High Stakes Judicial Primary Today In Wisconsin (UPDATED)

 

 

We know you Badgers are on this, but just in case:

Wisconsin voters on Tuesday will cast their primary ballots in what’s turned into an expensive and high-stakes battle for control of the state Supreme Court in a key political battleground where power is divided between a Democratic governor and a Republican-controlled legislature.

Voters will narrow the field of candidates down to two, who will then advance to April’s general election for a seat on a court where conservatives currently hold a 4-3 majority. Although the election is technically nonpartisan – there are no party labels on the ballot – interest groups align, party operations mobilize and money flows into races for its seats as if they were partisan contests.

The departure of a conservative justice, Patience Roggensack, has given liberals an opportunity to seize the majority on a court that could decide on issues such as abortion, redistricting, and voting rights ahead of the 2024 presidential election.

Conservatives have controlled the state’s high court for 14 years – a span in which the court has sided with Republicans’ union-busting efforts and affirmed voting restrictions, including ID requirements and a ban on ballot drop boxes.

“This seat is crucial to the balance of the court, and the court is crucial to the balance of the state,” said Barry Burden, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and director of its Elections Research Center.

The candidates hoping to advance to the April general election are liberals Janet Protasiewicz, a Milwaukee County circuit court judge, and Everett Mitchell, a circuit judge in Dane County; and conservatives Daniel Kelly, a former state Supreme Court justice, and Jennifer Dorow, a judge perhaps best known for presiding over the trial of a man convicted of killing six and injuring scores more in a 2021 attack on a Christmas parade in Waukesha, Wisconsin...

As noted above, abortion, redistricting and voting rights are on the ballot, via the choice voters will make between the liberals and right- wingers.  The court could also be a factor in the 2024 presidential election should election deniers try to overturn a potential Democratic victory.

Janet Protasiewicz has received the support of most Democratic groups, and it's thought she's the most likely to face one of the right- wingers in the April general election.  

Elections have consequences, and this and the April general election have CONSEQUENCES.

Polls are open until 8 pm.

UPDATE:  Judge Protasiewicz and right- winger Daniel Kelly will face off for the state Supreme Court seat in April.  One more time, Wisconsin --