How Dane County and other educated areas are the Death Star against Wisconsin going MAGA

I saw this article on social media, and it immediately piqued my attention.

Then I noticed the in-depth article begins DATELINE MADISON, WISCONSIN, and talks about how Dane County led the way in Janet Protasiewicz's landslide victory in April's Wisconsin Supreme Court race.

No place was more energized to vote than Dane County, the state’s second-most populous county after Milwaukee. It’s long been a progressive stronghold thanks to the double influence of Madison, the state capital, and the University of Wisconsin, but this was something else. Turnout in Dane was higher than anywhere else in the state. And the Democratic margin of victory that delivered control of the nonpartisan court to liberals was even more lopsided than usual — and bigger than in any of the state’s other 71 counties.

The margin was so big that it changed the state’s electoral formula. Under the state’s traditional political math, Milwaukee and Dane — Wisconsin’s two Democratic strongholds — are counterbalanced by the populous Republican suburbs surrounding Milwaukee. The rest of the state typically delivers the decisive margin in statewide races. The Supreme Court results blew up that model. Dane County alone is now so dominant that it overwhelms the Milwaukee suburbs (which have begun trending leftward anyway). In effect, Dane has become a Republican-killing Death Star.

“This is a really big deal,” said Mark Graul, a Republican strategist who ran George W. Bush’s 2004 reelection campaign in Wisconsin. “What Democrats are doing in Dane County is truly making it impossible for Republicans to win a statewide race.”

Protasiewicz won nearly 82% of the vote in Dane County in April, and Dane County accounted for more than 13% of the state's total votes in that Supreme Court election. As someone who worked an on-campus polling site that day, I couldn't help but notice that not only were a sizable number of students registering that day (meaning they likely had not registered and voted in November's midterms), but that around 3/4 were female. The chance to flip the court and reverse Wisconsin's 1849 abortion law had to be a main driver.

Coming up in 2024 is a presidential election, and in prez elections, Dane County has become a lot more Democratic since 2000, even though the margins statewide aren't much different. Democrats did 30 points better in Dane County than the rest of Wisconsin in all 3 elections between 2000 and 2008, but the difference compared to the rest of the state was a consistent one. That difference widened a bit in 2012, and broke apart after Donald Trump became a candidate to where the "Dane vs statewide" gap ended up closer to 50 points in 2020.

But it's not only Dem percentages that have been growing in Dane County - it's the total margins themselves. Because as the Politico article notes, these college communities are growing much faster than the rest of their swing states. They define these "college counties" as such:

The American Communities Project, which has developed a typology of counties, designates 171 independent cities and counties as “college towns.” In a combined social science/journalism effort based at the Michigan State University School of Journalism, the ACP uses three dozen different demographic and economic variables in its analysis such as population density, employment, bachelor’s degrees, household income, percent enrolled in college, rate of religious adherence and racial and ethnic composition.

Nationwide, Republicans have gone from slight victories (!) in these counties in the George W. Bush elections to losing them by more than one million votes in 2020. With total votes going up by nearly 50% in the last 20 years.

Turns out that people with options want to live in highly-educated places with high qualities of life, and businesses like to set up in communities that have those type of highly-educated workers (who knew?). And they care about issues and elections.

And while Madison and Dane County are the largest example of how this trend in college counties helps Dems in Wisconsin, it's not the only one. Eau Claire and La Crosse are Dem strongholds as well (Protasiewicz got 64% of the vote in both of those counties), Portage County (Stevens Point) gave soon-to-be Justice Janet 58% of the vote, and Protasiewicz won Republican-leaning Winnebago County by more than 8% after Evers lost it by less than 1% in November.

You also see a similar blue trend happening in Milwaukee suburbs that have a lot of college-educated individuals and future college students. Even though it was a July special election with smaller turnout, GOPs had to be alarmed with this result from Tuesday.

The AD24 special election results are in. 53.6 to 46.4.

An R +7.2 margin in a district gerrymandered to have an R+24 advantage. That’s a terrific showing for Bob Tatterson, @AssemblyDemsWI, and @gretaneubauer—and a big flashing red light for the GOP. https://t.co/UbdDMb2kFQ

— Ben Wikler (@benwikler) July 19, 2023

Census data tells us that nearly 46% of the 24th Assembly District's adult population has a bachelor's degree or higher, well above the Wisconsin rate of 31.5% with bachelor's degree or higher. The 24th also has more than 13,000 children under 18, whose parents are seeing the anti-education future that WisGOPs constantly spout, and increasing numbers aren't buying it.

You'd think Republicans would notice this and try to remove that motivator in time for the 2024 elections, but Legislative GOPs refuse to put forward any bill to restore Roe v. Wade rules in the state. Instead they are wasting time trying to push through anti-trans bills under the guise of "protecting girls' sports" - WHICH IS NOT A THING IN ALMOST ALL PARTS OF WISCONSIN.

And when the Assembly GOP Leader (who controls the campaign funds for other Assembly GOPs, and doesn't allow other legislation to get to the Assembly floor) isn't trying to revive unpopular tax cuts for the super-rich, Dweeby Napoleon continues to push this cultural BS.

Americans' Confidence in Higher Education Down Sharply

Maybe if higher education institutions focused more on education and less on ideological indoctrination, the results might be different?https://t.co/SvhyLiQewg

— Robin Vos (@repvos) July 11, 2023

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos raves about the evils of DEI at the University of Wisconsin creating racial division.https://t.co/PleGZQUfu8

— Shepherd Express (@shepherdexpress) July 15, 2023

The Politico article ends with this brutal bit of honesty from the recent Wisconsin GOP Convention, where a resolution to try to force college students to vote in their home districts got tabled. And it was because the dwindling number of Dane and Milwaukee County Republicans told other GOPs that they were getting their asses kicked.

“Why on Earth would we send a message to the students that we don’t want them to vote our way?” Milwaukee County GOP Chair Hilario Deleon told his fellow party activists. “Do not give the Democrats ammunition, give them competition.”

Shhhh, don't tell the MAGAts. Let them keep living in their Bubble of BS and anti-education resentment, and let them keep losing by bigger and bigger margins in Wisconsin.

Here's the link to that article again. Read it, it's a good one.