What a week, a barn burner of a
state Supreme Court election
followed up by head spinning Trump
tariffs.
All as the beat goes on with Elon
Musk and Doge within the
administration.
Here to discuss are political
panelists, Republican Bill
McCaussian and Democrat Scott Ross,
and thanks for being here.
Thanks for having us.
So, Scott, how big of a gift
was Elon Musk to Susan Crawford's
campaign?
Well, I think he certainly didn't
help things.
But this was about Trump, you know?
And when Trump finally gets tired of
Musk and dumps him, the failure,
the incompetence, the
authoritarianism, the rejection of
the rule of law, the stealing away
of people's money in their
retirement accounts, that's gonna
still be there.
This anger is going to
continue. It's gonna continue into
2026.
But again, I don't
think that Musk helped the cause.
I mean, granted, he and E-Line
and... You know, Hendricks, they
spent a fortune to try and win this
seat, but they didn't because
Democrats, independents, and even
some Republicans stood up and said,
what's going on with the Trump
administration does not work for
Wisconsin.
Bill, do you think that the entry
of Musk and Donald Trump into Brad
Schimel's campaign was a good idea?
But I wanna pick up on something
Scott said first.
Democrats were motivated, they were
angry. They were pretty beaten
down in November when Trump won.
I don't think they ever thought that
was possible. It was possible,
Trump not only won here, but he got
the most votes in history in the
state of Wisconsin.
So, Democrats here did all they
could to make sure that their base
turned out.
Turnout was very high, it was
gubernatorial levels.
2.4 million people, which in the
spring elections unheard of.
I thought the higher turnout
actually would help Brad Schiml and
help Democrats more.
On the Musk's thing,
I think without his money, Schimm
will have lost by worse.
I think it might have been 14 or 15
points.
I think where Musk's
team crossed the line was on giving
away checks.
That didn't sit well with Wisconsin
voters and it super fired
up Democrats at the end.
I was at the Musk event in Green
Bay. There were probably 400
protesters outside that event in
sleeting rain and it was, They were
fired up.
Yeah, I mean, those people better
cash those checks quick, you know,
because they most likely won't
be able to be cashed.
But you know the thing about it is
if you look at the numbers,
literally every single of the 72
counties in Wisconsin went
more Democratic, went more left
than they did in November 24.
And this was not a special election.
This was a regularly scheduled
election. We had turnout that
was higher than 38, 38
states.
off your turnout last time.
Like it was a pasting, it was so
much of a past thing that like, I
don't know, Derek Van Orton wasn't
drunk yet and Chuck Schumer was
still awake.
Republican turnout was up, it just
wasn't up as much as Democrats.
Oh, and independents.
I mean, independents were there with
the Democrats on this one.
Do you think that follows through?
Absolutely, because it's not gonna
get any better. We just saw with
what's going on in three, $30
trillion of wealth being shot
out the window with the Trump tariff
tax going, it's
gonna get worse. People are looking
at their retirement accounts now.
If your bills age, you can put
$8,000 in your IRA.
Other people at 7,000,
and people are seeing years and
years of the money they invested in
their IRA wiped out like that.
Spring elections don't
correlate to what happens in the
fall. I'll give you the example.
Janet Procewitz won by 10 points,
which is exactly what Susan Crawford
won in 2023 in the spring.
Donald Trump came back and won in
2024.
But this is an off year election in
2026 and Democrats are going to be
motivated and independents are going
to be angry because of what's going
on with the economy and how badly
things are going.
I want to bring this to you, Bill.
Wisconsin conservative Rick
Essenberg said this, quote,
I'm not surprised that populist
voters didn't care about having a
conservative court.
They aren't conservative.
They are, rightly or wrongly,
resentful and alienated.
What it takes to attract the
populist vote limits the
conservative vote.
How do you navigate this?
We've got some soul searching to do
on our side, whether it's the state
party or the ally groups, and
there are many that have been
helping Republican candidates,
everything we did wasn't enough.
And it wasn't by a lot.
When you lose by 10 points, it's not
just one thing, it is multiple
things.
So I think the party's got to do
some soul-searching on where we go
from here.
To Essenberg's point, he's right.
There are low-propensity
voters that do turn out for Donald
Trump, but they also turn out on
Donald Trump's agenda.
I think where Republicans came up
short, particularly in the Supreme
Court races, Brad Schimel wasn't
clear enough about what his agenda
was, what he stood
for. And the Marquette poll in March
told us 80 percent of Wisconsin
voters actually want to know what
judicial candidate's position is on
issues, which I find sort of
appalling. But that's where the
public is. They want to know where
you stand. These are no longer
nonpartisan races.
They're very partisan.
This isn't, this race was not
about some fracture between two
parts of the Republican Trump Party.
This was about Democrats,
independents, and even some
Republicans going out and saying,
we reject what Donald Trump's doing.
They have taken over government.
There needs to be a check on them.
That check needs to Susan Crawford.
And it's not going to get any easier
for the Republicans.
And if you think about like what the
next race is, you know, April 2026,
Rebecca The best chance that
Republicans have is if she
gets a federal judgeship.
and Tony Evers, Governor Evers gets
to appoint a successor because she
is so toxic.
She is more toxic than even Brad
Schimel or Dan Kelly.
respond to that.
I think she's tough as nails, and
that's the kind of candidate we
need. A, we need a female candidate.
B, we somebody who's tough-as-nails
that's willing to fight for the job.
So with about a minute and a half
left, how seismic was Crawford's
win, given what's about to come
before the court?
Well, it preserves a
liberal majority for three more
years. Republicans or conservatives
cannot get the majority again until
the spring of actually the summer of
2028. So what will
be will be now for three years
minimum. And that includes school
choice. It includes act 10.
It includes a variety of voter
ID, thankfully is no longer under
consideration because the voters
overwhelmingly passed that.
But there are a lot of things
that'll come before the court.
And if you're a business owner here
in the state of Wisconsin, buckle
up, could get rough.
there have been freedoms under
assault in Wisconsin for the 15
years that Republicans controlled
the Supreme Court.
Now that we have serious
justices in there who will look at
the law and not interpret the law, I
think we're gonna have a lot more
cases coming before the court in a
way that's going to preserve freedom
here in the state of Wisconsin and
restore some of the freedoms that
have been taken away.
We leave it there, Scott Ross, Bill
McCroshen, thank you.
For more on this and other issues
facing Wisconsin, visit our website
at pbswisconsin.org and
then click on the news tab.
That's our program for tonight.
I'm Frederica Freiberg.
Have a good weekend.