A small-town medical examiner has given Democrats across the US another shot of hope heading into the fall election by upsetting a US Republican legislator in a conservative Wisconsin Senate district.
Patty Schachtner’s victory on Tuesday over Wisconsin Representative Adam Jarchow marks the 34th legislative seat that has flipped from Republican to Democratic nationwide since US President Donald Trump took office last year, according to the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, signaling a backlash against Trump could fuel a Democratic wave in November.
Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, a Republican who is running for a third term in November, sounded a warning bell, firing a flurry of tweets late on Tuesday urging Republicans to “wake up.”
He on Wednesday morning told reporters in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, that dissatisfaction with national politics influenced Schachtner’s win.
He stopped just short of blaming Trump or Republican congressional members.
“Washington and Wisconsin are two very different places,” Walker said. “I think people look at Washington and think there’s not as much getting done as maybe some people had hoped.”
Democrats have already made gains elsewhere, including picking up 15 seats in the Virginia House of Delegates in November last year, and in Alabama, where Doug Jones captured a US Senate seat last month.
In the past two weeks, high-profile Republicans passed up Senate races in North Dakota and Minnesota that were thought to be winnable seats.
Schachtner’s victory is especially notable in Wisconsin, where Democratic numbers are at their lowest since 1971 in the state Senate and since 1957 in the Wisconsin State Assembly.
Even with the victory, the Republican party still holds an 18-14 edge in the state Senate.
The district in northwestern Wisconsin — a mix of rural areas, small towns and two larger college towns just across the St Croix River from Minnesota’s Twin Cities — has trended deeply Republican for years.
Mitt Romney won it by six points in 2012 and Trump won it by 17 points in 2016.
Schachtner was the clear underdog, with a biography that included serving as the St Croix County medical examiner and starring in a 2006 episode of Wife Swap, in which she trades families with a modeling agency manager.
Jarchow is a political veteran in the middle of his third Assembly term and conservative outside groups rallied behind him.
Americans for Prosperity and the Republican State Leadership Committee both ran ads supporting Jarchow. Wisconsin Senator Leah Vukmir, who is running for the US Senate, traveled to the district to campaign for him.
Schachtner won by 11 points.
“Thanks to you, we have sparked hope throughout Wisconsin and the nation,” Schachtner said in a statement to her supporters.
Wisconsin Democratic Party chair Martha Laning was more effusive, saying on Facebook following Schachtner’s win that a “change is coming.”
In a statement, the party said the result shows a national Democratic wave is swelling, fueled by voter anger toward Trump and his allies.
Paul Maslin, a Wisconsin-based Democratic national pollster, said Schachtner’s victory coupled with Jones’ win over Republican Roy Moore for an Alabama US Senate seat last month shows Democrats are building inroads with key suburban voters across the country.
Part of the Wisconsin district includes suburbs of Minneapolis-Saint Paul.
“If this is a suburban revolution, and everything we saw last year keeps happening with Democrats over-performing, Katie bar the door in November,” Maslin said.
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