Stop out-of-state spending on Wisconsin elections
When buying a car or buying an election the adage “You get what you pay for” rings true, or at least that is what the mega-donors in the recent state supreme court race are hoping is the case.
When the dust settled on the mountains of mailers moldering in recycling bins and the television commercials left on mute, political donors spent an estimated $109 million in an attempt to sway voters in the Wisconsin State Supreme Court race. This is more than double the previous spending record set in the last state supreme court race in 2023.
Much of that spending frenzy was driven by partisanbacked spending from out-of-state mega-donors. On the liberal side were billionaires George Soros and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker. On the conservative side, there was billionaire Elon Musk. According to the non-partisan Brennan Center for Justice, Musk spent at least $3 million on the race himself and groups he funds spent nearly $19 million more while Soros and Pritzker spent a combined $3.5 million in the race.
There is an old saying that the definition of an honest politician is one who stays bought. By this cynical measure, with hot-button cases in the pipeline ranging from tearing down how car dealerships operate in the state to reproductive rights and defining the power of regulatory agencies, having a justice in your back pocket will have a pretty good return on investment for these outof-state influencers. It shouldn’t be this way.
Wisconsin needs to find a better way. We, as citizens, need to demand that our elected officials work for the good of the people and not for the good of the out-of-state interests who padded their election coffers.
One solution would be to cap total spending on nonpartisan races with established benchmarks on if they are local, regional or statewide.
Another way the state can do this is through caps on the amount of money out-of-state billionaires can dump into Wisconsin elections. The state already requires outof- state mega-donors to give to party organizations rather than to specific candidates. It is not much more of a leap to put a stopper in the flow of out-of-state cash entirely.
Wisconsin needs to rein in campaign spending or face the consequences of having candidates and elected officials answering to the whims of the people who write them checks rather than voters who they serve.
It is time to break the transactional nature of political donations and return elections to being a contest of ideals and ideas rather than a cash grab.
A century ago, Wisconsin led the nation with progressive idealism that tore down corruption and restored the rights and voices of its citizens. Wisconsin must reclaim that heritage and drive out the out-of-state mega-donors.
