Wisconsin Megathread v3: GOP in MASSIVE DISARRAY

[Sir Mohamed]

https://twitter.com/Taniel/status/1511559593964494854

Corrupt Dems just rigged another election!!1!

[Sir Mohamed]

Tommy Thompson endorses Michels

wpr.org/former-governor-thompson-endorses-michels-gop-race

Seems like Kleefisch is losing her role as the favorite on the GOP side?

[Sir Mohamed]

Former Speaker of the U. S. House Paul Ryan, Former RNC Chair Priebus, Former Governor Scott Walker and current Senator Ron Johnson all indicated that they would not rally or campaign with Tim Michels in the fall should he win the GOP Nomination for Governor tomorrow.

That won't move a single vote in November. Just won't. These endorsements from has-beens mean nothing.

[Sir Mohamed]

Pure tossup -> Tilt D

If the GOP indeed underperforms in key senate and gov races, it will mostly because of nominating terrible candidates. Several of them endorsed by Trump. Remains a big If since we're still 3 months away from the election, but it's really kind of stunning how many joke candidates they nominated this year.

[Sir Mohamed]

The turnout operation that Ben Wikler & co have built in Dane County is probably the single-greatest threat to Republican statewide chances in this state for the foreseeable future, even moreso than trends in WOW (though the latter obviously does more to help with geographic balance).

Really frustrating too in the sense that if everyone knew the Barnes race would only be 1pt, I'm sure he would've been able to maximize resources and come up with some additional ideas to get that last 25-30k votes.

I haven’t done the maths but I really wonder whether the post September tightening saw a lot of resources go elsewhere- NV obviously needed it, but I wonder how much NH and some other house raises got.

It really was awful that Barnes got outspent in that time and iirc he didn’t have a huge lead in campaign cash to overturn the huge Super PAC spending against him.

It really stings but despite how close it was, I don't think Barnes actually could have won. Johnson was more toxic than we thought

Hard to say, but what is pretty clear is that Kind would’ve won had he run (assuming he could win the nomination).  I think Barnes might’ve won had he received significantly more outside support (maybe if the DSCC made it’s beefed up late-ish play here rather than in North Carolina and began doing so back in early September), but it’s impossible to know.  

I do think this election shows that #StrongIncumbent Ron Johnson was largely a myth/meme given that he almost lost to Barnes despite Barnes being a pretty weak candidate who received inconsistent support from the national party.  

I think Barnes wins if he would have been able to counter Johnson's post-primary spending barrage that permanently defined Barnes as weak on crime which critically wounded him. Just countering that with equal spending I think would have gotten him the necessary votes. He only needed to flip ~15k. Funny enough, Johnson's strategy here is what Baldwin has done to both of her opponents in both 2012 and 2018. You hit them hard immediately after the primary.

Re: Baldwin: Ehhhh…I dunno.  I don’t recall 2012 that clearly, but 2018 wasn’t anything so impressive.  Baldwin’s opponent was a whacko sacrificial lamb and the seat was always considered Safe D iirc (plus, it was 2018).  I actually think Baldwin is somewhat overrated Re: candidate strength and is basically just Generic D.

I think both Wisconsin senators are overrated and more lucky than anything in the years they’ve ran.

RoJo for sure got lucky in all of his 3 elections, though Baldwin winning with 55% in 2018 was impressive, even for a blue wave year. Remember that Evers just very barely won on the same ballot. Baldwin for sure is favored next year and will most likely outperform Biden.

[Sir Mohamed]

Oof, I didn't expect such a blowout. That said, I don't think this has any implications for the 2024 prez election. Starts out as pure tossup or Tilt Biden.

[Sir Mohamed]

At this point, I think we can conclude that "Trumpism without Trump" is not a viable campaign strategy. Trump was the selling point, not Trumpism.

Yup, though the selling point is just for a limited base. Trump got extremely lucky in 2016 that he was running against a candidate with a weak campaign and in a time the electorate was calling for an outsider.

Ever since 2017, the GOP was done poorly in several elections because Trump is an albatross on their neck. Especially in elections he isn't on the ballot because his base doesn't bother to turn out in high enough numbers.

[Sir Mohamed]

Oof, I didn't expect such a blowout. That said, I don't think this has any implications for the 2024 prez election. Starts out as pure tossup or Tilt Biden.

Partly disagree. Obviously Trump will do much better than Kelly in the rurals, but I think the WOW margins are indicative of what we’ll see next year in a rematch.

Biden might very well do better in WI than 2020, though a D-shift of more than 1-2 pts. would actually indicate Biden won by more than he did last time at the national level.

[Sir Mohamed]

Wisconsin rejected a MAGA judge by a double digit margin? Based. It's too unfortunate ElectionsGuy has dropped out of the forum. Heck, this is his homestate.

His final post was that he was considering leaving the forum because we were all too stupid to see that Hassan was going to lose. I'd be shocked if he has the balls to show himself again after his behavior in the months leading up to the 2022 elections.

I can see why he isn't posting anymore. His final prediction post which was very confident turned out to be very wrong.

Not only very wrong, but one of the worst predictions on the entire website.

Disappearing like EG and Calthrina did just displays their immaturity.  I would venture to say that everyone who follows politics for long enough has made some wrong predictions, probably including some doozies, at some point.  (I've certainly made some!)  But being able to admit it when you're wrong, and trying to learn something from it, is something that a mature person does.  Refusing to acknowledge your mistakes is a sign of weakness, not strength.

Couldn't have said it better.

EG would possibly run around now and argue how this was a non-partisan election and therefore not actually a D-win. He might compare it to the KS abortion referendum and how this doesn't make KS a D-pickup.

[Sir Mohamed]

https://twitter.com/jessieopie/status/1667760494436859909

I already forgot WI doesn't have term limits. He might be the best Dem to keep the seat, though it might be more difficult in a 2nd Biden midterm unless the GOP nominates another weirdo.