With Wisconsin in the news so much lately, I wanted to see how voting patterns have shifted. Here we are. Special thanks to californianintexas’s blog for PVI info!
This was Wisconsin in 1968. The labor-heavy northwest (Sean Duffy’s district) was heavily blue, particularly compared to today. Milwaukee and Madison, “Fake Wisconsin” were blue as well, although the inner suburbs seem to be even more conservative back then. Kenosha was quite blue as well (was labor strong there too?) Sheboygan and Manitowoc along Lake Michigan were once union strongholds as well. The farming country of Southern Wisconsin, the Milwaukee Suburbs, and the Northeast (Green Bay, Fond du Lac, Appleton) were conservative, as were some sparsely populated northern counties
This was Wisconsin in 1984. The Northwest shifted even more strongly to the Democrats, even as labor began to decline. Some of this shift can probably be attributed to Walter Mondale being from neighboring Minnesota and much of this area being in a Minnesota media market. Some of the rural North became more Democratic too, while in farming country, we can see the beginning of a leftward shift that still exists today (Ron Kind’s district, basically). Racine and Milwaukee both got bluer as well.
This was Wisconsin in 2000, another sixteen-year shift. Milwaukee’s suburbs shifted back to the right. The central northwest counties lost union workers and went GOP. However, the Minnesota border and Wisconsin Iron Range counties stayed with Democrats. A huge shift occurred along the river, in the Southwest. This still exists today. The counties near Madison all became more Democratic. In a reverse of Ohio’s Democratic strength, Wisconsin’s is West and South, not East and South.
Please give feedback.
I had always thought they were just historically Republican and had remained that way, but according to your map it seems they have gotten more Republican over the past few decades. They really stand out from the suburbs of almost every other city, not only in the way they vote but the way they have trended over time.
It’s funny how things have changed. The Milwaukee suburban counties are DEFINITELY more conservative now (this is Paul Ryan’s base), for whatever reason. I’d also like to point out that the center of the state, especially Shawano, Waupaca, and Waushara counties, went from very to only moderately red. Meanwhile, we saw the northwestern counties go from leaning blue to leaning red (excluding Ashland and neighbors on the very top) and the southwestern counties going from leaning red to currently leaning blue.
And my favorite WI county, Menominee, population all of 500, mostly an Indian range, has stayed stubbornly democratic the entire time. =]