Tony signs the maps. A good thing in a normal world, but lots of work left.

Sure Tony. Go ahead and play it straight instead of listening to me.

BREAKING: I've promised from the beginning that I will always try to do the right thing. Today, I'm keeping that promise and I'm signing fair maps for Wisconsin.

Wisconsin, for the first time in over a decade, we will not have some of the most gerrymandered maps in America. pic.twitter.com/jc5RUGY0mM

— Governor Tony Evers (@GovEvers) February 19, 2024

Scene in the governor’s conference room in the state Capitol ahead of Gov. Tony Evers taking action on new legislative maps that will give Democrats a chance to gain more seats in the Legislature for the first time in more than a decade. pic.twitter.com/eWmuMmyhL8

— Molly Beck (@MollyBeck) February 19, 2024

I put nothing past GOP scum to try to delay this past November's elections, but I am a bit heartened to read this sighing admission from the dbag most likely to try to pull such a stunt.

Rick Esenberg of WILL, on Wisconsin's new electoral maps: Republicans "were obviously terrified of what the court would do and were trying to cut their losses."

More analysis of this momentous day by @MollyBeck, @jessieopie, @evawen_WQH and @ndrewhahn:https://t.co/0WxuQWepp0

— Journal Sentinel Investigations (@js_watchdog) February 19, 2024

We'll see if that's truly the calculation the WisGOPs have made, and that these are the Legislative maps we will have in place for the next 8 years. Let's then take a look and see what we got.

First thing to note is that despite any whining Republicans may make, this map does not advantage Democrats. For example, even though Joe Biden won Wisconsin by 0.6%, Donald Trump won a majority of State Assembly districts under these maps in the 2020 election.

Evers had proposed these maps to Wisconsin's Supreme Court after it struck down the GOP's maps.

They're slightly more GOP-friendly than 3 other proposals, which may be why GOP legislators passed them, but they're still much fairer than their gerrymanders https://t.co/Lb7V48v5XN https://t.co/T7N96X9rAV

— Stephen Wolf @stephenwolf.bsky.social (@PoliticsWolf) February 19, 2024

I'll note that the Highway 41 corridor between Green Bay, Appleton and Oshkosh is now the home of 2 close-but-Dem leaning Senate seats currently held by Republicans, and 3 Dem-leaning Assembly seats that are currently held by GOPs. So what's already an big swingy/battleground area in statewide elections is now going to be that way for legislative races as well this November.

I also wanted to take a look at results of the 2022 elections on these maps, to get an idea of what this may look like in the post-Dobbs world in Wisconsin (a state where the abortion issue and January 6th events are VERY relevant). And I wanted to go with the lower-profile Attorney General's race (which Dem Josh Kaul won by 1.3%), to have a picture of "generic D vs R" at the state level in these districts.

It's pretty much the same story as the Presidential breakdown, except that Dems would have 1-seat advantages in both houses under the AG results - 50-49 in the Assembly, and 17-16 in the Senate. Here's a look at where control flips, and the number of competitive seats that had an AG election result decided by less than 10 points.

First the Assembly.

Now the Senate.

But it's not all great news for Dems. You'll notice a lot more Dem-leaning seats are close to 50% than GOP-leaning seats. So if you hear Robbin' Vos and other Republicans whining about "Democrat[ic] maps", they're DEAD WRONG, and it shows how absurdly huge their sense of privilege has gotten under in their 13 years of gerrymandered power.

It's even dumber to hear complaints from Republicans because there still is practically no way that Dems can have complete control of state government after November 2024, even with these new maps. That's because only half of the State Senate is up for re-election in 2024, and Dems would have to pick up 6 currently GOP-held seats in November to undo the 22-11 GOP supermajority. To get that far, Dems would have to win a seat that voted GOP in the 2022 Attorney General's race by more than 17%.

But all 99 seats in the Assembly are up in 8 1/2 months, and that certainly will be up takeable for Dems under these fairer maps. The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel has a neat group of graphics which compares the old and new districts, and how those districts have voted.

Assuming this holds, it's a great step forward for Wisconsin, which will likely have a Legislature that becomes more responsive to the wishes of the state's voters. Maybe we can now stop being out of step with Midwestern states like Michigan, Minnesota and Illinois, which all have some form of legal marijuana and Roe v. Wade protections, and Medicaid expansion.

But I've also learned over the last 13 years not to be too comfortable, as WisGOP will try to retain power and go around the people's wishes by any means necessary. One of the things we've had to learn the hard way is that we need to be constantly vigilant against these scumbags, and if any front for WisGOP and their puppetmasters tries to use the Courts to overturn something that still gives a 50-50 chance for total GOP control of the State Legislature, their funders need to be exposed and damaged.

I'll take the win today, but lots of work still left to do.