MADISON — Dane County Judge Susan Crawford’s victory in a historic state Supreme Court race on Tuesday sends a message of support to the court’s liberal majority and warning signs to President Donald Trump’s administration, Wisconsin’s Democratic attorney general said.
Crawford, who was backed by Democrats, swept the race, defeating conservative Brad Schimel by 10 percentage points, according to unofficial results. Her victory comes just four months after President Donald Trump won Wisconsin by less than one percent of the vote in the 2024 general election.
“I think this is a pretty resounding mandate in support of the approach that the majority on the court has taken,” Kaul said at a news conference on Wednesday.
Watch: Supreme Court race shows where Wisconsin falls on Trump, Musk and liberal justices, Kaul says
Schimel, a Waukesha County judge and former Republican attorney general, didn’t protest the outcome – and encouraged his supporters to do the same.
“You’ve got to accept the results,” Schimel said on Tuesday evening. “The numbers aren’t going to turn around.”
Liberals took control of the court in 2023 for the first time in 15 years. They have since ruled in favor of Democrats on several major cases, including overturning state legislative maps that favored Republicans and settling disputes between Democratic Gov. Tony Evers and Republicans who control the Wisconsin Legislature.
Kaul’s Department of Justice has argued in support of many such rulings. He said Tuesday’s results showed a majority of Wisconsin voters also support those decisions.
The competition between Schimel and Crawford was the most expensive state judicial race in U.S. history, with roughly $100 million in total spending. Tech billionaire and Trump advisor Elon Musk poured upwards of $20 million into the race and visited Wisconsin in person just days before the election to hand out $1 million checks to voters.
Musk’s involvement brought even more national attention to the race, and his sweepstakes-style gifts prompted accusations of bribery from Democrats. Kaul tried to block Musk’s gifts to voters with a lawsuit, but his efforts were rejected by the courts.
Kaul has seen more success in challenging Musk’s efforts at the federal level to cut government programs and spending through the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE.
“Obviously Elon Musk was an enormous part of this campaign, and I think this is a really strong rebuke of DOGE and of what we’re seeing from the Trump administration in terms of the sabotage of federal government agencies,” Kaul said on Wednesday.
The Wisconsin Department of Justice is representing the state in several major multi-state lawsuits against the Trump administration, including challenges against cuts to medical research funding, cuts to public health grants, and the firing of federal workers.
