Residents of the Badger State will have their last chance Tuesday to vote in an unusually high-stakes race for a seat on Wisconsin’s Supreme Court.
The election, which is officially nonpartisan, pits Dane County Judge Susan Crawford, who is backed by the Democratic Party, against Republican-endorsed Waukesha County Judge Brad Schimel in what has been the most expensive judicial election in American history. The campaigns and their supporters have spent more than $81 million, attracting endorsements and campaign appearances from Elon Musk, Vermont Democratic Sen. Bernie Sanders and other national political figures.
The race is seen by some as an early swing-state test of voter sentiment related to President Trump’s performance in the White House, but it’s also a crucial statewide race that could swing ideological control of Wisconsin’s closely divided highest court.
Liberals currently hold a 4-3 majority, and the court is expected to consider cases related to abortion rights, congressional redistricting, union power and voting and election rules.
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By Monday morning, 644,800 advance ballots had been returned, representing about a 40% increase over the advance total in Wisconsin’s 2023 judicial race, and that year also set a turnout record. About a third of advance ballots so far have come from heavily Democratic counties of Milwaukee and Dane, in the Madison area, and that’s roughly in line with their share of the advance vote in 2023.
Nineteen percent of advance ballots have come from the WOW counties in the Milwaukee suburbs of Waukesha, Ozaukee, and Washington, which is a couple of points higher than their share in 2023.
Given that the more liberal candidate won the 2023 race by double digits, the early turnout numbers look good for Crawford. But the bulk of the voting is expected to occur on Election Day, when Schimel could very well close a gap.
Musk, the world’s wealthiest person and an ally to Mr. Trump, has personally campaigned and spent big in an effort to sway voters toward Schimel, who both he and Mr. Trump have endorsed.
That effort nearly collided with the justices currently seated on the state’s Supreme Court, when Musk was sued over his promise to hand out $1 million to individual voters at a campaign event over the weekend.
The court unanimously declined on Sunday to hear a last-minute attempt by the state’s Democratic attorney general to stop billionaire Musk’s checks from going out. At a rally soon after the decision, Musk handed two people oversized posters depicting $1 million checks, declaring that the money was payment in exchange for promises they’d be spokespeople for his political group.
Five of the court’s seven justices have endorsed a candidate in the race. The court’s liberal justices have endorsed Crawford. One of the court’s conservative justices has endorsed Schimel, who wore a “Make America Great Again” hat while campaigning Sunday.
Polls in Wisconsin close Tuesday at 8 p.m., which is also the deadline to get absentee ballots to municipal clerks.
Kabir Khanna
contributed to this report.
