The biggest shifts happened in the Milwaukee Metro area. Not only did Evers benefit from a big shift to Dems in the Milwaukee County suburbs and increased turnout in the City of Milwaukee, but he also held down Walker’s margin of victory in the WOW Counties, as Walker basically split the difference between himself in 2014 and Trump in 2016.
Note- all of these maps will use "Dem% - GOP%" as the baseline.
If you look at the largest counties in northeastern Wisconsin, while Walker won every one of those 6 counties, Evers outperformed Burke in all of them, and improved on Hillary Clinton’s 2016 results in 2/3 of them. This kept Walker from running up the massive margins in the 920 that were keys to his prior victories.
As WisGOPs seem to bemoan every day, central to Evers’ win was a 150,000+ vote advantage in Dane County, which was 50,000 more votes than what Burke won the county by in 2014. Tony won Dane by a comical 51%, and he also did better than either Burke or Clinton in 4 other typically blue counties that border Dane.
Another area where Evers (generally) did well in was the southwestern corner of the state. Not only did he become the first Dem to win Grant County since 2012, but he also more than doubled Burke’s win in La Crosse, and gained back rural counties that were lost badly to Trump in 2016.
For Trump to win Wisconsin in 2020, he needs this area to vote like it did in 2016. If that’s not happening (and it didn't in November 2018) the GOP’s losses in the larger metro areas will be too large to make up. So this is worth keeping an eye on.
Similarly, the area along Highway 29 in Central and Western Wisconsin was one I identified as a key tale-teller for 2018 and 2020. And as you can see, Evers made gains vs 2014 and 2016 in 3 of them, but that the Wausau area stayed strongly red.
This has big downticket implications, as it indicates Sean Duffy’s lucked into a House seat that is much easier for him to win than it was when he first won it in 2010. It also helps explain how Jeff Smith got a surprisingly easy 6-point win to keep Kathleen Vinehout’s Eau Claire-area State Senate seat in Dem hands, and the shift toward Dems in both Dunn and St. Croix Counties could help Dem Patty Schachtner hold her State Senate seat in 2020.
Lastly, let me give you this map from J. Miles Coleman at Decision Desk HQ. As you can see, Walker actually did better in some rural counties in 2018 than he did in 2014. But the more populated southern half of the state shifted harder towards Dems, and that's what did Scotty in.
In the #WIGov race last week, @Tony4WI (D) beat @ScottWalker (R). Compared to 2014, Walker improved in some northern areas, but it wasn't enough. The two counties that swung hardest against him were in the Milwaukee suburbs: Ozaukee & Waukesha. This was crucial to Evers' win. pic.twitter.com/11tQYVs4Kt
— J. Miles Coleman (@JMilesColeman) November 15, 2018
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