Obviously Wisconsin will be very close, but I think that Biden will ultimately win Wisconsin. There are several factors involved in this. I am listing them in no particular order.
The first is that many parts of rural Wisconsin, while not maxed out for Trump, can’t get too much more red. Places like Taylor County are already 75-25 GOP, and places like Marinette, Rusk, Langlade, Shawano, Clark, etc already are voting 70/30 Trump. There just simply are not a lot of places for Trump to squeeze out of rural Wisconsin; rural Wisconsin is not rural Alabama; Trump won’t win it by 80 points. There are a combination of enough 1) retired Chicago/Illinois/Twin Cities liberals that have lake homes in places like Hayward, Spooner, and Rhinelander 2) Native Americans and 3) remote workers to hold most of rural Wisconsin from dropping off completely for Dems.
Second, shifts are bad for the GOP in both WOW and BOW. Republicans have seriously lost ground in eastern Waukesha and Ozaukee counties in a big way. Additionally, inner ring suburbs such as Greenfield, Franklin, and Hales Corners in MKE county have moved solidly left too. This isn’t just Trump, but Evers did well there in 2022, and Barnes actually cracked 37% in Waukesha and 42% in Ozaukee. Often overlooked, but critically important, are the Fox Valley suburbs. Evers only lost Brown by 4%, and Democrats flipped places like De Pere and significantly improved in places like Bellevue and Howard. If Trump loses any support in BOW or WOW, it’ll be very hard to make that up elsewhere.
Third, Dane County’s growth is stupid. It’s crazy how many people are moving there, many of them Democratic leaning. Although much smaller, St Croix County and Eau Claire are growing solidly too, with St Croix being some blue spillover from the Twin Cities.
Lastly, Wisconsin actually got fair state legislative maps this year. Democrats are investing a lot to try to flip the state assembly (the senate is still out of reach). This will likely help with Democratic turnout, and I can’t explain how much of a dumpster fire the WisGOP is right now. Despite having billions of dollars in state surplus, the GOP refuses to find Wisconsin schools and they are going to referendums to try to avoid shutting down. The GOP refused to expand abortion access, marijuana, and are constantly infighting (see Robin Vos recall effort). This is unlikely to stop anytime soon.
Thoughts?
Always interesting to read breakdowns like this so thank you for that.
However, I do think that one should be very careful about drawing too many conclusions from that. Wisconsin is gonna be super close yet again and ultimately turnout will decide the election. Since Biden is the current president it will "all else being equal" be harder to energize the anti-Trump turnout which ensured Bidens victory in 2020.
Regarding Dane County you say that a lot of D leaning people are moving to Dane. But that would mean fewer D leaning people elsewhere, so it should only be a net gain for Dems if those D leaners are moving to Dane from other states. Whether this is the case or not I have no idea.
I think the general idea that a candidate is "maxed out" in certain areas is problematic. First up there are still a lot of WWC's who are voting democratic and haven't gotten the memo that the GOP is now their party (not saying this is at all true, but that is the feeling amongst many WWCers). Second, this ignores the effects of social pressure. In areas that are totally dominated by one party, I think it is more likely that social pressure turns that area even more towards that one party, than the opposite happening.
Anyway, I am definitely not calling this either way. I am on record for stating that WI/MI/PA is THE path to reelection for Joe Biden, so I do believe that this is his best chance. But I also believe that it is going to be a tough win if he pulls it off.
