Liberal Wins Wisconsin Court Election, Benefiting Supporters of Abortion Rights

Since Janet Protasiewicz won the state’s extremely significant race for the Supreme Court, the state’s prohibition on abortion and the use of gerrymandered legislative districts are now likely to be overturned.

According to The Associated Press, Wisconsin voters on Tuesday decided to change the state’s political course by electing a liberal candidate to the State Supreme Court, taking the majority power away from conservatives. As a result, the court is expected to overturn the state’s prohibition on abortion in the coming year and stop using Republican-drawn gerrymandered legislative districts.

Daniel Kelly, a conservative former Wisconsin Supreme Court justice who sought re-election, lost to leftist Milwaukee County Judge Janet Protasiewicz. Judge Protasiewicz was in the lead by 10% after 90% of the ballots had been tallied.

At her victory party in Milwaukee, she said to her joyful supporters, “Our state is taking a step forward to a better and brighter future where our rights and liberties will be preserved.”

The election was the most costly judicial election in American history, costing over $40 million. Democrats early on understood the significance of the contest for a swing vote on the supreme court in one of the nation’s ongoing political hotbeds. Judge Protasiewicz’s campaign received millions of dollars from out-of-state donors, and it was backed by several national Democratic organisations.

When Judge Protasiewicz, 60, made her political interests the focal point of her campaign, she upended long-held beliefs about how judicial candidates should behave themselves. She made clear that she was in favour of abortion rights and referred to the maps as “rigged” and “unfair,” which handed Republicans a near-supermajority in the Legislature.

Wisconsin’s liberals now hold a 4-to-3 majority on the court, which had been under the authority of conservatives since 2008, thanks to her election to a 10-year term in a nominally neutral position. Until at least 2025, when a liberal justice’s tenure ends, the liberal party will control the majority of the court. The tenure of a conservative justice expires in 2026.

During Judge Protasiewicz’s election night celebration in Milwaukee as the winner was announced on Tuesday night, the three sitting liberal justices of the court hugged one another as bystanders sobbed with happiness. The judge and the other three liberal judges raised their hands in delight as she finished her statement.

Judge Protasiewicz stated that “today’s results signify two extremely significant and distinctive things.” “First of all, it indicates that Wisconsin people have had their say. In this state, they have made the decision to reject partisan extremes. Moreover, it guarantees that democracy will always win out.

With a testy acceptance speech that accepted his loss and foretold catastrophe for the state, Judge Kelly, 59, conveyed the venom of the campaign. He condemned “the putrid slanders that were launched against me” and dubbed his rival’s campaign “really beyond contempt.”

Justice Kelly addressed his fans in Green Lake, Wisconsin, “I hope that I could be willing to concede to a good opponent, but I do not have a suitable opponent.” After she made her victory speech, he still hadn’t phoned Judge Protasiewicz.

I wish Wisconsin the best of luck because I think it will need it, he said at the end of his final campaign speech.

Judge Protasiewicz calculated from the beginning of the contest that voters in Wisconsin would reward her for being transparent about her views on abortion rights and the state’s maps – subjects most likely to stir and motivate the Democratic Party base.

Judge Protasiewicz (pro-tuh-SAY-witz) credited her success on the campaign trail to her choice to tell voters of what she termed “my principles,” as compared to Justice Kelly, who used less specifics about his opinions, in an interview at her home on Tuesday before the results were announced.

She stated, “I believe I would rather just let people know what my principles are rather than reading between the lines and having to do your sleuthing about like I think people have to do with him. “We’ll find out tonight whether or not the electorate values such openness.”

The court has been a crucial safety net for Wisconsin Republicans for the past twelve years. It upheld voting limitations such the need for a state-issued ID and the ban on vote drop boxes, as well as Gov. Scott Walker’s initial reforms to state government, like Wisconsin Act 10’s elimination of public employee unions.

Only Wisconsin’s Supreme Court agreed to consider President Donald J. Trump’s appeal of the results of the presidential election in 2020. 200,000 votes from the two most Democratic counties in the state were targeted for invalidation by Mr. Trump. With one of the conservative judges sided with the court’s three liberal justices on procedural grounds, the Wisconsin court dismissed his claim by a vote of 4 to 3.

Because that the justices would have an impact on voting and election concerns pertaining to the 2024 election, that decisive decision gave the court contest this year added significance. Wisconsin will once again be fiercely fought because Mr. Trump’s victory there in 2016 broke a run of Democratic presidential victories dating back to 1988.

In cases that have gotten little notice outside of the state, the court has sided with Republicans.

Conservative judges decided to restrict Gov. Tony Evers’ line-item veto power in 2020, a year after the Democrat succeeded Mr. Walker as governor of Wisconsin. Historically, Wisconsin governors of both parties had used this power extensively. Against Mr. Evers’s objections, the court’s conservatives last year let a Walker appointee whose term had already expired to continue serving.

The first order of business for Wisconsin Democrats once Judge Protasiewicz takes her seat on the bench on August 1 will be to file a lawsuit challenging the existing legislative boundaries, which have given Republicans a near-total hold on the state legislature in Madison.

The day after Judge Protasiewicz takes office, according to Jeffrey A. Mandell, the head of Law Forward, a liberal law firm that has defended Mr. Evers, a formal petition to have a redistricting case heard by the Supreme Court would be filed.

In an interview on Tuesday, Mr. Mandell claimed that “pretty much everything negative in Wisconsin stems from the gerrymandering.” “The top goal is to try to fix the gerrymander and reverse the tremendous political gerrymandering we have.”

Josh Kaul, Wisconsin’s Democratic attorney general, is already contesting the state’s 1849 abortion prohibition, which was put into effect seven decades before women were allowed to vote. The first oral arguments in Mr. Kaul’s case were set for May 4 by a circuit court in Dane County this week, but regardless of the county judge’s decision, the matter will almost certainly be appealed to the State Supreme Court later this year.