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Written by Louis Weisberg, Staff writer
Nov 17, 2010
On Nov. 2, Republicans won the majority over all three branches of Wisconsin government, securing their control of the state’s political agenda for at least the next two years – and quite possibly well beyond.
In conjunction with the 2010 national census, new legislative maps will be drawn next year throughout the nation to reflect population changes. With complete control over the process of redistricting in Wisconsin, GOP leaders will have leeway to configure political boundaries that maximize the impact of Republican voters and ensure them a strong political advantage for the coming decade.
Conservative, anti-gay leadership dominates the state’s GOP, and a number of pro-equality Democrats lost their seats in the mid-term election. This scenario does not auger well for progress toward equality in the state. Gov.-elect Scott Walker promised during his campaign to eliminate the state’s domestic partner registry as well as to end domestic partner benefits for both straight and gay state workers.
But if Republicans do choose to pursue an aggressive anti-gay agenda, they run the risk of alienating the independents who switched in large numbers from voting Democratic in 2008 to Republican in 2010. The majority of these voters are neither anti-gay nor particularly interested in LGBT issues. Even with gerrymandering, Republicans cannot shore up a majority by squandering their efforts on behalf of the fringe right.
Nationally, exit polls on Nov. 2 showed that Republicans benefited from voter frustration over the lack of jobs, not from a sudden surge in converts to Christian fundamentalism.
“I did more media interviews about why LGBT rights were not an issue in this election than about LGBT rights themselves,” said Katie Belanger, executive director of Fair Wisconsin.
At the same time that pro-equality legislators lost their races in swing districts that went for Walker and GOP Senate candidate Ron Johnson, a number of highly vocal supporters of LGBT equality won, Belanger said.
Wisconsin is a moderate swing state, and its voters have shown a tendency in recent years to swing far and fast. President Obama beat Sen. John McCain by 14 points in Wisconsin in 2008, while two years later Walker beat Democrat Tom Barrett by 5 points.
Exit polls in Wisconsin this year showed a 10-percent increase in self-identified “conservative” voters since the last election. But moderates still accounted for 42 percent of the total votes cast in the gubernatorial race. The increase in conservatives was more a reflection of who showed up at the polls this year – older voters – than an actual shift in overall ideology.
In fact, the term “conservative” did not even mean the same thing this year that it did during elections in which the so-called “culture wars” played a role. Adopting the mantle of a conservative today is more likely to indicate support for a small, limited government than opposition to choice or same-sex civil unions. That’s why nearly one-third of gay and lesbian voters cast Republican ballots in this election cycle (see sidebar).
In recognition of this political landscape, even state Sen.-elect Leah Vukmir, the most extreme religious right candidate on the ticket in Wisconsin, was silent about LGBT issues during the campaign. And Walker’s staff effectively muzzled his evangelical running mate Rebecca Kleefisch, refusing to allow her to debate or appear at unscripted press events.
When Kleefisch did speak out about her Christian views against gays and lesbians, it made headlines that brought national ridicule to Wisconsin – which is less than desirable for an administration that says it’s focused on getting major businesses to relocate here
For the GOP to lurch from a victory that was clearly a referendum on jobs into pouring energy into controversial and divisive social issues would be risky at best. It would signal to voters that Republicans are not interested in or able to fix the problems they were elected to address.
It would also involve some backtracking. Incoming Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, R-Juneau, said in 2006 that the constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage and civil unions “would not prohibit the state Legislature from putting together a package of 50 protections and calling it a domestic partnership,” Belanger said.
The domestic partner registry provides 41 of those protections.
“It will be very interesting to see how the leadership will proceed,” Belanger said. “The domestic partner registry is really just about allowing couples to take care of each other. And it’s something that the people of Wisconsin agree with. What Scott Walker and the Legislature would be doing is saying that gays and lesbians shouldn’t be able to visit their partners in the hospital. That’s not something our state government needs to be focused on when we are in tough economic times.”
Belanger said Fair Wisconsin plans to focus its energy in the coming months on defending the domestic partner registry in the courts, where it faces a legal challenge from Wisconsin Family Action, the state’s leading proponent of the evangelical Christian agenda.
Key to Fair Wisconsin’s defense is building the case that the registry plays an important role in protecting same-sex couples in the state. Toward that end, Belanger is urging gay and lesbian couples to register under the program.
For more information or to contribute to the organization’s political and legal work on behalf of Wisconsin’s LGBT community, go to fairwisconsin.org.
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