MADISON, Wis. (AP) — The Wisconsin Supreme Court will swing from conservative majority control to liberal control in August, and Democrats are hopeful that the change will result in the state’s abortion ban being lifted and the maps redrawn to weaken GOP control over the legislative and congressional districts.
Democrats in the eternal state of the battlefield targeting abortion to elect a Liberal majority to the court for the first time in 15 years. The Democratic Party spent $8 million to overturn the court’s 4-3 conservative majority by one seat with the election of Janet Protasiewicz, who has campaigned for abortion rights and against the map drawn by the Republicans. Her victory in April broke national spending records for a state Supreme Court race.
Yet there are no guarantees. Republicans were angry when a Conservative candidate they supported in 2019 turned out to sometimes side with Liberal judges.
While the court is widely expected to rule on abortion and redistricting, liberals are also talking about new challenges to school choice, voter identification, the 12-year-old law that effectively ended collective bargaining for most public employees, and other laws backed by Republicans.
“If you don’t know the scale of the battle you have to fight, it’s concerning,” said attorney Rick Esenberg, president of the conservative Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty. “It’s very concerning.”
Some issues can take years to get to court, said liberal attorney Lester Pines, who, like Esenberg, has argued countless times before the state Supreme Court. Unlike under the Conservative majority, Pines said the new Liberal court is unlikely to rule on cases before lower courts have heard them.
“They’re not going to do it,” Pines said.
There is already a lawsuit against Wisconsin’s pre-Civil War ban on abortion, and there is a circuit court judge ruled earlier this month that it can continue, while also raising the question of whether the law actually prohibits abortions.
The case is expected to reach the Supreme Court within months. Protasiewicz nearly promised to reverse the ban by repeatedly speaking out in favor of it abortion rightswinning support from Planned Parenthood and others.
“If you’re a politician and you’re seen by voters as someone who makes a promise, and you don’t keep it, they get angry,” Esenberg said.
There is currently no trial over redistricting, but Democrats or their allies are expected to take another challenge this summer in search of new districts ahead of the 2024 election.
The Supreme Court of the State maintained maps drawn by the Republicans in 2022. Those cards, widely regarded as one of the most gerrymandered in the landhave helped Republicans increase their hold on the legislature to near-supermajority even as Democrats won statewide elections, including Tony Evers as governor in 2018 and 2022 and Joe Biden in 2020.
Protasizewicz stated that those cards were “rigged” and said during the campaign that they should be reviewed. Democrats are also hoping for new congressional maps that improve their chances in the state’s two most competitive House districts, which are held by Republicans.
“What we want to see are maps that are fair and reflect the will of the people and the actual makeup of their state,” said Democratic strategist Melissa Baldauff.
Four of the past six Wisconsin presidential elections have been decided by less than one percentage point. The outgoing conservative court came within one vote of overturning Biden’s 2020 victory. The new court will preside over any challenges leading up to the election and in the months after.
That includes voting rules. Courts have repeatedly upheld Wisconsin’s voter ID requirement since 2011, but some Democrats see an opportunity to challenge it again, particularly over what IDs can be legally displayed. There also is a impending fight about the state’s top election administrator.
“It seems to me that the most sweeping issues that could come before the new court have to do with elections,” said Alan Ball, a history professor at Marquette University Law School who runs a blog on statistical analysis of the court and judges’ tendencies.
Given the comments Protasiewicz made during the campaign, “it’s hard for me to imagine her not siding with the Liberals on those issues,” Ball said.
A national democratic law firm filed a lawsuit on Thursday seek to overturn a Wisconsin Supreme Court ruling last year banning absentee ballot drop boxes. The case could make its way to the state Supreme Court before the 2024 presidential election.
Other thorny issues that have been criticized by two sides, including the governor’s powers, could also come before the new court.
Evers surprised many with a veto this year for an increase in school spending for 400 years. Republicans said a challenge was likely.
In 2021, the court struck down three of Evers’ previous partial vetoes, but did not provide clear guidance on what is allowed.
A Wisconsin governor’s veto power has been expanded and used by Republicans and Democrats, but the new court could consider whether it should be scaled back. Esenberg, who challenged Evers’ veto rights in the previous case, said he expected another legal challenge in light of the 400-year veto.
This story corrects the name in paragraph 6 to Lester Pines.
