The Legacy of Matt Rothschild

Matt Rothschild, executive director of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign. File photo by Cameron Smith / Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism.

This is what the job of executive director of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign (WDC) was like for Matt Rothschild. Several times a year he testified at state legislative hearings against bills he believed were a threat to democracy, knowing Republican lawmakers were probably hostile to his message. This year he testified against a bill to end local advisory referendums, which he considered a “grotesque violation of our constitutional rights,” but only after waiting more than five hours to speak.

“I got there at quarter to nine and I was the very last person allowed to testify, at quarter after two,” he tells Urban Milwaukee.

And the legislation passed, as had many other bills he opposed over his eight years as head of the WDC.

It takes a lot of patience to do such work, but somehow Rothschild has retained his energy and optimism while taking on issues like campaign finance reform, ending gerrymandering and protecting the right to vote, all seemingly hopeless causes facing adamant opposition from the Republican-controlled Legislature.

He worked tirelessly to try to overturn gerrymandering by convincing counties to support fair maps. “I traveled around the state giving speeches to local groups, civic organizations, Democratic party groups, anybody who would have me,” Rothschild says.

His work, along with that of many other pro-democracy groups in the state, helped convince 56 of the state’s 82 counties to pass referendums or resolutions backing fair maps. But Republicans ignored the will of the state’s majority.

Rothschild’s hyperactive style was saluted by Wisconsin’s Democratic U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin in a statement she released in the Congressional Record. “Matt has the distinguishing quality of being everywhere, all at once,” she marveled, “and has taken his vital messages about protecting democracy to hundreds of radio and television broadcasts, newspaper articles, opinion columns, social media and, in person, doing talks to good government groups in nearly every community in Wisconsin.”

Prior to his time with WDC, Rothschild spent 32 years helping run The Progressive magazine, first as publisher, then adding the title of editor while always writing many articles. He is a true believer in the progressive cause, rather than that of the Democratic Party.

The WDC has always aggressively reported on campaign donations by both parties, and Rothschild wrote frequently about fat cat liberal and conservative donors. (Urban Milwaukee regular published stories based on WDC research.) And its website tracking donations by all individuals to all state office holders is indispensable to reporters and researchers.

Democrats may think they can beat the Republicans at their own game, given the recent success raising money by state Democratic leader Ben Wikler, but they are wrong, Rothschild warned in a farewell column he wrote. “First of all, there simply are more rightwing billionaires and multi-millionaires than there are liberal ones” and you can bet “they’re gearing up to outspend him.”

“Most fundamentally,” he stressed, “our campaigns shouldn’t be a tug of war between a handful of billionaires on one side and a handful of billionaires on the other. In a real democracy, we’d all have an equal tug on that rope.”

Campaigns have become even more beholden to fat cat donors during his eight years with the WDC, Rothschild ruefully notes. And there has been little progress on gerrymandering, though he has hopes the state Supreme Court, with a liberal majority as of August 1, could revisit that issue. As for voting rights, Republican laws have made it harder to vote during the last eight years, he notes.

Yet Rothschild never gave up the fight. In 2021, he wrote a book, 12 Ways to Save Democracy in Wisconsin, published by UW Press, with concrete proposals and action items for grassroots organizers and other advocates for how to restore control of state politics to average folks in Wisconsin.

Rothschild, who will retire at the end of this week, sees much reason for optimism about Wisconsin’s future. He notes that the advent of Law Forward has created a liberal counterpart to the conservative Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty in courtroom battles, while the growth of Civic Media radio stations, along with the rise of liberal publications like the Wisconsin Examiner and UpNorthNews, has provided stronger counterparts to conservative talk radio in Wisconsin. And he notes that pro-democracy advocacy groups in Wisconsin, perhaps in response to former governor Scott Walker and the Act 10 legislation, have become more unified, with “all rowing in the same direction.”

Rothschild himself might have helped make that happen. Those working with other pro-democracy groups in Wisconsin sing his praises. “I learned so much from him,” says Erin Grunze of Common Cause of Wisconsin.

“He has taught me about working with the media, and by his ability to listen. I think of Matt as a media savant,” says Anjali Bhasin, Civic Engagement Director for Wisconsin Conservation Voters

And along the way, Rothschild has offered some occasional lessons in humanity. “Matt’s a fierce advocate with a gentle spirit,” says Debra Cronmiller of the Wisconsin League of Women Voters. “I have seen Matt stop a meeting to point out a rare bird sitting outside in a nearby tree. His happiness immediately lifted everyone’s spirits.”

“I’ve always told myself that I’d retire when I turn 65,” Rothschild wrote his staff “and that’s coming up this July. “l’ll be cheering on the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign from the sidelines.”

“But I’ll also be watching the goldfinches change color,” he noted. “And I’ll also be writing poetry, which I promised myself 40 years ago that I’d do in retirement.”

Oh yes, he’s a very patient man.