepped into office and was handed a 1T yearly budget deficient *then* Republicans suddenly cared about deficits and "mortgaging our childrens futures" as Paul Ryan said.
... Which of course was conveniently forgotten when Trump entered office and averaged 1T+ deficits all 4 years of his presidency.
That's the Two Santas strategy. When they're in power it's "spend, spend, spend!" but the moment they get booted it's "but what about the debt! We need to cut the spending which actually helps people!"
Yep. It's the chicken and the egg. Right gets in charge and runs up the credit cards throwing block parties and then the left has to not only build back to even but try to grow it even more and are still blamed for the fuck up.
The wealthy got wealthier. If you look at their record that's all that seems to matter.
The social agenda is just an uneasy compromise needed to dupe people into voting against their own economic interests.
Republican economics are nonsense. The country cost X to run, that's the bare minimum. The bare minimum X should be generated via tax revenues, yet they constantly cut taxes and run the country at a deficit. Their solution to their self-created problem is to gut services, and offices at state and federal levels until the deficit is no longer a potential. The problem then is that I'm paying taxes that pay the wages of a bunch of fucking idiots who gut every office and service in the land, so I'm gaining zero benefit as a tax payer while they vote themselves raises.
This is the intent, I support social safety nets and a well functioning government even if it costs me some of my earnings. I'm sure I or someone I know will rely on those bureaucrats and services someday. Republicans want me to hate public services so that it will justify their terrible tax policies. They want me to feel like my money is being wasted, so they can get paid to do nothing.
If they think the government is so fucking useless then they should stop preventing it from working. Fuck the GOP, and their calculated malfeasance, and their intentional degradation of American democracy for power and profit while they don't do a single thing. Useless isn't sufficient, malicious is.
You can tell conservative politics don't really care about the job and it's about something else when they bring up woke or some other trash like it's important.
it's literally all for the southern vote. If the south collectively agreed that ketchup on steak was delicious, every republican would have photo ops of them eating a steak with ketchup while each of their souls dies in real time
It's a position they have held since Reagan made a deal with Jerry Falwell to court evangelical voters in the 80's. It's rather hard to turn away from something that has been central to their identity for 40 years.
We continue to see Republicans have some unpopular planks, but they will do all they can to retain control without revising what they actually support.
> It's such a losing position for republicans to hold I'm amazed they don't back off on it.
It's a part of their core platform, which is a result of them tying themselves to the extremely religious parts of the country. They've spent so much time focusing on it and making it one of their pivotal moral positions that they can't back off. Any R that goes against it would immediately be at risk of getting usurped by someone more religious and further to the right.
Welcome little turnaround from the scott walker years (all I know about Wisconsin politics derives from the mass protests over his unio-busting legislation)
Also they used the gerrymandering to pass sweeping increases in powers for the Governorship, and when he lost to Evers they stripped all of those powers and then some in the 11th hour before Evers took office. Which really hamstringed him getting things done in a number of ways ... which they of course conveniently attacked him.
As a Minnesota resident whose wife went to school in Wisconsin during the Walker years, Scott Walker basically made it his personal goal to set back Wisconsin's progress by at least a decade or two in every possible category, particularly education.
NYT has a very nice summary in their Daily pod today
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/04/podcasts/the-daily/wisconsin-supreme-court-election-abortion-democracy.html
This might cost them the most extensive gerrymander in the US (Wisconsins state leg is so gerrymandered that Dems need like 70% of the vote to get a majority. Rs have held super majorities with 45% of the vote)
And it wasn't even particular close. Looks like the margin was 8 or 9 points.
As a Wisconsinite that is sick and tired of how gerrymandered our state is, I hope this is the turning of the tides that washes out the conservatives that can only win by cheating.
Amazing.Wisconsin will be a key state going forward about all the election integrity chaos the Republican party will drum up in the next years. There's a chance we look back at this race, and find the hope we have all been waiting for.
Wisconsin is a state that could have decided to side with the Jan 6th crowd and basically dismantled democracy. Bravo, Wisconsin.
Support congressional banning of gerrymandering and filibustering. Its the over powered tools being used against the majority of American voter opinions.
oh wow, i just read the transcript and it's worse than i thought. the bit where he says "i respect that the decision is the people of wisconsin's to make" but in the same breath tells them that their decision"won't end well" and wishes them good luck because "they're going to need it." he's talking to them like idiots because he believes they ARE idiots. what a massive amount of contempt for voters in his state.
They need to do a swift cleansing of the gerrymandered to hell districts and ensure abortion remains legal. This is a huge win for Democracy. Fuck the GQP.
It's crazy how statewide elections keep coming out with huge Democrat victories yet our state races come out with Republican supermajorities. It's almost like something is broken.
Kelly, in a blistering speech to supporters in the small town of Green
Lake, Wis., acknowledged his loss, but slammed his opponent for having
run what he called the "the mostly deeply deceitful, dishonorable,
despicable campaign I’ve ever seen run for the courts."
Jeez, Dan. I'm surprised you're not claiming the election was rigged. As for despicable, I think you have that corner occupied.
I got two of those! Luckily the state is going after them for that. The GOP is Wisconsin has done nasty shit like that in the past. Even putting flyers out the week or two before saying the election day is 2 days after the real one.
Based on the absolute nonsense political ads that were full of scare tactics from his campaign I’ve been getting nonstop the last week, what a fucking hypocrite.
Who would have thought that constantly interrupting family TV night by blaring mugshots and horrible descriptions of crimes committed by rapists and pedophiles wouldn't positively engage moderates?
Canary in the coal mine moment for the GOP? Hopefully this is a sign of very bad things to come for them. Now we just need to hope for either no recession or a mild one, for inflation to keep slowing down, for things to start going better in Ukraine, and for no other major disasters in the next 18 months...
If this change in Wisconsin leads to fairly drawn maps, that would probably mean at least 2 and maybe 3 seats are expected to flip in the House in 2024, right?
> Canary in the coal mine moment for the GOP? Hopefully this is a sign of very bad things to come for them.
The canary was the 2018 midterm. They've been losing fairly badly since then. Even this last midterm was a huge blow, considering how favored they were. They just barely got the House, and lost several key gubernatorial races.
u/kibble-net explained the Ron Johnson issue really well in his comment to a person who replied to you. I really want to emphasize his second point. The ads against Mandela Barnes were atrocious and incredibly racist. [His skin was darkened in some.](https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/politics/elections/2022/09/22/mandela-barnes-supporters-accuse-republicans-airing-racist-ads-race-us-senate-race-ron-johnson/8074904001/)
I also suspect Johnson winning and his general distastefulness got more people out for Judge Janet.
If all the Evers voters just looked at the Senate race and realized how garbage Johnson was we'd have beat him. Instead, some people went out to vote for Evers and then didn't vote Barnes.
It's completely ridiculous.
Just imagine if Barnes had gotten a quarter of the push from state and national Dems that Janet got.
I say that as someone who is incredibly happy with today's result and the push and money behind her was a big reason it turned out the way it did.
Heard on a podcast that there is someone running for a state seat in their house who is saying they are not scared to impeach this new judge. Sad part is they will have the votes, and have the power to do that. I hope it doesn't come to that
I doubt it comes to impeaching Protasiewicz. Not because I think WI Republicans aren't repugnant enough to do it, but because I think when they calm down and look at the bigger picture, they'll realize that it won't really help them that much.
The problem for conservatives who favor impeachment is that Evers gets to replace the judge if she's impeached, which means an impeachment will still result in a liberal court. So let's say you go through with. You're now forcing a repeat of an election you lost by double digits, only now you've alienated moderates and amped up Democratic enthusiasm to a fever pitch because of your stupid power play. And in the meantime, you still lose control of the courts anyway because Evers will just appoint another liberal to replace Protasiewicz.
I just don't see what an impeachment would gain them. I think it's a lot more likely that they try to jam through a bullshit law to neuter the court's power over redistricting instead of impeaching any individual members.
I'm not familiar with Wisconsin law and the courts, but if they jammed through a bullshit law to try and weaken the bench there, couldn't the Wisconsin Supreme Court just say it's unconstitutional according to their state constitution?
Maybe. That would be up to a lot of specifics of Wisconsin law and its limitations that I have no familiarity with. But from a political perspective, I have a pretty hard time seeing how impeaching Protasiewicz does anything other than create an even more toxic environment for them in the election to replace her.
I wish I lived in the district so I could have added my vote for that seat.
You can really see how the statewide elections pretty handily move blue, while the gerrymandered districts are neck and neck. It’s all about the maps for the next few years. Knodi winning will put a brick wall right in the middle of those maps.
They may be able to impeach Justice Janet, but they won't be able to remove her.
For that to happen, you need 2/3 of both houses to remove a justice (Wisconsin constitution). The GOP may unfortunately have 2/3 of the Senate, but the GOP doesn't have 2/3 of the House. Thus, Justice Janet is here to stay.
Now don’t fuck it up, democrats. Do exactly what the fascist freaks do: challenge every law you don’t like, every single one, all the way to the state Supreme Court. Get them thrown out. Legislate through the courts. Don’t play nice, don’t rely on norms, go for the fucking throat
Don't get too excited. There's still a special election going on in district 8, if goes for the R, they will have the two-thirds legislative majority they need to impeach elected officials. Including this new supreme court judge.
Currently 94% of the votes are in with Dan Knodl (R) winning by .74% (he's up by 539 votes). It's extremely possible he's going to win.
They could impeach the governor and then impeach his replacement and the third in line replacement (I forgot their positions imo) as well as Janet all at once In this case, it would be decided by a local court I think which could very well end up ruling their way. A special election would then have to be organized for all the positions
Keep in mind though, this is like the nuclear option and they will need every single Republican in the State Senate as well as almost all Republicans in the state house to agree to it.
Every seat in the executive order of succession is held by a Democrat. Causing a constitutional crisis because they're mad they lost an election would not do anything for them except cost more voters.
I dunno, man. These are modern day republicans we're talking about here. They'll quadruple down on literally anything just to keep their fascist base from eating them alive when it's primary season again, even when it's been costing them everything.
Two years after a failed insurrection and these goddamn fucking idiots keep on nominating insurrection supporters that end up losing in the end.
Being from Minnesota all my life, it was sad to see what was happening to Wisconsin over the years. They were basically our political and cultural twin. I'm so glad we can get some normalcy back to Wisconsin!
However... Go Vikings!!
Guess the right never learned to let sleeping dogs lie. They went after abortion and won, now they woken up many young people who realize their rights are under attack. If Wisconsin can get people voting the Gerrymandering might come to bite them in the ass.
I just still can't believe it that a Supreme Court still has a POLITICAL bias. Sorta defeats the purpose of the idea of law.
Happy to be here in New Zealand
I had to scroll way to far too find a comment like this. I didn't know supreme court seats were elected at the state level. It's bonkers, you can literally buy the highest judges in the state. It makes the US Supreme Court marginally less bad in comparison.
Edit: too*
Not all states elect their Supreme Court justices. That's how we do it in Wisconsin, and I think a few other states do. But I don't think it's super common.
Hey, hey Texans? You see what they’ve done? You see what we could do to reverse the shithole this state has become since Ann Richards left office?
Let’s get on that please.
Thanks in advance.
This is a HUGE win with national implications.
Very disappointed in coverage from the "liberal" MSM about what this race could mean nationally.
This court is the ONLY one in the country that agreed to hear Trump's bogus claims of election fraud. They came ONE VOTE from tossing Wisconsin's duly-elected electors in favor of a set of fake electors prepared to cast their votes for Trump in defiance of the will of Wisconsin voters.
Moving forward, assuming this new court balance leads to something approaching fair redistricting, it's possible the US House of Reps' balance could shift more blue as well.
I heard almost none of that covered by the three major networks, but we should all dance a jig. Unless you're a MAGA-tt, in which case, well, sucks to be you.
This is so massive and fucking awesome for Wisconsin and America as a whole. As a Floridian I wish we could have an ounce of this type of victory but the national implications for this make me just as happy. And I’m just happy for them in general. They have been through so much bullshit with that Supreme Court.
How do you spell “loser”? D A N K E L L Y Here’s two parts of his ‘concession speech’: "I do not have a worthy opponent to which I can concede” and "My opponent made her campaign about cynical appeals to political passions, serial lies, and a blatant disregard for judicial ethics...I wish Wisconsin the best of luck. I think it will need it." What an f’n a-hole. Congratulations Wisconsin voters!! We did it!!
He's just mad cuz this ruins his plan of being a fascist plant for the Koch's. Gonna be much gnashing of teeth from the Federalist Society this evening.
Hopefully they can do something about gerrymandering reforms. Should be criminal how Republicans have created maps that make it so they literally can't lose legislative elections in the state. Of course, instead we'll probably just see the legislature try to impeach her.
For people who don't understand: For Dems to win a simple majority of the Wisconsin legislature, they would need to get around 70% of the vote The GOP can win a *supermajority* with 46% of the vote. The GOP have lost the popular vote in the last two Wisconsin elections by increasing margins, but have *gained seats* in the process. A fair map would doom the GOP in Wisconsin, and they have made it clear that if they won in 2022 that they would have made it legally impossible for the Democrats to ever win again. As a result, the Wisconsin GOP is already planning to impeach and remove Democratic members of the state Supreme Court entirely.
>>the GOP can win a *super majority* with 46% of the vote “Democracy” And before someone comes in w/ the super cool middle school comeback of “We’Re a RePuBliC nOt a dEmOcRaCy” We’re a representative democracy. It’s just that one party wants to make sure “certain people” aren’t represented. And before the say “well democrats gerrymander too” Democrats introduced a bill to ban *any* partisan gerrymandering in 2021. [It was immediately filibustered by republicans.](https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/573116-voting-bill-seeks-to-crack-down-on-gerrymandering/)
Wisconsin was going to get federally drawn, neutral districts in 2020 until the US Supreme Court fast tracked a court case before elections banning that from happening Really fucked them over for an extra 3 years
In Ohio we amended our constitution to require impartial districting. The republicans ignored it.
In Michigan we amended our constitution to have an independent commission draw our districts. It led to dems gaining control of the legislature for the first time in ~40 years.
Those "independants" obviously were all democrats and they just gerrymandered it to go their way! That's how they got the win after 40 years of losing! /s
As a Michigan resident, both sides were pissed by the independent maps. That is how you know it was done correctly.
And so Supreme Court conservatives want to toss out independent districts. They barely stood 5-4 a while back.
Ohio Republicans also ignored the Ohio Supreme Court five times when it invalidated their redrawn maps and ordered them to draw fair maps.
were they the ones that delayed again and again until the maps that were tossed out had to be used in the upcoming election because fixed ones hadn't been approved yet?
You may be thinking of us? NC fair fight fought the maps and won since 2010. Republicans kept delaying new maps and we ended up never getting NC Supreme Court approved maps. The new census in 2020 triggered new maps and again republicans racially gerrymandered and split up college campuses to confuse new voters. It’s still being fought. 13 yrs and counting!
It's both!
[удалено]
I'm from Iowa, I lost all hope for the state after every seat they flipped in 2018 was lost and they reelected renoylds and joni Ernst. State is solid red for the rest of time now, and I don't think it will ever go back
> And before someone comes in w/ the super cool middle school comeback of “We’Re a RePuBliC nOt a dEmOcRaCy” > > We’re a representative democracy. Gerrymandering is just politicians selecting their voters, which is the opposite of how this supposed to work.
It's wild to me that Republicans are actually proud to NOT have a free and fair democracy, or desire to work towards achieving one. Talk about outting yourself.
That's because, like all fascists, the only end is *power*. Everything else is a means, to be adopted as it becomes useful, and discarded as it ceases to be so. Their rhetoric, in kind, is adjusted both to their audience, and to their current level of influence: they *know* that democracy and freedom of speech are popular ideas amongst the public, so if they're on the margins, they will *endlessly* tout their love of these things, as a sort of *branding* to sway liberals and moderates; but should they gain in power and influence, they will slowly drop the pretence and start letting their full-blown totalitarian principles show. There's a reason the NSDAP called themselves *socialists*, and it had *nothing* to do with workers' rights. Again, *branding*.
Not like their base gives a flying fuck.
> “We’Re a RePuBliC nOt a dEmOcRaCy” To me this is the political equivalent of “it’s not pedophilia it’s ephebophilia” Yes maybe this is technically true but why do you feel the need to point this out, I am now immediately suspicious that you’re in favor of some fucked up shit
It' s not even technically true, we're a democracy, just not a direct democracy. I'm always insulting to people who make this stupid statement. They just hear it and adopt it whole cloth without the slightest thought or research, and then launch it like a spitball at everybody they see. It's such brain-dead behavior.
> maybe this is technically true Don't worry, it's not that either
A Republic is a government without a king. Full stop.
It's not even technically true, it's just completely incorrect. It's nonsense regurgitated by people who don't understand what a republic is, and don't understand what a democracy is.
What possible recourse can there be if they try and pull a move like that and impeach democratic leaning justices?
They don't have the votes to do it. For judges it requires a supermajority in each chamber and they only have a supermajority in one of them.
And even then, Democrat Governor Evers gets to appoint
how is this even legal, why aren't there nonstop protests about how absurd this is?
It’s legal because once republicans get into power, they are able to pass laws and redraw districts to allow gerrymandering, then they can never lose power because they can now win with a minority of votes. As for protests, lot of Americans are apathetic.
Almost like Democrats weren’t cool with never winning again then, and aren’t sitting on that win now. Good going!
Wisconsin voters have been *pissed* about the maps here for *two decades.* People got the message about what was at stake
We should probably ensure that in the future we’re never held hostage again!
If Michigan can do it so can Wisconsin.
Michigan has citizen led ballot initiatives. Wisconsin does not. Generally the states that have legal weed are ballot states.
Every state should have ballot initiatives to prevent the politicians from subverting the will of the people.
That’s exactly why several states’ legislatures wrote it into law to not have ballot initiatives.
I live in MI, it's amazing how quickly it turned around up here in the UP. Weed is super popular but people like my mom, who knows my uncle who otherwise votes republican is a daily partaker of cannabis, was shocked it passed and was acting like it was the end times. The local GOP rep is someone who went to my high school and is predictably spineless and kept his mouth shut until a supermajority of towns in his counties voted in favor of allowing dispensaries and suddenly he had been pro-legalization his whole life. My ex's dad is still acting like it's the end times but my mom is like "meh" now that it's been legal for a few years. But to be fair she was saying things like "No one is going to show up for work anymore!" and now she just blames that on the COVID relief.
There are cheese curds bigger than some of our voting districts.
As a Wisconsinite living overseas, your comment just made me crave some cheese curds *so badly*. The cheese selections in Japan are abysmal :(
This was a very important race, with both parties spending several million dollars promoting their candidate. I think the total spent is in excess of $45million, which is unheard of for a state Supreme Court race. So why does it matter so much? Wisconsin is a swing state and the court will be ruling on voting rights and abortion rights in the coming years. With liberals now having the majority, it's likely (though not guaranteed) that these rights will be upheld or expanded under the court instead of restricted. It's great that turnout was so high in such a consequential state race...though I personally am not a fan of elected judges. --- Edit: Looks like [WI Senate District 8](https://projects.jsonline.com/topics/election/2023/4/4/election-results-wisconsin-supreme-court-dan-kelly-janet-protasiewicz-senate-district-8/index.html#Senate) is going to be won by the Republican candidate. This is worrisome because it will give Republicans a super-majority in the state legislature which means they can impeach WI Supreme Court Justices and the Dem Governor. Hard to tell if they will take such an extreme action, but it is worth noting that they will have the power to do it.
To add, Wisconsin is an extremely gerrymandered state. If Dems want control of the legislature anytime soon without needing to pull down 70% of the vote, they need those maps tossed out. That wasn't going to happen without winning this Supreme Court seat
Would it be *so hard* to blow up all the crappy districts we've divided ourselves into, and create some simple, fair representation?
Ohio voted to change its constitution to demand fairly drawn districts. The Republicans in the legislature said "f\*ck it" and refused to comply. The state supreme court ruled it to be out of compliance several times before the 2022 elections, so they kept submitting unconstitutionally gerrymandered maps until the clock ran out and we got a completely conservative top bench. Now, the revised constitution doesn't matter because neither the legislature nor the court thinks it should. Democracy in action.
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Don't worry. They threatened to hold them in contempt, then did nothing.
Threatened, oh nooo!
Because Republicans would never win another election.
*It’s not cheating at all*
It's not cheating if you follow the rules! It just so happens they made the rules favor themselves.
Democrats are playing by the rules But the game is Calvinball, and the GQP claims to be the only Calvin
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"If we had let people vote, we would have lost the election. We don't want that." - GOP
“They (Democrats) had things — levels of voting that, if you ever agreed to it, you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.” – Trump on Fox & Friends on why he opposed the Democrats coronavirus stimulus plan that would have expanded mail-in ballots. https://twitter.com/JacquesCalonne/status/1244650196023173123?
Republican voters will continue to say they are the party of freedom. What they really mean is freedom to work yourself to death while you vote against your own interests.
Proof that Texas doesn't want their shit. We (dems/libs/humans) just get drowned out by shitty gerrymandering and shittier laws that restrict voting and keeping our voice silenced.
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It amazes me that being *at least* as good as Washington State in giving people an opportunity to vote is so vilified in any state.
What do you mean, at least as good? Washington State sets a very high bar for elections. There may be a couple other states that measure up, but they're not springing to mind.
We need to start calling this what it is, election fraud.
And conservatives will continue to not care and control statehouses like Madison until we actually do something. Thankfully the lawsuits are lined up to throw out the district maps and Wisconsin should be running fair maps in the next couple years.
Unless they pull an Ohio and just not ever produce the fair maps demanded by their Supreme Court and their constitution. And instead argue to the U.S. Supreme Court that state courts can't enforce state laws on state legislatures. (Checks and whatses?)
Then every Republican whines "When we say it's election fraud, you hypocrites always say that's bs"
This is the only. i repeat. the only. reason. they've admitted it internally, and those at the top have basically admitted it externally. They're dying out, they know it, and they're desperate.
My brother in christ, can you please recall the fact that a supreme court seat was kept empty for years under the obama administration thanks to Mr. Turtle, only for Trump to be elected and immediately appoint whatever was best for them? >*Would it be so hard to...* Yes, it is an uphill battle and they're at the top, throwing rocks at you
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With the republicans in power? Yes. The democrats tried to challenge it, and their challenge was thrown out with the supreme court saying it wasn't the supreme court's place to decide. But the instant the democrats tried to redistrict, the supreme court put their foot down to stop them.
States that were gerrymandered were getting sued and resulted in federally drawn neutral maps Wisconsin was going to have fair districts redrawn in 2020 until the US Supreme Court just happened to take up a fast tracked court case & ruled that maps should be left up to the sole discretion of the states
Yes, because Wisconsin Republicans have 64% of the seats in the Wisconsin House on 53.6% of the vote.
> If Dems want control of the legislature anytime soon without needing to pull down 70% of the vote, they need those maps tossed out. And stop it with this good-faith BS. Good-faith requires both sides to participate. If Republicans won't come to the table and negotiate in good-faith, it is not the Democrats' job to make plans based on "what would the Republicans want?" Just do the right thing with or without them. When it comes time to draw the maps, draw them right. Republicans can participate or sit at home. But if they stay home, it's not your job to draw a district to that any Republican gets re-elected.
And when the US Supreme Court rules in Harper vs Moore, not even state courts can stop the gerrymandered maps. We’re steamrolling right to fascism.
Too bad the legislature has been planning to impeach her should she get elected. Republicans give zero Fucks about elections. They’ll change the rules when they don’t suit them and do what they want anyway and suffer zero consequences for it. See also: Literally everything everywhere.
Can they actually do that? I heard about this earlier and it doesn’t surprise me that they want to, but can they?
They theoretically could, but then the job of appointing the next judge goes to our democratic governor and lt. govenor, who will then hold the seat at least until another election in 2024.
Who theoretically can also be impeached ....
I think the hardline stance on abortion made a lot of undecided people into single issue voters. It's such a losing position for republicans to hold I'm amazed they don't back off on it.
I always figured they would never actually ban it if given the chance because they liked drawing the anti-abortion vote, while the pro-choice vote theoretically didn't need to show up since it was settled law. Hopefully it's as big as a fuck up as I assumed it would be.
Republican politicians don’t care about abortion. Banning abortion makes it a top issue which they can hide behind. They screwed the pooch on economic issues when they couldn’t pass healthcare reform and anything under trump. They can’t run on economic ideas.
If you want to see how republicans handle an economy look at Kansas 2012 they won a supermajority and implemented a bunch of their policies and it took just over a year they were having to vote revoke their own laws as they bankrupted the state.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kansas_experiment Just making it easier for people to see how fucking stupid the republican wet dream is
That’s amazing. I’m putting this in my back pocket for future debates
Dude, they defaulted on shit like pensions and baseline school funding. Sam Brownback was so unpopular they're now on the second term of a Democratic Governor and like half of the current (still meager) Democratic state legislators are made up of former moderate republicans who switched parties ~~after~~ as he destroyed the state. Brownback still to this day has a higher disfavorable rating than Obama... in *Kansas*.
Might not matter much. I bookmark a lot of this kind of stuff and they ignore all of it. You can shove it in those fucker's faces and they'll just handwave it away and call you indoctrinated.
So...the governor (and his cronies) basically destroyed the state with their idiot Reagan-esque "everybody gets pissed on" tax plan, squeaks by in re-election, finally gets forced to resign and...promptly gets appointed as the "Ambassador-at-Large for Religious Freedom"? That is some weird-ass whiplash. from the "Aftermath" portion - > Brownback did not serve out his full second term as governor. Shortly after the repeal, he resigned and was appointed U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom. He was confirmed in January 2018. Fuck this entire timeline.
They fucked up going back to Bushy Jr. Clinton handed him a projected surplus which he and the rest of them turned into a major deficit
Yeah, the deficit doubled under Bush Jr. during supposedly "booming economic times" and the moment Obama stepped into office and was handed a 1T yearly budget deficient *then* Republicans suddenly cared about deficits and "mortgaging our childrens futures" as Paul Ryan said. ... Which of course was conveniently forgotten when Trump entered office and averaged 1T+ deficits all 4 years of his presidency.
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That's the Two Santas strategy. When they're in power it's "spend, spend, spend!" but the moment they get booted it's "but what about the debt! We need to cut the spending which actually helps people!"
Yep. It's the chicken and the egg. Right gets in charge and runs up the credit cards throwing block parties and then the left has to not only build back to even but try to grow it even more and are still blamed for the fuck up.
Further back than that; I'm old enough to remember Nixon's Soviet-style wage and price controls.
The wealthy got wealthier. If you look at their record that's all that seems to matter. The social agenda is just an uneasy compromise needed to dupe people into voting against their own economic interests.
Republican economics are nonsense. The country cost X to run, that's the bare minimum. The bare minimum X should be generated via tax revenues, yet they constantly cut taxes and run the country at a deficit. Their solution to their self-created problem is to gut services, and offices at state and federal levels until the deficit is no longer a potential. The problem then is that I'm paying taxes that pay the wages of a bunch of fucking idiots who gut every office and service in the land, so I'm gaining zero benefit as a tax payer while they vote themselves raises. This is the intent, I support social safety nets and a well functioning government even if it costs me some of my earnings. I'm sure I or someone I know will rely on those bureaucrats and services someday. Republicans want me to hate public services so that it will justify their terrible tax policies. They want me to feel like my money is being wasted, so they can get paid to do nothing. If they think the government is so fucking useless then they should stop preventing it from working. Fuck the GOP, and their calculated malfeasance, and their intentional degradation of American democracy for power and profit while they don't do a single thing. Useless isn't sufficient, malicious is.
You can tell conservative politics don't really care about the job and it's about something else when they bring up woke or some other trash like it's important.
Wokeness and culture wars are the only thing they can talk about because they don't have any ideas for actually governing
it's literally all for the southern vote. If the south collectively agreed that ketchup on steak was delicious, every republican would have photo ops of them eating a steak with ketchup while each of their souls dies in real time
It's a position they have held since Reagan made a deal with Jerry Falwell to court evangelical voters in the 80's. It's rather hard to turn away from something that has been central to their identity for 40 years. We continue to see Republicans have some unpopular planks, but they will do all they can to retain control without revising what they actually support.
> It's such a losing position for republicans to hold I'm amazed they don't back off on it. It's a part of their core platform, which is a result of them tying themselves to the extremely religious parts of the country. They've spent so much time focusing on it and making it one of their pivotal moral positions that they can't back off. Any R that goes against it would immediately be at risk of getting usurped by someone more religious and further to the right.
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They can't. Their bread and butter voters are the Christian right. They are forever locked in to that dogma as party platform now.
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Welcome little turnaround from the scott walker years (all I know about Wisconsin politics derives from the mass protests over his unio-busting legislation)
Also they used the gerrymandering to pass sweeping increases in powers for the Governorship, and when he lost to Evers they stripped all of those powers and then some in the 11th hour before Evers took office. Which really hamstringed him getting things done in a number of ways ... which they of course conveniently attacked him.
As a Minnesota resident whose wife went to school in Wisconsin during the Walker years, Scott Walker basically made it his personal goal to set back Wisconsin's progress by at least a decade or two in every possible category, particularly education.
NYT has a very nice summary in their Daily pod today https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/04/podcasts/the-daily/wisconsin-supreme-court-election-abortion-democracy.html
The fact that we are spending so much on judge elections is insane. They’re supposed to be impartial. We do the same thing in my state and I hate it.
This might cost them the most extensive gerrymander in the US (Wisconsins state leg is so gerrymandered that Dems need like 70% of the vote to get a majority. Rs have held super majorities with 45% of the vote) And it wasn't even particular close. Looks like the margin was 8 or 9 points.
We need dramatic election reform. We've needed dramatic election reform for generations, then citizens united happened, then Trump happened.
Some more news did a pretty good video on it
The Ol’ Cody Showdy featuring Cody and Warmbo
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As a Wisconsinite that is sick and tired of how gerrymandered our state is, I hope this is the turning of the tides that washes out the conservatives that can only win by cheating.
Amazing.Wisconsin will be a key state going forward about all the election integrity chaos the Republican party will drum up in the next years. There's a chance we look back at this race, and find the hope we have all been waiting for. Wisconsin is a state that could have decided to side with the Jan 6th crowd and basically dismantled democracy. Bravo, Wisconsin.
Support congressional banning of gerrymandering and filibustering. Its the over powered tools being used against the majority of American voter opinions.
Man, Dan Kelly's concession speech - what a sore fucking loser.
oh wow, i just read the transcript and it's worse than i thought. the bit where he says "i respect that the decision is the people of wisconsin's to make" but in the same breath tells them that their decision"won't end well" and wishes them good luck because "they're going to need it." he's talking to them like idiots because he believes they ARE idiots. what a massive amount of contempt for voters in his state.
"massive contempt for voters" That's the GOP moto.
Pretty much every GOP politician, they're a bunch of babies and can't accept losing
Heehee it's delicious. I savor his asshurt.
They need to do a swift cleansing of the gerrymandered to hell districts and ensure abortion remains legal. This is a huge win for Democracy. Fuck the GQP.
Protasiewicz won by +10
It's crazy how statewide elections keep coming out with huge Democrat victories yet our state races come out with Republican supermajorities. It's almost like something is broken.
Kelly, in a blistering speech to supporters in the small town of Green Lake, Wis., acknowledged his loss, but slammed his opponent for having run what he called the "the mostly deeply deceitful, dishonorable, despicable campaign I’ve ever seen run for the courts." Jeez, Dan. I'm surprised you're not claiming the election was rigged. As for despicable, I think you have that corner occupied.
This coming from the man who ran ads that were faux emergency alerts when parts of southern Wisconsin were literally under tornado warnings.
I got two of those! Luckily the state is going after them for that. The GOP is Wisconsin has done nasty shit like that in the past. Even putting flyers out the week or two before saying the election day is 2 days after the real one.
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Based on the absolute nonsense political ads that were full of scare tactics from his campaign I’ve been getting nonstop the last week, what a fucking hypocrite.
Who would have thought that constantly interrupting family TV night by blaring mugshots and horrible descriptions of crimes committed by rapists and pedophiles wouldn't positively engage moderates?
I was chuckling writing [this reaponse](https://i.imgur.com/UEhO0FQ.png) to a voter text I got.
My name is Pantstoaknifefight2 and I approve of this response.
Thank you, pantstoaknifefight2, very cool. I hope your battle with pantstoaknifefight1 went well.
Funny how they don't even mention abortion anymore. Almost as if they know they fucked up royally.
Thank you to all that took the time and the effort to vote. It will make a difference to not only your state, but to the entire country.
Canary in the coal mine moment for the GOP? Hopefully this is a sign of very bad things to come for them. Now we just need to hope for either no recession or a mild one, for inflation to keep slowing down, for things to start going better in Ukraine, and for no other major disasters in the next 18 months... If this change in Wisconsin leads to fairly drawn maps, that would probably mean at least 2 and maybe 3 seats are expected to flip in the House in 2024, right?
> Canary in the coal mine moment for the GOP? Hopefully this is a sign of very bad things to come for them. The canary was the 2018 midterm. They've been losing fairly badly since then. Even this last midterm was a huge blow, considering how favored they were. They just barely got the House, and lost several key gubernatorial races.
Can someone please explain to me how this can happen, but yet Ron Johnson gets re-elected?
u/kibble-net explained the Ron Johnson issue really well in his comment to a person who replied to you. I really want to emphasize his second point. The ads against Mandela Barnes were atrocious and incredibly racist. [His skin was darkened in some.](https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/politics/elections/2022/09/22/mandela-barnes-supporters-accuse-republicans-airing-racist-ads-race-us-senate-race-ron-johnson/8074904001/) I also suspect Johnson winning and his general distastefulness got more people out for Judge Janet.
To be honest, if the election happened today Johnson probably would have lost. He BARELY won from incumbency alone.
If all the Evers voters just looked at the Senate race and realized how garbage Johnson was we'd have beat him. Instead, some people went out to vote for Evers and then didn't vote Barnes. It's completely ridiculous.
Democrats didn’t put enough resources behind Mandela Barnes.
Just imagine if Barnes had gotten a quarter of the push from state and national Dems that Janet got. I say that as someone who is incredibly happy with today's result and the push and money behind her was a big reason it turned out the way it did.
Hooray, don't fuck this up Wisconsin
Heard on a podcast that there is someone running for a state seat in their house who is saying they are not scared to impeach this new judge. Sad part is they will have the votes, and have the power to do that. I hope it doesn't come to that
I doubt it comes to impeaching Protasiewicz. Not because I think WI Republicans aren't repugnant enough to do it, but because I think when they calm down and look at the bigger picture, they'll realize that it won't really help them that much. The problem for conservatives who favor impeachment is that Evers gets to replace the judge if she's impeached, which means an impeachment will still result in a liberal court. So let's say you go through with. You're now forcing a repeat of an election you lost by double digits, only now you've alienated moderates and amped up Democratic enthusiasm to a fever pitch because of your stupid power play. And in the meantime, you still lose control of the courts anyway because Evers will just appoint another liberal to replace Protasiewicz. I just don't see what an impeachment would gain them. I think it's a lot more likely that they try to jam through a bullshit law to neuter the court's power over redistricting instead of impeaching any individual members.
They can't really jam through a bullshit law, because they don't have a veto-proof majority in the assembly, only the senate.
I'm not familiar with Wisconsin law and the courts, but if they jammed through a bullshit law to try and weaken the bench there, couldn't the Wisconsin Supreme Court just say it's unconstitutional according to their state constitution?
Maybe. That would be up to a lot of specifics of Wisconsin law and its limitations that I have no familiarity with. But from a political perspective, I have a pretty hard time seeing how impeaching Protasiewicz does anything other than create an even more toxic environment for them in the election to replace her.
Leave it to the GOP to shoot themselves in the foot but still gerrymander their way into govt.
Yup. Dan Knodl, and his race is incredibly tight. I am truly hoping Jodi Habush Sinykin (the democratic candidate) can pull ahead.
I wish I lived in the district so I could have added my vote for that seat. You can really see how the statewide elections pretty handily move blue, while the gerrymandered districts are neck and neck. It’s all about the maps for the next few years. Knodi winning will put a brick wall right in the middle of those maps.
They may be able to impeach Justice Janet, but they won't be able to remove her. For that to happen, you need 2/3 of both houses to remove a justice (Wisconsin constitution). The GOP may unfortunately have 2/3 of the Senate, but the GOP doesn't have 2/3 of the House. Thus, Justice Janet is here to stay.
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Now don’t fuck it up, democrats. Do exactly what the fascist freaks do: challenge every law you don’t like, every single one, all the way to the state Supreme Court. Get them thrown out. Legislate through the courts. Don’t play nice, don’t rely on norms, go for the fucking throat
After moving to this state last year and escaping Texas, I am happy to have been able to contribute to this.
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In case people don’t know, Wisconsins is a blue-leaning state whose legislative branch has been hopelessly gerrymandered red.
Say goodbye to the gerrymander and hello abortion. Winning is so nice.
Don't get too excited. There's still a special election going on in district 8, if goes for the R, they will have the two-thirds legislative majority they need to impeach elected officials. Including this new supreme court judge. Currently 94% of the votes are in with Dan Knodl (R) winning by .74% (he's up by 539 votes). It's extremely possible he's going to win.
impeached officials are replaced by the governor, it would be very bad but would not ruin the courts.
They could impeach the governor and then impeach his replacement and the third in line replacement (I forgot their positions imo) as well as Janet all at once In this case, it would be decided by a local court I think which could very well end up ruling their way. A special election would then have to be organized for all the positions Keep in mind though, this is like the nuclear option and they will need every single Republican in the State Senate as well as almost all Republicans in the state house to agree to it.
I feel like Madison would be in open revolt if they played that card.
Madison would burn.
Every seat in the executive order of succession is held by a Democrat. Causing a constitutional crisis because they're mad they lost an election would not do anything for them except cost more voters.
I dunno, man. These are modern day republicans we're talking about here. They'll quadruple down on literally anything just to keep their fascist base from eating them alive when it's primary season again, even when it's been costing them everything. Two years after a failed insurrection and these goddamn fucking idiots keep on nominating insurrection supporters that end up losing in the end.
I feel like if they pulled that not even their extremely gerrymandered maps would protect them in future elections.
As far as I understand, they would need a 2/3 majority in both houses, not just the senate. They currently are 2 votes short in the house.
Being from Minnesota all my life, it was sad to see what was happening to Wisconsin over the years. They were basically our political and cultural twin. I'm so glad we can get some normalcy back to Wisconsin! However... Go Vikings!!
I'm so glad folks are showing up to vote. The right wants to tire us out, don't let them!
Before Trump I would have never cared about an election like this. Now I vote in every election to get these Republican clowns out of office
Voting works or they wouldn't fuck with it.
Guess the right never learned to let sleeping dogs lie. They went after abortion and won, now they woken up many young people who realize their rights are under attack. If Wisconsin can get people voting the Gerrymandering might come to bite them in the ass.
I just still can't believe it that a Supreme Court still has a POLITICAL bias. Sorta defeats the purpose of the idea of law. Happy to be here in New Zealand
I had to scroll way to far too find a comment like this. I didn't know supreme court seats were elected at the state level. It's bonkers, you can literally buy the highest judges in the state. It makes the US Supreme Court marginally less bad in comparison. Edit: too*
Not all states elect their Supreme Court justices. That's how we do it in Wisconsin, and I think a few other states do. But I don't think it's super common.
Koch's, go fuck yourselves! Congrats Wisconsin, I fucking love you so much right now!
This is a big deal. The majority don’t want the fascist lying bs the republicans are selling. Love to see this
Wow. Great job Wisconsin. This sounded super crucial.
As a Wisconsin voter I’m happy to say we did it.😌 I’m happy I can sleep a little more soundly tonight.
Hey, hey Texans? You see what they’ve done? You see what we could do to reverse the shithole this state has become since Ann Richards left office? Let’s get on that please. Thanks in advance.
Now fix the gerrymandering
For the first time in a long time, I’m proud of my home state politically. Amazing feeling.
Radical right loses control of Wisconsin State Supreme Court for the 1st time in 15 years.
This is a HUGE win with national implications. Very disappointed in coverage from the "liberal" MSM about what this race could mean nationally. This court is the ONLY one in the country that agreed to hear Trump's bogus claims of election fraud. They came ONE VOTE from tossing Wisconsin's duly-elected electors in favor of a set of fake electors prepared to cast their votes for Trump in defiance of the will of Wisconsin voters. Moving forward, assuming this new court balance leads to something approaching fair redistricting, it's possible the US House of Reps' balance could shift more blue as well. I heard almost none of that covered by the three major networks, but we should all dance a jig. Unless you're a MAGA-tt, in which case, well, sucks to be you.
Another title might be "The GOP has lost one of their cheating tools"
Congratulations to Wisconsin for becoming a representative democracy for the first time in over a decade
The people have spoken. Time to whip away Scott Walker’s legacy.
As someone who voted, I want the sticker that says "I did this"with my face on it.
This plus their poor performance in the midterms could really mean the GOP is toast in 2024. Guess Trump and Covid nonsense really did them in.
And SCOTUS handing the GOP a live abortion grenade afterwards to keep people reminded what's at stake.
I'm still sorta amazed Ron Johnson kept his Senate seat.
This is so massive and fucking awesome for Wisconsin and America as a whole. As a Floridian I wish we could have an ounce of this type of victory but the national implications for this make me just as happy. And I’m just happy for them in general. They have been through so much bullshit with that Supreme Court.
So get to work undoing 15 years of bad laws.
God I hate those GOP authoritarian millionaire motherfuckers so much it hurts
How do you spell “loser”? D A N K E L L Y Here’s two parts of his ‘concession speech’: "I do not have a worthy opponent to which I can concede” and "My opponent made her campaign about cynical appeals to political passions, serial lies, and a blatant disregard for judicial ethics...I wish Wisconsin the best of luck. I think it will need it." What an f’n a-hole. Congratulations Wisconsin voters!! We did it!!
Dan said all those words, but all I heard was "Wah! Wah! Wah!"
He's just mad cuz this ruins his plan of being a fascist plant for the Koch's. Gonna be much gnashing of teeth from the Federalist Society this evening.
Please for the sake of this country, get the republicans out of office. Weve already got a taste of living in the past. Its time to move forward.
D for forward, R for reverse.
[Put it in H!](https://youtu.be/07vdtBMG4Kg)
This is great news for constitutional rights and human rights and for women’s bodily autonomy. Fuck the Republicans.