The partisan divide among educational differences that’s emerged in recent years is a real one, too, and that divide has come to define much of these shifts in the suburbs. Early 2022 school board elections that saw some far-right freakouts on issues like “ CRT ” and teaching about race or gender in schools ultimately proved to be positions of a vocal minority and not anything indicative of a coming suburban backlash. Some of the anti-LGBT, anti-abortion positions held by Republicans are ones that long predated Trump. Another factor could be the influence of talk radio, which has dominated with suburban Republican voters for decades, and now appears to be waning.Īdditionally, as generational shifts continue to unfold and Democratic-leaning millennials become parents and move to the suburbs, many are not fighting the same culture wars as older generations. Perhaps Republicans in the state might have fared better in this election had they actually addressed the state’s wildly outdated and unclear 1849 abortion ban. Senate and Assembly seats in the Milwaukee suburbs are trending blue, whether Trump has a presence in the race or not. It’s certainly possible that some of these voters preferred Tony Evers’ self-described “boring” demeanor and approach to governing to the scorched earth, obstructionist, conspiratorial, power-consolidation-at-all-costs policies of Robin Vos and the Wisconsin right. The outsized influence and power of the state legislature under GOP control is becoming more clear, and with some Assembly seats flipping blue for the foreseeable future, perhaps suburban voters have not been on board with the obstructionist policies of legislative Republicans during the Evers years. This has been a tense few years for state government in Wisconsin. While the former president is undoubtedly a part of what’s happening – he has certainly turned many suburbanites, particularly women, away from the Republican Party – that obscures the bigger picture. Some on the right are attributing this suburban shift solely to the influence of Donald Trump, who endorsed the underperforming Michels in this race. In fact, it seems to be picking up steam. But this shift has been happening here for several election cycles now, and it doesn’t seem to be slowing down at all. ![]() ![]() The polarization was so deeply entrenched, it took awhile for it to shake loose. ![]() Perhaps this is in part due to the deep rifts in the region that prompted the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel ’s Craig Gilbert in the 2010’s to identify the Milwaukee area as one of the nation's most politically polarized metros. The suburban trend toward Democrats seemed to happen more slowly in the Milwaukee suburbs than it did in other parts of the country. And it’s a big reason why Tony Evers is going to be Wisconsin’s governor for the next four years. This 2022 midterm seemed like it would shape up to be a test case on whether or not the suburban shift towards Democrats that largely began during Donald Trump’s presidency was still unfolding, or if it had reached a point where there would be some level of backlash and a return to the GOP for some suburban swing voters.Īfter the election, the verdict is in: That shift is still happening. Going into Election Night, one of the big picture questions I had for the state results at large was about suburban voters in Wisconsin.
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