The six recall elections for Republican state senators is less than one week away and things are looking good for Democrats. (There are 2 recall elections for Democratic senators on August 16 still.)
On a conference call with reporters just now, Wisconsin Democratic Party chairman Mike Tate made a very bold claim: He said party polling shows that Dems are leading or in a dead heat in all six of the races to recall Wisconsin GOP state senators.
If this is an accurate depiction of the state of play, then Wisconsin Dems may be on the verge of taking back the state senate. Putting that outcome aside, though, Tate shared some new numbers about the level of grassroots energy in the state that are eye-opening in their own right, and suggest that labor and Dems have already accomplished something historic.
Tate insisted that party polling shows that Dems are leading in the races to recall GOP senators Randy Hopper, Luther Olsen, and Dan Kapanke, and that they are in dead heats in the remaining races.
“I don’t know that I would say that we are going to sweep all six races, but our polling tells that we have leads in three of these races an we are dead tied in three,” Tate said. “Independents are moving towards the Democratic candidates in strong numbers.” Every race, he said, is “emminently winnable.”
Democrats only need to flip 3 of these races to take control of the state senate but it sounds like they could win all six. It will all depend on the GOTV effort. Republicans allies have dropped a lot of money on these races ($1.5M according the last numbers I saw) so this really is a proxy battle for future labor battles. Moreover, winning in Wisconsin will give Democrats a much-needed boost.