Source: Politics<\/p>\n
CHICAGO \u2014 Democrats from the upper Midwest to the White House were brimming with confidence after Tuesday’s wins in Wisconsin and Chicago, believing President Joe Biden was handed a template for crucial battlegrounds once he moves forward his reelection bid.<\/p>\n
Already, top party officials and operatives were sketching out the beginnings of a 2024 campaign playbook that again leans heavily into shielding abortion rights and doesn’t shy away from taking more nuanced approaches to tackling crime. The twin victories \u2014 in the Chicago mayoral race and for an open seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court \u2014 had emboldened their belief that voters were more repelled by the GOP brand \u2014 colored by anti-abortion politics and personified by former President Donald Trump \u2014 than by accusations that Democrats were soft on crime.<\/p>\n
Left-leaning Janet Protasiewicz won resoundingly in her bid for the Wisconsin Supreme Court, despite being labeled \u201cNo Jail Janet\u201d by her opponents. Democrats noted that her opponent, Dan Kelly, was connected to a plan to reverse the 2020 election results.<\/p>\n
Similarly, Brandon Johnson, a Chicago union organizer, was hammered by his rival for previously leaning into the \u201cdefund the police\u201d movement. But he stressed that his opponent Paul Vallas was not actually a Democrat, forcing him to repeatedly defend his credentials.<\/p>\n
Both Protasiewicz and Johnson prevailed.<\/p>\n
\u201cVoters showed that they understand public safety to be much more nuanced than the way the Republicans try to frame it. That this is not just about having adequate law enforcement on the streets to promote public safety, but also about investing in mental health and substance use treatment and addressing poverty,\u201d Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker said in an interview with POLITICO. \u201cThere are not just the short-term efforts to address crime, but also the long-term efforts.\u201d<\/p>\n
While both of Tuesday night\u2019s races were nonpartisan, they did each contain a left vs. right ideological contrast that offered a temperature reading as to where voters stood on key issues. Johnson emphasized taxes on the ultrarich, while Protasiewicz played up protection for abortion rights as well as voters\u2019 concerns about threats to U.S. democracy.<\/p>\n
The through-line issue, however, was crime.<\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t lost on state or national officials that had Johnson lost the race, they would have been forced to push back hard on the narrative that his \u201cdefund\u201d position cost them the keys to City Hall. Instead, while concerns over crime did indeed dominate the race, voters weren\u2019t buying solutions that simply called for adding more police. And they rejected the controversial police union that went hard after Johnson.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe narrative coming out of the first election was that voters were scared out of their wits,\u201d said Geoff Garin, a Democratic strategist and pollster. \u201cNow, after the last election, the story is that while voters are scared, they aren\u2019t out of their wits.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pritzker, who helped raise critical money for TV ads in Protasiewicz\u2019s race, said the GOP tactic to paint Democrats as soft on crime was also used in the midterms, and didn\u2019t work then in Illinois and several key battleground states, either.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe all got attacked on the simplistic vision of Republicans and we all are folks who believe you\u2019ve got to address public safety in a nuanced and multifaceted fashion. We\u2019ve said that to the voters and they responded,\u201d Pritzker said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe saw it over and over again,\u201d he added, pointing to the 2022 Democratic victories of Govs. Tim Walz of Minnesota, Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan and Tony Evers of Wisconsin as well as his own in Illinois.<\/p>\n
In Pritzker\u2019s race last year, his conservative opponent, Darren Bailey, hammered the governor over Chicago\u2019s persistent crime problem. Pritzker said polling showed crime was \u201can important issue\u201d to voters, \u201cbut that didn\u2019t mean they wanted to choose the more conservative or Republican candidate. That bore itself out.\u201d<\/p>\n