A self-described “authentic MAGA activist” who vows to bring election administration under control of the secretary of state won the Republican nomination for the office Tuesday.

The Associated Press called the secretary of state primary election for Jay Schroeder at 8:42 p.m. With 90% of the ballots counted by 10:30 p.m., Schroeder had 47% of the votes — far outpacing the candidate endorsed by the Republican Party.

Schroeder declared himself to be an “authentic MAGA activist” and a “MAGA aligned candidate on election integrity.” He focused his campaign message heavily on election administration, including eliminating the bipartisan Wisconsin Elections Commission.

The Democratic candidate for the post is JoCasta Zamarripa, a second-term Milwaukee alder and former five-term member of the state Assembly. Zamarripa was unopposed in the Democratic primary for secretary of state.

A Green Party candidate, Pete Karas, is also seeking the office and did not have a contested primary election Tuesday.

The secretary of state’s duties have been narrowed over the last several decades, but the office remains an elected position under the Wisconsin Constitution and cannot be eliminated without a constitutional amendment.

The remaining duties of the office include haveing responsibility for the official state seal and validating the certificate of Wisconsin’s electoral votes in presidential elections. But the office is otherwise unrelated to election administration.

The secretary of state also sits on the Board of Commissioners of Public Lands, which distributes revenues from timber sales on former federal land that now belongs to the state, donating proceeds to public school libraries and making loans to public projects.

Schroeder’s campaign has focused on moving Wisconsin elections from the bipartisan elections commission, established in 2016 by the Republican majority in the Legislature, to place them under the control of the secretary of state’s office. That would require the passage of new legislation.

Schroeder has run for the office previously. He was the Republican nominee in 2018, losing to incumbent Democrat Doug La Follette, and ran for the party’s nomination in 2022, coming in second to Amy Loudenbeck in the primary, who lost to La Follette that November.

At a 2022 Republican rally, Schroeder told a crowd that he would not have signed “a sheet of paper for the election,” apparently a reference to the certification of electoral votes in the 2020 Wisconsin presidential election, Bill Lueders reported in a commentary for the Wisconsin Examiner.

On his website Schroeder calls the elections commission “corrupt” and “a disaster.”

Nathan Pollnow, a beef farmer endorsed by the state Republican Party, came in a distant second in the primary, with just under 26% of the vote.

Pollnow ran on a platform of promoting government transparency, vowing to create a publicly accessible guide to laws, administrative rules and other actions of government.

Two other Republicans finished in the low double-digits: Cindy Werner, with 14% of the vote and Brayden Myer with just under 13%.

The 2026 election will be the first in more than 40 years without an incumbent running for reelection. The incumbent, Democrat Sarah Godlewski, opted to run instead for lieutenant governor. Godlewski also had no primary opposition Tuesday.

Godlewski was appointed in 2023 after La Follette, a long-time incumbent, resigned only a few months after winning reelection in November 2022.