Wisconsin Republicans Have An Off-Year Turnout Problem
On Tuesday, Wisconsin voters will elect a Supreme Court justice in an election that could decide the ideological balance of the court until 2028. Although we will not be releasing a model for this race, the early vote data we have extensively analyzed and modeled suggests Democratic-aligned liberal judge Susan Crawford is a clear favorite to win this election.
While the GOP-aligned conservative Brad Schimel certainly could pull off an upset (and it would be foolish to rule him out this early), the early vote suggests that this would be a monumental feat for him, and he is staring down the barrel of an immense deficit that he is unlikely to overturn on election day. The early vote data shows that even relative to 2024, Democrats are significantly more likely to show up than Republicans are — and in a state that Donald Trump won by less than a percentage point in 2024, this makes the GOP’s job much harder.
Across the board, Democrats are simply showing up more. For instance, among voters who cast mail ballots in 2024, Democrats are more likely to have cast a mail ballot in 2025 than Republicans are.
It’s a similar story with in-person early voting, where among those who voted early in 2024, Democrats seem much more likely to vote early in 2025 than Republicans are.
https://split-ticket.org/2025/03/31/wisconsin-republicans-have-an-off-year-turnout-problem/