Spring Election 2022 Recap

Here at MacIver, we’ve focused on the groundswell of parental involvement in school board elections across the state. We’ve talked about what was at stake for parents, and what changed the usually sleepy April contests into races where ordinary people – often motivated by anger at being ignored and sidelined – threw their hats in the ring to take back their government. Here’s a recap of the outcomes of many of those races.

School Boards

Parents across the state won spots on school boards, giving them a greater voice in the education of their children after years of clashes on remote learning, CRT principles, and curriculum transparency disputes.

We’ve reported on a number of school districts many of which had competitive races going into Tuesday’s elections, and many of those districts saw parents win a voice for their kids, a voice which in some districts, had been silenced by out-of-control bureaucrats.

Conservative candidates won overwhelmingly in Southeast Wisconsin, earning seats in Cedarburg, West Bend, Elmbrook, Lake Country, Kettle Moraine, Menomonee Falls, Kenosha, New Berlin, Oconomowoc, Pewaukee, Waukesha and Germantown.

Notably, Germantown School Board anti-transparency candidate Pam Schulz, who went to the extraordinary length of filing a complaint with the employer of a parent who spoke at a school board meeting, was rejected by a nearly 2-to-1 margin.

The conservative school board wins were not limited to the southeast: Antigo, Wausau, Stevens Point, Sparta, Beloit all saw engaged parents win spots to guarantee input into their schools.

Closely watched races for Eau Claire’s school board saw the three conservatives lose. Eau Claire has been the focus of national attention, and we’ve reported extensively on the district’s use of CRT principles and the training of teachers that parents have to “earn” the right to know about what is happening with their child.

The races got ugly. Incumbent school board members accused the conservative candidates of white privilege and endorsed the ‘none of your business’ approach to parental involvement. Eau Claire voters placed their stamp of approval on those tactics and Democrats point to their dominance in Eau Claire in showcasing their successes.

La Crosse County school board races also saw conservative candidates lose. Of note, the two Holmen candidates targeted by the left with phony mailers casting the conservative candidates as racists lost to their liberal opponents. The mailer, which did not contain a political disclaimer and was not investigated by county officials, clearly had a negative impact on those races.

Big Wins for Conservative Women

Maria Lazar won a hotly contested race to replace an Evers appointee in the Second District Appellate Court. This marks the second time Evers has had a judicial appointee rejected by the voters.

State Representative Samantha Kerkman became the first woman to be elected Kenosha County Executive, and the first Republican to earn the spot.

In Neenah, Jane Lang became the second woman in history to win the mayoral seat, in a city that heavily supported Biden in 2020.

Portage County Executive

Another County Executive race went for the conservative candidate in Portage County where John Pavelski won by a 24-point margin. This race, as well as one of the Beloit school board races, are well within recount territory.

County Board Control

A major story of the election is the flipping of a number of county boards to conservative majorities. Calumet, Door, Kenosha, Marathon, Rock, Adams, and St. Croix Counties now have conservative control, while La Crosse doubled the conservative representation on their board

Referenda

There were 81 school district referenda questions on the ballot across the state, asking for over $1 billion in taxpayer funding. The two largest requests were $150 million in West Allis, and $120 in Wausau. The West Allis question failed, while Wausau succeeded, with about a 60-40 margin for each.

Oconto, Winneconne and Medford were among the districts where additional spending was rejected.

Referenda questions always elicit arguments from the left that their passage is “proof” that schools should have more funding. A more reasonable argument might be that voters should be asked massive spending increases that will increase taxes. The system clearly works. Voters in West Allis don’t believe that $150 million in proposed spending is necessary, while the voters in Wausau are willing to take on the additional tax burden.

Instead of arguing that taxpayers should not be asked their opinion on spending, more relevant questions about referenda might include, should state taxpayers have to pick up the tab for any portion of local tax hike decisions and should tax dollars be spent on advertising campaigns for referenda questions.

A recap of the referenda courtesy of The Wheeler Report is included at the end of this post.

City Council

The Green Bay City council races were in many ways a battle for election integrity. The city is into their second year of partisan election misdeeds and wrongdoing which has earned national infamy. From selling their election administration to partisan dark money groups to putting out misinformation about vote counting to ease secret counting by partisan staff, Green Bay, under Mayor Genrich, has been the Northern epicenter of dirty election practices.

Conservatives wanted to take control of city council seats to be a check on Genrich’s partisan shop and clean up elections. Conservatives took two of three seats, even with democrats pouring $100,000 into digital advertising alone.

The Takeaway

The 2022 Spring elections, which generated uncharacteristically high levels of attention and engagement in a year without a statewide race on the ballot, show the impact of the past two years of local battles on masking, lockdowns, remote learning, CRT and parents rights. According to the Republican Party of Wisconsin, conservatives won in more than two-thirds of the races they followed, and in 80% of the targeted races in Waukesha, Langlade and Washington counties. The broad success of conservative candidates across the state shows voters taking a strong stance that they expect representatives who will be accountable to the people.