The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, Stephen Wolf, Daniel Donner, and Cara Zelaya, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, James Lambert, David Beard, and Arjun Jaikumar.
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Leading Off
● WI State Senate: Despite Democratic Gov. Tony Evers' 3-point re-election victory last year, Wisconsin Republicans managed to win a two-thirds majority in the state Senate thanks to gerrymandered maps. But Democrats have a shot at rolling back that ill-gotten supermajority in a special election for a vacant GOP-held seat on April 4—and they know exactly which Republican they'd like to face.
- The lone Democrat just launched ads "attacking" state Rep. Janel Brandtjen. A series of women call Brandtjen "the most conservative you can be when it comes to abortion," telling viewers she "even sponsored a bill to defund Planned Parenthood" and was named "legislator of the year" by an anti-abortion group. Of course, that should be music to the ears of GOP primary voters.
- Even Republicans loathe Brandtjen. Sure, she's an election conspiracy theorist, but her real sin was supporting an unsuccessful primary challenge to Assembly Speaker Robin Vos last year. Following that, she was booted from the GOP caucus, which bluntly told her that her various "issues" had caused members "to lose trust" in her. Republican groups are spending big bucks to boost a different state representative instead.
- Pearl-clutchers, begone! Last year, many observers bemoaned similar efforts by Democrats to elevate more extreme Republicans, saying such efforts would harm democracy. But these gambits worked exceptionally well: Democrats went eight for eight in races where their preferred candidate won the GOP nod.
Read more about the race, and watch Jodi Habush Sinykin's ad.
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