Amy Loudenbeck:

This is where we are right in the center of all this.

Zac Schultz:

Republican Amy Loudenbeck’s 31st assembly district can be seen as a microcosm of the state of Wisconsin.

Amy Loudenbeck:

So again, you’re here in one space, but you can kind of get a feel of what all Beloit has to offer.

Zac Schultz:

In the west she represents part of the city of Beloit, an old industrial town split by the Rock River.

Amy Loudenbeck:

This is Geneva Lake.

Zac Schultz:

In the east, she has the wealthy village of Williams Bay, a tourist town with a lot of big boats.

Amy Loudenbeck:

There is a stark contrast. Because in between here and there there’s a lot of corn, a lot of soybeans and a lot of little, small towns.

Zac Schultz:

But when Loudenbeck first ran for office, her district was much different. Her hometown of Clinton is in eastern Rock County. It was part of the old 45th assembly district which was centered around Beloit and had been represented by Democrats for decades.

Amy Loudenbeck:

It was very Beloit-centric, and I thought somebody needed to do a better job of representing everyone.

Zac Schultz:

In 2010 the incumbent retired, and with the Tea Party wave at her back, Loudenbeck won the seat with 54% of the vote.

Amy Loudenbeck:

I didn’t come in as an activist, as a part of an activist.

Zac Schultz:

In her first few months on the job, Loudenbeck voted for the Act 10 changes, voter ID and a budget that cut aid to public schools.

Amy Loudenbeck:

Those were not things that I ran on, but they were things that the people that I know here I think trusted that I would make an informed decision and not a partisan decision. I was very aware that there were people that were going to be unhappy.

Zac Schultz:

It didn’t take long for Democrats to say Loudenbeck would regret those votes when she faced the voters of Beloit in 2012.

Amy Loudenbeck:

It was about the next generation and not the next election, because I didn’t have an expectation of winning a second time. I wanted to win the first time.

Zac Schultz:

A couple months later, Loudenbeck learned she wouldn’t be running again in most of Beloit.

Amy Loudenbeck:

Whenever they put the maps out to the public, I probably found out a day before that.

Zac Schultz:

In 2011, for the first time in state history, one party controlled the redistricting process. Republicans had a private law firm draw the new legislative maps. One by one, members were brought into the assembly speaker’s office and told to sign a confidentiality agreement before they could see their new maps.

Amy Loudenbeck:

It’s an attorney-client privilege document in the law firm. So at the time it didn’t seem unusual to me. That actually seemed kind of like standard practice.

Zac Schultz:

Loudenbeck’s home was now in the newly drawn 31^st assembly district, which stretched east into more conservative Walworth County.

Amy Loudenbeck:

I had about 50% new people, I had a new number, new senator.

Zac Schultz:

She lost most of the city of Beloit with her new district line running along Prairie Avenue on the east side.

Tim Cullen:

When Republicans gerrymandered the state, they really took care of Representative Loudenbeck.

Zac Schultz:

Before redistricting, Democrat Tim Cullen’s 15^th senate district used to include Representative Loudenbeck and most of Rock County. Now it does not. Senator Cullen says redistricting was a life saver for Loudenbeck.

Tim Cullen:

They got her out of Beloit, Democratic Beloit, and moved her over into part of Rock County, a Republican part of Rock County and into southern Walworth County.

Zac Schultz:

Representative Loudenbeck laughs at the idea the Republican party went out of their way to save a freshman lawmaker.

Amy Loudenbeck:

I think it’s very flattering to think that people thought I was that important.

Zac Schultz:

But the facts are clear. Amy Loudenbeck’s re-election prospects went way up with the change. Documents revealed in a redistricting lawsuit show Republicans knew the voter makeup of their new districts, and Loudenbeck went from a district where Republicans averaged 45% of the vote to a district where they averaged 57% of the vote. In 2012, Loudenbeck won re-election with 56% of the vote, almost exactly what was predicted.

Tim Cullen:

I went from a competitive seat to a wired Republican seat.

Zac Schultz:

In the 45th assembly, which contained the rest of Beloit, the Democrat won with 64% of the vote. So what would have happened if Loudenbeck had to run in Beloit in 2012? Overall, Loudenbeck won the 31st by 3,800 votes. The remaining part of Beloit that she no longer had voted for the Democrat by 4,200 votes.

Tim Cullen:

I think she might have got beat, but it would have been extremely close.

Amy Loudenbeck:

I don’t know if turnout– if I would have been able to drive turnout in the more conservative areas to offset that.

Zac Schultz:

Loudenbeck lost the city of Beloit in 2010 as well, with her winning margin coming from the outlying areas. And she makes the case that in 2012, even with President Obama on the ballot, she would have made up the margin.

Amy Loudenbeck:

And I would argue that even with that, even with that higher turnout, that people would have split their tickets in 2012.

Zac Schultz:

Now in 2014, Representative Loudenbeck will go unchallenged in her election. So will the Democrat in the 45th.

Tim Cullen:

We went from one competitive to seat to gerrymandering a map that creates two seats, one safe for one party, one safe for the other.

Zac Schultz:

Senator Cullen has proposed a nonpartisan redistricting process.

Tim Cullen:

The cold, hard truth here is that neither political party should be trusted to draw the maps. They can’t help themselves. If they have total control, they will draw the maps to favor themselves.

Amy Loudenbeck:

I’m acknowledging that some of the districts became less competitive.

Zac Schultz:

Representative Loudenbeck admits up-front redistricting is not her specialty. But like most Republicans, she’s not eager to change the system.

Amy Loudenbeck:

I’m not going to necessarily say the system that we’ve had this long is flawed. It juts out a little here, so C20. And on this map, I have C20.

Zac Schultz:

Instead, she points to the nonpartisan maps that Cullen’s bill would have drawn up, pointing out how they would have split Beloit in nearly the same fashion as the maps the Republicans drew.

Amy Loudenbeck:

It’s disappointing that there’s so much focus on how flawed a system was and what happened here when under the system that is proposed the maps would have looked almost identical.

Zac Schultz:

For her part, Loudenbeck says she’s no less engaged in what’s happening in all of Beloit.

Amy Loudenbeck:

I’m down here very often. And so you know, if I’m meeting someone in the district, I’d be more likely to meet them downtown. It's not like I say, oh, we have to meet on the east side because that's where my line is.

Zac Schultz:

In fact, Loudenbeck argues Beloit is better off.

Amy Loudenbeck:

There’s strength in numbers.

Zac Schultz:

The city is now represented by Democrats and Republicans in each chamber.

Amy Loudenbeck:

And I think having two senators and having two assembly representatives could be argued is a good thing.

Frederica Freyberg:

When Representative Loudenbeck told us Beloit was split similarly in both maps, the GOP redraw and the proposed nonpartisan one, we wanted to get Senator Cullen’s response. Here’s what he said. The issue is not how Beloit is split. Amy has one of the most gerrymandered district in the state, which has been made so heavily Republican that she doesn't even have a Democratic opponent this year. Unlike Wisconsin politicians, how many Wisconsin citizens have a guaranteed job for the next ten years?