Joanne Kloppenburg.

The name brings back memories.

Back in 2011, she narrowly lost a challenge to unseat conservative Supreme Court Justice David Prosser.

Kloppenburg even declared victory on election night.

Progressives claimed fraud when Waukesha County realized it had failed to count some votes. In fact, as we noted at the time, there was no fraud:

The supposedly “found” votes in Waukesha were not “found.” The votes were reported by the city of Brookfield on election night, but the Waukesha clerk initially failed to report those votes to the press on election night. The meme that Republicans stole the election was pure fantasy.

Kloppenburg lost the recount, and threatened litigation that never materialized.

After conservative Justice Patrick Crooks died last September 2015, Gov. Scott Walker appointed Rebecca Bradley to fill the spot temporarily until the next scheduled election. That election was yesterday.

The Supreme Court matters not just at the federal level, but also at the state level. It was the Wisconsin Supreme Court that upheld the collective bargaining reforms and also threw out the abusive “John Doe” investigation targeting conservative activists.

Wisconsin progressives threw everything into it. Oppo researchers dug out writings by Bradley while in college some 25 years ago:

But it didn’t salvage the hapless Kloppenburg:

With 100 percent of precincts reporting, Bradley had captured 1,017,083 votes —52 percent of those cast — to 925,836 for Kloppenburg. “I need to thank the people of Wisconsin,” Bradley told supporters. “I have had, for the most part, a wonderful time traveling around the state.” Bradley was appointed to the court by Republican Gov. Scott Walker in October to replace the late N. Patrick Crooks. Kloppenburg is a state appeals court judge. The winner will serve a 10-year term. “We did all that we set out to do,” Kloppenburg told supporters as she conceded the race, “except for the ‘coming out ahead’ part.”

One analyst described how conservatives have progressives on the run in Wisconsin, JoAnne Kloppenburg’s loss a punch to progressives:

You want a model of how conservatives can out-hustle and out-vote progressives?

Look at what Scott Walker and conservative activists have built in Wisconsin.

[Featured image via JSOnline Twitter]



