Political energy ‘off the charts’ in county

Ozaukee County is experiencing never-seen-before levels of political activism and, with one Wisconsin senate race setting a record for spending, it’s not all about the presidential or other national races.
“People I’ve never seen before are signing up to volunteer, answer phones, knock on doors,” said Deb Dassow, who has been chairman of the Ozaukee County Democrats the past four years. “Some of these doors have never been knocked on before. I have never seen such an overwhelming level of volunteerism in our party.”
Her counterpart, Ozaukee County Republican Party Chairman Alex Leykin, agreed.
“Republicans are coming out in huge numbers,” he said. “The energy is absolutely off the charts.”
That’s apparent in early voting, with about 30% of registered voters having cast ballots in the first three days after in-person absentee voting began on Oct. 22, Leykin said.
“The early voting has just been insane,” he said. “It’s been absolutely amazing.”
Leykin and Dassow both said there’s no way to know who people are voting for, but both suspect Republicans are turning out in force to vote early, taking a page from the Democrats’ playbook.
“I don’t have a crystal ball as to who they (early voters) are voting for,” Dassow said. “In the past, the Democrats have led in that category. Perhaps Republicans have learned their lesson.”
“We have no one gauging who people are voting for,” Leykin said. But in the past, the Democrats have voted early in disproportionate numbers. But a huge number of Republicans have been voting early, we know. We can’t tell yet if we’re getting new voters” or if early voters are merely those who have voted on election day in the past.
If the number of yard signs being issued are any measure, this election cycle has seen the most engaged electorate in memory.
Leykin said his office has given out more than 7,000 yard signs this cycle in the predominantly Republican Ozaukee County, compared to just over 1,000 in 2020, touting GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump, U.S. Senate candidate Eric Hovde and other down-ballot Republicans.
“It’s absolutely intense,” he said.
Dassow said her office has handed out more than 1,500 yard signs, far less than Leykin’s claim, but still the most her office has ever issued, she said.
“People are very passionate about these candidates,” Dassow said. “Three times we’ve run out of (U.S. Senator) Tammy Baldwin signs.”
She acknowledged that the Democrats’ changing the top of their ticket, replacing President Joe Biden with Vice President Kamala Harris just before the party’s national convention in Chicago, disrupted the issuance of signs but Harris’ candidacy energized the Democrat base and drew more volunteers.
Most stunning, however, is the State Senate race in the Eighth District between incumbent Republican Duey Stroebel and Democrat challenger Jodi Habush Sinykin.
So far, $2.5 million has been spent on the race, setting a record for money spent on a State Senate race.
Much of the money has come from outside the state, with Sinykin leading on the money front by an almost 2-to-1 margin.
“Jodi is collecting a lot of money from outside the state, a lot of money from nontraditional places, including from former Republicans who may be voting for her just because they like her,” Dassow said.
Stroebel also has received money from outside the state.
“The spending in the Sinykin race for a local campaign is off the charts,” Leykin said.
The newly drawn Eighth District includes Cedarburg, Port Washington, Mequon, Bayside, Butler, Fox Point, Grafton, Lannon, Menomonee Falls, River Hills, Thiensville, Whitefish Bay and most of Brown Deer and Germantown.
The Wisconsin Legislature has been controlled by Republicans for more than a decade, but Democrats last year convinced the state Supreme Court to throw out Assembly and Senate district maps drawn by the GOP majority in favor of maps proposed by Democrat Gov. Tony Evers.
Under the new map, Stroebel and Dan Knodl, of Germantown, were drawn into the same district. Knodl, after defeating Sinykin in a special election, chose to run for an Assembly seat this year, leaving Stroebel to fend off another challenge from Sinykin, from Whitefish Bay, an environmental law attorney who has never been elected to public office.
Stroebel, a builder and real estate developer from Saukville, was first elected to the State Senate in a 2015 special election after serving four years in the Assembly. In his last two elections, he has had no opposition, either in the primary or the general election.
“They specifically targeted Duey and Ozaukee County,” Leykin said. “Because Duey was redistricted — gerrymandered, is the right word — he has a tough race. It pulled in a lot of Democrats into his district, voters that Duey did not represent previously. It’s one of those things that was done intentionally by the Democratic Party with their Supreme Court.”
A Marquette University Law School analysis concluded the new district leans approximately 53% Republican, rating the race a toss-up.
“Duey has never had to run a serious race. Ever,” Dassow said. “All eyes are on this race.”
That’s because if Sinykin prevails, the Democrats would be one step closer to having a shot at winning the Senate in the 2026 election.
Republicans currently hold a 22-10 majority in the Senate with one district vacant. If Democrats want a realistic chance at winning the Senate, they’d need to flip three to four seats this year, and two or three more in 2026.
Dassow handicapped the race as a three-point lead for Stroebel, which she thinks Sinykin can overcome in the final days of the race.
“The amount of doors being knocked on by volunteers is 50% ahead of where we were in 2022,” she said. “I think we can overcome that” three-point gap.
Leykin called the Stroebel-Sinykin race a bellwether on how the other presidential and senate contests will fare in the county but was unsure whether Trump or Harris have coattails to carry either of the State Senate candidates to victory.
Dassow, however, said she is hopeful Ozaukee County, one of the GOP’s vaunted WOW counties — so named after Waukesha, Ozaukee and Washington counties — has become bluer in recent years.
According to Dassow, 32% of the county voted for Barack Obama in 2012, 38% for Hillary Clinton in 2016, 43% for Joe Biden in 2020 and 44% for Evers in 2022.
“Ozaukee has moved toward blue the most quickly of the WOW counties. The numbers are moving in our direction,” Dassow said.
Both Dassow and Leykin said the two northern Ozaukee races for the Assembly remain firmly in the GOP’s hands.
Rep. Paul Melotik is seven or eight points ahead of challenger Dana Glasstein for the 22nd Assembly District, which includes Port Washington, Grafton, Cedarburg and portions of Mequon and Germantown.
Assemblyman Rob Brooks is handily leading in his race for the redrawn 59th Assembly District against Jack Holzman, Dassow conceded.
The sprawling district includes Saukville, Belgium, Fredonia, Cedar Grove, Random Lake, Kewaskum and extends as far west as Theresa and north to Eden, Osceola and Forest.
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Wisconsin’s largest paid circulation community weekly newspaper. Serving Port Washington, Saukville, Grafton, Fredonia, Belgium, as well as Ozaukee County government. Locally owned and printed in Port Washington, Wisconsin.
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