That eye-popping figure has drawn plenty of headlines — as did the millions spent by billionaire Elon Musk to support Republican-backed Waukesha County Judge Brad Schimel, who lost handily to Dane County Judge Susan Crawford, backed by Democrats.
But the race also set another record in Wisconsin for a spring election not featuring a presidential primary contest: in voter turnout.
More than 2.3 million people cast ballots in the election, according to Associated Press tracking. That amounts to nearly 51% of the voting age population, shattering the previous record for such elections of 39% in 2023.
“Wisconsin’s electorate is just plain extremely engaged,” he wrote. “Scour American history and you’ll struggle to find an example of (a) state as hyper-engaged with, and narrowly divided by, electoral politics as Wisconsin in the present moment.”
Last week’s election offered good news for Democrats, aside from the top-line figures in Crawford’s 55%-45% win. (The Supreme Court is officially nonpartisan, but Democrats backed Crawford, while Republicans backed Schimel.)
When comparing the high-turnout 2024 presidential election to the latest Supreme Court race, voting shifted toward the Democratic-backed candidate in all 72 counties.
The biggest difference in the latest election, according to Johnson: “A majority of the million voters who stayed home are probably Republicans, or at least Trump supporters.”
More broadly, it’s clear that the high stakes of the Supreme Court race drove most to cast ballots in an election that also included an officially nonpartisan contest for state superintendent of public instruction and a successful ballot measure to enshrine voter ID requirements in the Wisconsin Constitution.
Nearly 200,000 people who cast ballots did not choose a superintendent candidate. Democratic-backed incumbent Jill Underly prevailed over Republican-backed Brittany Kinser by a 53%-47% margin — closer than the Supreme Court race.
Additionally, about 76,000 voters did not weigh in on the voter ID amendment.
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It is too soon to definitively say whether Madison’s April 1 election went off without any problems. But city and county election officials told Votebeat that they were confident that new absentee ballot procedures put in place after 193 ballots went uncounted in November would prevent another major error.
Tuesday was the first high-profile election in Madison since the snafu in November, when 193 ballots in unopened ballot bags from two polling stations went uncounted during the presidential contest. Staff didn’t discover the ballots until much later, a critical lapse that prompted state and city investigations and the suspension of Madison Clerk Maribeth Witzel-Behl in March. A voter lawsuit is expected.
Witzel-Behl’s replacement is City Attorney Mike Haas, formerly the Wisconsin Elections Commission administrator and a longtime election lawyer. This was the first election he has ever run as a municipal clerk.
Amid the investigation, city officials implemented new procedures to better track absentee ballots and ensure that oversights are detected before results are finalized.
New procedures add to the paperwork
The changes were apparent at Madison polling places, which had multiple new checklists and required paperwork to ensure that officials opened and processed every bag containing absentee ballots. They were also apparent at the clerk’s office, where at 9 p.m., employees had begun looking through election materials from each of the city’s 108 polling sites to make sure there weren’t any missing ballots.
At Madison West High School, where 68 of the ballots went missing in November, chief inspector Peter Quinn said just before 4 p.m. that the new procedures make a repeat error “basically impossible.”
Quinn has been a chief inspector before, but he wasn’t the chief inspector at the school in November when the ballots went missing.
“It’s a mistake that should not have been made,” Quinn said about the error, adding that the new procedures make it easier to catch discrepancies.
After nearly 200 absentee ballots weren’t counted in the November election, Madison implemented new procedures for poll workers for the April 1, 2025, election. (Joe Timmerman / Wisconsin Watch)
Each polling site now receives updated lists throughout the day detailing every absentee ballot bag delivered. Each bag is identified by a seal number. Election officials check off one blank on that list when they open each bag and another blank when they process the ballots. This way, election officials know how many carrier envelopes they receive — and how many they’re supposed to count.
Poll workers also record the number of ballots in each bag on two separate documents and, at the end of the night, complete a summary sheet confirming that the number of absentee ballots received matches the number counted or rejected.
Kevin Kennedy, former state elections chief and now a chief inspector at Madison’s Senior Center, called the new process “good documentation” — but said it can be overwhelming.
“My problem,” he said at 2 p.m., standing in front of the table where absentee ballots get processed, “is that there’s so many things to keep track of here.”
Kennedy pointed to an absentee ballot processing guide given to poll workers and said he wished the clerk’s office provided equally clear instructions for navigating the added procedures. While he believes the system is now less prone to error, he warned that paperwork redundancies can slow down the process.
Procedures still need to be refined
A half-mile away, Sam Peplinski, 19, stood outside the Nicholas Recreation Center polling place — the same site where his absentee ballot went uncounted in November.
“It was my first time voting,” he said of the experience, which shook his trust in elections. “It was just shocking.”
He said it’s unrealistic to expect perfection, but the loss of nearly 200 ballots made the issue “large enough to not be ignored.”
This time he voted at the polls on Election Day — but only because he just recently learned of the election date. “An unintended benefit,” he said.
At the end of the night, Haas, the interim city clerk, told Votebeat the new procedures might have been a little “overkill,” but said after the November snafu it’s better to have too much paperwork than too little.
Witzel-Behl, the city clerk on leave, put in place many of the new procedures between November and February, and more were added since then, but Haas said there wasn’t much time to get feedback on those procedures from the city’s poll workers.
“I think we just need more time to refine those, make sure that they’re workable for the inspectors,” he said.
Deputy Clerk Bonnie Chang told Votebeat that staff would spend Wednesday and Thursday looking through all the election materials that polling places return to the clerk’s office, making sure there aren’t any missing ballots there. They were also checking a new sheet that each polling site’s chief inspector fills out to make sure the number of ballots processed is equal to the number of ballots received.
At the City-County Building in Madison, Wis., Madison Deputy Clerk Bonnie Chang prepares to review results from polling places following the April 1, 2025, election. (Joe Timmerman / Wisconsin Watch)
Alexander Shur is a reporter for Votebeat based in Wisconsin. Contact Shur at ashur@votebeat.org.
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