Tuesday's special elections in Wisconsin could offer clues about a possible 'blue wave'

Patrick Marley , Craig Gilbert | Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Show Caption Hide Caption Upcoming elections could signal a 'blue wave' Craig Gilbert talks about how the upcoming special election could be more evidence of a 'blue wave' sweeping across Wisconsin.

STURGEON BAY - Tuesday's state Senate showdown won’t determine who holds the seat for long, but it could provide some clues about how contests across Wisconsin will play out this fall.

The winner of the unusually timed election will have to stand again Nov. 6 for a full four-year term. But both sides see the race in northeastern Wisconsin as crucial because winning next week will give the victor an advantage in the fall.

“I think it will give somebody a leg up,” said Patrick Guarasci, a Democratic strategist. “But ... they will continue to have to work their ass off.”

The race is also closely watched because winning the seat this fall would greatly improve the Democrats’ chances of taking control of the Senate.

Democrats have been winning special elections across the country, including in northwestern Wisconsin in January, thanks in part to a spike in turnout and enthusiasm on the left. A win for their side would be another sign of a possible "blue wave" in November.

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"If there's a big Dem turnout and Republicans stay home, then I think it does play into (that) narrative not just in Wisconsin but across the country," said Mark Graul, a Republican consultant.

The race pits Democrat Caleb Frostman, the former director of economic development for Door County, against GOP Rep. André Jacque of De Pere. The first Senate district includes all of Door and Kewaunee counties and parts of Brown, Manitowoc, Calumet and Outagamie counties.

The race will provide some information about the mood of the electorate, but that data can easily be over-interpreted.

“It’s kind of like a Rorschach test, isn’t it?” Guarasci said. “You see what you want to see in some of these special elections.”

Said Graul: "I wouldn't go overboard in trying to make predictions based on a special election the first week kids are out of school and people are paying attention to other things."

In a low-turnout, stand-alone June election, both sides are focused on turning out their base.

Reaching out to voters

On a recent swing through the district, a reporter followed Frostman as he visited Democratic homes in Sturgeon Bay and Jacque as he visited Republican homes in De Pere.

“Obviously, Caleb and I are knocking on … different doors,” said Jacque.

Frostman talked at the doors about investing in “schools, health care and natural resources,” and told voters that as a hunter and fisherman, “I care a lot about wetlands.”

Jacque mentioned his work on public safety, domestic abuse, human trafficking and drunken driving.

Frostman said he has been surprised at how often national politics and President Donald Trump come up at the doors he visits.

But Jacque said GOP Gov. Scott Walker comes up “much more frequently” than Trump at the homes he visits.

Jacque has long clashed with GOP leaders as he has pursued conservative causes. Some of those GOP leaders, in turn, backed his opponent in the primary. In 2015, Jacque helped advance a bill to eliminate the state’s prevailing wage law even though Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) insisted there weren’t enough votes to pass it.

The district is unquestionably Republican-leaning in its makeup. It voted by a margin of 18 points for Trump over Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential race (56% to 38%). And it voted by 23 points for Walker over Mary Burke in the 2014 race for governor (61% to 38%).

But a surge in Democratic turnout in special elections around the country has made GOP seats like this one vulnerable. In western Wisconsin this past January, Democrats captured a GOP state Senate seat that Trump had carried by 17 points in 2016.

"Aside from geography, they're relatively similar districts," pollster Charles Franklin of the Marquette University Law School said of the two seats. "They're both solidly Republican districts."

The western Wisconsin district saw an election swing of almost 30 points from Trump's 17-point margin in 2016 to the Democrats' 10-point victory in January. A similar swing would easily be enough to flip Senate District 1 on Tuesday.

In special elections across the country since Trump became president, 25 legislative and congressional seats have flipped from red to blue; only five have flipped in the other direction, said Franklin.

“We take nothing for granted as far as a blue wave. If we get a slight tailwind that would be wonderful,” said Frostman.

“A lot of people (at the doors) want to talk national politics,” he said, “but it is a local race with local candidates and local issues.”

While Frostman would benefit from an energized Democratic base, Jacque points to the district’s overall GOP makeup, and the fact that whoever wins the special election will have to win again in November in a contest with far higher turnout.

Next week's vote “can be I guess a measure of base activation, but it is still a very different group that turns out in a June special election than will turn out in a November fall election,” Jacque said.

Walker, who has not campaigned in the race, said of the contest: "I don’t know (that) you can read too much into it regardless of whether a Republican or Democrat wins. It’s a much, much bigger field in November."

The special election is being held to fill the seat of former Sen. Frank Lasee (R-De Pere), who stepped down in December to join Walker’s administration. Walker at first didn’t order a special election, but did so in March after losing a lawsuit brought by voters — leading to the unusually late special election.

RELATED: Gov. Scott Walker calls special elections; Senate chief drops bill to sidestep court order

Assembly race

A special election is also being held Tuesday in Assembly District 42 northeast of Madison to determine who will take the place of former Rep. Keith Ripp (R-Lodi), who also took a job in December with Walker’s administration. That race will also take the temperature of the electorate but is viewed as less important because Republicans hold a commanding 63-35 majority in that house.

The margin is closer in the Senate, where Republicans hold an 18-14 lead. If Democrats win three seats this fall, they will control the chamber. Senate District 1 would help them do that, though Democrats contend they still have a path to the majority even if they lose that election.

"There's one Senate seat up for play and if you get that one and hold that one, the path to 17 (Senate seats) is easier," said Joe Zepecki of the liberal group For Our Future, which is running digital ads in the race.

After Democrat Patty Schachtner shocked Republicans by winning the Senate seat in western Wisconsin in January and liberal Rebecca Dallet won a seat on the state Supreme Court in April, Walker warned his backers a “blue wave” could be coming. He called the election wakeup calls that should rouse the GOP base.

The trend has been developing around the country since Trump took office. On Tuesday, a Democrat won a special election in Missouri to a state Senate seat that had been held by Republicans for more than a decade.

Special elections have much smaller turnouts than fall elections, but they can loosely measure the enthusiasm each side has.

It would be possible for one party to win the seat in June only to lose it five months later, Guarasci, Graul and Zepecki said. Something along those lines happened in 2012, when Wisconsin voters went for the Republican governor that summer only to back Democratic President Barack Obama in his fall re-election bid.

The lawsuit that prompted Tuesday’s special elections was bankrolled and litigated by a group headed by former Obama Attorney General Eric Holder.

An affiliated group, the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, is now spending $175,000 on ads in the pair of special elections. Other liberal groups, as well as conservative groups, are active in the races.

Craig Gilbert reported for this story in Sturgeon Bay and Patrick Marley reported from Madison. Molly Beck of the Journal Sentinel staff contributed to this report from Madison.