The sit­u­a­tion in the Wis­con­sin recall elec­tions started out messy and has become even more complicated.

Wisconsin’s State Sen­ate cur­rently has 19 Repub­li­cans and 14 Democ­rats. Demo­c­ra­tic activists are there­fore con­cen­trated on recall­ing three Repub­li­can sen­a­tors and replac­ing them with Democ­rats, which would shift the bal­ance to 16 R/​17 D.

Wis­con­sin law demands that an elected offi­cial serve one year in office before s/​he is sub­ject to recall.

Six Repub­li­can state sen­a­tors who are being recalled meet that stan­dard, and have been tar­geted with suc­cess­ful recall peti­tions. Democ­rats are angry over a pro­vi­sion first advanced by Repub­li­can Gov. Scott Walker and approved by both houses of the state leg­is­la­ture which would take away col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing rights for almost all pub­lic employ­ees. The State Supreme Court has cleared the law and it will now go into effect.

Edit: Reader rgbact has cor­rectly pointed out that the bill restricts col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing rights only on ben­e­fits, leav­ing col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing for wages in place. I regret the error.

Jus­tices David Prosser and Ann Walsh Bradley (source: Hud­son Star-​​Observer)

Even stranger (if that were pos­si­ble), dur­ing the Supreme Court delib­er­a­tions, Jus­tice Ann Walsh Bradley has accused Jus­tice David Prosser of try­ing to choke her. Jus­tice Bradley voted to block the law; Jus­tice Prosser voted to allow the leg­isla­tive action to move for­ward. Jus­tice Prosser nar­rowly sur­vived an elec­tion of his own ear­lier this year.

Three Demo­c­ra­tic state sen­a­tors are also being recalled. Repub­li­cans accuse them of dere­lic­tion of duty for leav­ing the state in a failed attempt to keep the State Sen­ate from reach­ing a quo­rum. The Demo­c­ra­tic recall pri­mary for two of the can­di­dates is July 19; on that day also, a “real” recall elec­tion will be held because one of the Repub­li­can can­di­dates did not qual­ify for the ballot.

The recall elec­tion for the six Repub­li­can sen­a­tors is not until August 9. Today, there is an impor­tant pre­lim­i­nary step, a “recall pri­mary”. Since this is a bit of an odd con­cept, and came about in an unusual way, some expla­na­tion is in order.

Six Democ­rats had orig­i­nally filed to oust the six Repub­li­can sen­a­tors, with a recall elec­tion slated for today. How­ever, by forc­ing Democ­rats to hold a pri­mary to select the recall chal­lenger, Repub­li­cans effec­tively delayed the actual recall elec­tion by one month, to August 9. In each elec­tion, there are “real” Democ­rats and “fake” Democ­rats. The Democ­rats had orig­i­nally threat­ened to run three “place­holder” can­di­dates but decided not to at the last minute.

Here are the races sched­uled for today. In each case, the “real” Demo­c­rat is in blue and the “fake” Demo­c­rat (actu­ally a Repub­li­can oper­a­tive) is in red. For exam­ple, Otto Junker­mann is a for­mer Repub­li­can state leg­is­la­tor. I have indi­cated polling num­bers where I have them from Pub­lic Pol­icy Polling data that is about a month old, and only com­pares the sit­ting Sen­a­tor to the “real” Demo­c­ra­tic challenger.

Dis­trict 2 (Sen­a­tor Robert Cowles)

  • Nancy Nus­baum, for­mer Brown County executive
  • Mert Sum­mers, DePere
  • Otto Junker­mann, Green Bay, for­mer Repub­li­can state assemblyman

Dis­trict 8 (Sen­a­tor Alberta Dar­ling)

  • Sandy Pasch, White­fish Bay
  • Gladys Huber, Mequon

Dis­trict 10 (Sen­a­tor Sheila Hars­dorf) (PPP 50%)

  • Shelly Moore, teach­ers’ union leader (PPP 45%)
  • Isaac Weix, Menomonie

Dis­trict 14 (Sen­a­tor Luther Olsen)

  • State Rep. Fred Clark (D-​​Baraboo)
  • Rol Church, Wau­toma

Dis­trict 18 (Sen­a­tor Randy Hop­per) (PPP 47%)

  • Jes­sica King, Oshkosh (PPP 50%)
  • John D. Buck­staff, Oshkosh

Dis­trict 32 (Sen­a­tor Dan Kapanke) (PPP 42%)

  • Jen­nifer Shilling, La Crosse (PPP 56%)
  • James D. Smith, La Crosse

We will have elec­tion results on Log­a­rchism tomor­row morn­ing, or as soon as they’re available.

July 12: Pri­maries in all of the Repub­li­can recalls
July 19: Pri­maries in all of the Demo­c­ra­tic recalls
Aug. 9: Gen­eral elec­tion in all of the Repub­li­can recalls
Aug. 16: Gen­eral elec­tion in all of the Demo­c­ra­tic recalls

There are very few sources for com­plete, author­i­ta­tive infor­ma­tion. Elec­tion Info is the best blog I have found, because oth­er­wise the infor­ma­tion is scat­tered between a half-​​dozen local newspapers.

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