Shawn Johnson:
A gerrymandering arms race is happening around the country this year. Why not in Wisconsin? Also, how some big orders out of Washington could affect Wisconsin, and a look at the closing days of our state Supreme Court race. This is Inside Wisconsin Politics.

Shawn Johnson:
I'm Shawn Johnson, here with my colleagues Anya van Wagtendonk, Zac Schultz and Rich Kremer in Eau Claire. Hey, everyone.

Anya van Wagtendonk:
Hey.

Zac Schultz:
Hello.

Rich Kremer:
Hey.

Shawn Johnson:
So Rich, there had been sort of this hope by Democrats that there was this one case in this courtroom in Madison that could potentially redraw the congressional lines ahead of the midterm elections. It seems like this courtroom said no, that door is actually closed. What did they say this week?

Rich Kremer:
So, they said that they don't really have the authority to do anything about the maps. The lawsuit is seeking a redraw because of some things that happened back in 2022. Well, the Supreme Court is the one that put those maps in effect, but the circuit court judges said that they just, they can't overrule the Supreme Court. So, essentially, they dismissed the case, and it seems all but likely that the current districts — which are held by six Republicans and two Democrats — will remain the same for the November election.

Shawn Johnson:
And just kind of zooming out as to why this feels like it matters more at this moment in time, you have this redistricting battle going across the country where Republican states have redrawn their congressional maps to add more Republican seats. Democratic states have responded in kind. Where does this leave Wisconsin — big picture, Zac — when it comes to what everything looks like here as part of that battle?

Zac Schultz:
Well, we're still going to continue to be operating under the same congressional lines that were actually Tony Evers' version of the maps, if you recall, under the old "least change" model at the Supreme Court at that time, run by conservatives, dictated. This was Tony Evers' version of the old Republican map, slightly adjusting them. The most competitive district remains the 3rd, which is western Wisconsin, La Crosse and going up through Rich's area. And that race has been close for a few cycles. It will remain close this fall. Democrats across the country look at it as a possible pickup, but the rest of the districts, barring a huge wave, look like they're going to stay the way they've been. There were Democrats who were thinking Wisconsin could get in this redistricting game. Most of the states doing that around the country are doing that with one-party rule, where the Democrats or Republicans control the entire state so they can do this mid-decade, even though they're not supposed to be. Wisconsin obviously doesn't have that. It would have had to go through the Supreme Court. The Wisconsin Supreme Court has consistently said we do not want to touch these congressional lines. They have been given options multiple times, and they've said no through original action. So that's why, in this case, there were two different plaintiffs that said how about we go through the local courts first and see if it can work the way up to the Supreme Court? Under a law passed by Scott Walker and the Republicans, that meant these changes had to go to this panel of three judges, and there were two panels created by the Supreme Court. One of them has said, well, we'll have a trial in April of '27 — so a year away, obviously nowhere near in time for '26. The other one was the one that dismissed the case this week. The other panel that still has a case out there has not ruled on their motion to dismiss. It's possible that could get thrown out under the very same grounds. And it looks like at this time the flaw is in the law that was passed that was supposed to hear this, because it requires the Supreme Court to set up these judges to do something, and the judges say it's not clear what we have the authority to do in this case, which is why they dismissed it — yet another time where this challenge will not get to the Supreme Court under this venue.

Shawn Johnson:
To the dismay of many Democrats who said, hey, we have a 4 to 3 majority on, liberals do, on the state Supreme Court. Let's try there. Maybe not the Legislature this time because it's not going to go anywhere there. Or will it, Anya? Because, you know, some people may have heard about this push by Gov. Tony Evers to ban partisan gerrymandering in Wisconsin. He's going to call a special session for that later this month. Just a thought exercise here — could it work? Could that change the lines?

Anya van Wagtendonk:
I mean, if history is any guide, Evers' special sessions don't often go anywhere, right? Republicans who control the Legislature, they have to show up, but they gavel in and gavel out very often on his agenda. But there was actually maybe some signs that there could be something to this. Initially, first of all, Republicans did not sort of dismiss it out of hand, which was notable. Robin Vos said that he would be willing to negotiate on this. Last I asked him about it a couple weeks ago, he said, like, it hasn't come up yet. So it's possible that a deal kind of won't be brokered. But when I've spoken to experts about it, what they say is that because of the redrawn state maps of two years ago, kind of GOP-guaranteed hold of the Legislature is no longer so guaranteed. And so both parties would need to kind of map out the 2026 elections, the 2028 elections, the 2030 elections going back and forth. And so because of that, it's not clear that gerrymandering in Wisconsin is beneficial to either party in a way that in California or Florida, it is guaranteed sort of beneficial to one party or another because we have divided government and these super, super close elections. Because we are so purple, gerrymandering is not necessarily beneficial to either side. So maybe getting rid of it altogether is actually the politically better choice.

Shawn Johnson:
But as a constitutional amendment in the year 2026, not going to happen, because it just, it takes too long.

Anya van Wagtendonk:
Well, certainly, right, it won't affect the midterms in any kind of way. But if there were any kind of, like, negotiation there — and constitutional amendments take a bit longer, and Republicans have said they don't agree with sort of the language that Evers has put forward, that it's too vague and it's too broad — so there's all these details that would need to get hashed out. But I think this kind of broader conversation, knowing that voters pretty categorically, regardless of party, don't like gerrymandering, they don't like to feel like they are subject to gerrymandering. It could be a really interesting issue to kind of be in the water during this election year.

Zac Schultz:
But just to be clear, the most important thing for viewers to know is that even if a deal somehow got passed — like the Hail Mary of all Hail Mary's for gerrymandering reform — it wouldn't affect the maps. The next time this would come up would be redistricting in 2032 after the '30 census. So, these maps would be locked in place. The only way they're going to change, barring the Wisconsin Supreme Court, is if Democrats win a trifecta this fall, then they would actually have one-party rule to do what we've seen in these other states. But otherwise, it's not going to happen.

Shawn Johnson:
So what about that other case, though? You alluded to it. Rich, you're familiar with this case. It's been filed by Law Forward. And it just took a different approach to this redistricting question.

Rich Kremer:
Yeah, I'd say it's a slightly different approach. It's kind of getting at the same thing. The overall complaint is that the districts are designed to favor incumbents. So that's slightly different than the argument that, well, Republicans drew the districts to favor Republicans, but it's in a lot of ways very similar. So that case is proceeding. The parties in the lawsuit seem to be more amicable with one another. They've all agreed on these court dates that will start in 2027. So again, that's not going to result in any changes to the congressional map in Wisconsin before November. And if it's not thrown out on the same grounds that the other case was dismissed, it'll be interesting to see how that plays out before the three-judge panel.

Shawn Johnson:
Yeah, I would say there's a pretty good chance that we are going to — while it is not really a scheduled thing to do in 2027, I think we're going to be talking about this map in 2027. I mean, we just think about what wins elections in Wisconsin, or anywhere from a party's perspective. Well, you got candidates, and you still have to have that. You got to have a message voters like. You got to have money. But what is maybe more powerful than all of those? Lines and districts that favor you. You change the math because you can't win in a district where you have those other three if the voters are tilted to the other side. So I think in this hyper-partisan era, they're definitely going to be talking about this in 2027, whether it is in the Legislature with Democrats in power or the Supreme Court, where a 4-3 majority for liberals now could potentially be 5-2 next year. We just don't know. So I think that's something that, obviously, is going to be on our radar for a while.

Zac Schultz:
Redistricting is always in play in Wisconsin, and it'll never be a topic that we're not interested in and it's not relevant.

Shawn Johnson:
That's right. We don't have to wait for the next census. So from voting maps to voting, Rich, there was also this big executive order from President Trump this week dealing with mail-in voting. What did the president call for there?

Rich Kremer:
He called for some very sweeping changes, essentially a federal overhaul and a lot more participation from the federal government with regard to voting lists and absentee voting. So, the executive order directs federal agencies to create lists of U.S. citizens who are eligible to vote in every state, including Wisconsin. And then it also directs the U.S. Postal Service to not send any mail-in ballots to people who aren't on those lists. It would just give President Donald Trump's administration a lot of power over who gets to vote and who doesn't. So it's likely to wind up in court. In fact, a lawsuit has already been filed. There's a lot of questions about whether the president can do this, and that's what we're going to see the different parties in the lawsuit argue. So, it's a big change that's been proposed, but it's just an executive order, so it doesn't carry the same kind of weight as a congressional act or something like that.

Shawn Johnson:
So I think what a lot of people would be rightfully wondering is: Is this going to happen? Is this something that is likely to happen in Wisconsin specifically?

Zac Schultz:
The first thing I always look at when these kind of things come out of Trump White House specifically is what is the reaction for politicians in Wisconsin? We saw universally all the Democrats, including Gov. Evers use a profanity online to describe his reaction to this. And we didn't see anything from Republicans. If this had a prayer or a chance of actually being legal or valid in Wisconsin, there would have been some of the usual Trump-supporting Republicans that would have come out and said, yes, thank you, President Trump, it's about time. I didn't see any of that, maybe somewhere it was put out and I missed it, but the overall reaction was a lot of crickets from Republicans. That signals — most election observers saying this is completely not legal in Wisconsin, unenforceable in Wisconsin, would remove the right to vote for absentee ballots. We have, you can register on day of — there's just so many things that do not apply to how Wisconsin elections are run, barring the fact that it's not even legal constitutionally across the rest of the country according to every election expert that we ever talked to. I mean, Shawn, you've covered this just as long — it's not possible for the federal government to dictate how elections are run. That's done by the states.

Shawn Johnson:
No, I mean, actually, Rich was just doing an interview with a legal expert — and Rich, I'm stealing your story here — but the expert was just reading from their phone the section of the Constitution that says, basically, this is a right that belongs to states. Anya, there was an order this week, though not from the president, from the United States Supreme Court, that overturned a conversion therapy ban in Colorado. We have a conversion therapy ban in Wisconsin. What does that U.S. Supreme Court decision mean for us here?

Anya van Wagtendonk:
Yeah, so this is kind of, there's sort of two levels at which this decision functions in Wisconsin. So, to go back in time a little bit, last summer there was this big Wisconsin state Supreme Court decision that is the reason that we have this statewide conversion therapy ban. But it is an administrative rule, it's not a law. And so, kind of putting aside the conversation around what that did for the balance of powers, it was this kind of huge decision. One of the outcomes of that was that agencies that want to impose rules can do so, and one of the ones that was imposed was around professional behavior for therapists and marriage counselors. And so, according to sort of the rules of their conduct, they cannot practice conversion therapy, which is the practice of counseling people towards certain gender or sexual identities. So that is the form that our ban takes. That's different than how it looks in Colorado. All of which is to say that the answer of how this affects us in Wisconsin is it really depends on who you ask. According to the governor's office, and the governor supports this ban on conversion therapy, the ban here is still in place pending litigation — that was the tempering of that. And then, I spoke to conservative supporters of overturning bans on this, including at the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty. And they said, well, as soon as the lawsuit is filed, they will go after the Wisconsin ban. And so the question is, is WILL going to file that lawsuit? So, right now, it seems to be on the books. And also we have many local versions of these laws around Wisconsin. But sort of how soon will this be then challenged here in the state? That's the big question.

Shawn Johnson:
But definitely it carries more weight than your average executive order, I suppose, because they are the court of last resort.

Anya van Wagtendonk:
And yeah, they said that these types of bans violate a counselor's free speech, that's a First Amendment violation. That's a very big, and it was an 8 to 1 decision, right? Even liberals on the Supreme Court found that...

Shawn Johnson:
Alright...

Zac Schultz:
What's interesting is more likely that would be filed in federal court, which really would take away the venue of the liberal majority in Wisconsin Supreme Court. Even though it's a state administrative rule, this was a federal court decision. Free speech, First Amendment is a federal right, so they don't have to worry about Wisconsin's liberals running the court. They can skip the venue and head right to Madison and federal court.

Shawn Johnson:
Sure. So we got to talk about our court, though, because we have an election on Tuesday. By the time we do the show next week, we're going to know who the next justice is. There were some fundraising numbers out this week. Rich, as we wind up this campaign, what story did they tell?

Rich Kremer:
Well, they told that liberal Appeals Court Judge Chris Taylor is continuing to really pull ahead in terms of fundraising over conservative Appeals Court Judge Maria Lazar. So Taylor, in this last reporting period, raised four times as much as Lazar. She also got donations from around, more than 20,000 people. Lazar donations came from about 1,700 people — so, a big discrepancy there. Also, Taylor really outspent Lazar this time. So the numbers actually represent an improvement for Lazar compared to the last reporting period that ended at the end of last year, which was a 10 to 1 gap with Taylor in the lead, but still not the kind of numbers you want to have days before the election.

Shawn Johnson:
And some money coming to the candidates from the political parties — Zac, you've done some reporting on this. One of these people is going to be a justice very soon, and they will have that political donation basically on their resume. Are they going to have to step down when these parties have business before the court?

Zac Schultz:
The short answer is no. And there are two different courts that have said that is the reason. The first of which is the Wisconsin Supreme Court. When the conservatives ruled the court about a little more than a decade ago, they put in place the recusal standard that still governs the court that says just because you received a campaign donation does not mean that you are biased in part for that party. Part of that reason, the rationale was, well, what if your opponent donates money to you and then tries to kick you off the case? Another one is the United States Supreme Court has similar rulings that have been applied multiple times that say that just because you received a campaign donation does not mean you have to step down. This has been tried repeatedly. Republicans have gone after Janet Protasiewicz multiple times, including on redistricting cases over and over because of the donations she got. And over and over, no one has been stepping down over this in Wisconsin.

Shawn Johnson:
You know, I'm curious. Anya, both parties, we said, gave money to the candidates. Democrats gave more, but in the past, they've given a lot more. What can we read into the fact that they're deciding to not deem this the election of all elections and pouring all resources into it the way that they did in the Protasiewicz race or the Crawford race?

Anya van Wagtendonk:
Yeah. I mean, we are used to hearing that level of language around both the Supreme Court elections and then also various national elections…

Shawn Johnson:
"Every election is the most important of our lives."

Anya van Wagtendonk:
Exactly, but "this one in November is actually probably the most important of our lives," and maybe the Democrats want to keep that messaging for the midterms. So, stepping back, and maybe they're really confident about their contender this time. The stakes are not as high. Liberals will hold a majority no matter who wins. And so why not keep those resources in the bank for November?

Shawn Johnson:
Zac, you described it as kind of they're making a bet, essentially.

Zac Schultz:
They're hedging their bet that they don't have to invest any more to secure this win. I think you pointed out perfectly that even if they lose the hedge on that bet, somehow they still maintain the majority. But the incentives aren't as high. And seeing the incumbent Republicans, or conservatives leave this race repeatedly shows they don't believe the same either.

Shawn Johnson:
Sure. Well, that's all the time we have for today. Thanks for joining us for this week's Inside Wisconsin Politics. Be sure to follow us on pbswisconsin.org, wpr.org, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.