Prior to the 2016 election, Wisconsin was considered part of the
blue wall—the group of states that had voted Democratic in every presidential election from at least
1992 on. Wisconsin itself had voted Democratic in every election from
1988 on, having been one of 10 states that supported
Michael Dukakis in 1988. Republicans had scored notable statewide victories over the
Obama presidency, with
Scott Walker having won election and re-election as Governor and having fought off a
recall attempt in 2012, and with
Ron Johnson having defeated
Russ Feingold in the
2010 Senate election. Nevertheless, Wisconsin was seen as a lean-Democratic state given its presidential voting history. Trump pulled off a surprise win in the state in 2016, in large part due to a collapse in support for
Hillary Clinton in the state. In 2020, both Trump and Biden improved their parties' vote shares in Wisconsin. Trump achieved a record for the total number of votes ever received by a Republican presidential nominee in Wisconsin, although he fell short of
George W. Bush's
2004 vote share. Biden improved on
Hillary Clinton's number of votes received, as he did in every state, but fell short of the number of votes won by
Barack Obama in
2008. Joe Biden received strong support in the city of Milwaukee, improving on Clinton's 2016 performance by 3.6 points in
its county; Biden received 92% and 60% of the black and Latino vote respectively, with most of that electorate living in Milwaukee County. Both candidates performed well in the state with whites, with Trump carrying whites overall by 6 points, though Biden performed better with college-educated whites. Cementing Biden's victory was his strong performance in
Dane County, which he carried by nearly 53 points. Biden would also carry
La Crosse County by 13 points,
Eau Claire County by 10 points, and flipped
Sauk County and the bellwether
Door County, while only losing
Brown County by seven points, winning the county seat Green Bay. Biden even made in-roads in
Waukesha and
Washington counties, nearly breaking 40% in the former and breaking 30% in the latter, though Trump still held these counties with large margins. On the other hand, Trump was able to hold much of the
Driftless region in southwestern Wisconsin; many of these counties, such as
Vernon,
Crawford, and
Grant were reliably Democratic during the latter half of the 20th century, but Trump maintained his results from 2016, solidifying a Republican shift in this part of the state. Additionally, Trump performed strongly in the more traditionally conservative northern counties of Wisconsin. Finally, Trump kept
Kenosha County in his column, with both candidates improving there; Kenosha County is significant, as it was the site of the
Jacob Blake shooting, which triggered nationwide protests. Biden became the first Democrat to win the White House without the once-strongly Democratic counties of
Kenosha and
Forest since
Woodrow Wilson in
1916 as well as the first to win without
Pepin County since
1944. He was the first Democrat since 1960 to win without Adams, Buffalo, Crawford, Dunn, Jackson, Juneau, Lincoln, Price, Sawyer, and Trempealeau counties; and the first since 1976 to win without Columbia, Grant, Lafayette, Marquette, Racine, Richland, and Vernon counties. In terms of partisan lean, Biden was able to win 7% of Republicans in the state, which is significant, as they voted in this cycle by about 5 points more than Democrats. More importantly, Biden won independent voters by 12 points; Hillary Clinton lost this bloc to Trump by 10 points in 2016.
Pivot counties Wisconsin is a state with a notable number of
pivot counties, meaning counties carried by Obama in the 2008 and 2012 U.S. presidential elections that then flipped for the Republican candidate, Trump, in 2016. Of Wisconsin's 72 counties, about one-third (N=23, 32%) are considered to be pivot counties, and pivot counties include 17.35 percent of the state population. Lists of Wisconsin pivot counties a) retained by the Republican presidential candidate in 2020 (Trump) and b) boomerang counties "returning" to the Democratic presidential candidate in 2020 (Biden) are below.
Retained pivot counties (remained Republican in 2020) •
Adams •
Buffalo •
Columbia •
Crawford •
Dunn •
Forest •
Grant •
Jackson •
Juneau •
Kenosha •
Lafayette •
Lincoln •
Marquette •
Pepin •
Price •
Racine •
Richland •
Sawyer •
Trempealeau •
Vernon •
Winnebago Boomerang pivot counties (returned to Democrat in 2020) •
Door •
Sauk Edison exit polls ==Aftermath==