Gogebic gave $700,000 to the Wisconsin Club for Growth in 2011 and 2012, according to documents sited in the article. Wisconsin Club for Growth, in turn, passed the money along to other groups. In all, the two groups spent $3 million

Together, the two groups played a critical role in defeating King, who had voted against the initial mining bill.

Estimates compiled by a King campaign consultant show WMC spent a total of $965,000 on TV ads in the race, with the Wisconsin Club for Growth shelling out another $919,000, according to the article.

Roughly 85,000 votes were cast in King’s Senate race against Republican Rick Gudex. She lost by 600 votes.

With King out and Gudex in, a revamped mining bill passed within months of the election.

In a blog post two days after the election, the Wisconsin Club for Growth bragged that it had played a "pivotal role" in the results, airing more than $1.5 million worth of ads in Green Bay "to educate voters on the records" of King and another Democrat who had voted against the bill.

"The mining law we have today would never have happened if Jessica King had won re-election," Sen. Tim Cullen, D-Janesville, who helped craft an alternative mining bill with Schultz that went nowhere, told ProPublica.