Half Of State Legislative Races This Fall Will Not Have A Major Party Challenge

[midnight]

Tuesday, June 7, 2016, 5:30pm
By Rich Kremer

"Half of all Wisconsin legislative candidates up for election this fall won't face a major party challenger and are almost certain to win their seat.

There are 115 state legislative seats up for election this November, but voters in 58 of those districts will only have one choice for a major party candidate. That's because either the Republican or Democratic parties aren't fielding contenders in unfavorable districts.

For Mort Sipress, a University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire emeritus political science professor, it's a result of powerful new voting maps drawn by Republicans during the 2011 redistricting.

"Both parties have come to recognize that they waste a lot of money if they run candidates in losing districts and that has discouraged even the possibility of competition in many parts of the state," said Sipress."

http://www.wpr.org/half-state-legislative-races-fall-will-not-have-major-party-challenge

[dhill926]

1. this once wonderful state...

is completely broken.

[Nay]

2. You see, this is the problem. We are always told to get involved locally, but the

national party (in the case of the Democrats) won't come through with ANY money to help local delegates. It happened here in the 10th District in VA, once when voters were so sick of Cantor the local Dems fielded a candidate. This candidate actually walked the neighborhoods. I talked to him personally. He told me that he applied for and did not get one thin dime from the national D party. Cantor got $10 million from Pub sources. THEN, a few years later, Pub voters themselves put up a Pub candidate to challenge Cantor (Brat) because they were so disgusted, and local Dems saw their chance to put up a Dem to challenge the total unknown Brat.

I also talked personally with this second Dem candidate. He also did not get one thin dime from any Dem PAC or anything. IIRC, Brat got $5 million from somewhere. This guy got a lot of votes, but not enough to win. If he'd had a financial boost from ANY Dem PAC, he could have won.

Face it, local candidates need MONEY. Neither of these Dem candidates had enough money to even put out signs. Around here, Pub signs are EVERYWHERE during election season, no matter how small the election. Intersections are filled with Pub signs. If the national party doesn't start funding local candidates EVEN IF THEY THINK THEY WILL LOSE, Dems will never be able to build a bottom-up organization. You MUST invest in the process whether or not you think you will win that specific election. That's what the Pubs have been doing for decades, and it works. I don't think Dem strategists are stupid, so I think maybe they aren't very interested in building a 50-state strategy. Why that is, I'm not sure, but Dean tried and got shafted, so . . . in any case, we can't MAKE anyone fund our local candidates, so we've been stalled out here for 30 years.

[Jimbo S]

3. This what democracry looks like

</sarcasm>

There was a time not long ago when nearly all races were contested. Now, in my case, I'm left to vote in the Republican primary because that is not the de facto general election. It's increasingly become more difficult to hold officials accountable for their actions.

[dembotoz]

4. hard to recruit lambs to the slaughter

no help from the state
no coordinated effort to get candidates in red areas
hell i am not even sure that state party went out of their way to let the local parties know the recruitment window was open. I think at times from what i have seen, the state party sees non targeted races as a distraction from their anointed chores.

[ewagner]

5. Several local districts are like that

Central Wisconsin

Seats held by: Kulp, Spiros,Moulton, Petrowski....

No Dem has been able to pull more than 35% of the vote no matter who it was...

Gerrymandering at its finest


Last election the Democratic Assembly Campaign Committee and the Democratic Senate Campaign committee actively recruited KAMIKAZE Pilots to run in these districts....I was one of them but declined.

[midnight]

6. Maybe it's time to run our folks as republicans who can protect our water, schools, and economy.

[ewagner]

8. Interesting Concept...

Some pitfalls....but interesting...

[midnight]

9. If they can run clark as a democrat…. just saying.

[midnight]

7. Recruitment window information would be a important start to turning this around...

[bobthedrummer]

10. It's bad, you know...

[Still In Wisconsin]

11. Meet the new boss...

oh, hell, you know how the song goes.