New Analysis Shows Wisconsin Legislature Sharply Divided on Party Lines

Alexandria, VA—Lawmakers of the Wisconsin Legislature voted along party lines more frequently than nearly any legislature in the country, according to the just-released analysis published by The American Conservative Union Foundation (ACUF), host of the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC).

Review the scorecard to see the ratings of all Wisconsin state lawmakers and find out which votes ACUF scored.

On average, Wisconsin state lawmakers earned a 58.49% conservative rating for the 2020 session, denoting a fairly moderate legislature. However, Wisconsin Republicans (88.5%) regularly top ACUF’s rankings of Republican conferences, while Wisconsin Democrats (11.95%) are tenth-most liberal, following Massachusetts, New York and others.

Since 2018, the Wisconsin Legislature’s “partisan divide,” or the difference between the average score of each party, has topped ACUF’s national rankings of all 50 states. During the 2020 session, the partisan divide was 76.55%, once again ranking in the top five.

“Our analysis shows that Wisconsin is one of the most deeply divided legislatures in the country,” said ACU Chairman Matt Schlapp. “It is troubling to see so many of Wisconsin’s elected officials on the left try to tear down basic principles of election integrity or increase wasteful spending during an economic shutdown. Wisconsin’s partisan divide may continue to grow if liberals insist on such a radical agenda.”

ACUF’s Ratings of Congress and Ratings of the States are initiatives of ACUF’s Center for Legislative Accountability (CLA). These ratings are designed to reflect how over 8,000 elected officials across the nation view the role of government while illustrating the differences between chambers of the legislature and revealing lawmakers’ positions on a wide variety of issues that directly affect citizens.

ACU Foundation reviewed each piece of legislation voted on in both chambers of the legislature to produce average scores of each chamber as well as individual scores for each sitting member.

Click Here to view the 2020 Ratings of Wisconsin online and Click Here to visit our website.

For questions or media inquiries regarding ACUF’s Ratings of the States, email Luke Schneider, Deputy Director of ACUF’s Center for Legislative Accountability, at lschneider@conservative.org.

NOTE: This press release was submitted to Urban Milwaukee and was not written by an Urban Milwaukee writer. While it is believed to be reliable, Urban Milwaukee does not guarantee its accuracy or completeness.