Liberals seized majority control of the Wisconsin Supreme Court in 2023 — their first majority on the Badger State’s high court in 15 years. That majority was firmed up with Justice Susan Crawford’s win last year following the most expensive judicial race in U.S. history.
Wisconsinites dashed conservative dreams of a more balanced court on Tuesday by increasing the liberal stranglehold over their state’s high court in a landslide election.
‘We will keep fighting for our courts because they are that important.’
With over 95% of the votes in, Wisconsin Court of Appeals judge and former Democratic state legislator Chris Taylor had secured 60.1% of the total. Her Republican-endorsed opponent, Wisconsin Appeals Court Judge Maria Lazar, secured 39.8% of the total vote.
Abortion was a key issue during the race. Taylor, a former policy director for Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin, is, after all, a hardline abortion activist.
The 58-year-old liberal authored a bill in 2017, for instance, that claimed “every woman has the fundamental right to choose to obtain a safe and legal abortion.” The bill, which failed to pass, would have barred the state from preventing a woman from procuring an abortion “at any time during her pregnancy” if deemed necessary to “protect her life or health.”
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Wisconsin Appeals Court Judge Maria Lazar. Jonathan Aguilar/Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service/Catchlight/Getty Images
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that Taylor, who was endorsed by various pro-abortion groups, also celebrated after the state supreme court invalidated Wisconsin’s 1949 law that banned most abortions.
Taylor reportedly said last year that she would not recuse herself from a case just because it dealt with abortion.
Lazar, who previously enjoyed the support of pro-life groups and called the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs “very wise,” accused Taylor of being a “judicial activist.” Taylor, in turn, claimed that her opponent would bring “an extreme, right-wing political agenda to the bench,” reported the Los Angeles Times.
In addition to pushing the abortion agenda during her time in the state legislature, Taylor also championed curbs on the Second Amendment, demanding universal background checks, gun purchase waiting periods, and other so-called gun safety measures.
Whereas Taylor raised over $6.2 million over the course of her campaign, Lazar netted only around $1.2 million, reported the Courthouse News Service.
“The fight is not over,” Lazar said in her concession speech. “And that we will keep fighting for our courts because they are that important.”
Moving forward, the court will be skewed 5-2 for liberals. NBC News noted that it could get even worse: Next year, liberals could potentially pick up another seat on the bench as conservative Justice Annette Ziegler is not running for a third term.
Taylor, who will begin her 10-year term in August, is taking the seat of retiring Justice Rebecca Bradley, a Republican-aligned conservative justice who helped strike down Democratic Gov. Tony Evers’ order to postpone an election because of COVID-19 and condemned lockdown measures.
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