Weekly News from Your Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair

Follow this newsletter to keep current on the events shaping our state and the work our party is doing to win in 2020 and beyond. 

Here are two articles that are very much worth your time. Both in the New York Times. Both by the same reporter, Reid Epstein. One bleak. The other, a cause for hope.

The first: “In Wisconsin, Virus Creates New Front in Long-Simmering Partisan Wars.” As the piece illustrates, Wisconsin is not just 2020’s electoral college tipping-point state—we’re also  the front line in the fight against a Republican Party that has gone completely over the edge.

The piece quotes the treasurer of the Republican Party of Wisconsin, who posted this plea to fellow organizers of today’s anti-Safer-at-Home protest in a Facebook group:

“Ok folks, I implore you, please leave Confederate flags and/or AR15s, AK47s, or any other long guns at home… I well understand that the Confederacy was more about states rights than slavery. But that does not change the truth of how we should try to control the optics during the event.”

The reason why Wisconsinites fought and died in the Civil War was to end slavery. The Republican Party was founded in 1854—in Wisconsin—to oppose slavery. That was a very different party. Today’s Wisconsin Republicans defend the banner of slavery, hiding it in order to manage the optics of their protest against public health measures intended to keep them (and all of us) alive. It says everything about what we’re up against.

But the second article is a cause for hope: “Vote by Mail in Wisconsin Helped a Liberal Candidate, Upending Old Theories.” The piece describes an analysis of ballots cast in person versus via mail. The finding:

Jill Karofsky performed 10 percentage points better than her conservative opponent in votes cast by mail than she did in votes cast at Election Day polling places.

71% of the votes in our April 7 election were cast via absentee ballot. The piece concludes that “The gap suggests that Democrats were more organized and proactive in their vote-by-mail efforts.”

That’s no accident. That’s the result of tireless work by thousands of us across the state—not just in the three and a half weeks that we spent helping people vote by mail before April 7, but in the three and a half years since we launched the DPW’s year-round field program. And for many DPW members, it’s the fruit of three and a half decades—or longer—involved in building our party from the grassroots up.

We won on April 7 not despite our values, but because of them. Because our values drive us to care for our communities. To keep people safe. To help people vote, not shut people out. To make democracy work.

As anti-science, anti-health Republican protestors gather in their thousands to oppose public health measures, our counter-protests won’t be in the streets. We won’t mourn. We won’t gather and boo.  We’ll organize.

Ben

P.S. — Earlier this week, I joined Sen. Tammy Baldwin, Ady Barkan, Bradley Whitford and Desmond Meade for a conversation on how to protect an election during a pandemic (we have a little experience on the matter here in Wisconsin). You can watch our conversation here.

FIGHT on the Issues & FIGHT to Win

Our elected officials must listen to science and data to inform their decisions about how to move forward. That’s why Gov. Evers relied on public health experts to inform the Badger Bounce Back plan which will get Wisconsin back on track and ensure our workers and businesses are prepared to reopen as soon as it is safe to do so.

Gov. Evers’ plan responsibly prioritizes the health and prosperity of Wisconsinites in an unprecedented time of social disruption. Republicans, on the other hand, are actively endangering the public and undermining efforts by the governor to move the state forward through this pandemic. Today, right-wing groups are planning to put themselves and everyone else at risk by gathering at the capital to stage a protest against Safer at Home. Republican leaders themselves have encouraged these protests in an attempt to delegitimize the safety measures that will slow the spread of the pandemic. We should expect better from our leadership.

At a time when Republicans are blatantly vying for power in the midst of a pandemic, it is vital that Democrats protect the Governor’s authority. The party has already raised over $2 million for the initiative, and the scale of the program is unprecedented and will work both to protect incumbent Democrats and challenge vulnerable Republican legislators. Save the Veto will stop Robin Vos and Scott Fitzgerald’s supermajority, ensure Democrats continue to wield the executive power that voters elected them to hold in 2018, and prevent the GOP from re-rigging the maps in the 2021 redistricting process.

INCLUDE & RESPECT

Earth Day is an important reminder of what can be achieved collectively when the most vulnerable populations are included in the fight for action on climate change. Wisconsin has a dangerous legacy of environmental injustice, whether it is that children of color are twice as likely to live near hazardous chemical facilities or that zoning laws created industrial dumping grounds in predominately poorer and Black and brown neighborhoods. In calling for action, it is essential to remember that many communities are disproportionately affected by climate change and that any solution must address those inequities.

Similarly, though coronavirus has been concentrated in cities across the state, it appears to be expanding in rural communities and continues to hurt their economies and health. It is crucial for Wisconsinites of all races and in all geographies to work together to control the spread and fight for the common good of the state.

EMPOWER the Grassroots

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