Wisconsin voters dump three Scott Walker judicial appointees, including Daniel Kelly

A Supreme Court jus­tice and two Mil­wau­kee Coun­ty Cir­cuit judges appoint­ed by dis­graced for­mer Wis­con­sin gov­er­nor Scott Walk­er have been turned out of office by vot­ers in the Bad­ger State in a water­shed vic­to­ry for pro­gres­sive forces.

In the high­est pro­file race of last week’s elec­tion, which Repub­li­cans insist­ed be held amidst the pan­dem­ic, Jus­tice Daniel Kel­ly con­ced­ed defeat to his pro­gres­sive chal­lenger Jill Karof­sky after it became clear that she would win easily.

“As the cam­paign comes to its close, the work of the Court con­tin­ues,” Kel­ly said, after wish­ing his oppo­nent well. “My term ends on July 31st, and I will ded­i­cate every day from now until then to fin­ish­ing well in my ser­vice to this state.”

“Although we were suc­cess­ful in this race, the cir­cum­stances under which this elec­tion was con­duct­ed were sim­ply unac­cept­able, and raise seri­ous con­cerns for the future of our democ­ra­cy,” Karof­sky said in a statement.

“Nobody in this state or in this coun­try should have been forced to choose between their safe­ty and par­tic­i­pat­ing in an election.”

Karof­sky’s win nar­rows the right’s advan­tage on the State Supreme Court from five mem­bers out of sev­en to four mem­bers out of seven.

She will take office August 1st for a ten-year term.

Karof­sky received 841,297 votes to Kel­ly’s 682,657. Her ten point mar­gin of vic­to­ry stunned Repub­li­cans both in Wis­con­sin and elsewhere.

Democ­rats were elated.

“In the face of unprece­dent­ed vot­er sup­pres­sion efforts by Repub­li­cans, Judge Karof­sky has won the Supreme Court race — a result that speaks to Democ­rats’ incred­i­ble enthu­si­asm advan­tage and should ter­ri­fy Don­ald Trump and every oth­er Wis­con­sin Repub­li­can,” said DNC Chair Tom Perez. “I know Judge Karof­sky will be fair and make deci­sions based on the rule of law, not a hyper-par­ti­san agen­da. Wis­con­sinites will be well-served with her sound judgement.”

“This vic­to­ry comes despite Repub­li­cans’ best attempts to steal this elec­tion,” Perez added. “In the mid­dle of a pub­lic health emer­gency, when hard­work­ing Amer­i­cans are des­per­ate for lead­er­ship, Repub­li­cans saw an oppor­tu­ni­ty to dis­en­fran­chise vot­ers and advance their own tox­ic agen­da. It’s uncon­scionable, and it’s why Democ­rats are work­ing to ensure no vot­er should have to choose between risk­ing their health and par­tic­i­pat­ing in an election.”

“Repub­li­can attempts at vot­er sup­pres­sion didn’t work in Wis­con­sin, and Democ­rats are fight­ing tooth and nail to ensure they don’t work in Novem­ber when we will send Joe Biden to the White House and elect Democ­rats up and down the tick­et,” Perez concluded.

Biden weighed in a short time lat­er with a state­ment of his own.

“We often speak of the sac­ri­fices that Amer­i­cans make to pro­tect our free­doms – includ­ing putting their lives on the line,” said Biden, who over­whelm­ing­ly won the Bad­ger State’s pres­i­den­tial pri­ma­ry. “We saw that Amer­i­can spir­it last week in Wis­con­sin. It’s a tes­ta­ment to how much respect peo­ple have for their cher­ished right to vote. And we saw that courage not only in those who came to vote but in the ded­i­ca­tion of those who did the work of car­ry­ing out the election.”

“But as grate­ful as I am for your sup­port, and as proud I am of the com­mit­ment and courage shown by so many in Wis­con­sin – it nev­er should have come to that. No one should ever have to choose between their health and our democracy.”

“Instead, we saw Repub­li­cans will­ing to risk people’s lives for their own polit­i­cal pur­pos­es – refus­ing to work with the gov­er­nor [Demo­c­rat Tony Evers] to find an alter­na­tive solu­tion to in-per­son vot­ing last week,” Biden continued.

“It was more than shame­ful. It put lives in dan­ger unnec­es­sar­i­ly, and I hope no one for­gets what the Repub­li­cans in the state leg­is­la­ture did come November.”

As of press time, Biden had 570,639 votes in the state’s pres­i­den­tial pri­ma­ry, with 62.94% of the vote. Bernie Sanders trailed with 288,043 votes (31.77%). No oth­er can­di­date sur­passed the fif­teen point via­bil­i­ty threshold.

Biden’s blowout vic­to­ry had been expect­ed, although the results were not avail­able on Elec­tion Night. Despite not know­ing the offi­cial results, Bernie Sanders decid­ed to call it quits after vot­ing in Wis­con­sin end­ed. He announced the ces­sa­tion of his pres­i­den­tial cam­paign the next morn­ing (last Wednesday).

Wis­con­sin was a Sanders state in 2016, like its neigh­bors Min­neso­ta and Michi­gan. All three states have now swung to Joe Biden, the Demo­c­ra­t­ic Par­ty’s 2020 pre­sump­tive nom­i­nee. The same is true of Wash­ing­ton, Ida­ho, Alas­ka, Maine, and Okla­homa. All were for Sanders in 2016; all now favor Biden.

Sanders now also favors Biden. Hav­ing with­drawn from the race last Wednes­day, Sanders chose today to endorse Biden for the nom­i­na­tion via livestream.

In an ami­able con­ver­sa­tion, the duo spoke of their plans to set up six task forces hat would allow their cam­paigns to attempt to bridge their pol­i­cy divides to the extent fea­si­ble. Sanders plans to cam­paign for Biden for the dura­tion of the 2020 cycle, and Biden wants to part­ner with Sanders if he gets the chance to govern.

In addi­tion to turn­ing out Daniel Kel­ly, Wis­con­sin vot­ers also sent Judges Paul Dedin­sky and Dan Gabler pack­ing. Both had been appoint­ed by Scott Walk­er pri­or to Walk­er’s defeat in the 2018 midterm elec­tions. Dedin­sky was seek­ing to be retained in the Court’s fifth branch and Gabler its twen­ty-sev­enth branch.

Dedin­sky lost by an almost twen­ty point mar­gin. His chal­lenger Brett Blomme gar­nered 58.29% of the vote, leav­ing no doubt as to the outcome.

Upon learn­ing of his vic­to­ry, a deeply grate­ful Blomme wrote:

I want to send a big thank you to the thou­sands of vot­ers from every part of Mil­wau­kee Coun­ty that helped pro­pel my cam­paign to VICTORY! I am over­whelmed right now and so appre­cia­tive of all of cam­paign vol­un­teers, donors and grass­roots activists and orga­ni­za­tions that worked tire­less­ly on my campaign!

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

I got into this race to give the peo­ple of Mil­wau­kee Coun­ty a choice in this elec­tion. We ran a grass­roots cam­paign focused on bring­ing to light the need to elect judges that are com­mit­ted to work­ing to change our bro­ken crim­i­nal jus­tice system.

I proud­ly endorsed the ACLU’s Smart Jus­tice ini­tia­tive, a set of reforms that are aimed at reduc­ing Wis­con­sin’s prison pop­u­la­tion by over 50% in the next few years.

A spe­cial thank you to my hus­band, Chris and our two young kids Caleb and Sophia Jo, my par­ents, fam­i­ly and all of my friends. Thank you as well to my staff for your amaz­ing work in this campaign.

I look for­ward to join­ing jus­tice part­ners work­ing to make our jus­tice sys­tem more equi­table, fair and open for every­one in our community.

With grat­i­tude,

Brett Blomme
Mil­wau­kee Coun­ty Cir­cuit Court — Branch 5

Mean­while, in the oth­er fierce­ly con­test­ed Mil­wau­kee Coun­ty Cir­cuit Court race, the right wing lost by an even big­ger margin.

Chal­lenger Rebec­ca Kiefer secured more than sev­en­ty per­cent of the vote, eas­i­ly dis­patch­ing Gabler, who was unable to crack thir­ty percent.

Upon learn­ing of her vic­to­ry, Kiefer wrote:

I am hon­ored to share that I have been elect­ed Mil­wau­kee Coun­ty Cir­cuit Court Judge in Branch 29.

This cam­paign has been such an incred­i­bly pos­i­tive force in my life. I am grate­ful for my fam­i­ly, friends, and every­one who has sup­port­ed me through­out the cam­paign. Mil­wau­kee Coun­ty needs judges who can fair­ly apply the law, ensure we care about the needs of kids and vic­tims, and who will treat every­one with respect.

Thank you for trust­ing me to be that judge.

We will find bet­ter solu­tions to make our com­mu­ni­ty stronger, togeth­er. I couldn’t have done this with­out sup­port like yours.

I look for­ward to serv­ing you.

Wis­con­sin Democ­rats, led by the irre­press­ible Ben Wik­ler (for­mer­ly of MoveOn and The Al Franken Show) made it clear they’re just get­ting warmed up.

“Tonight, despite the Repub­li­can Par­ty sav­age and shame­ful attempt to sup­press votes and steal Wis­con­sin’s Supreme Court elec­tion, Judge Jill Karof­sky pre­vailed. It’s a vic­to­ry for jus­tice and democ­ra­cy in an elec­tion that should nev­er have tak­en place in per­son,” Wik­ler said in a state­ment.

“Despite the result, the fact that this in-per­son elec­tion took place was a sear­ing loss for Wis­con­sin. Today’s results don’t tell us how many peo­ple were exposed to coro­n­avirus at polling places, how many were infect­ed, or how many will die. Had jus­tice pre­vailed, those num­bers would have been zero.”

“No one should ever have to choose between their health and their vote, yet Repub­li­cans chose to pri­or­i­tize their own polit­i­cal gain over actu­al human lives. Wis­con­sin vot­ers will not for­get this trav­es­ty,” Wik­ler added.

Wik­ler urged Repub­li­can leg­is­la­tors in Madi­son (who cur­rent­ly have super­ma­jori­ties and have repeat­ed­ly tus­sled with Gov­er­nor Tony Evers) to join Democ­rats in sup­port­ing a vote-at-home elec­tions reform bill.