Wisconsin Voters See State Supreme Court Race as Referendum on Trump
The New York Times
Elon Musk’s prominent role in the most expensive judicial race in American history has helped turn Tuesday’s election into a battle over national politics.
At face value, an election on Tuesday will decide whether conservatives or liberals control the Wisconsin Supreme Court, a result that could shape the fate of essential policies in the state from abortion to congressional district maps.
But as a torrent of money from outside Wisconsin has made the contest the most expensive judicial race in American history, voters across the state said they had come to see this election to fill a single State Supreme Court seat more as a referendum on the early months of President Trump’s second term.
Fueling that perception is roughly $20 million that Elon Musk and groups allied with him have spent to boost the conservative candidate, Brad Schimel, a judge who also got President Trump’s endorsement not long ago. The liberal candidate, Susan Crawford, another judge, has decried Mr. Musk’s spending as an attempt to place a lackey on the state’s top court.
Whichever candidate wins will tip the seven-member high court’s political balance, which liberals currently control with a 4-to-3 majority.
But the outcome will also show how voters in one of the most evenly divided battleground states in the nation are feeling about Mr. Trump’s sharp cuts to the federal work force, his crackdown on illegal immigration and the administration’s crusade against diversity initiatives in government programs and higher education. Mr. Trump won Wisconsin by less than a percentage point last November and narrowly lost it in the 2020 election.
“The pendulum swings back and forth in U.S. elections, and I think this election will be a good indicator of whether the pendulum is going to swing back the other way based on Trump’s actions in office,” said Michael Orwig, 40, a federal worker and Schimel supporter who lives in a suburb south of Milwaukee. “This is going to be the first litmus test.”
The old Portal Bridge disrupted rail commutes in New Jersey for decades, frequently getting stuck when it swung to let boat traffic pass. Now a new bridge is open to the public.
As the president’s immigration policies squeeze an already tight supply of farm labor, the Trump administration is making it cheaper to hire foreign farmworkers.
The crew members had been part of the U.S. and Israel’s war on Iran, bringing the death toll of American service members in the conflict to at least 13.
Unleashing his inner hawk, Secretary of State Marco Rubio plans President Trump’s military interventions. So far, they favor regime compliance, not change.
Faycal Manz, a German tourist, claimed that a taco had given him diarrhea, a Walmart store had discriminated against him and that an interaction with the police had given him insomnia.
For more than a century, Jewish, Arab and Muslim people have lived in and around Detroit, coexisting mostly peacefully.
Two generations of one family have owned this restaurant in the Bronx, trying to change with the times while staying true to the borough.
Several incidents, including an attack on a synagogue in Michigan, a shooting in Virginia and a thwarted explosives attack in New York, may be linked to the fighting in the Middle East.
Love Locks left behind were one thing. But when actual garbage (like tampons and condoms) started appearing, a righteous quest to remove it was born.
President Trump is the first American leader to embrace fighting a full-fledged, joint war with Israel. Washington has tried to avoid that level of coordination in the past.
The school also said that it would review policies about philanthropy and donor engagement after new revelations about the disgraced financier were made public.
A formal tally on Friday showed Sam Page ahead of Phil Berger, the powerful longtime leader of the State Senate. A recount is expected but experts say that is unlikely to flip the results.
Legislation has been introduced to authorize two new casinos at the Meadowlands and Monmouth Park racetracks to compete against the three new casinos planned for New York City.