House Democratic Leader’s Admission Stirs Controversy in Wisconsin Supreme Court Race
March 24, 2025
The race for Wisconsin’s Supreme Court has taken a fiery turn, with a new video clip igniting debate just days before the April 1, 2025, election. Earlier tonight, Team Schimel, the campaign for conservative Waukesha County Judge Brad Schimel, shared a post on X that’s raising eyebrows and drawing sharp reactions.
The tweet:
The post links to a video from a “National Update & Call to Action” event hosted tonight and streamed on the social media platform X by the Democratic National Committee, featuring House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries alongside DNC Chair Ken Martin.
In the video, Jeffries says:
“In Wisconsin that’s a 50/50 race, because we know Wisconsin is a 50/50 state, and we have a strong Democratic candidate. Whoever wins is going to determine who has the majority in the Wisconsin Supreme Court. Why is that important? Because there are gerrymandered congressional lines right now in Wisconsin. Wisconsin is a 50/50 state, as I mentioned, but there are 6 Republicans and only 2 Democrats out of an 8 person delegation, because the lines are broken, right and as soon as possible, we need to be able to revisit that. and have fair lines, the only way for that to be even a significant possibility is if you have an enlightened Supreme Court, and so you know I think that’s an incredibly important race in Wisconsin.”
Crawford participated in a Jan. 13 donor briefing organized by the liberal group Focus for Democracy. An email invitation to the event, titled “Chance to put two more House seats in play for 2026,” featured Crawford alongside Wisconsin Democratic Party Chairman Ben Wikler who recently failed in his attempt to become chair of the Democratic National Committee. The New York Times reported that the call was organized by LinkedIn Founder Reid Hoffman, raising concerns among Republicans that Crawford’s potential victory could very well lead to a court-ordered redistricting favoring Democrats.
With the election looming, this video has added fuel to an already heated race. For Schimel’s camp, this real-time, rapid response is a strategic move to tie Crawford to national Democratic figures and the specter of their partisan overreach, as well as calling into question Crawford’s impartiality when it comes to cases brought to the court by her party, her donors and her supporters. For Crawford, it’s another hurdle in a campaign already having a difficult few weeks.
Wisconsin elections data and redistricting guru Joe Handrick explained how an activist Wisconsin Supreme Court could redraw Wisconsin maps. In this analysis, below, he refutes the claims that the Congressional maps are ‘unfair.’
