First major swing state election of 2025 turns into referendum on Trump, Musk
MADISON, WI - Voters head to the polls in Wisconsin on Tuesday to decide if conservatives or liberals will control the majority on the key Midwestern battleground state's supreme court, which is likely to rule on crucial issues including congressional redistricting, voting and labor rights, and abortion.
However, with a massive infusion of money from Democrat and Republican-aligned groups from outside Wisconsin - which turned the race into the most expensive judicial election in the nation's history - the contest has turned into a referendum on President Donald Trump's sweeping and controversial moves during the opening months of his second tour of duty in the White House.
Also, front and center in the electoral showdown is someone else, who, along with Trump, is not on the ballot - the president's top donor and White House adviser - billionaire Elon Musk.
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Musk, the world's richest person and chief executive of Tesla and SpaceX, has taken a buzzsaw to the federal government workforce as he steers Trump's recently created Department of Government Efficiency.
Through aligned political groups, he has dished out roughly $20 million in the Wisconsin race in support of Trump-backed Brad Schimel, the conservative-leaning candidate in the election and a former state attorney general who currently serves as a state circuit court judge in Waukesha County.
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Musk, in a controversial move, handed out $1 million checks at a rally in Green Bay on Sunday evening to two Wisconsin voters who had already cast ballots in the contest and had signed a petition to stop "activist judges."
Wisconsin's Democratic state attorney general sued to block the payments, but the state Supreme Court refused to weigh in.
"It causes the legacy media to, like, kinda lose their minds. And then they'll run it on every news channel," Musk reasoned as he told the crowd the motive behind his million-dollar giveaways. "It would cost, like, 10 times more ... to get the kind of coverage that it gets."
Calling the election a "super big deal," Musk emphasized it was critical to the Trump agenda. "I think this will be important for the future of civilization," he said. "It’s that significant."
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Musk is not the only mega donor on the right playing in the Wisconsin showdown.
Shipping magnates Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein, who are among the biggest conservative contributors in the nation, have also dished millions in support of Schimel and the Wisconsin GOP.
"If you told me six months ago this was what was going to happen, I would not have believed it. But yeah….some parts of this are way beyond my control anymore," Schimel said in a Fox News Digital interview during a bus tour stop Monday just outside of Green Bay.
However, Schimel, who launched his bid 16 months ago, added that "other people can treat this how they want, if they think they want to make it a referendum on the president or Elon Musk, so be it."
"This is a referendum on Wisconsin," he emphasized. "Can we restore objectivity to the Wisconsin Supreme Court?"
Schimel has also leaned in to the endorsement from Trump. A TV ad running in the closing stretch of the race spotlighted that voting for Schimel would protect Trump's agenda. Additionally, the candidate wore a "Make America Great Again" hat at some campaign stops during the final weekend ahead of the election.
Schimel spotlighted his final blitz to reach out to voters.
"We are doing 6-8 rallies every single day in cities across the state," he said. "People are turning out in huge numbers, and we’ve got other surrogates going out around the state where we’re not, doing the exact same thing. It’s absolutely about getting those voters out."
And Schimel also got a boost from the conservative powerhouse organization Americans for Prosperity. The group says its grassroots army connected with nearly 600,000 voters in Wisconsin since last November's election.
Trump, who narrowly carried Wisconsin in both of his White House victories, spelled out why the contest was so important, because the state supreme court can settle disputes over election outcomes.
"Wisconsin’s a big state politically, and the Supreme Court has a lot to do with elections in Wisconsin," the president said Monday at the White House. "Winning Wisconsin’s a big deal, so therefore the Supreme Court choice … it’s a big race."
Schimel's camp and other conservatives repeatedly argued that a continuation of the liberal majority on Wisconsin's high court could lead to unfavorable congressional redistricting in the state, which could spell doom for two Republican lawmakers: Reps. Derrick Van Orden and Bryan Steil, chair of the House Administration Committee.
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Tuesday's election, the first statewide contest held since Trump returned to the White House, is an opportunity for voters to vent against the president and his policies.
The liberal-leaning candidate in the race, Dane County Circuit Court Judge Susan Crawford, has enjoyed a surge in fundraising, thanks in part to an energized base eager to resist Trump and Republicans.
"People are really motivated and want to make sure that we protect the Wisconsin Supreme Court," Crawford said in a Fox News Digital interview on the eve of the election following a rally in Madison.
Crawford argued that voters "don’t want to see some outsider, some billionaire, come in and try to buy a seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, which is what Elon Musk is trying to do."
At her rally, Crawford emphasized that "this election is going to determine all of our fundamental rights and freedoms."
Crawford has also benefited from roughly $2 million infused into the race by left-leaning financier George Soros, long a boogeyman of the right. Billionaire progressive Gov. JB Pritzker of neighboring Illinois has also dished out big bucks in the race in support of Crawford.
"I have gotten some generous contributions, and we’ve raised a lot of money in this race," she acknowledged. "But just to put that in perspective, in the last two months, Elon Musk has spent more than we have raised over the 10 months of this entire campaign, so his spending dwarfs that of any individual in any state supreme court ever and certainly one in Wisconsin."
Crawford and Schimel are battling to succeed liberal-leaning justice Ann Walsh Bradley, who has served on Wisconsin's highest court for nearly three decades. Tuesday's election will determine if the court remains under 4-3 liberal control or if it flips to a conservative majority.
Asked about the conservatives shining a spotlight on potential congressional redistricting, Crawford told reporters on the eve of the election that "it's just not appropriate for me as a judge to express a view on that, especially on an issue that someday could come before the Wisconsin Supreme Court again. That's why I don't speak to the issue."
The showdown has drawn some top surrogates to Wisconsin, including progressive champion Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and MAGA rock star Donald Trump Jr., the president's eldest son.
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Early voting, which ended on Sunday, was up more than 50% - according to the initial tally from the Wisconsin Elections Commission - compared to the last state supreme court election, which was held in 2023.
Since voters in Wisconsin do not register by party, there is no way to know how many ballots cast during early voting came from either Democrats or Republicans.