Why Wisconsin Has Such Odd Politics

The Economist: “On the one hand, it retains a large blue-collar workforce—19% of the state’s GDP comes from manufacturing—who have been drifting more towards Republicans in recent years, making the state look more like Indiana or Ohio, which are now both solidly Republican. On the other hand, it also has a vast and growing progressive vote, particularly around Madison, the home of the largest University of Wisconsin campus. About 7% of the state’s adult population consists of students, who are well organised, and who this year especially, have been fired up by the Supreme Court’s decision to undo abortion rights (it helps that Wisconsin now has, by virtue of a law passed in 1849, one of the strictest bans on abortion in the country.)”

“This helps to explain why the Badger State is so weird. Essentially, when Democrats can motivate their electorate (which also includes the large black population of Milwaukee, and a surprising rural redoubt in the north-west) they can win. The state’s junior senator, Tammy Baldwin, is a lesbian progressive who wants America to introduce universal health care. But when they fail, Republicans, with their more unified base, can also get in their own radicals. Ron Johnson thinks global warming is fake, covid-19 vaccines are dangerous, and that the Trumpist riot on January 6th 2021 was no big deal.”