Turning Wisconsin into the blue column at Election College is the No. 1 goal for state Democrats in 2020. Wisconsin has already attracted tens of millions of dollars in spending and is at the top of the Trump and Joe Biden target lists. , with the combination of campaigns and external groups. Spend or book more than $ 35 million on television and radio ads from March through the general election, according to Advertising Analytics.
But state Democrats are also focused on building enough state legislature to affect redistricting in 2021, with Republicans only three seats from the veto-proof majorities in both houses.
Recent public polls in the state, from both the Marquette Law School and the Siena College / The New York Times, showed Biden with a 9-11 point advantage over Trump.
“I think we have a great opportunity and I am convinced that Joe Biden will win. But we just can’t let our guard down, “said Evers. “We have good momentum” in the state, he said, citing his own election in 2018 and the Democrats’ victory in a 2020 state Supreme Court election.
Party officials said Wisconsin Democrats have about $ 12 million in cash between their state and federal accounts.
Wisconsin Republicans control both the State Senate and State Assembly, and Democrats are campaigning in the 2020 state election to “Save the Veto” for Evers after repeated bitter bitter clashes in recent years. The Democratic governor and Republican state have stumbled across everything from holding the state’s scandal-ridden primaries amid a pandemic to the legislature’s ability to fire Evers’ cabinet members without his blessing.
The battle for the state is also important to both parties, with the next legislature in charge of drawing the state’s legislative and legislative lines for the next ten years.
“If we lose that three-person margin, they will draw their maps, they will probably draw them even worse than they are now,” Evers said. “One of the first bills that I will receive in the next session will be those new maps, and I will veto them, and they will override that veto.”
Evers recently filed requests for a commission to draw the state maps. Evers is promoting the commission’s mandate as public and nonpartisan, but the legislature has no obligation to consider the maps the commission ultimately draws.
Wisconsin is a prime target for both parties in the redistricting battle, and Wisconsin residents are well represented among efforts focused on redistricting national districts in this cycle. Former House Speaker Paul Ryan advises the Republican State Leadership Committee, and former Republican National Committee Chairman and White House chief of staff Reince Priebus sits on its board of directors. Former Governor Scott Walker is helping run the National Republican Redistricting Trust.
Democrats have also launched an aggressive campaign focused on the lines of the map, spearheaded nationally by the National Committee for Redistribution of Democratic Districts, a group led by former Attorney General Eric Holder and the Democratic Legislative Committee.
Democrats were crushed by Republicans during the post-2010 map drawing cycle, both in Wisconsin and across the country, after Republicans outperformed and outscored Democrats with their REDMAP program, which focused on legislative careers key state.
“I am a former educator, right?” Evers said. “You learn from your mistakes, and that was a huge one. … we learned from that experience, [and] We also learned how important it is for one party to focus their efforts. “
